Mating Dance
Chapter 15
I knew Jak would be ashamed for me. He might even die trying to prevent that shame from falling on me—and the thought made me angry. What would he have us do? Be shot down in the tavern, be turned over to the Mar consul, starve to death? Known to the most powerful people on this island where we were stranded, we seemed to have no other alternatives to doing as he asked. Then I poked at my anger, like some fool poking a stick into a hive. Of course what came out was my own shame.
Next morning, a guard of four armed men, two with loaded crossbows and two with swords, ordered me to go with them. I made a fuss for Jak’s benefit, but not enough to make it likely that they would panic and kill me. Once we were out of that corridor, I stopped protesting. And then I was before Caspar.
“What can you tell me about this man?” I asked, standing in front of a long table where Caspar wrote his accounts and records. “His habits, his favorite locales, anything that could help me gain access to him. Is he married?”
“His wife is dead,” Caspar said. “Died of fever two years ago. He has a son.”
I swallowed. “How old?”
“Seven or eight, I think. Does it matter?”
I felt a stir of nausea and fought it down. “Yes, it matters. If the boy is five, he couldn’t do much to interfere. If he’s eight, he could raise an alarm. If he’s ten, he might try to stop me and I might have to . . . You get the point?”
“What matters is whether you do,” he said, sipping at his wine.
“Please get me the information I need for the job,” I said.
He smiled, showing large teeth, well cared for. “Then we have an agreement,” he said. “It will be a pleasure doing business with you, Champion,” he added. “I honestly don’t see why Marian women in business have aroused such resentment. You seem entirely reasonable.” An insult packaged as a compliment.
A schedule of Rollo’s observed movements over the last month was brought to me, along with a personal history which revealed his apparent aversion to bribery, the death of his wife two years ago, and the fact that Caspar’s spies used the presence or absence of Rollo’s son with him as a barometer of whether Rollo was anticipating violence from the grove owners at a particular public function. I wondered how long it would take them to decide that abducting the boy would be their shortest road to neutralizing Rollo. That they hadn’t tried it yet suggested that they feared a massive uprising of all the cinnamon workers, in fact of all the laboring men and women on the island, if they killed the boy or even threatened to do so. It was obvious to me that the way to get close to Rollo was through his son. As if he could read me, Caspar said,
“Tomorrow is an annual festival at the loading docks. It has to do with the gods, so violence is unlikely. The boy will be there, probably with a couple of burly tree-fellers as guards.”
“The guards won’t be a problem,” I said.
“Really,” Caspar observed drily. You’re going to abduct a seven-year-old, struggling boy with one hand and fight off two guards with the other?”
“Not abduct,” I said. “Rescue.”
One of Caspar’s minions accompanied me to the festival to point out the boy. He also identified the two guardians.
“What are they arguing with the boy about, do you think?”
“The brat always wants to be in the front row to see whatever’s going on,” he said. “I bet he’ll get his way. Little shit.”
Perhaps Rollo had made the mistake of spoiling the boy a little in the wake of his mother’s death.
Caspar’s man was right; the bigger of the two guardians heaved a visible sigh and bulled through the crowd so that the boy could be in the front row. I got into position.
At first it all went according to plan. I bumped someone in the third row at the perfect moment; he fell into a second who staggered into the boy and knocked him into the water. I moved quickly then, stepping over the fallen man and slipping between the man in the second row and his neighbor. Only one person had even noticed that the boy had gone into the water; they were all looking back angrily to see who had caused the commotion. When I reached the end of the dock, I looked into the grey-green, almost opaque water and saw nothing. Panic. I jumped in well to the left of where the boy had been standing so that I wouldn’t land on him. He’s drowned. You’ve killed a child, I thought. I couldn’t see anything, but then I felt him, his terror in the choking green murk, and I followed the fear to his body just as his consciousness was winking out. I reached out blindly, touched the back of his neck, slipped my arms under his arms, which now floated limply, and I kicked for the surface.
“Help us!” I shouted up at the gawking crowd, and a man shouldered forward and waved me toward the short ladder that let people board small craft from the dock. I passed one of the boy’s arms up to him and he caught the wrist, hauling him up like a hooked fish.
“Lay him on his stomach!” I shouted, my voice allowing no possibility of his doing anything else. “Get back, all of you! Give him room to breathe!” That last order, of course, made no sense, but they backed up and gave me what I really needed: room to work on him. He was lying on his stomach, his right cheek on the planking of the dock, not breathing. I leaned on his back with the heels of both hands. A little water and vomit spurted out of his mouth, but he did not begin to inhale. I rolled him over, put my mouth over his, pinched his nostrils, and blew my own breath into his mouth. I pressed on his chest to force that breath out and blew in another one. And repeated. On the fourth cycle, he coughed out more sea water, gasped in some air, coughed again. Then I knew he would keep breathing, because he had started to cry. I scooped him up in my arms as I heard a focused commotion, not the random surging of the crowd, coming our way. I knew what it was.
Flanked by two stocky men whose eyes darted around the crowd continuously, Rollo was a man of about forty. He had brown eyes, deep set, very intense. He was training them on me, I knew, trying to remember if he had ever seen me—among government figures, on the island police force, as one of the smaller farm holders.
“It looks as if I owe you my son’s life,” he said, halfway between a statement and a question.
“I happened to be there,” I answered.
“You also happened to know what to do.” A little suspicion in the tone. He had lasted a long time as the leader of opposition to the most powerful men on the island.
“I’m glad I got the chance to do it,” I said, looking to focus the conversation elsewhere. “That water isn’t very clear.”
“So how did you find him?”
“A lucky grab.”
“Very lucky,” he said, still suspicious. Then I read embarrassment. “Not that safe for you, either,” he added. “I owe you thanks.”
I caught his eye, let my eyes film a little so that he could see them.
“Sir, all of us owe you thanks. You stood up for us. A lot of men are proud to stand with you.” I gave him the slow lowering of the eyelids. “Some women, too.”
When I looked back up at him, he seemed a little flustered.
“What, uh, where are you from?” he asked. “You’re not from the island, I’m sure. And you should call me Rollo.”
“Crescent Island . . . Rollo.” It was one of the outermost of the Spice Islands, named for its shape, left by a volcano whose center had blown out before time was counted.
“I hope you’ll . . . “ he began, stumbling, and started again, “I’d like to invite you to have a meal with me and my boy. As a thank-you. I know it’s not much—“
My mother had done business with an independent bark farmer on Crescent Island. It was also known for its wine grapes. His own invitation gave me the idea.
“I’d be honored,” I said. “But you’ll have to let me bring the wine. I am a Crescent girl, after all.” I smiled at him.
“Done,” he said, with a relieved smile that told me he was shy around women, maybe around everyone except when he was wrapped in his cause. I seemed to see a flash of boyish relief and pride strike a light in his mind, that this frightening business, inviting a woman to his home, had gone so well. In my own mind arose a sorrow that I forced down savagely, covering myself by answering his smile again.
“Tomorrow night? At moonrise?” he asked.
“Lovely,” I answered.