Dying Trade

by David Donachie

  Ma Thomas was upset, though Harry doubted it had anything to do with Bartholomew’s body. She was probably wondering how this was going to affect her future. ‘Not that he was any good to me. I never saw a shilling of his money.’

  ‘Did Crosby come up here when he returned?’

  Ma Thomas was all belligerence again. ‘How should I know?’

  ‘Crosby is lying in pool of his own blood on the tap-room floor,’ said James, a note of deep disapproval in his voice.

  ‘Could you see if you can revive him, James?’ His brother looked set to protest. ‘Please James. I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important.’

  ‘I would be more willing if you told me what’s going on here.’

  ‘I don’t have the complete answer, James, and even if I did, I don’t have the time. For if I don’t move quickly, brother, then this man’s murderer, and very likely Broadbridge’s, is going to get away.’

  ‘You know who killed Broadbridge?’

  Harry’s voice showed his uncertainty. For this body had shocked him. ‘I think I know who ordered it, James.’

  ‘You only think so? You’d better make certain before you go accusing anyone.’

  James was feeling excluded again. Harry knew that his brother had probably been worried sick. He knew nothing about the things which had happened since they last met. It would have been so easy to blast him for his obvious pique, but Harry felt that, if anything, he should apologise. Yet he could not do so, for such an act would open him to a discussion of the mystery, something he was not ready to undertake. He was thrown back once more on an inadequate response.

  ‘James. I know that I’m not making things clear to you.’

  His brother’s face was like granite. ‘Understatement, Harry.’

  Harry smiled suddenly. ‘I’m alive. Pender’s alive, and thank God you seem to be well. Everything in my world is near perfect. But if I was to try now to tell you all that’s happened in the past weeks, we’d be here for an hour at least. That’s an hour I don’t have to spare, but I look forward to having it very soon. An hour when you, at your leisure, can tell me what has been going on in the world.’

  He must have seen the strain in Harry’s face, for recent events had taken their toll. James walked over and put his mended arm round Harry’s shoulder. ‘Sorry, brother. I must stop standing on my dignity.’

  ‘How’s the arm?’ asked Harry

  James, close to, was examining his face, looking at all the little scars which had not yet healed. ‘What happened to your face?’

  ‘That is another thing that will have to wait, brother. And you’ll need a strong drink when I tell you.’

  James nodded. ‘I’ll go and see if I can revive Crosby.’

  He was just going out the door when Pender came in with Fairbairn. The surgeon was now the picture of health, and it was such a startling contrast to what James had seen before that he had to look twice to be sure it was the same man.

  ‘Fairbairn?’

  ‘James,’ said his brother impatiently. ‘Crosby.’

  James went down the stairs, calling over his shoulder, ‘Aye, aye, Captain.’

  Harry took another sniff at Bartholomew’s glass then passed it to Fairbairn. He sniffed in turn and his nose twitched. ‘Poison?’

  Fairbairn looked at the position of the body, then he stepped forward and lifted Bartholomew’s eyelid. Finally he sniffed at the glass again and nodded. Harry handed him the full glass. Fairbairn sniffed that in turn, dipped a finger in the wine, and touched his tongue.

  ‘This seems fine,’ he said.

  ‘So whoever shared a glass of wine with him put poison in his.’

  ‘It looks that way.’

  Harry was still for quite a while, thinking. Then he started knocking on the walls looking for a secret entrance. Sutton said that Broadbridge had spied the dead man coming and going out of the back entrance. And that day, when Harry’d knocked on his door, he’d been out of the room. So there had to be another way in and out. Ma Thomas was by the doorway watching him. Something in her eye made him suspicious. ‘Where is it?’

  ‘Right by the fireplace, on the left. Just push.’

  ‘I would have appreciated it if you’d told me.’

  She scowled. ‘I would’ve, if you’d asked.’

  Harry went down the spiral staircase to a passage that ran for about twenty yards. At the end there was a doorway which opened out onto the alley. The key was still on the inside, and the door was slightly ajar. Harry looked at the key carefully, but it was a plain affair, with no crest or anything to identify it. He went back upstairs to find James there, but no Crosby.

