The Pyrates: A Swashbuckling Comic Novel by the Creator of Flashman

Author:George MacDonald Fraser [Fraser, George MacDonald]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Pirates, Action & Adventure, Humorous, General, Fantasy, Suspense, Historical, Fiction
ISBN: 9781585748006
Google: vR176pmACXoC
Publisher: Globe Pequot
Published: 1983-01-02T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER

THE TWELFTH

elvet night shed its peace o'er the Viceregal Palace. The great ballroom lay deserted, naught remained of Xavier Cugat and his Orchestra save a faint aroma of hair-oil and a solitary shattered maraca, pale moonlight shone through archways on empty corridors and silent stairways, continental breakfast orders hung outside bedroom doors, and even the mice were lapping it up in their nests. It can't last, though; soon no one will be getting a wink of sleep, for e'en now a fracas is breaking out in the wine-cellar, with muffled oaths and blows and excited cries in Spanish, and the unmistakable noises of people wrestling in yellow Chartreuse. Follows dread silence, and presently a thin, distant wail of agony; and now the footsteps of a female in drag running in frantic haste as a pale figure flits through the guest wing, sobbing in terror …

Avery awoke to sounds of scratching at his chamber door, and sprang nimbly from his pit, teeth clenched and eyes blazing – had he or had he not put out a Do Not Disturb notice, and here they were wanting to make up the room at 4 a.m! He flung open the door wrathfully, and a lithe stripling tumbled in and clung to him, gasping:

“Oh, Capeetan Ben, Capeetan Ben! All eez lost! You are lumbaired, an' we mus' flee! Queekly – thaire eez no time to lose!”

Realising almost instantly that it was not a chambermaid but Meliflua, the captain drew her in, closed the door, and strove to calm her as she collapsed on the bed and panted out her tale.

Having absconded from the ballroom earlier, she had wandered the grounds in a dazed condition for some hours, until challenged by a patrol of guards. Darting into a low doorway, she had found herself in a cellar occupied by a drunken dwarf and a slumbering red-bearded giant (at which news Avery's eyes narrowed to steely slits, and he stroked his chin as he mumured: “Firebeard and Goliath – ha!”). Hiding behind a barrel, she had seen the guards lay hold of them, and from the obscenities they uttered she had judged them English. Not that the giant had put up much resistance, for—

“'E was plastaired out of eez min', but thee dwarf 'e struggled an' called them bloddy Dagoes. Then presen'lee, that deezgusteeng Don Lardo an' the greaseball Enchillada come, een their night attire, an' they take thee two Eengleesh to the torture chamber. Thees I see through a leetle barred weendow. Thee giant they chain up, an' the midget 'e squeal an' say eef they let 'eem go 'e will tell them beeg news. So Don Lardo laff an' say, ‘Let's 'ear eet, shortie’, an' the dwarf 'e say 'e 'ave seen you fight weeth Capeetan Beelbo, an' you are not Don Espresso at oll, but thee faymoos Capeetan Avery, an' Eengleesh 'eretic pirate – wheech is true, as I know.”

“I see,” said Avery. “And did they release the dwarf?”

“No!” Donna Meliflua shuddered piteously. “They

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