Guns and Guano

by Andrew Knighton

CHAPTER 10: TWO DOWN

  A fist like a cured ham clutched the revolver, the grip dwarfed by sausage fingers.

  “Up.” The man’s pale skin was reddened by the sun and peeling at the tips of his ears. Sunlight flashed off the tip of the barrel as he gestured for Dirk to rise.

  Blaze-Simms lay on the far side of the deck, a bruise on his forehead. Isabelle nestled his head on her knee. She managed a smile for Dirk, then went back to frowning at the second thug leaning by the wheel.

  Dirk stood, water dribbling from his saturated clothes. Aside from the one pointed at him there was another gun on the boat, held by the second brutish figure in his badly cut suit. Even with an extra day’s sunburn, the “secretaries” of Cullen’s French guest were easily recognisable. They looked like they’d been carved out of beef and left to stew in the sun. Guns suited them like a bow tie suited a chimp.

  “Drop it.” The man gestured at Dirk’s sack. From him, even a French accent sounded inelegant.

  The guy was standing too close for his own good. From here Dirk could swing the bag around, smack the gun clear and be on him before he even took a shot. Even tired, wet and aching, it’d be easy.

  The problem was the other guy, out of reach and aiming for Isabelle and Blaze-Simms. Dirk could guard himself with the first thug’s body, but that wouldn’t help his friends. There’d be a messy few seconds, and it would be over for these sweating slabs of useless meat. But it might not just be over for them.

  Dirk dropped the bag.

  “Kick it to me.” The thug eyed the bag eagerly.

  “It’s a lump of stone.” Dirk had dealt with some stupid people in his time, but this one was real special. “That ain’t gonna work.”

  The thugs exchanged words in French, the brief sentences of slow men debating obvious issues.

  Now that he had time to look around, Dirk saw a rowboat tied against the yacht, knocking on the side as waves pulled it away and back again. It was easy to see how they’d gotten aboard without Blaze-Simms noticing. He would have been so caught up in testing out his diving gear, the world around him would have just disappeared. But Isabelle...

  The thug in front of Dirk stepped aside and gestured him towards the other captives.

  “How are you doing?” Dirk asked, settling down beside Isabelle.

  “Better than poor Timothy.”

  Blaze-Simms’s eyes were closed, his breathing shallow. Dirk felt his pulse.

  “He’s been worse.” Dirk could remember at least three times that fit the bill, and only one had been Blaze-Simms’s own doing.

  “I’m sure that’s meant to be reassuring.” Isabelle frowned.

  “It’s meant to be true.”

  The thugs stood together as one of them pulled the tablet from the bag. He peered at it, made a comment in French, and jabbed it at his companion. They both laughed.

  “Reckon they’ve cracked the code already,” Dirk said. “Or maybe it was a fart joke. Hard to tell.”

  “Really, Mr Dynamo.” Isabelle raised an eyebrow. “If you can’t say anything polite, you can at least say something useful.”

  “Alright. How long do you reckon it would take to get from that pier we used to the wharfs at Freeport, and to row out from there to here?”

  “That would depend on whether you had horses. Why?”

  “’Cause I think I just heard oars.”

  Their captors turned back towards them. Dirk found himself now staring down the barrel of not one but two pistols. They were ugly devices, the product of some cut-rate Prussian workshop, barely functional and utterly charmless.

  “It is almost over, Monsieur Dynamo,” one of the men said. “For you and for your little friend.”

  He slowly thumbed back the hammer of his gun, letting it click out one notch at a time.

  Behind him, hands appeared on the ship’s railing, hauled themselves upwards into arms, and then bruised, muscular bodies.

  “Why are you here?” Dirk asked, playing for time. He didn’t think the natives meant him and his companions much good, but creeping up on the the Frenchmen meant they weren’t feeling too friendly about them either. They were probably out to get anyone who looked like they might meddle with the wreck.

  “Why do you think?” The English speaker waved the tablet. “You think you are the only ones looking for this?”

  Ubu Peter and Felipe slid over the rail, knives gripped between their teeth like picture-book pirates, pistols holstered at their sides. Sunlight gleamed off wicked blades and angry eyes.

  “But who sent you?” Dirk asked

  “The Dane, of course!” The thug’s expression was one of pig-faced malice. “Who else ever stands in your-”

  The deck creaked beneath Ubu Peter just as he was reaching for his gun. The Frenchman turned in alarm, gun raised.

  Not pausing to draw his own pistol, Felipe leapt onto the other Frenchman’s back. Clamping one arm around his opponent’s throat, he swung a knife at his chest. The Frenchman blocked the blow with his arm, cloth ripping as his sleeve caught on the blade. With his other arm he flailed above his shoulder, trying to point his gun in Felipe’s face.

  His companion bellowed as Ubu Peter ducked beneath his gun and lunged into his side. The African’s knife sank six inches through fat and muscle, but the Frenchman snarled and batted him aside.

