Beyond Compare

by Candace Camp

  “What are those?” Kyria asked.

  “These sort of jugs that they put water in, and then there’s this long tube that comes out of it, with a mouthpiece on the end, and that’s what you smoke from. Hookahs, they call them, too. It’s the way they smoke tobacco and other drugs. It’s not as strong because they mix the opium with tobacco, see? And most who favor those dens are Arabs and Turks and such.”

  “Lebanese, like our friend Mr. Habib,” Rafe added.

  “So…another connection to Istanbul,” Kyria mused.

  “Yeah—or just the place Habib would naturally go to if he’s an addict.”

  When they reached the warehouse where the opium den was located, they had the coachman drive past it and stop a block away before they disembarked. The carriage lumbered off down a side street to wait for them, and the three of them walked back to the nondescript warehouse.

  Tom pushed open the door, nodding to the man who stepped forward to greet them. Kyria kept behind Rafe in an attempt to show as little of her face as possible, but she glanced all around her interestedly. The term opium den conjured up in her mind a vision of sinful, exotic surroundings. She had envisioned dark red velvet sofas and low, flickering lights, gauzy curtains and enormous plush cushions on Persian-carpeted floors.

  The reality was disappointingly stark. The floor was bare, old wood, scarred and pitted, and there was no red velvet or exotic lights anywhere in evidence. Ordinary kerosene lamps lighted the room rather dimly, and the drab walls were unadorned by any sort of hangings, gauzy or otherwise. Cushions and mats were scattered around the room, most of them occupied, and among the seating arrangements were low tables on which sat water pipes of various shapes and sizes. Men lay and sat beside these tables, puffing at the pipes and paying little attention to anything. In an area off to one side, one of the girls Tom had mentioned danced for a group of men, and Kyria’s eyes widened a little at her skimpy attire of filmy trousers hung low on her hips and a short blouse that left her entire stomach area exposed. As she danced, bells tinkled at her wrists and ankles and waist.

  The man who had greeted them went on to offer them all the pleasures of the place, but Rafe shook his head, saying, “I just want to look around a bit first. Visiting, you see. I’m from the States. I’ve never seen one of these places before.”

  “Very good, very good,” the man said, smiling and bobbing his head. “You look. Anything you want.”

  Rafe, Kyria and Tom strolled through the room, the doorman trailing alongside them, still smiling and dipping his head obsequiously until finally Rafe stopped him with a sharp word. They looked carefully all around them as they walked. The customers were largely Middle Eastern in appearance, many of them clad in traditional robes and turbans, or kaffiyehs, some of them in Western suits. But there were a number of Englishmen, as well, and Kyria realized with a start of recognition that a man standing near a beaded-glass curtain at the rear of the room was the third son of Lord Herringford.

  There was, disappointingly, no sign of Habib or either of the collectors who had shown interest in the box.

  Kyria looked back at Lord Herringford’s son and saw him nod to the man with whom he had been chatting and slip through the curtain of beads. Kyria poked Rafe in the back.

  “Look,” she hissed in his ear. “Someone went back there.”

  Rafe nodded and wound his way casually through the room until he was near the beaded curtain.

  “Don’t look back,” he whispered to the others. “Be natural.”

  Kyria, concentrating on keeping her stride long and manly while at the same time unobtrusively scanning the room, decided it was hard enough just to keep from craning her neck behind her to see whether the doorman was watching them without having to think about what looked natural.

  They paused in front of the beaded curtain, and as Rafe turned to Kyria, Tom slipped through the curtain into the back. Kyria realized then that she and Rafe blocked the smaller man from the view of the rest of the room.

  “Go on and stroll a little ways over there,” Rafe murmured. “Then come back to meet me.”

  Kyria did as he told her, walking away from him and pretending interest in something on the low table in front of her. A man lay on a mat beside it, asleep, the long tube and mouthpiece of the water pipe dangling beside him. She turned and walked back. Rafe had walked farther away, and she sauntered over to join him.

