The Tiger's Prey

by Wilbur Smith

  She raised her head, so her sharp chin jutted towards them. ‘Can you deny it?’

  Though it hardly mattered, Agnes felt a stab of betrayal. In their prison, all they owned were their secrets. Now she had lost even that. And she did not trust Lydia.

  ‘It is true,’ said Sarah flatly. ‘Agnes and I are sisters. I had not seen her for near twenty years before we landed, unlooked for, in Brinjoan.’

  ‘So you must also be a sister of Caroline Courtney, the Governor’s wife.’

  Sarah nodded.

  Lydia raised her manacled arms. ‘Then tell our captors who you really are. If Guy Courtney knew they held both his wife’s sisters – to say nothing of the widow of his loyal friend Mr Foy – he would pay whatever ransom they demand.’

  ‘You are mistaken,’ said Sarah. ‘If Guy knew my real identity, he would pay Angria to keep us here the rest of our lives. Or if he did ransom me, it would only be to inflict worse punishment than ever Angria would visit on me.’

  Lydia leaned in, like a bloodhound catching the scent. ‘Why?’

  Too late, Sarah realized she had said too much. Fatigue and despair had lowered her defences. ‘It does not signify.’

  ‘If it is the reason I am left rotting in this dungeon, it signifies everything.’ Lydia crawled forward. ‘What does Guy hold against you?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Did he love you?’

  Sarah shuddered. ‘Never.’

  Lydia considered this. ‘He did not forgive Agnes for marrying beneath her station. Perhaps you committed the same offence?’

  Sarah did not trust herself to speak.

  ‘But that would not explain the hatred,’ Lydia mused. ‘There must be more. Your husband, perhaps. Some enmity between your husband and Governor Courtney?’

  Her nose twitched. ‘But what would provoke him so? An interloper? A rival?’

  ‘He was an interloper,’ said Agnes. ‘You know how Guy despises the men who steal the India trade from him. That is the reason.’

  But she had spoken too hastily. Lydia heard the lie. ‘No. I do not think that can be it.’ A triumphant smile parted her lips. ‘When we were loading the boat at Brinjoan, I heard one of the men call you “Mrs Courtney”. Now why should they do that? And the boy who travelled with you – Guy’s nephew, Francis Courtney. A remarkable coincidence, is it not?’

  ‘You misheard,’ said Sarah.

  ‘I fear I did not. And if you are Mrs Courtney, then your husband must be …’ She thought a moment. ‘Tom Courtney.’

  She saw the stricken looks on their faces, and laughed. ‘You are Mrs Tom Courtney – not only Guy’s wife’s sister, but also his brother’s wife. Now I begin to understand. I have heard of Tom Courtney, during my days in Bombay. It was said he and Guy had become such enemies that they tried to kill each other. I heard Guy once threw a man from the roof of the Governor’s house merely for mentioning his name.’

  ‘I do not pay attention to gossip,’ said Agnes.

  But Lydia had not finished. ‘There was another story I recollect now. A veritable scandal. I had it from a friend, who had it from Caroline Courtney’s maid that came with her from England. According to the serving girl, Caroline was no maiden when she married Guy – in fact, she was already ripe with child.’

  Lydia’s face loomed out of the gloom. The privations of the past weeks had only sharpened the lines of her angular face, giving her a terrifying appearance.

  ‘They said the child – young Christopher Courtney – was not Guy’s at all. They said Caroline had been rather free with her charms on the voyage from England, and that though it was Guy who drank the nuptial wine, he was not the first to pop the cork. His brother Tom, they said, had that pleasure.’

  Even in the darkness, her eyes shone with triumph. ‘That is why Guy hates you. Though I wonder,’ she added spitefully to Sarah, ‘that you are so loyal to your husband, after he made so free with your sister. I am sure I would not content myself with being any man’s desserts.’

  ‘Please,’ begged Agnes. ‘Now you understand why Guy cannot know who Sarah is. You must not reveal this to anyone.’

  Lydia sank back into her corner, her cheeks flushed dark with the thrill of the hunt.

  ‘You may rely on me,’ she said. ‘Your secret is safe. And the other matter, of which you do not speak.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ said Sarah dully.

