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“I must ask a favor of you, Edenmont,” Sir Gerald said as Varian was pouring his second cup of coffee. “I’d hoped to leave soon for England, but my responsibilities order otherwise. I want you to take Percival to Venice.”
“Certainly, I should like to oblige,” Varian murmured politely, “but—”
“I realize it’s a great deal to ask,” the baronet interrupted, “but I haven’t much choice. I can’t look after the boy at the moment, it’s too complicated and tedious to explain, but it suffices to say there are certain delicate negotiations—that sort of thing—and one can’t have the lad about, making a nuisance of himself.”
Varian gazed impartially at his coffee cup.
“It wouldn’t be for very long. I expect to take him off your hands in a month or so.”
A month? Or so? Varian dropped in another lump of sugar.
“Naturally, I would assume all expenses,” said Sir Gerald. From his breast pocket he withdrew a bank draft, which he laid beside Varian’s saucer.
Varian eyed it with all the composure with which he regarded a winning card hand, his gray eyes as unreadable as smoke.
“For out-of-pocket expenses,” his host said. “Of course, I shall see to your passage and write to engage suitable lodgings en route, and in Venice.”
“Venice,” said Varian, “is very damp this time of year.”
“Well, you needn’t hurry. It hardly matters to me whether you dawdle along the way to see the sights, does it? Certainly I’ll send a manservant with you, and pay his way as well. Choose whomever you like.”
Passage paid, a fortune to spend on the way, and a servant. For a man with one pound, three shillings, sixpence in his pocket, the offer was—as it was intended to be—irresistible.
Varian looked up from his cup to meet his host’s impatient gaze. “As I mentioned, Sir Gerald, I should be happy to oblige,” he said.
Tepelena, Albania
Ali Pasha, the wily despot who ruled Albania, was old, fat, and sick. Periodically, he suffered fits of madness.
These drove him to acts of savagery so sadistic that even the Albanians, inured to the brutality of a world in which human life was held very cheap, found them worthy of remark.
That the populace remained loyal, for the most part, and even boasted of his triumphs, was evidence not only of their stoicism, but of their acute political perceptiveness. There were plenty of monsters about ruling the downtrodden masses of the Ottoman Empire. Ali, however, was the only monster the Sultan could not make his slave. Consequently, the Sultan could not make the Albanians his slaves. They answered only to Ali—when they condescended to answer at all—and he was no outsider, but an Albanian, one of their own. He couldn’t even be bothered to learn Turkish. Why trouble himself when he wasn’t going to listen to the Turks anyhow?
Like the Albanians, Jason Brentmor took the broad view of the Machiavellian Vizier. Aware of Ali’s courage, his military and political acumen, and weighing the advantages against the man’s many character flaws, Jason still felt that Ali Pasha, the Lion of Janina, was far preferable to any available alternative.
After more than twenty years’ close association, Jason knew Ali very well. As he left the Vizier’s palace, Jason wished his friend did not know him quite so well. Naturally, as a British subject, Ali had said, Jason was free to leave Albania whenever he wished, but…
Well, what Ali’s long “but” boiled down to was, “How can you abandon me at a time like this? After all I’ve done for you?”
“He’s quite right,” Jason told his comrade, Bajo, as they rode out of Tepelena that afternoon. “And he doesn’t know the half of it. If the rebels succeed, Albania will be plunged into chaos, and the Turks will sweep in easily to crush your people. Ali doubts the uprisings will lead to anything, but he doesn’t want any trouble now, when he’s trying to get the Greeks to join his revolution.”
“If the Greeks join, under his lead, we’ll be able to overthrow the Turks,” said Bajo. “But Ali’s old. I fear there won’t be time.”
“He’s lived this long. He might live to be a hundred.”
Bajo looked at him. “You didn’t tell him, then, of your suspicions about Ismal?”
“I couldn’t. Ali’s been too preoccupied with his grand scheme to notice that we’ve more than scattered unrest on our hands. If he learns a conspiracy’s afoot—and his own cousin behind it—”
“A bloodbath,” Bajo finished succinctly. His gaze softened into compassion. “Ah, Red Lion, you must deal with it yourself, if you wish it to be done without great slaughter.”
Jason sighed. “I realized that in about a quarter hour. I had plenty of time to think it through while pretending to listen to Ali’s brilliant plans to throw off the Turkish yoke.” He paused for a moment to glance about him, but the landscape was deserted. “I shall have to pretend to be killed,” he said quietly.
