Pirate King: A novel of suspense featuring Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes

Laurie R. King Pirate King Mary Russell – 11

PIRATE KING

a Moving Picture in Three Acts

Director: Randolph St John Warminster-Fflytte

Assistant director: Geoffrey Hale

Assistant’s assistant: Mary Russell

Cinematographer: Will Currie

Choreographer: Graziella Mazzo

THE CAST:

Major-General Stanley played by Harold Scott

Ruth played by Myrna Hatley

Mabel played by Bibi

The Pirate King played by Senhor M. R. X. La Rocha

His Lieutenant, Samuel, played by Sr La Rocha’s Lieutenant

Frederic played by Daniel Marks

THE SISTERS:

Annie

Ginger

Bonnie

Harriet

Celeste

Isabel

Doris

June

Edith

Kate

Fannie

Linda

THE PIRATES:

Adam

Gerald

Benjamin

Henry

Charles

Irving

David

Jack

Earnest

Kermit

Francis

Lawrence

THE CONSTABLES:

Sergeant played by Vincent Paul

Donald

Alan

Edward

Bert

Frank

Clarence

AUTHOR’S FOREWORD

I find myself of mixed mind about this, my eleventh volume of memoirs concerning life with Sherlock Holmes. On the one hand, I vowed when I began writing them that the accounts would be complete, that there would be no leaving out failures or slapping wallpaper across our mistakes.

Nonetheless, this is one episode over which I have considerable doubts – not, let us be clear, due to any humiliations on my part, but because I fear that the credulity of many readers will be stretched to the breaking by the case’s intricate and, shall we say, colourful complexity of events.

If that be the case with you, dear reader, please rest assured that for this one volume of the Russell memoirs, you have my full permission to regard it (and alas, by contagion, me) as fiction.

Had I not actually been there, I, too, would dismiss the tale as preposterous.

– MRH

BOOK ONE SHIP OF FOOLS November 6-22, 1924

CHAPTER ONE

RUTH: I did not catch the word aright, through being hard of hearing … I took and bound this promising boy apprentice to a pirate.

“HONESTLY, HOLMES? PIRATES?”

“That is what I said.”

“You want me to go and work for pirates.”

O’er the glad waters of the dark blue sea, our thoughts as boundless, and our souls as free …

“My dear Russell, someone your age should not be having trouble with her hearing.” Sherlock Holmes solicitous was Sherlock Holmes sarcastic.

“My dear Holmes, someone your age should not be overlooking incipient dementia. Why do you wish me to go and work for pirates?”

“Think of it as an adventure, Russell.”