by Wilbur Smith
The October day wore on. Shadows lengthened; the coffee house emptied. The church bells started chiming for evening prayer. Francis began to wonder where he would go that evening, and where he could eat. He had forgotten his noonday dreams of fortune and trade. All he wanted was a meal. He touched the velvet bag that bulged slightly under his shirt. He’d seen a pawnbroker’s near the inn: surely he could get a good price there. Only for a few days, until he had the money from Hyperion. The thought made him feel ashamed of his weakness.
Lost in thought, Francis didn’t see the porter hurrying towards him until he was halfway across the street. He was carrying a hotcake wrapped in a napkin.
‘I’ve been watching you all day. You haven’t eaten a thing.’
Francis almost snatched the cake out of his hands. He buried his face in it, too hungry to taste the sweet flavours of sugar and almonds filling his mouth.
He was so busy eating, he didn’t notice the two men who had accompanied the porter across the street. The first he knew was stout hands seizing his arms, another hand over his mouth and the porter holding a stick across his throat. He choked. The cake fell half-eaten to the ground and was trampled under hobnailed boots.
He struggled, but he had no chance. The porter and his men bundled him across the road and inside the building; he couldn’t even cry out. If any of the passers-by noticed, they knew well enough to keep on walking.
The house was much larger inside than it had seemed from the street. The men dragged Francis down a long corridor, thick with the smells of cloves and pepper, then up many stairs. Francis heard laughter and conversations, but all the doors were closed and no one looked out.
The men brought him to a great door on the top floor, with a brass handle shaped like a snarling lion. The porter knocked respectfully. Even he seemed to hesitate before opening the door, as if approaching the lair of a fearsome beast.
It was dark inside, the air hot and damp like a greenhouse. A small fire burned in the grate, and a candle burned on the vast desk by the back wall, but they cast little light on the curtained room. The walls seemed to lean in, huge paintings of ships and battles hanging floor-to-ceiling in ornate gilt frames. The air smelled rotten, as if a slab of meat had been left too long and forgotten. Francis searched the gloom but didn’t see anyone: only a large mound behind the desk, like a heap of discarded laundry.
His captors let him go and doffed their caps. Caught off balance, Francis stumbled forward and almost fell. He rubbed his throat.
A wet, rasping cough sounded behind the desk. The heap began to move. It was a man, Francis realized, as his eyes adapted to the gloom. It was an enormous, great-bellied man with a blanket over his knees and a silk dressing gown wrapped around his shoulders. His neck had disappeared beneath a cascade of wobbling chins. His head was shaved, but badly, so that white hairs sprouted out like the spikes on a thistle. Broken veins mottled his sagging cheeks. Only his eyes, sunk deep in folds of flesh, remained bright and alive.
‘Who are you?’ he demanded. He did not rise. In fact, Francis thought, he was probably not able to do so. Later he learned that the iron rings hanging from the arms of his chair, were there to enable him to be carried on the rare occasions when he left this office. They said that when he was at stool, it took three men to lift him onto the privy, and wipe his backside when he was finished.
One of the guards stepped up and slammed his fist into Francis’ stomach. ‘Answer when Sir Nicholas speaks to you,’ he barked.
Francis tried to speak, but the blow had winded him badly and no words would come.
‘Who sent you? Was it Norris and his Dowgate men?’
‘Who?’ Francis gasped. ‘I know nobody with that name.’
‘Do not play the fool with me, boy.’ Sir Nicholas twitched his head and another blow struck Francis hard in the guts, doubling him over. ‘You have been watching this house all day. Who were you spying on?’
‘I’m not—’
‘Was it those damned interlopers? They know the consequences if they attempt to steal my trade. I will burn their ships and see them rot in an Indian prison if I catch them.’
‘Please,’ said Francis, as another blow jabbed into his kidneys. ‘I am Francis Courtney. My mother sent me.’
Sir Nicholas’ face was crimson with rage. ‘What impudence is this? Sir Francis Courtney died near fifty years ago.’
