Virgin Star (12 page)

Neither the man nor his two darker-skinned bodyguards noticed the magnificence of the proud oceangoing vessel. The great Dutch seven-hundred-tonner measured one hundred and sixty feet along her main deck and thirty-four feet at the beam, with not three but four towering masts. It might have been a fishing boat for all his admiration. He thought the ornate bulkhead and gilded stern ridiculously extravagant, rather than elegant. The tremendous power packed in the neat row of over twenty cannon was observed with more interest, then dismissed as inadequate to defend its enormous cargo hulls—he understood these oversized ships were relatively easy prey to pirates. .

A breeze blew across the crowded docks, scattering a few fat raindrops. He turned up the fur-lined, tailored redingote, and with his gold-handled cane out front, he moved toward the ship. The two men followed him obediently. Boxes were piled up three high around the wide wood plank, yet no men guarded it or the cargo crowding the dock. A brow rose at the curiosity. No one was in sight.

The three men started up the plank.

A low vicious growl stopped them before the second step. They all looked up. Standing at the top of the plank was a creature as large and wide as a carnival bear. The black and white fur lifted on its thick coat and it stood poised, looking a split second from a decision to attack. The enormous animal barked, low and mean, then its lips curled over large white teeth in a snarl.

The man held up his hand to the two behind him before rather calmly opening his coat. He grasped his waist pistol and slowly drew it out. The dog barked again, then howled for help, alarmed by this. He aimed the barrel to the right first, judging how quickly he could get in the two shots, not willing to take any chances. The barking sounded viciously. A strong forefinger edged the trigger—

"You shoot and you're as good as gutted."

The three men's anxious gazes flew around the immediate surroundings, but there was nothing and no one. Light footsteps approached the place where the dog stood on deck above the plank. "All right, all right. Let’s see what you caught this time."

A face appeared above the dog. A red scarf covered dark curly hair falling to a wide arch of shoulders. The man leaned over slightly as if one with the creature, and he did not smile. "What's your business, man?"

The Frenchman kept his uncertain gaze on the dog, still snarling. "Monsieur, the creature?"

Edward raised a tattooed forearm. The dog sat. He lowered his hand. The dog lay down, watching with keen animal interest, but showing no sign of a threat.

"May I ascend, monsieur?"

"That all depends on your business. I've got no time for peddlers today," he said, then noticing the expensive tailored clothes—a gent's garb—and the two dark-skinned Arabs, men who looked so strangely similar to each other, he added, "especially the religious kind."

"I am on a mission of inquiry, monsieur, no more. I need but a moment or two to ask my questions."

The Frenchman's English was flawless. "Come along then," Edward said, watching as the finely dressed gentleman climbed aboard, the two men behind him. "You can leave the baggage."

The Frenchman hesitated before passing quick words in an Arab tongue. The two men fell back to assume two straight-backed positions on either side of the plank. Trained like old Oly here, Edward thought.

The Frenchman proceeded up the plank. As he came to the deck, he looked briefly around the main deck: the tall masts over galley lofts and carpenter's room the main cabins. His gaze swept the well-scrubbed decks, neat coils of rope, and stacked crates of goods.

Observing with a judgment shrewder than most, Edward asked pointedly and with no humor, "Is it all fine enough for you now?"

The dark eyes settled on Edward's tall frame at last, naked to the waist. The man's well-muscled physique gleamed with a faint sheen of perspiration, despite the cool, fair breeze of the day. A tattoo in carefully penned Latin beneath a magnificent picture of a ship spread across an impressive biceps. Sean always claimed the Latin words explained the unnatural courage of his crew. Presently the Frenchman translated the words in his mind: "Only one death to fear."

"I will speak to the captain, monsieur."

"Not likely."

The Frenchman's eyes narrowed just slightly. The great dog sensed Edward's mistrust and rose to sit by him, staring up with small animal eyes. "The..." He searched for the English word but produced, "The number one officer?"

"Slightly more likely but still in the realm of absolute fantasy." He spotted a small puddle of mud or soup spilled outside the galley stairs and shouted to a nearby seaman, "Sexton, get deck mop on those steps there!"

" 'Tis just a small bit of—"

"I don't care if it's a drop of spittle. Get on it!"

"Aye, aye!" It took the Frenchman a moment to catch up with so many English words, and when he did, cool arrogance entered his tone. "Monsieur, I ask you to direct me to a person of authority."

"You're looking at him."

The English bluntness always irritated him, a thing Edward was counting on. He was surprised, though, as Edward surprised many people. The crew certainly knew their quartermaster; each man was intimately acquainted with his authority, despite the look of a common deckhand.

"Very well," he said with a slight bow of acknowledgment. "I understand this ship shall be sailing to the South China Seas in a week's time, no?"

"Aye."

"I want to know if a young lady has recently inquired as to purchasing passage."

"This is not a passenger ship. You, Isaac!"

"Aye."

"Start hauling these crates to the galley before Slops comes topside with an ax!"

"Aye, aye!"

The Frenchman waited impatiently for Edward's attention to return. "Perhaps not, but still my master would be interested if you knew of a young lady making an inquiry?"

A strange question. Someone had lost a woman, and it was Edward's considerable experience that a man lost a woman when he didn't deserve her in the first place. And if this gentleman was any reflection of the "master" he did not blame the woman for her unconventional flight. "And who's this, ah, 'master'?" The last word was drawled, accented to underline the man's relative status.

He seemed not to notice. "My master is a private gentleman, one who is seeking this woman." From his vest pocket he withdrew a piece of paper. He carefully unfolded it and presented it to Edward.

