Chapter 235: Uncultured Swine

Moonlight came through the shutters and laid silver stripes across the four-poster. The netting hung looped over one post where James had shoved it aside, and one washstand in the corner held a dish of rings, all of them shining for nobody.

Behind him the tall door was shut, and James would have wagered the Rose that two women had their ears pressed against it.

Ambrosio slept on his back with his mouth hanging open, snoring like a sow in a sty.

James put himself on his chest like a hen on a nest. His knees planted themselves in the blanket over both arms and his bad arm stayed tucked against his ribs, a knife there.

Hobbs had forbidden him to swing a blade. Idly holding one, James figured, was close enough to medicine.

His good hand hovered over Ambrosio’s throat.

The famous mustache had wilted into two limp black commas. His bare fingers lay on the blanket like sausages no one had been foolish enough to buy.

James let the moment go on.

Then the snore caught on and stopped.

Ambrosio’s eyes opened on James’s face, a hand’s breadth away, grinning at him like an open gunport. The scream reached his lips and went no farther, as James’s good hand slapped over his mouth and shoved it back down his throat.

"Here’s Johnny."

He said it softly, almost sweetly, leaning close enough that his breath stirred what remained of the mustache.

Then animal terror spread across Ambrosio’s face, and even a whimper leaked into James’s palm.

"Nothin’?" James waited. "Not even a wee laugh?"

He sighed as though deeply disappointed.

"Never met a more uncultured bastard in me life."

He bounced once for emphasis, and the breath went out of Ambrosio in a wheeze.

"Now listen close, Don."

James leaned nearer, and the sling brought his bad hand along with him. The flat of the knife lay against Ambrosio’s throat, cold as a gravedigger’s spade.

He kindly informed. "I’m takin’ me hand off your mouth. If you shout, I open you, breastbone to belt, slow, the way a butcher opens a hog, so your guts slide out in a heap and you get to watch ’em steam."

Ambrosio nodded so fast the bedposts rattled.

James lifted his hand away, but the knife stayed where it was.

The Don drew one shuddering breath.

Then he whispered. "Señor Azote. Please, we are men of business, you and I, whatever offense I have given can be put right. Gold, the warehouses on the wharf, every one open to you. Name the sum, señor, and it is done, simple enough, this part."

James repeated warmly, savoring the words like wine. "Simple enough, this part. ’Sit, señor,’ you once said. ’Tell me what misfortune brought a man like you so far from home.’"

He bounced again, gently. "Well, I’m sat, Don. The misfortune’s you. Go on, pour us a drink, like civilized men. I’d do it myself, but as you can see I’m a wee occupied."

He raised his good hand and began counting. "Wine, that’s one. You lifted your glass, I lifted mine, your boy whispered in your ear, and you went cold as a cod. ’Regretfully, señor.’ Never got a drop past me teeth, wasted it on your guard’s face."

One more finger rose. "Two, you put my lass in a cell on a smugglin’ charge you made up from the first word to the last. Then you stood in front of the Governor and said your proof was ’plain as...’"

James cocked his head. "And she cut you off, remember? ’Plain as what, gordo?’ It’s been botherin’ me for days. Plain as what, Don?"

Ambrosio’s lips quivered. Nothing came out.

"Plain as a pig’s arse, I’d have said. Three."

The third finger rose, and the fat man’s eyes crossed trying to follow it. "And you told Vicente de Raja you put a shot in me shoulder. I was there, Don, the shot came from above, some lad on a roof with a steady hand. Last I saw of you, you were rollin’ round the cobbles like a cask off a cart. I betcha couldn’t hit the sea from a rowboat."

James looked him over, from the drooping mustache to the bare, pudgy fingers. "Where’s your wax, hero? Where’s your rings? You look like a goose that was plucked naked."

Ambrosio’s whisper climbed toward a wail. "Ships! I have four at the wharf, take all four! I have friends in every port from Cartagena to Veracruz! ¡Por Dios, señor, eighty thousand reales! Double the bounty, it is in the strongbox downstairs, every coin, I will open it with my own..."

He pissed himself.

It came with a long, shameful sigh, hot enough to soak through the blanket and into the cloth beneath James’s knee, and the sharp reek followed. Under the bed, the chamber pot sat where it had been all night, apparently of no use to anybody.

James looked at the spreading stain, and his shoulders began to shake. He bit the same cheek he’d chewed raw in the gallery and tasted iron.

"Christ, Don. You’ve pissed the bed, and me kneelin’ in it."

He wheezed. "Double the bounty. So you sell me for forty thousand and buy me back for eighty. Fine head for numbers, shame about the bladder."

Ambrosio wept, sweat and tears running together into the pillow. "A hundred thousand! And the ships, and the..."

James lifted the knife clear. His open hand cracked across the fat cheek.

The man’s head rocked sideways into the pillow, and the limp mustache slapped back across his own face when it came around again.

James told him cheerfully. "I’ve heard better offers from drownin’ men, and they were only askin’ for a rope."

"¡Ay! ¡Madre de Dios!"

Ambrosio reeled, more surprised than hurt. His cheek bloomed red in the moonlight. He blinked, swallowed, and gathered what little dignity he had left.

"You are a dead man, señor, and I am the only one that can help you."

The English came out crisp again, absurd in that soaked bed. "The Governor is enraged by this unrestricted filthy blockade. The garrison, every soldier in Havana, the Crown’s justice, all of Spain will fall on you..."

James nodded, counting it off.

"The Governor. The garrison. The Crown’s justice. All of Spain."

He leaned closer, friendly as a chandler pricing rope. "Here’s mine. I put this city armada on the bottom of its own bay not a week gone, in clear sight of your own forts. Then I strolled across your city, over your wall, up your gallery, and into your bed, and nobody so much as cleared their throat."

He looked down at Ambrosio.

"Do I look to you bloody afraid of consequences?"

Ambrosio’s eyes trembled.

"Señor... the Governor..."

The second slap cracked across the other cheek, making the pair match.

"Regretfully, Don," James said. "I heard you the first time."

The courtly merchant now lay in a soaked bed with two red cheeks, his arms twitching uselessly beneath James’s knees. Thin, high squeaks leaked from him, exactly as promised.

James laid two fingers over the trembling lips, gentle as a nurse hushing a babe.

"Shh. Nearly done, Don."

He raised his voice just enough to carry.

"Lasses."

The door swung open immediately, Bert holding the latch with a courteous little bow.

Milagros and Esperanza came through shoulder to shoulder, and the doorway barely looked wide enough for both of them. Their eyes shone bright and hungry in the moonlight, and whatever patience they had brought with them was gone.

Esperanza cracked her knuckles one at a time.

Ambrosio saw them, and the squeaks climbed into a whistle.

James clicked his tongue. He wouldn’t help that pig for all the reales Ambrosio had left to promise.