Читать книгу The Bloody Herring - Phyllis Ann Karr - Страница 10

Chapter 6

The Pirates of Penzance

They had walked in an almost straight line overland for almost an hour before Sir Ruthven, apparently remembering his earlier resolve to misguide his companion, began making a circle. Chuck humored him a quarter of an hour longer, until a sturdy peasant turned up opportunely to point out the true direction. Once on a road, Chuck found plenty of old-fashioned milestones to keep them going right.

It was twilight when they arrived on the southern coast, the hike across the western tip of Lozinski’s virtual Cornwall having taken a summer’s day of weather as pleasant as in any programmed pylon of Papa’s Pride.

“Tremorden Castle.” Sir Ruthven pointed to an old pile, almost as grim as Ruddigore Castle, on the cliffs above them to the right. A few paces farther along, they came in sight of Mount’s Bay, opening out below them to the left, lights beginning to show in the tiny black shapes of houses that spread from the landward edge of the darkening beach up the sloping shore. Sir Ruthven pointed again. “Penzance.”

Chuck would not have been surprised to find the pirates keeping house respectably in the heart of town, but Sir Ruthven led him down a narrow, almost invisible smugglers’ path between Tremorden Castle and the small city. As they came in sight of another, much smaller bay, its waters and the ship riding thereon fast merging into the general darkness, a stout but shadowy figure stepped out in front of them.

“Friend or foe?” It seemed to be a woman’s voice, deep contralto and slightly hoarse.

“Friends,” said the baronet.

“Give the password.”

“I have given it often.” Sir Ruthven pronounced the last word as if it were a homonym of “orphan.”

“Murgatroyd!” The pirate sentinel flung both arms round the baronet, then fired a pistol into the air, apparently to alert the rest of the band. A cheer rose from the beach below, where Chuck glimpsed torches being lighted.

“Who’s the other one?” asked the pirate.

“Quite all right, Ruth. He’s an orphan also. Allow me to present Dr. Charles Falcon. Dr. Falcon, Mrs. Ruth Cripps, piratical maid of all work par excellence.”

Thrusting her pistol back into her belt, the piratical maid seized Chuck’s extended hand and shook it heartily, at the same time clapping him on the back with her other hand. “Welcome aboard, Dr. Falcon! Any orphan is an honorary member of our band. Come on now, watch your step.”

Familiar with the trail, Ruth bounded down ahead of them with surprising agility for her bulk. Sir Ruthven followed more slowly with Chuck, who inquired, “How did they know she fired that shot as a salute instead of a warning or to kill an intruder?”

“They never fire at intruders under such circumstances—the pistol would give the sentinel an unfair advantage. They grapple instead.”

“Suppose the intruder is the weaker party?”

“It’s assumed that anyone who comes forcing his way here is stronger than whomever he hopes to find. If he should prove the weaker, of course, the sentry takes him down and feeds him.”

“They must get raided fairly often.”

“Every time an enemy comes here. By the way, don’t let it slip that you’re not an orphan. You’re probably much stronger than any of them, so they would have no scruples about attacking you.”

“Thanks for the tip, but it’s okay. I really am an orphan.” At least, Chuck Falcon was. Chandra Falcon had a mother still living in Gadore neighborhood, pylon 8.

“I do wish you hadn’t told me that. I’d hoped I was telling a terrible story.” The baronet sighed. “But perhaps it’s as well. I would rather hate to see any of the dear fellows injured.”

* * * *

The fact that the piratical maid of all work shared a surname with one of the Antique Terra players who had been in the same backstage area when Steve Davis died had not escaped Dr. Falcon; but it could be coincidence. The cast list for H.M.S. Pinafore attached the name “Mrs. Cripps” to Little Buttercup, though nobody ever called her that in the show itself. Lozinski might have assigned it to pirate Ruth also, as part of his virtual world-building. Chuck would have tried probing Sir Ruthven about Ruth’s surname, but they reached the bottom too quickly.

How far were real people Lozinski knew in the ship turning up as characters in his virtual fantasy? How important might it be to know whether or not the real Barbara Cripps had become piratical Ruth “in here,” and how much might it have to do with whatever Deuteronomy Osborne suspected? Dr. Falcon looked forward to getting a closer look at Ruth by the light of the cheery picnic fire the pirates had kindled on the beach.

Somewhat to his surprise, he found a closer look impossible to get. At one moment or other during a pleasant evening of balladeering and storytelling, the flames lit up every other pirate’s face—black beards, bristling whiskers, eye-patches and scars superimposed as if for a costume party on mild faces with round cheeks and ingenuous eyes—but Ruth was always half in shadow, the flickering light doing more to distort than reveal her features. The few times Chuck should have been able to see part of her face clearly, what he saw seemed slightly blurred, like a movie a fraction out of focus.