‘My great-grandfather.’ Francis fumbled for the velvet bag inside his shirt. The guard saw him and though he was reaching for a weapon. He kicked Francis’ legs from under him, dropping him to the floor, and aimed a kick at his ribs.
Francis pulled out the bag. The guard snatched it from him. He jerked the drawstring stretched open, and the golden medal of the lion holding the globe in its paws fell out onto the floor.
The guard had raised his fist again.
‘Stop,’ called Sir Nicholas. ‘Give me that.’
Two of the men held Francis, while the porter retrieved the golden lion and laid it on the desk. Sir Nicholas held it up, letting the candlelight sparkle on the inset rubies and diamonds.
‘Where did you get this?’ he demanded of Francis
‘It belongs to my family. My father left it to me.’
Sir Nicholas turned the emblem in his fingers. He waved his men to let Francis go.
‘Who are you?’ Sir Nicholas said again, but more thoughtfully this time.
Francis drew himself up, determined to ignore the pain that shot through his body when he moved. He’d rehearsed the words all day, though he’d never imagined delivering them in such circumstances.
‘I am Francis Courtney, son of William Courtney and grandson of Hal Courtney, Baron Dartmouth and Nautonnier Knight of the Order of St George and the Holy Grail. Twenty years ago, my grandfather gave his life defending your company’s shipping from pirates. Now, all I ask is some preferment, an opportunity to join the Company’s service and prove my worth.’
Childs stared at him as if he were a ghost.
‘Leave us,’ he ordered his men.
They withdrew. Childs studied the boy. For decades, now, he had governed the East India Company as his personal domain, stretching out his tentacles from this office in Leadenhall Street to the furthest corners of the globe. Kings and Parliaments had come and gone, some of them claiming the Company was too powerful, that its monopoly should be withdrawn. He had seen them off, broken his competitors and outlived them all.
Courtneys, too, had come and gone. For a time, they had been useful servants and helped him build up the Company fortune. When that ceased to be the case, he had dispatched them as easily as he had done his enemies, with never a prick of conscience. From his home at Bombay House, he had sent Tom Courtney to be murdered by his brother William. To his surprise, Tom had sprung the trap and turned the tables on William, but that had not troubled Childs. Tom had fled, a wanted murderer, and William’s seven per cent holding in the East India Company had passed to his infant son. Childs had had little difficulty persuading the widow to sell it to him on the most advantageous terms, cementing his control still further. He had all but forgotten young Francis Courtney.
Now the boy stood before him, grown almost to manhood. A livid welt coloured his neck where the men had choked him; his face was pale, but firm with the unyielding pride Childs had seen twenty years ago in his grandfather Hal. He thought that this was a lad who could be useful, or dangerous.
‘My boy,’ he adopted a more kindly and avuncular tone, ‘come closer where I can see you better.’
It was an act: his body might be failing, but his blue eyes remained as clear and sharp as his mind.
Francis took a few hesitant steps forward.
‘I am sorry you were so roughly handled,’ Childs said. ‘My enemies have many spies, and will stop at nothing to thwart me and this noble company. I trust you were not seriously hurt?’
Francis rubbed his side. He could already feel the skin tightening as the bruises formed.
‘I
am a little hungry, your lordship.’
‘Of course, of course.’ Childs rang a hand bell that stood on the corner of his desk, and bellowed for the servant to bring food. ‘Now, my boy, take a chair and tell me everything. How do you come to be here? If you had written, I could have given you a kinder reception.’
Francis lowered himself painfully into the chair. ‘My stepfather died last week. He left me nothing but the golden lion.’
Childs mopped his brow with a handkerchief. ‘I am sorry to hear it. Your mother probably never told you, but I always took a keen interest in your upbringing. The way your father died – I am afraid I feel some guilt for it. You see, I was the last man to see your uncle Tom before he committed the murderous deed. I have always asked myself, was there something I could have said or done to change his course? Could I have discerned what he intended, and taken steps to prevent it?’
He broke off in a fit of coughing, dabbing his mouth with the handkerchief. It came away dabbled with specks of fresh blood.
‘I’m sure you are beyond reproach, sir,’ Francis protested.
A troubling thought nagged him as he remembered those last frantic moments with his mother.
