The King's Beast

by Eliot Pattison

  The ensign’s eyes went round, then he puzzled over the words. “I have the speaking of the old tongue but nae so well the writing of it.” He stumbled over the first words. “Mhicheal bheannaichte?”

  “A special Highland blessing for warrior heroes. Blessed Michael defend us from demons, it says.”

  Lewis gave an appreciative nod as he folded the blessing into a pocket. “So all that’s left,” he said in an earnest tone, “is for you to tell me who be the heroes and who the demons.”

  Two hours before midnight, Duncan began helping Ishmael with his preparations, then readied himself just as he had before each of his nightly circuits of the deck. He removed his shoes and stockings, his waistcoat, and the pouches that hung from his waist, leaving only the one at his neck, which never left him. The bosun arrived, producing a dark cloak that he wrapped around Ishmael. “They be rummaging down in the hold, like ye said they would,” Darby reported, then slipped away with the young Nipmuc. Duncan gripped his totem pouch, whispering prayers in Gaelic and then Mohawk, and climbed up to the main deck.

  As had become his habit, he spent a few moments chatting with the helmsman, who this night had another seaman at his side. By the stern rail an odd contraption had appeared, two casks with a short net slung between them. “Darby,” the helmsman said in explanation. Duncan nodded uncertainly, then descended to the main deck to begin his slow promenade.

  He heard the muffled steps and urgent whispers before he reached the far side of the hogsheads tied to the deck. As he turned the corner, two of Hastings’s accomplices were heaving the great curving bundle from the cargo hold into the sea as the major watched with a smug expression.

  “Hastings!” Duncan hissed and sprang forward as three of his crates from Philadelphia were flung into the water by more of the major’s men. Hastings stepped between Duncan and his soldiers, ordering them to go for the rest, then bent and leaned forward, dagger in his hand. Duncan grabbed a belaying pin from the rail and crouched on the balls of his feet, ready to spring. “Those crates are not yours to dispose of, Major!” Duncan growled, keeping his eyes on the blade.

  “Call it a military requisition,” Hastings sneered.

  “Didn’t you hear?” Duncan asked. “The crates are protected by angry spirits.”

  “Only old fools are worried about dead gods, McCallum. Old fools and pagan Highlanders.”

  “What about the fools who feel threatened by old bones?” Duncan shot back.

  Without warning Hastings lunged at Duncan, aiming for his heart. Duncan easily evaded the thrust.

  Duncan himself lunged now. Hastings did not see that he had shifted the pin to his other hand. The makeshift club slammed into Hastings’s wrist, sending the dagger spinning across the deck. But Duncan did not see the man who leapt out of the shadows, seizing one of his legs. Lieutenant Nettles appeared, grabbing Duncan’s wrist and pushing him bodily against the rail. An instant later Hastings had his other leg. Duncan had no leverage. He fought for a grasp on the rail, twisting in an effort to shake his assailants off. Then Lewis appeared, dropping the crate he carried and grabbing a foot. With a jubilant cry Hastings heaved upward and Duncan tumbled over the rail.

  He had planned to end the fight by falling overboard, but he had intended to stage it so he would be standing on the rail with a clear view of the moonlit ocean as he dropped. Instead he careened against the ship, upside down. His head slammed into the hull before he hit the cold Atlantic water, stunning him. By the time he righted himself and could focus, the ship’s stern had passed him.

  “Sarah!” he heard himself cry. His heart lurching, he desperately swam toward the retreating ship, his confidence gone. If he missed the dragging rope he would be lost, alone in the vast dark sea with no hope of rescue. He fought his rising panic, taking long powerful strokes, but with increasing dread knew he had missed his lifeline. Hastings had won. “Sarah!” he cried again.

  Suddenly a bright lantern flared on the stern and he saw the outline of two bulky objects floating fifty feet away. He reached the casks and with a hammering heart pulled himself onto the netting fastened between them. This only prolongs my death, he thought, shaking off a vision of his parched, withered corpse washing up with the casks on some distant shore. The foolishness of his plan overwhelmed him. Duncan had thrown away his life, had not even written farewell letters to Sarah and Conawago. He drifted in the moonlight, considering how long his body could endure without nourishment and water, and whether he would have the spine to throw himself to sharks if they presented themselves. Then suddenly the casks were jerked about and began moving. The bosun had tied a line to them.