  Dirk sprang from the deck, body uncoiling behind him, channelling all his strength down a line of motion that ended in his fist. The stabbed Frenchman got in a punch that floored Ubu Peter, only to stagger back as Dirk hit him in the face.

  A gun roared, its single shot like a thunderclap echoing across the still sea. The other two combatants stumbled apart, the Frenchman clutching his powder-burned ear, Felipe clutching his blood-streaked face.

  All five of them stood for a moment, staring at each other in confusion.

  Then someone moved to attack, someone moved to intercept, and they all got tangled together in a muddled melee that rolled back and forth, fists flying, feet flailing, guns drawn just long enough to be knocked out of hands. The boat rocking to the rhythm of violence.

  Dirk took an elbow to the guts and a face full of fingers, while his own foot hit something that gave way with a satisfying crunch. He slid on a patch of blood, turned the movement into a lunge and sent one of the Frenchmen spinning towards the bow. Before the man could regain his balance Dirk rushed after him, slamming into his chest and launching him over the rail. The man had less than a second to cry out before he hit the ocean and disappeared with a splash.

  Turning, Dirk saw Felipe darting toward him, knife outstretched. He twisted clear of the lunge, then ducked as Felipe swung the blade at neck height. The point glistened menacingly in the sunlight.

  Rising behind the strike, Dirk grabbed Felipe’s arm and flung him over his shoulder. With a splash, Felipe followed the Frenchman into the sea.

  Something hit Dirk’s head like a steam train. Black spots danced across his vision, obscuring his view of the remaining Frenchman’s fist. Pain roared through his face as another punch knocked his head back on his shoulders. And another. And another. He tried to duck the fourth, took it on the side of the head. His attacker’s idiot grin, like a pig rammed hard against a wall, filled his vision. The world tasted of blood and sounded like all the bells in New York ringing just for him.

  This time the darkness was warm and inviting as it crept in from the corners of his mind, as he struggled to keep consciousness from slipping away, while that flat, bestial face blotted out the sky.

  The Frenchman raised his fist, roaring with laughter. Then suddenly he slumped, face falling, grip loosening, body sliding to the floor.

  Dirk blinked back darkness and pushed himself to his feet, though he needed the rail for support. Ubu Peter faced him, looking nearly as bad as Dirk felt. He clutched an oar, its broken end lying beneath the Frenchman’s head.

  “Guess I owe you,” Dirk mumbled through fat lips, wobbling as he raised his hands in defence.

 
“You desecrated the wreck.” Rage blazed in Ubu Peter’s eyes. “You stole from the graves of our fallen. Felipe is right. There is only one way to stop you.”

  He hefted the oar ready to swing. Dirk wondered how long he could stay afloat in his present condition. Assuming he was even conscious when he hit the water.

  They were interrupted by the small, sharp click of a gun being cocked.

  “Enough.” Isabelle stood in the middle of the deck, clutching one of the Frenchmen’s ugly guns. It looked absurdly large in her hands, like she was a farmgirl playing with her Pa’s tools. But her stance made clear that she knew what she was doing.

  Ubu Peter dropped the oar and squared his shoulders, standing proud despite the resignation showing through his blood and bruises.

  “Are you going to drop me in the water, too?” he asked. “Maybe knock me out first, to make sure I sink like the others before me?”

  Dirk shook his head.

  “Take your boat.” He nudged the fallen Frenchman with his foot. “Hell, take theirs if you want. We’ve got no use for either.”

  “We came to stop you leaving.” Ubu Peter looked at each of them in turn. “To kill you if we could. Why let me go?”

  “I understand your anger.” Dirk took a deep breath. He ached all over, and was too damn tired for a long debate. “I know what it’s like for your life to be in the hands of folks who don’t give a damn. I know what it’s like to lose good people, and to see their memory dishonoured. But to me, the dead are just bones, and what matters here is what we can learn for the living.

  “I don’t agree with what you wanted, but that doesn’t mean I don’t understand. Now we’ve done what we came for, and soon we’ll be too far away for you to do us any harm. The least we can do is not cause any more grief.”

  “You will tell others what you’ve seen here.” Ubu Peter’s tone was one of resignation, matching the slump of his shoulders.

  “Me?” Dirk shrugged. “Probably not. Him...” He gestured towards Blaze-Simms. “Discretion ain’t his strong suit. But attention ain’t either, so who knows.”

  “I...” Ubu Peter paused at the rail, one foot over the side.

  “Just go. I’m too damn tired to care, whatever it is.”

  The African nodded and disappeared over the side. Moments later, oars splashed in the water, then were joined by voices as Ubu Peter helped Felipe into the boat. The sound of oars faded as they sculled back towards the island. Overhead, gulls soared on the wind coming in off the ocean, hundreds of them flocking above the cliffs, their remains ensuring the island’s wealth.

