Airman

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Airman Page 17

by Eoin Colfer


  This is ridiculous. I am a scientist. Look upon this as an experiment.

  It was no use. He could not calm himself. The spectre of failure tapped his shoulder in time with the water dripping from the ceiling. There would be other plans certainly, he already had the bones of half a dozen. Some more convoluted, some less so. He had designed a diving helmet, like a miniature bell, which should contain enough air to get him to open water, after that he could manually inflate a pig’s bladder and swim to shore by night. To amass the materials for that plan would take five years, at the very least.

  Five more years. Unbearable.

  Conor redoubled his efforts, blinking the fog from his eyes, pressing his fingertips together until the shake subsided. The coronation was tonight, he must be ready.

  CHAPTER 11: TO THE QUEEN HER CROWN

  The Saltee islanders were preparing for celebration. The British royal yacht, HMY Victoria and Albert II, a 360-foot paddle steamer, lolled regally in Fulmar Bay with the waves of Saint George’s Channel tipping her gently like the fingers of a child on a rubber balloon. The queen herself was happily ensconced in one of the palace’s sumptuous apartments. Her diary records that: I find the air of industry in this miniature kingdom wonderfully exhilarating. Looking down from my balcony window at the commerce far below, one almost feels as though one has arrived in Swift’s Lilliput.

  Almost every patch of Great Saltee’s 200 acres had been appropriated for the celebrations. The South Summit was festooned with clusters of pikes decorated with crimson and gold flags. The streets of Promontory Fort were painted in the same coloured stripes. Every man with a hammer was banging in nails, and every man without one was hanging bunting from those nails. Even the weather gods were proving benevolent on the day, pouring down sunshine on the little principality, setting the waves dancing with sparkles. The southern cliffs lost some of their gloom, fringed in beards of white spume.

  It seemed to the gentlemen of the world’s press as though the kingdom of the Saltees was an oasis of calm amid the political consternation of Europe. They sat in seaside taverns in Fulmar Bay, boiling up their gullets with traditional spicy gull pancakes and cooling them off again with tankards of Irish stout. No journalists were permitted on Little Saltee, and none had been invited who might press the matter.

  On the surface, happiness and contentment abounded, but as in many things the surface gave a treacherous reading. Many were unhappy in the kingdom. Taxes had been reintroduced, and heavy tithes on imports. Public services were so skimped on that they were almost non-existent, and residency had been granted to an assorted bunch of motley characters who were then spivved up and handed commissions in the Saltee Army, the best barracks too. Common scarred veterans most of them, landing on the port with clanking sacks of weapons. Bonvilain was filling his ranks with mercenaries and turning away raw recruits. Building his own private army many said, though the marshall claimed that he was merely protecting the princess from revolutionaries.

  Captain Declan Broekhart would, once upon a time, have objected vehemently to Bonvilain’s politics, but now he was too besieged by his own demons. Catherine Broekhart too was haunted by sadness, though she concealed it for the sake of their eighteen-month-old baby son, Sean.

  Declan was consumed and ravaged by grief. He wore it like a coat. It was more a part of him now than his eyes and ears. It took his hunger and his strength. It ate away his girth and his stature. Declan Broekhart had grown old before his time.

  Often Catherine would encourage him to fight his way clear of his dark mood.

  ‘We have another son now, Declan. Young Sean needs his father.’

  His answer was always a variation on the following:

  ‘I am no father. Conor died at my post, doing my duty. My life is gone. Spent. I am a dead man still breathing.’

  Declan Broekhart shunned close contact, eager for punishment. He grew tight-lipped and short-fused. He returned to his duties at the palace, but his manner had changed. Where before he had inspired devotion, now men obeyed him through fear. Declan worked his men hard, chastising honest soldiers who had been at his side for years. No dereliction of duty was left unpunished, however slight. Declan prowled the Great Saltee Wall at night, clothed entirely in black, searching for an inattentive sentry. He demoted soldiers, docked their pay and on one occasion had a watchman dismissed for nodding off in the guard hut.

