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“This is inconvenient,” he said at last.

Renforth lowered the handbill and regarded him across the scarred table of the shepherd’s cottage. “Your gift for understatement remains undiminished.”

The entire troop had gathered again, although no casual observer would have guessed that the six men scattered across northern England had spent years working together. Stuart occupied the cottage’s only serviceable chair, having claimed that a horse buyer of his advanced age deserved consideration. Fielding leaned against the wall near the cold hearth, while Chum stood beside the table studying the handbill over Renforth’s shoulder. Manners had arrived from Lord Harcourt’s estate shortly before Baines and looked offensively elegant for a man who had ridden six miles before breakfast.

“Read it again,” Fielding said.

“I have read it four times. Repetition has not improved it,” Chum remarked.

Renforth laid one hand upon the table. He did not say anything, which was generally more effective than speaking. Years of acquaintance had taught them that Renforth possessed several varieties of silence, and the present one meant he was thinking.

Baines picked up the handbill. The relevant passage had been printed in Newcastle before dawn.

Reliable information suggests that government forces presently stationed in the north are to be redistributed with the object of securing the western roads whilst maintaining cavalry within reach of the principal Scottish manufacturing districts. Particular attention is expected to be given to communication between Carlisle, Newcastle and the border counties, where magistrates have requested military assistance should the present stoppage spread south.

He read it once more, though he no longer required the words.

The previous afternoon they had planted three separate versions of military movement. Cranford had been allowed to hear that cavalry would move north towards Glasgow. Pembroke had received the suggestion that troops might instead be redirected west towards the Carlisle road, while Lady Beckenham had heard that no reinforcement would go north at all because forces near Newcastle were required in case the unrest spread into the manufacturing districts of northern England.

The three stories had been deliberately separated, yet the handbill contained pieces of every one.

“None of that is precisely what we planted,” Baines said.

Fielding came away from the wall. “No, but nearly every part of it derives from something we planted. The western roads belong to Pembroke’s version, the cavalry near the Scottish manufacturing districts resembles Cranford’s, and Newcastle comes from Lady Beckenham.”

“Which gives us three possible sources,” Stuart said.

Baines stared at the handbill. “No, I think it gives us none.”

The others looked towards him. He crossed to the little window, where the grey morning pressed against old glass. Beyond the cottage the ground rose towards Scotland, though nothing in the quiet fields suggested that men had recently marched through darkness with pikes and muskets, convinced that rebellion might somehow force the world to hear them. Reports reaching them from the west suggested that very little beyond those hills remained ordinary.

The general strike had spread with astonishing speed. Workshops had emptied across Glasgow, Paisley and the surrounding manufacturing districts, while messengers moved between towns and villages, carrying proclamations issued in the name of the Committee of Organization for Forming a Provisional Government. Renforth’s reports suggested that tens of thousands had stopped work, though no one seemed capable of saying with certainty how many of those men intended merely to strike and how many were prepared to take up arms.

Will Fletcher had warned them that the language in the villages was changing. Men who had spoken a week ago of wages, representation and parliamentary reform now spoke of pikes, muskets and marching. Rumours travelled faster than facts, and each new report seemed more alarming than the last. One claimed troops were already moving towards Glasgow. Another insisted government forces had been ordered to seize every known radical leader before the week was out. A third maintained that thousands of armed men were preparing to march upon Carron and seize weapons there.

Baines did not believe half of what he heard. Unfortunately, he could not determine which half.

He had seen armies become dangerous when commanders possessed bad intelligence. He could think of no reason frightened civilians, angry workers and nervous magistrates should prove less susceptible to it. Someone at Blackthorn was feeding information into precisely that confusion. The game had ceased to amuse him.

“What are you thinking?” Stuart asked.

“That we are running out of time.”

Renforth’s gaze settled upon him. “For what?”

Baines turned from the window. “For this to remain an exercise in pamphlets and overheard conversations. The strike is one thing. Men refusing to work may inconvenience half of Scotland, but it does not require cavalry to fire upon them. Men carrying pikes towards soldiers are another matter entirely.”

Manners’ expression sobered. “We do not know that they will.”

“No, but there is too much bad blood for it to be kept suppressed much longer.”

He returned to the table and flattened the handbill beneath his palm. The words irritated him merely by existing. Somewhere between Blackthorn and Newcastle, someone had believed those invented troop movements important enough to set in type and distribute, and somewhere farther north another man might read them and decide where government forces would be weakest.

“If this reaches the wrong people, they may act upon it,” Baines continued. “We know the information is false because we invented it. A man who believes cavalry troops are being drawn towards Glasgow may decide another road is undefended. Another who believes troops are remaining near Newcastle may conclude that the government has left the western approaches exposed.”

Fielding nodded slowly. “On the other hand, magistrates might see the same handbill and alter their dispositions because they believe the radicals know where the troops are.”

“Precisely. Then each side begins acting upon what it believes the other side knows, and before long no one has the faintest idea what is true.”