Exploits (16 page)

“I am afraid you have the advantage of me, Mr...?”

“Reverend, ma'am,” I said. “The Right Reverend Doctor Lucifer Jones at your service, fresh from risking life and limb to save Geoffrey Bainbridge from a tiger attack.”

“My goodness!” she said. “Is he all right?”

“The doctors say he'll be up and around in a couple of months,” I said.

“How did it happen?”

“Well, it's a long story, ma'am, and being the modest Christian gentleman that I am I hate to set myself up as a fearless hero what dragged poor Geoffrey from the jaws of death and dispatched a tiger with my bare hands, so it's probably best left untold.” I paused. “I do bring a message from him, though.”

“What is it?” she asked.

“Due to the delicate nature of one of his injuries, he regrets to inform you that he's no longer on the marriage market, and he hopes you'll understand and won't think no less of him for it.”

“The poor man!” she said. “We wondered what happened to him when he didn't show up for lunch after the hunt.”

“He was probably preoccupied with bleeding to death at the time,” I said. “It was just a stroke of providence that I came by when I did.”

“You must tell me all about it,” she said.

“Well, I'd enjoy doing so, Lady Edith, but Geoffrey ain't the only one what missed out on lunch, and I think now that I've delivered his tragic message to you, I'd best be getting back to town to hunt up some dinner.”

“Nonsense,” she said. “You will have dinner here, with us, Reverend Jones. It's the very least I can do for such a noble and courageous man.”

“Well, I'd surely like to, Lady Edith,” I said, “but I also ain't got no place to stay, and I'd better scare me up a room before all the hotels are sold out for the night.”

“I won't hear of it,” she said. “I'll have my servants make up a room for you right now.”

“I couldn't impose on you like that, ma'am,” I protested. “Even though I give all my money to the poor, I usually hold enough back to rent a cot in some flophouse.”

“You're staying here, and that's all there is to it,” she said firmly.

Well, I spent a couple of more minutes letting her argue me into it, and then I went up to my room and freshened up a bit. When my stomach told me that it was dinnertime, I opened the door and started walking down the hall to the big winding staircase that lead to the main floor and the dining room, when I bumped into a familiar-looking figure coming out of his own room.

“Doctor Jones!” said Rupert Cornwall. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Howdy, Brother Rupert,” I greeted him. “You still on the run from Inspector Willie Wong?”

He put a finger to his lips. “I must ask you to be more discreet,” he said, which I took to be an affirmative.

“No problem at all, Brother Rupert,” I said. “But just out of curiosity, what's Hong Kong's most notorious criminal kingpin doing hiding out in Lady Edith's house?”

He grabbed me by the shoulder and pulled me into his room, then closed the door behind us. “I'm not hiding out, Doctor Jones,” he said. “In point of fact, I'm here to press my suit upon her.”

“Sounds painful,” I said. “Wouldn't an ironing board do just as well?”

“You misunderstand,” said Rupert. “I'm courting Lady Edith.”

“So
you're
the guy who pushed Geoffrey Bainbridge out of the howdah,” I said.

“How did you know that?” he demanded.

“I happened along just in time to save him from getting et by a tiger.”

“You mean he's here right now?” asked Rupert, a kind of wild look about his eyes.

“No, he'll be indisposed for the next couple of months.”

Rupert kind of chuckled at that. “Good!” he said. “I'll have her married long before then.”

“Well, now, I sure wouldn't count on it, Brother Rupert,” I said.

He stared at me kind of suspiciously. “Why not?”

“You might say that another player just entered the game,” I answered.

“You?” he sneered. “You haven't got a chance with her.”

“Well, that remains to be seen, don't it?” I said.

“I want you to know that I resent your intrusion, Doctor Jones,” he said. “I'm the one who found this set-up. I think it's very unfair of you to come along now and try to horn in after I've laid all the romantic groundwork.”

“Before you get to feeling too righteous, Brother Rupert,” I said, “let me remind you that I'd still be in Hong Kong spending our ill-gotten gains if some criminal kingpin had played square with me.”

“That was just business,” he said innocently. “Surely a man of the world like yourself doesn't hold that against me.”

“
This
is just business too, Brother Rupert,” I said. “I'll make you a deal, though: I won't tell her how and where we met if you don't.”

