Gideon Smith and the Mask of the Ripper
Read Gideon Smith and the Mask of the Ripper Online
Authors: David Barnett
Thank you for buying this
Tom Doherty Associates ebook.
To receive special offers, bonus content,
and info on new releases and other great reads,
sign up for our newsletters.
Or visit us online at
us.macmillan.com/newslettersignup
For email updates on the author, click
here
.
The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you without Digital Rights Management software (DRM) applied so that you can enjoy reading it on your personal devices. This e-book is for your personal use only. You may not print or post this e-book, or make this e-book publicly available in any way. You may not copy, reproduce, or upload this e-book, other than to read it on one of your personal devices.
Copyright infringement is against the law. If you believe the copy of this e-book you are reading infringes on the author’s copyright, please notify the publisher at:
us.macmillanusa.com/piracy
.
This one’s for Malcolm Barnett,
the best dad in the world.
Writing a book, for me, means long hours at the keyboard, generally in very unsociable hours. It also means long hours staring into space,
thinking
about writing a book. And that can make for a very unsociable time, as well. So I’d like to thank my wife, Claire, and my children, Alice and Charlie, for putting up with me when my eyes glaze over and I adopt that thousand-word stare, drifting into Gideon’s world trying to find out just what he and his compatriots are up to.
Writing might be a solitary business, but the production of a book isn’t. It’s a team effort, and I’m proud to be part of the fantastic team that’s responsible for this, the third Gideon Smith adventure, being released into the world. That team includes, of course, my agent, first reader, and friend John Jarrold, without whom none of this would be happening. Huge thanks must also go to the wonderful Tor Books team—my editor, Claire Eddy, Bess Cozby, Desirae Friesen, Leah Withers, Irene Gallo, Patrick Nielsen Hayden, and anyone, anywhere at Fifth Avenue who’s had a hand in these books coming to fruition. A big tip of the hat to cover artist extraordinaire Nekro for his wonderful work on the covers not only of the books but also the short stories on
Tor.com
set in Gideon’s world. And big thanks to Emma Barnes and the team at Snowbooks, UK publishers of Gideon, for all their support and help along the way.
But most of all, thanks to the many, many readers who’ve picked up Gideon and Co. and taken them to their hearts. There really is nothing more satisfying and humbling than getting an e-mail or message from someone you’ve never met saying they stayed up all night finishing your book. Really, when that’s the case, can I do any less?
Bring me some midnight oil. I got books to write.…
England, 2015
“The doer” is merely a fiction added to the deed—the deed is everything.
—F
RIEDRICH
N
IETZSCHE,
On the Genealogy of Morality,
1887
Captain James Palmer held the wheel steady as the
Lady Jane
lurched into a trough between gunmetal waves taller than Big Ben. There was a volley of shouts from the deck and a crack of splintering wood; Palmer ignored it, concentrating on keeping his vessel upright on the storm-ravaged sea. It would be that damned cargo, swinging around on the gantry and crashing into midships. He didn’t care how much the bloody thing had cost or whether there would be hell to pay; if it threatened to drag the
Lady Jane
over he would order it cut loose, and hang the consequences.
The door to the bridge banged open, letting in the howling Atlantic gale and a spray of seawater. Cursing, Palmer reached one hand out for the papers the wind tried to snatch up, the wheel skidding a half-turn, the ship shuddering and dipping in the storm.
“Our status, please, Mr. Devonshire,” called Palmer without turning around, shoving the papers into his oilskin and returning his full weight to keeping the wheel immobile.
“Never seen anything like it,” gasped the first mate, throwing himself at the door to force it shut against the sodden wind. “It’s bloody hell out there.”
“It
is
December, and it
is
the Atlantic,” said Palmer. “You were perhaps expecting sunshine and lily pads, Mr. Devonshire?” Not waiting for the first mate to answer, Palmer went on, “Here, take the wheel. I need to look at these charts again.”
Devonshire, his woolen sweater drenched, his gray hair plastered to his head, applied his meaty forearms to wrestling the wheel into submission. A sudden lull allowed Palmer to place himself at the bolted-down table and withdraw the papers from his coat.
