The Time Travelling Taxman Series Box Set

by Rachel Ford

  “We weren’t sure,” Nance demurred. “We’ve gotten so turned around.”

  The fishmonger’s confusion did not diminish. “Hmm.”

  Alfred decided to try another tack. He wasn’t sure why Winthrop had dumped them on the mainland instead of Atupal. But, since he apparently had, he needed to figure out the nearest means of transportation. “Suppose we…well, if we wanted to get to the island, how would we do that?”

  “The island?” Her expression lightened. “Well, you’ll have to hire a boat for that. You could talk to Dagson. He’s making another trip out today yet. He’d take you, for a few coppers.”

  “Dagson?” Nance repeated. “Where would we find him.”

  Pointing a crooked finger toward the docks, the old woman indicated a broad, one-legged man. “That’d be Dagson. Tell him Ruthie sent you, will ya’? Tell him he owes me first dibs on the catch next time.”

  “Thank you, Ruthie. We owe you.”

  “Not at all, young travelers. But before you go, won’t you buy a slab of smoked fish to take with you? I’d hate to think of you out at sea with nothing to eat.”

  Nancy did, and Alfred tucked the odiferous bundle into their backpack. It reeked, and he had every intention of dumping it at the earliest opportunity. But that would have to wait until they were out of sight.

  “Good work, babe,” Nance whispered as they headed for the docks.

  “What?”

  “Getting the info, about the island.”

  “Oh.”

  “I guess Winthrop wasn’t exaggerating. They don’t like Trajan here.”

  “No, they certainly don’t.”

  “But why do you think he sent us here instead of Atupal?”

  Alfred shook his head. “I was wondering the same thing myself. But I have no idea why.”

  Nancy’s brow furrowed in thought, but she said no more as they neared the docks. The one-legged man Ruthie had pointed out was hard at work, barking out orders to a handful of underlings. They were shifting empty crates and barrels, and wrangling with large nets. He glanced up as they neared. His fierce eyes and large jowls reminded the taxman of a bulldog. But the bulldog’s bite, it seemed, was not as bad as his bark. Though his expression remained fixed in a scowl at the sight of Alfred’s approach, the instant he saw Nance, he doffed his cap and bared his teeth in some semblance of a smile. The sight made the taxman shiver, but she was more diplomatic.

  “Mister Dagson?”

  “Captain Dagson,” he replied. “At your service, Miss.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry.”

  “No worries at all. Can I help you?”

  “We were hoping to buy passage with you, to the island. Ruthie said you were heading over today?”

  “Ruthie, eh?” He set his jaw, and Alfred couldn’t tell if it was a scowl or a smile. “And let me guess, she expects the fare will get her first pick of my fish?”

  “Err, yes, she did mention something like that.”

  Dagson’s expression deepened, but it wasn’t until he began to laugh that the taxman perceived it was an amused reaction. “Well, well. The woman’s insufferable. But better she sends fares my way than Tigve’s, eh?”

  Nancy murmured in the affirmative, and the captain nodded vigorously. “Well, will you be heading back with us, or is it just for the one crossing?”

  “Just the one way.”

  “Alright. Then that’ll be a copper and a half for each of you.” Nance paid the three coppers, and he counted twice. Then, nodding, Dagson said, “Well, we’ll be setting out in the half hour. You can board now, or then. But don’t be late. We won’t go looking for you.”

  Chapter Seven

  Considering that fair warning, they boarded without delay. The Red Eel – Dagson’s fishing boat – did not leave in half an hour, though.

  On the contrary, an hour passed before they weighed anchor, and the captain was puffing and fuming at the delay. His jaw was set into a deep grimace, and his cheeks were so red Alfred feared for his health. He feared more, though, for the crew of the Red Eel, for they were on the receiving end of Dagson’s wrath. He had a whole slew of colorful adjectives to describe the men under his command – them, and several generations of relatives before them.

  The delay, Alfred gathered from this ranting, was attributable to incompetence of every variety from the crew. Gross incompetence; disgusting incompetence. Incompetence that was at once inconceivable, unrivaled, and goll-darned typical. It was hare-brained, but, the captain insisted, it took an effort to be just that incompetent.

