Birds of Prey c-1

by Wilbur Smith

  Still on one knee and screened by the horse's body from the view of any of the guards or overseers, he looked up for the first time at Hal. Their gaze touched for an instant. Aboli nodded almost imperceptibly and opened his right fist to give Hal a glimpse of the tiny curl of white paper he had in his palm, then closed his fist and stood up. He walked down the team of horses examining each animal and making minute adjustments to the harness. At last he turned aside and leaned against the stone wall beside him, stooping to wipe the fine flouring of dust from his boots, Hal watched him take the quill of paper and surreptitiously stuff it into a joint in the stonework of the wall. He straightened and returned to the coachman's seat to await the Governor's pleasure. Van de Velde never showed consideration for servant, slave or animal. All that morning the team of greys stood patiently in the traces with Aboli soothing them at intervals. A little before noon the Governor re-emerged from the Company offices and had himself driven back to the residence for the midday meal.

  In the dusk, as the convicts wearily climbed down into the courtyard, Hal stumbled as he reached the ground and put out his hand to steady himself. Neatly he picked the scrap of folded paper from the joint in the stonework where Aboli had left it.

  Once in the dungeon there was just sufficient light filtering down from the torch in its bracket at the top of the staircase for Hal to read the message. It was written in a fine neat hand that he did not recognize. Despite all his father's and Hal's own instruction, Aboli's handwriting had never been better than large, sprawling and malformed. It seemed that another scribe had framed these words. A tiny nub of charcoal was wrapped in the paper, placed there for Hal to write his reply on the reverse of the scrap.

  "The Captain buried with honour." Hal's heart leapt as he read that. So it was Aboli who had taken down his father's mutilated corpse from the gibbet. I should have known he would give my father that respect.

  There was only one more word. "Althuda?" Hal puzzled over this until he understood that Aboli, or the writer, must be asking after the welfare of the other prisoner.

  "Althuda!" he called softly. "Are you awake?" "Greetings, Hal. What cheer?"

  "Somebody outside asks after you."

  There was a long silence as Althuda. considered this. "Who asks?"

  "I know not." Hal could not explain for he was certain that the gaolers eavesdropped on these exchanges.

  Another long silence. "I can guess," Althuda called. "And so can you. We have discussed her before. Can you send a reply? Tell her I am alive."

  Hal rubbed the charcoal on the wall to sharpen a point on it and wrote, "Althuda well." Even though his letters were small and cramped, there was space for no more on the paper.

  The following morning, as they were led out to begin the day's w "ark on the scaffold, Daniel screened Hal for the moment he needed to push the scrap of paper into the same crack from which he had retrieved it.

  In the middle of the morning Aboli drove the Governor down from the residence and parked once more beneath the staircase. Long after van de Velde had disappeared into his sanctum, Aboli remained on the coachman's seat. At last he looked up casually at a flock of red-winged starlings that had come down from the cliffs to perch on the walls of the eastern bastion and give vent to their low, mournful whistles. From the birds his eye passed over Hal, who nodded. Once again Aboli dismounted and tended his horses, pausing beside the wall to adjust the straps on his boots and, with a magician's sleight-of hand to recover the message from the crack in the wall. Hal breathed easier when he saw it, for they had established their letterbox.

  They did not make the mistake of trying to exchange messages every day. Sometimes a week or more might pass before Aboli nodded at Hal, and placed a note in the wall. If Hal had a message, he would give the same signal and Aboli would leave paper and charcoal for him.

  The second message Hal received was in that artistic and delicate script. "A. is safe. Orchid sends her heart."

  "Is the orchid the one we spoke of?" Hal called to Althuda that night. "She sends you her heart, and says you are safe."

  "I do not know how she has achieved that, but I must believe it and be thankful to her in this as in so many things." There was a lift of relief in Althuda's tone. Hal held the scrap of paper to his nose, and fancied that he detected the faintest perfume upon it. He huddled on his damp straw in a corner of the cell. He thought about Sukeena until sleep overcame him. The memory of her beauty was like a candle flame in the winter darkness of the dungeon.

  Governor van de Velde was passing drunk. He had swilled the Rhenish with the soup and t-GMadeira with the fish and the lobster. The red wines of Burgundy had accompanied the mutton stew and the pigeon pie. He had quaffed the claret with the beef, and interspersed each with draughts of good Dutch gin. When at last he rose from the board, he steadied himself as he wove to his seat by the fire with a hand on his wife's arm. She was not usually so attentive, but all this evening she had been in an affectionate and merry mood, laughing at his sallies which on other occasions she would have ignored, and refilling his glass with her own gracious hand before it was half emptied. Come to think of it, he could not remember when last they had dined alone, just the two of them, like a pair of lovers.

