The Flag of Freedom (21 page)

‘And what of the hands? You said you had plans to increase their number.'

‘I did. I will disclose them to you in a moment. But first, I think this calls for a celebration.' He produced a hip flask and, after wiping out the dregs of their coffee with a napkin, poured a generous quantity into each of their cups.

‘I would much rather have breakfast at this time of the morning,' Nathan informed him ungraciously as he peered into the colourless liquid gracing his cup.

‘And so you shall, so you shall. But first let us drink to the success of our present venture.'

They clinked their cups together and Nathan sipped cautiously. Not cautiously enough, however, for the fiery liquid caught at the back of his throat and near choked him.

‘What in God's name is it?' he demanded, when he had got his breath back.

‘Vodka,' Imlay replied, amiably. ‘A Russian drink not unlike gin but much purer in content, I am told. Possibly it is an acquired taste.'

Certainly Imlay seemed to have acquired it, for though it caused him to shudder it was with every evidence of enjoyment. ‘It is customary to smash the glass after a toast,' he said, ‘but as we have only two cups between us, I give you the
Jean-Bart
and all who sail in her.'

‘Wait. We cannot call her the
Jean-Bart
.'

‘Why not?' Imlay's cup was poised in mid-air.

‘Because that is what she was called when she was in the French service. They may not know her by sight, but they may very well know the name –
and
that she was taken prize by the British.'

‘I had not thought of that. So what shall we call her?'

Nathan considered. The naming of a ship was not to be taken lightly.

‘What about the
Swallow
?' he proposed.

‘The
Swallow
?' Imlay mused. ‘Well, it is an elegant bird – and swift.'

‘It is also a sign of hope, in the maritime world, of a sailor's return,' Nathan said. ‘For the swallow, I am told, always returns to its own home, no matter how long its absence and how far the journey.'

He was suddenly overwhelmed by a wave of melancholy so desolate he was scarcely aware of Imlay's response.

‘So, the
Swallow
it is.' Imlay raised his cup once more. ‘A successful voyage, and a safe return – to whatever we think of as home.'

T
he life of a slave girl in an Ottoman harem was not so very different from the life of a nun, Caterina reflected, except that you prayed less, ate more, and bathed a great deal more frequently. And though it might have surprised a few people of her acquaintance in Venice, you never saw a man, not even the shadowy figure of a father confessor through a grille.

At other times she was reminded of her childhood, tending to her father's sheep in the hills.

It was rather more enclosed, of course. You never saw the sky, or the sun, or the moon and the stars – all you saw was their light through the narrow windows, high above your head, or reflected off the tiled walls or in the play of shadows on the stone floors. You could not smell the herbs crushed beneath your bare feet or breathe the sun-baked earth and the fresh, clean air. But there was
the same sense of timelessness – of endless days of quietude, and boredom, and loafing around with very little to do. Except watch sheep. And the women of the harem were very like sheep, in Caterina's view, except that they were lazier, and sillier, and a great deal more inclined to petulance.

Caterina's understanding of the word ‘harem' was that it meant a safe haven, a forbidden place, sacred and inviolable. In the best of them, the women were educated and trained, not only in the skills of being a wife and mother, but in diplomacy and statecraft. Certain of the women of the Sultan's harem in Topkapi had achieved so great an influence they had become the effective rulers of the Empire.

The harem of Yusuf Pasha, however, was not quite in this exalted category.

The
seraglio
– the living quarters of the harem – occupied a labyrinth of rooms on two floors along one side of the castle, facing towards the sea. Not that the sea was very much in evidence. Sometimes, you could smell it. And in some of the rooms you could hear it, especially at night, the soft murmuring of waves on shingle; the sound of freedom. But you could not see it. Not if you were a slave.

There were about thirty women in the harem, not counting the hostages, and about a dozen young children. It took Caterina a while to sort out who they were and how they were related, and even after six months, some of these attachments were still puzzling to her.

It quickly became apparent, however, that there was a fairly strict hierarchy and a shifting system of alliances.

At the top of the pecking order was the Pasha's mother, Lilla Kebierra, a faded blonde beauty with an air of tragedy about her, and a withered hand like a claw which she normally kept hidden within her robes.

It was some time before Caterina learned that her hand was not withered but shattered – smashed by a pistol ball fired by her son, the present Pasha, when she had had tried, unsuccess fully, to prevent him from murdering his elder brother. And to make it even worse, this terrible crime had been committed within the sanctuary of the harem itself. There was a room which no one ever entered where the murder had been committed, and it was even said that the floor and furnishings were still soaked in the blood of the murdered prince.

Lilla Kebierra had apparently forgiven Yusuf Pasha this atrocity, or was at least officially reconciled with him. But then, as Caterina's informants told her, what choice did she have?

But although Lilla Kebierra was the official doyen of the harem, the real power lay with the Pasha's wives.

There were two of them. Lilla Hadrami and Lilla Hamdouchi. Lilla Hadrami was white and Lilla Hamdouchi was black. Otherwise, so far as Caterina was concerned, there was not a great deal to choose between them in terms of spite and petty-mindedness.