Bajo thought this over, then shook his head in agreement. “Very wise. If Ismal wishes to succeed, he must get you out of the way. If he believes you’re dead, he won’t need to be so cautious. Meanwhile, you can go where you like and do what you must without troublesome spies and assassins bothering you.”
“That’s not the only reason,” Jason said. “I think Ismal is too cunning to try to kill me outright, at least this early in the game. It’s more likely he’ll try to tie my hands—and the best way to do that is to take Esme as hostage. He’s been moaning about his desperate love for her just a bit too much lately. I suspect he means to abduct her and make it look like an act of passion. That Ali will readily believe; he’s stolen women and boys enough, merely because he fancied them.”
“I see great advantages to your death,” Bajo said. “She’ll be no use to Ismal then, and he’ll leave her in peace.”
“I don’t mean to risk even that. I want her out of Albania,” Jason said firmly. “I’ve thought it over, and what I propose is a cruel deception, but I see no alternative. Esme must believe I’m dead, or she’ll never leave without me. You must make certain she believes it, and get her on her way to England. I’ll give you money and the names of some people in Venice who can be trusted to take her to my mother.”
“Y’Allah, Red Lion, what a thing you ask of me. To tell the child you’re dead—and then make the grieving creature go away? She’s very stubborn, this girl of yours. How am I to make her go to strangers, foreigners?”
“Don’t give her any time to think,” Jason answered sharply. “If she gives you trouble, knock her on the head and tie her up. It’s for her own good. Better some hours’ discomfort and a few weeks’ grief than rape or murder. I want my daughter to be safe. Don’t make me choose between her and Albania. I love this country, and I’d risk my life for it...but I love my daughter more.”
Bajo shrugged. “Well, you’re English, after all.” He threw Jason a smile. “I’ll do as you ask. She is a superior female, worth two good men, I’ve often said. And once she’s safely away, I’ll return to help you. I suppose you want me to go now?”
“Not just this minute. I need to be killed first. We’d better do it further north. I must fall into the river, and be swept away—-or into a deep gorge. We don’t want anyone hunting for my body, now, do we?”
Chapter Two
Bari, Italy
“‘Who soon had left her charms for vulgar bliss,’” Percival quoted. “What does it mean?”
Varian paused in the doorway, a towel in his hands.
Percival had begged to visit the fish
stalls today, which he claimed had existed on the Bari breakwater since before Roman times. The area certainly stank as though it had existed—and not been cleaned—since the beginning of time. There Varian had watched the boy consume a bucket of oysters and another of sea urchins, followed by a half bucket of clams. Though Varian had not partaken of the feast, the stench of shellfish had permeated them both equally. This was the third bath he’d taken, and at last the odor seemed to be gone.
He gave his hair a final rub with the towel, then tossed it behind him and entered the sitting room. He sniffed dubiously as he passed Percival, but their servant, Rinaldo, had scrubbed the boy raw. Not a hint of fish remained.
Percival repeated the line from Childe Harold. “I take it ‘vulgar bliss’ is a euphemism,” he said. “Does Byron refer to women of ill repute? I can’t think what else he could mean. But why leave the one he loved for a tart, when he’s supposedly sick of tarts? And why call it ‘bliss’ when he’s so unhappy?”
“I’m not certain I ought to explain it,” Varian said as he dropped into an overstuffed chair by the fire. “I suspect your father would not approve your reading Lord Byron.”
“Indeed he would not,” Percival answered, looking up from the book. “But Papa isn’t here, and you are, and you are not in the least like him. Mama said you were like Childe Harold, actually, and so one must conclude you are best able to explain his state of mind. He seems a most morose sort of hero. That is, if he spends his life in pleasure, how can he be unhappy?”
“Perhaps he’s repenting his sins.”
“I thought wicked men did that only when they were old and decrepit. Gout, I understand, has reformed a great many rogues.”
“Perhaps Childe Harold suffers from toothache,” said Varian, leaning back comfortably. He was relieved to find Percival once more his usual self. The boy had been unnaturally quiet and well-behaved all the way to Bari, a sad ghost who gazed dully out the coach window for hours and passively did whatever Varian asked. The shellfish had evidently enlivened Percival’s disposition. Certainly his digestion hadn’t suffered. At dinner, the lad had consumed enough to bloat an elephant. Where the devil did he put it? He was the scrawniest boy Varian had ever seen outside a slum.