  His friends draped a blanket over him as he climbed over the stern, then quickly led him to the port rail. Below on the main deck, Hastings was directing the disposal of the last of Duncan’s cargo, cursing at one of his party who hesitated, a small crate in his hand. In the still air Duncan could hear the man’s complaint.

  “You’ve eliminated your foe, Major. Must we still flaunt the spirits?”

  “You superstitious fool!” Hastings snapped. “Give me the damned box and I’ll—” His words were cut off by a terrible wail from overhead.

  “It’s him, the devil they spoke of!” the nervous soldier cried, and dropped his crate on the deck. “The ghost warrior! God preserve us!”

  As the officer backed away, Hastings cursed again. Ignoring the man’s gesture to a yardarm on the aft mast, he retrieved a belaying pin from a rack below the rail and raised it to strike his fellow officer.

  The act provided the extra moment the warrior needed. The line strung from high in the mainmast was invisible in the darkness, so that as he swung out on it, it seemed the ghost warrior was flying directly at Hastings from the heavens. At the last moment a war ax appeared in the pale warrior’s hand, slamming into the major’s arm. Hastings screamed in pain as he fell backward, striking his head hard on the deck as the ghost disappeared into the darkness above.

  “Damn you to hell!” Lieutenant Nettles shouted at Ishmael. “He is a major of the Horse Guards! Do something!” Nettles had changed into his uniform before coming to the sick bay, as if for added protection.

  “Right now he is a patient in mortal danger if he is moved,” Ishmael replied evenly.

  Duncan smiled as he watched through the small hole the carpenter had drilled in the wall when building the secret berth adjoining the sick bay. Ishmael was playing his well-rehearsed role of surgeon’s mate perfectly, doing all he could to keep Hastings unconscious and confined to his control.

  “He is tied to the cot!” Nettles protested.

  “Standard practice,” Ishmael explained. “Were he to revive prematurely, he would be too dizzy to remain standing and might concuss his head again. Another blow could seal his fate. And the fracture of his arm means he will need to be restrained for days.”

  As if to refute Ishmael, the lieutenant jabbed a finger into the exposed flesh of Hastings’s good arm. The major did not respond. Before he had set the broken fibula, with the bosun guarding the door, Ishmael had administered a heavy dose of laudanum, the tincture of opium, to the still unconscious Hastings. Duncan had instructed Ishmael the day before on how to prepare the doses, to be administered regularly until reaching the Thames.

  “The doctor is oddly missing,” Ishmael said, “but he will doubtless have more detailed advice when he reappears. Meanwhile your major will be safer here than anywhere in the ship.” He pointed to a bundle of leather nailed to the doorframe, containing a feather, a shark’s tooth, a length of dried octopus tentacle, and a patch of crocodile skin, the most intimidating charm the bosun could assemble on short notice. Ishmael lowered his voice to a whisper. “There’s a Jamaican in the crew who assures me it will repel even the most evil of spirits.”

  Nettles examined the bundle with a sneer that gradually faded into a sober, worried nod. “What in God’s name was that creature?” he asked Ishmael. “I would never have credited it had I not seen the beast with my
own eyes. An ape from the clouds, I hear some say, a banshee risen in anger from the deep, said another.”

  “More likely the latter,” Ishmael said in an earnest tone. “I hear he didn’t appear until you started throwing those crates in the water.” Duncan knew that behind his mask of worried sympathy Ishmael was deeply amused, and he worried that the Nipmuc might break out into laughter. “Though God alone knows why a man of such lofty station as the major would do something to offend the Ancient Ones.”

  Nettles’s face darkened. “A soldier has duties.”

  Duncan saw the hesitation on Ishmael’s face as he considered how far to press. “You mean in the last war.”

