Wanted: Mail-Order Mistress

“I’m sorry. I don’t know what that means.” Bethan shook her head and gave an exaggerated shrug. “I didn’t even understand English very well until the past year. And I don’t suppose you know any Welsh.”

Another voice spoke up, heavily accented but in English. “Say again who you look for, lady?”

Bethan turned eagerly towards the speaker, a man with dark, almond-shaped eyes, who wore a large, round straw hat. “I’d be grateful for any help you could give me. His name is Hugh Conway. He’d be taller than you.” She raised her hand to indicate her brother’s height, then pulled back her bonnet and pointed to her head. “His hair is almost the colour of mine.”

She could do better than try to describe him with gestures and words the man might not understand. Reaching back to her nape, Bethan unfastened the silver locket that was her most precious possession. Then she opened it to show the miniature portrait inside. “He looks like this. At least he did the last time I saw him.”

The tiny painting wasn’t of Hugh himself, but it was the nearest likeness she had.

A flicker of interest kindled in the man’s eyes as he stared at the locket. Did he recognise the handsome young face? If Europeans were as scarce in Singapore as they appeared to be, those few must stand out, easily noticed. Perhaps easily remembered.

“Have you seen him?” she asked. “Please, I’m very anxious to get word of him.”

The man nodded slowly. “Maybe I saw this one. Not sure.”

Bethan’s heart leapt. Even in her most hopeful dreams, she’d never imagined getting a lead on her missing brother so soon. “He was in Singapore three years ago. I got a letter posted from here. Do you know what happened to him or his ship?”

The man’s high forehead furrowed as if trying hard to remember where and when he’d seen that face. “I look closer?”

“Yes, of course.” Bethan pushed the locket into his hands. “I wish I had a bigger picture to show you.”

A small crowd had gathered around them as they talked. Suddenly someone tapped Bethan on the shoulder from behind. Did another person recognise Hugh from a distant glimpse of the miniature? Or did they recall his name?

She spun around only to find a bank of expressionless faces staring back at her.

“Did one of you have something to tell me?” she asked. “Have you seen Hugh Conway? Do you remember his ship?”

None of them replied except with sheepish grins.

“Think it’s great fun hoaxing a stranger, do you?” Bethan snapped. “I see some things are the same wherever you go.”

With an indignant huff, she turned back to her informant. By now he’d had plenty of time to study the likeness. But when she looked around, all she glimpsed of the fellow was the back of his faded blue tunic disappearing into the crowd.

“Come back!” she cried, tearing after him. “Thief! He has my locket. Someone please stop him!”

But no one on the quay seemed willing to help her. Quite the opposite, in fact. Men who moved aside to let the thief escape quickly stepped back into Bethan’s path, hindering her pursuit.

“Wilson! Ralph!” she called, though she knew her travelling companions must be far out of earshot by now. She didn’t dare stop to look around for them or she might lose sight of the man who’d stolen her locket.

“Please,” she cried, “you can have the necklace! Just leave me the picture!”

Catching sight of the bridge out of the corner of her eye, she hoped the thief might run that way and perhaps overtake her friends. Instead he darted down a crowded street in the other direction with Bethan in breathless pursuit. After five months aboard ship, she was not used to running, especially in such oppressive heat. Sheer desperation pushed her forwards.

The thief dodged into a side street. Bethan reached it just in time to glimpse him entering the mouth of an alley. By the time she staggered to the spot where she’d seen him disappear, she was gasping for air while a hot flush smarted in her cheeks. No doubt he would have slipped away, leaving her with no idea which way he’d gone.

But, no. When she peered into the alley, there he was, strolling towards her as brazen as could be—the same clothes, dark eyes and shaved head.

Planting herself in front of him, she signalled him to stop. “I want my picture back. Come now, it can’t be worth anything to you.”

The man scowled at her as if she was the one who’d done him wrong. He muttered an answer in his language.

“You could speak English well enough a few minutes ago!” cried Bethan. “Or did you forget it all while you were making away with my property?”

The man’s scowl turned into an outright sneer as he pushed past her.

“Oh, no, you don’t.” She caught his sleeve and hung on. “I’m not about to chase you through the streets again in this heat. Just give me back my picture!”

