Chapter Thirty-Five
One, two, three, four, five, six. The guard disappeared from view and crossed behind the closed wrought iron gate. Sophia counted to thirty. Right on cue the guard came back. One, two, three, four, five, six. The pillar on the other side of the gate hid him from view once more.
She had spent all morning seated on a park bench under the shade of a tree across the street from Sheik Selim Omar’s palazzo. If the guards were any guide, the sheik and his lady were still in residence.
Shakespeare kept her company. A volume open on her lap. Sophia prized open the lid of the tin beside her. She nibbled on a pastry while she watched the windows for signs of movement from inside.
The raven himself is hoarse
That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
Under my battlements. Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me from the crown to the toe topful
Of direst cruelty!
She hadn’t exactly thought through her course of action beyond the idea of confronting the envoy.
His interest in Laura was too obvious, too overt for her to believe a simple rejection of him would be the end of the matter. The thought of kidnapping her from a ship seemed to beggar belief, yet who else would have the resources? What of the little boat Samuel insisted he’d seen? Thanks to Jonathan, there was now some corroborating evidence.
Sophia was under no illusion about breaking in and confronting the sheik – she would leave that sort of derring-do to Captain Kit Hardacre, thank you very much – but she was prepared to camp outside the palazzo. For days if she had to. The man would know, if he didn’t already, that she was there, watching; waiting for him. And he would know she knew what he had done.
“You seem intent on seeing someone, Miss Green. Or do I still get to call you Mrs. Hardacre?”
Sophia started at the voice behind her. Kit! Her pounding heart slowed and she caught her breath. She started to turn her head when he continued.
“Don’t move. Stay as you are. He can’t see me and I’d like to keep it that way.”
“But you’re happy for him to see me.”
“I’m not happy at all, but this is your production. So, tell me Lady Macbeth, what are you plans?”
Sophia snapped closed the copy of Shakespeare’s plays that lay on her lap.
“I don’t have a plan.”
“There’s a mistake.”
“Well, forgive me if subterfuge is not second nature to me.”
There was a long silence, and she wondered whether Kit had gone. In fact, she wondered whether she had conjured him up from her imagination.
“Where did Selim Omar first talk to you and Laura alone?”
“At the shrine of Saint Rosalia.”
“Are you wearing walking shoes?”
“Yes.”
“Count to three hundred then make your way back to the Hotel de France. Stay there until the clock tower strikes two o’clock, then make your way up to the shrine. I suspect it won’t be long before you have company.”
“And exactly where will you be?”
“Bringing Great Birnam Wood to Dunsinane Hill.”
Sophia cursed under her breath. Kit chuckled. Then there was silence. Still seething, she opened her volume once again and started counting.
*
Jonathan’s message had been short but Kit needed no other explanation. His wife needed him. Even if she didn’t want him anymore, she still needed him. It was a poor foundation on which to salvage a marriage, but if that was the only breadcrumb he was given, he would feast on it like a king.
From his vantage point in the cliffs, he looked out over the plaza and in front of Saint Rosalia’s sanctuary. Morwena’s father looked the part of a vendor, selling votaries and souvenirs from the cart opposite the convent. Another of his men, forty yards away, sat with a sketchpad and easel – and a loaded musket by his side, hidden by a blanket. Another man hid by the rocks in the late shadows.
The stage is set, all that’s needed are the players.
He forced himself to quell his uneasiness over Sophia. Not that she would know it, but another of his men would be trailing her to this spot.
The woman seemed to have a knack of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
He believed her when she said she had no plans to confront Selim Omar, but improvisation only worked when one had a plan. Well, now he had given her one. He wrote out hasty instructions and arranged for a messenger to deliver them to her. He would see if his beautiful wife could follow directions.
Half an hour after two o’clock, Sophia rounded the final rise. She looked around, as though taking in the view, and, as he instructed her, ignored everyone to walk to the lookout and take a seat on the bench.
Now was the hardest part, the waiting to see if Selim Omar would take the bait.
Earlier today, he had looked over the Triumphant and concurred with Jonathan’s conclusion. Laura had been targeted specifically but it was not enough to pin the blame on the Turk, and if Bentinck was to do anything, he would need evidence. Kit hoped Sophia would be disarming enough for the man to confirm their suspicions.
