The Book of the Seven Delights (7 page)

Alarm shot like steam through her veins. Hot. Unexpected. The full impact of all that had happened broke through her carefully erected defenses. There were thieves and rascals all around, and two very different men were insisting she place her welfare in their hands. She hadn't a clue who to trust.

"Of course. I-I have a pistol. In one of my bags." Still. She hoped.

"Load it and keep it handy," he ordered.

It suddenly seemed that her entire expedition was in danger of being waylaid and misdirected by men telling her what she could and couldn't do.

"See here,
Mr. Smith
—if that is indeed your name—" She had to reclaim enough ground to stand on with her own two feet. "I appreciate you returning my bag and your offer of assistance, but I don't intend to travel to Marrakech or anywhere else with you. I've told you… first thing tomorrow morning, I will seek assistance from the Consul or his staff in arranging transport and—"

"The British Consulate is about as useful as a sandbox in a shitstorm," he declared irritably. "Believe me—you're on your own here. Except for me. Now load your damned gun and be ready to move when I come for you."

Before she could protest further, he was at the door and producing his own key to unlock it.

"Wait a minute—how did you—" She searched for her key, certain he must have taken it. Her eyes widened as she found it still in her pocket.

"This is the
Marrat
." He held up a straight-shanked key just like hers. "There are a hundred of these for every lock in the place."

Her anger came out as a strangled gurgle. Before she could recover, he was out the door and closing it behind him. She hurried to turn the key he had left in the lock and held her breath, listening, sensing that he was still on the other side of the door. Even so, his voice startled her as it came through the panels.

"The washstand, Boston… push it in front of the door."

She had the feeling that he would stand there waiting until he heard the requisite noise. Muttering, she did push the washstand in front of the door. Then she gave it an extra shove to jam it tightly in place and produce a telling
thump
against the door.

"That's better." She could hear the smile in his voice through the parched wood. "Now, go load your gun."

Apparently bullets were made to fit into a gun in only one direction. She stared at the six shiny brass disks visible in the cylinder of the pistol she had purchased for the trip. Clearly, the manufacturer had factored "inexperience" into its specifications.

Mechanics of Firearms
. . .
the 660's… Applied Sciences
.

She closed the chamber and wrapped her hand around the pistol grip, looking tentatively down the barrel of the gun as if firing it. The cold steel drew heat from her palm. With a shiver, she laid the pistol on the bed beside her and stared at it.

She'd never fired a gun in her life. Did she really intend to start now? She was a
librarian
, for heaven's sake. A keeper of knowledge. A purveyor of enlightenment. Guns embodied a blind and amoral power that was too often bent to the service of ignorance and destruction. Did she honestly think she could fire a weapon at someone?

Feeling suddenly foolish, she gathered up the bullets scattered on the bed around her and dumped them back into the box. Then she carried both ammunition and pistol to one of her carpetbags and tucked it deep inside.

Smith had intended to scare her with his talk of criminals and cutthroats and the Frenchman's treacherous nature to make her think she needed his help. He was probably just as curious about her

"treasure map" as LaCroix and the host of cads and criminals he claimed were plotting to rob her.

Spawn of Satan
. Her first instincts about him had been right on target.

He had followed her to the Marrat… heard her speak of her search for something ancient and valuable… and decided to exploit whatever sense of obligation their previous association might have created in her. He planted himself in her room and began issuing orders right and left, assuming that she—like most well-bred young women—had been conditioned to defer to men.

Well, he had badly underestimated her. She narrowed her eyes and produced a smile of pure defiance.

No daughter of Olivia Ridgeway Merchant was going to be frightened into submission by a holdover from the days of Blackbeard the Pirate!

She began to unbutton her blouse and in a few moments had donned a clean nightdress and retrieved her doeskin sheets from one of her bags and spread them over the dusty bedclothes. When she crawled between the sheets, she had a difficult time making her tense limbs relax and her chaotic thoughts quiet.

