Not Less Than Gods (16 page)

“Don’t see why not,” Bell-Fairfax replied. As he settled the bundle of equipment on his shoulder, there came an impact on the air and then the
boom
of cannon fire, the sound echoing in waves off the hillsides and steep streets.

“Are they saluting someone?” Pengrove shaded his eyes with his hand, peering out at the harbor. “There are some fancy-looking boats coming in over there. Really quite Arabian Nights, you know.”

“Let’s see,” said Bell-Fairfax. They sprinted, pacing the big caiques in their stately progress across the Bosporus, and arrived at a white mosque with a water landing, white steps coming down to the blue water.

“Oh,
frightfully
Arabian Nights!” exclaimed Pengrove. “Look!”

Bell-Fairfax had to crane his neck to see, for the view was being rapidly blocked by the Sultan’s guard, marching to line the steps of the mosque. A band accompanied them, shrilling on fifes, rattling and thundering on drums and playing, of all things, the “Turkish March” by Beethoven.

“By Jove,” said Bell-Fairfax. “Here’s the Sultan himself.”

“I can’t see!” fretted Pengrove. Bell-Fairfax picked him up bodily and pushed him up into the branches of a cypress, a little awkwardly because he was unwilling to tear his gaze from the spectacle. The caiques were splendid, gilded and carved, with canopies of gold and velvet. The most magnificent of them bumped gently against the landing now, and a number of officials stood forward to help the Sultan from the boat.

Pengrove, sprawling on his cypress branch, saw a young man in a military uniform, gold lace over silk, and his fez bore a high white cockade. His lean face was handsome, but he looked exhausted and somber as he stepped forth onto the white staircase. He smiled and nodded his thanks, nonetheless, to the vizier who hurried to open a red silk parasol over him.

Pengrove, with great presence of mind, raised his hand to his lapel and took a picture of the young man, before the parasol hid him utterly: Abdülmecid I of the House of Osman, Thirty-first Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, Caliph of Islam, sick and weary, shoulders bowed under
the weight of the past but dutifully climbing the steps toward the future.

Ludbridge held the photographs up to the lamplight, sorting through them slowly. “Well done,” he said. “Really first-rate. Full marks for both of you.”

“You’re welcome,” said Pengrove, a little crossly. The carnal splendors of the mystic East had, it must be said, fulfilled all his expectations; but a superfluity of ripe melon, sweet pastries and Turkish coffee had combined badly with a choppy ride back across the Golden Horn, and a lengthy session developing the images from his camera in an airless closet had not improved matters.

Ludbridge came to one image, and peered at it. “What the hell’s this?” He held up the shot of the Americans walking through the Greek Quarter.

“Oh!” Pengrove cleared his throat. “Those are some Americans I saw. One of ’em’s a clergyman, you can see from his hat, and I thought—
how funny, I wonder if they’re the same chaps Hobson overheard next door?
So I took their portrait. Just with the hat-camera, of course, and anyway my talbotype box had been smashed to pieces by then—which reminds me, we’ve got to get hold of some glue so it can be mended—”

“That’s rather a coincidence,” said Ludbridge, slowly turning the picture in his fingers. “Did Bell-Fairfax see them too? What did he think?”

Pengrove went red-faced. “Well, er—no, he didn’t see them, he was—erm—in the back of a fruit stall at the time.”

“What was he doing in the back of a fruit stall?”

“Buying melons. I suppose.” Pengrove studied a fly sitting motionless on the ceiling.

“What the devil is the matter with you?” demanded Ludbridge. “You’re blushing like a bloody schoolgirl.”

“Well, I didn’t like to ask what he was doing in the back of the stall, it was a private matter—” Pengrove cast a furtive glance at the door,
hoping that Bell-Fairfax and Hobson would return from their late supper. Ludbridge’s eyes narrowed.

“Was it indeed? He’d gone back there with someone, had he? Was it a boy?”

“Oh, no!” Pengrove’s monocle fell out. “A female, really a very charming—”

“Well then, what in hell’s got you stammering like that? Especially as I understand you both went off to his favorite brothel tonight. Though that’s rather a lot of fornication in one day for a man on duty, I must say . . . so he’s a ladies’ man?”

