The Tiger’s Prey. Wilbur Smith

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СКАЧАТЬ thought about returning to the inn, to see if the ostler had sold Hyperion, but he didn’t want to miss a possible meeting with Sir Nicholas.

      He had no idea how he would recognize him. His mother had said Childs was a friend of his grandfather Hal, so he must be of a great age by now. He watched the comings and goings at the house on Leadenhall Street. Older men in immaculate wigs, younger men stooped under the weight of bulging satchels of books and documents. Each time the door opened, the porter stepped out and glared at him, but he didn’t cross the street. Once, Francis thought he saw a man studying him from the shadows of the first floor balcony, but he retreated inside before Francis could get a good look at him.

      The October day wore on. Shadows lengthened; the coffee house emptied. The church bells started chiming for evening prayer. Francis began to wonder where he would go that evening, and where he could eat. He had forgotten his noonday dreams of fortune and trade. All he wanted was a meal. He touched the velvet bag that bulged slightly under his shirt. He’d seen a pawnbroker’s near the inn: surely he could get a good price there. Only for a few days, until he had the money from Hyperion. The thought made him feel ashamed of his weakness.

      Lost in thought, Francis didn’t see the porter hurrying towards him until he was halfway across the street. He was carrying a hotcake wrapped in a napkin.

      ‘I’ve been watching you all day. You haven’t eaten a thing.’

      Francis almost snatched the cake out of his hands. He buried his face in it, too hungry to taste the sweet flavours of sugar and almonds filling his mouth.

      He was so busy eating, he didn’t notice the two men who had accompanied the porter across the street. The first he knew was stout hands seizing his arms, another hand over his mouth and the porter holding a stick across his throat. He choked. The cake fell half-eaten to the ground and was trampled under hobnailed boots.

      He struggled, but he had no chance. The porter and his men bundled him across the road and inside the building; he couldn’t even cry out. If any of the passers-by noticed, they knew well enough to keep on walking.

      The house was much larger inside than it had seemed from the street. The men dragged Francis down a long corridor, thick with the smells of cloves and pepper, then up many stairs. Francis heard laughter and conversations, but all the doors were closed and no one looked out.

      The men brought him to a great door on the top floor, with a brass handle shaped like a snarling lion. The porter knocked respectfully. Even he seemed to hesitate before opening the door, as if approaching the lair of a fearsome beast.

      It was dark inside, the air hot and damp like a greenhouse. A small fire burned in the grate, and a candle burned on the vast desk by the back wall, but they cast little light on the curtained room. The walls seemed to lean in, huge paintings of ships and battles hanging floor-to-ceiling in ornate gilt frames. The air smelled rotten, as if a slab of meat had been left too long and forgotten. Francis searched the gloom but didn’t see anyone: only a large mound behind the desk, like a heap of discarded laundry.

      His captors let him go and doffed their caps. Caught off balance, Francis stumbled forward and almost fell. He rubbed his throat.

      A wet, rasping cough sounded behind the desk. The heap began to move. It was a man, Francis realized, as his eyes adapted to the gloom. It was an enormous, great-bellied man with a blanket over his knees and a silk dressing gown wrapped around his shoulders. His neck had disappeared beneath a cascade of wobbling chins. His head was shaved, but badly, so that white hairs sprouted out like the spikes on a thistle. Broken veins mottled his sagging cheeks. Only his eyes, sunk deep in folds of flesh, remained bright and alive.

      ‘Who are you?’ he demanded. He did not rise. In fact, Francis thought, he was probably not able to do so. Later he learned that the iron rings hanging from the arms of his chair, were there to enable him to be carried on the rare occasions when he left this office. They said that when he was at stool, it took three men to lift him onto the privy, and wipe his backside when he was finished.

      One of the guards stepped up and slammed his fist into Francis’ stomach. ‘Answer when Sir Nicholas speaks to you,’ he barked.

      Francis tried to speak, but the blow had winded him badly and no words would come.

      ‘Who sent you? Was it Norris and his Dowgate men?’

      ‘Who?’ Francis gasped. ‘I know nobody with that name.’

      ‘Do not play the fool with me, boy.’ Sir Nicholas twitched his head and another blow struck Francis hard in the guts, doubling him over. ‘You have been watching this house all day. Who were you spying on?’

      ‘I’m not—’

      ‘Was it those damned interlopers? They know the consequences if they attempt to steal my trade. I will burn their ships and see them rot in an Indian prison if I catch them.’

      ‘Please,’ said Francis, as another blow jabbed into his kidneys. ‘I am Francis Courtney. My mother sent me.’

      Sir Nicholas’ face was crimson with rage. ‘What impudence is this? Sir Francis Courtney died near fifty years ago.’

      ‘My great-grandfather.’ Francis fumbled for the velvet bag inside his shirt. The guard saw him and though he was reaching for a weapon. He kicked Francis’ legs from under him, dropping him to the floor, and aimed a kick at his ribs.

      Francis pulled out the bag. The guard snatched it from him. He jerked the drawstring stretched open, and the golden medal of the lion holding the globe in its paws fell out onto the floor.

      The guard had raised his fist again.

      ‘Stop,’ called Sir Nicholas. ‘Give me that.’

      Two of the men held Francis, while the porter retrieved the golden lion and laid it on the desk. Sir Nicholas held it up, letting the candlelight sparkle on the inset rubies and diamonds.

      ‘Where did you get this?’ he demanded of Francis

      ‘It belongs to my family. My father left it to me.’

      Sir Nicholas turned the emblem in his fingers. He waved his men to let Francis go.

      ‘Who are you?’ Sir Nicholas said again, but more thoughtfully this time.

      Francis drew himself up, determined to ignore the pain that shot through his body when he moved. He’d rehearsed the words all day, though he’d never imagined delivering them in such circumstances.

      ‘I am Francis Courtney, son of William Courtney and grandson of Hal Courtney, Baron Dartmouth and Nautonnier Knight of the Order of St George and the Holy Grail. Twenty years ago, my grandfather gave his life defending your company’s shipping from pirates. Now, all I ask is some preferment, an opportunity to join the Company’s service and prove my worth.’

      Childs stared at him as if he were a ghost.

      ‘Leave us,’ he ordered his men.

      They withdrew. Childs studied the boy. For decades, now, he had governed the East India Company as his personal domain, stretching out his tentacles from this office in Leadenhall Street to the furthest corners of the globe. Kings and Parliaments had come and gone, some of them claiming the Company was too powerful, that its monopoly should be withdrawn. He had seen them off, broken his competitors and outlived them all.

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