The Devil She Knows (23 page)

Constantinople, night of 7/8 May 1887

T
he moon glowed golden and ripe with mystery, just above the horizon, as if the rippling waters were a road leading to undreamt-of delights within its portals. Dark woodsy scents and sweet flower aromas sifted into the air to tease the nose from the quiet western shoreline.

But the Old City, on the eastern shoreline, was very different. All of the great mosques which dominated the city's backbone were bedecked in light, from ancient Hagia Sophia to the immense Blue Mosque. Gareth could even see Mihrimah Sultan Mosque far to the east like a beacon of hope, where Abdul Hamid had warned Portia and him about St. Arles' plans.

Horses' hooves, plus the heavy metallic clank and rattle told how thousands of soldiers returned to their barracks, after lining the streets while the Sultan lighted the first candle.

The Sultan was safe and Portia had finally consented to depart for England.

He should be glad. He could leave her now and let her have a quiet annulment. Nobody need know about a marriage contracted in a foreign land, which had only lasted for a few days.

“Are you sure it's safe?” she asked again. Her face was very white in the moonlight. No lights showed where Kerem Ali Pasha's yali slept within its sheltering gardens on the Bosporus's eastern edge.

“St. Arles will have to lie low here until the furor dies down. That should give you more than enough time to return to London and look after your friends, no matter how cautious they are.” His cheeks were too stiff for an encouraging smile. Stupid idea, anyway.

Her family's men started to lower her last trunk into the
Naiad
's launch and they both turned to watch. He, at least, was grateful for the distraction.

The northern wind, a harsh counterpoint to the evening's festival, shoved the small boat sideways, away from the pier. A sailor's foot slipped and the fellow lost his grasp on the damn chest.

Gareth lunged forward to help prevent the rifles and ammunition from crashing through the boat or, worse, into the man's leg. His fingers closed on the padded handle just as two other sailors caught the damn heavy thing, and their helmsman brought the recalcitrant vessel well under control.

Portia let out a long, almost inaudible sigh.

Gareth flashed them a quick thumbs up and stepped back.

“Sorry, sir,” the helmsman said. “Very choppy seas running tonight and I wasn't quite prepared. We'll do better when the lady comes aboard, I promise.”

His heart, which had dropped back into its normal rhythm, rocketed into something far closer to a bullet's hungry search for mayhem.

They'd damn well better look after her or he'd tear their eyes out for frightening her. If anything happened to Portia, he'd…he'd…he'd be better off dead. He'd found a way to keep on living after his parents died. But he didn't think he could do that if she wasn't in the world.

He didn't have to see her every day because he didn't deserve that. He only needed to know she was happy.

He loved her.

The truth hit him like a stampeding longhorn bull, closing his lungs and taking the strength from his knees.

He swayed slightly, unable for the first time in years to find his knife against his wrist.

Portia tugged on his sleeve and he looked down at her. Dear God in heaven, she was beautiful. She'd been a damn smart fighter when she'd tripped up that fellow with her parasol, too.

“So you do think St. Arles is still a threat?” she hissed, a distinct note of triumph in her voice.

He tried to remember what she'd just been saying to him, after she'd dragged him away from the sailors. “Could be.”

“He'll certainly be furious when we dump the rifles at sea.”

Was she having second thoughts now?

“There's no other sure way to destroy them, unless we sail them all the way back to London. A ship's the only way to keep them far from St. Arles and his hirelings.”

“But I have to catch the first possible train back to London so I can reach my friends. I can't stay with the boat.”

“We're back to the beginning, honey: The rifles will have a decent burial at sea.”

Even so, St. Arles could follow them, hoping to regain his box of tricks, and revenge himself on Portia in the process.

Gareth could escort her and make damn sure the brute didn't lay hands on her again. But that meant drawing close, far closer than he'd ever dared before, to home and family, everything he didn't deserve and couldn't have. Everything that sent him back outside with the wind, where it was safe, or at least less dangerous.

No matter how many of her family's men were on that boat with her, they wouldn't be willing to die for her.

“I'll come with you,” Gareth said.

“To London?” Her voice rose.

“All the way to England,” he affirmed, putting his neck in the noose.

“Thank you, Gareth!” Tears welled up in her eyes until they sparkled like diamonds.

 

HMS
Phidaleia
rolled hard, jolted, and twirled in the opposite direction like a Cockney flower girl pretending she still possessed her virginity. A man's voice rose from below decks, cursing his once-neat equipment.

Waves smacked against her sides, promising a long, bitterly uncomfortable night. Thank God the charts for these waters were younger than the Christian Church and showed every lee shore where a ship might run aground, given these high winds.