  The sheer volume of Dagson’s anger made Alfred positively uncomfortable, and he and Nance sat together on the far end of the deck. He couldn’t speak for her, but he was counting the minutes until they reached Atupal.

  After a short time at sea, when the shore was beginning to diminish, Dagson joined them. The taxman would have preferred being ignored until they reached land, but the other man seemed intent on apologizing. “Forgive the delay, Miss. These damned fools’ll put me in the ground one of these days.”

  “It’s quite alright, Captain,” Nance assured him.

  He, though, frowned at her. “No it bloody well isn’t. I’ve never worked with such an incompetent band of imbeciles.”

  “I’m sorry,” Nance said. “That must be…difficult.”

  “Difficult? Impossible, more like. I’m ready to keelhaul the lot of them. Except they’d probably mutiny. The bastards.”

  The prospect of mutinies and keelhauling was a little much for Alfred. It was the language, though, that really pushed him over the edge. “So, umm, Captain?”

  “What?”

  “How long do you think it’ll be before we reach Atupal?”

  Dagson blinked, his eyes flashing angrily as he repeated, “What?”

  “No rush,” the taxman hastened to assure him. “I was just wondering if I, err, had time for a nap.”

  Dagson ignored this lie, though. “Did you say Atupal?”

  Alfred stared, a little taken aback by the hostility in the other man’s tone. “Yes?”

  “Why in the gods’ names would you want to know how long it’d be to Atupal?”

  “Because…that’s where we’re going?”

  Dagson’s cheeks turned a deep crimson, and he fixed first the taxman, then Nancy, with a piercing glare. “Are you daft? We’re going to the Island, not that godsforsaken den of iniquity.”

  Nancy cleared her throat. “Forgive me, Captain. But…are you saying the island we’re going to is…not Atupal?”

  “Of course it’s not. Why would you get in a ship to go to Atupal?” He shook his head, as if the idea was madness. “Are you daft?”

  “Then…where are we going?”

  “The Island. That’s where you said you wanted to go.”

  “So…the island is some other island, other than Atupal?”

  He glared at Alfred. “Obviously. You think I’d take you to Atupal for three coppers? I wouldn’t take you there for three hundred coppers.”

  “Oh.” Nance blinked. “Well, umm, I think there’s a mistake, Captain.”

  “What kind of mistake?”

  “We, uh, thought you were taking us to Atupal. When you said the island, we thought you meant that island.”

  Dagson crossed his arms. “There’s no refunds, Miss.”

  “No, no of course not. I wouldn’t dream of it, Captain. The mistake was ours.”

  “You’re damned right it was.”

  “Darned,” Alfred corrected, catching himself a moment too late. The barrage of language he’d suffered so far overpowered his sense of self-preservation. But, staring into the captain’s death stare, he was keenly aware of his misstep. “Err, never mind.”

  “Of course it was,” Nance continued, in her most placating tones. “And we’ll compensate you accordingly for return passage.”

  Dagson, though, crossed his arms. “We agreed on a one-way trip.”

  “Yes, but that was before we knew we weren’t heading to
Atupal.”

  “That’s your mistake, not mine.”

  “Which is why we’ll pay you handsomely, Captain.”

  Dagson seemed to consider this, now. His scowl eased, and a greedy glint lit his eyes. “Handsomely, eh? How handsomely?”

  Alfred glanced between the fishing boat captain and the little purse that hung at Nancy’s lap. “Handsomely,” he said, “but within reason. Of course.”

  Now, Dagson’s scowl returned in earnest, and he pushed to his feet. “Within reason? You want to renegotiate terms onboard my ship, and then you have the audacity, the damned audacity, to lecture me about rates? On my own ship?”

  Nancy protested that they weren’t lecturing at all. But the captain would hear none of it. “After you try to drag me to Atupal? And what business do you have on Atupal, anyway? Strangers from the capital, my wooden leg. You’re spies is what you are. Spies. And the most incompetent spies I’ve ever met at that.”