He watched her cut a solitary figure on the bench. His heart ached to see her sitting alone. He had spent so many years alone himself and, yet, in such a short space of time, her absence pained him. He had tried not to think about it and buried himself deeper in his plans.
It actually worked for a while, but he had to come up to breathe sometimes. And each time he did, he felt something missing. He had to piece it together like a puzzle. It was the smell of her perfume gone, the warmth of another body, tangible and real when nightmares tore at the edges of his sleep. To live without Sophia was to live without the other half of himself. Sadly, it seemed she didn’t feel the same.
Kit heard the sound of approaching footsteps and focused his attention on the man who approached the bench.
Selim Omar was dressed in European clothes and appeared to be without escort. Kit tapped Jonathan on the shoulder to silently indicate to check further down the hill in case their “guest” had his own men lying in wait.
*
“You have made me come a long way for an audience, Miss Sophia – or should I say Mrs. Hardacre. I understand congratulations are in order.”
Sophia refused to rise to the bait. Instead, she followed the instructions Kit sent by messenger at lunchtime. He had given her a role to play and she slipped into it easily. It gave her courage she did not own.
“I don’t recall issuing an invitation, Your Excellency. As far as I’m concerned, this is simply a fortuitous meeting of acquaintances. By the way, how do you do?”
She watched the slow smile and, perhaps, even the beginnings of a look of respect cross his bearded face.
“Then I apologize. What shall we talk about, my dear acquaintance?”
Sophia paused, then dropped the bait.
“My cousin, Laura.”
“And how is the beautiful English rose?”
Sophia seethed. Oooh, how could he ask that question with so much guile?
“Missing.”
Selim Omar gave her an exaggerated expression of concern. “Oh! How alarming for you. I am at your service, Madam.”
She allowed herself a tremulous smile.
“I miss my cousin very much and I wish… well, wherever she is, I wish I could be with her.”
“And yet you don’t know where she is.”
“She would be frightened on her own with no one she knows. If I were with her, she would be less frightened and more…”
Sophia held her breath and prayed she hadn’t overplayed her hand.
“You must pray to your God, or to Allah, the merciful. Perhaps he will grant your wish.”
Selim Omar rose to leave and she started to panic. She had learned nothing, absolutely nothing of value.
“Why did you follow me here?”
Selim paused.
“Follow? As you yourself said, we are acquaintances whose meeting is fortuitous. But if I might offer a word of advice, it would be to remind you it is unwise for a pretty young woman to be walking alone. She may attract the wrong sort of attention. I will escort you.”
She rose slowly, demonstrating reluctance that wasn’t completely feigned. She felt exhilaration surge through her veins. Things seemed brighter, her hearing seemed more acute, even her sense of smell, the smell of vegetation and wildflowers seemed all the more vivid here.
Is this another part of what drew Kit into this dangerous world? Living life to its very limits, seeming to dare the fates themselves to stop her? The sheik offered his hand, but she did not take it.
The sun was beginning to fall over the Tyrrhenian Sea. Ripples of gold and pink spread across the sky. Red sky at night, a sailor’s delight.
They walked in silence, the shadows lengthening.
“I understand your uncle has left for England and you did not join him,” he said. “I would like to know why.”
The imperious manner in which he talked to her rankled, but she put the slight aside.
“I wished some time to contemplate my future. You see, I made an impetuous decision and married a man my family considered unsuitable. I am considered ruined. I have brought disgrace to them. I have to consider my future and, now, with my cousin missing, I begin to wonder what future I have at all.”
She marveled at how her voice remained steady. After all, everything she told him was the truth. It painted a very sad picture, indeed. She swallowed and waited, attuned to even the slightest change in his body language. She weathered his steady regard of her, pretending to be so lost in her own thoughts. Did she pass the test? Did she overplay her hand? Now she wanted more than ever to see Kit’s face. Did he hear what she said of their marriage? What must he think of her?
“Do you know the story of Little Hyacinth’s Tent?”
Sophia shook her head, as much an answer to him as it was to pull her thoughts back together.
“It is a very popular folk tale in my country – a handsome prince, overcome with love for a rare beauty he discovers from another land, steals into her tent, past her protective brothers, and takes a kiss.”
“And what happened?”
“On the awakening of her passion, she did not want to leave him.”
