Virgin Star (13 page)

"He will be back shortly." She dismissed the man as she turned away. "He just went to discover which ships are sailing today to the South China Seas."

"The South China Seas? Where on earth did you come from?" The man appeared outraged at her ignorance. "There are no passenger ships that sail the

horn at this time of year, there never have been and there never will. I daresay we have enough shipwrecks as it is without sending passengers around the horn so close to winter. Good Lord, miss, don't you know anything?"

Alarming words. She turned back to the man, whose wife had glanced away as she muttered, "There ought to be a law against unescorted women ..."

"But the clerk said he was going to—"

She stopped, her mind rushing ahead. If what the irate man said was true, where had the port master run off to?

She never waited to find out. Her bare feet were moving. "Good riddance," the man said as the beautiful girl disgracefully dressed in men's trousers vanished into the crowded street.

She ran down the street as if chased by demons.

Nearly a mile away she ducked into the alley to catch her breath and hold her throbbing head. Her legs burned, her heart raced as the narrow and deserted alley began spinning.

Think! What was the worst possibility? The port master had left to alert someone! Why else would he disappear like that? They were searching here for her! Who? Who?

She had to remember! She had to!

Had the people pursuing her put everyone on notice: port master, ship captains, the English redcoats? Had they described her physical features or had they shown a miniature of her face? How had the port master recognized her?

Breathing deep and fast, she abruptly realized such sweeping effort was too farfetched. There must be another explanation. There must...

The dark eyes focused on her attire. Clothes she had taken from his house. The abominable Captain Seanessy! Had his men reached the port master's office first to alert him to a girl wearing trousers and looking to book passage to Malacca? And she, like a fool, had even used his name!

She wondered which was worse: the dark phantoms of her missing memory or Captain Seanessy. It hardly mattered; she had no intention of falling victim to either of them. If no passenger ships sailed until spring, she'd have to get passage on a merchantman heading for India or Malay or Singapore, braving the wind and storms and terrors of the cape. Somehow she'd have to do it. Beg, bribe, or threaten, she had to have passage on the next ship that sailed.

First she had to find the ship...

She tossed her head back to look up at the gray sky, her heart slowing at last as she told herself over and over that she would be safe once she sailed. The nightmare would be over.

Not that she had any idea what she would find once in Malacca. Perhaps nothing. Or perhaps she would find the very thing that would trigger her memory and unlock the mystery of her life. And, if she never found it, at least she would be safer there. Somehow she knew that.

As she collected the scattered fragments of her senses, the image of a small wood house emerged in her mind's eye. The small home perched on the levee of the mouth of a river, all surrounded by the verdant green of the jungle's edge. Her heart leaped; she tried to seize the picture.

The image faded like a dream upon waking, then disappeared altogether. Who was with her in that house? Dear Lord, would her memory start returning like that? With fleeting glimpses and small bits and pieces of a much larger puzzle? That would take years! Time was the one thing she felt certain she didn't have, at least not here in London. In London her life was but a sand glass turned upside down.

She stepped out of the alley. The street here was still crowded, but in the crush she felt anonymous. A few passersby stared, but not many, and those few turned away after an amused smile or a shake of their heads. She spotted a group of sailors congregating atop various-sized crates nearby. Puffs of tobacco smoke rose from the group. Dice rolled at their feet. Laughter sounded with the outcome.

Now or never.

She approached the men. Three feet away, she beckoned, "Good day, sirs." The gazes of four hardened seamen found her. "I am searching for a merchantman leaving for the South China Seas or even India. Could you—"

"Will ye lookit that! 'Tis a little lassie playin' at being a man—"

Another man withdrew his pipe in a cloud of smoke and laughed. "This here's a first for me—"

"Ain't the goddamn Brits got laws 'bout that—"

"You a lawbreaker, little girl?"

The question sounded as a larger man rose on unsteady feet and the others laughed. Drunk, she saw, knowing danger when she encountered it. Not that any or all of these men could give her any problem, but she could easily imagine the attention she'd draw with her fighting skills.

"Sir," she said sweetly. "If you are interested in a demonstration of my unusual talents, I would beg for a place of privacy."

The others burst into encouraging hoots and obscene curses. Surprised by the easy piece of luck and excited the man wiped his lips oh his sleeve before a wide smile broke over his bearded face, revealing a cork-filled grin. The sight startled her and she stared

a moment too long. Poor people used cork to replace lost teeth, squeezing it between the remaining ones.

Her tongue raced over her neat row of small white teeth in reassurance.

The man completely misunderstood the gesture. He wiped his mouth on his sleeve, grinning as he swept his arm toward the ship with an invitation. As he followed Shalyn up the plank, the other men roared with excitement. The dice were put into play to determine the lucky dog who would go next.

Shalyn's bare feet touched topside when she felt his large hands on her. She caught a strong whiff of his foul scent and nearly retched. She ducked out from under his reach, not willing to let his filthy hands touch her again. The man laughed; thinking this a game. He lunged for her. She ducked again and he stumbled, falling flat on his stomach. Shalyn positioned her bare foot on his spine, applying a painful pressure. The man cried out with the sharp pain. Confused, he tried to get up. She applied slightly more pressure. He grimaced in acute agony.

"I'll let you up only after you provide me with the name and whereabouts of a ship that will be debarking soon for the Straits of Malacca or India. Do you know such a ship?"

