by Andre Norton
“To the Ranee. She has just come to anchor, and she carries a treasure on board which will amaze you. Hurry now, I have a carriage waiting.”
Perhaps it was the magic word “treasure” which brought Victorine out of beginning sulks. I was more than a little excited as I pinned on my hat. For I remembered —so much. It had been a long time since I had walked a ship's deck, smelled that odor which is a combination of many scents, but would always signify happiness for me.
CHAPTER TEN
As we drove along Victorine asked many questions. But I was silent, relishing the thought of the experience ahead. This was a different part of the city than I had seen, for we entered now the fringe of the infamous Barbary Coast.
The blatant noise reached our ears even through the closed carriage windows. Here, I had heard,’ hoodlums ran in packs, and the police (specially chosen for strength and courage, carrying both pistols and knives) dared only go in twos and threes. This strip of the city was famed throughout the seas. In filthy lodging houses, the unspeakable drinking dens, crimps followed their trade, putting opiates into the liquor of fuddled seamen, plundering them of everything worth taking, then shipping them out again, inert and oftentimes deathly ill, to fill up the crews of waiting ships.
My father had never dealt with crimps. Twice in this harbor, he had told me, he and his mates had to fight on deck to get rid of them. And his stories of San Francisco portside had made me shudder.
But when we at last stepped on the deck of the Ranee I gazed about with a feeling close to pain. She was a clipper, one of those beauties now, alas, fast being replaced by steamers. No more beautiful ships have ever existed, the dreams of men who had built them, sailed them fearlessly into waters where the American flag had never been shown before. She was one of a dying race and I loved her.
We were met by the Captain and his first officer, escorted below, Victorine complaining over the unsteady footing. But I discovered that sea legs cannot be lost and I needed no steadying hand.
Captain Maxfield entertained us royally. There were boxes of candied ginger, other strange sweets. Yet not so strange or exotic to me. I was surrounded by far-found objects such as my father had once collected. There was a scroll of a Chinese painting, a hideous mask with shark teeth set in its gapping mouth, a Malay kris, its blade pitted by exposure to the salt air.
I nibbled my ginger and gazed from one wall to the next until I was startled from old dreams by the first officer:
“Pardon me, Miss Penfold, but one would think you had been here once before, the way you look about you.”
“I have,” and then catching sight of his amazed expression, I explained. “No, I did not mean right here. But my father was Captain Jesse Penfold and I sailed with him for many years. In fact I was born on shipboard.”
“Fancy that now!” But I supposed in my fashionable furbelows I looked far removed from Spartan sea life. “Captain Jesse Penfold? Aye—I've heard tell of him. In Canton it was. He was good friends with Merchant Ho. They still speak of him there.”
“I am so glad!” A man should live in the memories of those he had touched. That those of his calling still spoke of him with respect made me proud and happy.
“And it was he who beat off five pirate junks in the Japanese sea, too, I heard tell,” Mr. Whicker continued. “Now that was a story!”
I smiled. “One which seems to have grown in the telling. I was there, you see. There were only two junks and one must have had a drunken steersman, it sailed so erratically. But their attack was frightening for a while.”
“Two—five—what matter? It took a tough man to do that. Those eastern pirates are none I want to meet without a couple of cannon primed and ready and a pistol in each hand. It was a sad loss, Miss Penfold, when those devils of Reb commerce raiders put an end to such a man and his command,” he ended frankly.
Again I was touched and pleased, glad to know my father was remembered so.
“Well now, ladies.” The Captain, who had been talking with Alain, arose. “Mr. Sauvage thinks you might like to see the cream of the cargo before he turns it over to the bank guards.”
He went to a small safe well secured to the deck and brought out a metal box. From that the Captain lifted several trays, lined with raw Indian cotton, which held treasure indeed.