‘May I confide in you, sir?’
‘Of course, my boy. As your own father.’
‘Before I left home my mother made a most outlandish suggestion. She said – she believed – that my uncle Tom may be innocent of the crime. She said he only killed William in self-defence.’
Childs shook his head so hard, all his chins wobbled. ‘She is mistaken. Grief has addled her wits, poor woman. I saw William Courtney in the House of Lords the day he died. The concern he expressed for his brother, the love and affection he bore him – no man could doubt it. That very day, he told me, he intended to advance Tom ten thousand pounds to fit out an expedition to rescue their brother Dorian, who had been seized by pirates – though it later transpired that the boy was dead. But that was not enough for Tom Courtney. He ambushed William on the Thames path late at night, demanding a greater share of their father’s inheritance, and when William refused Tom cut him down without mercy.’
Francis shuddered as he imagined the scene. ‘You are sure of it?’
‘I had a full report from a boatman who witnessed the entire tragedy. Even after so many years, I remember every detail.’
A servant knocked and entered with a silver tray. He set out the dishes on Childs’ desk, mounded platters of roast meats, and poured two glasses of claret from a crystal decanter. It was all Francis could do to wait until the servant retired before he fell upon the food.
Childs ate almost as ravenously as Francis did. Gravy dribbled down his chins and dripped onto his shirtfront.
‘Do you wish to avenge your father?’ Pieces of food sprayed from his mouth as Childs asked the question. He went on without waiting for a reply. ‘Of course you do. You are a Courtney, and I know well what blood runs in those veins of yours.’
Francis took a gulp of wine. ‘Yes, sir. But I do not understand—’
‘Your presence here today is most auspicious; it is almost as if fate guided your footsteps. You see, a week ago a ship from the Indies docked at Deptford. The Dowager, under Captain Inchbird. He brought a most remarkable tale. Twenty-two days out from Bombay, near the coast of Madagascar, he was attacked by a pirate and nearly taken. It was a fierce fight by all accounts, but while he was gallantly fending off the enemy a small sloop joined the fray. Her captain was none other than Tom Courtney.’
Francis felt the room spin around him. The pictures on the wall seemed to press in on him, and the wine throbbed in his head. ‘That cannot be, sir. Tom Courtney died in Africa while I was a child. My uncle Guy confirmed it.’
‘Your uncle was wrong. Tom Courtney is alive and well, trading along the coast of Africa. Inchbird believes he resides in Cape Town, when he is not at sea.’
Childs put down his knife and fork. ‘You asked me for a position in the Company. For the love I bore your grandfather, and our long association with your family, I will gladly give you a clerkship with your uncle Guy in Bombay, and free passage on one of our ships. But I can give you more. The vessel will call at the Cape en route to Bombay. It may be there some weeks, provisioning and watering. If you wish, you will have time to disembark. You could find your uncle, if he is there.’
Francis chewed a piece of pork, struggling to take in this latest intelligence. Childs leaned forward. Wine stained his lips the colour of blood.
‘When Tom Courtney fled England, we offered five thousand pounds for his capture. I, personally, guaranteed the reward. It still stands. Five thousand pounds,’ Childs repeated. ‘A princely sum for any man, let alone a youth of your age just starting to make his way in the world. And if you invest it wisely in Bombay, you could double or triple the sum by the time you return.’
Francis tried to imagine that much money. He imagined returning to High Weald in a coach and four and taking possession of the house. Establishing his mother in her own apartments, scrubbing off the years to make it the bright, happy place he remembered from his youth.
The wine was hot inside him. He knew he should not drink so fast on a famished stomach, but he couldn’t resist. He felt sure there was more he should ask, important questions about Guy and Tom and his inheritance, but Childs’ tone brooked no discussion. When he poured more wine, Francis drained it gratefully.
‘This is the revenge you have waited for your whole life,’ said Childs. ‘A chance to settle unfinished business for both of us.’
The St George medallion still lay on the desk, half hidden under a sheaf of papers. Francis lifted it up, missing the flash of disappointment that crossed Child’s face. He stood, unsteady on his feet after so much wine.
