by Zizou Corder
‘Dio mio, is a Lion,’ he whispered. ‘Always more Lion!’
And then: ‘But Lions don’t have six legs,’ he said to himself. ‘Er – seven … er … and two tails …’
The Young Lion coughed sheepishly.
Elsina raised her sweet face and purred at him.
‘Elsina!’ he squeaked. ‘My beautiful girl!’ To tell the truth he was extremely charmed, but charming purring was all very well – what were they going to be fed on? Claudio shook his head furiously, as if by shaking it they might go away.
‘How come there is Lions?’ he squeaked, trying to squash his outrage. ‘I don’t have enough to eat for two Lions! How can I feed? How can I hide? O Dio mio, ma che fate qui, siete pazzi leonacci, è troppo questo, non posso …’
Claudio felt he ought to be cross. He was cross.
But Elsina was so sweet.
‘You plan this or what?’ Claudio demanded.
The Young Lion looked as affronted as he could. Elsina looked as winning as she could.
Claudio stared at them and it began to sink in to him just what a position he was in.
I should turn straight around and go back to Venice, he thought. This is absurd.
But as absurd as it was, he could not seriously consider deserting Charlie. He just couldn’t. And how could he turf these Lions out now?
So, he thought, I’ll just be shovelling merda di leoni overboard every morning, and the sailors will think I’m completely pazzo, and they’ll be right. I must find a way to take them in my cabin. More safe.
He and Boris had been given a tiny cabin to share. The Lions would just have to sneak into it, and stay put until – o Dio mio. What would King Boris say?
Just then Younus called down into the hold. Putting his finger to his lips to shush the Lions, Claudio turned and slipped out. Younus and King Boris were discussing a simple yet vital question: where were they going?
‘We have a clear view of Suleiman’s Joy,’ Younus said excitedly. ‘We can catch them if you like. Certainly we won’t lose them. But please, it would help to know where we are going. It’s not like New York “Follow That Cab!” There at least they have streets and back-up other cops in automobiles coming up vroom vroom bang bang.’
‘My dear boy,’ said King Boris kindly. ‘Let me assure you that we have not the slightest idea where we are going, and indeed, as soon as any information reaches us, believe me, dear boy, you will be the first to know.’ And with those reassuring words, he pit-patted up to the bows, where he planned to enjoy the magnificent sunset.
The Head Chief Executive thought quietly. None of the Ashanti family to be found in Essaouira, though they had been there recently. A Lioncatcher. Three boats heading west suddenly; two of them following the first. A young guy with a bad arm asking for a Liontrainer.
So who’s on those boats?
Who’s following who, and why and … where?
He thought. All heading west, following each other.
How interesting.
Rafi Sadler really had made a mess of things, but perhaps …
The Head Chief Executive made a decision, and then he made a call.
Back in Essaouira, the men in burnooses packed up and left.
Chapter Seven
On board Old Yeller, just as Charlie felt the unmistakable sound of Maccomo’s voice vibrate in his ear, the telephone started to vibrate in his pocket.
He couldn’t answer it! Maccomo would take it away, and then how would he communicate? There were no cats in mid-ocean to take notes.
But what was Maccomo doing here? He was meant to be lying in a stupor under a tree at Lionhome! How had he escaped? How had the Lions let him?
A glance at the screen told him that, yes, it was his mother.
He bit his lip. He could hardly bear it. It would go to Message, and she would leave one, and he could call for it later and hear her sweet voice, and her wise advice. But he hated that he couldn’t answer and speak to her now.
Maccomo, meanwhile, had taken Rafi’s phone off him. Rafi had quite a lot to say about that.
‘Excuse me, Maccomo, but what exactly is going on ’ere? I came to you in good faith, with a business proposition, and now you’re sticking me in the basement of this bliddy boat like I’m your prisoner, and excuse me, trying to take my phone off of me. What’s up, man? What’s the problem?’ You could hear in his voice that he was torn between being really angry and wanting to be threatening and rude, and realizing that actually Maccomo had all the power so he’d be better off sucking up to him. It made for a very nasty mixture.
Charlie found himself listening to Rafi’s voice for any kind of family similarity.