  This last was three days before the coronation, when Declan was at his most tense. When the news trickled through to him that the punished watchman was worn out with newborn twins and a wife still in her bed, Catherine believed her husband might come to his senses, but instead Declan Broekhart turned a degree colder.

  Little Sean cried from the bedroom, his midday sleep disturbed.

  Catherine wiped her eyes, so the baby would see her happy. ‘Do you think Conor would want this?’ she said, making one last attempt. ‘Do you think he looks down from a hero’s heaven and rejoices at what his father has become?’

  Declan cracked, but he did not break. ‘And what have I become, Catherine? Am I not still a man who fulfils his duties to the best of his abilities?’

  Catherine’s eyes blazed through the last of her tears. ‘Those of Captain Broekhart, certainly. But Declan Broekhart, husband and father? As you say yourself, those duties have been neglected for some time now.’

  With these harsh words Catherine left her husband to his brooding. When he was certain that she could no longer see him, Declan Broekhart clasped his hands on either side of his head, as though he could squeeze out the pain.

  Declan had never recovered from Conor’s supposed death, and perhaps he never would have, had two events not occurred one after the other on the day of Isabella’s coronation. Alone, these events might not have been enough to raise him from his stupor, but together they complemented one another, shaking the lethargy from Declan Broekhart’s bones.

  The first was a simple thing. Common and quick, the kind of family happening that would not usually qualify as an event. But for Declan something in those few seconds warmed his heart and set him on the road to recovery. Later he would often wonder whether Catherine had engineered this little incident, or for that matter, the second one too. He questioned her often, but she would neither admit nor deny anything.

  What happened was this. Little Sean came waddling from his room, unsteady on chubby legs. When Conor had been that age, Declan called his legs fat sausages and they rolled on the rug like a dog and its pup, but he hardly noticed Sean, leaving the rearing to Catherine.

  ‘Papa,’ said the infant, slightly disappointed that his mother was not to be seen. Papa ignored him. Papa was not a source of food or entertainment, and so little Sean toddled on towards the open bay window. The balcony was beyond, and then a low wrought-iron railing. Hardly enough to contain an inquisitive boy.

  ‘Catherine,’ called Declan, but his wife did not appear. Sean skirted a chair, teetering briefly to starboard, then on towards the window.

  ‘Catherine. The boy. He’s near the window.’

  Still, no sign of or reply from Catherine, and now little Sean was at the sill itself, a pudgy foot raised to step over.

  Declan had no choice but to act. With a grunt of annoyance he took the two strides necessary to reach the child. Not such a momentous undertaking, unless you consider that this was perhaps the fifth time that Declan Broekhart had set hands on his son. And at that exact moment the boy turned, pivoting on the ball of his heel, the way only the very young can, and Declan’s fingers grazed Sean’s cheek. Their eyes met and the boy reached up, tugging Declan’s bottom lip.

  The contact was magical. Declan felt a jolt run through his heart, as for the first time he saw Sean as himself and not a shadow of his dead brother.

  ‘Oh, my son,’ he said, hoisting him up and drawing him close. ‘You must keep away from the window; it is dangerous. Stay here with me.’

  Declan was halfway back to life. Perhaps he would have continued the journey in fi
ts and jumps, an occasional shared smile, the odd bedtime story, but then there came a knocking on the front door. A series of raps, actually. Regal raps.

  Before Declan had the chance to register the sounds, the door burst open and one of his own men stepped across the threshold, holding the door wide for Princess Isabella.

  Declan was caught tenderly embracing his son, a most un-Broekhart-like action. He frowned twice, once for the soldier: a warning to keep this sight to himself. A second frown for Princess Isabella, who was clothed in full coronation robes. A vision in gold and crimson silk and satin, more beautiful than even her father could have dreamed. What could she be doing here? On this of all days?

  Isabella opened her mouth to speak. The princess had her entreaty prepared. Declan had requested Wall duty for the ceremony, but she had needed him at her side, today of all days. She missed Conor and her father more than ever, and the only way she could get through the ceremony was if the man who she considered a second father was restored to her. And not simply in body, but in spirit. Today Declan Broekhart must remember the man he had been.

