by Adrian Speed
“Mr and Mrs O'Connor.” The man stood up and appeared to show no shame. He offered his hand to me. He had a brogue thick enough to cut cheese. “Pleasure to meet you Mrs...?”
“Ms Hannah Delaronde.” I took his hand and shook it.
“A pleasure.” The woman stood and took up station next to her husband. His hair was the colour of freshly peeled carrot while hers was dark as chocolate, but otherwise they were a matching set: almost the same height and build, both young, both wearing khaki jackets and, I hid my jealousy, matching trousers. Numerous books were strewn in the sun-shade with titles like Safaris of Africa or Hunting the Great African Rhino.
“You're on safari?” I guessed.
“Planning one,” Mrs O'Connor said. “A sort of pre-honeymoon honeymoon.”
“They say Kenya and Rhodesia are the places to get the best shooting, but I say the best game is on the road less travelled. So we're going to head up to Niamey, to scout out the best spots and return with our friends from Lagos for the real thing.”
“Shooting?” I tried to hide the disgust from my voice, I didn't quite manage it.
“It wouldn't be a safari without a shoot,” Mrs O'Connor laughed.
“I prefer to shoot them with a camera.”
“Oh, what's the point in that? You can't show people back home how massive and beautiful these animals are. We're looking to bag at least two elephants this autumn,” said Mr O'Connor. “One for Trinity College Dublin, and one for me.”
“One for us,” Mrs O'Connor wrapped her hands around her husband, the strength of her love breaking through the social decorum of the early twentieth century.
“Hmm, yes, well, I hope you enjoy your journey with us.” Parker nodded and waved me on while the new Mr and Mrs O'Connor began a public display of affection that would have drawn disapproving looks even a century later.
Parker and I moved towards the stern of the ship. There wasn't much to show off, except for another companionway leading down below decks.
A young man stood at the stern, staring out at Onitsha. I couldn't see much from this angle, but I recognised him.
“Ah, Miss Hannah Delaronde, may I introduce the last of your fellow passengers, Captain Albert Fairfaix – that's army captain.” Parker made the introduction.
“I told you, it's just Mr Fairfax,” the man's head bowed even lower below his shoulders. “Please don't call me Captain.”
“Er, yes, well, Mr Fairfax, can I introduce you to Miss Hannah Delaronde?”
Albert turned. It was shocking how he looked older than he would ten years later. There was no joy behind his eyes, none of the enthusiasm that so defined him when I met him. He looked old and tired, with wrinkles around his eyes even though he couldn't be over twenty; a man who didn't sleep.
“Hello.” Albert held a hand out to me.
“It's good to meet you,” I said. I didn't have to pretend I was meeting him for the first time. Compared to the man I left back in the twenties, this was an entirely new person.
“Is it?” Albert turned away from me.
“Is there anything more to see, Parker?” I asked.
“Er, no, not really,” Parker admitted.
“Well then, thank you very much. I am sure I can find my own way back to the cabins.”
“Very good, Miss.” Parker touched his hat and left to shout at the sailors closing up the hold.
I walked up to Albert and leant against the railing next to him, staring out at the river.
“I don't need any company,” Albert said. He didn't even have the energy to be angry or annoyed. He just sounded tired.
“I know,” I said, watching the native fishermen in the delta.
We stayed there over an hour in silence while the sailors yelled and cursed at each other. By the time the ship got underway it was mid afternoon and we’d been out in the heat of the day.
Onitsha faded into the trees. Stout brick buildings that would have been unremarkable in Birmingham were the only signs of civilisation around. The scrub closed around us chattering with birdsong. The propeller beneath us churned up the water.
“Thanks.” Albert said after another half-hour of watching the world roll past.
“For what?”
“For not saying anything.” Albert tapped the railing a few times and left.
Well, I thought, as good an introduction as any.