St. Arles dropped the telescope down to his side, enjoying the salt spray crystallizing on his hair and wool coat. For a few minutes, he could pretend he was at home, no matter how bad the news was.

As he'd suspected, the silly little house contained no traces of his former wife and her paramour. Or new husband, to give him due credit for an English wedding, at least.

He still needed the damn chest with its rifles and cartridges to create a puppet Sultan. And the sooner the better, too, for both Britain and himself.

“What do you want, St. Arles?” Southers asked.

“Can you see the American yacht which just got underway?”

“Very pretty lines,” the British captain commented, “but she's having a hard time of it, with this sea.”

“Aren't we all?”

“True, we're all fighting the wind. But she's cutting very close to the Asian side, rather than staying more toward the center of the channel.”

A bit of over-caution which would give him time to catch up with her. Of course, British ships didn't have to worry about coming close to Chiragan Palace's bloody-fingered jailers.

“I want you to put me aboard her.”

“Unnoticed, St. Arles?”

“Of course.”

“A little tricky, given the full moon and these sea conditions, but I'm sure the lads will consider it a pleasant break from the recent monotony. What else?”

Life held few pleasures greater than rejoining the Royal Navy, even for a few minutes.

“I will create a distraction and then signal for assistance. At that time, I want two men to come aboard and assist me in taking off the chest lashed down behind the aft wheelhouse. Do you see it?”

“The large oak one, old chap, with black bands?” Southers fiddled with his own spyglass for a moment before nodding with satisfaction. “Yes, of course, the lads will be ready the instant you need them.”

“Thank you, Southers.” He'd have to give the young captain a longer mention than planned for this assistance in his despatches back home, possibly even enough for a medal. Damn. But it would be worth it, to regain the rifles—and ruin the bitch's happiness.

“Good luck, St. Arles.” For an instant, Southers' voice darkened to a warning note deeper than the wind's hungry howl.

St. Arles's eyes flickered then he shrugged off the comparison as nursery rhymes' rubbish. He had far more important matters to think about, such as how best to destroy his ex-wife's new marriage.

T
he
Naiad
hit another wave and jounced before settling back on course. Crockery rattled as if all the fiends of hell were trying to escape their bounds. The gas lamp swung, bouncing its light through a blinding arc of reflections.

Portia's stomach leaped for her mouth, somersaulted, and started to slowly settle.

The steward lifted a cup of hot tea off his tray, moving as carefully as if he were gliding over hot coals. In the same instant, the yacht jolted and rolled again, restarting the hellacious racket.

“I believe I need a bit of night air,” she said firmly, to the world as much as to herself, “to refresh myself.”

“But, ma'am,” the steward started to protest.

“I'm sure I will be more comfortable there, sir.” Plus, she'd have the freedom to be alone with her husband. Dear Lord, how she needed every minute of that which she could grab.

The stern deck was deserted and its usual canvas awnings rolled up, due to the heavy wind. But she could adapt a little better to the ship's motion there, since she could see the waves' choppy pattern.

Gareth was silent, stumbling a little bit when the ship's awkward motion caught him unawares.

But her heart was happy to watch him and save up memories of how he looked—his profile against the moonlight, his quick grace when he pivoted, the warmth of his hand when he caught her elbow…Every small detail that might be fodder for a thousand future dreams.

The trunk—St. Arles' blasted mass of iron and oak which had started everything—was lashed beside the waist-high deckhouse. Stolid and dangerous, it commanded all eyes the same way the judge's bench had in that British courtroom. It creaked and groaned, straining against its restraints like a living being. She'd have to ask Captain Pendleton to secure it more firmly.

A stench drifted back from the ship's bow and Gareth's nose twitched. Portia sniffed, too.

Faint but unmistakably foul, it was—fire?

The alarm bell broke out, tolling the cry more dreaded than any other at sea.

Fire!
Men shouted, doors slammed, and feet pounded toward the bow. The yacht could sink within five minutes if flames reached the boiler, fifteen if they reached the coal bunkers.

Portia stared at Gareth, her heart leaping in her breast. He alone hadn't moved.

“What are you thinking?” she asked softly.

“Go to a lifeboat, honey.” His face held the hard determination of an Arizona gunslinger and he scanned the deck.

She glanced around. But all she could see was a thin plume of smoke rising from the
Naiad
's bow.

Fire, ready to kill them all.

“Darling.” She bit her lip, forcing herself to find a steadier note.

Bang!
A shot whizzed from behind the deckhouse, past Portia's head, and into the capstan. Its hot trail scorched her ear and she yelped, then dropped flat on her face.

Bang!
The second shot nicked Gareth's shoulder, singeing his linen jacket as if the hounds of hell had bitten him.

He whirled, just in time to grab St. Arles' revolver before the dripping wet brute could get off another shot.

