A Buccaneer at Heart

by Stephanie Laurens

  She clasped her hands about the top of her reticule and, no longer smiling, arched an imperious brow at the clerk.

  He debated for a second, then waved her to a chair by the side of the room. “If you’ll take a seat, Miss Hopkins, I’ll let Mr. Muldoon know you’re here.”

  Buoyed by mild triumph—and a surge of anticipation over perhaps getting some worthwhile answers—she consented to sit on one of the three straight-backed chairs lined up against the wall. She placed her reticule in her lap and watched the clerk go to the door, tap, and enter.

  The clerk shut the door behind him. She wondered how long she might have to wait.

  A minute ticked past, then the door opened, and the clerk came out—followed by a rather handsome man in a plain suit.

  The man’s gaze found her. While the clerk returned to his desk, the man came forward and opened the gate to the side of the counter. “Miss Hopkins?”

  Aileen rose and went forward. “Indeed, sir. I take it you are the naval attaché?”

  The man bowed. “Muldoon, Miss Hopkins.” He straightened and, with a wave, invited her to precede him into his office.

  She passed through the gate, walked through the door, and halted in the space just beyond. The office wasn’t large; directly in front of her sat a plain desk with two padded chairs angled before it. There were cabinets against three walls, a map of the settlement and its surrounds on the wall behind the desk, and to her right, a small window that gave onto some alley.

  Muldoon followed her in. He shut the door, then moved past her to place one of the padded chairs directly facing the desk. “Please have a seat, Miss Hopkins. Then perhaps you might tell me how I and my office might assist you.”

  Aileen went forward, drew her skirts in, and sat. She watched as Muldoon rounded the desk and sat in the chair behind it. He was only a little taller than she was, so relatively short for a man, but he was built in proportion, and his features were striking—coal-black hair and intense blue eyes set in a face of sharp angles and planes. Irish or Cornish was Aileen’s guess; he was a rivetingly handsome man...and she realized she was regarding him with supreme dispassion. The sight of him left her totally unmoved.

  Apparently, rivetingly handsome wasn’t enough to entice her senses anymore.

  An image of Frobisher swam across her mind...

  Hurriedly, she banished it. She had work to do. “Thank you for seeing me, Mr. Muldoon. As your clerks might have mentioned, I arrived in the settlement in search of information about my brother Lieutenant William Hopkins.”

  “Ah, yes.” Muldoon rested his forearms on the desk and clasped his hands on the blotter. “Sadly, Hopkins vanished from the settlement some months ago.”

  “So I have heard. What I fail to understand is what Will was doing in the settlement at all, rather than being at sea with his ship. However, I have already been informed that your office has no knowledge of Will’s movements. That is not why I have called today.”

  She paused, swiftly reviewing her rehearsed questions. She needed to be careful how she phrased her queries. “While attempting to learn more about my brother’s disappearance, I discovered that, apparently entirely unconnected with Will’s case, more than a dozen children—admittedly of the lower orders, but British children nonetheless—have also vanished.”

  Muldoon’s attention was fixed on her. She couldn’t complain that he wasn’t listening.

  She continued, “While I might not be able to further my brother’s case in any meaningful way, I would like to inquire what the authorities have learned about the disappearances of these children. I understand it’s an ongoing problem.”

  Muldoon frowned, then looked down. A second passed, then he drew a fresh sheet of paper onto the blotter and picked up a pencil. He wrote rapidly—several lines of script Aileen couldn’t see well enough to read—then Muldoon looked up at her. “Matters such as this are handled by the governor’s office. I’ll ask his staff and see what I can learn.”

  She smiled. “Thank you.”

  His gaze on her face, Muldoon asked, “Is there anything else you’ve heard with regard to the missing children?”

  Caution raised its head; she searched for the right words. “Well... I did hear a rumor about slave traders operating inside the settlement—that perhaps it was they who had taken the children.”

  Muldoon was scribbling again. “Rumors.” Without looking up, he asked, “From whom?”

  When she didn’t immediately reply, Muldoon glanced up, his gaze rather sharper than it had been before.

  Aileen wished she could color on command; it would have added a helpful touch of verisimilitude just then. “I...ah—I went into the slums. Just the edges, so to speak.” She waved to the east, toward the slum from which the children had been taken. “I was asking after my brother, but instead I heard about the children and the rumors about the slave traders.”

  Muldoon had glanced in the direction of her wave. His frown grew more definite. “That is...worrying.” He looked down at what he’d written and added another line. He glanced briefly up at her. “I’m glad you brought this issue to me, Miss Hopkins. I will certainly follow it up. Might I ask how long you plan to remain in the settlement and where we can find you?” He waved at his notes. “Once I have an answer to your questions, I will endeavor to inform you.”

  Her smile was entirely genuine. “Indeed, sir—I would appreciate that. I am uncertain as to how much longer I will remain here, but certainly for the next several days. You can find me at Mrs. Hoyt’s Boarding House—it’s not far from the rectory.”

