“Señores,” she said, curtsying despite the tray, and deposited it on the desk. “Cerveza, vino rústico, y un poco comida: moros y cristianos”—she unlidded one of the dishes, loosing a savory steam—“maduros”—that was fried plantains; Grey was familiar with those—“y pulpo con tomates, aceitunas, y vinagre!”
“Muchas gracias, Inocencia,” Malcolm said, in what sounded like a surprisingly good accent. “Es suficiente.” He waved a hand in dismissal, but instead of leaving, she came round the desk and knelt down, frowning at his mangled leg.
“Está bien,” Malcolm said. “No te preocupes.” He tried to turn away, but she put a hand on his knee, her face turned up to his, and said something rapid in Spanish, in a tone of scolding concern that made Grey raise his brows. It reminded him of the way Tom Byrd spoke to him when he was sick or injured—as though it were all his own fault, and he therefore ought to submit meekly to whatever frightful dose or treatment was being proposed—but there was a distinct note in the girl’s voice that Tom Byrd’s lacked entirely.
Malcolm shook his head and replied, his own manner dismissive but kindly, and laid his hand on the girl’s yellow head for a moment. It might have been merely a friendly gesture, but it wasn’t, and Grey stiffened.
The girl rose, shook her head reprovingly at Malcolm, and went out, with a hint of flirtation in the sway of her skirts. Grey watched the door close behind her, then turned back to Malcolm, who had plucked an olive out of one dish and was sucking it.
“Inocencia, my arse,” Grey said bluntly.
Malcolm’s normal complexion being brick red, he didn’t flush, but neither did he meet Grey’s eye.
“Quite the usual sort of names they give girls, the Spanish,” he said, discarding the olive pit and picking up a serving spoon. “You find young women called all kinds of things: Assumpción, Immaculata, Concepción…”
“Conception, indeed.” This was said in a tone cold enough to make Malcolm’s wide shoulders hunch a little, though he still wouldn’t look at Grey.
“They call this moros y cristianos—that means ‘moors and Christians’—the rice being Christians and the black beans Moors, d’you see?”
“Speaking of conception—and Quebec,” Grey said, ignoring the food—though it smelled remarkably good, “your son by the Indian woman…”
Malcolm did glance at him then. He looked back at his plate, finished chewing, swallowed, and nodded, not looking at Grey.
“Yes. I did make inquiries—once I was mended. They told me the child had died.”
That struck Grey in the pit of the stomach. He swallowed, tasting bile, and plucked a bit of something out of the dish of pulpo at random.
“I see. How…regrettable.”
Malcolm nodded, wordless, and helped himself liberally to the octopus.
“Was it quite recent, this news?” The shock had gone through him like an ocean breaker. He remembered vividly the day when he had taken the infant—the child’s mother having died of smallpox, he had bought the boy from his grandmother for a blanket, a pound of sugar, two golden guineas, and a small cask of rum—and carried him to the little French mission in Gareon. The boy had been warm and solid in his arms, looking up at him from round, unblinking dark eyes, as though trusting him.
“Oh. No. No, it was at least two years ago.”
“Ah.” Grey put the piece of whatever-it-was into his mouth and chewed slowly, the sense of shock fading into an immense relief—and then a growing anger.
Not a trusting man himself, he had given the priest money for the child’s needs and told him this payment would continue—but only so long as the priest sent Grey a lock of the child’s hair once a year, to prove his continued existence and presumed good health.
Malcolm Stubbs’s natural hair was sandy and tightly curled as sheep’s wool; when left to its own devices, it exploded from its owner’s head like a ruptured mattress. Consequently, Malcolm usually kept his head polled and wore a wig. He’d evidently been wearing one earlier but had taken it off and set it aside, and the inch of mad growth thus displayed strongly resembled the texture of the two small curls of dark cinnamon-colored hair that Grey had so far received from Canada, each one bound carefully with black thread and accompanied by a brief note of thanks and blessing from Father LeCarré—the latest, just before his departure for Jamaica.
The urge to bounce Malcolm’s head off the desk and shove him facedown into the pulpo was strong, but Grey mastered it, chewing the bite of octopus—very flavorful, but in texture reminiscent of an artist’s rubber—thoroughly before saying anything. He swallowed.
“Tell me about this slave revolt of yours, then.”
* * *
—
Malcolm did look at him now, considering. He nodded and reached, grunting, for the limp, bloodstained stocking hanging out of his artificial foot.
“We’ll go up to the battlements,” he said. “Not many of the servants speak any English—but that doesn’t mean none of them understand it. And they do listen at doors.”
Grey blinked as they emerged from the gloom of a stone stairwell into a pure and brilliant day, a blinding sky spinning with seagulls overhead. A stiff wind was coming off the water, and Grey removed his hat, tucking it under his arm lest it be carried away.
“I come up here several times a day,” Malcolm said, raising his voice above the wind and the shrieks of the gulls. He had wisely left his own hat and wig below in his office. “To watch the ships.” He nodded toward the expanse of the huge harbor, where several very large ships were anchored, these surrounded by coveys of smaller vessels, going to and from the shore.
“They’re beautiful,” Grey said, and they were. “But they’re not doing anything, are they?” All sails were furled, all port lids closed. The ships lay at anchor, rocking slowly in the wind, masts and spars swaying stark and black against the blue of sea and sky.
“Yes,” Malcolm said dryly. “Particularly beautiful when they’re not doing anything. That’s how I know the declaration of war hasn’t yet been received; if it had, the decks would be black with men, and the sails would be reefed, not furled. And that’s why I come up here morning, noon, and night,” he added.
“Yes,” Grey said slowly, “but…if in fact de Prado—that’s the commander of the forces here?—if he doesn’t know that war is declared,—why are these ships here already? I mean, plainly they’re men of war, not merchantmen. Even I know that much.”
Malcolm laughed, though without much humor.