Pirate King: A novel of suspense featuring Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes mr-11

by Laurie R. King

  Everyone ducked. A gun went off, although the shutter it destroyed was a good ten feet from the bright visitor that swooped through this urban canyon, beating its wings to perch upon a frayed clothes-line strung between buildings. “She is MINE!” the bird screeched.

  The street blinked, and began to breathe again. Benjamin lowered his eyes to the two brothers and, as if Rosie’s words had been meant for him alone, stepped forward to side with Adam. The remaining members of the crew exchanged another round of speechless consultation; their weapons stayed up, but their shoulders lost a degree of belligerence.

  Adam kept his chin raised, as haughty as if the question of succession had never been in doubt. “You take me as leader?” he demanded. “You agree that I am my father, in your eyes?”

  No one openly denied it; in fact, a general shrug of acceptance ran through them as if to say, Well, why not?

  I shot Holmes a glance, warning him, and then Annie at the back – because, in truth, whether it be Samuel or his son giving the orders, our position had changed little. We had to fight here, or risk abduction into the distant inland, never to return.

  Should I attack first, before Adam could give the order? The confusion that followed would free the others for a panicked flight-some of them might find their way to safety. I eyed the young man’s back, tightening my fingers on the knife in my sleeve. If I go in under his ribs with a sharp push to the right, my knife will clear as he falls into Benjamin and that big fellow, after which-

  “Then I say, we let them go!”

  – my right hand is clear to shoot the Swedish accountant and … Wait. What?

  The pirate crew were looking every bit as puzzled as I.

  “No!” one of them finally said, although the word grew elongated and ended in a distinct question mark.

  “Yes!” Adam shouted. “You said you would follow me. And I will lead you, and I will provide for you and for your families. This I vow. But I will not have you living off the takings of a wicked act. I will not feed my men off the suffering of women.”

  Good God: The subversive sentiments of W. S. Gilbert had converted this hereditary Moroccan cut-throat into a Frederic of morality. I had never before thought of the Savoy operas as a tool of Anarchic philosophy.

  “Noble lad!” Holmes murmured.

  But the pirates were not convinced. Indeed, judging by the spreading grumble of dissatisfaction, if something was not done quickly, this would be the briefest reign in Salé’s history.

  I raised my voice. “I know you men were looking forward to your share of the ransom monies, but there remains much money to be had, and without the disruption of British cannonballs or the inconvenience of French gaol.”

  That caught their attention.

  “The small man, in our company – Randolph Fflytte? He is a man who lives for the privilege of giving money to others. He points his camera, and it makes a man wealthy. And he may be small in stature, but in my country, he is huge in authority. If he says ‘Come,’ many will follow – all of whom will have busy cameras and equally large purses, and an equal desire to share their wealth. Think for yourselves, O men of Salé: A single payment”-(What the hell was the Arabic for ransom?)-“now, followed by years of grief with your families huddling in the far mountains? Or a moment of generosity that opens the doors to long years of gentle thievery? The choice is yours.”

  The men knew all about Fflytte; even those who had not received his money personally had heard that he could certainly throw it around. It was not a far reach to believe that he might cause a tap of gold to flow. They thought about it, and the weapons in their hands sagged a fraction.

  “Your pride is your country,” I persisted in a gentle voice. “You can conquer the world from within.”

  None of which actually meant anything: I was merely offering a stall and a distraction, desperately gambling that their blood might cool and dilute their single-minded intent.

  Adam stepped forward. “My friends, the days that my uncle and my father were trying to remake are gone. The wind has shifted. If we deny this, if we shake our fists at the sky and tell ourselves that the wind is still at our backs, we will end up wrecked upon the shore, or worse, becalmed. If, however, we trim our sails and run with that new wind, who knows where it will take us? Us, and our sons and grandsons, bearing the blood of our noble ancestors.

  “The pirate way gives all an equal voice and an equal share. The pirate way demands that the king be chosen. I ask that you trust my father’s blood, and follow me.”

  When he ended, I half expected the film crew to burst into applause – then remembered that they did not understood Arabic, and in any event, had their hands full with knives. Adam’s followers, more inured perhaps to flights of Arab rhetoric, were not so instantly convinced, but they could not deny that a boy who could talk like this might be just the fellow to deal with the French authorities.

  Gröhe felt the shift in the metaphorical rigging first, and gratefully worked the unaccustomed blade back into its scabbard. One by one, others did the same. Three men at the far end looked at each other, looked at the guns they carried, and put them up.

  Adam nodded, and gave a brief command that I did not hear, but that sent one of his men off at a run. When he faced us again, he was no longer a boy.

  “Come,” he said.

  We came. Through the medina we passed, the streets gone silent as word spread like a fire through dry grassland. Donkeys miraculously vanished, heaps of merchandise no longer filled the way, and I pushed the hood from my robe, allowing my European hair to shine out. When I glanced back, I could see the others doing the same.

  Full points to Adam, the new pirate king of Salé, parading his foreign captives through the streets of his realm.