  Nettles’s own expression stiffened. “We are the Horse Guards. We are held to a different standard.” He seemed to take strength from his own words. He straightened his uniform and spoke more boldly. “We take a vow to protect the interests of the king. We are thus called to a war that never ends.” The tinge of arrogance that never left Hastings’s voice crept into that of his aide. “No act to preserve the king is ever too bold.” It had the sound of a barracks slogan. “Summon me immediately when he regains consciousness,” he ordered, and turned to leave.

  “I hear that wearing seaweed around the neck helps keep banshees away,” Ishmael said to his back. Nettles twisted with a surly expression, but grabbed the dried sprig of kelp that Ishmael extended before marching down the passage.

  Captain Rhys had sought in vain to persuade Duncan to take the visitor’s berth inside his own cabin, but Duncan would not chance being seen by the army officers. “If you’re going to be so stubborn as to decline my hospitality, then oblige me by accepting some comforts,” the captain had insisted, and had surreptitiously sent down a quilt, a whale oil lamp, several books, and a fresh baked loaf with a block of cheddar. A note was pinned to the cheese. If wind holds, then three days.

  Idleness was deeply against Duncan’s nature, but he accepted the need to stay out of sight, so he plugged the hole that opened on the sick bay and lit the lamp. He lifted a heavy black tome and saw to his unexpected delight that it was volume one of the Encyclopedia Britannica, newly published in Edinburgh. Duncan’s gratitude to the captain instantly deepened, for he knew no learned man would lightly surrender such a valuable book. He lay down with an unfamiliar sense of pleasure, bunched the quilt into a pillow, and propped the book on his bent legs. Aa, read the first entry, the name for several rivers.

  The hours raced by as he made his way through the encyclopedia, lost in the wonder of its contents, sometimes drifting away from a passage to consider the immense effort it had taken to catalog the knowledge of the world in such a manner. He recalled now a professor in Edinburgh stating in a lecture that the responsibility of the educated human was to advance the cause of civilization, a sentiment that had been echoed in Thomson’s house in Philadelphia. Here surely was a work that advanced civilization. He was humbled by the amazing book and he read entry after entry, lingering long over the thirty-nine pages concerning Algebra and the one hundred forty-five on Anatomy. He began to appreciate why a review he had read in The London Gazette had praised it as the second most important book ever published.

  When he paused to rest his eyes, Duncan opened the small trunk that contained the few personal possessions he had brought with him and extracted the single biggest object. He removed the linen shirt that had been wrapped around it, not for the first time admiring the intricate natural design of the ancient tooth. He smiled again at the deceptions he had worked on Hastings. Surely in the next edition of the encyclopedia there would be an entry for the incognitum. Was he advancing the cause of civilization by bringing it to London? Some seemed to think its essential message was one of religion, others one of natural philosophy. Still others, working for the king, were hell-bent on destroying all evidence of the incognitum, as if it were a creature of politics, and a disloyal one at that. He thought of the crates now resting at the bottom of the sea and gave thanks, not for the first time, for the precautions he and Ishmael had taken before leaving Philadelphia.

  Alone, quietly studying each crevice and ridge of the molar and the smooth enamel of its sides, which glowed dark gray with swirls of chestnut in the soft light, he again felt an unexpected calm. He felt an odd resonance at the touch of the relic. He had experienced such a sensation before, when he had sat with Conawago beside an aged shaman of the Delaware in a cave shrine built around the skeleton of a massive bear. There had been petroglyphs on the wall, and images of hands that had been painted with ochre and pressed to the stone. Duncan had eventually fallen into a deep contemplation of the ages-old signs, and when he had stirred, the shaman smiled at him and spoke with Conawago in his native tongue. Duncan had asked his friend to translate.

  Conawago had rested his chin on one hand. “It is difficult to put into English words, for it is rooted in a world the English do not know. The closest I might come is to say he sees an ancientness inside you. He says you are one of the ones who can touch the ancientness and keep its spark alive. He says nothing else matters, not the wars, not the lives of nations, not kings and queens. What matters is that spark.”