Edward took the paper and stared at the drawing of a young woman. And stared. She was beautiful, one of the loveliest women it was his misfortune not to have ever seen before: long hair was pulled back over a delicate face as comely as a slow-rising dawn at sea. The artist had drawn coal-black thin brows over dark haunting eyes. Tragic eyes.

"I have never seen her." He handed the picture back.

The man looked disappointed as he carefully folding the paper again and slipped it in his vest pocket. He said only, "We have reason to believe she will be seeking passage to India, the Straits of Malacca. Any information concerning the young lady will be rewarded with fifty of your English pounds—"

"Fifty pounds?" Edward whistled, his arms crossed over his chest. "Either your master's mighty desperate or the lady's mighty determined not to be found:" He met the Frenchman's eyes and decided, "Or both, I see. What did he do to her to make her want to put thousands of miles of deep blue sea between them?"

Edward smiled slightly as he saw the question pricked the man's temper. There was nothing on God's green earth more irritating than a Frenchman who still didn't know they had lost the war. For a long moment, the Frenchman seemed to have been rendered speechless. Then: "I do not believe that is any of your concern, monsieur!"

"It sure as hell is if you want to hear if she ever does wander up this plank."

"The young woman has lost her mind. She is insane. My master is frantic with worry, imagining, certain, the worst has happened to her." He had found only one ship leaving soon for the Far East and he had offered that captain a hundred-pound reward, rather than the fifty-pound note. "Please, if you have any news of her ..."

He turned away, and thereby missed the changed face of Seanessy's quartermaster. "Wait! You never said where I could reach you."

Too late. The Frenchman quickly raced down the plank, cursing the Englishman, then all Englishmen, under his breath. Barbarians! All of them!

*****

Chapter 4

Her anxious eyes kept glancing to the side and to the crowded street beyond where she stood at the port master's window. A smooth sheet of gray clouds hung low on the horizon; the muted color permeated everything. Dull London gray. The Thames stretched in each direction like a ribbon of murky green, while in the distance dozens and dozens of ship's masts looked like ravished stalks in a forest consumed by fire. Smaller fishing vessels sat alongside proud oceangoing vessels. Sailors and other people—maids, errand boys, peddlers, apprentices, shoppers, travelers—bustled about, maneuvering between carriages, horses, vendor carts, and carefully watched crates. Three scroungy dogs cornered a bawling chicken, barking wildly and adding to the noise. Two beggars sat outside the door of a tavern, cups and bored pleas aimed at the indifferent passersby.

London was new, exotic, wondrous! She felt certain she was seeing it for the first time. Hidden within her caution and weariness, she greeted every sight and sound with wide-eyed fascination—it seemed at once foreign, strange, and extraordinary. So many people speaking English!

The man and woman behind her kept exchanging

contemptuous glances until the woman's gaze fell to the young woman's bare muddied feet. She almost screamed. "How indecent! This is too much! The streets are becoming rife with scoundrels and foreigners! Something must be done ..."

When she heard this, her back stiffened. She looked down at her muddied feet and bit her lip. She felt quite unaccustomed to presenting herself in public, she was certain of that. She tried her best to ignore the couple, grateful when at last the two gentlemen in front of her stepped aside.

The port master, an older gent, marked off the two passengers proceeding to board the Georgian, which sailed within the hour to Amsterdam, then turned to the girl: "Name, please?"

The simple question took her by surprise. A name, she needed a name. "Shalyn."

The older man looked irritated, though he barely glanced up from the large leather-bound books that he wrote in: "Your surname, miss—" From the edge of his gaze he caught the oddity of the shirt and vest, imagining the rest. His gaze lifted to the lovely face.

The girl that Frenchman had been looking for just this morning! Lord, oh Lord! Fifty-pound reward— twice his annum! He swallowed as his heart started racing. All right, all right, just slow down.

He realized immediately that he must stall her long enough to get the word to the unpleasant Frenchman. But how? He glanced to the sides just as she said, "Seanessy."

"Seanessy?" The name gave him pause. What did Captain Seanessy have to do with it? What did the captain have to do with her?

He gambled she had drawn the famous name in her own desperation to escape the unpleasant Frenchman, a slip he could use to intimate her. "There is no Seanessy booked on the Georgian, I can tell you that. But I'm wonderin' if the cap'n knows you're running around using his name?"

Surprised he would address her so familiarly, she lifted a dark brow with indignation. "I do not believe I gave you leave to question me or my particular circumstances. Furthermore, I am not interested in the Georgian, unless it is bound for the Far East. Now, I want passage aboard the next ship leaving for South China Seas. Especially one that would go to the Straits of Malacca."

The man and woman behind her sighed with impatience, rolling their eyes. Foreigners acting like the Queen of Sheba!

The woman tilted her purple silk hat to hide her contempt.

"China Seas?" the port master questioned as if she had asked for passage to the moon. Was the girl green! This was perfect. "Well, passage to the South China Seas be difficult to book, miss. I don't have anything at the moment. Ah, if you could step aside a moment, I'll send someone round to check the docks for the first ship sailing today."

"Oh?" The man's sudden kindness took her by surprise. "Well... yes. If you can be quick about it."

Shalyn moved aside while the man ignored the vigorous protestations of the couple waiting behind her and stepped outside his window, disappearing down the docks. A strong finger tapped her shoulder. She turned to see the man who had been next in line. "What is the meaning of this? Where did the clerk run off to?"