Seductive Wager (37 page)

The commander of the French ship called to them as he passed to ask if they needed help.

“No,” the first mate, now in command of the ship, called back, “but I have an Englishman here I need to turn over to you.” But first he wanted the pirates captured. He glanced again at the body of the captain and a frown furrowed his brow. Why had he been killed? Why had he been talking to Raisuli? There was some mystery about this whole thing and he wanted it cleared up. He owed that to his crew.

There’s a second ship on the way,” the French commander called back as the two ships quickly separated. “Hand him over to them. I’m going after the pirates.”

The first mate went among the men checking on the wounded. It seemed a miracle that the captain and young Mark were the only casualties suffered in the attack. There were many cracked heads and some rather nasty flesh wounds, but the pirates’ greed for marketable slaves had prevented them from doing any real harm to the crew. So, bruised and battered, they were able to return to the task of sailing their ship. The new commander decided he would not stop at Algiers but instead go on to Tripoli. Someone had betrayed the Englishman, and he had the feeling neither he nor his crew would be welcome in Algiers just now.

Unaware they were about to be given over to the French, Charles cut Brett’s bonds. Mercifully, Brett was still unconscious, but nothing was going to help once he learned what had happened to Kate. In a way it would have been easier if he’d been killed instead of Mark. Charles had been in Brett’s service for eight years and he had not foreseen, and still could hardly believe, that Brett would fall so deeply in love, but there was one thing he had learned about him: Brett could not accept failure or defeat. How was he going to live with her loss? How was he going to live with his failure to protect her? Most important of all, how was he going to live knowing she probably wasn’t dead?

Charles had no answers, and he knew Brett wouldn’t have any, either. It might have been more merciful if she had let him die on the yacht.

Algiers was a towering formation of dazzling whitewashed buildings dominating a snug harbor. The white cubes of the older section of the city piled up the hillside, nestling under the canons of the Ottomans and the green flag of Islam. In the labyrinths of the Medina, where overhanging eaves allowed only a slit of the vivid blue sky to be seen, Spanish, Italian, Berber, English, Greek, and Arab merchants congregated to do business. Commercial ships from every nation anchored in the azure waters of the bay and were boarded and left by way of small boats rowed between the shore and the ships.

It was some time before the French ship bearing Brett returned to port, where it was met by a large and curious crowd. A rumor had raced through the town that a ship had been set upon by pirates within sight of land earlier that morning. The mention of pirates sent a thrill of fear and excitement through a population accustomed to such things; they were anxious to see any man or ship who could fight off Raisuli. They gathered along the waterfront and the streets, their long robes merging into a single mass of off-white, while their colorful turbans dotted the whole like sugared fruits on Christmas baking. Here and there a veiled face denoted the presence of a woman, but their numbers were few.

There were only two piers of the most rudimentary kind in the busy port. As soon as the ship was tied up and a gangplank laid down, a smartly dressed man of medium height and slight build climbed down from a closed carriage and walked up the gangplank. He spoke briefly to the seaman in charge before he was escorted to the cabin of the ship’s captain. It was quite some time later before he knocked at the door of Brett’s cabin.

Charles opened the door with his usual cheerful demeanor despite a bandage that covered a third of his head and face. Brett, disdaining bandages, lay on his side on his cot to avoid putting pressure on two enormous knots that had formed at the base of his skull. His hands and feet were encircled by iron manacles which were firmly anchored to the wall.

“I’m Kenneth Wiggins, the English consul in Algeria,” the man said, introducing himself. “I’m afraid your welcome to Algiers has been rather rude,” he purred in a quiet, cultivated voice which seemed incapable of rising to anger, or any other form of passion.

Brett suddenly sat up in the bed, and despite the excruciating pain at the back of his eyes, his eager gaze fixed itself upon Wiggins. “Did they capture them?” he demanded abruptly.

“I beg your pardon?” Wiggins said, appalled by Brett’s deathlike appearance.

“The pirates,” Brett repeated. “Did they catch them?”

“I do not know. They haven’t yet returned. I am sorry it should have to be a French ship that rescued you, but as you know, we have no regular Navy here. We could see your ship from the roof of the consulate, but there was nothing we could do. Not even one of our ships could have reached you in time.”

“You’ve got to find out for me. I’ve got to know.”

“Certainly,” Wiggins replied, still rather cool. “But surely you can wait for their return. There is no great hurry.”

“My wife was on that damned boat, man!” Brett shouted at him with savage anger. “They took my
wife!”

“Oh, I see,” Wiggins mumbled, his pale skin turning a pasty white. “That does put a rather different light on the situation.” He paused for a moment, deep in thought, and then redirected his gaze to Brett. “I was not informed you were bringing a wife. I was told you were unmarried.”

“We were married in France, just before I left. We didn’t want to be separated so soon.”

“Understandable, but rather unwise,” Wiggins replied. “This is no place for a young woman.”

“I know that,” Brett shouted. “Don’t you think I’ve cursed my selfishness every minute I’ve been awake? Just get me out of here,” he said, jangling the chains that held him. “I can’t do a thing as long as I’m anchored to the walls of this bloody ship.”

“I’m not sure I can do that at least not just yet.”

“What do you mean?” Brett demanded.

“It seems the man who took over your ship gave the French captain a rather prejudicial account of your purpose in coming to Algiers. So prejudicial, in fact, he has decided to wait until he can consult his government before deciding whether to let you go.”

“This is intolerable. They have no right,” Brett raged.

“You also seem to have aggravated an already difficult situation by attacking the captain when he would not give you command of his ship,” Wiggins continued as imperturbably as ever.

“I only wanted to follow Kate before their ship was out of sight,” Brett raged, straining against the chains.

“Surely you could have tried talking to the captain before you struck him?”