  For once, he had not been forced to put up with the company of the rustic yokels from the settlement, or with the obsequious flattery of ambitious Company servants or, greatest blessing of all, without the posturing and boasting of that amorous prig Schreuder.

  He fell back in the deep leather chair beside the fire and Sukeena brought him a box of good Dutch cigars to choose from. As she held the burning taper for him, he peered with a lascivious eye down the front of her costume. The soft swell of girlish breasts, between which nestled the exotic jade brooch, moved him so that he felt his groin swell and engorge pleasantly.

  Katinka was kneeling at the open hearth, but she regarded him so slyly that he worried for a moment that she had seen him ogle the slave girl's bosom. But then she smiled and took up the poker that was heating in the fire and plunged its glowing tip into the stone jug of scented wine. It boiled and fumed, and she filled a bowl with it and brought it to him before it had time to cool.

  "My beautiful wife!" He slurred a little. "My little darling." He toasted her with the steaming bowl. He was not yet so intoxicated or gullible that he did not realize there would be some price to pay for this unusual kindness. There always was.

  Kneeling in front of him, Katinka looked up at Sukeena, who hovered close at hand. "That is all for tonight, Sukeena You may go." She gave the slave girl a knowing smile.

  "I wish you sweet sleep and dreams of paradise, master and mistress." Sukeena gave that graceful genuflection, and glided from the room. She slid the carved oriental screen door closed behind her, and knelt there quietly with her face close to the panel. These were her mistress's orders. Katinka wanted Sukeena to witness what transpired between her and her husband. She knew that it would tighten the knot that bound the slave girl to her.

  Now Katinka moved behind her husband's chair. "You have had such a difficult week," she said softly, "what with the affair of the pirate's body being stolen from the scaffold, and now the new census and taxation ordinances from the Seventeen. My poor darling husband, let me massage your shoulders for you."

  She removed his wig and kissed the top of his head. The stubble prickled her lips, and she stood back and dug her thumbs into his heavy shoulders. Van de Velde sighed with pleasure, not only with the sensation of the knots being eased from his muscles but because he recognized this as the prelude to the infrequent dispensation of her sexual favours.

  "How much do you love me?" she asked, and leaned over him to nibble at his ear.

  "I adore you," he blurted out. "I worship you "You are always so kind to me." Her voice took on that husky quality that made his skin tingle. "I want to be kind to you. I have written to my father. I have explained to him the circumstances of the pirate's demise and how it was not your fault that it happened.
I shall give the letter to the captain of the homewar&bound galleon, which is anchored in the bay at the moment, to hand to Papa in person."

  "May I see the letter before you dispatch it?" he asked warily. "It would carry much weight if it could accompany my own report to the Seventeen, which I shall send on the same ship."

  "Of course you may. I shall bring it to you before you leave for the castle in the morning." She brushed the top of his head with her lips again, and slid her fingers from his shoulders down over his chest. She unhooked the buttons of his doublet and slipped both hands into the opening. She took a handful of each of his pendulous dugs and kneaded them as though they were lumps of soft bread dough.

  "You are such a good little wife," he said. "I would like to give you a sign of my love. What do you lack? A jewel? A pet? A new slave? Tell your old Petrus."

  "I do have a little whimsy," she admitted coyly. "There is a man in the dungeons" "One of the pirates? "he hazarded. "No, a slave named Althuda."

  "Ah, yes! I know about him. The rebel and runaway! I shall deal with him this coming week. His death warrant is already on my desk waiting for my signature. Shall I give him to Slow John? Would you like to watch? Is that it? You want to enjoy the sport? How can I deny you?"

  She reached down and began to unlace the fastening of his breeches. He spread his legs and lay back comfortably in the chair to make the task easier for her.

  "I want you to grant Althuda a reprieve," she whispered in his ear.

  He sat bolt upright. "You are mad," he gasped. "You are so cruel to call me mad." She pouted.

  "But but he is a runaway. He and his gang of thugs murdered twenty of the soldiers who were sent to recapture him. I could never free him."

  "I know you cannot release him. But I want you to keep him alive.

  You could set him to work on the walls of your castle."

  "I cannot do it." He shook his shaven head. "Not even for you."

  She came round from behind his chair and knelt in front of him. Her fingers began work again on the lacing of his breeches. He tried to sit up but she pushed him back and reached inside.

  All the saints bear witness, the old sodomite makes it difficult for me. He is as soft and white as un risen dough, she thought as she grasped him. "Not even for your own loving wife?" she whispered, and looked up with swimming violet eyes, as she thought, That's a little better, I felt the drooping lily twitch.

  "I mean, rather, that it would be difficult." He was in a quandary.