  Dirk leaned against the rail and closed his eyes, sensing all the aches and pains that riddled his body. There was a salt taste on his tongue and a distant ringing in one ear. It was years since he’d been so tired and battered, and he’d been having more fun that time around.

  Cold and heavy, the tablet lay abandoned in the middle of the deck. He picked it up and peered at it. One face was inscribed with elaborate lettering, its edges smoothed by decades of ocean currents but the letters still legible. Meaningless to him, just a jumble of foreign characters, but someone at the Club would be able to translate it or crack whatever code it was in. There was usually a code.

  After all this, it had better be worth the reading.

  Isabelle eased the hammer back down on the gun as she came to his side, peering intently at the tablet.

  “Two down...” she said.

  “You couldn’t have stepped in sooner there?” Dirk asked. He spat out a mouthful of blood.

  Isabelle frowned.

  “I’m sorry, not my finest moment.” She looked over at Blaze-Simms, still stretched out unconscious on the deck. “We should get moving, before anybody else comes our way. Can you stay upright to take the helm while I see to Mr Blaze-Simms?”

  “Guess I’m gonna have to.”

  Dirk grabbed the unconscious Frenchman and dumped him into a rowboat bobbing at their side. He cast it off, not wishing the guy a particularly safe voyage, and set to raising the anchor. Beautiful as Hakon was, inspiring as its people’s soft revolution might be, he felt glad to be getting out of there. Ninjas, bears, gangsters, locals - there were only so many random attacks one man could take. He needed time to rest, and to work out who was behind some of them.

  A few minutes later he was at the wheel, sun beating down on his back, breeze brushing his wounds as it filled the sail and drove them north - away from the island of Hakon, leaving behind the ghosts of a cruel trade and the scars it left in its wake. Back to England, and the search for the next tablet.

  The sun was shining. They had what they’d come for. At last, Dirk smiled. It was turning into a mighty fine day.

  To Be Continued…

  Dirk, Timothy and Isabelle’s adventure continues in Suits and Sewers…

  Dirk Dynamo is glad to be back in civilisation, with the first two clues to the location of the Great Library of Alexandria. But when ninjas kidnap his best friend and steal a priceless artefect, Dirk is forced to pursue them across London and into the sewers below. Faced with deadly assassins and the strange followers of London’s Underlord, can Dirk save Sir Timothy and the tablet before he finds himself on the wrong end of a shuriken?

  Find out in Suits and Sewers.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  When not writing fiction I’ve worked as a teacher, academic, data analyst, project manager and, in my darkest hour, a call centre employee. Over the years I've studied medieval history, management, teaching and social research. I now work as a freelance writer for websites, books, apps, and anything else that needs words strung neatly together.

  If you’d like to read more of my stories you can get a free copy of my steampunk short story collection Riding the Mainspring by signing up for my mailing list. The collection includes two more of Dirk and Blaze-Simms’s adventures, fighting monsters and machines in the sewers beneath London and Venice.

  You may also enjoy my other books:

  The Epiphany Club:

  Suits and Sewers - Dirk’s journey takes him into the sewers below London, pursuing ninjas in search of a stolen artefact.

  Aristocrats and Artillery - As war descends on Paris, Dirk seeks the third clue to the Great Library.

  Sieges and Silverware - Dirk’s adventure takes him to Germany, where strange things roam in a castle under siege.

  Dead Men and Dynamite - At last Dirk has all the clues, but can he find the Great Library before his enemies do?

  Short stories:

  Mud and Brass - a mudlark inventor balances love and vengeance in a steampunk short story.

  Riding the Mainspring - a collection of steampunk short stories featuring moving buildings and incredible machines.

  From a Foreign Shore - history and alternate history short stories, featuring Vikings and a statue that refuses to die.

  By Sword, Stave or Stylus - fantasy short stories featuring a shadow-draped ninja, a gladiator painting in manticore blood and a knight so stupid that he just might win.

  Lies We Will Tell Ourselves - the future is uncertain and the truth even more so in these science fiction short stories.

  You can read free stories from me, as well as thoughts on books and writing, on my blog at https://andrewknighton.com/ . I'm also on Twitter where I go by the name of @gibbondemon .

  DEDICATION AND THANKS

  This book is dedicated to my friend Simon Childs. I can think of no better person to go adventuring with, whether it’s to face terrifying monsters, hunt assassins through the streets of Durham, or clamp the mystical island of Lantia. Mammoth!

  I owe a debt of thanks to many people for helping me with this story.

  Huge thanks to Laura Knighton and Sheila Thomas for reading the first draft and knocking off the roughest edges. Also to my accountability partner Russell Phillips, a great source of motivation and guidance.

  Thank you to my excellent beta readers, who provided me with both encouragement to continue and the insightful criticism I
needed to get things right. In no particular order - Ben Moxon, David Knighton, Joanna Chaplin, Kelly Cipolla-Fitzsimons, Mantaj Panesar, Peter Knighton, Steve Hartline, Tania Devine and Alice Macklin. Thank you all.