The pirate king, a tall English gentleman of the bluff-and-hearty school, with long, curling black hair and frown-lines that appeared to have been etched in with dark pencil—less precious in virtual fantasy than out in Papa’s Pride proper—agreed readily to take the visitors to Portsmouth next day. “We were planning an attack on Tremorden Castle tonight, but that can wait.”

“I trust you will not be too much inconvenienced?” asked the baronet.

“No, no. Little matter of a bloody vendetta—stern revenge, just though technically illegal retribution, all that sort of thing. Necessary to keep up our reputation, y’know.”

“I quite understand. If you’d prefer to keep to your schedule,” said Sir Ruthven half-heartedly, “we might accompany you. I really ought to learn a bit more about how such things are done.”

“Never worry about it, lad. It’s like tobacco—comes to you in a moment when the time comes; and we’ll be the better for a bit of sleep before the morning tide.” The pirate king gave his mustache a picturesque twirl, but Chuck guessed he was secretly just as glad of the excuse to postpone his vendetta for a few days. “There’s poor young Frederic, though,” the chief pirate went on. “Been a little lower lately than usual. I’d take it as a great favor if you’d see what you can do to cheer him up.”

Sir Ruthven eagerly sought out a beardless youth who had so far been sitting moodily eating an orange and tossing little chunks of peel into the flames. Frederic—the pirates’ apprentice, bound to them by mistake; his father had meant for him to be apprenticed to a pilot, but Ruth (now the piratical maid of all work), who was then Frederic’s nurse, and for some reason in charge of drawing up the articles of indenture, had misunderstood the word “pilot” for “pirate.” As far as Chuck could see, Sir Ruthven’s efforts to “cheer Frederic up” were taking the form of mutual commiserations on the far side of the fire; but the two appeared safe enough, enjoying a fit of Byronic gloom together in the midst of the Victorian-parlor roystering of the other pirates.

“Every baronet of Ruddigore is, ipso facto and ex officio, an honorary member of our bloodthirsty band,” the pirate king confided, pouring Chuck a mug of sherry. “Sir Roderic, uncle of the present bart., gave me my own start in the trade, as you might say. Well, well, maybe we’ll find a nice Cunarder to scuttle on our way out, give him a little experience. One with an unorphaned crew.”

“Have you ever considered,” Chuck inquired, “if you took a ship that wasn’t manned by orphans and scuttled her with her crew, the grief you’d cause the bereaved parents?”

“By Jove, you’re right, lad!” The pirate king blinked, drained off his sherry, refilled his mug, and eyed Chuck with renewed interest. “You think like one of us, man—bloodthirsty but not altogether heartless. I don’t suppose I could persuade you to throw in your lot with us?”

Chuck grinned and shook his head. “Sorry, captain, not this time out. Pressing engagements elsewhere.”

“Pity.” After several puffs on his pipe, the pirate king went on, “Maybe it’s just as well for us, though. Perhaps you’ve heard we never attack a weaker party than ourselves? Now, unless I mistake you, you’re a man who could take on any two and, in certain cases, any three of us at once. With you on our side, devilish little chance we’d have of ever finding anybody at all to attack.”

Yes, Chandra thought, my inner man really is quite a fine figure of a male, isn’t he?

* * * *

The pirates’ ship, the Divine Emollient, weighed anchor at dawn and rode out on a fresh tide, with a favorable wind. The sun rose in a clear blue sky, a few small whitecaps danced on the waves, the Jolly Roger flapped merrily overhead, and Chuck realized he was dangerously near hoping his mission would be a long one. At least in virtual time; for Osborne’s sake, they should maybe hope it was short “out there.”

Chuck leaned on the rail of the poop deck, inhaling the salt air and watching the crew at work. If they were incompetent at piracy, at least they were good at sailing and singing.

“Come, friends, who plough the sea!

First-class navigation,

Each man at his station—

This is the way that we-eee

Go about our piracee!”

The cheerful bustle on shipdeck made him think of H.M.S. Pinafore, which made him think of the scene in which Ralph Rackstraw announces his intention of committing suicide, and his crewmates, dolefully singing their grief, do all in their compassionate power to help him, by loading the pistol and passing it up to him. Humorous in its proper stage context, the image was disquieting here. Sir Ruthven had said earlier that he rarely attempted suicide at night through fear of the less pleasant aspects of the other world. Might it follow that a bright, sunny, invigorating morning would inspire him with the boldest ideas of self-destruction?