  ‘You hit him too hard, Harry. It will be a while before he talks to anyone. Fairbairn has gone to have a look at him.’

  ‘No matter. I know the answer to the question I was going to ask him anyway.’

  ‘So. Do I warrant some kind of explanation?’

  Harry changed the subject quickly. ‘What brought you back to Genoa?’

  ‘Harry, I’ve been here for weeks. I came back as soon as Williams assured me my arm was on the mend. I really do think you should tell me where you have been.’

  ‘I have been to a leper colony, brother.’

  ‘Indeed,’ said James, testily. ‘I try to avoid lepers, so I’m not over-familiar with the effects of the disease. But I know that is not what has caused those blemishes on your skin.’

  ‘No, James, that was rats.’

  That shocked him. ‘Rats!’

  ‘You see, brother, it is too complicated to explain now. How did you get here so soon after I arrived?’

  ‘I’ve had the place watched. Guistiani hired me some excellent fellows.’

  Harry was looking about the room again, as if hoping some clue would leap out at him. ‘What did Guistiani say about me?’

  ‘Only that you’d bought the ship, and that you had disappeared on a cruise without informing him of your destination. Count Toraglia told me you were in such a hellfire hurry to get to sea that you left without saying farewell.’

  Harry’s head snapped round, and he barked the name. ‘Count Toraglia?’

  ‘Yes. Is that so strange?’ Harry didn’t reply, so James continued. ‘I went to see him, to find out if he knew your whereabouts. We shall go and visit him. I must show you the portrait I’ve done of his wife. I am immoderately pleased with it.’

  But Fairbairn came back into the room, followed by Pender. Harry told his servant to fetch their boat crew. He saw that James was about to ask something. ‘Please, brother, no more questions.’

  Yet he knew that would not do. James deserved some form of explanation. He turned back to look at Bartholomew’s body. ‘I came here to kill him, James. But someone beat me to it. Time to find that someone, and bring all this to an end.’

  ‘All this?’

  He was saved from answering by the appearance of his boat crew. Harry immediately led the way down the secret staircase and out through the passageway into the alley. He walked confidently ahead, forcing the others to a fast pace to stay with him. The party of armed men cut a swath through the crowded streets.

  ‘Where are we headed, Harry?’

  ‘Can’t you tell, James? You must have come this way a few times.’

  James looked confused, then angry, and finally he lapsed into a thoughtful silence. They were out of the town gates now and heading along the route to the Toraglia villa. As they approached the high white walls that surrounded it, Harry could hear his brother give a soft curse under his breath.

  ‘Wait and see, James. And I assure you this time I’m not being impetuous.’

  Harry strode ahead, produced his key, and quickly opened the postern gate. The whole party filed through with Harry in the lead, and James, somewhat dragging his feet, now bringing up the rear. Harry heard the noise of the man coming through the undergrowth and spun to face him, but Pender was there before him with a club raised and his foot out. The fellow tripped and sprawled across the pa
th. Pender fetched him a blow behind the ears and he went limp. Harry bent and turned the man over. His mouth was wide open, and the missing tongue was plain to see. He was entirely dressed in black, and wearing a black headscarf.

  Harry turned to look back at his brother, standing rigid in a state of shock. ‘A mute, James. Recognise the clothing? I dare say you didn’t spy this fellow when you came here to do your portrait, brother.’

  James couldn’t answer. He was just staring at the man on the ground.

  Harry turned him over and ripped the shirt from his back. The crescent-shaped brand mark stood out, stark against the man’s olive skin.

  ‘Keep your eyes open, there may be others,’ he said.

  ‘How many, your honour?’ asked Pender.

  Harry treated him to a smile, thinking there were not enough to carry a sedan chair. ‘Certainly less than four.’

  Pender shook his head to indicate he didn’t understand.

  They continued towards the house, with the captive dragged along behind them. He came to and wriggled in his captors’ arms, but made no sound.

