The Temple Dancer (30 page)

"Eight hundred ninety-one, uncle," Mouse answered, crinkling his nose.

"How do you like that, eh?" Victorio said in Portuguese. "Does sums
in his head."

"How do you know if he's right?" Da Gama asked. Victorio merely
glared in reply, and pressed his fat fingers on Mouse's withered hand. The
old man had aged since Da Gama had last seen him. His cheeks sagged as if
weighted; his watery eyes nearly hid by flesh that bagged from his eyebrows. His nose drooped now, blue and fissured, even gray in places. Instead of a distinguished silver, his mustache had turned yellow. Victorio
wore an old man's knit hat for warmth though the air was hot, and his body
filled the chair like a bag of sand.

It was going rather well, all things considered, Da Gama thought. Victorio heard the story of the bandit attack with a mournful reticence. None of it
shocked or disturbed him; it was as if he'd already heard the news. But he
lifted his heavy head each time Da Gama mentioned Lucinda. "And she is
well? She is well?" he asked each time Da Gama said her name. Mouse's eyes
never left Victorio's lips when he spoke. He's trying to learn Portuguese, Da
Gama guessed.

Despite the early hour, Victorio's swollen hand, its skin peeling like an
old snake's, cupped a flagon full of sherry. "What do you think of this factor?" Vittorio asked nodding vaguely toward the building where they sat.

"I can't rightly say, sir. I've seen so little of it." For Mouse had brought
Da Gama straight to Victorio's tiny office as soon as they'd arrived.

"You'll see more. You'll see it all. I'll have Mouse show you. I don't
walk so well these days; I let Mouse be my eyes and cars. He's very clever."
His hand stroked the eunuch's withered fingers. Da Gama wondered if the
wine were drugged. Victorio tilted his head so his eyes looked deep into Da
Gama's. "But I need more than a eunuch now, Captain."

Da Gama looked up, hearing an invitation in Victorio's words, or a
warning.

"Have you not grown tired of soldiering? Are you ready to settle
down? Take a woman, build a house? Get a gelding of your own?"

"The thought has crossed my mind, sir," Da Gama answered carefully.
Except the part about the gelding, he thought.

"My brother Carlos is dead." The news slapped Da Gama like an unexpected wave. "My brother-in-law, I mean. Poisoned, from all accounts.
Died the very day you left. He improved for a little while before your caravan left Goa, then died a few hours later. In great pain. Typical of poison."

"Dead? Poisoned?" It took a moment for Da Gama to process this information. "Who would poison him?"

"We may guess. When Carvallo, his secretary, sent news of Carlos's
death, he said the valet had found Lucinda's box of arsenico by the bed."

Da Gama felt as if his heart were twisting on a blade. "She could
never...

"You know about her mother, don't you?" Da Gama shook his head.
"Brain fever. She spent her last four years chained to her bed, screaming.
God, I was glad when she died. She poisoned her first husband, you know."

"I had no idea."

"No, we kept it quiet. Even Lucinda thinks she died in Lisbon. Same
with my Lucinda's aunt, my wife. Jumped to her death from a church tower.
So we've been watching for signs in the girl, because, well ... You never
know, do you? Carlos should have been more alert." When Da Gama gave
no answer, Victorio leaned forward. "I need to trust you, Da Gama. You are
a relative, though a distant one. I need to trust our ties of blood." Victorio
looked at him, pressing the question with his eyes.

"I am your servant, sir."

Victorio looked toward some distance only he could see. "I don't need
a servant, Da Gama. I need a partner now, a friend. I need your help." He
looked at him earnestly. "Did Carlos send any money?"

"Only the rials I used to bribe the bandits," Da Gama answered bitterly. "That's gone."

With a great sigh Victorio slowly lowered his hand to the arm of his
chair. Da Gama tried to show no reaction when Mouse placed his face
against it like a pillow. "Matters are delicate at the moment. The finances of
our family are ... well ... complicated. Extended. Speculative." He looked
at Da Gama significantly. Beside him, Mouse raised his dark-lashed eyes.

You're broke, Da Gama realized. Da Gama remembered Shahji's comments about Victorio's gambling. He said nothing.

"Our fortunes are enmeshed with those of the sultanate. It's not yet
clear who will be regent to the young heir. Whoever gets the post will rule
Bijapur for eight years at least. He will be the master of our fortunes. We've
thrown in our lot with Wall Khan, the grand vizier, but his path is by no
means certain."

"Wasn't the bayadere bought as a gift for him?" Da Gama asked.

"A bribe, you mean? Yes. Another of Carlos's schemes. He does not
know the man. Did not, I mean. Wall Khan is subtle, and to influence him,
we must be subtle also. I play Fives with him and lose. It's more effective
than a bribe." Victorio's face grew dark. "But that bayadere cost us a fortune. We are stretched to our limits and beyond. Every hun that Carlos
could borrow or beg."

"What did she cost?" Da Gama asked.

"Half a lakh of hun."

Da Gama gave a low whistle. Fifty thousand hun! Da Gana was not
poor by any means, and in a typical year he made two thousand hun. A servant might make fifty. Half a lakh was a fortune.