The swirling blades overhead, just visible in the filtered light, and the low rhythmic thumping of whatever powered the fan slowly worked a spell on her senses. She went over and over what she would say to Smith when he arrived and found her snug and safe in her room, in her bed, and in her nightgown.

Wretched fright-monger. Unbidden, impressions of him flashed through her consciousness… reckless and intimidating… big and male… smelling of liquor laced with honey… with wind-ruffled hair and a bruise on his cheek…

She came awake with a start, later, to the sound of someone pounding on her door.

"
Ouvrez la porte
!" came a rough male voice from the loggia outside.

Seconds passed. She sat up and blinked. It couldn't be Smith; he wasn't civilized enough to knock.

"
Ouvrez
—
sur l'autorite de le gouvernement de France. Ouvrez
!"

Did he say the government of France?

Other voices rose, all male, all speaking—shouting—French. She froze, watching movement in the fingers of light crawling in under the door, and her heart seemed to climb into her throat. The demand came again in heavily accented English:

"O-pen… theeese… door!"

The knocking escalated to banging that shook the wash-stand against the door and rattled the basin and pitcher on it. A volley of French invective resulted in concentrated blows against the door that jarred the entire door frame. She bolted from the bed and stood stiff with horror.

"Don't you dare—I'll have you know—
I am an American citizen
!"

The only response was the application of an axe to the brittle center panels of the door. The wood splintered and shouts of fury erupted as her attackers tore away the broken wood and encountered yet another obstacle. Coordinating their efforts with a verbal count, they alternately pushed and pulled to rock the washstand free.

"Keep out—I'm warning you—" She thought frantically of her journals and maps… her precious cache of coin… her
gun
!

Just as she dove for her carpetbags, the invaders gave a last, mighty heave that sent the washstand toppling across the tile floor and slammed the broken door back against the wall.

Bod ies—
men
—poured into the darkened room from the torchlit loggia. Some paused to locate the room's occupant and others rushed forward with weapons drawn to defend their possession of the room.

Her involuntary-scream served only to draw them down on her as she knelt by her carpetbags… up to her elbows in table linen, metal teapots, tins of sugar, and boxes of quinine…

They hauled her to her feet, shouting: "
Ou est le deserteur? "
When she didn't answer immediately, they gave her a shake and barked: "
Ou est Smeeth
!"

Light bloomed around them from a lantern… held by the hotel manager, who was himself being held by two burly men in uniforms.

"How dare you invade my rooms in the dead of—"

"Where is he?" the manager said as they dragged him into the room. The quiver in his voice and the haunted look in his eyes fed her rising fear. "Just tell the sergeant where he is, mademoiselle, and they will leave you alone."

"I have done nothing wrong, and I—" She twisted and shoved against their grip on her arms, mildly astonished by her own behavior. Where did this mad impulse to fight come from? "Tell them where
who
is?"

She stilled long enough to turn to the manager and then the man he seemed to be watching… the one he called "sergeant." The man was thickset and muscular, with coarse features and flat, black eyes.

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Smeeth," the sergeant spat out, shoving his grizzled face into hers. "
Ou est
—Smeeth?
Dites nous
."

They thought Smith was here with her? It was only then that she made sense of the fact that they wore khaki uniforms and white cylindrical hats with neck flaps and military badging. They were dressed like those men on the dock earlier… the ones who had refused to go after the thieves… "Legionnaires."

"Tell them I have no idea what they're talking about," she ordered the manager, to translate. "I've been in my room since I left dinner with Mister LaCroix." The sergeant's response to the translation was a guttural snarl that sounded like an oath and a rough wave to his men that ordered them to search everything.

Suddenly teapots, petticoats, shoes, brushes, linen, and journals were being dragged out, examined, and tossed onto the floor.

"Stop!" She strained against the Legionnaires' grip. "Make them stop! I have no idea where this 'Smith'

person is." She looked to the ham-fisted sergeant, whose sullen gaze was roaming her nightgown with alarming interest. "I swear to you, I have no idea where he is!"