They were reckoned to be great beauties – at least by the standards of Ottoman high society, if not by Caterina – and they preferred to be surrounded by beautiful things, provided such things could in no way be construed as a threat.

Caterina and Louisa came into this favoured category.
They were without any obvious physical defects or deformities, but far too thin to be considered alluring by the Pasha or any of his important male familiars, in the opinion of the wives. This qualified them as handmaidens. So instead of being confined to the role of skivvies – working in the kitchens or cleaning out the bedchambers and the privies – the two women spent a great deal of their time in attendance on the wives and their immediate family circle.

Beneath these close relatives was an amorphous layer of ‘dependants' who were either vaguely related to the Pasha or were the wives and mothers of men he had murdered and for whom he had generously taken responsibility. Their role seemed to be to look after the spoiled brats that passed for children and to organise and discipline the servants.

The servants were the next layer. They were either Arabs or Africans and they were exclusively Moslem. Beneath them, at the very bottom of the heap, were the slaves, who were all Christian, of course, and did the most menial tasks. There had been four of them before the arrival of the hostages – all Italians – and they became Caterina's chief informants.

It was through them that she learned why Lilla Kebierra's left hand resembled a claw and why her hatred of Lilla Hadrami and Lilla Hamdouchi was only surpassed by their hatred of each other.

For if Lilla Kebierra was unable or unwilling to be revenged upon her son, she had no such reservations about his wives. Most of the time she kept her feelings as closely hidden and as clenched as her shattered hand, but she did
everything she could to make their lives difficult, if not impossible. The two wives distracted themselves from this torment by tormenting each other. And all cloaked in silk and satin and smiles.

So all things considered, the harem of Yusuf Pasha was not so very different from your average convent in Venice.

The problem, from Caterina's point of view, was that she was no longer in a position of authority. And though she was a natural-born conspirator, her opportunities in the closed world of the harem were strictly limited. She could not use her beauty to the same devastating effect as she had in the past; she was a despised Christian; and most difficult of all, she could not speak the language, for though she spoke Spanish and Latin, and French and English almost as well as her native Venetian, she had never learned Turkish or Arabic. There was not the call for it in Venice. And without the books she was unable to master more than a few basics.

The only books available in the harem were of a religious nature, and most of them were in Arabic. There was one Latin translation of the Qur'an – made by Father Ludovico Marracci of Padova – and Caterina did apply herself to this for a while, for she was a great believer in the maxim
Know Thine Enemy
– but in truth it did not tell her a great deal that was useful to her, and as a form of diversion it was not remotely comparable to the amusements that had been available to her in the convent.

She learned much from the four Italian girls, however, and conversed a great deal with Louisa in English. The two captives made as thorough an exploration of the seraglio as was possible, but without finding any obvious
means of escape. The only way in and out was through a great oak door that was almost permanently locked; the only times Caterina saw it open – for the admission of supplies – she noted the heavily armed guards in the corridor outside. There were plenty of windows, but they were set high in the walls, and without a rope and a grappling hook, impossible of access. On the other side of the walls was the sea – but it must be a 200-feet drop down the sheer walls of the Red Castle and the rock on which it was built. But the thought of the sea always gave Caterina hope. Though she had been born and bred in Verona she was, by nationality and inclination, a Venetian.

She conversed little with the other Venetians. There were nineteen of them, all sharing the same crowded dormitory. They comprised four women from the highest strata of Venetian society, ten of their servants and dependants, and five children. The aristocrats treated Caterina with disdain, though they would not have done so in Venice. They knew of her reputation there – that she had been an actress and, some said, a courtesan before she had become a nun – and they resented the influence she had formerly possessed. Caterina was in no way disquieted. For the most part she ignored them as com pletely as they ignored her, and took a secret delight in seeing them trying to make beds or wash dishes in the kitchens. And yet she could not help but think that if they could only unite, they might achieve something. Together with herself and Louisa, and the four Christian slave girls, they numbered twenty adults. An uprising was not inconceivable. In her more sanguine moments, Caterina imagined them taking over the seraglio, locking
the other women in their rooms, scaling the walls and dropping down into the harbour. Then stealing a boat and sailing out to sea.

But those moments were fleeting.

The hostages were closely watched by the Moslem slaves at all times; even at night there was always one of these women on duty in their dormitory. At the slightest alarm Caterina had no doubt that the male guards would come rushing in, as they had at the behest of Yusuf Pasha when he had murdered his elder brother here. Besides, it was impossible for her to trust her fellow captives. Except Louisa.

The chains of slavery had strengthened the bonds forged by the two women on the
Saratoga
. It was as strong a relationship as Caterina had ever known with another woman. In the convent she had always felt a certain detach ment from the other nuns, perhaps even distrust, but she experienced a real sense of affection for and protectiveness towards Louisa. She was not sure why this was – perhaps some latent maternal instinct. Louisa had lost her mother quite recently and this made her vulnerable, needful of the advice and support of an older woman. But there was also a sharpness in Louisa, an intellect and a wit, that gave her a status in Caterina's eyes that the nuns of San Paolo had lacked. She made Caterina laugh.