Ahab's Return: or, The Last Voyage

by Jeffrey Ford

  “He sounds useful,” I said, and for some reason recalled Mrs. Pease’s statement concerning the system, “You can get from anywhere to anywhere.”

  “He’ll be an asset in a fight. You’ll see,” she said.

  I was sorry she’d mentioned the word fight. It was a part of the adventure we were embarking on that I least wanted to reckon. Turning away from her, I watched the night fly past. Otis was letting the horses go. The longer I watched, the more it seemed the coach was flying above the road. The wonder of that made me blink, and it became clear that the sensation of flight was merely an echo of the opium.

  A moment later, the coach was back on the road, and I felt every bump. The springs squealed and I heard Otis, above, mumbling to himself. Arabella had said he was “effective.” I wondered what that meant. I had noticed that her man was attired in full formal butler regalia for our outing, which seemed strange.

  An hour on, Mavis nudged me awake with the toe of her boot. I came to and looked around the darkened cab. Arabella was slumped against the wall sleeping, her arms wrapped around the coach gun. Mavis moved forward in her seat and whispered to me, “Garrick said to tell you, ‘No more with Ahab. That last piece was a fart in church.’”

  “That doesn’t sound good,” I said.

  “He said, and this is word for word, ‘No one wants to read about the purgatorial sufferings of Captain Dimwit. Harrow’s getting sentimental over this whole project. Tell him he’d better shake himself out of it.”

  “Did you warn him there might be one more Ahab piece?” I asked.

  “I hinted at it.”

  “What was his reaction?”

  “He said, ‘Tell Harrow I don’t give a donkey shit about Ahab anymore and neither does anyone else. Everyone’s sick of it.’”

  “A ringing endorsement,” I said.

  “I think he’d take one more if you insist,” said Mavis. I was glad to hear that, knowing how astute she was when it came to cyphering Garrick’s nature.

  “Let’s hope there’s one more,” I said.

  After that I fell asleep for quite a while and woke suddenly when the coach came to a halt. The door opened and a frigid breeze blew through the cab. Otis was standing just outside.

  “Let’s go, Harrow,” he said and helped me out of the conveyance. I had with me my satchel, minus the writing gear but plus Misha’s pistol and the blasted fid. It was pitch-black wherever it was we’d landed. I could hear bare branches clicking together overhead. We were off the road, in the woods. I looked up and found that my eyes had adjusted to the dark. I saw the stars in the distance and heard Arabella and Mavis disembark. Otis strapped feed bags on the horses to keep them quiet while we were off raiding the caves.

  “This way,” he said and he led us through a thicket of trees to a clearing in which stood the giant tulip tree Mrs. Pease had mentioned. He lit a lantern there and held it up for us to see the towering wonder. Its trunk was enormous and it reached far higher than I could fathom. I watched Otis consult a compass and in the next second he led us away due west. I asked him if the lantern was a good idea. I was afraid we might be spotted.

  “There’s thick woods we have to traverse to get to the caves,” he said. “I was told that without a lantern, we’d instantly be lost and in grave danger of falling from the outcroppings.”

  When he led us down a game trail that wound like a snake amid a labyrinth of low bushes and pine forest, I instantly saw the necessity for the light. It didn’t make me stop worrying about being seen. For us to be successful in rescuing Ahab, we needed the element of surprise. I worried that we didn’t represent anyone’s idea of a formidable militia. My only defense was to ignore reality, which was something I had some practice in. Mavis, Arabella, and I followed in a cluster around Otis, all fitting snugly in the orange globe of lantern light.

  We came into a clearing and as we stepped free of the tree line, it was obvious the terrain had changed. A few feet in front of us the ground went from dirt to hard rock. Otis put his hand up as a signal to us to be still. I froze and looked at him, trying to read from his expression what had spooked him. And then, like that, there was the tail of an arrow jutting out of his forehead. He gasped once and fell straight back at my feet. The lantern hit the ground, and from the corner of my eye, I could see a shadow approaching.