  He led us, not to the closest gate in the walled city, but to the river entrance we had come by, half a lifetime before. Boats were already waiting, summoned by the new king’s runner. By the time the first of the boats had crossed the Bou Regreg – laden with the younger girls and their mothers, despite Edith’s furious protestations that she wanted to stay behind, to be a pirate, with Jack – a crowd had begun to gather on the Rabat side.

  Finally, a small knot of us remained: Holmes, Annie, Will, and I, talking to Adam as we waited for the last boat to come back for us.

  Or so I thought.

  “I’ll send the film over with the luggage,” Will said.

  Annie looked puzzled, Holmes (although he later denied it) did, too. I, however, merely asked, “What about the cameras?”

  “I’ll keep one. They’ll be hard to find here, and Mr Fflytte owes me that much.”

  “Will!” Annie protested. “You’re surely not thinking of staying behind?”

  Holmes had caught up quickly. “I believe you’ll find that Mr Currie is concerned that if he comes within reach of the British authorities, he’ll find himself behind bars.”

  “What? Will! No, not you – tell me you didn’t kill the poor girl!”

  “Kill? Who? Me? I didn’t kill anyone! What are you talking about?” He looked confused, and frightened.

  “Lonnie Johns,” I said.

  “What, Lonnie? Good heavens, has she died?”

  I remarked to my husband, “He’s a cameraman, not an actor.”

  “I agree.”

  “When did she die?” Will asked.

  “No guilt in his eyebrows.”

  “No avoidance of the eyes.”

  “How did she die?”

  I took pity on the man. “We don’t know for certain that she’s dead. The police suspect it.”

  “They’re usually wrong,” Holmes commented.

  “I wouldn’t say ‘usually,’ Holmes,” I chided.

  “Then why the hell did you tell me she was dead? Accuse me of killing her?”

  “To see your reaction. You smuggled guns, and drugs. If Miss Johns had discovered it, perhaps you’d have killed her.”

  “I never!”

  “But you did sell th
e guns and the drugs.”

  Now he looked down, kicking at the dust with his boot. “Well, yeah. But it was just … lying there. Hale got all that stuff, for Fflytte. Nothing would do but that we had the real thing, for the camera. Insane, but it’s what he wanted. Only the three of us knew, the others thought it was washing-up powder or something. And then when we moved on to the next project, someone had to tidy after them.”

  “And you always resented, just a little, that Fflytte’s name alone was on the credits.”

  The Welshman’s face lifted, his eyes bitter and defiant. “Without me, Randolph Fflytte would still be scratching his head over that first camera. So yes, I will admit, I thought that picking up a little extra on the side might make up for it, just a bit. But I never hurt anyone.”

  That was, I supposed, debatable. But I for one did not intend to tackle him and truss him for the next boat across the river. “You want to stay here in Morocco?”

  “It’s warm. I like the food. The French can’t arrest an Englishman here. There are worse places to retire. And, somebody has to let these boys know how to deal with the actors and directors they’ll be meeting.”

  Adam decided we had finished, and said to Holmes in English, “I will return your things by morning.”

  Holmes replied in Arabic, “The ladies will be glad for their clothing, certainly. And do not forget your guards on the roof of the house.”

  “Or those in the ground floor of the women’s quarters,” I added.

  “The punishment for the men should be light,” Holmes suggested. “They were overcome by the artistry of women, a mistake they will not make again.”

  “We are all overcome by women,” said the young pirate ruefully, and turned to the yellow-curled source of his overcoming (and of his guards’ overcoming, which I was glad he did not know). “Would you stay?” he pleaded. Holmes and I studied the river, although we did not move out of earshot. Neither Adam nor Annie seemed concerned with privacy; why should we be?

  “I cannot,” she replied, her voice low with emotion. “Your people, your country, are beautiful, but they are too different from what I know. My heart tells me to try, but my head tells me that in the end, that difference would come between us. And I would not hurt you, not for the world.”

  “I will come to you, then. Let me help my people for a few years, and then I will return to you.”

  “No,” she said – just the tiniest fraction of a second too quickly. “Your people need you. I see that now, and I rejoice for them, even as I sorrow for myself. I can live with the hole in my heart, knowing that it is for a good cause.”

  I couldn’t help giving her a quick glance, then looked away again, astonished: I’d have sworn her eyes welled with unshed tears.

  Adam seized her hands, a shocking public demonstration for a Moslem male.

  “You are as noble a woman as any man could desire, and I can only say, if your heart aches too much, when you are home, if you wish to return here and become my wife, I will be here.”

  “You must not wait for me,” she answered firmly. “You must marry and have sons of your own.”

  “Oh, I will. But I will always welcome you as another wife.”

  I shot her another glance, but fortunately her head was down, studying their entwined hands, and when she raised her face, any reaction was hidden away.

  “I will always remember you,” she told him.

  “And I, you,” he said.

  And with that she retrieved her hands and walked away, head bent, to the last boat. I got in behind her, with Holmes last. She kept her head down as we crossed the muddy river, and when we climbed out, she kept her rigid spine to the pirate town across the water.

  We pressed our way into a noisy crowd made up of British soldiers, French soldiers, film personnel, half-naked bathing children, donkeys, sheep, a camel, some bewildered tourists, and a parrot. A half-naked water carrier with a bulging goatskin slung over his shoulder was selling cups of water to an audience of delighted locals who sat atop the wall, kicking their heels and passing around small baskets of pistachios and dates.