Tugging his sleeve roughly out of her grasp, the man unleashed a flood of words Bethan could not understand. But she recognised violent anger when she heard it, no matter what the language. This was the man who’d stolen her locket, wasn’t it? Were his cheekbones perhaps a little higher? His face a trifle thinner?

“I—I beg your pardon if I mistook you for someone else.” She pointed down the alley. “Another man ran that way. He had something he stole from me. Did you see which way he went?”

The man she’d accosted heaped more abuse upon her. Suddenly Bethan realised he was not alone. She was surrounded by a score of men all dressed the same, all glaring at her in a way that sent a shiver down her spine.

Was she in danger of disappearing in this lawless, foreign outpost the way her brother had? And if she did, would anyone care enough to come looking for her?

“The mace and nutmegs sell for seventy-five Spanish dollars a picul,” Simon Grimshaw informed the Swedish captain from whom he’d just bought a cargo of iron. “You won’t get them cheaper from any of the other merchants in town. The situation in Java has driven prices up for everyone.”

The craggy Swede scowled. “Maybe I take my iron to Batavia and trade direct with the Dutch for their spices.”

“Be my guest,” Simon bluffed. He’d hate to lose that cargo of Swedish iron. “Pay the outrageous tariffs they charge in Batavia. You’ll have less money in your pocket at the end of your voyage. That is, if you’re lucky and the pirates don’t get you between here and Sumatra. Perhaps I could come down a dollar or two on the mace, but not the nutmegs. My partner is due back from England soon and he’ll have my hide if he catches me giving our goods away at such prices.”

Part of him eagerly awaited Hadrian Northmore’s return. It would be a relief to have someone else shoulder half the workload. Since both his partners had gone back to England—Hadrian for a brief visit and Ford to stay—Simon had taken on the responsibility of three men.

In spite of that, he was reluctant to surrender control of the company to his senior partner. Hadrian was an ambitious, astute man of business, but he had a reckless streak of which Simon had never approved. He preferred the steady, cautious course and seldom acted on impulse. The few times he had, he’d later regretted it.

Might he regret asking his partner to fetch back a young Englishwoman to be his mistress? While the Swedish captain considered his terms, Simon mulled over that question.

When the south-west monsoons had signalled the arrival of ships from the West, he’d begun to have second thoughts about his plan. It would be good to have a safe outlet for the desires he had not entirely managed to stifle with long hours of work. But what kind of woman would willingly journey halfway around the world to serve as a hired bedmate? Only one with an unsavoury past, he feared. How could he risk taking a woman like that into his home?

The Swedish captain gave a deep rasping cough that jolted Simon out of his troubled thoughts. “What is it you English say—‘a bird in the hand…’?”

“‘…is better than all your birds in the hands of pirates.’ That’s what we say here in Singapore.” Simon extended his hand to seal their bargain.

Few things gave him as much pleasure as making an advantageous deal. Unlike affairs of the heart, he knew where he stood in a clear-cut matter of business. That was the sort of relationship he’d had in mind when he asked Hadrian to find him a mistress—a straightforward exchange of things they wanted from one another, without dangerous sentiment to complicate matters. Now he wondered if such a thing would be possible.

As he and the captain shook hands, one of Simon’s Malay workers appeared, leading four European lads who looked quite distressed. “Master, these boys say they came from England to work for you.”

“This is the first I’ve heard of it.” Simon eyed the four suspiciously. “Captain Svenson, if you’ll excuse me, I must see to this. Ibrahim, send some boats to begin unloading the iron.”

As Ibrahim and the captain headed away, Simon rounded on the boys, who were growing more agitated by the minute. “What is all this about? I didn’t hire any of you.”

“Please, sir,” said a sturdy, handsome lad who looked to be their leader, “Mr Northmore sent us. He said there’d be work for us with his company.”

Before Simon could reply, a gangly lad with a shock of red hair cried, “The boat let us off on the wrong side of the harbour!”

“And we’ve lost Bethan!” added a third fellow. “She was right behind us…and then…she wasn’t.”

They all started jabbering at once, so that Simon could not make out what they were trying to say.