  The ancientness. Was that what the Horse Guards and their king feared, that the world’s ancientness would somehow render them insignificant? He reached to the bottom of the trunk and extracted the little bone he had saved for himself, the small irregular cylinder with a cavity down its center. It was itself ancient and mysterious and he had come to think of it as his personal link to the incognitum. He had wondered what to do with it, and had thought about giving it to Charles Thomson or Deborah Franklin, but they had not labored in the mud, carried the body of Ezra, sat in the Shawnee bone chamber, or lingered with Pierre by the pool of his life’s blood. He removed the lanyard that held his Mohawk totem, then untied the knot at the top. It was not just in homage to Conawago or the Shawnee shaman that he threaded the lanyard through the hole in the bone and fastened it above his sacred quillwork pouch. It was also to confirm a growing bond he could not put a name to, a link to something ancient and powerful that he had released at the Lick.

  He dozed, and was awakened by the angry voice of Lieutenant Nettles on the other side of the wall. “He should be awake by now!” Nettles insisted. “I must speak with him!”

  “I told you, Lieutenant,” Ishmael replied, “that there was a shock to his brain. If the ship’s surgeon were here he might know the treatment, but we fear he is lost. A crewman says he saw you with one of his crates before he disappeared. Perhaps you know the fate of our doctor?”

  The lieutenant hesitated. “Of course not, and damn your impertinence!” he finally rejoined. “Everyone knows Mr. McCallum had a reckless habit of walking the deck in the middle of the night. If he was leaning too far over the rail when the ship lurched it was his own damned fault!”

  “Ah, well then,” Ishmael said. “He was a tolerably fine fellow, our doctor. More than a few will miss him. But here your major lies, a victim as much of the doctor’s absence as of the odd misfortune that broke his arm. That fracture is faring well with the splint. But the concussion is troublesome. If you like, I could try to drill a hole in his skull.”

  “A hole? Surely you jest! A hole in his skull?”

  “It’s a procedure called trepanning, to relieve the pressures of bad humors pressing upon the brain. I have never done it, but I have read about it. No doubt the ship’s carpenter could help me. He has a wide selection of augers.”

  Duncan grinned at the stunned silence that followed.

  “No, no,” Nettles finally said, in a much subdued voice.

  “Doubtless the army has good doctors in London,” Ishmael suggested.

  “Yes, yes, in London.”

  A moment later Duncan heard the door to the sick bay close and he pulled the stuffing from the crack to confirm that Ishmael was alone with Hastings, now lifting him to get a cup of honey and water down his throat.

  “Swallow, you damned murderer,” Ishmael whispered. “I
would have thrown you over the side long ago but your friend Duncan won’t have it. We need to tie up all your sins in a neat package for him. How lucky for you. It wouldn’t be the Nipmuc way, wouldn’t be the Mohawk way. I suspect it may not even be the Highland way. Mr. McCallum grows more English in his sensibilities. He doesn’t grasp the great evils you are still capable of inflicting on us.” Ishmael’s voice had grown louder, and Duncan realized he meant for him to hear. He closed the hole in the wall and chanced a brief dash along the passageway to enter the sick bay.

  Ishmael stood and with a wave of his hand yielded his patient to Duncan. Duncan quickly felt the man’s pulse, looked at his dilated pupils, and laid his hand on the officer’s forehead. “Mr. McCallum,” Duncan declared in a chastising tone, “has not succumbed to English ways, he has grown more distrustful of them.” Satisfied with his patient’s condition, he turned to the young Nipmuc. “This conspiracy was hatched in London. We must sever it at its source or else it will strike at us again. And Hastings is our only link. Better to have an enemy we know and can track than one with no face and no trail.”

  Duncan prepared another dose, a half vial of laudanum, and as he administered it, they discussed London. Ishmael had identified three crewmen who had lived in the city, including Darby. The bosun had drawn a careful map of the city, responding to his questions, marking the locations of Craven Street, St. Paul’s Cathedral, Westminster Abbey, the king’s residence at St. James’s Palace, and Charing Cross, complete with an odd stick figure with four legs and two heads that Ishmael explained was the famous equestrian statue of King Charles the First. Another sailor had drawn a cruder map with other landmarks pinpointed, mostly around Covent Garden.