  He was in a proper rage now, spittle flying from his mouth with every word. Nancy’s best efforts to placate him were having no effect, and Alfred’s attempt seemed only to enrage him further.

  The crew was gathering by now, forming a kind of semi-circle around them. Alfred tried to swallow the fear that filled him. The spray of the ocean, the lolling of the boat underneath his feet, reminded him of just how dependent on this madman’s good graces they were. And the rage in his eyes convinced him of just how doomed they were.

  He offered one last attempt to calm this raging bulldog of a man. “Sir, I believe we have gotten off on the wrong foot.”

  Here, Dagson’s eyes flashed. “Foot, eh?”

  The vehemence in the other man’s tone as he repeated that word took Alfred aback, and he asked, rather than said, “Err…yes?”

  “So you think peg-leg jokes are funny, do you?” He thumped his wooden leg against the deck for emphasis, and a murmur of disapprobation ran through the crew.

  Alfred glanced between the captain’s face and prosthetic. This was a conclusion so far afield of anything he’d intended that he was almost too surprised to speak. “Of course not,” he managed. “I would never-”

  “Well you’re damned right they’re not funny. You Atupalans think you’re so clever.”

  “We’re not Atupalans,” Nancy protested.

  “That’s it, Miss. You’re going with him.”

  “Going?” Alfred repeated, a wave of concern washing over him. “Going where?”

  Dagson ignored the question, though, and turned to his crew. “Well? What are you waiting for? You know what to do.”

  The band of men loosed a hurrah that altogether drowned Nancy and Alfred’s wary questions. Then, they set upon the pair.

  “Hey,” Nancy protested, “stop.”

  “Leave us alone,” Alfred said.

  But the men continued to advance, shouting and laughing with a foreboding glee. Soon, their backs were against the side of the ship. The men continued to advance, pawing at them now while Dagson looked on encouragingly.

  Nancy managed to bloody a few noses, and Alfred was sure he knocked a few teeth out of one leering face. The sailors seemed outraged at this treatment, and fought with renewed vigor to subdue them. And, despite their best efforts, in a few moments the band had overpowered the pair. Alfred found himself hoisted into the air by several men, and saw with alarm that Nance was in the same predicament.

  “Bon voyage, Atupalans,” Dagson called.

  Then, with a great heave, the men cast Alfred and Nancy overboard.

  Chapter Eight

  After a few minutes of fruitless pleas, and as the taunts from the Red Eel grew more and more distant, Alfred resigned himself to the fact that Dagson truly did not mean to return for them.

  Indeed, his last image of the captain was his face beaming at them. The taxman was pretty sure it was the only time he’d actually seen Dagson smile – at the prospect of dumping two helpless passengers into the sea. “That son-of-a-biscuit,” he sputtered, fighting to keep his head above water. He was an average swimmer, but with a now-soaked pack on his back, and in water that was quite a few degrees colder than it looked, his best efforts were not very promising.

  “Come on,” Nance said, her teeth chattering. “We need to get back to shore. He’s not coming back for us.”

  That was true enough. Dagson and his crew had spent the last few minutes, as the Red Eel moved further away, shouting taunts. “Looks like it’s going swimmingly, eh?” and “You’re lucky that’s all I did, after what you did to my nose,” and “Looks like they’re in over their heads.”

  Alfred didn’t like the prospect of drowning, but there was something about the idea of drowning to a chorus of such pettiness that really chafed. “Alright,” he gasped. “Let’s go.”

  They swam for a bit, but Nance quickly outpaced him. The waters roiled gently, but it was enough movement to make it almost impossible for Alfred to make headway. “Babe, you need to lose the pack,” Nance said.

  “But it’s got all our supplies,” he protested.

  “Then give it to me.”

  “No, Nance.” Every fiber of his being bristled at that. It was heavy – way too heavy and cumbersome for him to manage. She was more athletic, there was no denying. But her slender frame would have been dragged under with such an added burden. “You’ll drown.”

  “You’re about to drown. You’re barely keeping your head above water.”

  He sputtered out a response – sputtered, mostly because his mouth was below the waterline. “We can’t lose the supplies.”