  She wondered what they were doing and why they had not joined Tom, but she kept her mouth shut, knowing that it would be disastrous for anyone to hear her voice. Rafe walked back through the room, moving without seeming haste. The doorman was watching them, and a frown appeared on his face. He glanced around, then looked back at Kyria and Rafe.

  When they drew near, Rafe would have passed him, but the man planted himself directly in their path, saying, “Where is other?”

  “What? Other what?” Rafe replied, looking puzzled.

  “Other man. Other man.”

  “Oh, that chap. He stopped to visit someone he knew,” Rafe said, gesturing vaguely behind them. “Very interesting place you have here.”

  He started around the man to the door.

  “You like? You buy?” the doorman said, distracted from the matter of Tom’s presence by Rafe’s leaving. “Do not go. I give you good price, good price. First time offer,” he said, grinning, in the tone of something learned by rote.

  Rafe smiled pleasantly, waving him off as he walked away, Kyria in his wake. “It’s not what I expected, you see. Not the sort of place I was told about. I think it must be a Chinese place we want.”

  “No. Chinese not the best way. Best opium in the world comes from Turkey!” the man said, opening his arms grandly. “Turkish way of smoking is the best way. You see. I show you. Give you first pipe free.”

  The man pursued them out into the street, earnestly selling the admirable points of his method of opium intake, but Rafe merely shook his head good-naturedly and walked on. After trailing them halfway down the block, the doorman finally gave up and trudged back to the warehouse, grumbling under his breath.

  “What are we doing?” Kyria whispered, once the doorman was gone.

  Rafe glanced back to make sure that the man was out of sight, then picked up his pace. “We’re looking for an alleyway beside this building. Tom told me there was one. He’s going to try to find a back door and open it for us, and we are going to inspect the back rooms of this place. I figured we might be able to hide Tom’s slipping in, but if all three of us went back there, they’d be bound to come charging after us. This way, with any luck, we’ll get in the back way and they’ll not know it.”

  They came upon the alleyway and stopped, peering down it doubtfully. It was narrow, barely wide enough for two people to walk abreast, and enveloped in stygian darkness. They started down the alley cautiously.

  As they walked, their eyes grew more accustomed to the dark, and they realized that there were a few dimly lit windows opening into the alley, though all were covered with curtains. A door opened not far ahead of them, a rectangle of light revealing Tom Quick, who was looking up and down the alley. They hurried to join him inside and shut the door behind them.

  “There’re a bunch of little rooms back here,” Tom told them, speaking in a whisper. “I’ve looked into most of ’em. They’re either empty or just have some bloke or two in ’em smoking away.”

  “Private rooms for their more important customers,” Rafe said. “It makes sense. Any offices?”

  “No.” Tom nodded his head toward a plain staircase behind them. “But I haven’t been upstairs yet.”

  “Let’s try it. We might get lucky and find Habib,” Rafe said, starting toward the stairs.

  “Or whoever he was meeting.” Kyria followed Rafe up the stairs, adding, “If, of course, he was meeting someone.”

  “And if we would recognize that person if we saw him,” Rafe stuck in.

  Kyria sighed. It didn’t seem likely that they were going to meet with an
y success. Still, they had to try; it was the only lead they had.

  At the top of the stairs, they found a hallway lined with doors on either side, all closed. They moved along the corridor, opening the doors as they went and peering inside. The first two rooms Kyria tried were empty, though obviously set up for a customer, with a narrow cot and a low table containing a water pipe.

  In the third room, Kyria found a man seated on the bed, leaning back against the wall, shoes off and collar opened, puffing on the pipe. It was Lord Herringford’s son, whom she had seen earlier downstairs. He looked at her with a sort of languid disdain.

  “Here, what are you doing barging in like that?” he asked, his tongue tripping a little over his words.

  Kyria just smiled and shook her head, backing out the door. His eyes narrowed and he leaned forward a little. “I say, do I know you?”

  “No,” Kyria answered in as low and gruff a voice as she could manage.