They struggled for it, both pairs of hands wrapped around the gun. The sea flung them back and forth against the deckhouse until they stumbled and fell. They rolled a few feet more and then St. Arles slammed Gareth into the mast.

What could she do to help? Everyone else was fighting the fire.

The Bosporus roared and shook itself like an angry beast, until taking even two steps unaided was a miracle. Her life turned to ashes in her throat, Portia reached for a handhold to steady herself.

Gareth beat St. Arles' hand against the deck again and again but the Englishman's grip was too strong to break.

The great moon hung golden and unmoved above and the wind howled around them like Apache war cries. The sea hissed and flung itself against the
Naiad
in a portent of hell, while the chest pivoted like a tiger under its ropes.

Two shots fired, four to go. If she grabbed the gun, she could be injured, too, even if she managed to grip it.

St. Arles forced the revolver back toward Gareth—and fired it again.

Bam!

The wind blew the acrid smoke away, as if the gates of hell had opened.

Gareth's face was black with smoke and red streaked one side of it. But his silver eyes, lethal as any wolf's, promised revenge.

Slipping and sliding on the wet deck, Portia ran for the only other weapon—the fire axe inside the deck house.

A second later, far too few paces separated Gareth from St. Arles and the damn revolver. Her knife gleamed in her lover's hand but how much use was it now?

What could she do with the heavy axe? She could lift it but throwing it was beyond her strength.

The
Naiad
heaved again, as if the sea mocked their tribulations. In the distance, the Sultan's palaces glittered like undisturbed fairy tales—Yildiz, Dolmabahce, Chiragan with its blood-soaked prisons.

“I used to think I'd make you pay for his life, Portia,” St. Arles remarked, as conversationally as if they stood in the center of Regent's Park. “But now I believe he's caused so much trouble that I'll simply kill him out of hand.”

You hellspawn fiend.

Portia crept forward until she came out into the stern deck, away from the deckhouse. She had two possible targets from here—St. Arles' damn chest or the beast himself.

For a moment, she teetered, fighting the wind. Her skirts tried to become sails and manacles, while she had nothing nearby to hold on to.

But she'd manage this. Somehow. For Gareth and everyone else whose lives St. Arles had carelessly wrecked.

Calling on all the Lindsays in her blood, she created a balance between herself and the ship and the sea. Then she took a firmer grip on the axe.

One long step to the trunk and the weak rope holding it—or three paces to St. Arles.

Gareth's eyes widened slightly, even underneath the salt spray and the blood from his wound. His smile turned as sharp-edged as his blade.

“Perhaps you should look to your own defenses in this weather,” he suggested to St. Arles. He feinted, moving forward, pressing his opponent as if he had full advantage.

He'd attack a man with a gun—when all he had was a knife?

The Englishman laughed, the sound's gleeful triumph resonating through the sudden absence of bells and shouts from the
Naiad
's bow.

“You fool. You bloody, glorious fool.” He shifted and circled, keeping his gun pointed at Gareth's chest. Then he cocked it.

Her heart leaped into her mouth. She swung down the same way the judge had wielded his gavel on the bench—and sent the axe's full weight into the hemp strands. The blade thudded into the solid oak, final as the gavel's slam. The strands snapped in an instant and the trunk hurled itself forward to slide free.

The big, heavy chest roared across the deck toward the two fighters. Gareth sprang for Portia and knocked her away from it.

St. Arles turned to dodge it but slipped on the wet deck. The
Naiad
continued to roll, sending the iron-bound oak chest thundering down upon him. He fell, screaming curses, and skidded into the ravenous seas through the open gangway only inches ahead of the great chest.

Gareth and Portia raced to the rail.

“Where is he?”

“There!” Gareth pointed. “Can you see him swimming?”

“If you say so but I'm not sure I want to.” She leaned against her husband and tried to find merciful thoughts.

Others joined them, smelling strongly of smoke. Someone handed her a telescope.

“He's heading for the small white palace to the north. With the large terrace,” Captain Pendleton reported.

“Chiragan Palace,” Portia said. A very hollow feeling began to grow in her stomach. “Where the former sultan is held captive.”

“All unexpected visitors to Chiragan Palace are always interrogated by experts,” Gareth murmured. “I understand it frequently involves having your rib cage bound so your spinal column can be extracted.”

Neat as any marshal, she and Gareth had delivered St. Arles to the only tribunal where his nationality and rank meant nothing, compared to his crimes.

Portia hid her face against Gareth's shoulder and he hugged her. She'd have to go to church and pray for forgiveness, because she had no regrets.

St. Arles hadn't gone to court for adultery but he was standing in the dock now.

In a Turkish court, on the Night of Absolution, may Allah have mercy on him.