There was one tray of pearls, their luster gleaming against the dull cotton. Below those a second tray held stones from Ceylon, rubies and sapphires, and the third contained jade. Not that jade which is usually exported to the West, but that translucent “imperial” jade kept so closely within the borders of China that many westerners do not know it exists. These pieces were not unset stones like the others, but worked and carved. There was a butterfly, two perfect drop earrings, a bracelet bearing a tiny intricate scene—all of which might have belonged to a lady of the Court.
“That jade—where could you have gotten it?” I asked before I thought.
Captain Maxfield smiled. “Fair come, Miss Penfold, though of this quality you might well wonder. The truth is we were lucky in the Straits. The pirates tried one of those devilish tricks of theirs—set a ship's boat adrift with an upright oar, a bit of a shirt rag fastened to it for a distress signal. Only one of our hands had been in a ship near suckered in by such a ploy some years back. So we let them think we took the bait and then got the dhow as they came in to board us. We found this”—he patted the top of the box with weathered brown hand—“in her captain's quarters. No telling where he had stolen it, could be loot of years. But in any case there are no legal owners, they're probably long dead. So it's rightful treasure trove.”
“So it is. After an auction or a private sale, whichever you decide,” Alain said briskly, “the sum realized shall go on ship's share. I'll give you a receipt for the box and that will be taken straight to the bank. Tucker himself has agreed to value it. He may make you an offer; if he does, consider it. His jewelry shop is the best in the city.”
“We'll leave all that to you, Mr. Sauvage. You take owner's cut anyway.”
“Not this time,” Alain shook his head. “Spoils of a fight I wasn't in are not mine. You risked your lives, I don't collect on that.”
The Captain produced pen, ink, and paper and Alain wrote out the receipt. Over his hunched shoulder I watched Mrs. Deaves and Victorine. The former was frowning but Victorine had eyes only for the gems. There was a kind of hunger in her face—as if she regarded food placed just beyond her reach.
I felt the fascination of the gems also—mostly the jade. Then my mind shuddered away from imagining how those pieces had found their way into the hands of a Straits pirate. I believed that any who wore them and knew of their history could not feel clean.
“Alain,” Victorine said as we once more settled in the carriage, “those so beautiful things—who will buy them?”
“Perhaps Tucker. His ‘Diamond Palace,’ as they speak of it, could afford them. At any rate Captain Maxfield can depend upon him for a fair appraisal. Now you have seen what might be termed ‘the wealth of the Indies.’”
“The wealth of the Indies,” she repeated dreamily.
“And most of the profit will be wasted!” There was irritation in Mrs. Deaves’ voice. “Those men were perfectly ready for you to accept owner's share, Alain. Now it will go into the pockets of ordinary seamen, to be wasted in such places as these!” She waved a gloved hand toward the streets of the Barbary Coast.
“Not ordinary seamen. Very extraordinary ones to accomplish what they did. No, owner's share comes from legitimate trading. This find was the result of their risking their lives. They are entitled to benefit from their effort, if ever men did. That jade—it must once have been the pride of some imperial princess or concubine. How did it wind up in the strongbox of a Straits pirate?”
“In a way I would not care to dwell upon.” I spoke my earlier thought aloud.
“Quite right!” Alain returned promptly.
We did not return at once to the hotel; rather Alain e
scorted us to the famous French restaurant, The Poodle Dog. There we lunched on viands which I had not seen or tasted since I left Brussels on the India Queen. It was when we arose after dining that I caught a glimpse of a dark head beside a pillar on the far side of the room, eyes which watched us.
Was that the young man I had seen with Victorine on the balcony? Or was I inclined to see that stranger in any man of the right height and coloring? My glimpse had been so fleeting I could not be sure.
A waiter came hurrying just as Alain was handing us into the carriage. He reached past Mr. Sauvage and handed a folded handkerchief to Victorine.
“Mademoiselle dropped this—”
Victorine murmured thanks, crumpled the linen square to ruck it into the lace undersleeve of her dress. A small enough incident, and an innocent one—but it lingered in my memory.
