The Flashman Papers: The Complete 12-Book Collection. George Fraser MacDonald
reasonably close to Usman. And there is nothing impossible about some wealthy Borneo raja or sharif sending his child to an English school – unusual, yes, but it has certainly happened in this case. And the son, following in his father’s footsteps, has practised piracy, which we know is the profession of half the population of the Islands. At the same time, he has developed business interests in England and Singapore – which he has now decided to cut.”
“And stolen another man’s wife, to carry her off to his pirate lair?” scoffs Balestier. “Oh, but this is beyond reason—”
“Hardly more unreasonable than to suppose that Don Solomon Haslam, if he were not a pirate, would kidnap an English lady,” says Whampoa.
“Oh, but you’re only guessing!” cries Catchick. “A coincidence in names—”
“And in times. Solomon Haslam went to England three years ago – and Suleiman Usman vanished at the same time.”
That silenced them, and then Brooke says slowly:
“It might be true, but if it was, what difference does it make, after all—”
“Some, I think. For if it is true you need look no farther than Borneo for the Sulu Queen’s destination. Maludu lies north, beyond the Papar river, in unexplored country. He may go there, or take cover among his allies on the Seribas river or the Batang Lupar—”
“If he does, he’s done for!” cries Brooke excitedly. “I can bottle him there, or anywhere between Kuching and Serikei Point!”
Whampoa sluiced down some more sherry. “It may not be so easy. Suleiman Usman was a man of power; his fort at Maludu was accounted impregnable, and he could draw at need on the great pirate fleets of the Lanun and Balagnini and Maluku of Gillalao. You have fought pirates, your majesty, I know – but hardly as many as these.”
“I’d fight every sea-robber from Luzon to Sumatra in this quarrel,” says Brooke. “And beat ’em. And swing Suleiman Usman from the Dido’s foretop at the end of it.”
“If he is the man you are looking for,” says Catchick. “Whampoa may be wrong.”
“Undoubtedly, I make frequent mistakes, in my poor ignorance,” says Whampoa. “But not, I think, in this. I have further proof. No one among us, I believe, has ever seen Suleiman Usman of Maludu – or met anyone who has? No. However, my agents have been diligent tonight, and I can now supply a brief description. About thirty years old, over two yards in height, of stout build, unmarked features. Is it enough?”
It was enough for one listener, at any rate. Why not – it was no more incredible than all the rest of the events of that fearful night; indeed, it seemed to confirm them, as Whampoa pointed out.
“I would suggest also,” says he, “that we need look no further for an explanation of the attack by Black-faces on Mr Flashman,” and they all turned to stare at me. “Tell me, sir – you dined at a restaurant, before the attack? The Temple of Heaven, as I understand—”
“By G-d!” I croaked. “It was Haslam who recommended it!”
Whampoa shrugged. “Remove the husband, and the most ardent pursuer is disposed of. Such an assassination might be difficult to arrange, for an ordinary Singapore merchant, but to a pirate, with his connections with the criminal community, it would be simple.”
“The cowardly swine!” cries Brooke. “Well, his ruffians were out of luck, weren’t they? The pursuer’s ready for the chase, ain’t you, Flashman? And between us we’ll make this scoundrel Usman or Haslam rue the day he dared to cast eyes on an Englishwoman. We’ll smoke him out, and his foul crew with him. Oh, let me alone for that!”
I wasn’t thinking that far ahead, I confess, and I didn’t know James Brooke at this moment for anything but a smiling madman in a pilot-cap, with an odd taste in friends and followers. If I’d known him for what he truly was, I’d have been in an even more agitated condition when our discussion finally ended, and I was helped up Whampoa’s staircase to a magnificent bed-chamber, and tucked in between silk sheets, bandaged shoulder and all, by his stewards and Dr Mackenzie. I hardly knew where I was; my mind was in a perfect spin, but when they’d left me, and I was lying staring up at the thin rays of sunlight that were breaking through the screens – for it was now full day outside – there broke at last the sudden dreadful realization of what had happened. Elspeth was gone; she was in the clutches of a nigger pirate, who could take her beyond the maps of Europeans, to some horrible stronghold where she’d be his slave, where we could never hope to find her – my beautiful, idiot Elspeth, with her creamy skin and golden hair and imbecile smile and wonderful body, lost to me, forever.
I ain’t sentimental, but suddenly I could feel the tears running down my face, and I was muttering her name in the darkness, over and over, alone in my empty bed, where she ought to have been, all soft and warm and passionate – and just then there was a scratching at my door, and when it opened, there was Whampoa, bowing from his great height on the threshold. He came forward beside the bed, his hands tucked into his sleeves, and looked down at me. Was my shoulder, he asked, giving me great pain? I said it was agony.
“But no greater,” says he, “than your torment of mind. That, too, nothing can alleviate. The loss you have suffered of the loveliest of companions, is a deprivation which cannot but excite compassion in any man of feeling. I know that nothing can take the place of the beautiful golden lady, and that every thought of her must be a pang of the most exquisite agony. But as some small, poor consolation to your grief of mind and body, I humbly offer the best that my poor establishment provides.” He said something in Chinese, and through the door, to my amazement, glided two of his little Chink girls, one in red silk, t’other in green. They came forward and stood either side of the bed, like voluptuous little dolls, and began to unbutton their dresses.
“These are White Tigress and Honey-and-Milk,” says Whampoa. “To offer you the services of only one would have seemed an insulting comparison with the magic of your exquisite lady, therefore I send two, in the hope that quantity may be some trivial amend for a quality which they cannot hope to approach. Triflingly inadequate as they are, their presence may soothe your pains in some infinitesimal degree. They are skilful by our mean standards, but if their clumsiness and undoubted ugliness are offensive, you should beat them for their correction and your pleasure. Forgive my presumption in presenting them.”
He bowed, retreating, and the door closed behind him just as the two dresses dropped to the floor with a gentle swish, and two girlish giggles sounded in the dimness.
You must never refuse an Oriental’s hospitality, you know. It doesn’t do, or they get offended; you just have to buckle to and pretend it’s exactly what you wanted, whether you like it or not.
For four days I was confined in Whampoa’s house with my gashed shoulder, recuperating, and I’ve never had a more blissfully ruinous convalescence in my life. It would have been interesting, had there been time, to see whether my wound healed before Whampoa’s solicitous young ladies killed me with their attentions; my own belief is that I would have expired just about the time the stitches were ready to come out. As it was, my confinement was cut short by the arrival and swift departure of HMS Dido, commanded by one Keppel, RN; willy-nilly, I had to sail with her, staggering aboard still weak with loss of blood, et cetera, clutching the gangway not so much for support as to prevent my being wafted away by the first puff of breeze.
You see, it was taken for granted that as a devoted husband and military hero, I was in a sweat to be off in quest of my abducted spouse and her pirate ravisher – that was one of the disadvantages of life on the frontiers of Empire in the earlies, that you were expected to do your own avenging and recovering, with such assistance as the authorities might lend. Not my style at all; left to old Flash it would have been a case of tooling round to the local constabulary, reporting a kidnapped wife, leaving my name and address, and letting ’em get on with it. After all, it’s what they’re paid for, and why else was I stumping up sevenpence in the pound income tax?
I said as much to old Morrison, thinking it was the kind of