Swords From the Sea (64 page)

But here, afoot in the streets, his task seemed to be hopeless, unless luck gave him a hand. And he had the ill luck to lose the Greeks. Climbing a flight of steps to a wide sun-drenched street, he saw no trace of them except dust drifting away. Nor could he catch an echo of their footsteps. On either side the buildings seemed to be empty ruins.

In one of these-where massive red stones bore carved inscriptions-Paul sighted a slender man stretched at ease beneath a broken statue of Hercules.

"Well?" observed this foreigner, brushing away the flies indolently. Unshaved, in worn smart clothing, he had an air of being at home in the ruin, and the clipped voice of an Englishman of breeding. Silver gleamed on the butt of the pistol in his sash. Seeing it, the Yankee felt a surge of familiar fear. With his sleeve he wiped at the sweat above his eyes.

"Where," he asked cautiously, "can I find a quiet lodging-place?"

"There, sir." The Englishman's fan pointed at a bare rise set with tiny slabs of stone. "It has no equal."

Studying the distant slope, Paul nodded, his gray eyes amused. "Besides the cemetery, sir, is there any decent lodging in this port?"

The Englishman, who had been contemplating him through half-closed eyes, moved his head from side to side. "Decent, sir, there is none. I have quartered myself upon these gods of Greece. If you still have money, try the Devil's Coffee-House across the way. It may still be there. Ask for Eugene, but on no account make a wager with him. Especially-" he added bitterly-"upon the physical momentum of a knife-blade against a playing card in the air. It cost me eight pounds to discover that Eugene can stick the blade through the card. Mind you, he can accomplish the seemingly impossible in other ways. But he will not steal from you."

Paul nodded, amused-and fancied that he had hit upon the explanation of the missing men. "The armed platoon-the Greeks-turned into this coffee-house?"

The other's haggard, handsome face went blank. "Armed Greeks? I've seen only Hercules." His fan pointed indolently at the headless statue grasping a club above him. "And I vow he'd not leave his post for coffee."

Chapter Two

Seeking the street again, Paul observed that the spot chosen for a siesta by the drowsy Englishman afforded a clear view of all who passed by. The watcher had lied to him.

Squinting against the sun's glare, he made out a painted sign suspended over a dilapidated gateway: "The Devil's Coffee-House." By it squatted a peasant, haggling over pomegranates in his basket with a young Eurasian resplendent in a zebra-striped cloak. The two paid no apparent attention to Paul as he entered the gate and crossed a courtyard littered with wagon wheels and broken jars.

As soon as the Yankee had passed into the ancient stone dwelling beyond, the Eurasian buyer of fruit tossed a piastre to the peasant and walked off briskly, swinging a gold-tipped cane. Passing the Greek ruin, he slid his eyes toward the lounger but did not turn his head.

Paul stepped into cool shadow reeking of fish and rancid oil. At once he felt that he was observed. Against the wall in front of him, a giant sat polishing the copper bowl of a saddle-drum. From an embroidered jacket the man's bare arms projected like massive vines; from his girdle gleamed the hilts of knives. One hand dropped on the drum, and the sound echoed deep along the walls.

A glance showed Paul only bare benches and a table set with clay jars and drinking bowls. Beside him a curtain moved, and a broad man stepped close to him. "Tiens!" ordered a staccato voice. "Face to the door. You understand English?"

Instead of turning his back on the pair, Paul studied the speaker, aware of a plump moon face bisected by black waxed mustachios above a military dolman and a body as round as a wine tun.

"Eugene?" he asked.

"Johann Eugene Leitensdorfer, Military Engineer. And you?" Black eyes probed shrewdly from the pallid round flesh. "A moment, and I will tell you. Un homme du monde nouveau. You are from the New World, certainly. Quebec, the Federal City, New York? Proud, perhaps stupid, perhaps merely-das Junge." A powerful hand plucked Paul's book from him. "Gerechter Herr Gott, a pilgrim. In Alexandria." The eyes gleamed reflectively. "Why? One moment. You make the search for someone. For who? Two gold crowns that you make the search for another American-I wager!"

Eugene's voice, making play among languages, had the quality of music. It compelled attention.

"I am searching for a lodging."

"In Alexandria?" The keeper of the Devil's Coffee-House shook his head. "No, an American younker would come only for another of his kind. In trouble, certainly. Here there is immense trouble. I know." He rapped out the words. "Two gold crowns down on the table for a month's lodging all found, and the woman to cook."