  She’d returned to him now, and was tugging at the backpack. “And I can’t lose you. Dammit, Alfred, let it go.”

  “But Winthrop said-”

  “I don’t give a damn what Winthrop said. Get rid of the pack, before it kills you.”

  Alfred was pretty sure he’d swallowed more water in the last few minutes than the daily recommended guidelines, and it was saltwater at that. “Alright,” he conceded, “I think it is drowning me.”

  She helped him stay afloat as he slipped his arms out. They bobbed together, legs kicking furiously, arms pumping like mad. And, somehow, neither of them drowned. It was, the taxman was firmly convinced, a miracle of near Biblical proportions.

  She let the pack slip away, and it sank like a rock, disappearing from sight in moments. Alfred was amazed by how light he suddenly felt. “Wow. You were right, Nance.”

  “Come on, babe. Let’s get back to land.”

  The swim back was long and tiring. Once or twice, large fish circled them. Alfred’s heart nearly leapt out of his chest at the sight. Sharks were an abiding fear of the taxman’s, and right now, they were nearer the top of his list than they were usually wont to be.

  Though he yelped out loud as one of the creatures opened its mouth, his fears were soon allayed: rather than rows of flesh-piercing teeth, its mouth sported long baleen bristles. And while the fish were large, they were not so large as to be able to consume a whole person in a single mouthful. Thus reassured that he was neither about to be a predator’s lunch nor was he to be drafted into a reenactment of the story of Jonah, Alfred relaxed a pinch.

  Still, he was not sorry to see them take their feeding elsewhere. He only hoped that they would discover nothing more sinister in these frigid waters.

  And the waters were icy. The taxman was sure he would die of hypothermia before they ever touched dry land. Even with the vigorous exercise and the bright sunlight, his teeth were chattering.

  He did not, however, expire from hypothermia, or anything else for that matter. And though he was thoroughly chilled, and while his muscles ached with fatigue, Alfred Favero made the shore as alive and whole as he’d left it.

  Nance reached it at the same time, and together, struggling to find their legs, they helped each other onto their feet. They tripped the last few meters through knee-high water until they were on dry, solid ground. And then, they collapsed into a sodden, wheezing heap.

  “Oh God. I t
hink my lungs are going to burst,” he rasped out.

  “I’m not going to be able to move for a week,” she agreed.

  “A week? I’m thinking a year. I’m going to find a cave, and hibernate. Like a bear.”

  The comment elicited gasps of laughter from Nancy. “Save room for me.”

  “Of course.”

  They recovered in silence after that. The sun’s heat did something to combat the chill, but the breezes that had, earlier, been so pleasant made the taxman shiver now. “We lost our change of clothes,” he realized. “In that pack.”

  “Not that it would have done us much good. They’d be soaked too.”

  “Still, we lost everything. Even our sunscreen.”

  Nancy laughed again, pushing up on her elbows with a groan so that she could plant a sandy kiss on Alfred’s cheek. “That would be the thing you’d be most concerned about, wouldn’t it? Not the food, the purified water: but the sunscreen.”

  “You won’t die of skin cancer because you don’t eat, Nance.”

  “That’s true. Just starvation,” she teased.

  “I’m serious, darling. Skin cancer is no laughing matter.”

  Laugh, though, is what Nancy did. Then, protesting all the while, she got to her feet and offered Alfred a hand. “Come on, babe. Let’s get a move on it. We need to find some shelter before nightfall.”

  He complied, grumbling as he did so.

  “And the good news is, Mister Favero, we’re not entirely without hope.”

  “Oh?”

  She tapped the purse that still hung at her belt. “I’ve got the money.”

  “Oh.” His frown eased at that. “That’s good.”

  “Yes.” Her eyes twinkling, she added, “It doesn’t solve the sunscreen crisis. But at least it means we can afford a place to stay, and some food too.”

  Chapter Nine

  “Oh Nancy,” Alfred groaned. “I am chafing so badly.”

  She groaned too, although there was more bemusement in her tone. “I don’t need to know that, Alfred.”

  He proceeded to fill her in anyway, about all the ways his wet clothes were causing him discomfort. “This is torture.”