‘Upon my father’s honour, Sir Nicholas, I will find Tom Courtney and bring him to justice.’
Tom and Dorian sat outside the tavern, nursing their drinks and looking down at the ships anchored in Table Bay. Tom was drinking a sweet muscadel wine, but Dorian was true to his adopted religion and eschewed all alcohol. He was drinking diluted orange juice. Behind them, the top of Table Mountain ruled a flat line across the sky, while the lesser summits of Devil’s Peak and Lion’s Peak reached out to enclose the bay in a natural amphitheatre. Below the forests on the lower slopes, a hundred or so stone-built, white-washed houses dotted the landscape, running down to the sea where warehouses and taverns lined the shore. At the northern end, the Dutch tricolour blew over the five-pointed fort that left no doubt as to where the power in the colony lay.
An Indiaman was beating in to the harbour. From her colours, and the state of her rigging, Tom saw she must be fresh from England. He made a quick calculation of what her arrival would mean. Ivory prices would rise, as the English merchants sought supplies to take to India; in return, they would want to trade knives and steel goods from England. The ship was late in the season, and most of the ivory stocks had been sold, but Tom had kept back a few good tusks from their last voyage for just such an eventuality. He smiled as he thought of the profits to be made.
Soon, he and Dorian would return to the boarding house where they lodged during their interludes in Cape Town. He had some ten thousand pounds deposited at the offices of an Amsterdam bank here, though he had never used it to buy his own home. The Dutch authorities laid ferocious restrictions on foreigners owning property in the colony, but a few rix-dollars in the right palms might smooth the way around that. He had never tried. Year after year, he waited out the monsoon in the boarding house, impatient for the next season to begin.
‘Are you bored, Tom?’ Dorian asked. In reply Tom swept his arm in a full circle, taking in the mountains and the sea, the cotton-fluff clouds and the sun sinking towards the horizon. ‘How could I ever be bored with all this to enjoy?’
‘I know you too well, brother,’ Dorian chuckled. ‘You haven’t fired a gun in anger since the day we rescued the Dowager from that pirate Legrange. And that was almost a year ago.’
&nb
sp; The past ivory-hunting season in the African interior had been a quiet one. Tom and Dorian had taken an expedition almost two hundred leagues up the Zambesi River, but found none of the slavers he had warred with in the past. Even the hunting had been less bountiful than past years. Centaurus had returned with her hold only half full of ivory.
‘Fighting is bad for business,’ Tom said, without conviction.
Then he blinked with astonishment as he saw out on the far horizon, where the last rim of the sun was slipping away, a sudden flash of the most brilliant green he could ever imagine. It startled him; although he had heard of the phenomenon before, this was the first time he had actually witnessed it.
‘Did you also see that?’ Tom demanded as both of them jumped to their feet in amazement, staring at the distant horizon.
‘Yes, indeed!’ Dorian was as excited as he was. ‘Neptune’s Wink.’ It was one of those mysteries, like St Elmo’s fire, that you would seldom see unless you lived your life on the wild oceans of the globe.
‘I have heard tell that the man who sees it acquires special wisdom,’ Tom enthused as they resumed their seats.
‘Bully for you,’ Dorian teased him. ‘You can certainly use all the wisdom you are able to lay your hands on.’
In retaliation Tom grinned and poured the dregs of his wine over Dorian’s head. ‘For such impertinence you can buy me another glass of wine,’ Tom told him.
When Dorian returned from the bar with Tom’s glass topped up they settled down again in companionable silence to enjoy the last of the sunset, and to watch the Indiaman drop anchor in the bay.
As its anchor splashed into the darkening waters the bum boats from the beach swarmed about the ship, as eager as lambs for the teat.
‘They won’t bring their cargo ashore until morning,’ Tom decided. ‘We can wait until then to see what we can sell them.’
He left a coin for the drinks, and together they went back up to the slopes of the mountain, following Die Heerengracht, the ‘Gentlemen’s Walk’ that ran between the parade ground and the Company gardens. Deep in conversation, they didn’t notice the woman in the blue dress coming down the path towards them until she was almost abreast.