  I turned and barely caught a glimpse of Mavis slipping into the woods. Arabella leveled her gun and put her finger on the trigger. She glanced at me and I could read in her expression that she knew it would be foolish to fire the weapon and call a swarm of the Host down upon us. She dropped the gun and we ran blindly into the dark, pursued by the assassin who’d murdered Otis.

  Arabella, her cape flying behind her, ran swiftly, and I could hardly keep up with her. We were heading across an open expanse for the cover of the forest beyond. I was no more than fifteen feet behind her, when, in the middle of that enormous meadow, I tripped on a small outcropping of rock and went down hard, face-first. The fall knocked the wind out of me and jostled my brain. It took me too long to get up. I heard the footsteps approaching, and Arabella called back to me, “Harrow, he’s coming.”

  I sat up and fumbled in my satchel to find my gun. My grasp closed twice on the fid before I finally got ahold of the pepperbox. At that point, I could hear the heavy breathing of the archer. He was steps behind me. I pulled the gun out of the bag and aimed into the dark. I squeezed the trigger, braced for an explosion, and nothing happened, nothing but a click. By then, I could smell his fetid breath, and the hair on my arms and neck stood up straight.

  He loomed above me, a bow slung over his shoulder and his right hand holding a meat cleaver. Shaking, I spun the barrel of the pepperbox and fired. Again nothing. He raised the knife above his head, and I cowered on the ground, convinced I’d filed my last column. When no blow came, I dared to look up. In a pool of lantern light, I saw the archer facedown on the ground, the handle of a thin knife protruding from the base of his skull. Mavis set the lantern on the ground and reached out to help me up. Arabella joined us.

  “What happened to your pistol?” said Mavis.

  “Shit,” I said and threw the piece into the woods.

  “I wanted to run away,” said Arabella, “but I was transfixed by what was about to happen.”

  “You mean me being hacked to death?”

  “That is ghoulish, isn’t it? But yes, that,” she said.

  Mavis put her shoe on the archer’s head to steady it and pulled her knife from his neck. While she wiped it clean on a handkerchief, I asked her which way she thought we should go.

  She put the knife and the handkerchief away and said, “Follow me.” She picked up the lantern, and Arabella and I fell in behind her. As we moved in silence through the forest, I wondered if Mavis understood that when I asked her which way to go, I meant the most direct path back to the coach. Instead, she led us along a trail that worked its way down a steep incline, boulders strewn on either side. As we followed the lantern, Mavis warned us to watch our footing.

  At the bottom of the hill we came to a cave. We stood before the opening like it was Garrick’s maw of Leviathan. Mavis lifted the lantern and there was the sound of something within beating against the stone floor. Finally, it appeared out of the deeper dark—a chestnut horse, and riding it, was Madi. He dismounted and came forward to greet us. The horse followed close behind him.

  I was, for some reason, overjoyed that he was alive.

  “Harrow,” he said. “Glad you survived the night at the Crystal Palace.”

  “Me?” I said. “How about you? How did you get away?”

  “I told you he was resourceful,” said Mavis.

  “Did you know he was here?” I asked her.

  “Not until a few minutes ago when I fled into the woods to escape the sights of the archer. I was making my way through the trees and the next I knew he was standing there in front of me with a torch.”

  “I saw you get kidnapped by the Host and Malbaster,”
I said to Madi.

  He paid no attention to me but was kissing the back of Arabella’s hand in greeting. His lips lingered on her third knuckle. He eventually backed away, but by then I was much less happy to see him. As for Arabella, her cape was draped around her like a shroud, and she had tears in her eyes, no doubt over the loss of Otis.

  “I was taken,” he said. “But when we got close to this area, I managed to leap through the window of the coach. I hit the ground and rolled and was up and gone into a thicket of trees before the driver could stop. I heard Malbaster croaking in his Pale King Toad voice, ‘I want that nigger’s head on a stake,’ which hastened my getaway. I made my way south to Seneca Village, bought this horse, put together some provisions, borrowed a pistol and two throwing knives, and struck out immediately for this area. I knew they must be held up somewhere around here.”

  “Are you planning to rescue Ahab?” I asked.