  Muldoon jotted down the information. With that done, he briefly reviewed what he’d written, then he set down his pencil and pushed back from the desk. “Again, thank you for bringing this to my attention, Miss Hopkins. Rest assured I will set matters in train as soon as I possibly can.”

  He rose and rounded the desk.

  Aileen came to her feet. Pleased beyond her expectations, she held out her hand. As Muldoon lightly gripped it and respectfully bowed, she said, “Thank you for your help, sir. If you should learn anything, please do send word. If I can at least get something done about these poor children, my trip to the colony will not have been in vain.”

  She was perfectly content to have Muldoon and his lackeys view her as a member of that tribe of well-to-do ladies who busied themselves with good works. And if, via Muldoon and his queries, she gained any insight into how nineteen children could be kidnapped from within the settlement, and slave traders walk its alleys with impunity, all with no reaction from the local authorities, she would count her morning’s excursion a signal success.

  Buoyed by a pleasant sense of accomplishment, she allowed Muldoon to bow her out of his office and escort her along the bustling quay and up the steps into the street.

  With a nod, she parted from him at the top of the steps. Despite his quite remarkable handsomeness, his grip on her elbow hadn’t affected her pulse in the slightest. Smiling, she raised her skirts and walked up the incline; she’d left Dave and his carriage waiting in the main street.

  It had occurred to her that Frobisher’s mission was to follow the path of the missing adults. At this juncture, they had no firm evidence that the children were being taken by the same band of slavers, let alone for the same end purpose. There was a distinct possibility that the disappearance of the children was completely unconnected with the missing adults. And if that proved to be so, then as she understood things, once Frobisher discovered the location of the slavers’ camp to which the adults were taken, he was under orders to depart forthwith—leaving no one concerned over, much less looking for, the kidnapped children.

  She’d told Muldoon the unvarnished truth. She couldn’t in all conscience sail away from the settlement without doing whatever she could to ensure that something was being done about the children—those already take
n and those who might yet be lured into the slavers’ clutches.

  Thoroughly satisfied with her morning’s work thus far, she reached Water Street, released her skirts, saw Dave waiting, and headed his way.

  * * *

  The rest of her morning did not go quite so well.

  Aileen reached the inn at which Frobisher was staying only to discover him absent. She’d remembered the directions he’d given the lad by the shore, and she confirmed with the landlady that a man of Frobisher’s description was, indeed, in residence at the inn, but that he’d left after breakfast—to where, the landlady had no idea.

  Aileen wasn’t at all sure she trusted Frobisher to send to inform her if the lad arrived with word of the slavers appearing on the shore. He’d promised to inform her of anything he and his men learned; he hadn’t promised when such information would be communicated—before or after any action had taken place.

  Then again, several of the children had stated that the slavers came in the afternoon, so presumably, she wasn’t missing any action at that moment.

  She returned to Dave’s carriage and debated her options. Most likely, Frobisher would be with his men in their hide, watching the slavers’ lair.

  Or perhaps some adult had been kidnapped last night, and Frobisher and his men were already following...but no. The landlady had said he’d been at the inn for breakfast, and the slavers carried their captives out of the settlement during the night. Aileen couldn’t see Frobisher returning to his bed and calmly breakfasting at the inn while his men slipped through the jungle on the slavers’ heels.

  No. If she was any judge of character—and with men like him, she was—then he would be leading his men.

  So they—he, his men, and she—were all still waiting. She for news from the shore, he and his men for the slavers to kidnap another adult.

  She felt her lips set. Patience had never come easily. She rose from the seat and pushed up the trapdoor. “Back to Mrs. Hoyt’s, please, Dave.”

  “Aye, miss.”

  She stared unseeing out of the carriage window as Dave drove her back up the slope of Tower Hill. She was sorely tempted to redirect him to drive out along the street that led to the crest above Undoto’s house, but... Even if she persuaded Dave to accompany her—and she wasn’t at all sure that leaving his carriage unattended in such an area would be wise—walking through that slum without a man like Frobisher by her side would be not just foolish but foolhardy.

  If she wanted Frobisher—and others—to view her as a sensible and reliable partner, she couldn’t behave like a reckless twit.

  They reached Mrs. Hoyt’s Boarding House for Genteel Ladies. Aileen left Dave with his carriage drawn up beside the curb; she’d paid for his exclusive services for a full week. Still trying, somewhat despondently, to think of something sensible to do, she walked up the path and into the boardinghouse.

  It wasn’t until she was in her room unpinning her bonnet that a potentially useful endeavor occurred to her. She laid the bonnet aside, considered the prospect, then turned on her heel and went downstairs.

  She’d discovered that although Mrs. Hoyt wasn’t a fan of Undoto’s services—“I have better ways to pass my time, miss”—as a shrewd woman looking to make her way, Mrs. Hoyt posted advance warning of the priest’s services on a little noticeboard by the dining room door. An aunt of one of the maids was a devotee, and so the postings were usually up to date.

  Aileen reached the dining room door, searched the various notices—of recitals, church services, and the like—pinned to the board, and saw that—yes—Undoto was holding a service today.