  Tom popped his head in beside her, saying cheerfully, “Sorry, mate,” and they closed the door.

  “Someone you know?” Rafe murmured.

  “Not well,” Kyria whispered back. “It’s nothing significant, just a little surprising. His father is rather important in the government.”

  They turned down another hall, which ended in a set of stairs. They opened the first door, which seemed to be a storeroom of some sort, with stacks of black material on shelves, along with more pipes and several boxes. Rafe started toward the boxes.

  At that moment, a large man coming out of one of the rooms farther down the hall spotted Kyria and Tom standing at the storeroom door, and his brows rushed together.

  “Ere!” he called, starting toward them purposefully. “Wot the devil are you doing? Nobody’s allowed back ’ere without one of us!”

  “Don’t get yourself all in a pucker,” Tom said cheerfully, starting toward him as Rafe quickly stepped back out of the room. “We’re lookin’ for a room, like.”

  “The devil you say! You’re up ’ere lookin’ for sommat to steal!” He reached out for Tom, who jumped back away from his grasp.

  Faster than any of them could see, Rafe’s gun was in his hand and pointed at the man. The man stopped, his eyes on the pistol.

  “Let’s go,” Rafe said quietly, jerking his head back in the direction they had come. Kyria and Tom turned and walked down the hall with Rafe following them, walking backward, holding the large man at bay.

  The man edged after him, but Rafe gave a warning twitch of his gun. “Stay right there. If I see your face around this corner, I’m firing. Got it?”

  The other man nodded, his jaw set and his eyes blazing with fury. Rafe hurried behind Kyria and Tom, half-turned so that he could see back down the length of the hall. When he got to the stairs, he faced forward and ran down the stairs after the other two.

  As he reached the last step, he heard their opponent letting out a bellow, “Thieves! ’Elp! Thieves!”

  Tom and Kyria were waiting at the bottom of the stairs for Rafe, and as he appeared, Tom flung open the door. The last thing they saw before they slammed the door shut behind them was a door opening at the other end of the hall and a turbaned man charging out.

  The darkness in the narrow alleyway slowed them down, but when they reached the street, they broke into a run. Unfortunately, to reach their carriage, they had to pass by the front door of the den, and before they could reach it, several men, including the large man who had stopped them in the hall, came storming out.

  The sight of Rafe’s gun pointed at them made them check. They started to walk around the group of men, but suddenly a rock came whistling through the air behind them and slammed into Rafe’s shoulder, sending the gun flying from his hand. The gun went off as it hit the pavement, knocking a chunk of brick out of the building.

  The men charged at them. Rafe threw himself in front of Kyria, shouting, “Run!”

  “And leave you?” Kyria said with scorn, crouching down to pull the derringer from her boot.

  She came up firing just as a man leaped at her, and he fell back with a shriek, clutching his shoulder. Rafe knocked one man out with a quick uppercut to the jaw, but another smaller man rushed in from behind swinging a knife and slashed out. Rafe spun quickly to the side to avoid the blade, but it managed to slice through his jacket sleeve, cutting his arm. He closed in quickly and grappled with the man, his hands clenched around the smaller man’s wrist.

  Tom, meanwhile, was slugging it out with the man who had discovered them in the hallway. The other man was larger by far, but Tom was light on his feet and could dodge in and out, escaping the man’s swinging blows and landing a few punches of his own. Kyria’s small gun held only one bullet, and before she could dig another out of her pocket and reload, another man was on her. All she could do was swing her arm as hard as she could into the side of her assailant’s head, the small gun still resting in the palm of her hand.

  But then the group of men who had emerged from the door behind them were also upon them, and they were hopelessly outnumbered. A blow from behind knocked Kyria to the ground, sending her hat rolling and her hair tumbling free. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Tom get knocked to the ground. Rafe gripped her wrist with one steely hand, yanked her to her feet and shoved her behind him, then lashed out at her assailant with the knife he had taken from its owner.