As we entered the Lick House Alain was presented with a telegram which set him frowning. His mouth became grim and all the harsh lines in his face were emphasized.
“Bad news?” Mrs. Deaves asked quickly. She appeared ready to offer sympathy but I could not imagine Alain Sauvage wishing that, no matter what blows life might deal.
“There is difficulty at the Horseshoe again. I thought that this last time I had made Parkinson see reason. He simply cannot deal well with the men. It is time I made a change there. But this means another trip to Virginia City. I shall make it as short as possible.”
“At least,” Victorine observed after he left, “he did not send us back to the country. Here there is something to do, to see—”
“But you have not wished to do anything.” I was more disturbed at the change of events than I dared display.
Again I was responsible, and if Victorine had only been waiting for Alain to go—what could I do?
“That was because Alain spoke always of the docteur and said I must not tire myself by doing things until I saw him. Now Alain is no longer here to shake his head and say be careful. I am not ill, as I have told him—all of you—but never does he listen. I have only now and then an aching head which makes me feel queer and giddy. Now I do not feel that way at all and we shall do things without seeing Alain's stern face.” She drew down the corners of her mouth in a counterfeit of a disapproving expression.
At least she was not going to start at once, for which I was thankful. For instead she started toward her chamber saying she would rest now. We had had cards left by those who had attended the ball, but had been absolved from the rounds of duty visits by the plea of Victorine's ill health and the fact we were in the city ostensibly to see a physician.
I think Mrs. Deaves chafed at our isolation when Alain was no longer available. Now she might wish to establish contact with old friends and I would be left alone as Victorine's mentor.
Heretofore the girl had been docile enough. But that restlessness which she showed again in the afternoon, wandering from window to window, dismayed me.
Mrs. Deaves withdrew with a bundle of notes she said must have immediate answers. And Victorine's lack of ease reacted upon me; I could not settle with a book nor a piece of needlework. Victorine had made plain from the first that fashion magazines were her only reading. If she had ever opened a book, that had been an act of curiosity to see why others could be attracted to reading.
Though she had clever fingers and could fashion amusing trifles in the way of caps, jabots, and the like from scraps of lace, ribbon, an artificial flower, her span of concentration was short. She would toss her creation aside before it was quite finished, leaving Amélie to add the last few stitches, her interest in it gone.
Now she clapped her hands in that way she always used to summon her maid, a gesture I found too hinting of slave-day customs to like. Though neither mistress nor maid seemed to find it amiss.
“Amélie—bring me the cards.” Her order was in the sharpest tone I had ever heard her use in addressing the maid.
While, unlike her usual quick obedience, Amélie did not go at once, I saw her lips part as if to say something, and she glanced questioningly in my direction.
“It is all right, I tell you!” Victorine's impatience mounted. She seemed overriding some unheard protest. Her fingers went to her throat, parting the frills of her vestee to reveal the serpent necklace. “Bring them now!”
Amélie went with visible reluctance. And Victorine selected one of the smaller tables, swiftly stripped it of a vase of roses, a salver filled with calling cards, and a half-emptied box of bonbons. She ended by switching off the crimson plush cover to bare the polished surface.
A couple of jerks brought the denuded table to face her chair, as she kicked the cover into an untidy heap. Amélie returned, a black box in her hand, but she did not present that directly to her mistress.
Instead she stood by the table, holding what she carried pressed against her breast as if she hated to yield it up. Victorine's fixed gaze met the maid's stare. Then very slowly Amélie put down the box. That hideous bracelet with its spider setting was very obvious as she did so. I wondered why she clung to an ornament lifelike enough to bring a shudder from me every time I saw it.
“You may go!” There was a chill in Victorine's voice.
Amélie left slowly. She might be lingering, hoping to be recalled, to have her mistress declare she had changed her mind. If so she was to be disappointed.
