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‘Indeed, Sir.’
‘Hm. We will have to discuss this at some later point in greater detail, Mr Linton. But for now, let us leave this inhospitable place.’
‘Yes, Sir! Right you are, Sir!’
His bonds falling to the floor, Mr Ambrose rose to his feet. ‘Do you know where Karim is? And our luggage, and horses?’
‘Karim is probably farther down the corridor. If I was the colonel, I’d want him locked up in the safest cell I had, behind three doors.’
‘All right. Let’s go.’
My conjecture proved justified. We found Karim several cells farther down the corridor, behind an additional door, this one with a real lock, which Mr Ambrose opened using some fiddly little metal thing he pulled from his sleeve. When we reached the second door, the one with a bolt, we heard gagging noises from inside.
‘Karim?’ Mr Ambrose called. ‘Are you in there?’
The Mohammedan’s huge beard appeared in front of the opening, replaced by his face a moment later when he bent his knees. ‘Sahib?’
‘Yes.’
‘I knew you would escape! Nothing is beyond you, Sahib.’
I cleared my throat, delicately, and tucked a lock of hair behind my ear. ‘Actually, it wasn’t he who escaped. It was me.’
There was a moment of silence in the cell, this one definitely pregnant. With ugly quadruplets.
‘Sahib? Is this true?’
Mr Ambrose didn’t look at me. He stared straight ahead, his expression ten times as unreadable as ever. ‘Unfortunately, it is.’
Another moment of silence.
‘Well,’ Karim’s gruff voice finally came from beyond the door, ‘it can’t have been very difficult. I am sure anyone could manage it.’
‘Indeed?’ My voice was as sweet as solid chocolate with honey and nougat inside. ‘I notice that you are still in your cell.’
The bodyguard muttered an unintelligible curse. I was pretty good at Spanish profanities by now, and I was beginning to understand Portuguese ones, but whatever language Karim cursed in, it was none I had heard of before. It was, however, adoringly abominable.
‘I was just in the process of breaking out,’ Karim growled, clearly holding onto his temper by the skin of his teeth.
‘Indeed? And how exactly were you planning to do that?’
‘Why don’t you ask him?’ There was a thud, and suddenly, a pale, bluish face was thrust against the bars. Not Karim. Most certainly not. This man was a lot smaller, and a lot more being suffocated. The gagging noises I had heard earlier now made sense.
‘Just out of curiosity,’ I enquired. ‘Who is the man you’re strangling to death?’
‘I would be interested in that information as well,’ came Mr Ambrose’s cool voice from behind me.
‘This little haramjada is one of their torturers. The insolent imp came in here with his knives, thinking to deprive me of my manhood!’
‘Oh. Did he succeed?’ I asked hopefully. It would be an interesting experience to hear Karim sing soprano.
‘Bah! Of course not! I tore my bonds, overpowered him and told him to open the door. But he would not. He said they were bolted from the outside. So I decided to apply a little pressure.’
The face of the jailor had turned a nice shade of violet by now, and the gagging noises sounded suspiciously like the beginnings of a death rattle.
‘Yes, I can see that.’ Mr Ambrose nodded. ‘The problem is, he’s telling the truth. There really is a bolt on the door.’
‘Oh.’