  Quite a fine speech; obviously the girl would make a fine queen. However, no one heard the words, for the moment Isabella laid eyes on Declan cradling his son, her posture slumped from queen to girl and she flung herself at his chest weeping. Declan Broekhart had little option but to wrap his free arm around the weeping princess.

  ‘There, there,’ he said uncertainly. ‘Now, now.’

  ‘I need you,’ sobbed Isabella. ‘By my side. Always.’

  Declan felt tears gather on his own eyelids. ‘Of course, Majesty.’

  Isabella thumped his broad chest with her delicate fist.

  ‘I need you, Declan. You.’

  ‘Yes, Isabella,’ said Declan gruffly. ‘By your side. Always.’

  Catherine Broekhart stepped in from the balcony where she had been waiting, and joined the embrace. The guard at the door was tempted, but decided against it.

  The coronation was a wordy affair, with clergy and velvet and enough Latin chanting to keep a monastery going for a few decades. It was all a bit of a blur to Declan Broekhart who installed himself behind his queen on the altar, so he could be there to smile encouragingly when she looked for him, which she did often.

  Shortly after the papal nuncio lowered the crown, Declan noticed his wife’s dress.

  ‘A new dress?’ he whispered. ‘I thought we weren’t coming?’

  Catherine smiled archly. ‘Yes, you did think that, didn’t you.’

  Declan felt a glow in his chest that he recognized as cautious happiness. It was a bittersweet emotion without Conor there at his shoulder.

  They rode in the royal coach back from Saint Christopher’s towards Promontory Fort, though in truth the town now covered almost every square foot of the island. As the population increased, houses grew up instead of out and were shoehorned into any available space. The higgledy-piggledy town reminded Declan of the Giant’s Causeway, a chaotic honeycomb of basalt columns in the north of Ireland. Though these columns were marked by doors and windows and striped by the traditional bold house colours of the Saltee Islands. As for the islanders, it seemed they were all on the street along with half of Ireland, cheering themselves hoarse for the beautiful young queen.

  The coach was shared with Marshall Bonvilain in full ceremonial uniform including a Knights of the Holy Cross toga worn loosely over it all. The Saltee Templars were the only branch to have survived Pope Clement V’s fourteenth-century purge. Even the Vatican had been unwilling to risk disrupting the diamond supply.

  Bonvilain took advantage of the new queen’s distraction to lean across and whisper to Declan.

  ‘How are you, Declan? I’m surprised to see you here.’

  ‘As am I, Hugo,’ replied Declan. ‘I hadn’t planned to come, but I am happy to find my plans changed.’

  Bonvilain smiled. ‘I am happy too. It does the men good to see your face. Keeps them alert. Nice work dismissing that sentry by the way. Sleeping sentries is just the opening the rebels need. One chink in the wall and they’re in. And I needn’t tell you the heartache they can cause.’

  Declan nodded tightly, but in truth Bonvilain’s speech seemed a little hollow on this day. There had been little rebel activity for many months, and some of the marshall’s arrests had been made on the flimsiest of evidence.

  Bonvilain noticed the captain’s expression.

  ‘You disagree, Declan? Surely not. After all the Broekharts have endured?’

  Declan felt his wife’s fingers close around his. He gazed past Isabella’s shining face, through the window, over the heads of a hundred islanders and into the blue haze of sea and sky.

  ‘I don’t disagree, Marshall. I just need to think about something else today. My wife, and my queen, they need me. For today at least.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Bonvilain, his tone gracious, but his eyes were hard and his teeth were gritted behind his lips.

  Broekhart recovers, he thought. His scruples are already returning. How long before the dog bites his master?

  Hugo Bonvilain waved a gloved hand at the cheering citizens on the roadside.

  Better not to take the chance. Perhaps it is time for a little blackmail. Declan Broekhart could not bear to lose his elder son a second time.

  Little Saltee

  Conor was ready for flight. His sewing was done. A double seam would have been better but there was not a strand of thread left. The device was as sound as it would ever be.

