China Flyer

Part One

THE SCENT

Chapter One

ROSE COTTAGE

Bombay Marine Captain Adam Horne shifted uncomfortably on the edge of the dainty parlour chair placed to face the divan with its recumbent figure. Forcing himself to ignore his Commander-in-Chief’s frail condition, he tried to concentrate on the older man’s explanation for summoning him to the homely cottage in Bombay’s Old Church Quarter. Commodore Watson held a damp cloth to his mottled pate as he talked, gasping out the words.

‘I was leaving my chambers yesterday in Bombay Castle … feeling like a poxy camel … when Governor Spencer stopped me in the courtyard … and … and … gave me the news about—’ Watson winced with obvious discomfort, then proceeded painfully. ‘—gave me news about a Company man disappearing from Fort St George and—’

Horne watched as Watson paused to gulp some water. He wondered if he should insist that his chief stop talking until he felt better. Why should the old walrus sacrifice his health for the Honourable East India Company? Commodore Watson shouldered more than his share of responsibilities as Commander-in-Chief of the Company’s private naval force, the Bombay Marine; there was no need for him to keep going while on his sick bed.

Watson struggled on. ‘Governor Spencer’s named you, Horne, to sail to Madras to find the missing fellow.’

Horne forgot his concern for his superior’s health. ‘Governor Spencer orders me to Madras, sir?’ he asked.

Watson’s suety face flushed as he rose from the pillows, rasping with sudden irritation, ‘Dash it, Horne! How else can you pick up the scent of a man gone missing? You can’t play bloodhound from this side of the blasted country.’

‘No, sir. Of course not, sir.’ Horne remained sitting stiffly on the edge of his chair, his hat on his knee. The outburst told him that Watson’s condition might not be as fatal as he had feared.

Watson sank back on the divan. ‘True,’ he admitted, ‘the Governor ordered silence about your last trip to Madras. But now it seems they’re sending you to Fort St George in broad daylight. In an official capacity.’ He closed his eyes. ‘The Lord only knows what skulduggery they want you to do this time.’

It was no secret that Commodore Watson disapproved of the East India Company’s use of their Bombay Marine, and especially of Horne’s rag-tag squadron of ex-convicts. Horne viewed his deployment more realistically: the Honourable East India Company hired him to keep trading routes open, waters free of pirates and strife, enabling the Company to remain the largest, richest trading company in the world. Surely that made the Bombay Marine virtually mercenaries. He did not complain when he was treated as such.

He waited silently, feeling uncomfortably hot in his blue and gold uniform, with its silk shirt tight around his neck and breeches snug above the gleaming black horse-leather boots. The wide rattan sweeps of a ceiling fan pulled by the punkahwallah in a far corner did little to ease the room’s temperature.

The tempting aroma of cooking drifted through the cottage—roasting chicken, baking bread, stewing apples. Looking around the cluttered parlour, he considered he might very well be in England. The furnishings, the smells from the kitchen, even the small house’s name—Rose Cottage—suggested a way of life far removed from India. Yet he knew that outside the front door a narrow street led down to a thoroughfare busy with cedarwood palanquins, plodding elephants painted with indigo, women running behind bullocks with cupped hands to catch dung to burn as fuel in their hovels.

Watson drank some more water and set down the posy-painted tumbler, asking weakly, ‘What was I saying, Horne, before you interrupted me?’

‘You were telling me, sir, about a Company employee disappearing from Madras.’

‘Ah, yes. George Fanshaw.’

Horne made a note of the man’s name.

Watson resumed dabbing his forehead with the wet cloth. ‘George Fanshaw’s a purchasing agent. He buys cotton for merchants back in England. Less than three months ago he disappeared from Fort St George. The coffers came up short around the same time. Madras doesn’t think Fanshaw absconded to England with the money. Spencer has received word that Pigot and Vansittart want you to investigate a trail leading somewhere else.’

The power of the Honourable East India Company—in India, in 1762—was divided between three governors, Spencer of Bombay, Pigot of Madras, Vansittart of Bengal. In the past, Commodore Watson had been the buffer between Horne and the three governors, relaying their orders, passing on as many details as the governors allowed him to divulge, and occasionally telling Horne more than he was supposed to by using insinuation or supposedly irrelevant asides. Had the governors again muzzled Watson, leaving the Marines to hear the full facts at a later date from a senior source, even from one of the governors himself?