  They were in the hallway, their feet echoing on the tiled floor. Harry stopped and looked at James’s portrait, which hung alongside Count Toraglia’s own. His brother had caught her well, seeming with his brush to be able to portray her beauty, and in some way project her lack of vanity. She sat dressed in a loose-fitting gown of pale blue silk with a hooded black velvet cloak just covering her shoulders. At her feet sat a bird of prey, holding a small mammal in its claws.

  ‘When we see them, James, not a word, d’you hear.’

  James was quite shocked at the commanding tone of Harry’s voice, and still somewhat confused by what had happened in the garden. ‘If you say so, brother.’

  She’d heard them and come to investigate. So had the tall mute servant who’d attended Toraglia on the Principessa. The old servant who’d shown Harry in that first day, appeared dragging a sword which was far too heavy for him, showing great loyalty, if no practicality, in the face of this party of armed men. Lelia di Toraglia stood framed in the doorway to the inner courtyard. Harry, still quite taken with her beauty, glanced from her to the portrait and back again. A wonderful likeness.

  ‘Madame. I have come to see your husband.’

  ‘Indeed, Signor.’ If she was frightened by all these weapons it didn’t show. ‘He has only just returned from the city. I know he must be tired. I will see if he feels up to receiving you.’

  ‘Forgive me, Madame. I’ve come too far to stand on ceremony.’

  Harry pushed past her. Toraglia had heard the voices and his nose was in the air, almost like a sniffing hound. ‘Lelia. What is it?’

  Harry spoke before she could. ‘Harry Ludlow, Count Toraglia.’

  There was a moment’s confusion. James spoke up. ‘My brother, Count. The one to whom you sold the Principessa.’

  Toraglia’s face lit up with a smile. ‘Ah, Captain. How good to hear from you. A successful voyage, I hope?’

  There was no warmth in Harry’s response. ‘You might like to know that the Principessa is at the bottom of the Ligurian Sea.’

  The smile disappeared, and he turned his head slightly as if seeking reassurance from his wife. ‘I am not sure I like your news. And if I may say so, Signor, your tone. It seems rather rough.’

  ‘The night I dined here you said that I was less barbaric than the last English sailor you’d entertained.’

  His wife stiffened at that. He looked confused. Harry surmised he’d be trying to remember not only if he said it, but where.

  ‘You remarked upon it to your wife.’

  ‘Did I?’ His head swung round the room, for he didn’t quite know where she was. ‘Then it was less than polite of you, my dear, to say anything to Captain Ludlow.’

  ‘Was his name Howlett by any chance?’

  James stiffened and gasped. The count maintained his aristocratic air. ‘That is the fellow. A rather harsh man, in the manner of your naval officers. We met at a ball in the city. I have to say he rather forced himself upon us.’

  ‘And you have often entertained a privateer captain called Bartholomew. Another Englishman?’

  The count frowned. ‘Occasionally would be closer to the truth. And not of late. As you may remember, I enjoy the company of sailors. May I ask the purpose of your sudden arrival at my house, and the meaning of all these questions?’

  ‘And why the need for all these armed men,’ snapped the countess.

  Harry spoke quickly, for Toraglia was alarmed at that information. ‘Captain Howlett was found hanged down in the port.’

  ‘A very sad affair, Signor. Some deserters from his own ship, I believe.’

  ‘Had he been here to dine that night?’

  For the first time Toraglia showed a trace of genuine anger. He must have heard of the various speculations on the death of Howlett and the inference in Harry’s words was too obvious to ignore. His aristocratic demeanour quite evaporated. ‘No, Signor, he had not. He came to us the previous week.’

  ‘You’ve just returned from the city, Count Toraglia.’ A sharp nod. ‘Did you call on Bartholomew while you were there?’

  ‘How could I, since I don’t have any idea where to call?’

  ‘I asked you once about a fellow called Broadbridge. You said you didn’t know him.’

  The voice was even, showing no trace of emotion. ‘Did I? I don’t recall.’

  Harry deliberately followed suit, keeping his voice calm. ‘He was murdered in the cabin of the Principessa, the very day you first offered to sell it to me.’

  Toraglia frowned. ‘Murdered, you say? How do you know this, unless you were responsible?’