  ‘You are with child. You never say it, but it is as plain as the bulge in your belly. The way you could not keep your meals down in the boat, and now how you grow fat even on the thin fare the pirates allow us. And there are other signs, which any woman would notice.’

  Sarah clenched her fists.

  ‘Why do you not tell the pirates?’ Lydia asked.

  ‘Tom and I have wanted a baby these last fifteen years,’ said Sarah sadly. ‘In all that time, only once did I conceive, and that child I lost. That it should happen now, in these surroundings …’ She trailed off.

  ‘If the pirates knew, they would surely find some way to exploit her vulnerability,’ said Agnes. ‘That is why we do not talk of it, and why I implore you, Mrs Foy, to say nothing to the pirates.’

  ‘As you wish,’ said Lydia. She curled into a ball and smiled to herself, though in the dim light the others could not see it. ‘Besides, whom could I ever have to tell?’

  Far above them, through many levels of rocks and into the parts of the castle built of stone, the pirate Angria sat in his hall. He had a slight, lithe build, but no man who saw him could mistake the intensity that glowed in his eyes. A knotted turban covered his head, and a long moustache turned across his cheeks and almost joined his sideburns.

  He had not been born a seafarer. His father had been a deshmuk, a minor lord charged with the care of a hundred villages. His business had been passing judgement on farmers’ disputes, and protecting villagers from the depredations of brigands. But Angria was not made for the stiff rituals and proscriptions of rural life. The peasants grovelled to his father, his father grovelled to his overlord, and all that ever mattered was the next rice harvest. There was no glory. The first time Angria had seen a ship, a Portuguese merchant scudding across the bay in full sail, he had known that was his destiny. To fly free, unencumbered by laws and custom, unanswerable to anything but the wind and the sea – that was his dream. Twenty-five years later, he had achieved it with infamy.

  The hall was testament to his success. Trophies from the ships he had taken lined the walls – Dutch, English and Portuguese ensigns, ships’ bells and lanterns, and even the carved figurehead of a bare-breasted mermaid. Thickly woven rugs covered the floor, sometimes piled three deep. His men lay sprawled out on them. Usually, they would be playing at dice, drinking arak or smoking the hookah pipes they imported from Arabia. Now, though, all were quiet, their attention fixed on the man who stood before Angria.

  He had arrived that afternoon, riding up to the castle on a horse that had once been a fine mount, but was now lamed by weeks of hard riding. He had a long, dark beard, though the hair on his head had been burned off, leaving him bald. Even when he dismounted his horse, tossing the reins to a stable boy, he towered over the other men in the castle. He had demanded to speak to Angria. The guards admitted him, for who could deny a man with such a fabulous sword about his waist?

  Now Angria studied him from the dais where he sat. Beneath the beard, and the fresh scars that shone pink on his skin, the visitor was still almost a boy, not yet twenty but already battle-hardened. A warrior, no question. Perhaps the way Angria had looked at that age, before he learned to appreciate the merits of subtlety, as well as strength.

  ‘What is your name?’ the pirate asked.

  ‘Raudra,’ said the visitor. Raudra was an avatar of the god Shiva. Looking at the youth, the wildness in his eyes, Angria could imagine him as an incarnation of that god, the destroyer of worlds.

  ‘Why have you come here?’

  ‘To serve you.’

  ‘What do you of
fer?’

  ‘I have studied the ways of the hat-wearers,’ said Christopher. ‘I have sailed their ships, and I can train your men to fight as they do – with discipline and precision.’

  Angria shook his head. ‘I have fought the hat-wearers more seasons than you have lived. I do not want my men to fight as they do. I need men who fight in our own fashion, with spirit and bravery. You cannot teach a tiger to spit like a cobra.’

  ‘I have trained in the kalari. I can fight like a tiger, or like a cobra.’ Christopher drew his sword. ‘I will take on any man in this hall to prove it.’

  At that, half Angria’s men were on their feet, clamouring for the chance to put the rascal in his place. A few, though, stayed seated: older, wiser heads that had taken the measure of the new arrival, and saw plenty in him to give them pause.

