inoffensive. Kite nearly told him that leaping on the unsuspecting by Men’s Buttons wasn’t a good start. ‘I don’t suppose you’re any relation of the Castlereaghs of St James’s Square?’
Kite thought he might just have taken Jem off guard enough to let something slip, but he needn’t have worried. Jem only sparkled at the man. ‘I have no idea, I’m afraid. I’m only recently arrived from the Caribbean; why, ought I know you?’
‘Oh, the Caribbean? My sister is in Kingston. Where were you, I wonder?’
‘I find mystery to be an extraordinarily valuable currency in London, so I hope you won’t mind if I don’t hand it all over to the first curious person who asks me.’
‘Well—’
‘Leave him alone,’ Kite said flatly.
The man looked frightened and vanished towards the drapery section. There were a few advantages in having a resting expression that looked like you were about to kick someone.
‘He looked a lot like a pamphleteer.’ Jem had turned off his charm like a lamp.
‘He writes for the society pages,’ Kite said, feeling murky.
21
HMS Agamemnon, 1807
Joe woke up because of what he thought was daylight. The wrong kind of daylight: golden, summery daylight, not the dismal gloom that served now as the sub-Arctic dawn. Then his cogs began to turn and he jolted out of the hammock, onto the floor, just before the fire really caught.
It raced along the ropes, catching the blankets, his own sleeve – he tore his jumper off and stuffed it into a ball to crush out the flame – and across to Kite. It was licking at the lapel of his coat. He must have just come in from his watch, because he was fully dressed.
Joe was paralysed for a horrible second, which was doubly horrible because he hadn’t known he was a coward. Furious with himself, he slapped his own forearm, hard. It jerked him out of it and he lurched upright, and pushed Kite away from the fire. They landed on the deck with a thump that wrenched Joe’s shoulder.
‘What—’
‘Fire, there’s a—’
‘Bloody hell.’ Agatha, unlike Joe, had the presence of mind to snatch the water jug and sling it over the worst of the flames. She sounded more inconvenienced than worried. ‘There’s a sand bucket over there, Mr Tournier, if you wouldn’t mind – thank you. No, we’ll need more …’ She cast around, then wrenched a whistle from Kite’s neck, snapping the chain, and blew it sharp and hard. Then the room was full of people and water and sand, and then only smoke.
Kite was pressed back against the wall. He had turned glassy and unmoving.
‘He’s not keen on fire,’ Agatha said when Joe tried to make her look. She sighed, and then slapped Kite. ‘Snap out of it, sailor!’
‘Jesus!’ Joe yelped, appalled. Twenty seconds ago he would have said he’d have loved to see her do that, but now he caught himself right on the edge of demanding to know if she’d thought about how you made someone into a psychopath.
Kite seemed to think it was normal. ‘Where did the fire start?’
The answer was clear. It had begun in Joe’s hammock. There was even a black smoke stain above the place where the hammock had hung.
‘Did you have a candle?’ Agatha asked Joe.
‘No,’ Joe said, beginning to feel panicky. The smell of burned rope and clothes was thick everywhere, and the smoke was sticking to the back of his throat, gritty, and bizarrely homely, because it was how all of Londres smelled. If they thought he was the kind of person who dropped candles and set fire to things, he really was going to end up chained to the mast. ‘No; nothing …’
The marines all looked at Kite.
Kite let his neck bend. He was still on his knees. It looked like a lot of work to breathe. There was a red mark by his eye where Agatha had hit him. He got to his feet again. ‘All right, everyone, back on watch.’
There was a quiet chorus of yessirs, but some of the men glanced at each other, and at Joe.
‘It wasn’t him,’ Kite said, when he saw how they were hesitating. He pushed his hand through his hair. Joe saw him snatch it back when his fingertips brushed the burn scars on his neck, fast, as though he had touched something unspeakably disgusting. ‘It must have been me. Go on.’
They went.
It was the worst lie Joe had ever heard. He’d never seen Kite so much as touch a candle. Kite got up