Perhaps, after all, the black dirk had been crafted by dark Umbrus Equitus magicians who infused it with a lust for blood, or perhaps I was stronger than I imagined, but throwing my weight into Sir Basil drove his own knife not back into the scabbard but between his ribs, and put the point into his side. With a soft cry the outlaw fell to the cobbles, and I stood with my dagger in my hand, and tried to work out a way to defeat the armored spearman who had come lunging at me out of the darkness.
The old man stood there in his big boots, his eyes growing wide as he saw Sir Basil lying at his feet, and then he threw down his spear, fell to his knees, and began to weep.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“ ‘Unhoused’ is good,” said I.
He grinned thinly. “It’s a new word. I made it up.” He coughed, and blood stained his teeth.
“Oh, my darling!” cried the old man. “My darling little boy!”
Sir Basil continued to direct his black, intent stare at me. “Who helped you to escape?”
“A lady,” said I.
He laughed and spat blood. “Some whore helped you, and you abandoned her in the camp. For no woman was missing.”
“I saw her last in Selford,” I said. “She fares better than I.”
“You left her. Do not deny it.” He grinned again. “I know what it is to be a heartless young man.”
“My poor, poor boy,” wept the old man. “My beautiful boy.”
Clanking soldiery approached, five men in half-armor under the command of a young officer, who frowned down at the strange scene revealed by the flickering light of torches: the man with his mortal wound, the old weeping man in his armor, I with my sword-hilted dagger in my hand. The officer touched his little mustache with his hand.
“Who is this, then?” he asked, his eyes on Sir Basil.
“That is Sir Basil of the Heugh,” I told him. “An infamous outlaw. The other fellow is one of his band.”
Sir Basil seemed amused by this description.
“And this is Goodman Quillifer,” he said. “A young man and an orphan, heartless though no longer penniless.”
The officer knew not what to make of this, and seemingly did not care. He looked down at the dirk still in the renegade’s side, then bent to examine it. He gently removed Sir Basil’s hand from the hilt, took a firm grip on the weapon, pulled it from the wound, and then seemed surprised and a little annoyed when blood gushed out.
Sir Basil’s black eyes flashed. “Damn you, you block-headed malt-horse,” he said. He snarled. “And damn all lawyers, and damn all gods.” His head fell back and he died, his lips still twisted in a fierce, contemptuous smile.
The officer straightened, the dirk still in his hand. “Be wary of that knife,” said I. “It’s supposed to be ensorcelled, and bloodthirsty.”
The officer looked at the knife and pursed his mouth in distaste. He handed it to one of his men. “Take care of this,” he said. The soldier looked at the weapon uncertainly, then bent to wipe it clean on Sir Basil’s coat before putting it in his belt.
The officer looked at me. “Is it your knife?”
“Nay, I have another. Sir Basil died on his own blade.”
“I’ll have your knife as well.”
I handed him my dagger. The old man’s spear was confiscated, as was the whinyard that hung at his waist.
And then he and I were marched off to the citadel, and each locked in a cell.
* * *
The citadel was under military governance, and the military being more scrupulous about cleanliness than bandits, there were no vermin in my cell. But the smells were still formidable, and I enjoyed confinement no more than I had in Sir Basil’s dungeon, the more so because I had to listen to the old man weeping all night. By morning, I was impatient to secure my release. But the officer did not come on duty till ten o’clock, and then he did little but take my name. I told him to contact the owner of the Meteor galleon, who would vouch for me, but he said something noncommittal and had me returned to the cell.
At least the old man had ceased to wail.
By midafternoon, I was brought into the presence of a provost, and I was relieved to see that both Kevin and Captain Oakeshott were present. The provost, a lanky man with a habit of twirling his long hair with ink-stained fingers, made me undergo a formal interrogation.
“The other prisoner has confessed,” he began, in a Bonillean drawl. “And he has identified the body as Sir Basil of the Heugh, which confirms your claim. This hearing is to determine whether or not you committed murder, or whether there were circumstances extenuant.”
I thought that extenuant irregular, as more properly the word was the third-person plural present active indicative of extenuo, and not meant as the provost intended. But I chose to view the usage as an idiosyncrasy, and decided to overlook it. Instead, I got straight to the point.
“I tried to capture him, and he tried to stab me. My own weapon is unbloodied, as you may observe yourself.”
The provost’s pen scratched on his crown paper. “I have no way of knowing which weapon was yours,” he observed.
“My friends should be able to testify to the matter,” said I.
“Let us start from the beginning,” said the provost.
The beginning proved to be my capture by the outlaw, my witnessing of one murder committed personally by Sir Basil, and another at his order. I told briefly of my escape, avoiding the subject of Orlanda, and then explained my business aboard Meteor, and the event that led to Sir Basil’s death.
The provost asked me to sign the statement, and then sighed. “I fear I must return you to your cell,” he said. “While I will not recommend prosecution, I have not the authority to release you. That is in the hands of Sir Andrew, the Lord Governor, who reserves all such decisions to himself.” He twirled a lock of his hair. “Indeed, justice in the Island is short these days, and Sir Andrew knows only two verdicts: death, and service in her majesty’s army.” He seemed amused. “You may hang, or you may trail the puissant pike. And lucky is the man who has the choice.”
“As a privateer,” said I, “I already serve her majesty.”
“You may plausibly make that argument,” said the provost, though his tone suggested that Sir Andrew was unlikely to view my reasoning with anything like favor.
Kevin joined me in my cell for a time, and had brought dinner and a bottle of wine in a basket. And so we made as merry as we could, Kevin on my bed and I on my upturned honey bucket, enjoying bread, butter, cheese, and little sweet sausages flavored with garlic, fennel, and honey, sausages I had last seen swinging from the overhead beams in Kevin’s sleeping cabin.
My distress relieved by the wine and Kevin’s kindness, I felt as easy as I could while locked and awaiting justice in a cold room of blackened brick. I was on my last cup of wine, and determined to savor it, and so I let it dwell on my tongue for a long moment, and then swallowed. When I looked up, I found Kevin looking at me with mingled curiosity and concern.
“I wonder,” said he, “if all this is not the doing of—of the lady we dare not mention.” For I had told him of my latest doings with Orlanda, and the threats she made at Kingsmere and Innismore.