  “Harrow, I told you. I’m not out to rescue Ahab. My goal is to kill Malbaster—slit his throat. Ahab can go down with his own dilapidated scow of a life. To be honest, I’m surprised to see you here. Is that what you’ve come for, to rescue Ahab?”

  “Not just Ahab, but you as well, Madi,” said Mavis.

  “You were a perfectly reasonable cynic when first we met, Harrow.”

  “That’s what my boss said.”

  “Harrow’s no cynic,” said Arabella. “He’s a man of enlightenment.”

  Madi laughed outright, and I couldn’t help but both blush and smile.

  “Have you seen Malbaster here, near the caves, in the past few days?” I asked.

  “No, but I was hiding in a blind the other day and overheard two members of the Host talking. I’m almost positive I heard them say that the Pale King Toad would be here tonight to check on the progress with Ahab.”

  “They’re turning him into another Bartleby,” I said.

  “All I want to see is Malbaster’s neck,” said Madi.

  “What if we work together?” said Mavis. “We all take on both tasks—rescuing Ahab and killing Malbaster.”

  I nodded. “I’m in.”

  “So now Madi gets to kill the bloated toad? That was a pledge you made to me, Harrow,” said Arabella, wiping the tears from her eyes.

  “We’ll kill him together,” said Madi.

  “That sounds promising,” she said and smiled.

  “And you’ll assist us with Ahab?” I asked.

  “I’ll make an effort,” said Madi. “But what I’ve learned about Ahab is that people die and the best of intentions evaporate when he’s around.”

  He led the horse back into the cave and when he emerged, carrying a lit torch, he said, “Follow me. Low and quiet.”

  We did. I brought up the rear, content with that spot, since being in the lead seemed to invite arrows. I was concerned that the archer Mavis had killed was not a youngster from the Jolly Host but a large burly man. I wondered if we were going up against Malbaster’s elite forces—his personal henchmen. I reached in my satchel and grabbed the fid. I was never so happy to have it, no matter how primitive it was. At that moment, it was worth a hundred pepperboxes.

  Madi led us down along the Hudson. I could see the lights of a ship passing on its way to the city. It was a frigid night and the wind off the water cut right through us. The torch was less effective than the lantern had been in the pitch dark. I’d already tripped three times, and Mavis had caught Arabella a time or two as we made our way, unable to effectively navigate the uneven ground. We wound up in a thicket of trees that went some way to blocking the wind. As soon as we were all within the safety of the trunks, Madi put the torch out against the ground.

  “That’s it,” he said. “We go forward from here in the dark. We’re going to need the surprise.”

  “Are these Jolly Host or are they men we’re up against?” I asked.

  “Both,” he said. “They’re all unhinged with opium and laudanum.”

  “That’ll make them easy to pick off,” said Mavis.

  “Where’s the cave with poor Ahab?” said Arabella.

  “Straight ahead. From what I could make out, it’s one of the bigger, deeper caves. Malbaster has some dangerous-looking oafs directly guarding the captain.

  “When we get to the entrance of the cave, I’ll go to the left, and Mavis, you go to the right. We’re the only ones with pistols. Harrow, you back Mavis up and Arabella, you come with me.”

  Arabella nodded. Without a further word, we headed due east on a rough path. It wasn’t long before we saw lanterns blazing in the cave mouth. With every step I took, the more jittery I got. My only hope was that if we managed to free Ahab, his mind would still be intact.

  20

  What we were waiting for I had no idea. We stood in the dark, perilously close to the lip of the cave and peered in. I was only yards away from a stocky fellow with a sailor’s pigtail, holding what looked like Ahab’s own boarding ax. Behind him, sitting on a small boulder, was none other than the emaciated Usual Peters, a pistol in one hand and a bottle of Papine laudanum in the other. On Madi and Arabella’s side of the cave was a younger man brandishing what I could have sworn was the spiked club that Fergus had used at Dutch Hill.

  We could not see beyond the front vault of the cave, and from somewhere deep inside, a haze of opium smoke drifted out. The scent was intriguing and it made me slightly woozy. All of a sudden I noticed that it was snowing. I saw two flakes fall on the back of Mavis’s coat. An instant later, she turned to me and grabbed me by the collar. “Ready?” she whispered. “I’m not waiting anymore.”

