The Tiger’s Prey. Wilbur Smith

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СКАЧАТЬ and Dorian sat outside the tavern, nursing their drinks and looking down at the ships anchored in Table Bay. Tom was drinking a sweet muscadel wine, but Dorian was true to his adopted religion and eschewed all alcohol. He was drinking diluted orange juice. Behind them, the top of Table Mountain ruled a flat line across the sky, while the lesser summits of Devil’s Peak and Lion’s Peak reached out to enclose the bay in a natural amphitheatre. Below the forests on the lower slopes, a hundred or so stone-built, white-washed houses dotted the landscape, running down to the sea where warehouses and taverns lined the shore. At the northern end, the Dutch tricolour blew over the five-pointed fort that left no doubt as to where the power in the colony lay.

      An Indiaman was beating in to the harbour. From her colours, and the state of her rigging, Tom saw she must be fresh from England. He made a quick calculation of what her arrival would mean. Ivory prices would rise, as the English merchants sought supplies to take to India; in return, they would want to trade knives and steel goods from England. The ship was late in the season, and most of the ivory stocks had been sold, but Tom had kept back a few good tusks from their last voyage for just such an eventuality. He smiled as he thought of the profits to be made.

      Soon, he and Dorian would return to the boarding house where they lodged during their interludes in Cape Town. He had some ten thousand pounds deposited at the offices of an Amsterdam bank here, though he had never used it to buy his own home. The Dutch authorities laid ferocious restrictions on foreigners owning property in the colony, but a few rix-dollars in the right palms might smooth the way around that. He had never tried. Year after year, he waited out the monsoon in the boarding house, impatient for the next season to begin.

      ‘Are you bored, Tom?’ Dorian asked. In reply Tom swept his arm in a full circle, taking in the mountains and the sea, the cotton-fluff clouds and the sun sinking towards the horizon. ‘How could I ever be bored with all this to enjoy?’

      ‘I know you too well, brother,’ Dorian chuckled. ‘You haven’t fired a gun in anger since the day we rescued the Dowager from that pirate Legrange. And that was almost a year ago.’

      The past ivory-hunting season in the African interior had been a quiet one. Tom and Dorian had taken an expedition almost two hundred leagues up the Zambesi River, but found none of the slavers he had warred with in the past. Even the hunting had been less bountiful than past years. Centaurus had returned with her hold only half full of ivory.

      ‘Fighting is bad for business,’ Tom said, without conviction.

      Then he blinked with astonishment as he saw out on the far horizon, where the last rim of the sun was slipping away, a sudden flash of the most brilliant green he could ever imagine. It startled him; although he had heard of the phenomenon before, this was the first time he had actually witnessed it.

      ‘Did you also see that?’ Tom demanded as both of them jumped to their feet in amazement, staring at the distant horizon.

      ‘Yes, indeed!’ Dorian was as excited as he was. ‘Neptune’s Wink.’ It was one of those mysteries, like St Elmo’s fire, that you would seldom see unless you lived your life on the wild oceans of the globe.

      ‘I have heard tell that the man who sees it acquires special wisdom,’ Tom enthused as they resumed their seats.

      ‘Bully for you,’ Dorian teased him. ‘You can certainly use all the wisdom you are able to lay your hands on.’

      In retaliation Tom grinned and poured the dregs of his wine over Dorian’s head. ‘For such impertinence you can buy me another glass of wine,’ Tom told him.

      When Dorian returned from the bar with Tom’s glass topped up they settled down again in companionable silence to enjoy the last of the sunset, and to watch the Indiaman drop anchor in the bay.

      As its anchor splashed into the darkening waters the bum boats from the beach swarmed about the ship, as eager as lambs for the teat.

      ‘They won’t bring their cargo ashore until morning,’ Tom decided. ‘We can wait until then to see what we can sell them.’

      He left a coin for the drinks, and together they went back up to the slopes of the mountain, following Die Heerengracht, the ‘Gentlemen’s Walk’ that ran between the parade ground and the Company gardens. Deep in conversation, they didn’t notice the woman in the blue dress coming down the path towards them until she was almost abreast.

      ‘Tom Courtney?’ she said, and he looked up in surprise.

      ‘Ana Duarte?’ he responded, and her face flushed with pleasure.

      ‘You remember me!’

      ‘How could I ever forget you? In fact, my brother and I were just this instant recollecting the day we met. But I did not know you were here in Cape Town.’

      ‘My ship arrived two days ago from Madras.’

      ‘I hope you had an easier crossing than the last time.’

      She touched a silver cross that hung at her throat. ‘Thankfully, yes!’

      Suddenly Tom thought of the green flash. Though he was not superstitious, he wondered if perhaps it had portended this unexpected meeting.

      ‘You must dine with us,’ put in Dorian. ‘Sarah and Yasmini would be delighted to see you again.’

      ‘I would like that very much.’ She smiled. ‘In fact, I was hoping for it. I have a proposal for you.’

      The Courtneys’ boarding house was at the far end of town, just under the walls of the Dutch East India Company’s garden. The Malay housekeeper, Mrs Lai, kept it spotless. The food she cooked was simple yet delicious, a unique blend of spices from the Indies with the flavours of the English recipes Tom insisted on.

      Tom poured wine from a decanter. Dorian, as usual, drank only fresh fruit juice.

      ‘No wine for you?’ Ana noticed.

      ‘I am a Muslim.’

      ‘Are there many Muslims in England?’

      ‘It is a long story.’

      ‘But a good one,’ put in Tom.

      ‘Then I would be glad to hear it,’ said Ana.

      So Dorian explained how he had been captured by Arab pirates as a boy of eleven, enslaved, bought by a Prince of Oman because of the red colour of his hair, the same as the prophet Mohammed, and raised in his household as an adopted son. Ana urged him to tell her more, so he told her how he had grown to manhood as a warrior of Islam, and how finally he had embraced that faith.

      Ana listened in total absorption to the story of his life. When he was done she asked quietly, ‘Is there a man around this table who does not have a price on his head?’

      Tom started. ‘How do you know?’

      ‘I have many contacts with the East India Company factors in Madras. From them I learned that the Governor of Bombay was a man named Guy Courtney. So I followed up and learned that you are related.’

      Tom and Dorian exchanged a look that was fraught with meaning.

      ‘Guy is our brother,’ Tom admitted. СКАЧАТЬ