  He swung wide, keeping their enemies at bay. Kyria fumbled a bullet from her pocket and into her gun. She raised it, and for a moment they were able to hold off their attackers, standing back to back, weapons at ready. But it was clear that their advantage would not last long; they were greatly outnumbered, at least six or seven men to their three, and there were more spilling out the front door. Tom, struggling to his feet, was blasted again by a blow from the large man’s fist, and he collapsed.

  Kyria screamed at the top of her lungs to their coachman, hoping the sound would carry to him, and waved her gun back and forth, threatening the men edging closer to them. In a moment, she knew, their enemies would rush them, and it would be all over.

  CHAPTER 16

  Out of the shadows came a loud cry as several white-robed men came running out of the darkness, shouting in an unknown language. They carried stout sticks, and when they reached the startled combatants, they laid about them with their cudgels, knocking out several of the men Rafe and Kyria were fighting before their hapless victims even knew what was on them.

  Rafe tucked the knife in his pocket and jumped into the fray with his fists, a weapon he was much more accustomed to using. Kyria, still holding her gun to keep the enemy at bay, skirted over to where Tom lay on the ground and reached down with her free hand to help him up. Tom grasped her hand and stood up somewhat dazedly.

  They heard the clatter of horses’ hooves on the brick-lined street, and Kyria glanced down the block to see the Moreland carriage charging toward them. At the sight of the four-horse equipage, the combatants scrambled to get out of the way. The coachman hauled back on the reins at the last moment and the horses stopped, shaking their heads and snorting. The coachman wrapped the reins around one hand to hold the steeds and grabbed his long whip with the other.

  He stood up, roaring, “Dare ye attack a Moreland?”

  He brought down his whip with a mighty crack, catching three of the men from the opium den with it. It was the last straw. The enemy broke, running back into the building.

  “Quick! Into the carriage. They may come back with reinforcements,” Rafe said, running over to pick up his gun.

  Kyria opened the door and helped Tom inside. She turned to the white-robed men who had helped them, motioning them toward the carriage. “Come. You had better get away from here, too, you know.”

  The men hesitated. Then one of them, apparently the leader, nodded to the others. He held out his hand in a courtly way to help Kyria up into the vehicle, then climbed in after her. The others scrambled up into the carriage, two of them hopping onto the back of the vehicle and the other two wedging themselves
onto the seat with the coachman. Rafe, gun in hand and watching the front door of the opium den, was the last to climb in. The carriage took off, its pace more sedate because of the heavy load.

  “Are you all right?” Rafe looked at Kyria with concern.

  “Yes. What about you?” She reached over to touch his arm where the jacket was ripped and stained red with blood.

  “Just a scratch,” he replied, peeling back the edges of the jacket and shirt to look at the long red streak across his arm. “It’s the blasted place where he hit me with that rock that hurts.” Rafe moved his shoulder, grimacing.

  They glanced at Tom inquiringly, and he gave them a nod, rubbing his hands over his face. “That big brute packed quite a wallop, I’ll tell you.” His jaw tightened. “I’d like to get another crack at him.”

  “You and me both,” Rafe said grimly. He looked at the man sitting beside Tom.

  His hair was dark blond and worn rather long. His face was thin and narrow, devoid of facial hair, and dominated by a pair of piercing blue eyes. He was dressed in a robe of a coarse white material, with a hood hanging down the back. Over the robe hung a white linen surplice, wide-necked and open at the sides, and embroidered on the chest in purple was a symbol that looked like the letter P superimposed over the letter X. A rope was tied around the waist over both the robe and surplice. Still in his hand was the knobby, stout stick.

  Kyria’s eyes were drawn to the symbol. It was, she felt almost certain, the Chi-Rho monogram that was said to have adorned the banner Constantine’s troops carried.

  “Thank you for helping us,” Rafe said to the man. “Haven’t I seen you before?”

  The man’s gaze flickered to Kyria and quickly away. Finally he said in a heavily accented voice, “We have been with you.”