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

Our impromptu garden party was at the edge of the road near the ruins of Castello dos Mouros, the Castle of the Moors, overlooking a wide plain of rich farmland with the Rio Tejo to the south and the Atlantic to the west. The castle (which had, in fact, once been Moorish) had guarded the vitals of Portugal for centuries. In the twelfth century, the place was sacked by passing Norwegians, on their way to the Holy Land. They must have recalled with fondness this frigid, wind-shoved, rain-whipped place as they plunged into their Crusader hell. (Had they decided to stay, I reflected, it would have made for an interesting shift in Iberian history.) By the fifteenth century, the hilltop fortress had been more or less abandoned, when finally even the Jews decided that Cintra in the lee of the mountain had to be more comfortable.

“They say it’s quite pleasant in the summer,” Will said sourly. “We have to make do with the flowers.”

“Flowers? Ah, I see: to give the impression of spring-time in Penzance.”

“Three hundred of the bloo – of the dratted things. We stick them in the earth so they look natural.”

“Whatever happened to realism?” I murmured.

“Pardon?”

“Where does Mr Fflytte want you to film?” I said.

Will set off to explore the walls – which, upon closer examination, looked more like an elaborate Victorian folly than an actual working castle. I followed him for a while, since I was supposed to be his assistant, but as he clambered and dangled and risked his neck on walls designed more for decoration than for invasion-repulsion, I went back to where we had begun, huddling into my coat until he returned.

“We’ll shoot here. No need for lights. Pain in the neck, lights. Maybe a reflector.” He was thinking aloud, frowning at the sort of glade or small amphitheatre in which we stood. It had a pool at its centre. I stood beside him and looked, imagining it transformed into black-and-white images on a screen, and had to admit, the setting would bring an unexpected degree of drama to what was a rather fatuous scene.

“I have to admit,” I told him, “the setting will help that scene.”

“The girls can dance in from the left, there. Gather in front of that section of wall, wondering if they dare remove their shoes and stockings to wade. Then pantomime the beginning of doing so. Fflytte and Hale may think it’s too risque to show, but they’re the editors. Marks goes behind that tree; the camera will see him but the girls won’t.”

“And the flowers?” Fortunately, the rains had brought a faint stubble of growth, so blossoms wouldn’t be springing out of bare rock.

“Put them where the girls sit. Give them something to do while they’re taking their shoes off.”

I had to wonder if the laconic Welshman had ever made a more, as he called it, risque film. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.

We returned to the tent, hearing music as we came along the hillside path, and found that someone had set up a gramophone. The girls were kicking up their heels and were nicely dry and pink-cheeked. When I pulled the needle from the record, their complaints were short-lived.

We led them through the mossy boulders to the proposed site, told the girls and Frederic what we planned, allowed Graziella Mazzo (wearing a coat today over her scarf-frock, and sandals) to flutter around her assigned dance-stage, and then sent them all back to town. By the time Will and I got the daffodils in the ground, it would be too late to begin filming: Plant now, and shoot in the morning.

I received my bucket and my hand-trowel, and we got to planting.

A hundred or so stems later, my hand was numb, my back was on fire, my garments were soaked from labour and mist. Will finished his last dozen, and we stood back to look at our handiwork.

“I have to say, that’s going to look fabulous,” I told him.

“Cost a fortune. I thought Mr Fflytte was mad – but then, I usually do. I’ve stopped arguing with him, he’s always right.”

We retrieved our empty buckets and walked in friendly accord back towards the tent. As we left the castle proper, we passed through a pair of oddly placed stone structures that I had seen earlier. This time, I stopped to look at them – then looked more closely, climbing up on the right-hand structure to rip away some fingers of obscuring ivy.

A skull and crossbones, carved into the stone.

* * *

The marquee remained, but the staff had gone. One of the carts was there, the driver stretched out on a bare table, snoring. We roused him and let the horse trot us down the hill to the town.

The hotel was adequate, the evening meal a step better than adequate, and the wine the best I’d had yet in this country. A holiday spirit took hold of the girls, aided no doubt by other spirits, and Marks and our Bonnie were moved to offer a series of duets, spoken and in song, from other ventures they had shared. We took to our beds well pleased with our side of Pirate King, and ready for the initial filming on the morrow.

In the absence of handsome pirates, I did not even feel it necessary to patrol the hotel corridors that night.

Will and I finished our breakfast before the others had come down, heading up the hill in a cart laden with his tools of the trade – cameras and reflective screens, cases and bundles, even an arc lamp he did not intend to use. The equipment was bulky, but lighter than half a dozen girls had been, which meant that this morning, the horse was positively frisky in its ascent. We found the marquee unoccupied, other than a small mountain of provisions that had been delivered during the night. The cart-man helped us unload our equipment, then Will set his tarpaulin-wrapped camera on his shoulder, I picked up the aluminium screens, and we went back along the path.

Past the pirate-stones, into the fort’s main gate, down to the clearing with its pond.

And face to face with a goat. A chewing goat, with an expensive, hothouse daffodil bobbing from its lips.

It was the last flower in sight.

I dropped the satchel and caught the camera being ejected from Will Currie’s shoulder as he launched himself at the devil’s spawn, a roar in his throat and murder in his eyes. The goat took one look and shot through the picturesque ruined gate to skip light-footedly away on the tumbled stones towards the valley below.

* * *

Telegrams were exchanged, the phone lines having proved erratic. Hale assured us replacement flowers would be there by afternoon. The girls introduced themselves to the residents of the decidedly bizarre royal palace uphill from the ruined fort, where most of the marquee employees normally worked, and desported themselves through the once-royal hallways (bereft of tourists, what with the weather, the economy, and the political turmoil) of the former convent (which had borne the cheering name Nossa Senhora da Pena: Our Lady of Punishment) while Will and I planted a second set of flowers.

I hired a guard for the night, a fit young man who understood that a return of goats would mean his instant death, and we arrived on Wednesday morning to find the daffodils intact, the sun out, the walls still standing.

But no pond. Had the goats consumed that, too?

“I thought this was a pond,” Will screamed at the hapless young man.

“Pond?” said the man.

I knew he spoke some English, so I contributed a few synonyms. “Lake? Pool? You know – a body of water.”

“Water? Yes, puddle.”

“Well no, not exactly-” Will started, but I laid a hand on his arm.

“I think it may be, exactly.” And so it turned out: What we had thought to be a conveniently located pond was merely a puddle; in the absence of rain the day before, it was now more of a wallow.

“Well, perhaps we could still …” I started, but Will was already shaking his head.

“A dozen nice English girls are not going to be stripping down for a frolic in mud. Without water, there’s no reason for them to be here. Fflytte will toss it all out.”