“I don’t like to peach on a chap,” said Pengrove miserably. “And it didn’t do any harm to the job, honestly, he was quite discreet and the girl didn’t complain and . . . and really it was just the sort of thing a rotten bounder on a grand tour would do, which is what we were pretending to be, only . . .”

“Only what?”

“He hypnotized the girl,” said Pengrove. “I think. He looked straight into her eyes and—but he wasn’t doing it with his eyes, I don’t think, it was his voice. Yes, it was the voice. I never heard a voice like that in my life, the way he was . . . he was
tempting
her. It made me ashamed.”

Ludbridge was silent for a long while, staring out the window at the lights of Stamboul.

“Yes,” he said at last. “Yes, I know what you mean. He uses that voice on women. Well.” He rose to his feet and, going to his trunk, put the photographs away. “None of us are saints, I suppose. Still, we won’t accomplish much if he has to fuck every pretty girl who catches his eye. I’ll have to have a word with him about it.”

“I’ve investigated our foxes,” said Ludbridge. He was walking with Bell-Fairfax through the cemetery, high above the city, in the bright heat of midday; the green cypresses made welcome pools of shade, and rustled in the breeze off the Golden Horn.

“Your little pasha with the seaside palace is as nasty a piece of goods as you might find in a long summer’s day. Got his office by performing certain criminal services for his betters; built his fortune pocketing bribes and other people’s taxes, and extorting anyone he could get his hooks into, and the odd bit of murder of wealthy heirs. You can imagine what he stands to lose if the Sultan can enforce reforms. He’s been named in connection with no less than three assassination attempts on the Sultan himself. Slipped through the noose every time, letting other men take the blame.

“Plenty of people are frightened enough of him to perjure themselves blue in the face on his behalf. Dear civilized Sultan won’t pursue the matter, naturally, so the pasha’s free to keep plotting.”

“Then it’s a moral act to execute him, sir,” said Bell-Fairfax, with certainty. Ludbridge, looking at him sidelong, raised an eyebrow.

“Moral, you say. Yes, very likely. I thought we’d go across tonight.”

“I’ve thought how it might be managed,” said Bell-Fairfax, stammering a little. “There’s an adjoining residence, with a big plane tree in its garden—we could climb up in its branches until we can see in through his windows, and perhaps shoot him—though there are dogs, and I’m not sure what we might do if they give the alarm—”

“Tut-tut! How d’you suppose a man my age is going to go scampering up a tree? A nice sight I’d look! We’re not stealing apples, Bell-Fairfax. No, I know how it’s to be managed. Pengrove’s excellent photographs made it fairly obvious. A good day’s work, that, by the pair of you.”

“Thank you, sir.” Looking away, Bell-Fairfax smiled, but Ludbridge saw it.

“Which is to say, it was a good day’s work when you were attending to your
job
,” said Ludbridge, in mild tones but with a hint of thunder beginning to roll. “Now, I can understand a happy little visit to the daughters of joy at the end of the day, with your work accomplished. But what the hell was this business with the Greek girl in the marketplace, eh? Who d’you think you are, bleeding Tom Jones? Damned fool thing to do, and damned disappointing as well. I’d have thought you had more self-control than that. And don’t you think Pengrove ran to me
and tattled on you, either! You put a fellow Resident in the position of having to try to cover up for your gross dereliction of duty. By God, son, it won’t do.”

Edward flinched, and stared at the path as they walked. “No, sir,” he muttered.

“A man with a weakness is a danger to his comrades. You ought to know that. You were the last person I’d have suspected of losing his head here and doing something as foolish as skirt-chasing. And in Constantinople, of all places! Makes me wonder if you’re fit for the job.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Don’t ‘Yes, sir’ me, I want to know whether you can be trusted! Talk to me.
Why did you do it?
”

Bell-Fairfax had gone scarlet. “Habit, I suppose, sir.”

“
Habit?
.”

“Yes, sir. I, er, I often indulge my, er, inclinations with the fair sex.”

“
Habit?
You make a habit of seducing innocent girls? And don’t tell me it won’t happen again, because if one thing’s certain in this sorry life it’s that a man with an addiction
will
do it again, whether it’s drink or women or anything else. And you’re already the fucking wonder of the Royal Navy, aren’t you, with a list of conquests like Don Giovanni!”

Bell-Fairfax looked up, startled. “I never told you that.”