Chapter XVIII
I lay on the bed holding my phone above my head, flicking through my notes on all I knew about the pearl, trying to piece together who was the thief. I wasn't worried about running out of battery. Sir Reginald had borrowed it once and disappeared to another time period. Since he returned it had never needed charging. It didn't look like it had a different battery pack or anything. It just no longer ran out of charge. The only way to be sure would be to take the phone apart, and that didn't seem like a sensible idea. I tried not to question it.
The museum had said the Order of the Pearl was from Germany originally, the Holy Roman Empire, at least. And Rothberg was a German name. Could Mr Rothberg be the thief? He didn't look like a knight, but maybe they'd gone further underground after they tried to kill me. One person you wouldn't expect to be part of a secret order of knights would be a man who looked like a clerk. Or a woman, I mused.
Mr Peterson was a little suspicious. People don't drop everything and head for deepest Africa for no reason. Could he be following Albert?
Major Stoat was too fat and too loud to be a thief. If he wanted something he would either buy it or brow-beat it from you. No mystery there, or is that just what he wanted people to think?
Mr and Mrs O'Connor didn't seem likely. That said, they didn't exactly seem normal for the time. How many couples were all over each other like that in public in 1919? Actually, come to think of it, I didn't know. Perhaps it was more common than films and TV would have me believe.
Mr Jones was weird. That was the easiest way to describe him. He seemed to be irreverent, viewing everyone and everything as meaningless to him. It didn't matter who he offended, everything was a big joke. Something about the way he spoke, though, didn't sound quite natural.
That only left Albert, and Albert couldn't be the thief. Perhaps one of the crew was the thief, I mused. Parker seemed nice enough, but there were lots of sailors on board. They might have sticky fingers. But there were lots of jewels and cash just lying around to disappear into pockets, why go to all the effort for a box if you didn’t know the pearl was in it?
My strength gave out holding the phone and it fell, slapping me in the face on its way down. It was impossible to solve a mystery before it happened.
I slid my feet off the bed, put my phone in my pocket and sighed. One of the people on this boat was a thief and I had to go and talk to them knowing that. One of those perfectly ordinary people.
I stood up, smoothed my skirts and walked out of the room, almost directly into Mrs Rothberg.
“Oh, I'm so sorry,” Mrs Rothberg said looking rather flustered. “I was just looking for the...the way up.”
“Here, Mrs Rothberg.” I opened the door on the other side of the corridor.
“Oh, thank you.”
I watched her disappear up to the top deck. A smell of rose water went with her. She wore rather soppy clothes really, and a rather soppy expression, like the sort of woman who was always a little disappointed no matter what came along.
Still, I thought no more about it and headed to the wardroom.
“No, no, listen boy, I tell you, we're better off for it.” Major Stoat's voice could be heard even through the doorway. When I let myself into the room it hit me like hammers. “Terrible time while we were doing it, but look where we are now. The Germans are out of Africa, the Polish have their country back, Britain and France are closer allies than ever before, the Germans pay us millions of pounds every year, and, and this is the most important part of it, unemployment has almost disappeared.”
“But—” Mr Jones tried to interject.
“But nothing, boy! Europe was a powder keg, always going to explode, and a good thing it happened sooner rather than later, we Englishmen were always going to come out on top over the Krauts, but this way their military didn't have time to prepare.” Major Stoat didn't look like he had moved since I’d seen him that morning, and had consumed rather more whisky since then. “A bloody terrible time, but frankly, a price worth paying. Thank god for the Serbs and Archduke Ferdinand, I say.”
A glass squeaked under pressure for a few seconds and then cracked. All eyes turned to Albert and the vein throbbing at his temple. A crushed glass lay under his fingertips.
“Blast,” Albert shook his hand free of liquid as the glass fell apart on the table.
“You all right, Captain Fairfax?” Major Stoat wobbled to get a good look.
“I would be much better if you would stop talking, Major,” Albert said taking a cloth offered by the waiter and wiping himself clean. “And please, do not call me Captain. I left the army.”
“Well, so did I,” the Major's moustache bristled. “It's only polite.”