“Do you think that is what’s happened to Laura?”
She stopped. Selim Omar carried on two more paces before he, too, stopped to look back at her.
“Perhaps,” he answered.
The silence stretched out, uncomfortably so. For the first time, she felt prickles of fear course along her arms. The adventure was becoming serious. If Sheik Selim Omar made a lunge for her or had men lying in wait, she would be powerless.
“You had better come to the purpose of our meeting,” he said. “I don’t prefer my women be so direct, but I find that flaw in you appealing.”
“You abducted my cousin from the Triumphant. I want to know where she is.”
*
“It’s been four weeks.”
Kit watched Sophia’s shoulders slump at her cousin’s words. Samuel’s injury hadn’t impaired his time-keeping ability. Indeed, it had been four weeks since she met with Selim Omar outside Saint Rosalia’s shrine and since then – nothing. The Calliope’s crew watched Selim Omar’s palazzo and his ship. Nothing. They’d pressed every contact on the African coast they had, and there had been no one appear fitting Laura’s description.
Sophia quickly crossed the floor in Samuel’s suite and opened the balcony doors to let the afternoon sea breeze into a room, which had become stifling. She spent a moment looking out. When she turned back into the room, he saw she had composed herself, but he knew despair lay close to the surface.
“All of this spying on the emir has been a wild goose chase!” Samuel’s accusation rose in volume until he yelled. “All this time we might have employed his help, his resources to find my sister!”
Kit took to his feet, rising slowly from his place on a couch. “Sophia did ask for his help. The man has done nothing.”
“Perhaps that’s down to you.” With his free hand, Samuel rubbed the arm still held immobile in a sling and warmed to his theme. “You insulted a very important man. Then you sent a woman out to trap him into what? Confessing? He’ll have seen through that pathetic ruse in a heartbeat!”
The man’s lip curled into a sneer. “Get out! You’ve destroyed my family. If I see you again, I will call you out.”
Kit took the abuse without reaction and allowed himself a moment of satisfaction when Samuel’s eyes fell away from his. The man had no idea how little it would take to push him past the limit of his patience. How long had Sophia put up with this obnoxious simpleton?
Kit stood at ease and looked to Sophia. Her expression of hopelessness breached the wall he had put around his heart. He missed her. He wanted his wife in his arms again. He had enough of sleeping on his own; of being on his own.
A sharp rap on the door jamb interrupted his musing. It was Jonathan. The man lifted his head but said nothing; his mouth was a tight line.
“Excuse me,” Kit murmured, touching Sophia lightly on the arm as he stood and left the room. He walked in silence down the hall with Jonathan for a few paces.
“Ahmed Sharrouf is here.”
“Here?”
What was that snake up to? He was supposed to have made contact nearly two months ago when he had learned the size of Kaddouri’s fleet, not come himself. Kit decided he would send Elias to see what the man wanted. Jonathan seemed to anticipate the question and shook his head.
“He insists on seeing no one but you.”
Shoving down his impatience, Kit glanced back at Cappleman’s suite, where Sophia waited, and turned to Jonathan.
“Where is he?”
*
“This is not the hospitality I expected, Effendi.”
Kit adjusted his eyes to the gloom in the warehouse and noted the amused tone in Sharrouf’s voice. The man was not alone as he sat at a table; Elias waited with him.
“I was hoping for a warm greeting and a tour of the Calliope.”
Kit shook his head. There was no way that untrustworthy snake was getting anywhere near his ship. “Not going to happen, Sharrouf. Why are you here?”
Ahmed leaned forward on the table. “There is movement at Al-Min, my friend. I’ve heard rumors their patron will be arriving within the next seven days. All the wasps are starting to gather to the nest. If you want to exterminate them, you should move quickly while they are still vulnerable. Kaddouri’s doors are open wide, but who knows for how long.”
Kit glanced at Jonathan and Elias, reading the tension in both men.
“I want a map of Al-Min, its fortifications and who is on Kaddouri’s invitation list. That’s the deal.”
Ahmed smiled and slid a large package across the table. That was too easy. Kit felt prickles up his neck and a nagging feeling in his gut that to accept it would be making a pact with the devil. The temptation of Adam was before him, the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil.
The Arab watched him closely. So, too, did his men.
Kit took the package.