The sergeant looked to the men at the window who had opened the shutters to search the tiny balcony and the street below. They shook their heads. Then he looked to the men who were riffling her bags and then to the soldiers who had checked under the bed and behind what little furniture might offer concealment. Nothing there, either. He turned back to Abigail.

"Smeeth is
deserteur
. You know thees word?
Deserteur
?" He began to speak freely in French and snarled an order at the manager, who translated: "He says… Smeeth abandoned duty… fled under fire.

His cowardice cost many lives. They will not rest until he is found and punished."

Her gaze caught on the sergeant's huge hand, which was clenched in a fist so tight that his sun-darkened skin was turning white. She looked up, and the soul-deep malice in his face stopped her breath.

"The sergeant says"—the manager's final translation seemed to stick in his throat and he swallowed hard before continuing—"those who give Smith aid will suffer the same fate as him, when he is caught."

The sergeant swaggered closer to her and ran a callused hand inward along the shoulder of her nightgown, pausing to grip the flesh beneath it with a force that was just short of punishing. When he transferred that grip to her face, she yanked her head back and glared at him with full Ridgeway-Merchant fury… no longer caring that her anger might provoke something worse.

"How dare you touch me?" She jerked her arms free and backed away, pouring all of her anger and contempt into her gaze. "Get out of my room." She flung a finger at the ruined door and by some miracle, it didn't shake. "And prepare your excuses. I intend to lodge a complaint with your commander first thing tomorrow morning!"

The sergeant assessed her determination and after a long moment, jerked his head toward the door, ordering his men out.

"Remember, mademoiselle." He paused in the doorway to construct a final warning in English. "We…

watch… you."

Remember, the beast had said. How could she
forget
? The brutality in their faces and actions, the fear that made her heart pound like a locomotive piston, the horrifying helplessness of watching men burst through her door in the dead of night… all on account of Smith. If she had entertained any thoughts of allowing him to escort her to Marrakech—the disappointment sinking through her middle said she had—such thoughts were banished now.

How had they known he came to see her earlier?

Her hands, her knees… her whole body was trembling.

We watch you.

Someone had already been watching. She glanced at her shattered door. She had done nothing wrong, but it was all too clear that innocence was no protection in this part of the world. Like Smith said: She was on her own here.

Taking refuge in action, she inspected the damaged door. The soldiers had dragged the manager off with them and she was not about to go searching through a darkened hotel to demand a change of rooms. She would have to make do… stand her own guard until morning, when daylight would provide greater safety. After what had just happened, she wouldn't sleep a wink, anyway.

The washstand hadn't been effective as a barrier when the door was intact; she looked around for an alternative and set about shoving the heavy wooden bed against the door. The physical exertion helped to dissipate some of her tension. Then she was able to face the mess the wretches had made of her possessions.

As she knelt by her bags, refolded and repacked her linen and equipment, her eyes began to sting and unshed tears trickled down the inside of her nose. She blinked repeatedly and sniffed. Stop that. No Ridgeway-Merchant woman would allow herself to be threatened and bullied into tears. She made herself think of the intrepid Mary Kingsley facing leeches and headhunters in West Africa and of Harriet Martineau facing the crocodiles of the Nile.

Then her hand brushed something cold near the bottom of her equipment bag and she recognized the metallic feel and shape. Her gun. The Legionnaires had either missed it or considered such a weapon no threat to them. She hauled it out and sat back on her feet to stare at it. An hour ago, it wouldn't have been a threat to anyone in her hands. But now…

Mariana Starke had included a pistol on her list of necessities for a woman traveler, and Abigail had assumed it was meant for protection against wild animals. Hazards to safety, she was learning, came on two legs as well as four.

Desperate to overcome the feeling of vulnerability the Legionnaire invasion had left her with, she set about dressing in clothes that would bolster her sense of control and make her feel less exposed. She chose her gray tweed split skirt, riding boots, and a simple cotton blouse with a band collar and sleeves that could be rolled up. She debated stuffing her pink satin demicorset in the bottom of her bag, then with a surge of defiance, donned it instead.