“Please. Do. Not.”
“Are you all right Albert? You didn't cut yourself?” I asked.
“I did not cut myself.”
“Well, another two of whatever Albert was drinking, please, barman,” I nodded to the man behind the bar.
“Double gin and tonic,” Albert reminded the barman. He turned to the Major. “And not one more word about the war. Understand? Not one more word.”
“You can't talk to a superior officer like that!”
“Neither of us is in the army anymore, Stoat.”
“You don't see silly-boy here complaining, do you?” Major Stoat waved a hand at Mr Jones. “He listens.”
“Only to have the perfect caricature of vileness,” Mr Jones said, still surrounded by paper.
“You were in the war surely? A boy your age.”
“Ran away to seminary school, I'm afraid,” Mr Jones said with a grinning, guilty face. “And hid in a Bible. I'm not ashamed to admit to cowardice when mustard gas is involved.”
“So you're a priest?” I asked.
“Oh no, no, I left the moment Armistice was declared,” Mr Jones flashed a smile.
“Bloody coward,” the Major grumbled.
“Coward yes, bloody no,” Mr Jones flipped through his papers to find a bare space and wrote down this bon mot.
“What is it you do, Mr Jones?” I asked. The waiter proffered my drink. Being alcohol it wasn't rehydrating, but it was refreshing.
“I'm a novelist, m'dear,” Mr Jones saluted to me while he wrote.
“Written anything we'd know?” Albert asked. His voice seemed designed to try to crush the enthusiasm of Mr Jones.
“Probably not,” Mr Jones finished writing and looked up. “Seeing as I haven't published anything yet.”
“You're an unpublished novelist?”
“Yep.”
“Pardon me,” Albert said slowly. “But I would have thought you would have to be published before you can call yourself a novelist.”
“Interesting point of contention,” Mr Jones put his hand on his chin and nodded to himself. “Are you defined by what you do, or what you get paid to do? Would I be a lumberjack if I spent my time cutting trees?”
“I don't follow.”
“I spend all day writing,” Mr Jones said. “When I am not writing I am thinking about writing. How can I not be a novelist if I spend all my time writing?”
“He's got a point,” I said.
“A poor one,” Albert said.
Mr Jones shrugged. “I live on a trust fund, if you must know,” he said. “So you can either class me as an example of society's waste by-product or you can call me a novelist.”
“Waste by-product, no contest,” Major Stoat grumbled.
“Well if that's the case I'm a waste by-product as well,” Albert drank almost his entire drink in one gulp. “Came into some land and property during the war. I've no right to it. It was all my brother-in-law’s until he died.”
“Yes, but you were in the army first,” The Major frowned. “If you lost it all again you could go back into the army. Unlike this wastrel.”
“No, Major, I could not.” Albert glared.
“Well what do you, Ms Delaronde?” Mr Jones changed the subject. “You're American, right?”
“Canadian,” I quickly corrected him.
“You're not a lumberjack are you?” Mr Jones laughed. “Or is it a lumberjane if it's a woman?”
“I'm the heiress to the Quebec-Delaronde Mining Company,” I lied with surprising ease.
“Aha, an heiress! Another of society's waste by-products! At this rate we're going to discover all the civilised world lives on the inherited wealth of their fathers!”
“But I'm studying to become an engineer,” I cut in quickly. This turned some heads. Mr and Mrs O'Connor had been in the corner whispering to each other and entwining themselves so tightly as to almost be indistinct from each other, but they looked up at this.
“Really?” Mr Jones smiled. “Now that is interesting.” He put down his pen, fixing me with his rapt attention. “So if I were to ask you to solve a differential equation?”
“I could.”
“What's the integral of cosine(x)?”
“Sin(x),” I crossed my arms. “High school students know that.”
“Must be quite an education system they've got in Canada,” Albert murmured.
“Cosine rule?”