  "I understand," she murmured. "It was just as difficult for me to compose my letter to my father. I would hate to be forced to burn it." She stood up and lifted her skirts as though she were about to climb over a stile. She was naked from the waist down and his eyes bulged like those of a cod hauled up abruptly from deep water. He struggled to sit up and at the same time tried to reach for her.

  I'll not have you on top of me again, you great tub of pork lard, she thought as she smiled lovingly at him and held him down with both hands on his shoulders. Last time you nearly squashed the life out of me.

  She straddled him as though she were mounting the mare. "Oh, sweet Jesus, what a mighty man you are!" she cried, as she took him in. The only pleasure she received from it was the thought of Sukeena listening at the screen door. She closed her eyes and summoned up the image of the slave girl's slim thighs and the treasure that lay between them. The thought inflamed her, and she knew that her husband would feel her flowing response and think it was for him alone.

  "Katinka," he gurgled and snorted as though he was drowning, "I love you."

  "The reprieve?" she asked. "I cannot do it."

  "Then neither can I," she said, and lifted herself onto her knees.

  She had to fight to keep herself from laughing aloud as she watched his face swell and his eyes bulge further out. He wriggled and heaved under her, thrusting vainly at the air.

  "Please!" he whimpered. "Please!"

  "The reprieve?" she asked, keeping herself suspended tantalizingly above him.

  "Yes," he whinnied. "Anything. I will give you anything you want."

  "I love you, my husband," she whispered in his ear, and sank down like a bird settling on its nest.

  Last time he lasted to a count of one hundred, she remembered. This time I shall try to bring him to the finishing line in under fifty. With rocking hips she set herself to better her own record.

  Manseer opened the door of Althuda's cell and roared, "Come out, you murderous dog. Governor's orders, you go to work on the wall." Althuda stepped out through the iron door and Manseer glared at him. "Seems you'll not be dancing a quadrille on the scaffold with Slow John, more's the pity. But don't crow too loud, you'll give us as much sport on the castle walls. Barnard and his hounds will see to that. You'll not last the winter out, I'll wager a hundred guilders on it."

  Hal led the file of convicts up from the lower cells, and paused on the stone step below Althuda. For a long moment they studied each other keenly. Both looked pleased at what they saw.

  "If you give me a choice, then I think I prefer the cut of your sister's jib to yours." Hal smiled. Althuda was smaller in stature than his voice had suggested and all the marks of his long captivity were plain to see. his skin was sallow and his hair matted and tangled.

  But the body that showed through the holes in his miserable rags was neat and strong and supple. His gaze was frank and his countenance comely and open. Although his eyes were almond-shaped and his hair straight and black, his English blood mingled well with that of his mother's people. There was a proud and stubborn set to his jaw.

  "What cradle did you fall out of?" he asked Hal, with a grin. It was obvious that he was overjoyed to come out from the shadow of the gallows. "I called for a man and they sent a boy."

  "Come on, you murdering renegade," Barnard bellowed, as the gaoler handed over the convicts to his charge. "You may have escaped the noose for the moment, but I have a few pleasures in store for you. You slit the throats of some of my comrades on the mountainside." It was clear that all the garrison bitterly resented Althuda's reprieve. Then Barnard turned on Hal. "As for you, you stinking pirate, your tongue is too loose by far. One word out of you today and I'll kick you off the wall, and feed the scraps to my dogs."

  Barnard separated the two of them. he sent Hal back onto the scaffold and set Althuda to work in the gangs of convicts down in the courtyard, unloading the masonry blocks from the ox-drawn wagons as they came down from the quarries.

  However, that evening Althuda was herded into the general cell. Daniel and the rest crowded around him in the darkness to hear his story told in detail, and to ply him with all the questions that they had not been able to shout up the staircase. He was something new in the dreary, monotonous round of captivity and heart-breaking labour. Only when the kettle of stew was brought down from the kitchens and the men hurried to their frugal dinner did Hal have a chance to speak to him alone.

  "If you escaped once before, Althuda, then there must be a chance we can do it again."

  "I was in a better state then. I had my own fishing boat. My master trusted me and I had the run of the colony. How can we escape from the walls that surround us? I fear it would be impossible."

  "You use the words fear and impossible. That is not a language that I understand. I thought perhaps I had met a man, not some faintheart."

  "Keep the harsh words for our enemies, my friend." Althuda returned his hard stare. "Instead of telling me what a hero you are, tell me instead now how you receive word from the outside." Hal's stern expression cracked and he grinned at him. He liked the man's spirit, the way he could meet broadside with broadside. He moved closer and lowered his voice as he explained to Althuda how it was done. Then he handed him the latest message he had received. Althuda took it to the grille gate, and studied it in the torchlight that filtered down the staircase.

  "Yes" he said. "That is my sister's hand. I know of no other who can pen her letters so prettily."