“There will be some hard bargaining first, poppet, and Adam would have my hide if I put you in any danger. I want you and Pansy safe.”
“Very well.” She sighed. “If we must stay here, then we must. Get the chess set out again, Pansy, and we’ll play a game while we wait.”
“Yes, m’lady,” replied Pansy. “Would it be safe for us to open the bow windows, Master Murrough? Perhaps there might be a breeze. Lord almighty, I’ve never felt such heat before. I feel positively weak in me knees.”
“Aye,” Murrough agreed with her. “ ’Tis debilitating, lass, and that’s a truth. Open the windows, and it will help, I promise. Now that we’re landed you can drink all the water you want, too.” He smiled at both women as they reluctantly settled themselves, and then hurried from the cabin. When he was gone, Velvet rose and crossed quickly to slip out after him. Once on deck, she hid behind a barrel that gave her a good vantage point.
The ship had been made firmly secure and the gangway lowered so that the severely correct Jesuit priest might board.
“You have returned quickly, Captain O’Flaherty,” said Esteban Ruy Ourique, the governor’s personal advisor, as he gained the deck.
“Where are my mother and her husband?” demanded Murrough. “That was part of the bargain, that they would be awaiting me on the docks of this pesthole so that I might be certain that they were alive and safe. I do not see them anywhere.”
“There has been some difficulty,” began the Jesuit smoothly, “but did I not personally give you the church’s word that no harm would come to them, Captain?”
“Then where are they, Father Ourique?” Murrough’s gaze swept the pier and as it did something suddenly struck him. When he had sailed for England his mother’s damaged vessel had been moored at this very dock. Now it was nowhere to be seen. In a flash he knew what had happened. They had escaped! His mother and Adam had seen some opportunity and had seized it! “They are gone!” he said triumphantly.
“Yes,” the priest returned. “Three months ago.” There was a small smile upon his thin lips. “Your mother is a formidable woman, Captain. As you know, we imprisoned the bulk of her crew, leaving only a small force aboard to repair the ship. Nonetheless, she somehow managed to gain freedom for her entire crew, overpower those soldiers guarding her vessel, and escape to the open sea. His Excellency, the governor, is most unhappy.”
“I’ve not a doubt he is,” said Murrough, a huge grin splitting his face.
“There is much, however, to be said for your honor, Captain, in returning here to pay the ransom nonetheless,” murmured Father Ourique.
“Ah, now, Padre,” said Murrough, “I see no reason to pay for something you don’t have.” He was immensely tickled that his mother had scored such a coup over the Portuguese. This would make grand telling back in England, and if he could return with the entire ransom intact, there might even be a knighthood in it for him. Sir Murrough O’Flaherty! Aye, his Joan would like that!
“A bargain was made,” said the priest.
“Nay,” returned Murrough. “Your governor, disregarding all the laws of hospitality, did unlawfully seize my mother, her husband, and their disabled ship when they entered this harbor in search of aid. Then he demanded ransom like a common pirate. A bargain with a pirate is not one that need be honored.”
“I am sorry you feel that way, Captain, for half the monies are marked for the church’s work here in India, and I cannot see it lost. As a faithful son of the church you must understand that.”
“There is nothing that you can do to prevent it, Padre,” came Murrough’s quiet reply.
“But there is,” returned the Jesuit, languidly raising his hand.
Murrough’s eyes followed the direction in which the hand waved, and to his horror he suddenly found his ship surrounded and being boarded by a large force of Portuguese soldiers who must have been waiting in the shadows of the buildings on the docks. “You’re wasting your time, Padre,” he said in an attempted bluff. “There is no gold upon my ship.”
“I cannot believe you returned without the ransom,” said Father Ourique. “If there is no gold upon this ship, then it is upon the ships you undoubtedly have awaiting your signal just beyond the horizon, Captain.”
“That, Padre, you’ll never know, for I shall say neither yea or nay upon the subject.”
“You will not object then if we search the ship,” was the reply.
Murrough shrugged. “Do I have a choice?”
Velvet slid from her hiding place and slipped back into her brother’s large cabin to tell Pansy the news. She felt as elated as her brother at their mother’s cleverness.
Pansy was delighted as well, but for other reasons. “Then we’ll not have to stay here, m’lady? We can turn right around and go home? Good! Lord, this heat is killing me. I wouldn’t last a month here.”
“Poor Pansy,” Velvet sympathized. “This has not been an easy trip for you, seasick the first few months and now this heat. I will ask Murrough to obtain for us some fresh fruit and vegetables before we sail. We haven’t had any in some weeks.”
“Aye, ’twould be nice, m’lady. Maybe it’s the salt air, but I do have a fancy for fruits. I wonder how me dad bears it being at sea for months at a time year after year.”
“He was home long enough to get all those children with your mother,” teased Velvet.
Pansy giggled back. “Aye, and that’s a truth! Still, I don’t know how he or any other sailor bears it. If it hadn’t been for that route your brother took, sailing just off the coast of Africa, going ashore every now and then for water and fresh foods, I don’t think I could have stood it, m’lady. I hope you’ve not developed a taste for travel like your ma.”
“Nay, Pansy, I haven’t. I will be glad to get home to England. The shock of Alex’s death has now worn off, although I shall never forget him, and I will spend my days mourning him. ’Twill be a quiet life we’ll lead, Pansy, for I do not want to return to court or see London again. I will spend my days atQueen’s Malvernwith my parents, caring for them as they enter their old age.”
