the petitioners gathered at the foot of the broad steps that climbed to the house door. Lanterns hung from the coconut palms that arched over the yard, while from inside the big house yellow candlelight glimmered behind filigree shutters. Sharpe pushed as close to the house as he could, staying in the shadow of the palm trunks. Under the greasy cloak he had his cavalry sabre and a loaded pistol, though he hoped he would need neither weapon.
The merchant was called Panjit and he kept the petitioners and beggars waiting until he had eaten his evening meal, but then the house door was thrown open and Panjit, resplendent in a long robe of embroidered yellow silk, appeared on the top step. The petitioners called aloud while the beggars shuffled forward until they were driven back by the staves of the bodyguards. The merchant smiled then rang a small handbell to attract the attention of a brightly painted god who sat in a niche of the courtyard wall. Panjit bowed to the god, and then, in answer to Sharpe’s prayers, a second man, this one dressed in a red silk robe, emerged from the house door.
That second man was Nana Rao. He had a wide smile, and no wonder, for he was quite untouched by fire and, as Sharpe’s guinea had discovered, he was also first cousin of Panjit who was the merchant who had profited so greatly by owning the second warehouse that had replaced the goods supposedly destroyed in Nana Rao’s calamitous fire. It had been a slick deception, enabling the cousins to sell the same goods twice, and tonight, replete with their swollen profits, they were choosing which men would be given the lucrative job of rowing the passengers and their belongings out to the great ships that lay in the anchorage. The chosen men would be required to pay for the privilege, thus enriching Panjit and Nana Rao even more, and the two cousins, aware of their good fortune, planned to propitiate the gods by distributing some petty coins to the beggars. Sharpe was reckoning that he could reach Nana Rao in the guise of a supplicant, then throw off the filthy cloak and shame the man into returning his money. The competent-looking bodyguards at the foot of the steps suggested that his skimpy plan might prove more complicated than he envisaged, but Sharpe guessed Nana Rao would not want his deception revealed and so would probably be happy to pay him off.
Sharpe was close to the house now. He had noticed that the empty palanquin had been carried down a narrow and dark passage that led alongside the building, evidently giving access to a courtyard at the rear of the house, and he was considering going down the passage and coming back through the building to approach Nana Rao from the rear, but any of the beggars who ventured near the passage were beaten back by the bodyguards. The petitioners were being allowed onto the steps in small groups, but the beggars were expected to wait until the main business of the evening was over.
Sharpe suspected it would be a long night, but he was content to wait with his cloak hood pulled over his face. He squatted against the wall, watching for an opportunity to dash into the passageway beside the house, but then a servant who had been guarding the outer gate pushed through the crowd and spoke in Panjit’s ear. For an instant the merchant looked alarmed and a silence fell over the courtyard, but then he whispered to Nana Rao who just shrugged. Panjit clapped his hands and shouted at the bodyguards who energetically drove the petitioners back to form an open passage between the gate and the steps. Someone was plainly coming to the house and Nana Rao, nervous of their appearance, stepped into the black shadow at the back of the porch.
The way was clear now for Sharpe to go down the passage beside the house, but curiosity held him in place. There was a commotion in the alley, sounding like the jeers and scramble that always accompanied a band of constables marching through the lesser streets of London, then the outer gate was pushed fully open and Sharpe could only stare in astonishment.
A group of British sailors stood in the gate, led by a naval captain, a post captain no less, who was immaculate in cocked hat, blue frock coat, silk breeches and stockings, silver-buckled shoes and slim sword. The lantern light reflected from the heavy gold bullion of his twin epaulettes. He took off his hat, revealing thick blond hair, smiled and bowed. ‘Do I have the honour,’ he asked, ‘of coming to the house of Panjit Lashti?’
Panjit nodded cautiously. ‘This is the house,’ he said in English.
The naval captain put on his cocked hat. ‘I have come,’ he announced in a friendly voice that had a distinct Devonshire accent, ‘for Nana Rao.’
‘He is not here,’ Panjit answered.
The captain glanced at the red-robed figure in the porch shadows. ‘His ghost will do very well.’
‘I have answered you,’ Panjit said, defiance now making his voice angry. ‘He is not here. He is dead.’
The captain smiled. ‘My name is Chase,’ he said courteously, ‘Captain Joel Chase of His Britannic Majesty’s navy, and I would be obliged if Nana Rao would come with me.’
‘His body was burned,’ Panjit declared fiercely, ‘and his ashes have gone to the river. Why do you not seek him there?’
‘He’s no more dead than you or I,’ Chase said, then waved his men forward. He had brought a dozen seamen, all identically dressed in white duck trousers, red and white hooped shirts and straw hats stiffened with pitch and circled with red and white ribbons. They wore long pigtails and carried thick staves which Sharpe guessed were capstan bars. Their leader was a huge man whose bare forearms were thick with tattoos, while beside him was a Negro, every bit as tall, who carried his capstan bar as though it were a hazel wand. ‘Nana Rao’ – Chase abandoned the pretence that the merchant was dead – ‘you owe me a deal of money and I have come to collect it.’
‘What is your authority to be here?’ Panjit demanded. The crowd, most of whom did not understand English, watched the sailors nervously, but Panjit’s bodyguards, who outnumbered Chase’s men and were just as well armed, seemed eager to be loosed on the seamen.
‘My authority,’ Chase said grandly, ‘is my empty purse.’ He smiled. ‘You surely do not wish me to use force?’
‘Use force, Captain Chase,’ Panjit answered just as grandly, ‘and I shall have you in front of a magistrate by dawn.’
‘I shall happily appear in court,’ Chase said, ‘so long as Nana Rao is beside me.’
Panjit shook his hands as if he was shooing Chase and his men away from his courtyard. ‘You will leave, Captain. You will leave my house now.’
‘I think not,’ Chase said.
‘Go! Or I will summon authority!’ Panjit insisted.
Chase turned to the huge tattooed man. ‘Nana Rao’s the bugger with the moustache and the red silk robe, Bosun. Get him.’
The British seamen charged forward, relishing the chance of a scrap, but Panjit’s bodyguards were no less eager and the two groups met in the courtyard’s centre with a sickening crash of staves, skulls and fists. The seamen had the best of it at first, for they had charged with a ferocity that drove the bodyguards back to the foot of the steps, but Panjit’s men were both more numerous and more accustomed to fighting with the long clubs. They rallied at the steps, then used their staves like spears to tangle the sailors’ legs and, one by one, the pigtailed men were tripped and beaten down. The bosun and the Negro were the last to fall. They tried to protect their captain who was using his fists handily, but the British sailors had woefully underestimated the opposition and were doomed.
Sharpe sidled towards the steps, elbowing the beggars aside. The crowd was jeering at the defeated British seamen, Panjit and Nana Rao were laughing, while the petitioners, emboldened by the success of the bodyguards, jostled each other for a chance to kick the fallen men. Some of the bodyguards were wearing the sailors’ tarred hats while another pranced in triumph with Chase’s cocked hat