‘You have no proposition, Rafi,’ Maccomo said, turning away from him. ‘You have nothing to offer me.’
‘Well, I did ’ave!’ crowed Rafi. ‘I only had your favourite little Catspeaking Charlie bliddy Ashanti, didn’t I, back in town? So what all this sweeping off to sea is about, I don’t know. We could make a good deal here, Maccomo! I’ve got the contacts, and the boy …’
‘If you have so much, Rafi, why do you need me? And why are you sitting tied up like a chicken in the bottom of my boat?’ asked Maccomo quietly. ‘And why do you lie to me? A man who is succeeding has no need to lie.’ His voice was as calm and cool as ever. Maccomo never raised his voice. Charlie remembered the flash of dark fire in the back of Maccomo’s eyes, the only way he ever expressed passion. He bet the dark fire was flashing now – just the once. Nothing extravagant.
And Charlie knew too from Maccomo’s voice that he hadn’t been taking the medicine drops. This was the clear, calm, dangerous Maccomo of old.
Charlie lay silent in his sack. He longed for Sergei to come to him. And little Ninu!
‘We got your message, darling,’ Magdalen cried into the telephone. ‘We’re coming after you. Where are you going?’ She closed her eyes, trying to think what was important to say. She couldn’t think. ‘Love you,’ she ended weakly, and rang off.
‘Sweetheart,’ said Aneba kindly, but at the kindness in his voice she started to weep, and he was not able to speak to her for a moment or two except to murmur comforting words he hardly believed himself. Soon, though, she wiped her nose and shook her head and said, ‘Yes?’
‘The Corporacy has all these Communities, all over the world,’ he said. ‘But Mabel said Headquarters and I think she must be right. The Headquarters, I’ve always heard, is secret.’
‘So … what?’ asked Magdalen.
‘They’ve got Communities in California and New England, and Florida, and in Mexico and Brazil and Venezuela and Chile, in Canada – I remember reading a list … But there’s one place you don’t hear about …’
‘What?’
‘Have you ever heard of a Corporacy Gated Village Community in the Caribbean?’
‘Well, no, I haven’t.’
‘And isn’t that odd? Because wouldn’t you think they’d have loads down there? What with the climate, and the beaches, and the palm trees, and how lovely it is? Holiday communities, and retirement communities, and all that stuff? But you don’t hear about it.’
‘It’s like the case of the dog that didn’t bark,’ said Magdalen, perking up.
‘Exactly. Why didn’t the dog bark? You’d have expected it to bark – it should have barked. Why don’t we hear about the Corporacy Communities in the Caribbean – we’d expect to. So there has to be a reason why we don’t …’
‘And you think it’s the secrecy.’
‘I think it might be.’
Magdalen was silent a moment. She huddled against Aneba.
‘Imagine,’ she said, ‘how Charlie must have felt that first night, running away from Rafi, chasing after us without any idea where we were being taken. The bravery of that boy …’
‘And here we are, in the same situation,’ said Aneba.
Magdalen closed her eyes for a moment.
‘We’ll tell Suleiman tomorrow,’ she said. ‘It’s all westwar
d anyway, for now. Come on. Let’s go in and get some rest.’
It had been quite uncomfortable enough trussed up in a dusty sack without the knowledge that Rafi Sadler was just a few metres away from him, or that he had been captured by Maccomo. Now, trussed up in the dusty sack, with his two enemies in the dank hold with him, and his mother’s call unanswered in his pocket, his friends all left behind in Morocco, Charlie felt about as low as he could feel.
He hardly dared to breathe – and not just because the dust was setting off his asthma. He was horribly aware of how he had punched Rafi. He was even more horribly aware of how he had handed Maccomo over to the Lions, and left him bound and drugged in the dust. He was utterly confused by the new situation that Rafi was his cousin, and worried about what, if anything, it meant – for example, was he supposed to like him now? Or at least not loathe everything about him? And he was most horribly aware that neither of these two guys was going to forgive him one tiny little bit for his having got the better of them, and made fools of them, and beaten them. Both of them would want to make him suffer. And both of them were much nastier than he was, and would think of much nastier ways to punish him than he had thought of for them.