  His wife finally spoke up. ‘Captain Ludlow. I really think that my husband is too tired—’

  Harry cut right across her, and anger flashed over her husband’s face at the way Harry addressed her. ‘Be quiet, Madame!’

  Toraglia struggled to his feet, his hand looking for support. ‘I will not allow you to talk to my wife in this way. Please leave my house.’

  James spoke too, his voice worried. ‘Harry …’

  ‘Count Toraglia. Before I leave this house I am going to find the answers to some questions. As your wife has told you I am at the head of a party of armed men. You, sir, are in no position to refuse me an answer. What do you know of the sale of Christian children to the slave markets of the Ottoman empire?’

  Toraglia waved his hands impatiently as though the question was a distraction. ‘I know that it is forbidden in all Catholic states on pain of death.’

  ‘Yet it still goes on?’

  Toraglia shrugged. ‘Perhaps where there is profit. But it is a dying trade …’

  ‘Your servants, Count Toraglia, are they all mute?’

  He nodded, thrown by the change of subject. Harry pressed on.

  ‘They are not local men?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And are they all Musselmen?’ Toraglia nodded. ‘They came as part of your wife’s dowry?’

  ‘Yes,’ he snapped angrily, and his voice rose. ‘Now will you please go.’

  Harry raised his voice to drown the blind man out. ‘And they all have a sign on their back, a brand mark. A crescent with lettering beside it.’

  This time his wife answered. ‘Yes. It is my father’s brand mark.’

  Harry turned to face her. ‘You were born in Anatolia, Madame, on the shores of the Black Sea?’

  ‘Her father and I were old trading partners,’ snapped the count. ‘Which is the kind of information you can find in any salon in the city. This is most impertinent, and I will answer nothing more. Neither will you, my dear.’

  ‘I think we should go, Harry,’ said James.

  Harry spoke without taking his eyes off the count. ‘You promised, James. I came into port today ready to accuse you of murder, Count Toraglia. The murder of Thomas Broadbridge.’

  Toraglia mouthed the word and the name as Harry continued, ‘Not personally,
but by using these mute servants that came to you as part of your wife’s dowry, at least one of whom also died aboard the Principessa. In fact, I killed him. That is where I first came across that brand mark. The second place I saw it was on the backs of a trio of eunuchs at an abandoned leper colony off Southern Dalmatia.’

  The countess tried to stop him from going any further. ‘Who do you think you are, Signor, to come into our house and bandy about such accusations?’

  Harry ignored her. ‘I came to accuse your husband of murder, Madame. Indeed I have spent the last three weeks thinking of little else. I also intended to kill Gideon Bartholomew.’

  Toraglia lifted his nose again in that odd, canine way, but he didn’t follow the movement with a question.

  ‘Bartholomew tried to kill me. Indeed, we had just struck a bargain and signed the papers transferring the Principessa to me, and a large sum of money to you. He abducted me outside this house the minute I left.’

  Harry paused for a moment to let these words have their effect. ‘I came to kill Bartholomew but when I got to his rooms he was already dead.’

  The countess gasped, looked at her husband, put her hand to her mouth, and sat down suddenly on the divan behind her.

  ‘Bartholomew was poisoned. I regret not being the agent of his death myself, though I had something less devious in mind. But his death confused me. At the very least it eroded my certainties. I had to look at things afresh, only to discover that I had been wrong. Yet the real solution to it all lay with him, even though he was a corpse.’

  Again Harry paused, this time to see if his words would provoke a reaction. No one spoke. ‘His glass of wine was poisoned. There was another glass, the one he poured for the person who killed him. That didn’t contain poison.’

  Harry reached into his pocket. ‘I have in my hand a key, Count Toraglia. It fits your postern gate. It was stolen some time ago from the pocket of a visitor to your house. That visitor was Bartholomew.’

  Toraglia’s face remained a mask. Harry gave him a chance to speak, but he declined to use it. But all eyes were on him, even the sightless ones of Count Toraglia.

  ‘Mr Fairbairn. Could a physician identify the poison that killed Bartholomew?’