“I did, but the bloody fool kept on coming up with objections, and there wasn’t time to convince him. With two ships, we could have caught them for sure.”

“Possibly, but you can’t expect a Frenchman to allow his ship to be taken away from him, especially when the person doing the taking is an Englishman.”

“I can see you’re well suited to be a diplomat,” Brett remarked scornfully. “You’re the kind who would stand around talking policy while cutthroats burned, pillaged, and raped their way through every village in the county.”

“We can’t all be men of action,” Wiggins purred softly, his detached gaze showing no hint of emotion. “Besides, someone has to save you intrepid warriors from the consequences of your ill-judged deeds.”

“Talk if you must, but get me out of here now,” Brett shouted. “Every hour lost gives those damned heathens a better chance to hide.”

“I will do what I can as expeditiously as possible,” Wiggins said, rising to his feet, “but I fear it will take some little time. As for the pirates, unless the French ship has kept them from going ashore, they will disappear into the countryside and our next step will be to discover where they have taken your wife. That will take even longer.”

“But you can’t let them keep her, man. She’s an English citizen, just like you.”

“If she were the queen herself, I couldn’t do any more than I’m doing now,” Wiggins informed him. “I have my sources, but out here everything takes time. Forgive me for asking, but is your wife pretty?”

“She’s beautiful!” Brett thundered. “The most beautiful woman you’ll ever see.”

“Then things aren’t quite so desperate after all.”

“How can you say that? She’s alone with those savages somewhere in the desert.”

“If she is young and lovely, she is too valuable to be harmed. She is also worth too much to be sold anywhere except in one of the major slave markets, so we have time. If she is as beautiful as you say, then we have even more time. They will try to interest one of the sultan’s agents in bidding for her.”

“You’ve got to find her,” Brett said, his voice suddenly more pleading than demanding. “She killed three men. They may want revenge.”

“She killed three men!” Wiggins echoed, his voice losing its calm control. “How can this be?”

“She shot two of the pirates and severed Raisuli’s jugular with a single knife thrust,” Brett said, unable to keep the pride from his voice.

“Raisuli!” Wiggins repeated, his voice rising yet another octave. “Are you trying to make me believe your
wife
has killed the most feared pirate in the Mediterranean? “

“You can ask anybody on the ship,” Charles said, speaking for the first time. “They all saw it.”

“Your ship did not stop here,” Wiggins said, recovering some of his control. “The French captain doesn’t know where they were headed.”

“Then someone did sell information about us,” Brett said, black fury working in his face.

“Most probably. Any kind of information can be bought for a price, but that need not concern us any longer. I will see what can be done about your release. I’ll also set inquiries in motion to discover where they have taken your wife and what they plan to do with her. Until then, you really can do nothing, even if you were free, so he back and do strive to contain your temper in the presence of your captors. You do neither your cause nor ours any good by such intemperate behavior.”

“The bloodless turnip,” Brett hissed after Wiggins had departed. “I have no doubt he was glad to leave his wife in England. He’d probably have apoplexy if she ever bared her breasts to him.”

But Brett soon forgot Wiggins. Kate’s whereabouts and safety were the only thoughts occupying his mind. Ever since he had awakened to find himself chained to the wall, he had gone over the battle step by step, from the time the warning bell rang until he was knocked out the second time, searching for something he could have done differently, some way he had failed, but he couldn’t think of what they could have done to defeat the pirates. They were lucky to have gotten off so easily, and they would all be headed for some slave market if the French ships had not come to their rescue. But it was hard to be thankful for the French intervention when it was the French commander who had refused to go after Kate and who now kept Brett from following.

He tried hard to believe Wiggins’s assurances of Kate’s safety, and he succeeded most of the time, but then he would remember her great beauty and worry would nearly drive him crazy. He didn’t know Raisuli had tried to rape her—Charles had decided there was nothing to be gained by telling him—so he was able to believe Wiggins knew what was likely to happen because he knew the people and their habits. It was fear that had driven him to try to take over the French ship, it was fear that caused him to strain against the chains until his skin was broken and bleeding, and it was fear that made him feel physically ill when he thought of what could happen to Kate. He had to believe she was safe. Otherwise—well, he couldn’t face the otherwise.

He closed his eyes and lay back, but he couldn’t rest. He was bombarded by memories of mornings when he would wake and be awed by Kate’s glorious beauty as though he were seeing it for the first time, of afternoons when they played together like lifelong friends, of evenings when they battled over cards or shared thoughts on any number of subjects, or of nights in her arms when he felt like he never wanted the dawn to come. Over and over he could see the love in her eyes, feel her soft skin, smell her hair and skin, taste her lips, hear her voice as she called out his name, and the thought that he might never experience any of these again was cruel torture.

But it was the feeling of helplessness that was the hardest of all on his temper. Never before had he been a prisoner, and only common sense kept him from senselessly struggling against the chains that bound him. His proud spirit rebelled at the knowledge someone had dared to confine him, and it was all he could do to keep from swearing vengeance on the French captain even though he knew he would have been just as helpless had he been free. Wiggins was right, however little Brett wanted to admit it; if the French ship did not capture them before they reached land, they would be gone beyond recall, vanished into the innumerable towns and villages from whence they and their kind continued to spring every year. To have gone charging into the countryside would have endangered his life and Kate’s, as well as doomed any hope he had of accomplishing his mission. His mind told him there was nothing he could do now, that the best course was to wait for the French ship to return and for Wiggins to learn what he could. But then he would think of Kate, remember some little quirk, some little thing she did, something she said, the way she would laugh when she hit the center of the target, the way she would scatter the cards all over the room when he beat her, and the pain would be so great he was certain he would die if he didn’t get up and do something.