Victorine paid no attention to me. She might have been alone in the room as she moved briskly as one repeating an action she had carried out many times before. The lid of the box pivoted to one side at a touch, and she lifted out a pack of cards.
They were certainly no ordinary pack such as might be used for a game of whist. In her white, beautifully kept hands, they were as incongruous as if she had deliberately reached into a gutter for a handful of mud. For their surfaces, as far as I could see, were grimed with ancient dirt. Such a foul deck might have been used for play on the Coast, yet they did not seem to disgust Victorine.
She shuffled three times before she laid the cards out, face up, on the table in a complicated pattern which had no resemblance to any form of patience I knew. Some were horizontal, crossing those laid vertically. And she did not use the entire deck, only a counted number. It was plain this was serious to her, her attitude was one of intense concentration such I had never seen her display before.
A few of the last cards had been laid face down and these she picked up one by one, surveyed, and then stabbed down on the table top either right or left. I was so curious I arose to look over her shoulder.
The usual pips were missing from these cards. Hearts, diamonds, clubs, and spades, there were none of those. These bore instead pictures which were so overlaid by dirt that one could hardly make out the full design, save one was a hand holding a dagger, another a black snake curled around a rod.
Victorine turned over the last card, added it to one of her piles. She scowled and muttered in the patois I could not understand. With a gesture of impatience or anger, she swept the cards into a pile, put them back into the box. Before I could ask a question, she pushed aside the table with such force that it nearly crashed, and stood up.
It was only then that she appeared to remember she was not alone, and turned her head to gaze at me.
“I am very tired, I go now to rest.” Her abrupt speech had little in common with her usual half-drawl. And her bearing was not that of one fatigued. Rather her eyes glittered, her body was tense. But the door of her room closed so firmly behind her I was at a loss.
When Mrs. Deaves appeared to say that she was dining with a friend, Amélie came from Victorine's room to announce her mistress had a headache and would want only a cup of chocolate.
“But she was feeling so much better!” Mrs. Deaves was plainly vexed. “Very well, I shall send a note to the Andrews—”
“You need not give up your engagement.” I did not fancy spending the evening with a Mrs. Deaves annoyed at the loss of her pleasure. “I shall remain here, of course. And I want no more than some sandwiches and
a cup of coffee. Mr. Sauvage left that package of new books that arrived this morning and I shall have plenty of entertainment with those. I shall be near if Victorine needs anything.”
She was torn two ways, but her desire for the evening's pleasure won. I sighed with relief when she left. Earlier I had dismissed Fenton so she could spend the evening with her sister, and the sitting room of the suite was very still.
In the book parcel was one of those three-volume novels from England with a most intriguing title—The Moonstone. I had vaguely heard of the author, Wilkie Collins, but the book was new to me and I sat down with the first volume, prepared to spend a quiet evening. If I were watched from Victorine's chamber, as I must have been, I was unaware of it.
When the light repast I had ordered arrived there was a second tray Amélie claimed. But I halted her to ask concerning Victorine. She said her mistress was better, had asked for soup and biscuits, but wanted nothing more. And she was so eager to go I could not detain her.
I found my book enthralling, too much so for an evening's reading when alone, I at last decided. Now I felt a vague apprehension and depression, as if the troubles of the characters were communicated to my own spirit. So I put the volume firmly aside and went to bed.
It must have been close to an hour later that, still uneasy, I drew on my wrapper and slippers to make one last check on Victorine. As I stood in the doorway of her room I could see her asleep in bed. All was well, I could retire.
Yet I could not sleep. The memory of those dirty cards crowded into my mind every time I closed my eyes. Why had I not asked Victorine to explain them to me? To handle such filthy things might well cause an illness if she did it often. The ancient Black Death itself could well cling to their smeared surfaces.
Did I finally drowse? I must have, for suddenly it seemed I was back in the cabin of the Ranee. But the friendly Captain, Alain, Mrs. Deaves were missing. Alone I faced Victorine and there was that in her face which made her another person—evil.