  She returned to her room, pinned her bonnet back on, and went out to the carriage.

  Dave accepted her order with a grunt and duly sent the carriage rattling down the hill, then turned his horse to the east, toward Undoto’s church.

  She hadn’t forgotten that the men she now knew were slavers called at Undoto’s house to speak to the priest on the evening after he gave a service. “There has to be some connection—something that happens at the services.” Something they hadn’t yet identified.

  Dave drew up outside the church a good twenty minutes before noon. Judging from the dearth of carriages outside, the bulk of the congregation had yet to arrive, but the church doors stood open, and a few people were strolling inside.

  Alighting from the carriage, Aileen shook out her skirts, then tipped her head back and looked at Dave. “Why don’t you go off and get something to eat? I expect to be here for about two hours.” She pointed at the benches set under a row of trees along one edge of the forecourt. “I’ll wait for you there.”

  Dave glanced at the spot, then nodded and touched his cap.

  Aileen watched him drive off, then she walked toward the church.

  She chose a position at the end of a bench a third of the way down the aisle. The spot gave her a decent view over most of the European congregation and also a clear view of the pulpit and the area before the altar. She sat and watched as the congregation streamed in. She saw Sampson, but of course, Frobisher wasn’t with him. Another old sailor came up, and the two old tars settled in the back corner; if Aileen was any judge, they were entertaining themselves with comments on the ladies and gentlemen who had chosen to attend.

  Despite watching everyone who entered, noting every interaction, she saw nothing even remotely suspicious. Once the service commenced, she concentrated unwaveringly on Undoto. She noted his every inflection, considered his every gesture. Searched for anything that might be a signal—although to whom and about what she had no clue.

  At the end of the service, she concluded that Undoto most likely derived the information about those to be kidnapped—the information that he subsequently passed on to the slavers—from his exchanges with his congregation as they filed out of the church. That might explain why the slavers called at his house only on the nights following a service.

  As he stood beside the door and shook hands and chatted, Undoto appeared genial, engaged, and in no hurry whatsoever. He spent at least half a minute with everyone who lined up to take his hand; with some—all of them Europeans, Aileen noticed—he spent significantly more time, and he clearly knew quite a bit about their lives.

  She was careful to slip out of the church at a moment when, amid a crush of ladies, she could avoid Undoto. She spent the next half hour moving through the crowd of parishioners, Europeans and natives alike, who dallied in the forecourt, chatting with each other and also with Undoto after he quit his post by the door.

  Smiling, the priest spoke with this one and that; Aileen watched closely and on several occasions saw Undoto ask what were clearly questions of certain European ladies—questions the ladies readily answered.

  So easy. How long would it take a priest to ask a question here, one there, and build up a working knowledge of the Europeans in the settlement—where they lived, who was among each household, where the men worked, where the ladies shopped? It wasn’t hard to understand why Undoto’s position made him useful to the slavers.

  She’d seen enough. She retreated to one of the benches, choosing the one most heavily shaded; with her complexion, she needed to take whatever steps she could to avoid freckling. She sat to wait for Dave to return.

  She looked out at the stragglers still chatting in the forecourt and thought of how much the minister of the village church near her parents’ house knew of his parishioners. A lot. Priests, ministers, vicars, and the like were trusted with all sorts of information—and the information Undoto would want, the sort of information the slavers would need, would, in the wider scheme of things, be considered relatively innocuous.

  If that was Undoto’s role—to provide the insights into people’s lives that would give the slavers the requisite knowledge to seize particular individuals without being caught—then what had Lady Holbrook done? From what Frobisher h
ad told her...

  She sat in the humid warmth under the trees and, bit by bit, assembled a mental diagram of the slavers’ scheme. Lady Holbrook had known who every European adult in the colony was—apparently even those who lived in the slums. She had also known her husband’s prejudices and therefore had been able to guide the slavers—most likely in conjunction with Undoto—to seize people whose disappearance would either not be noticed or, alternatively, could be attributed to some other cause—such as going into the jungle in pursuit of their fortune, or in the wake of a particular man.

  Aileen wracked her memory for the details of those taken. Perhaps in some cases there had been some other criterion involved in Lady Holbrook’s calculations—for instance, something that would explain why those particular young women had been taken.

  She mulled over the possibilities while the afternoon haze thickened and the shadows thrown by the leaves danced over and around her.

  A nearby birdcall jerked her out of her near somnolence. She refocused on the forecourt and realized that all the other carriages had left, along with all the people. The church doors and windows had been shut, and even Undoto had gone.

  Dave had yet to return, but no doubt he soon would.

  Aileen lifted her reticule from her lap, rose, and shook out her skirts—

  Black sacking fell over her head.

  Her lungs seized. Then she hauled in a breath and opened her mouth to scream.

  A hand clapped over the material across her mouth. She all but choked.

  Her head was pulled back, the crown of her bonnet squashing against a meaty chest.

  She tried to turn her head, tried to pull away, but then some other binding wrapped about her head and pulled tight over her mouth, gagging her completely. Then a brawny arm clamped around her waist, and she was lifted off her feet.