Dinner at the Palace, December 1. Will you be able to attend? —D
“December first?” I glanced at the newspaper on the counter. “So, ten days from now. That should be . . . just after full moon. A Monday night?”
Kashmir laughed. “Why are you asking me?”
“No, I know, it is,” I said, remembering an article I’d read. I made a face. “It’s the Monday after the Independence Day celebration.”
Kash raised his eyebrow. “Tacky. Very tacky.”
“Hmm. It should also be . . .” I plucked a newspaper from the desk and flipped through it to the schedule of the mail ships. “Ah,” I said, finding the spot. “Tacky but clever.”
“The most annoying combination,” Kashmir said, reading over my shoulder. The Alameda was scheduled to leave Honolulu on the morning of December first. We could slip right into her empty berth.
He sent back a message before we left Honolulu:
Arrival at 10 p.m. Send H to meet us at the dock.
I left a message as well—the note I’d written to Blake—giving strict instructions that it be delivered on December second.
We retraced our steps to the ship, and although it was out of character for him not to needle me mercilessly at every opportunity, Kash never said a word about the last conversation we’d had on this journey. I was quietly grateful, although it was only a promise kept.
Back aboard the Temptation, snags had developed in our absence. They’d had time to repair the crow’s nest and the mast, and Rotgut was healing well, but once I’d left, the clay soldiers had stood motionless on the deck of the 54, their eyes dimming like banked embers. Not even Rotgut could make them budge, no matter how he shouted in his native Chinese. But he told me he’d known I was returning when scarlet fire had flared again in the general’s eyes.
The general tracked my movements as I came to stand before him, and when I spoke, he seemed to listen. I explained the army’s part in the theft—it mostly involved silent and stoic marching, which they were good at—and he put his fist to his chest and bowed, although he never said a word. The emperor had not given his warriors tongues.
Rotgut watched me with wonder in his eyes. “How did you do that?”
I licked my lips. “I don’t know,” I said, which was technically true, although I had a guess.
“It must be because you woke them,” he said, after a moment’s thought.
“Must be.” And I left it at that.
We gave each soldier a torch to carry, the old-fashioned kind, made with branches hewn from the trees above the bay, their ends wrapped in oil-soaked sailcloth. The warriors performed admirably; their brooding silence and red eyes were frightening enough by day, and I imagined how terrifying they would appear by firelight, especially to the locals. And the locals were the only ones we had to worry about. The Honolulu Rifles sided against the monarchy.
When I had explained the plan to Slate before we sailed to Qin’s tomb, he’d looked doubtful. “Very impressive and everything, but how will we actually carry the gold?”
His expression had changed when I’d handed him the bottomless bag. “I couldn’t do any of this without you, Nixie.”
I shrugged. After all, it was because of me that he still had to.
So it was on December first we stood on the deck of the 54 and watched the Alameda leave for San Francisco. Once it was a misty speck on the horizon, we pointed our prow toward Honolulu Harbor. The wind filled the red sails of the junk and snapped the black flag flying above our heads: it was really one of the curtains from the alcove where Slate slept, but after all, we were only pretending to be pirates.
We had gone over the plan dozens of times, and we did so again as we approached the harbor. Our faces hidden by bandannas, and Slate sporting the reddish-blond beard he’d been letting grow, we would hail poor Colonel Iaukea and take the harbormaster prisoner when he came aboard. We would tie up at the pier and presumably meet Mr. Hart on the dock—that is, if he decided to show up. Part of me wondered if he would turn on Mr. D instead, or even turn him in—but no. Self-preservation would win out over revenge.