“How are our guests taking this bit of weather?” asked Palmer mildly.
Devonshire gave him a gap-toothed grin. “They’re Royal Navy, so they’d never let on. But I can tell they’re shit-scared.”
Palmer grunted with satisfaction. “Good. Perhaps teach them not to try to lord it over us on our own ship.”
Us,
of course, was a bone of contention for Captain Palmer—of the
Lady Jane
’s regular crew, only himself and Mr. Devonshire were on board. If the ever-mysterious Mr. Walsingham’d had his way, it would have been Palmer only, but the captain had drawn the line there. He was an experienced seaman who had done his fair share of work for the Crown on enterprises that were not always aboveboard, and very often beyond the ken of ordinary folk. When Walsingham had come to visit him at Portsmouth he’d outlined the mission, named his price, and laid down the terms: a journey to Gibraltar to pick up a secret cargo, three Royal Navy officers, and a civilian. There Palmer was to give his regular men shore leave and pick up a casual crew from the sailors who hung around the place they called the Rock, paying them in coin and telling them nothing of the next leg of the journey—a specific spot some 150 miles west by southwest of the Faroes, just about midway between Scotland’s northernmost tip and the arse-end of Iceland.
“No,” Palmer had said. “My crew goes with me.”
“Not this time,” said Walsingham, watching him intently with those hawkish eyes. “Not if they want to live.”
Palmer had leaned forward, his elbows on the table in the shadowy quayside pub where he liked to do business, and filled the bowl of his pipe with tobacco. “Suicide mission, is it?”
“Not for you, Captain. But dangerous. Very, very dangerous. And most secret.”
“You wouldn’t be here otherwise,” said Palmer, stroking his beard.
He’d negotiated his trusted first mate, Mr. Devonshire, on board but had eventually capitulated on the rest, of course, taking Walsingham’s handsome purse and granting the rest of his men a week’s paid furlough on Gibraltar. He’d picked up five new crewmen easy enough; once word got out that Captain James Palmer was hiring, they were lining up to sign on. His reputation preceded him, and it was one of adventure and—more often than not—riches. There were two Spaniards, a Frenchman, a mulatto built like a brick outhouse with tribal tattoos on his face and a silent way about him, and an Irishman from Cork. Like all sailors-for-hire who hung around the Gibraltar ports, they had a slightly desperate air about them: They were men who had nothing to lose because they’d already lost it, travelers with no ties who went whichever way the winds—or the steam-engines—took them. Gibraltar was a Royal Navy base these days, but still the Rock drew the flotsam and jetsam of the merchantman trade as a way station between Europe and Africa and a place to hear stories, listen to gossip, pick up rumors, and sign on for the next voyage. It was a melting pot, which was why Captain Palmer had both Spaniard and Frenchman on board without—as yet—any bloodshed. Even with grog in them and their blood up, land-bound enmities were put aside in favor of the brotherhood conferred by a life on the sea. The ocean was a constantly shifting, ever-changing territory, but still men such as those he had hired on Gibraltar considered it home more than they did any land-locked state.
Palmer spread the papers out on the table. He had been given them by Walsingham, who had insisted that he was to show them to no one else, nor copy them in any way, and that they were to be returned at the close of the venture. They were excerpts of a larger work that Walsingham termed the
Hallendrup Manuscript,
dating back to Denmark sometime in the 1650s, but the hawkish representative of the Crown had not elaborated further. The hand-copied pages given to Palmer seemed to detail the journey of a Norse longship in the late tenth century, which had met some calamity in the Atlantic Ocean. The clumsy translation suggested the ship had fallen victim to what the original manuscript called
hafgufa,
which seemed to translate as “sea mist.” The
Lady Jane
lurched again, the wind howling around the cabin, lashing the windows with thick rain that hinted at fledgling ice. Palmer shook his head. A ferocious sea mist, to send a Viking longship to the bottom of the sea. But that name …
hafgufa
. He was sure he’d heard it before, or something like it, but in a much different context than a sea mist. He shook his head. A sailor of his years heard a lot of things. He checked the coordinates on the notes against his own charts and rolled up the sheets of paper again, secreting them in his oilskins.