  Hale was pointing at the figures on the northern shore and shouting about his camera, his film, his-

  Fflytte was in full bore to an uncomprehending poilu about the interruption to his schedule, his urgent requirement for a local assistant, someone to help him hire replacement pirates-

  Mrs Hatley and Isabel’s mother had set the sails of their bosoms, despite their enveloping galabiyyas, and had cornered a British officer to demand that they and the girls be taken to the best hotel in Rabat, that very instant, because heaven only knew what sorts of vermin these costumes had in their folds, and they hadn’t seen a proper tub in days, and-

  Bibi, with her customary skill at arranging the scene around her, waited for a camera to appear before she gracefully fainted into the not entirely willing arms of Daniel Marks, who staggered and permitted her to slump to the filthy paving stones, which revived her into a cry of disgust recorded by the camera and-

  The parrot decided in the end that we were not where fate had intended him, and flew away across the river in search of his pirate king, shouting all the while, “The people will RULE! Golden daffodils! SEIZE the-”

  A perplexed and red-faced Mrs Nunnally was trying to quiet the tear-streaked Edith, who was demonstrating several new additions to her vocabulary and declaring that the instant she turned eighteen she would return, and that she would never wear a frock again, and that she wanted a hair-cut immediately, and that-

  With all this going on, I nearly missed the sound Annie made. My first thought, seeing the rhythmic heave of her body, was that she was sobbing at the loss of her one true love. Then she shot a look over her shoulders, back across the river where lingered the newly crowned pirate king of Salé, and I saw the dance of her dry eyes and the quirk of her lips.

  And the woman had claimed she wasn’t much of an actress.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  PIRATE KING: … with all our faults, we love our Queen.

  I DID NOT know if Mrs Hatley and Isabel’s mother got their baths that day. I did not know if Edith – Eddie – was granted his hair-cut. I did not discover until some days later whether or not Hale got his film back or if Bibi arranged a more satisfactory news photograph or if Fflytte found a local capable of working the ropes. And some things I never did learn: if Hale knew that June was his child; if the girls found a source of chewing gum in Morocco; if Rosie screeched forever in the air above Salé.

  Two things I knew, when I staggered into my own very small, very dim hotel room, very late that night. First, a telegram from Scotland Yard informed us that Lonnie Johns had been found, alive and well, having returned from an illicit holiday in Barbados with a Member of Parliament she’d met in the course of making Rum Runner. And second, that I was wearing the same goat dung – coloured robe I’d put on that morning; the itching from the wool (I prayed it was only from the wool) was driving me mad.

  I tore it off and threw it into a corner, replacing it with a dressing-gown I had chosen from a heap of cast-off clothing Rabat’s European community had hastily donated to their filmic refugees. The garment might have been designed for Randolph Fflytte, but modesty was not high on my list of concerns. I tied its belt, dropped into the armchair that was wedged between bed and wall, kicked off my boots, tipped back my head, and closed my eyes.

  “Just so you know,” I said, “I plan to murder Lestrade when we get home.”

  There came a ting of cut-glass carafe against tin mug, then the tap of my drink being set atop the small deal table tastefully decorated with cigarette burns.

  “I may be too tired to swallow,” I groaned.

  I heard another movement of clothing, then the cup nudged my hand. My fingers wrapped around it: perhaps I was not too tired to swallow, after all.

  “A most successful day, Russell. You overcame a band of ruffians with minimal bloodshed, freed thirty-two British captives and a Frenchman, and pre
vented a war. You oversaw the peaceful change of régime of a criminal gang into the hands of a young man eager to promulgate the noblest sentiments of Victorian England. You made your erstwhile employer – he is, I trust, erstwhile? – happy by finding a source of what might be described as Moroccan actors, and in the process not only salvaged the economic future of the British film industry, but saved King and country from scandal.”

  “However,” I told him, “scandal there will be, enough to keep Fflytte Films in the news for some weeks. To begin with Edith keeps trying to sneak across the river. Her mother caught her the first time. The second, she was returned by Benjamin.”

  “The pretty pirate?”

  “Yes. Who brought her into the dinner where the entire crew was gathered – her mother had thought she was sleeping – and asked M. Dédain for assistance.”

  “Asking for asylum?”

  “Asking for marriage.”

  “Celeste, wasn’t it? Well, at least someone is happy.”

  “Celeste is not happy. Oh, she was when she first saw him. But after a short time, the pretty young man contrived to be sitting next to Daniel Marks. Celeste swore she would talk to every newspaper in England.”

  “I see.”

  “Daniel removed himself to sit with Bibi, which made everything settle down nicely. Although as I came past the hotel tonight, I saw Benjamin going in through the service door. So everyone except Celeste should be happy.”

  “And thus is Fflytte Films hauled from the rocks of scandal. In addition – although I do not for a moment suppose such was your intent – you appear single-handedly to have shaped the basis for a future Moroccan tourist industry, by giving the country’s hereditary buccaneers an outlet for their innate drive for plunder.”