Breathing hard and fast, he could not speak to save his life. The she-witch was a demon risen from the bowels of hell—

She applied a bit more pressure, knowing the exact point at which the fragile spine would snap and careful not to come that close. The pain was enough—the last thing the world needed was another cripple. "Do not tax my patience."

"The Wind Muse." He gasped, feeling suddenly nauseated. "The Black Comet too, take yer pick—"

The Wind Muse. A fanciful name. One would have

to be fair and good to call a ship the Wind Muse. The Black Comet was an ominous name.

She discovered she was superstitious. Still, it mattered which left first. "Do you know which one sails soonest?"

He grunted in agony. "Probably the Wind Muse."

"Where?" she asked.

"Dead end of the fourth pier."

She withdrew her foot and turned away. The pain disappeared as if it never was. He stumbled to his feet, and with the sole idea of a raping and a killing, he lunged for the girl. She swung around with a hard kick to his kneecap. With a scream, he felt his consciousness splinter into a blinding white light of shocking pain. He stumbled and fell, hitting his skull on the hard wood deck, blackness exploding in his mind.

Shalyn walked down the plank. The other men waited with excited, rancorous laughter. "Excuse me," she interrupted, pointing to the deck. "Your compatriot has badly injured himself. I believe he needs your attention."

Laughter stopped and grins vanished as they turned their gazes toward the deck. The girl slipped silently past them and onto the crowded Port Street. A large cart filled with squealing pigs and hay and pulled by two mules moved slowly along the street, and she fell in step alongside it, glancing behind her to make sure none of those bumbling drunken sailors gave chase.

"Hey you thar!" -

Shalyn spun around and looked up to see a woman calling down from an upper apartment window. Relief washed over her in force as she saw a maid beating a rug outside the open window, calling to someone else. She looked over to see a vendor who hawked a cart stacked with iron pots and pans.

“’
Ow much for that small pan?"

A man standing outside a tavern pointed her out to his friends as she passed, and the small group burst into laughter. Another man smiled at her and tipped his hat, while his wife stared with astonishment, then burst into smothered giggles. Finely dressed merchants gathered around the plank of a newly docked ship. Another raggedy vendor passed, hawking hot potatoes for sale.

By far most people appeared too bent on their individual missions to notice her. She caught sight of a young apple vendor approaching in the opposite direction. "One apple please,”' she said. "And if you could kindly direct me to the fourth pier?"

"Fourth pier be right on the way. This here be the ninth pier, so just keep the numbers in yer head. And take yer pick of me apples."

She selected a shiny large one from the top, then withdrew the billfold to pay for the apple. The dark-haired teenager looked confused by this.

"A pound note for an apple, miss? Ah." He chuckled. "A poor bloke like me don' see enough coin inside a year to change a pound note for an apple farthing."

She looked at the crisp bill, realizing she hadn't a clue about English money. She suddenly wondered how much she had stolen from the captain. She returned the apple. "I'm sorry. I haven't any coins."

The young man looked at the lovely girl, his good mum's complaints sounding in his mind, "Jack lad, ye be supplyin' 'alf of London's beggars with fresh apples! La! I'll see the day when we be sittin' outside flower shops and bakeries with our own tin cups." To which he always replied, "Ye should have raised me with a cold hard heart, mum ..." And then they'd laugh.

Softhearted he was. He could hardly bear the disappointment in the lovely girl's dark eyes. He couldn't resist. "Ah well, I guess 'tis yer lucky day." He handed her back the apple. "Compliments of Jack, portside apple vendor." He bowed. "At yer service, my lady."

Shalyn smiled at the gift until her eyes came to the boy's own muddied bootless feet. A poor apple vendor with a kind enough heart to give apples away. On impulse she stuffed the bill into his worn vest pocket. The boy's face changed with wide-eyed disbelief, and she laughed. "Perhaps 'tis your lucky day as well!"

The boy looked at the pound note and leaped into the air with his excitement. Shalyn slipped back into the throng. By the time Jack recovered enough to want to give thanks, she was gone. Disappearing like any good fairy. He carefully folded the pound note and returned it to his pocket. "Mum." He laughed. "Ye won't believe it when I tell ..." Here was one person who would not escape his thanks, and he dashed toward the fourth pier.

The port master nervously counted the man's money, forgot what he was counting, and started anew. He had sent a young boy with the message. Any minute now. The only trouble was that the girl had disappeared—

"Sir." The waiting man stamped his cane on the wood deck. “Just how long does it take you to count a flat four pounds from an even ten?"

The port master looked at his hand that held only four notes, realizing he had counted all the way up to fourteen. Checking again, he marked the sum and the change in his ledger. He removed a pound note to hand back just as someone rushed up to the window with a sudden burst of motion.

"Yes?" The Frenchman shoved a startled Englishman from the window, ignoring the outraged exclamations of the rest of the people in the line. "Monsieur, you sent word that you found the young lady?'

"She was just here! She disappeared that way." The port master leaned out to point north, though this was a guess. He had no idea which way the girl had gone. He noticed the five dark heathens waiting in the street, each man wearing the same fine black trousers, boots, coat, and stiff-neck collared shirts as if it were a uniform. Foreigners all. Arabs by the looks of 'em. The Frenchmen snapped his fingers at these men, barked an order in rapid French, and the men dispensed like rats in the crowd. "Wait," he called. "What about the fifty pounds?"

"When we catch her, monsieur, when we catch her," and the foreigner quickly stepped into the street.