Drawing his wallet from his shirt, Paul laid two gold pieces on the table. Eugene hastily pocketed them. "So. Now tell me your name, and what you really want! Will you drink wine or arack? Wine for you better is."

With a single motion the giant at the drum rose and took the heavy jar that Eugene picked up. Lifting it high in one hand, he let a stream fall into his wide mouth.

"Selim," said Eugene after a moment.

The big man lowered the jar deftly, without spilling the wine, and handed it back, smiling.

"Drunk," explained Eugene Leitensdorfer. "From the janizaris; Selim is a deserter. He is sick in his heart for his own Dalmatian mountains. I am from the Tyrol-the Alps, certainly. Now, you?"

Having had a moment to size up Eugene, Paul did not venture to say that he was seeking employment as a teacher. He felt instinctively that the Tyrolese would ridicule any such tale. "I risked landing here," he said carefully, "to see something of the ancient monuments of Egypt, like the Pyramids. Few Americans have seen them."

"Only one-" Eugene paused, to tip his bowl of wine beneath his mustache. "I guided him."

Paul waited silently for more tidings of the other American, and then asked anxiously: "Who was he?" This might be the first trace of the man he sought.

"Now, I do not believe that you are stupid, Monsieur Davies. You pretend to be stupid. You cannot see the Pyramids at Cairo and come away alive. Even he, your countryman, had to leave from Cairo, although I had him in my care. So. If you wish a monument to see, go up to the cimetiere arabe-the graveyard-on the hill and look at the marble column which is Pompey's, the Roman."

Paul smiled, realizing how deftly the stout Tyrolese had parried his question. "And if I do that?" he asked. Twice these strangers had told him to seek the cemetery.

Eugene shrugged. "Thieves will sight you, and perhaps they will take the rest of your gold crowns. But they will not kill you, because the place of the dead is here a sanctuary-"

"Will I find the other American there?"

Barely could the boy keep from crying out: "Isn't he William Eaton, the American Agent, engaged upon a secret mission? Isn't he here in this place where I can reach him within an hour, before he starts on his journey?"

But no more than a half-dozen men knew why William Eaton had landed on the African coast with an escort of a few Marines. On the brig Argus, anchored in the road, Isaac Hull knew, and so did Paul. That knowledge he must keep to himself.

"No." Eugene's dark eyes probed the boy's face curiously. "He is in a safe place. A most safe place." White teeth flashed under the waxed mustache. "He has been arrested by the Turkish army, at an order from the governor of Alexandria, and at my advice."

Startled, Paul exclaimed: "Arrested-where? For how long?"

Reflectively Eugene pulled at his mustache. "Ahh! His Excellency the Minister of the Spanish Crown would have paid a purse of gold to inform himself of that. I, Eugene, refused his Spanish gold. So, I have spies quartered at my door." Suddenly he gripped Paul's arm with iron fingers. "Young sir, I like you, and by Salbal and Bathbal and the seven enthroned kings of Purgatory, I will help you to keep alive, except that you lie to me. You lie that you wish to see the ancient monuments of Egypt! Other Yankees hide-or they are taken captive into the bagnios of Tripoli. What do you seek?"

Hot blood throbbed in the boy's head. He could not answer. Suddenly Eugene cracked his thumbs, snapping them like pistol hammers. "Loot! Perhaps you ran away to sea-perhaps you then deserted your ship, to seek a dream-fortune? Look!"

Magically, his knot of a hand unfolded under Paul's eyes, revealing a shining gold coin, delicately inlaid with a head that might have been a Roman Caesar's. "The golden drachma of Cleopatra Selene, Princess of Africa-daughter of Cleopatra and stupid Mark Antony. And who is this handsome soldier? Who knows? The drachma bears only her name. It came, I have been told, from her tomb, Kbour Roumyah-tomb of the Outlander." The voice of the Tyrolese softened as a violin mutes, tenderly. "She ruled the Roman who ruled Africa. She ordered that her body be carried to Egypt's edge, to the height overlooking the sea and the desert. Never have we found her tomb-like those tombs broken and looted in the King's Valley. Think you how Cleopatra Selene would lie, splendid, in death. In walls of soft, pure gold-"

Close to Paul's eyes the ancient coin shone in the half-light. "I have seen the door of her tomb," the man's voice went on, "and I have marked its site on the mountain, in the map of my mind. Soon I shall find my way back to it. Will such loot tempt you-"

He broke off to listen. Paul thought: He is making a test of me, and he is boasting of himself. Then the drum sounded under Selim's hand. A shadow cut across the sun's glare in the doorway. The Englishman who had been taking a siesta sauntered in and poured himself a bowl of wine.