“a2 = b2 + c2 – 2bc cos(A)”
“Well, I'm no walking text book,” Mr Jones said. “But she does at least know her mathematics.”
“Please,” I snorted, “that was all high school stuff.”
“Well fancy that,” Mr Jones tapped the table. “Where do they let you study engineering then? Montreal?”
“No, Imp–” I stumbled over my own words. I had no idea whether Imperial College London taught women in 1919. “Toronto.”
“Ah, Toronto,” Mr Jones said. “Never heard of it.”
“It's on the other side of the lake from Detroit.”
“I swear America is throwing up new towns faster than I can keep track.” Mr Jones tapped his pen on the table. “So why are you here, Ms Delaronde? What use is Niger to an engineer or an heiress?”
“I could just as easily ask what's the use of Niger to a novelist.”
“Isn't it obvious? The adventure! The savage!” Mr Jones thrust his pen like a sword. “Travel broadens the mind, m'dear, and I intend to travel far before my money runs out.”
“Well I suppose I could say the same,” I said, inventing madly. “Father is in Lagos at the moment, but he and I intend to go on to South Africa. While he does his business I thought I could take a little journey up-river.”
“So you never stray too far from Daddy-dearest?” Mr Jones teased.
“I'm not going to pass up a journey to Africa just to show I'm an independent girl,” I scowled.
“True, true, I'd do the same in your position,” Mr Jones nodded sagely. “Then again I'd do just about anything to get out of the snowfields of Canada.”
“What about you, Albert?” I turned to him.
“You know the expression from here to Timbuktu?” Albert said slowly, as if every word was torn from his soul. “As in, he's the dumbest man from here to Timbuktu?”
“Yes, I know it.”
“Well it rather popped into my head around Christmas and I decided to go see it, the other side of the world,” Albert ran his tongue around his teeth. “Turns out it was rather closer to Europe than I thought.” Albert fiddled with his glass for a moment and rapped his knuckles against the bar. “Excuse me, I need some air.” Without pausing for anyone he disappeared.
“You know dinner will be served in a few—” Mr Jones called after him, but too late. He was gone.
“Tense chap,” Major Stoat shook his head. “War does that to some people you know. Breaks 'em. Terrible thing.”
I shook my head at the apparent paradox of Major Stoat's different, conflicting opinions.
“Why are you here, Major Stoat?” I asked in the end, to change the subject.
“Diplomatic mission, very serious.” He tapped his nose. “Well, I say serious...” he rolled his eyes. “During the war I used to work with the Frogs. You know, they're not bad chaps once you spend some time with them. We wouldn't scrap with them every hundred years if they weren't good chaps. Anyway, I spent a lot of time with one Frenchy in particular, Colonel Martin, and after the war he was given the French Sudan posting. You know, where Timbuktu is. Dash it all if he doesn't invite me to visit him. So here I am. Get a good look at the desert. See the Foreign Legion.”
“So basically, you're on holiday.”
“If you want. You wouldn't fill this back up, would you, dear?” He passed over a glass. I returned it to him full almost to the brim with whisky.
The door to the corridor opened and Mr Rothberg looked inside. He frowned.
“I say, any of you seen my wife?” he asked.
“I saw her go up to the top deck,” I said. “Probably to get some air. It's sweltering down here.”
“No need to tell me,” Mr Rothberg said. He was already drenched in sweat just from the effort of standing and talking. “Well, if you see her, tell her I'm in our cabin.”
“Will do,” I nodded. “Er, Mr Rothberg?”
“Yes?” the man caught himself just as he was about to close the door.
“Why are you travelling up the Niger?”
“Hmm? Oh, business,” Mr Rothberg said. “We, that is, my company, have acquired a large palm plantation and the river seemed the most convenient route to it. It's on good land but was poorly managed during the war. I've been sent out to set it to rights.”
“Oh, well, that sounds good,” I nodded.
“We thought it would be a bit of a holiday,” Mr Rothberg sighed. “Didn't account for this heat of course.” He mopped his brow and left.