  She made her move, leaping into the mouth of the cave. She squatted and rolled and stabbed the pigtailed fellow in his groin with her knife, giving it a savage twist as she pulled it out by the hilt. Usual Peters staggered out of his chair to assist his compatriot, and she threw another knife that hit him directly in the Adam’s apple. My God, the look of surprise on his face as he fell forward. I leaped in and smashed the first man across the top of the head with the blasted fid to put him out of my misery. He dropped like a sack of turnips.

  By the time I turned around, Madi had made his move and his victim lay on the cave floor with one knife imbedded in his heart and another in his left eye. Arabella scrabbled in behind him and pulled a pistol out of the dead man’s pocket. She stowed that and took up Fergus’s club. We moved quickly, Mavis retrieving her knives as Madi and Arabella pressed themselves against the wall at the back of the rock vault, and we entered a natural corridor that I hoped would lead to the captain.

  Mavis and I made our way into the back of the cave. The corridor was dark, and at its distant end, there was a lit chamber curtained by a yellow haze. Fifty yards ahead of us, Madi and Arabella were huddled silhouettes against the distant glow, their bodies pressed close against the rock walls.

  Mavis, on the other hand, strolled down the middle of the corridor, her hands in her pockets and a cigarette between her lips. She was as centered as a Brahmin about every task she took on. She had dispatched the three thugs that night with the same calm resolve with which she delivered Christmas hams to Garrick’s business associates. I never knew her to initiate violence, but once engaged by it, there was no warning shot. She killed with precision and speed. I could not help but wonder at all I was getting for twenty dollars.

  Mavis stopped and nudged my shoulder. She pointed ahead, and I looked up to see Madi’s and Arabella’s shadowed forms pass into the lit chamber. There were gunshots and screams. Mavis reached for her pistol and charged ahead. I clenched my fid and sped recklessly after her. Mavis was a few yards ahead of me when she entered the chamber. I lost sight of her as two more gunshots rang out.

  I charged, weapon held high, into a place of utter stillness. Corpses littered the floor. Through the opium haze, I saw Ahab by the light of a flickering torch, shirtless, bearded, bedraggled, tied to a large, high-backed chair with armrests like a cheap wooden throne. His chin rested upon his chest and his breathing was labored. His e
yes were open, staring at the rock floor of the cave. Mavis went to him and took her blade to the ropes.

  I turned to the left and saw Arabella sitting slumped down against the wall. The club she carried was across her knees and the spike end was coated with gore. She was breathing heavily, not, she explained, from exertion, but in an effort to suck the errant smoke out of the air. I left her to it and looked for Madi. I found him at the opening of the chamber. He stood with his boot on the back of one of the fallen. Leaning over, he grabbed a shock of black hair and lifted so I could see the face of his victim. It was Gabriel. I nodded. “Alive or dead?” I asked.

  “He’ll live,” said Madi.

  We bound Gabriel’s hands with the rope that had been used to restrain his father and shoved a handkerchief in his mouth to gag him. Madi started to walk the boy into the corridor, back toward the cave mouth. I quickly stripped one of Malbaster’s dead followers of his long, filthy coat and gave it to the captain to cover himself. We then followed with Ahab in tow, weaving and stumbling into the dark passage. As we proceeded, the captain got his feet under him and was soon shuffling along at a respectable pace. All I wanted to do was escape from them all with my life.

  Madi and Arabella waited for us in the entrance to the cave. “Hurry up,” he whispered as Mavis, Ahab, and I came into view. I found Ahab’s boarding ax on the cave floor and handed it to him. As our party left the cave, we heard the sound of an approaching stampede—the Jolly Host was on the hunt. I felt a jolt of fear run up my spine. I grabbed the captain by the beard and stared into his glassy eyes. “Run,” I hissed. We ran. As we crossed the clearing, going hell-bent for leather toward the cover of the trees, the Jolly Host arrived. I heard their shouts go up and knew they’d spotted us.