Horne tried for a few nuggets. ‘Sir, do the governors believe George Fanshaw’s still in India?’

‘You’ll receive full details when you reach Madras,’ came the grumpy reply.

Evidently there would be no hints during this meeting.

Stifling a cough, Watson explained, ‘You sail as soon as the Huma is seaworthy, Horne.’

The name took a few moments to penetrate Horne’s thoughts.

‘The Huma, sir?’

The stubble glistened on Watson’s chin, his lips parting in a smile. ‘Aye, Horne. The Huma. The Company’s given you your flying bird.’

‘The governors granted the Marine the Huma as a prize, sir?’

‘Your full command’s waiting aboard ship. You’ll know what you need to know at the time.’

‘But, sir. With all due respect, sir—’

Horne stopped. Either Watson was being deliberately evasive or he felt too ill to discuss the mission at length. Whatever the reason, there was no point in pursuing the matter.

Tempering his excitement, he replied honestly, ‘My gratitude, sir.’

Watson had turned his mind to more practical details. ‘Do you know where to find your men, Horne?’

‘Yes, sir.’ Horne’s excitement clouded. ‘I do, sir.’

‘What’s the problem? You sound hesitant.’

Horne did not want to divulge to Watson where his men were at this hour. Bareknuckle fighting was against Company regulations, forbidden for both civilian and military employees, even in sport. Nor did he want to confess that he himself—much to his shame—might have been attending the bareknuckle match at this very moment if Watson had not summoned him to Rose Cottage.

Horne’s reticence piqued Watson’s curiosity. His bushy eyebrows knitted as he turned his head on the pillows, asking, ‘Are you certain you know where to find your men, Horne?’

‘Yes, sir,’ answered Horne. ‘I’m in regular contact with my Marines as well as the men who served as crew aboard the Huma, sir.’

Watson’s jowls puffed. ‘Then round up all the devils, Horne. The Huma’s being provisioned at this very hour and—’

A cough silenced him. He struggled to raise himself, groping for his tumbler of water, the other hand grasping at his throat.

Horne sprang to his feet.

At the same moment, a diminutive woman in a lace bonnet and fluttering shawl hurried into the parlour.

Watson waved away his wife, complaining, ‘Dash it, woman. Don’t coddle me. I’m fine. I’m fine.’

Mrs Watson turned her kind face to Adam Horne. ‘Excuse me, Captain Horne, but the Commodore must rest.’

‘Of course, Mrs Watson. By all means, ma’am.’

‘But you’re welcome to come back and join us at table if the Commodore—’ Her voice trailed off as she looked for confirmation from her husband.

Horne smelled the roast chicken and baking apples. The idea of a crusty English loaf, rather than another pile of Indian chapatis, greatly tempted him to seize upon the kind lady’s invitation. But glancing at Watson and seeing his grimace, he quickly answered, ‘Thank you, ma’am, but I have pressing duties to attend to.’

From his couch, Watson rasped, ‘Take your last look at me, Horne. I’ll be six feet under the earth when you return to Bombay.’

Horne refrained from joining Mrs Watson in chiding the Commodore for his pessimism. Yet, leaving Rose Cottage, he wondered how serious the man’s condition really was.

* * *

‘What a nice young man Captain Horne is, dear.’

‘A cold-hearted rogue.’

‘Perhaps he needs a wife to mellow him.’

‘Adam Horne was betrothed to marry a young lady in London.’

‘And he absconded? Oh dear!’

‘No, no. A band of hooligans set upon the poor lass one night in Covent Garden and murdered her in cold blood. That’s why Horne came out to India. Heartbroken and bitter.’

‘How dreadful. That must be the reason he has such sad brown eyes.’

Mrs Watson sent her Tamil servant to pull the parlour shutters, darkening the small room in an attempt to help her husband take a nap. The Commodore refused to see Dr Young who served the European community in Bombay, insisting that his sickness was no more than a mild bout of coup de soleil. Yet he was too weak to go to his office at Bombay Castle, or even to dress to receive Adam Horne. Her husband’s lack of energy troubled her; he was not a person to lie around the house, definitely not a man to receive subordinates in such an informal manner. She worried that his history of gin drinking might be taking some toll on his health.

Working on a square of embroidery as she sat by her husband’s divan, she said, ‘Dear, you should have insisted that Captain Horne join us for dinner. We always have more than enough food.’

Watson jerked awake. ‘Hmmm? What’s that?’