“I agree,” he said. “And may the best man win.”

“Especially if he's a handsome, God-fearing Christian missionary,” I added.

We left his room then and went down the stairs to dinner, where we were joined by Lady Edith and maybe a dozen other house guests, most of them titled and all of them very old and very British. Afterward I recounted how I had pulled this raging tiger off poor Geoffrey Bainbridge's torn and tattered body and choked the life out of it, and when Lady Edith insisted that I stay over for a week or two, I shot Rupert a triumphant grin and figured that the Flame of Bharatpur was as good as mine.

We were up bright and early the next morning, and Lady Edith offered to show me around the place. She was dressed in her walking britches, and looking vigorous as all get-out, and she set a mighty fast pace, pointing out all her various flowers that had won prizes in flower shows. Then we visited the stables, and I saw her prize-winning horses, and after that we went to the kennels, where I saw her prize-winning dogs, and by the time we got to the barn to look at her prize-winning cattle and her prize-winning pigs I began to get the impression that Lady Edith was more than a little bit on the competitive side.

“I show them all over the continent,” she said, pointing to a pair of bulls who were snorting to beat the band and looked like they wanted nothing more than a matador breakfast. “This one even took a first in England last year before I imported him.”

One of the pigs started squealing, and she walked over and petted him. “This is Sylvester, my pride and joy,” she confided to me. “He's won prizes in five different countries.”

Well, I looked at Sylvester, and Sylvester looked at me, and all I could think was that he'd go mighty well with fried eggs and maybe some hash-brown potatoes, but I didn't want to offend Lady Edith, so I allowed that Sylvester was about the prettiest pig I'd ever seen. That seemed to satisfy her, and we moved along past the ducks and the chickens, most of which had blue ribbons tacked up next to their coops, and finally we finished the tour and returned to the house. “It's such a lovely day, why don't we have breakfast on the terrace?” she suggested.

Well, that suited me fine, since it meant I wouldn't have to share her company with my rival, and I followed her to a glass table with an umbrella over it. We sat down, and a couple of servants appeared from nowhere to serve us tea and little biscuits, and then they vanished again, and just as I was trying to figure out the best way to start charming her, she turned to me and reached her hand out for mine.

“I'm so glad you decided to stay, Lucifer,” she said.

Well, I'd had ladies fall in love with me before, but never quite that fast, and I figured this was going to be even easier than I'd thought.

“Well, that's perfectly understandable, you being the vigorous and attractive woman you are, in the prime of life so to speak, and me being a dashing Christian gentleman of noble mind and bold spirit.”

“You are the answer to my prayers,” she continued.

“Yeah?” I said, wondering whether to pop the question now or wait a respectable amount of time, like maybe another five minutes. “Tell me about ’em.”

“I've been so worried, what with all the tigers in the area,” she said.

“Tigers?” I said, surprised. “Who in tarnation is talking about tigers?”

“We are,” she replied. “That's why I'm so thrilled that you're here, Lucifer. As long as there are tigers in the area, all of my prize livestock is at risk, and to be perfectly honest, Mr. Cornwall, while a fine and thoughtful gentleman, really isn't the sort to comb the countryside looking for tigers—whereas you, the man who killed the tiger that attacked Geoffrey Bainbridge with your bare hands...”

“Well, it wasn't quite with my bare hands,” I interrupted her uneasily.

“Don't be so modest, Lucifer,” she said. “One of the local natives found and skinned the tiger, and the shopkeeper who bought the pelt said that there wasn't a bullet hole or even a knife wound anywhere on it.” She paused and stared at me. “Will you agree to lead a tiger hunt this afternoon?”

“I'd sure like to, ma'am,” I said, “but usually I set afternoons aside for prayer and meditation, me being a man of the cloth and all.”

“Couldn't you forego your meditation this one time, Lucifer?” she said. “You would have my undying gratitude.”

Well, it wasn't quite the same as her undying love, but it was a step in the right direction, and besides, I suddenly had a notion of how to impress the bejabbers out of her and make Rupert Cornwall look feeble by comparison.

“Well, God is a pretty understanding critter,” I said. “I suppose He wouldn't mind if I took an afternoon off to clear up your tiger problem.”

