He knew what Nick was getting at: an attack of their own. This had started as a simple business—never respectable, of course, but a business nevertheless. When had it descended into warfare? Maybe it was time to give up this illicit means of making money, but what else did he have? Land that his farmers labored to get a stingy crop from. How else could he turn his grain to money?
Nick watched him shovel coal silently for a moment.
“I seen that lady what came with you th’ other day,” Nick said chattily after a bit.
Griffin straightened and propped an elbow on his shovel, raising an eyebrow. Nick didn’t chat.
Nick pursed his lips—not a pleasant sight. “Seemed a mite put out, she did. Something you said, maybe, m’lord?”
“She doesn’t approve of gin distilling,” Griffin said flatly.
“Ah.” Nick rocked back on his heels. “Not a proper occupation for toffs, I’m thinking?”
“That’s right.” Griffin winced and rubbed the nape of his neck. “No, that’s not entirely correct. She champions a foundling home in St. Giles. She thinks gin is the reason there’s so many orphans. It’s the root of every evil in London as far as she’s concerned.”
“The ’Ome for Unfortunate Infants and Foundlin’ Childr’n.”
Griffin glanced at him, surprised. “You know of it?”
“ ’Ard not to, livin’ in these parts.” Nick tipped back his head to stare at the shadowed ceiling of the warehouse. “A good place, is what I ’ear. Not like those what sell the mites into bad apprenticeships. Pity the ’ouse burned last winter.”
Griffin grunted. “She’s having it rebuilt. Bigger and grander.”
“Sounds like a right angel of good will, she does.”
Griffin stared at him, suspicious of mockery.
Nick looked innocent. “Makes one wonder what she was doin’ wi’ you, don’t it, m’lord?”
“She’s affianced to my brother.” Griffin shoveled in more coal, though the fire was well enough stoked now.
“Oh, then she ’as but a sisterly interest in you.”
“Nick,” Griffin growled in warning.
But Nick was never the type to be cowed.
“It’s the saintly ones, I find, that needs watchin’,” he mused. “Now, whores, they be simple—fuck ’em an’ pay ’em. No problems, everything nice an’ tidy an’ never a thought afterward. But with a respectable woman, why there’s talk an’ feelings an’ suchlike. Trouble, the lot of them. Not, mind you, that it’s not worth it in the end, just that there’s a bit of worry up front. A man best be warned.”
“Nick,” Griffin said slowly, “are you giving me romantic advice?”
Nick pushed his hat to the back of his head so he could scratch his scalp. “Wouldn’t dream of it, m’lord.”
Griffin grunted. “She’s soon to be my sister-in-law anyway.”
“O’ course, o’ course,” Nick murmured.
He didn’t look at all convinced by the reminder.
Griffin wasn’t sure he was convinced himself. He sighed and threw aside the shovel. “Do you remember when we first started this all those years ago?”
Nick chuckled. “That little still on Tipping Lane? You were a right green ’un then, m’lord. Suspicious, too.”
“I wasn’t sure I could trust you.”
Nick grinned. “Nor I you. You was this toff down from that fancy school, all lace and fripperies. Weren’t sure as you’d last a week.”
Griffin snorted. He’d met Nick in a seedy Seven Dials tavern—not the place one usually found business partners. But something about the glaring former boxer had struck him as essentially honest. Nick had been the one to introduce him to the man he’d bought his first still from. The thing had been rickety in the extreme.
“Remember when we thought the still would blow?” he asked.
Nick spat into the straw. “Which time? I’m thinkin’ of more ’n one.”
Griffin grinned and looked around the warehouse. It was a far cry from that small single still on Tipping Lane. It had taken years to build his business to this point, to be where he didn’t have to lie awake at night worrying over money flow and harvests. To where he could tell his mother to plan for Megs’s next season and be fairly sure they’d actually be able to afford it. He only needed a little more time to get entirely financially stable.
“We worked hard to get here, didn’t we?” he said.
“That we did.”
“Damned if I’ll let the Vicar take it from me now.”
“Amen to that.” Nick dug a short clay pipe from his waistcoat. He took a moment to light it with a straw stuck in the still fire. Then he said, “ ’Ave you ever thought of doin’ somethin’ else?”
Griffin looked at him in surprise. “No. I suppose I’ve never had time to think of finding other business. Have you?”
“No.” Nick scratched the back of his head. “Well, not rightly. Me father was a weaver, but I never learned the craft. Seemed a tedious task when I were young, an’ now I’m too old a dog for learnin’ new tricks.”
“Weaving.” Griffin thought of the Mandeville lands in Lancashire. They’d always been too rocky for growing grain. Many of their neighbors had put in sheep for wool and meat.
“Mam and me sisters spun the thread for Pa,” Nick said. “I did, too, when I were a lad.”
Griffin smiled at the thought of Nick spinning thread with his great hamlike hands.
A shout came from behind them. Griffin whirled, snatching a pistol from his belt. Smoke was pouring out from one of the big chimneys that climbed the outer walls. The men were milling, coughing from the rolling black smoke.
Nick swore foully. “They’ve stopped th’ chimney from without!”
“Put out the fire!” Griffin shouted. “I’ll guard the walls.”
He gestured to the men, slapping his hands on the backs of those turned away, and ran to the warehouse entrance. Griffin slammed himself against the wall next to the door and shoved it open a crack with one foot. The guards outside were wrestling with attackers next to the walls. Already three men were past them and into the courtyard.
“They’re coming in,” he told his men. “Make damn sure they don’t get to the warehouse.”