‘Nothing, dear. Nothing. Just me chattering.’

Mrs Watson went on with her needlework, remembering that her niece would soon be arriving from England. As she pictured the spirited young lady, her thoughts returned to Adam Horne; perhaps she should give a small reception where two young people could meet without either of them suspecting they were being foisted upon one another. If anybody could pull the dashing young Marine captain out of his shell it would be Emily Harkness.

Chapter Two

FIST OF OAK

Adam Horne passed the row of East India Company warehouses lining the Bombay waterfront and hurried across a rope and wood footbridge connecting the dockyards to the native bazaar built on the marshlands. The sun was blazing high in the sky and Horne felt the heat prickle through his woollen uniform. As he stepped from the footbridge onto the embankment, he longed to rip open the gold buttons and free himself from the high-collared jacket, the stifling shirt and restricting waistband. A meeting with Commodore Watson was one of the rare times in Marine service when he donned the heavy frock-coat and breeches copied from the officer’s dress of His Majesty’s Royal Navy. Still, he would not have to endure the discomfort for much longer. Soon he would be shirtless, wearing dungri breeches, standing barefoot on the quarterdeck of the Huma and inhaling raw salty air, and meanwhile he was in a hurry.

Despite his disapproval of today’s fight between his Marine, Fred Babcock, and an Asian seaman, Horne did not want to miss the match. He frowned inwardly as he remembered how Babcock had become involved in the challenge at a waterfront beer shop. He had been arguing about bareknuckle fighting, boasting that the English were champions of all pugilists. The other men in the beer shop had been seamen off a Malagasy raiding boat. One of the raiders had challenged the loud-mouthed Babcock to a fight, and Horne had no power on shore to prevent the fight from taking place.

The harbour marketplace was crowded with hawking pedlars, herdsmen in brightly coloured headdresses, dhoolie bearers carrying veiled women peering through curtains. Horne moved through the din of shrill voices and jangling bells, momentarily forgetting about Fred Babcock’s fight as he mulled over the meeting he had left a few minutes ago at Rose Cottage.

Elated at being granted the Huma, Horne wondered if he would have command of the frigate merely to sail to Madras. Would it now be his official command?

And what about the mission? Would there be sealed orders aboard ship disclosing more details, or would he have to wait until Madras to hear where the Governors suspected their missing employee might have fled? The man must have disappeared with a great deal of money for the Governors to be sending the Bombay Marine after him.

First, though, there was work to accomplish here in port. The Huma was being provisioned at this very moment, Watson had explained. It was therefore vital to ensure that there was no cheating. A baker’s dozen might be thirteen, but a naval storeman’s dozen too often counted eleven, ten, nine …

The sound of wailing recalled Horne to his surroundings.

To his left, he saw a field stretching between the tented bazaar stalls and a clay hovel. In the centre, a circle of people sat cross-legged around a cluster of flopping vultures. Looking more closely and seeing that the vultures were fighting over—pulling apart—a human corpse, Horne realised he was witnessing a Parsi funeral.

Parsis were Indians who believed that to bury their dead in the earth—or to cremate a body by fire or inter it in the sea—was to defile those earthly elements with carrion. The Parsi mourners held one another’s hands as they sat around the funeral altar, chanting prayers as the vultures voraciously tore apart the decayed flesh, the birds gorging themselves on the human feast, flopping away when they were glutted.

Horne quickened his pace, checking his disapproval of the Indian tradition as he remembered how the Parsis criticised Europeans for burying their dead in the earth. Did it really matter whether a body was eaten by vultures or by worms?

By association, his thoughts returned to Commodore Watson’s remarks about being dead and buried when Horne returned from Madras.

Was Watson really so ill? If so, what was the cause? He had not seemed feverish, or no more than Horne himself in this stifling weather. In this woollen frock-coat.

Horne thought of the English world which the Watsons had recreated in India, the cozy nest they had built in the Old Church quarters, with its rural British atmosphere and homely smells. Horne himself had been in India for how long? Eight years. How European had he remained? Had he become easternised without noticing the changes in himself? His rooms near Bombay Castle were as simple as the cell of a hermit priest; no more than a place to sleep, a station to await the next command.

His commands had been few: first aboard the Eclipse which had been destroyed in a storm off the Coromandel Coast; latterly on the Huma, the frigate he had captured from pirates in the past year. Neither ship had afforded him the luxuries enjoyed by the officers of His Majesty’s