A Calculus of Angels (32 page)

“Tug was offering to show me Algiers.”

Nairne frowned. “Take no offense, my friends, but that may not be so sound an idea.”

“You doubt I can keep ‘im safe?” Tug grunted. “Me an’ the boys’ll look out for him.”

“I don’t doubt that, but I have my worries about this place. Pirates do not turn honest so easily.”

Tug frowned. “Who says that pirates hain’t honest? How is it we are less honest than some fillygree lord on his manor? At least we work’t‘ eat our bread. And I’ll say this about pirates and pirate ports, ”specially this one. They don’t give a good damn what family y’ come from, or whether you pray to Mary, Mahomet, Jesus, or Beelzebub. I can’t say as much for yer fine European cities.“

Nairne regarded Tug coolly. “I’m not going to argue with you, for I’ll wager you know the truth deep down in you. What I am saying is that we were nearly lost ourselves in England, and this place seems even riskier.”

“You can’t be sayin‘ we won’t go ashore?”

Nairne sighed. “If it was up to me, yes.”

“Then you would have mutiny. How long do y‘ think good men—or bad—can go without wine, song, a good thrum? Everyone knows the tales of ’Jiers, and A CALCULUS OF ANGELS

many enough have sampled the wares. Try and stop ‘em, Mr. Nairne. Try and stop we.”

“I said if it was up to me. It isn’t. Teach and Bienville both agree with you.”

“ ‘Cause they know sailing men better ’n you.”

“Perhaps. What I really meant was, I don’t think our Choctaw friend here should go ashore.”

Red Shoes frowned and rubbed his hands. They felt as if they itched, deep in the bone, a sign of healing but annoying nonetheless. “Why?” he asked.

“Remember what you told us at the start of this. If we should lose you, your people may declare war on us.”

“That’s your risk,” Red Shoes replied. “I told you I came here to see this place.

I will see it.”

“There is more reason. You councilmen are to attend a meeting of the Divan with Riva. To talk about trade.”

“That doesn’t interest me,” Red Shoes remarked. “Not now. You go in my place. I give you my vote.”

“The rest won’t like that.”

“I’ll tell them if you wish. But I’ve decided.”

Nairne seemed to struggle with himself for a moment, and then nodded grimly. “Keep him well, then, Tug. And stay away from strong drink.”

“By the prophet, I shall!” Tug promised, winking at Red Shoes.

Algerian streets seemed made for drunkenness; they were so narrow that the walls were always there to support you should you sway.

Red Shoes normally avoided the bitter water in quantity; it made men crazy, A CALCULUS OF ANGELS

turned warriors into madmen and then into wretches. And yet in this place it seemed fitting somehow, and, besides, Tug and Fernando were powerful persuaders. As well, the drink helped to dull the horrible smell of the streets—worse even than New Paris—and blunt the sharp, rude regard of the natives.

As a consequence, he had long since lost track of where they might be going, though he suspected it involved women. This far from upset him; he had done his best to put women from his mind on the voyage, but here they were everywhere, in every hue. Few, by his standards, were beautiful, but all were exotic, all spoke to the male parts of him. What he could see of them, anyway—most wore a cloth covering their faces, so that only their bright eyes could be seen. The mania the Europeans had for covering every inch of a person in cloth, despite the weather, seemed even more pronounced here, but that was, in its own sick way, more intriguing than what he was used to. Especially with bitter waters coursing in his blood.

Algiers was a dirty place, once you were there, and much of the population seemed to be wretched, clad in rags, their eyes mean or empty. It reminded him of the Indian settlements near Charles Town, people without pride or hope, who drank rum like water, dogs waiting for scraps to fall from the English tables. When he had seen that as a boy, it had been a powerful lesson.

He had promised himself that the Choctaw would never be like that. But here was the home of that sickness, multiplied beyond belief, and he himself was sick. He suddenly felt very stupid and sad. He should not have taken the disease into himself.

He frowned and shook that off. He would not be defeated; sometimes you had to take something into you to understand it, and he desperately wanted to understand this world across the ocean. Bitter waters were a part of it.