He was aware that at various stages he could have just let the Lions eat them both, and that if he had done that, he would not be in this situation now.
But it still wouldn’t have been right.
Especially not his cousin. Snike it, he didn’t want Rafi to be his cousin!
Anyway, why wouldn’t it be right? Wouldn’t it count as self-defence, given that neither of these two would leave him alone? He wasn’t asking them to follow him around and try to steal him the whole time – wouldn’t he be justified in whatever he did to get them off his back?
Oh, but what a stupid time to be having an argument with himself. He had no power to defend himself at all now. Here he was in a sack. And if he were let out of the sack, there’s no telling if things would get any better. At least now Maccomo was ignoring him and Rafi didn’t seem to know he was here. Actually, he’d like to stay in the sack. Much better. Safer.
At that moment Maccomo said a few words in Arabic to the other man, the one who had tried to take Rafi’s phone off him.
‘Talk bliddy English, won’t you?’ Charlie heard Rafi say crossly.
And then the other man was manhandling Charlie, pulling the sack off him – pulling his hair in the process.
‘Oww,’ said Charlie.
‘What the crike!’ said Rafi.
‘You. Here,’ said the man, and swiftly lashed Charlie’s arms to his chest.
Charlie’s limbs were stiff and his eyes blinking even in the gloom of the hold, but despite it all, in that moment he remembered something. A voice from months ago: ‘Make your muscles tense and big, and fill your chest and belly with air. Then when you relax and breathe out, the ropes will be looser around you.’ He did it. He could feel his torso and biceps swelling. The man was tying Charlie’s wrists with the same rope behind his back, and then the other end of the rope to one of the upright struts of the ship, leaving a loose sort of lead of a foot or two.
Charlie tried to focus. The light was dim, the hold was large, a doorway up to the left let in a shaft of light.
Lashed to the opposite strut, some five metres in front of Charlie, stood Rafi.
Rafi let loose a mouthful of extremely bad language.
Charlie held his chest-filling breath.
Maccomo said nothing.
The other man tugged on Charlie’s bonds, to make sure they were tight. Charlie still held.
‘You! You despicable little snike, you scumbag ratface little piece of … I’ll have you. I’ll bliddy have you, Charlie bliddy snike-face – you little graspole, you …’
Charlie let out his breath as gently as he could, and relaxed.
‘Yeah, hello to you too, Rafi,’ he said with a tired little smile.
Things were now about as bad as they could be.
‘SILENCE!’ said Maccomo. He stared at them, from one to the other, standing like a judge between them, a dark figure with the lighted doorway behind him. ‘You two small boys will not trouble my peace of mind. You will be silent. There has been a nonsensical conception,’ he said, his voice growing silky again, ‘that what either of you chooses to do has some effect on me – that you have some kind of power, or influence, on me and what I do. This idea is not to be entertained. It is nonsense. You two small boys are little nothings. Remember that. Little nothings. I take no notice of you.’
He turned on his heel as if to leave, his robe swishing behind him on the grubby wooden floor. Then he paused a moment.
‘Oh,’ he said. ‘And should either of you do any harm to the other, the same harm will be done back to him.’
And then he left. His henchman followed him. Charlie wriggled a little. Yes, the bonds were bearable.
Silence filled the dim cavern of the hold. Silence, and the immutable rushing of the sea beyond the wooden body of the ship.
Charlie was relieved. He’d been expecting a huge telling-off, a beating – he didn’t know what, but something more than a little run-of-the-mill humiliation. Lord, he could put up with Maccomo being rude to him. That was no problem.
Rafi, though, was furious. He was silent, for the moment, but he was breathing heavily, his eyes were glowing and his face had gone white with anger. Charlie eyed him carefully, trying not to let it show that that was what he was doing. If Rafi was going to be so very excitable, Charlie would have to be very careful not to set him off by accident, by looking at him, or some other unforgivable insult.
He might set him off on purpose, to amuse himself. But that was something different.