Dr. Falcon looked down, searching the decks below. Sir Ruthven was still chumming with Frederic. They stood together at the afterdeck rail, throwing bread crumbs to the gulls that were flapping along almost batlike behind the ship, diving occasionally into her wake for the tidbits. A peaceful enough picture; but if the baronet should suddenly feel moved to put a pistol to his head or jump over the side, the pirate apprentice would probably prove very cooperative. Chuck decided to lose no time joining them.

He was halfway down when a long, sharp, intense, tremendous roll of staticky thunder split the air—shaking vessel and ocean alike. The pirates were in instant confusion, shouting and running from port to starboard and vice versa, scanning the horizon in varying degrees of hope and timidity, looking for the enemy ship which was nowhere to be seen. The pirate king, trailing a string of picturesque oaths, came running around the corner of the cabin and almost careened into Chuck.

“What is it?” Chuck demanded. “Any chance some of our own guns went off by accident?”

The pirate king shook his head. “Samuel, Frederic, and myself are the only men aboard who know how to load the blasted things, and Samuel’s not working at all today—his birthday. Stand by to repel boar-r-ders!” he shouted, brushing past Chuck to rally his men against the invisible foe.

Chuck sprinted, reaching the after-rail in seconds. At least Lozinski’s virtual world had not winked out—but a sudden fog was coming up over the sea on all sides…

He found Sir Ruthven staggering, supported by Frederic and Ruth. “What happened here?” Dr. Falcon demanded, pushing Frederic aside almost brusquely in order to take hold of Sir Ruthven himself.

“Ah, Dr. Falcon!” Reeling, the baronet attempted a weak smile. “Absurd, really—seems to be a touch of…of mal-de-mere, I suppose. I say, I never asked—are you a medical doctor or a D.D.?”

His eyes closed, he swayed in Chuck’s grip, and the fog became several degrees darker. Ruth shuddered and untied the knot that held her workaday shawl about her shoulders. “It seemed to begin at the time of that incredible thunder,” said Frederic.

“Shock, I daresay,” murmured Sir Ruthven. “Set up a reaction, no doubt…bit of vertigo, I suppose. Dreadfully embarrassing, never seasick before…”

“Lord bless us!” ejaculated Ruth, staring up into the fog, which was so dense and black now that they could barely see the ship around them. The piratical maid took off her shawl and wrapped it around the baronet.

If…whatever…hadn’t happened within Lozinski’s virtual world, it must have been something “out there.” Chuck spoke low, trying to impress the baronet with his own sense of urgency. “Sir Ruthven! You remember what I’ve been trying to tell you?”

“What? Ah, you mean…” Sir Ruthven shook his head, clearly trying to go along with what he must consider a diversionary tactic. “That theory…self as center…the self as…stranger with a Japanese name? Odd sort of moment to bring it up.”

“No. It’s the vital moment to bring it up. Something’s happened in the outer world—”

“Ah, the thunder?” Sir Ruthven smiled hazily.

“I’m going back out there and see what the hell’s happening.”

The baronet nodded. “I assume you’ll…be flying upward through the air? Forgive me if I do not see you off.”

He reeled again and fell to the deck. The fog grew several degrees darker yet. Kneeling beside Sir Ruthven, Dr. Falcon squinted around, trying to see Ruth or Frederic, calling them and getting no answer. The ship was preternaturally quiet, and the deck boards seemed to be melting, fusing with the atmosphere.

“Lozinski!” Chuck bent and spoke the name like a command. The baronet’s eyelids fluttered—in recognition of his name, or in mere acknowledgment of the sound? “Listen to me,” Chuck went on. “If you want to suicide, this is your chance—all you’ve got to do is let go. But if you care about the people around you—the pirates, Frederic, Margaret, all the others—if you care about your whole world here—then you’d damn well better hang on! I don’t know if something’s happened to you ‘out there’ or if it’s some…something else wrong, but if it’s some outer threat, for God’s sake, fight it!”

Sir Ruthven frowned up. “Do you presume to command me, Dr. Falcon?”

“Damn right I presume to command you!”

“Very good. I do it on compulsion.”

Dr. Falcon helped the baronet sit up and wrap Ruth’s shawl more closely around his shoulders. The fog was still darkening, but now, to his relief, he again heard the voices of Ruth, Frederic, and the rest of the pirates. Good. All he had to do now was remember how he himself got back “out there”…

“Oh, I say, Dr. Falcon, when shall we two meet again?”

“If I don’t make it back aboard the Divine Emollient, I’ll try to meet you in Portsmouth.”

A helmet, that’s right. He was in a virtual suit…all he had to do was lift off the helmet with its goggles and earphones…