“Thank you,” she said with a great big smile.

“Of course, you understand that I don't make of point of rasslin’ tigers hand-to-hand,” I continued. “It takes too much time, and it's right hard on my clothes.”

“We have all the guns you could possibly need,” she assured me. “I can supply you with beaters, trackers, gunbearers, elephants, anything you want.”

“Well, I thank you for the offer, ma'am,” I said, “but I couldn't risk the lives of very heathen that I came to India to save. No, I think it'd be best if I just go out alone and match my wits and skills with the fearsome beasts of the jungle.”

“What a remarkable man you are, Lucifer!” she said. “I didn't know such brave, adventurous spirits still existed!”

“That's because you been associating with men like Rupert Cornwall too long,” I said. “Nature ain't run totally out of noblemen just yet.”

“You may just have a point, Lucifer,” she said, and I figured that I had just pulled ahead of Rupert right then and there.

Well, I spent the rest of the morning loafing around, and by noontime most of Lady Edith's guests were up and around, and even Rupert wandered downstairs looking for a little grub, so we all had lunch together while Lady Edith told ’em what a brave and fearless deed I was about to do on her behalf, and I modestly explained that it wasn't nothing special and indeed was all part of a day's work for a Christian gentleman of high moral standards what was intent on serving his fellow man, or woman as the case happened to be.

Rupert just kept looking at me like I was crazy, but everyone else was right impressed, and when it came time for me to pick up a gun and head out the door, all of the guests came up and hugged me one by one, which was a most fortuitous thing since it enabled me to lift of couple of the old gentlemen's wallets. Once I got outside I pulled about five hundred pounds out of ’em, then went back and announced that I was feeling mighty lucky this afternoon and thought I'd probably better take some extra ammunition along. We all hugged each other again, which allowed me to replace the wallets, and then I was out the door and walking boldly into the wild fields that surrounded Lady Edith's estate.

I walked for nearly a mile, and when I was sure no one was following me I took a hard right and headed off to Jaipur. It took me the better part of an hour to get there, and once I arrived I went right up to the first Indian I saw on the street and asked him where the local taxidermist was. He pointed out a shop down the block, and I went over to it and opened the door.

“Good afternoon on you, Sahib,” said a pudgy Indian with a neat little beard. “How may I be at your service?”

“I'm in the market for tiger skins,” I said. “You got any for sale?”

“How many do you want?” he asked.

“I dunno,” I replied. “How many have you got?”

“You come back and see,” he said, escorting me through a door to his workshop.

Well, there were skins galore back there, everything from tigers to leopards to deer to what-have-you, along with a fair sampling of elephant tusks and rhinoceros horns. He pulled out a tigerskin rug and held it up for me.

“Very nice rug, very nice price, Sahib,” he said. “Forty pounds.”

“I don't want no rugs,” I said. “Just skins.”

He ran over to another pile and held up a skin. “Beautiful tiger skin, this one, Sahib. The notorious Maneater of Dindori. For you, twenty-five pounds.”

“What about those over there?” I asked, pointing to a pile of skins that had flies buzzing around them.

He shook his head. “Oh, you do not want these, Sahib,” he said. “I have not had time to prepare them yet. They just arrived this week.”

“How many of ’em are there?” I asked.

“Seven.”

“Tell you what,” I said. “I'll take ’em all off your hands for fifty pounds apiece.”

His jaw dropped so far I thought it was going to hit the floor. Then he gave me a great big smile and nodded his head.

“You drive a hard bargain, Sahib,” he said. “But what is a poor shopkeeper to do?”

“I'll tell you what he's to do,” I said.

“Sahib?” he said, looking kind of puzzled.

“For another hundred and fifty pounds, he's to keep his mouth shut about this little transaction.”

For just a minute there I had the feeling that he was going to get down on his knees and kiss my feet, but he showed admirable restraint and a few minutes later I had loaded all seven skins into a cart he loaned me and started back toward Lady Edith's estate.

When I was maybe three miles away I made a big semi-circle and wound up in the fields where Akbar had accidentally saved Geoffrey Bainbridge's life the day before, and I took my rifle and fired seven quick shots into the air. Then I sat down and smoked a cigar, hid the cart in the woods, and started lugging the tiger skins up to Lady Edith's house.