Well, as soon as he was sure Maccomo was out of earshot, Rafi went off anyway – a good ten-minute diatribe about Charlie’s stupidity, his ugliness, his weakness, his parents and their stupidity, ugliness and weakness, a brief foray into his pride and thinking himself so special, and how he was no better than anybody else, a comment on his having no friends … At first Charlie blocked it out, but of course phrases slipped through, and gradually Charlie realized something rather interesting. All these insults that Rafi was throwing at him were actually true of Rafi himself. It was Rafi who had proved himself to be vain and foolish and proud and weak and stupid and arrogant and greedy and uppity, Rafi whose parents had let him down, Rafi who had no friends. Only the ugliness didn’t apply – even Charlie could see that Rafi was very good-looking, with his long eyelashes and high cheekbones. Though actually the effect was ruined by his spoiled and mean expression, and the whole combination, which in a way made him really ugly.
This realization made it easier to hear Rafi’s shower of insults. It also had the slightly odd effect of making Charlie feel sorry for Rafi. Imagine knowing so little about yourself! Imagine having to be such a horrible person as Rafi! But he stopped himself. He’d felt sorry for Rafi before, and he’d learned that being sorry for Rafi just comes up behind you and bites you on the bum, and Rafi being his cousin didn’t change that. He wasn’t going to be sorry for Rafi and he wasn’t going to be sorry for himself.
Charlie sneaked another look at him. Did he and Rafi look at all alike? Did he look like Mabel? For the first time, Charlie wondered who Rafi’s dad was.
Stop it, he told himself. He was going to move round to the other side of the strut where he couldn’t see Rafi, and he was going to sit down and work out how this terrible situation could have come about, and where they could be going, and what he could do about it.
‘Don’t you turn away from me, you little runt, you come back here when I’m talking to you, who do you think you are …’
Charlie leaned back against the strut, stared at the wall, and tried to think.
As soon as it was dark enough, and the humans mostly asleep, Sergei started sniffing around the boat. It was bigger than he’d expected, but even so it didn’t take him long to sniff out where Charlie was being kept. He located two entrances: the door
, towards the stern, and a hatch, towards the bow. Both were strong and firmly closed. But that was just human entrances.
Now, he thought. Where’s the Rat Network?
Almost all ships – and many other places – have a Rat Network. (The Circe didn’t, because the rats were put off by the smell of the Lions. They wouldn’t go on board if you paid them – and rats will do anything for money.) It didn’t take him long to find it: a dingy-looking hole leading from the corridor by the galley, the ship’s tiny kitchen. Too small for Sergei, obviously, but the chameleon could do it.
Sergei went back to the coil of rope they were calling home.
‘Oi, reptile,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Got a job for yer.’
Ninu poked his face out. ‘Really?’ he said. No one had ever asked Ninu to do a job before. He rather liked the idea.
Until he saw the hole, that is.
‘I can’t go down there!’ he squeaked. ‘It’s dark and horrible! Who lives down there? What if they bite me?’
Sergei sighed theatrically. ‘Excuse me,’ he said. ‘If you could manage to overcome your pathetic bourgeois antipathy to the dark and the unknown, you could become, instantly, the hero of the hour by making contact with Charlie, tellin’ ’im that we’re ’ere, transporting messages and generally in all senses saving the bliddy day. If yer don’t, we’re stuck. So make yer bliddy mind up, would yer? I’m getting cold sat here.’
Ninu stared. He shivered.
‘Whose hole is it?’ he asked in a small voice.
‘Rats’,’ said Sergei.
‘Oh,’ said Ninu.
And he took a tiny breath, and he made his mind up, and he slipped into the hole.
‘Bloomin’ ’eck,’ mused Sergei admiringly. ‘I didn’t think he’d do it.’
It was dark and smelly in the hole, dusty under Ninu’s tummy. He scurried along, trundling like a toy on wheels, hoping that there wouldn’t be a fork where he would have to decide which way to go. He smelt air ahead – not fresh air, but the wide air of a large space. He smelt rat too, but old rat, not fresh rat right here about to challenge him and bite him and want to know who he was and what he was doing. He smelt rat from half an hour ago. Rat who might be here next time. But not rat right now, so it was OK. Just.