Victorio continued. "News of Carlos's death has brought many creditors to our door. Now that you're a partner, you'll buy us some time. They
don't know you. They'll guess about your resources. It will take time for
them to sort things out. But when Wall Khan becomes regent ..."

"If he becomes regent ..."

A cloud covered Victorio's face at these words. Da Gama looked away.

"In any case, that whore could be our salvation." Victorio brightened a
little. "Someone wants to buy her from us."

Mouse helped Victorio rise, gently holding his arm as he shuffled from the
office through the crowded aisles of the factor. "You can see that I've been
busy, Captain," Victorio said, nodding to the goods stacked against the
walls in disordered confusion-great rolled carpets, bales of silks, baskets
of spice, barrels marked in some strange tongue. Atoms of dust swirled in
the sunbeams that leaked through minute holes in the tile roof. "If only we
could trade them, only get these things to Lisbon, our troubles would be
over. But we must hold everything here because we lack the funds."

"Sell something," Da Gama said.

Victorio's gurgling laugh became a cough, and he had to stop to catch
his breath. "Never sell in weakness, son. First rule of trade. Once it's found
that we need cash, then the vultures and jackals will rip out our insides.
We'd be lucky to get a quarter of what our goods are worth." Worried by
his agitation, Mouse patted Victorio's shoulder. "This factor holds all the
Dasana fortune. As a trustee, I must act responsibly. And now so must
you." He leaned forward and spoke softly. "What do you know of Whisper, the sultan's Khaswajara?"

Mouse's ears perked at the word, and his large eyes glistened.

"Not much," Da Gama replied.

"He's the buyer I spoke of. It's he who wants the bayadere." Da Gama
could not hide his surprise. "Yes, strange, isn't it? A gelding who wants to
buy a whore?" Victorio continued his shuffle through the factor. "And he
wants her delivered to some special place, not the palace. And in secret."
Victorio turned his head and whispered, his hooded eyes glittering. "These
conditions give me reason to hope."

At the end of the factor, light poured through a single window. Da
Gama could see that a part of the floor near the window had been cleared
and swept, and covered with carpets and cushions and silks. A bony silhouette sat there in silence.

"I'll do the talking. Just nod when I tell you," Victorio whispered.

With the light behind him, Da Gama could scarcely see the Khaswajara,
but could sense his dry, malignant presence. Mouse fell to his knees at
Whisper's feet.

"Up, up," the Khaswajara said to him, but only after waiting for a long
time.

Victorio merely nodded. "Senhor Whisper, this is my partner, Senhor
Da Gama."

Da Gama unfurled his arms in a sweeping farang bow, which elicited,
as he expected, an amused smile from the Khaswajara. "My Hindi friends
call me Deoga, senhor."

"How happy I am to meet your partner, Senhor Victorio. We all need
helpers, do we not? Helpers, and friends." Whisper's thin voice rattled like
a dying man's fingers clutching at gravel. "Sit, sit. Let us talk."

Mouse eased Victorio to a cushion to Whisper's right, then caught Da
Gama's eye and gave a brusque nod to a place on Whisper's left.

How about some respect for the new partner, bastard, Da Gama thought
as he took his seat.

Whisper tilted his head. "So much more friendly here, is it not? So
much more private than the palace. No unwanted ears." Each time before
he spoke, Da Gama noticed, Whisper slid his dry gray tongue across his
yellowed teeth.

With his good hand, Mouse carried a tray with pitcher and cups, all of
bright silver. Whisper waved at the tray like a priest giving blessing, but he
did not take a cup, so Victorio and Da Gama refused as well. The sun moved
higher and the light from the window softened. Victorio and Whisper were
just beginning the dance, discussing the health of one notable after another,
and then smiling or shaking their heads before moving to the next.

Da Gama's eyes drifted around the room. This part of the factor was crammed
with odd lots. A row of life-size idols leaned against the near wall in a tangle
of painted arms. Behind Victorio lay a wooden bird with the head of a man.

Further back Da Gama saw a gilded arch. The arch framed Victorio so
that he seemed to be sitting on a throne. On the floor nearby the arch, Da
Gama saw a line of dolls propped up in special stands. Then he realized what
he was seeing, and he was even more confused to find it here, in a factor in
Bijapur.

He was looking at a rich puppet theater, such as a nobleman from Lisbon might have in his palace. From the window, the sunbeams caught the
silky orange fur of the fox prince, his puppet robe glittering with jewels,
his toothy smile open but sly, his eyes black and empty as night. Beside the
fox hung a delicately painted Colombina, hanging from her stand as if
defeated, her serene face staring at the floor.

The black eyes of the fox absorbed Da Gama's attention far more than
the endless talk of Whisper and Victorio. After a night of little rest, his
thoughts began to drift. The fox seemed to lift its head, about to speak. Da
Gama jerked up, but neither Victorio nor Whisper had noticed him drowsing, though Mouse glared at him, full of disapproval.

But while he'd drifted, the two had reached the heart of the matter.
"Still, Senhor Whisper ... a nautch girl?" Victorio lifted his hands as if
confused. "What would you need with a nautch girl?"

Whisper's head wobbled on its reedy neck. "That is my business and
none of yours."