The four of them—Tug, Fernando, a gunner named Embry, and him—entered a building, a close, dark, reeking cave, paradoxical when he remembered how white, shining,
clean
the city had been from a distance. He sat with Tug and the rest on a carpet, a low table in front of them. A girl—probably no older than twelve—came by and Tug gave her a coin and said something to her in a language Red Shoes did not know. She nodded and walked off.

“What do you think of it?” Tug asked loudly, waving his bottle of wine around and then upending it.

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“It’s big.”

“It’s big,” Tug repeated, and then laughed coarsely. “Aye, it’s big.”

“I thought we were goin‘ to find us a doxy or two,” Fernando said.

“I’ve just done that,” Tug promised. “We’ll just have’t‘ wait here a tick.” He passed the bottle to Red Shoes. “We’ll find y’ a fine oyster basket,” he promised.

He took the bottle, wondering what an “oyster basket” was, only to discover his hands would not grasp the glass strongly enough. It slipped from his fingers, falling to the carpet and spilling the red fluid out like blood.

“Damn you, Indian!” Embry snapped. He was a block-jawed man from the
Jack,
one of the ships of the original flotilla, whom he had never met before.

“You spilled our damn wine. Damn stupid savage!”

Red Shoes reached for the bottle again, mumbling an apology, when suddenly Tug’s massive form bolted up from the floor. In two strides he had knotted his fists in Embry’s shirt and lifted the fellow into the air, slamming his head into the low ceiling. “Wha‘ d’jou say?” he roared. “What did you just say?”

Embry’s mouth worked, and Tug threw him back contemptuously, so that he crashed into another table full of dark men in turbans. Tug walked over and kicked him, hard, ignoring the shouts of the indignant Algerines.

“This here’s the bravest damn man I’ve ever seen, you slug,” Tug went on.

“Fernando saw it, didn’t you?”

“I saw it,” Fernando agreed. “I will never forget.”

Something bright appeared in Tug’s hand. “You know why he dropped the bottle? Look at his hands!”

Embry began fumbling at his own belt.

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“You pull your knife an‘ I’ll skin you! I swear, God rot you!” Tug bellowed, tears running down his face. Around the room, revealed steel gleamed.

“Tug!” Red Shoes said. “Tug! Be calm. He meant nothing.”

“Damn if he didn’t. Didn’t you, Embry?”

“I didn’t mean nothin‘,” Embry agreed, and then, to Red Shoes, “I’m sorry.”

“You see, Tug? This is nothing to fight about.”

“Look at your hands,” Tug said, his voice faltering a little. “Why did you do that? How did you do that?”

“It was the only thing to do.”

“Embry here couldn’t have done it.”

“It’s not important.” But he felt something inside him swell. Tug’s admiration felt good; it made him proud.

Fernando clapped Tug on the shoulder. “If Embry says another word,” the black man promised, “I’ll cut out his tongue myself, good? But for now, I think we best quiet. Look, isn’t that your girl, calling us over?”

“Why quiet? Are we afraid of these?” Tug brandished his knife at the crowd of Algerine faces. “You think I’m afraid of them?”

Red Shoes came to his feet. “No, my friend. I don’t think you are afraid of anything. I have never seen a braver man.”

“No?”

“No. But I want to see these women.”

“Women. Aye, women. M‘ pipe is fit to explode.” He looked around the room once more. “So long as they don’t think I’m a coward.”

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“They don’t,” Red Shoes assured him.

The girl led them into a narrow alley, and then down another. Overhead, the light was fading, and Red Shoes wondered how deep night would be. Finally, after another moment or so, they were led into a room lit only near the doorway. Inside were three women. One was little older than the girl who led them there—she might have been fourteen. The other two were older, one perhaps thirty, the other perhaps ten years older than that. Tug gave a loud whoop.

“Here we are! An‘ without Embry, no need to share.” He lurched into the room, grabbed the closest woman, the oldest, and began kissing her. She made no protest, but Red Shoes didn’t notice any enthusiasm, either.

Fernando patted Red Shoes on the back. “Take y’r choice,” he said.

A sudden dizziness overcame him, and he realized that he had drunk even more than he thought, first rum and then wine. He was not used to it, that was certain, and again he felt a hint of sadness.

The youngest girl was very pretty. He chose her.