“No. I learned it from the ladies at Nell Gwynne’s. It was their job to tell me. Does that surprise you? It oughtn’t. We can’t send a man out on the kind of work you’re to do if we don’t know all there is to know about him. And, clearly, we don’t know everything about
you
.”

“Sir, on my honor, my—er—dalliances have never harmed any female. It is entirely a matter of mutual agreement. I am careful to use protection and take a great deal of trouble to be certain the girl enjoys the experience as much as I do. Where’s the harm?”

“Where indeed? You’re the one who’s always so preoccupied with the moral side of matters.”

“But what we do isn’t immoral!” Bell-Fairfax said. “It’s simply the satisfaction of mutual need. As pleasant as—as—having a brandy or a cigar.
Where’s the harm?
”

“Perhaps in seeing a woman as nothing more than a brandy or a cigar,” said Ludbridge quietly. “And are you certain you’re always quite honest about your intentions?”

“I—what? Of course I am, sir. I have never lied to any woman.”

“How d’you do it, then?”

Bell-Fairfax, puzzled by his shift in tone, stared at him. “I, er, merely exert myself to be agreeable.”

“Any man does that, when he wants something badly enough. You do it with remarkable success. What do you do?”

Bell-Fairfax lowered his eyes. “Well, I greet them, and tell them they’re beautiful, and that I’d very much like to, er, engage in congress with them if they are so inclined, and have they a few moments free?”

“Hmph. That’d get any other man slapped, with the girl screaming for her chaperone or a policeman.”

“Well, I do have certain advantages of person, sir. And one must exert oneself to be charming, after all.”

“One bloody must. Sure it hasn’t something to do with your tone of voice?”

Bell-Fairfax appeared to think carefully before he spoke. “The voice is important, of course. One speaks soothingly to a frightened horse or a wounded animal. Or a shipmate—Shawe had to have his foot amputated, and Dr. Jameson had me sit beside him while it was being done, and I talked to him the whole while and kept him calm. And the tone is only a little different when one is trying to persuade a woman to plea-sure. And it’s not nearly so difficult.”

“No?”

“No, sir, because—it’s not as though I was asking them to do something they didn’t want to do.”

“Damned egotist. What happens when a girl doesn’t want to sample your charms, might one ask?”

“That has never happened, sir, but if it ever did, I should promptly apologize and depart.”

Ludbridge glared at him. They walked on a little way, between the graves, before he said: “Be that as it may. Henceforth what you do in
London is your own concern, but I will not have you sampling women like pastries when you’re on the job, do you understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Your continued employment depends on it, is that plain?”

“Perfectly, sir.”

They walked on in silence a few yards. Bell-Fairfax, relieved that the conversation appeared to have ended, attempted to change the subject.

“Curious, all these funny stone turbans lying about. They appear to have been broken off the gravestones. Shame people are such vandals.”

“It wasn’t vandalism,” said Ludbridge. “It was by royal decree. These were the graves of the Janissaries. D’you know what they were? An elite force of soldiers, the best the Ottomans could train. Became like the Praetorian Guard, picking and choosing sultans. At last they mutinied against the father of the present fellow, and he broke them and stripped them of honors. His punishment extended to the dead as well as the living: all the carved turbans were knocked off their monuments. Something to think about, isn’t it?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Let’s go down to the Cadde-i Kebir. I want a drink,” said Ludbridge.

There was a bar in the European Quarter run by a Sardinian, with a decent stock of brandies. After they had refreshed themselves, however, Ludbridge ordered a glass of Maraschino. The waiter brought it and set it before him. When the waiter had gone, Ludbridge lit a cigar and, settling back, told Bell-Fairfax: “Make me drink that.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I detest the stuff. Persuade me to drink it.”

“But—sir—.”

“Oblige me!”

Bell-Fairfax looked disconcerted. He drummed his fingers on the table a moment.

“Very well. You’ve ordered that liqueur; it’s rather costly, it can’t be as bad as all that, and you may as well drink it.”

“Bosh. I could as easily throw it in the gutter. It’s vile.”

“It doesn’t seem vile. It looks charming. Nearly colorless, in that little cut-crystal liqueur glass? You could drink it in one gulp. Think of all the care and effort that went into making it. Think of your expense report. Are you going to tell Greene you spend money on expensive drinks, only to throw them in the gutter?”

“Shan’t tell him. And why should I drink something I don’t like, anyway?”