at the man behind the desk. ‘And who, if I may ask, are you, sir?’
Del Garza stared at him while the other two guards took up position behind the Captain. Captain Alan Leighton was indeed a gentleman, the third son of a very minor nobleman whose family were willing to pay to get him out of the ancestral home; in other words, someone of less real use than the average dockwalloper or ditch-digger. And he would have been dismissed from either position for incompetence within a week. His commission and his ship had been bought for him, not earned, while better men had to wait. The Baron knew his type and despised him. He was a man who was just important enough to be a nuisance, and not important enough to have any real value.
‘I am the Governor,’ he said, his voice as flat and cold as a window in midwinter.
The captain shifted his feet and looked at him uncertainly. Del Garza was an ordinary enough looking man; rat-faced, and his dress was of simple if expensive weave.
‘Indeed?’ the Captain said dubiously.
‘Indeed,’ del Garza confirmed quietly. ‘Be seated, Captain Leighton.’ His nod indicated a stool in front of the desk.
The Captain looked at it, then at the acting governor in disbelief. ‘On that?’ he sneered. ‘The thing will collapse.’ Leighton turned to one of the guards. ‘You there, bring me a proper chair.’
Del Garza leaned forward. ‘Sit,’ he clipped out. ‘Or be seated.’
The two guards moved a step closer to the blustering seaman, ready to reach out and slam him down. For the first time Leighton actually looked at their faces; he blinked, and slowly sat down, his gaze moving from each of the men in the room to the next. ‘What is the meaning of this?’ he asked. His voice tried to carry the bluster, but there was a quaver in it now.
In answer, del Garza rubbed one hand over the stubble on his jaw and gave him the glance that a tired man would give a buzzing fly. Every irritation and annoyance from the day he had set foot in Krondor until this morning rose up and seemed to resolve itself in the person of this pitiful excuse for a sea captain. Del Garza decided at that instant that Leighton needed to pay for them all. ‘Can’t you guess?’ he asked through clenched teeth. ‘Can’t you even begin to guess?’
Leighton gazed at him like a mouse fascinated by a snake. ‘No,’ he said at last. He leaned back, remembered just in time that he was on a stool and frowned. Leaning forward, the Captain went on the attack. ‘I say, is this some form of joke? If so it is in very poor taste and I assure you I shall complain of it to your superior.’
‘Do I look as if I’m joking?’ del Garza asked. ‘Am I smiling? Am I, or my men, laughing? Does this seem to be an atmosphere of mirth and good-fellowship to you?’
Nervous perspiration dewed the Captain’s broad brow, his eyes shifted left and right. ‘No,’ he said and shook his head. ‘I suppose not.’ He straightened. ‘But I still do not know why I am here.’
‘You have been arrested for treason.’
Leighton shot to his feet, ignoring the guards who moved yet another step closer. ‘How dare you, sir? Do you know who I am?’
‘You are the noxious toad who took a bribe to break the blockade,’ del Garza said. ‘During wartime such an act can be nothing less than treason.’
‘I did no such thing!’ the captain insisted.
The Baron smiled. ‘Do you know how many fools have tried to lie to the Duke’s agents?’ he asked. He waved his hand casually at the two burly guards and at several other men whom he knew waited outside. ‘Usually their next remark is something on the order of: Stop! Gods, please stop!’
‘I admit that my ship floated off-station,’ Leighton blustered. ‘Such things happen occasionally, there’s nothing deliberate in it. An anchor bolt rusted through and the tide caught our bow. It was merely misfortune that it happened at that particular moment. When I heard the commotion I rose from my bed, came topside and corrected the situation at once. At the very worst it was dereliction of duty, though even that would be coming it a bit high under the circumstances.’
Del Garza raised his brows and leant back in the commander’s chair with his hands clasped over his lean stomach. ‘Indeed?’ he said.
‘Of course,’ Leighton said, allowing a touch of his former haughtiness to creep into his tone. ‘I tell you these things happen, ’tis no one’s fault, my good man. No one could have predicted that a ship would choose that particular moment to …’
‘We know the Upright Man bribed you.’ The acting governor waited for the explosion, but none came; the Captain merely stared at him, his mouth opening and closing like a gaffed fish. Not only guilty then, but the man had no spine. ‘What was it, the gold? Or some misplaced sense of loyalty to Prince Erland’s family?’
‘We have known them a long time …’ Leighton began.
Del Garza cut him off. ‘You may as well admit it, you know. We have proof.’
The Captain shook his head silently.
‘Oh, but we do,’ del Garza insisted. ‘We have our own sources inside the Mockers, you know.’
They didn’t, of course, have either – proof, or sources. But it was obvious to the secret policeman that the Mockers had an interest in freeing the Princess Anita. It was certainly Mockers he and his men had been fighting this morning. Besides, every instinct he had told him that it was beyond unlikely that a ship would just ‘happen’ to drift off-station at precisely the wrong moment.
The lie came easily though, because if del Garza was going to have to answer for Anita’s escape – and he was – then others would answer first and far more painfully.
Leighton licked his lips. ‘You could hardly call it treason,’ he said.
Del Garza leaned forward blinking rapidly, his brows raised incredulously. ‘Oh, yes,’ he said. ‘Taking a bribe deliberately to disobey orders during wartime could never be anything else.’
‘We are hardly at war with the Mockers,’ the Captain argued.
‘We are always at war with the Mockers,’ del Garza corrected, his voice flat. ‘That it has never been formally declared makes it no less a war. For if we were not at war with them, I assure you these thieves and murderers-for-hire are and have always been at war with the decent citizens of Krondor.’
‘They are hardly worthy …’ Leighton began.
‘Opponents?’ Del Garza sneered. ‘If their money is good enough for you then why shouldn’t they be considered … worthy?’
The Captain pressed his lips together and took a deep breath, then he straightened. ‘I should like to see this “proof” you claim to have.’
Del Garza chuckled, an impulse he couldn’t control. ‘Are you now going to claim innocence, after all but admitting your guilt?’
‘I have not admitted any guilt,’ the Captain said. ‘Come, come, you shall have to produce the proof at my trial.’
With a sad shake of his head the Baron asked: ‘Would you really put your family through the shame of a trial
