the singular experience of making one’s bed inside a hammock (except for Bibi, who was ensconced into a private cabin so small, her feather bed ran up the walls on three sides). They giggled and wrestled their way into the strange objects, shrieking in merry alarm as the taut canvas cradles flipped them out the other side. Then Annie either analysed the problem or recalled past experience, and loosened the ropes through her hammock’s overhead hooks. Sagging, the object proved less impossible to mount, and the others followed her example. Although a couple of the mothers absolutely refused to submit to the indignity, settling instead onto the hard bunks around the edges, the others were soon bundled triumphantly inside their soft wrappings. Talk and restless adjustments of extremities and blankets quickly gave way before the rocking motion, and soon the hold was nothing but a collection of silent cocoons, swaying in gentle unison.
And me.
After a while, I cautiously descended from my hammock and made my way above decks. I was well accustomed to spending most of a voyage braced in the fresh air, but that night I came up to escape nothing more troubling than the faint odour of fish and the snores of my cabin mates. In fact, I came up because I wanted to enjoy the sensation of a boat that did not make me ill.
The sail-makers had long since bundled their project out of the way. The only persons I could see were a pair of shadowy outlines on the quarterdeck. Adam – who, although by no means the eldest of the crew, was clearly deemed one of the more responsible – was at the wheel; with him was young Jack. I gave them a small wave, but wandered in the other direction towards the bow. There, as far as I could see in the faint lamp-light, I was alone beneath the sails.
I paused halfway up the side, watching the delicate coruscations of the aft lamp dance across the sea, listening to the constant motion of the sails and ropes and all the complex, sophisticated, and nearly anachronistic mechanism of this form of travel. For the first time, I understood why people referred to a hull and its means of propulsion as “she.”
I could almost sympathise with his wish for active cannon.
I smiled, and leant over the rail, hoping for a ballet of porpoises, for a-
A hand came down on my shoulder, and I screamed. Like any mindless female who had permitted herself to become oblivious of a world of danger, I squeaked and punched hard at the large, silent, threatening figure who had taken advantage of my idiotic preoccupation with beauty to corner me on the deck.
My arm is strong. Had there been three steps of distance to the bulwarks, my assailant might have recovered. There were but two. The man staggered away, arms outstretched, and the back of his legs hit the side. One hand clawed at the worn wood but his centre of balance was compromised, and over he went. Calling my surname as he fell.
I leapt forward and grabbed the ropes, staring back helplessly at the splashing figure who dropped farther and farther behind us in the featureless sea.
Holmes.
BOOK TWO
THE
November 17-27, 1924
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
KATE: Far away from toil and care,
Revelling in fresh sea-air.
Meanwhile, the previous Monday …
ABOUT THE TIME the charabanc full of Major-General Stanley’s thirteen blonde daughters was crawling out of Lisbon’s last hill on Monday, its War-era engine gasping for air much in the way its passengers would do on the hill above Cintra later that day, Teams One and Two arrived at their respective destinations. Within minutes, anger flared.
Team One, composed of Randolph St John Warminster-Fflytte and his piratical highness, La Rocha the First, disembarked from the taxi that Fflytte had judged necessary for the sake of face (even if, as he had to admit, they might have walked there and back in half the time) and presented themselves to the offices of the harbour master.
Which were shut, it having been judged time for morning coffee.
When the harbour master and his secretary returned, fifteen minutes later, Fflytte had worked himself into a state of high dudgeon and was ready to turn his aristocratic fury on someone, whereas La Rocha was … well, he was La Rocha. Anything might happen.
The harbour master was young, educated, and new to Lisbon (a beneficiary of the country’s current impoverishment and general dissatisfaction with The Way Things Were, young newcomers being both cheap and unaffiliated with the status quo). His secretary was a Lisboan, born and raised, who had lived within gull-cry of the water his entire life, and who had worked as a stevedore until an accident had cost him a few essential body parts. His wits, his modicum of literacy, and his ability to hold a pen landed him in the office instead of on the street, and here he remained, a valuable resource for three decades of harbour masters.
And this man knew La Rocha, oh yes. His hand came out as if to seize his employer’s coat, then faltered as his initial philanthropy was countered by craven self-interest: the impulse to turn heel and run. But the urge got no further than a brief step backwards before his nobler instincts regained control.
He caught his employer’s shoulder and murmured in that young man’s ear. The fresh face went from an expression of curiosity at the pair of men waiting to mild irritation at being manhandled by his inferior, followed by a frown of concentration at his secretary’s words, until his eyes went wide and his throat convulsed in a nervous swallow. The grey-haired assistant let go his grip. The boss settled his narrow shoulders inside the jacket, and came slowly forward.
“Good morning, gentlemen, I apologise for my absence. Are you waiting for me?” He spoke flawless English, and would have presented a face of complete assurance but for the tight wobble that was the final word. He made haste to get inside his office and around the back of the polished counter, as if personal territory combined with solid wood might offer a defence.
“Yes,” Fflytte answered. “There’s a ship in your harbour called
“The-”
One word was all he managed before La Rocha began to speak. Everyone listened, even Fflytte, who did not understand a word of it but could appreciate authority when he heard it: incongruous voice, looming presence, and the texture of promised violence at the back of La Rocha’s torrent of words. The scar helped, too: The harbour master’s gaze wove in fascination between the compelling eyes and the terrible scar.
Within a couple of sentences, the young man was making a hurry-up gesture to his assistant, who ducked under the counter and began to pull out files. Less than a minute after La Rocha opened his mouth, the secretary stood up with a piece of paper in his good hand, and made to proffer it to La Rocha. The harbour master snatched it, then laid the page cautiously on the wood between the two strangers. La Rocha picked it up.