Young she might have been, but not to the business of love. He lay back on the rug as she undid his breeches, kissed him, and then, slipping from her loose dress, slid her slim form against him. He shuddered, darkly delighted, reaching to caress her face. She pressed her cheek into his hand, and the ash light from the door filmed her eyes. They looked as dead as the eyes of a corpse.

He was making love to a dead girl.

He pushed her off him, trying not to be rough. At first she misunderstood, thought that he wanted a different kind of pleasure, but he kept fending her off with his hands, insisting, “No, no,” softly.

And then, it seemed, the world fell away. He was suddenly in the Bone House, surrounded by the dead, the girl a child’s skeleton. He stifled a cry of anguish, suddenly realizing how unnatural this sudden feeling of grief was. Unnatural and familiar at the same time.

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His shadowchild—the one he had made in England—was gone, ripped from him so subtly in the fog of alcohol he hadn’t noticed. But now he knew, and knew as well that he was under attack. His tormentor pulled away from him even as he knew it, and though he stabbed at it with the weapons of his soul, it fled, laughing, into the night. He thought he recognized the hoarse voice of Kwanakasha, the
oka riahollo,
the dreaded
na lusafalaya.
He tried to reach after the thing, to take vengeance on it for what it had done, but it was gone, only its evil scent remaining.

Sobbing, he backed into a corner, shaking, and his hand found his knife. For a terrible instant he wanted to plunge it into his own throat, end his suffering, flee from this house of death, this funeral city, life. He gripped the hilt of the blade for a long moment before his hand’s children, throbbing painfully, finally uncurled. The world spun and he vomited, grinding his head against the stone, wishing for oblivion, and finally finding it.

Only vaguely was he aware, much later, of being carried, of Tug’s grunting laughter, of the salt scent of the sea, and he hoped that he, too, was not dead.

Red Shoes rubbed his aching head, caught Mather’s disgusted look from the corner of his eye.

“We’ve got a little time to decide,” Blackbeard said, “but it were best done now, so we can provision.”

“We’ve got something of what we came for,” Bienville ventured. “I’ve found Frenchmen who have given me some report of France. My feeling is that we should return to the colonies.”

Mather shook his head. “I don’t agree.”

Riva, across the cabin, spoke up. “Sirs, whatever trade agreement you may conclude here, I can get you more and better in Venice. From there you can deal directly with the Ottoman sultan.”

“Not to mention your own family. Could it be that you will receive the dispensation to carry on trade with the colonies?”

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Riva cracked a bare grin. “I’ve never claimed a lack of self-interest. But as I say, this will benefit us all.”

“That’s well,” Blackbeard said, “for I’ve never trusted a man who had no interest in a matter.”

“Sir,” Bienville said, facing the Venetian but clearly addressing them all, “I have agreed that it is improprietous to ask this expedition to press my interests in France. And yet, it seems that some vestige of France remains, and I must contact it, decide what faction to support. I fear that it is time for our ships to part company. I regret this, but we all knew it might happen.”

“We agreed to stay together and abide by our covenant,” Mather reminded him. “I hope you will not break it.”

“You put me to a difficult decision,” Bienville said. “To choose between covenant and country.”

“But you made clear what your decision would be at the outset,” the preacher insisted.

“No. I promised that I would not join my countrymen against you, would even defend you against them, if it came to it. Neither situation exists here. What we have found is far different from what any of us had imagined.”

“Sir, listen to me, I beg you,” Riva said. “Take your ships and sail back to France, and the corsairs will swallow you whole—there is nothing I can do to protect you. But if you agree to help me back to Venice, I can outfit you with three more ships and the protection of the sultan as well. If there is trade yet to be had in France, I will find it, and your aims will benefit from that. I will benefit from your help, since you are a French gentleman and an officer of the court. All I ask of you is a bit of patience.” He lowered his voice. “The time will come, gentlemen, when Venice casts off the Turkish yoke. An alliance needs to be made in Christendom, else we will find all of our children Mussulmen.

Whatever you may think of Venice, her heart is still Christian, and we have secret ways that the Porte knows nothing of. Think, all of you, whether you would rather trade with Mohammedans or Christians.”

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“You know what my answer is,” Mather said.

“Oh?” Blackbeard growled. “Will the Puritan throw in with the pope, now? I myself care not who Charles Town gets her goods from so long as they are the cheapest possible.”