  Angria stood and quieted his men. He stepped down from the dais and approached Christopher, circling him like a buyer at a country fair.

  ‘That is a fine sword,’ he said. The lamps in the hall shone on the sapphire. ‘You must be a brave man, to bring such a weapon into a house full of strangers.’

  ‘I trust to your honour,’ said Christopher.

  Angria nodded, accepting the compliment.

  ‘And if any man touched it, he would lose his hand that instant.’

  A growl went through the room – though no-one moved to take the challenge. Angria hushed them again.

  ‘How do I know you are who you say? I have many enemies. You might be a spy sent by the rajah Shahuji, or an agent of the hat-wearers whose ships I plunder.’

  Christopher stared him down. ‘How can you be sure of any of your men?’

  That brought several of them to their feet again, knives in their hands.

  Angria laughed. ‘Truly, a spy might be expected to try to ingratiate himself more with his hosts. Unless, of course, that is what you wish me to think.’

  He made a gesture with his hand. A side door opened, and four guards bustled in a gaunt man with unkempt hair and a wild beard. He was naked, except for a breech clout around his middle, and judging by the scars and scabs on his body he had suffered many torments. The guards threw him down between Christopher and Angria.

  ‘This man was caught stealing from my treasure store,’ said Angria. ‘What should his punishment be?’

  The prisoner whimpered. Christopher looked bored. ‘If he stole from you, he should die.’ He drew the sword. A soft gasp went around the room as the men saw the perfection of the blade, and the gold inlay rippling down it. ‘Do you wish me to do it for you?’

  ‘Put your blade away,’ said Angria. ‘That would be too easy. I keep a special place for men like this, down at the foot of the castle by the water gate. I have had an iron collar fixed to the rocks so I can bind the traitor there, near the high tide mark. You said you were a sailor?’

  The question caught Christopher off guard. ‘Once.’

  ‘You know of the spring tides?’

  ‘Twice a month, at the time of the new and the full moons, the tide sinks lower and rises higher than usual,’ said Christopher.

  Angria nodded. ‘The collar keeps the man’s head fixed where it will not be covered until the flood of the spring tide. Each day, he comes a little closer to drowning. The rocks down there are covered with limpets and barnacles. The waves dash him against them, flaying his skin on their razor-sharp shells. When the tide goes out, the sun shrivels his skin and dries the salt into his wounds. Salt water gets in his mouth – he is so thirsty, he cannot help but drink it – but it only makes him sick. If I put him out at the time of the lowest tides, halfway to the full moon, it might take a fortnight for the water to come high enough to drown him. And, by the time it does, he will thank me for my mercy.’

  The prisoner had started to speak, mumbling pleas and imprecations under his breath. One of the guards silenced him with a slap across the face. Above him, Angria and Christopher gazed at each other. Looking into the pirate’s eyes, Christopher saw nothing but a limitless appetite for power. He did not know that Angria, returning his gaze, saw almost the same reflection.

  ‘I offer you a bargain,’ said Angria. ‘You came here freely, and freely I will let you go. You may walk out of my castle without hindrance. If you stay, and serve me well, you will be a rich man. But if you betray me, then you will pay such a price that even the sharks will have little left to feast on.’

  Christopher hesitated. Angria thought he was frightened.

  ‘If you have any doubts, there is no place for you here,’ he warned.

  But Christopher had none. Looking on the treasures and trophies in the room, he knew this was where he belonged. He knelt before Angria. A servant put two dishes of rice and milk before him. He dipped the rice the milk, ate it, and repeated the oath that Angria administered.

  ‘I will eat rice and milk, and remain always at your feet.’

  They reached Bombay without misadventure. Tom paid close attention as they sailed in to the harbour, observing the master as he lined up the seven trees on Malabar point to steer a safe course through the reefs and islets that guarded the approach. Features Tom had only seen on charts slid past: Sunken Rock, the Oyster, the Middle Ground. And so they came into Bombay roads, under the castle on Dungarey hill.

  Tom stripped down to his shirt and breeches, and removed his stockings so he looked like a sailor in short trousers. Going ashore, he pulled on an oar with the other men, while Francis and Ana sat in the stern with the master. Tom felt exposed, more vulnerable even than in the fort at Brinjoan. This was Guy’s domain, and he did not know what eyes might be watching unseen from the Governor’s house behind the walls.