  The sounds of revelries drifted across from the Great Saltee Wall. Singing, cheering, stamping of feet. A great coming together. A thousand faces flushed in the glow of the wall lamps. Conor imagined the crowds lined a dozen deep waiting for the great show of fireworks. It seemed as though the very prison walls shook, though a stretch of ocean separated prisoners from the party.

  The buzz of coronation excitement had communicated itself through the prison, and many of the prisoners hooted through their windows or dragged tin cups across their barred windows.

  Surprisingly perhaps, most of the inmates showed monarchist leanings in spite of their incarceration at Her Majesty’s pleasure. A ragged chorus of ‘Defend the Wall’, the Saltee national anthem, bounced off the walls and under Conor’s cell door.

  He found himself humming along. It was strange to hear the words King Nicholas already replaced by Queen Isabella.

  How could you believe Bonvilain’s lies? Why did you not send for me, Isabella?

  Confusion bred heat in his forehead and Conor felt the strength of it cloud his brain. His senses piled on top of one another. Sight, touch, smell. Grime in the wrinkles of his forehead. The cell door seemed to shake in its housing. Sweat, damp and worse from his cell. He closed his eyes, breathing deeply through his nose. One of Victor’s tricks, brought back from the Orient.

  Breathe in cold air, clear the mind.

  Conor pushed thoughts of Isabella aside. Time now to concentrate. Billtoe’s steps were on the flagstones outside. One last time through the checklist.

  Mud on his back?

  Yes. He could feel it crusting inside his collar. At last, a use for the damp wall. There is always a use for everything, Victor had told him. Even pain.

  The device secured?

  Conor reached round under his loose jacket, tugging at the rectangular pack concealed on his chest. The ropes groaned at his pull, but they were homemade and imperfect. Woven from raggy ends and cut-offs. Spliced together and daubed with candle wax.

  The cuff peg?

  Concealed in his palm. A jagged ivory cone, measured by pressing the cuffs’ ratchet hard into his palm when Billtoe was removing them. The cuff peg was an old escapologist’s trick, and would only work on a set of single-lock cuffs with some play in the bolts, but Billtoe’s cuffs were old enough to have belonged to Moses, and Conor had been yanking at the bolts for half a year now. There was enough play. When Billtoe slapped the cuffs on, Conor would quickly plug the hole with the ivory peg. The
ratchet would be deflected while appearing to close.

  Mud, devices, pegs! This plan was lunacy.

  And as such could never be anticipated. Conor stepped on his uncertainty with a harsh boot. There was not the time now. His plan would liberate him, or kill him, and both were preferable to more long years in this hell pit.

  Billtoe’s key clanked into the ancient lock, turning with some effort. The guard shouldered the door open, complaining as usual, but with one cautious hand on his pistol.

  ‘An angel is what I am, sticking it out with you clods, when a man like me would be welcomed into any discerning society in the world. I could be a prince, you know, Finn. An emperor, darn it. But here I stays, so that you can tell me my twelve-shot revolver is not ready yet.’

  ‘It is ready,’ blurted Conor, playing the excited, eager-to-please prisoner. ‘I have the plan here.’

  Billtoe was canny enough to be suspicious. Lesser brains would have lost the run of themselves and the price of their distraction would be a stove-in skull, but Arthur Billtoe’s prime instinct was self-preservation.

  ‘Where, exactly now, would that plan be? I won’t be doing any bending over, or fumbling in shadows.’

  ‘No. Lying on the table. Shall I hand it to you?’

  Billtoe cogitated. Coughing up a lump of recently swallowed rations for a re-chew.

  ‘No, soldier boy. How’s about I cuff you as per usual, then have a little look-see at the plan myself.’

  Conor extended his hands, happy to comply. ‘Do I get my walks, Mister Billtoe? You promised I would.’

  Billtoe smiled as he clamped on the cuffs, one eye on the table.

  ‘It’s your beard that has me grinning. A pathetic shrub. It ain’t ready for growing yet. You ought to trim it back, thicken it up. The Rams ain’t going to be ordered to by some runt with a bare gorse on his chin. And we’ll talk about walks after I have a good study of this drawing.’

 

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