Over the wine Eugene questioned the stranger swiftly in a language unknown to Paul. Then, as if touched by a spur, the tavern-keeper threw off his military cloak, kicking off his boots, and slipping his brown feet into sandals. He wrapped himself in a clean white burnoose, drawing a fold of it over his head, until only his eyes showed. With the change, his manner changed, and his very eyes looked different as he stared at the boy on his way out.

"You!" he exclaimed. "As to you, I have not made up my mind. Sleep here, certainly, but remember that Eugene Leitensdorfer has not bestowed his protection upon you."

"And don't wander," added the Englishman sharply, "from this door after dark."

Stung by the casual contempt, Paul started to retort, then closed his lips tight upon the words.

Left in the coffee-house with the drunken Selim and the native woman, who stared anxiously from the kitchen, Paul reflected that even a hangeron like the owner of the fan had the broadsides of Nelson's line-of-battleships to protect him; a French beachcomber had the magic of the Emperor's name for safeguard. Americans, however, were looked on as defenseless men who paid tribute-

Years before, his older brother had written him from the Mediterranean: "I hope I may never again be sent to this coast with tribute unless I am authorized to deliver it from the mouths of our cannon." Paul remembered every word clearly, because after reading them he had put aside his books-being then full fifteen years of age-to join the Navy in which his brother, William Bainbridge, served.

Slowly he paced the dirty sand of the coffee-house floor, his thin body aching with the shame that had come upon his brother and himself ...

William had never been a coward. Paul knew that as surely as he took the two steps forward in the sand and turned, seeing only the impassive Selim. Twice William had been wounded, defending his ship from seizure. In his veneration of the older man, Paul visioned him as laboring manfully against the curse of ill luck-forced to strike his flag to two French frigates of greater force; forced by civilian officials to hoist the Turkish colors when he delivered a year's tribute from America to Algiers.

Ill luck had driven the forty-four-gun frigate Philadelphia on the reef off Tripoli. But Captain William Bainbridge on his own responsibility had surrendered his crew and his ship. He gambled, taking a chance as he always did, Paul told himself savagely. He tried to float his vessel off by throwing over the guns; he had no luck.

Then, with William Bainbridge captive in Tripoli, the ill luck had turned against Midshipman Bainbridge ... In the crowded lobby of the theater at Malta, Paul had heard words he thought meant for him: "Those Yankees will never stand the smell of powder." Blindly, when the speaker jostled him, he had struck out ... Stephen Decatur had drilled him at firing a dueling pistol, which he had never handled before. Through the smoke he had seen the Englishman fall dead. Sir Alexander Ball, governor of Malta, had demanded a Court of Inquiry. But Midshipman Bainbridge's fellow officers had contrived to get him out of the port.

Now he had to be Paul Davies ... Midshipman Bainbridge was hiding out to escape Sir Alexander Ball's Court of Inquiry. And Captain Bainbridge, in prison at Tripoli, faced a Court of Inquiry on the loss of the frigate. Ill luck had shamed them both.

Paul had determined to reach his brother, to attempt, however futilely, to release him.

Twice before now he had failed to reach Tripoli.

Eugene and the Englishman did not return. The glare of the doorway sof tened to shadow. A distant call to prayer stabbed the twilight silence.

As if that had been a signal, men stirred and coughed out in the courtyard. Going to the door, the boy saw them, squatting against the walls, whispering with their heads together, looking like thieves in hiding, armed with every kind of weapon. When he would have gone out to examine them closer, he felt Sclim's hand on his shoulder. "La!" said the janizary, drawing him back.

Unable to answer the deserter, Paul obeyed. But from the courtyard he had sighted a squat white figure calling to prayer from the base of the Roman column on the cemetery rise. A ray of the setting sun struck it, and the figure very much resembled Eugene.

Turned back from the courtyard, Paul crossed the sanded floor to the kitchen. He had no mind to wait longer in the coffee-house, losing precious hours. The kitchen was half dark, except for the glow from the mouth of the oven, where the native woman was pulling out slabs of bread.