  The stench of swamp mud and rotting fish rankled his nostrils. As they beached the boat, he averted his face. The waterfront was quiet, that afternoon. The lascars and stevedores lounged in the hot shade, with no great enthusiasm for unloading the ship.

  Francis, Ana and the master fell into conversation with a group of Company officials. They were exceedingly surprised to find Guy Courtney’s nephew so suddenly come ashore; they mopped their faces and shot each other anxious looks, each calculating how this new arrival would change the balance of power in the settlement. Guy ruled the island as absolutely as the Great Mughal in Delhi ever ruled his empire, and his courtiers survived by reading the shifting tides of his mood.

  The Company men bustled Francis off to the Governor’s house. When he was sure no one was watching, Tom slipped away towards the little cluster of taverns and punch houses in the lee of the castle. He found the busiest, and took a seat in a corner. A few minutes later, Merridew – one of the few sailors who had survived the wreck of the Kestrel and the siege at Brinjoan – ducked in.

  ‘No one followed you, sir. I’ll keep a watch outside the castle for Master Francis.’

  Tom nodded, and settled down to wait.

  Francis stepped through the castle gates, and felt a shiver of apprehension as they rang shut behind him. His misgivings mounted as he crossed the courtyard, past various store rooms and guard huts, and climbed the steps towards the imposing Governor’s house, which stood against the southern wall of the castle overlooking the harbour.

  News of his arrival had raced ahead of him. He was admitted straight away to the Governor’s office on the top floor.

  He had never met his uncle Guy before. The one picture he had seen of him, a painting that had hung in High Weald, had showed a cherubic boy dressed in a white smock, standing beside a puppy. It was a far cry from the man who sat in front of the great windows now: tall and slim, dressed in a dark green coat with tailoring that was so impeccable it seemed almost unnatural. Even seated, he carried himself with grace and menace, like a cat pretending to sleep. He was handsome, with fine features and a full head of hair, yet the cast of his eyes warned against intimacy. Francis searched the face for any echo of his twin brother Tom, and found nothing.

  ‘Step into the light where I can see you,’ Guy growled. He studied Francis, with an
appraising gaze that made him feel like a piece of livestock at an auction. ‘Yes. You are Billy’s son, no doubt of it. I will try not to hold that against you.’

  Francis hardly dared speak, lest his voice betray him. Looking around the room, his eye was caught by a portrait on the wall. Sir Hal Courtney, dressed in the fashion of the late King Charles with a flowing wig and a feather in his hat. One hand rested lightly on the hilt of the magnificent sword he wore. The artist had painted it with rare skill, capturing every facet of the sapphire in the pommel.

  Guy followed his gaze. ‘You like my painting?’

  ‘I liked it better when it hung in High Weald,’ said Francis, despite himself.

  Guy chuckled. ‘Recognize it, do you? I had it from your stepfather. He was only too happy to part with it, given his need for ready money.’

  He put down the quill he had been writing with. ‘I confess, I have been expecting you these several months. I received a letter commending you to the Company’s service before the last monsoon.’

  ‘I was detained in Cape Town.’

  Guy studied Francis. Even before the boy had left London, Childs had written to Guy in secret, informing him that Tom was alive in Cape Town, and that he had dispatched Francis to kill him. The news had left Guy in a black mood, caught in a vice of uncertainty and hope. He had awaited further news for months.

  ‘I understand Lord Childs gave you an errand to run in Cape Town,’ he said.

  Francis marvelled that Guy could discuss the murder of his own twin so casually. Again, he wondered what could have come between the brothers.

  ‘I did.’

  ‘And did you conclude it successfully?’

  Francis nodded.

  ‘I have had no report of it.’

  ‘We hid the body on the mountain. The jackals and hyenas will have ensured no-one can identify him. Afterwards, I took passage on a country trader, but she was shipwrecked in a storm, near Brinjoan. I reached the fort, only to be swept up in the events I am sure you are well aware of.’

  ‘Indeed.’