An African Adventure - Au Bordello de la Mer Part 5

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This is the first time that the Knolly Estate has allowed the great man's memoirs to be published. What follows is the forty-second section of 'An African Adventure'.

Bertie turned to me as we entered the telegraph office.

'Popular place, ain't it?' he said as he joined the back of the queue.

'No time for orderliness, Bertie. We must fight our way to the front of this queue, eh?'

'Sorry, but we can't do that! We are British, after all.'

'Exactly! Now let's go.'

The assembled masses did not take kindly to our pushing our way to the front and I am sad to say that in the end we had to pull the trump card.

'Excuse me!' I said in a voice that would have not gone amiss on any parade square. 'My colleague here and I are Englishmen and while not averse to the queuing system, we are on the Queen's business and feel that our position in this queue must be elevated.'

The crowd parted (much like I how imagine the Red Sea must have done) amid much mutterings. Some raspberries were blown, but these were soon hushed up. A couple of Boer farmers tried to stand their ground, but these chaps were quickly manhandled to the back of the office and shown the door. Bertie tried to stop what he saw as a developing fracas, but to no avail. His parting words of 'I'm most dreadfully sorry' were lost in the general hubbub and were on the whole greeted with shaking fists.

On the business side of the counter stood a man visibly shaking; I thought best to put him at his ease. 'Good day to you sir! I believe you have a message for us?'

'Oh yes, sir, more than likely, but no one has finished the overnight sorting. It's usually handed over by Mr LeTang to the early shift before I come in, but...'

The word 'but' hung in the air and Bertie looked at me to finish the sentence.

'But Mr LeTang was not around. Am I correct?'

'Why, yes, sir, and so we have the entire backlog to sort though. We are getting there, but it will take a while, as messages never stop, sir.'

With a 'Hup! La!' Bertie hopped over the counter. For once it was a clean jump, with no barking of shins or thumping of foreheads.

'Well, let me help you sort, then! I've a tidy mind for this sort of thing.'

The clerk smiled his thanks and nodded to one of his assistants to show Bertie what needed to be done. At this, some of the other customers pressed forward offering their assistance.

'Now tell me, has anyone looked for Mr LeTang since it was discovered that he had missed the hand-over?'

'Oh yes, sir. I sent one of the lads round to his lodgings but got no reply. I thought it was best to get on with sorting things out here before doing anything else, due to all the customers.'

'Quite so, quite so.'

A thought struck me. I climbed up upon the counter in order to be seen and heard above the throng. 'Gentlemen and ladies! A moment of your time, please!' I hollered, clapping my hands to add effect. All heads turned to face me expectantly. 'There seems to have been some delay in sorting out the overnight messages and Mr... er...'

'Browne, sir.'

'Thank you, yes. Mr Browne here, along with some volunteers, is doing his best to resume normal service as soon as possible.'

The mustered crowd muttered as mustered crowds must and shuffled feet as mustered crowds must.

'However,' I went on, 'I need to ask you to remain still and quiet for a few minutes while I conduct an experiment.'

Amazingly, the room went quite. All that one could hear were the rhythms of the telegraph machines in the offices beyond the counter. There was, however, another fainter rhythm, coming from below. I bent down to Mr Browne.

'Tell me quickly, do you have a cellar?'

Mr Browne gave me an odd look and whispered 'yes'. He then pointed to the quieted throng. 'Can they talk now?'

I smiled. 'Silly me! Of course. Thank you, one and all, for your silence.' I hopped down from the counter with a theatrical flourish which gained some polite applause. Where is the cellar, Mr Browne?'

'Erm. Downstairs?'

'I meant... what is the best way to the cellar, Mr Browne?'

'Oh! I see. There — under the stairs, you see the green door. May I ask why you wish to visit it?'

'I believe I know where Mr LeTang is!' He made to speak, but I put a finger to his lip. 'The needs of your customers come first, my good man.'

As I made my way behind the counter I nodded to Bertie through the window. He cheerily waved back, clearly in his element once more, so I decided not to disturb him.

The door to the cellar was not locked, nor did it seem unused. As I pulled it open, there was a discrete tapping, a rhythm running in counterpoint to the telegraph machines. Taking the stairs two at a time, I soon reached the bottom. Here were stacks upon stacks of paper which rustled as if with a life of their own. The tapping was now louder and coming from a small door that I would have to crawl though. Judging from the dust on the floor and the footprints, this smaller door had also been recently used.

I tugged at the handle, the door gave way and out fell Henry LeTang, his wide eyes looking up at mine with the delight of a man saved. The poor fellow was bound and gagged; moreover, I noticed blood on the door where he had obviously been tapping out his cry for help with the back of his head. I dragged him though the door into the main area of the cellar and proceeded to ungag and untie him.

'Oh thank you, thank you! I knew that someone must hear me eventually! It was only a matter of time!'

His feet and hands, now free, began a frantic flexing, like a wild animal released from cage. Given the number of hours that he had been trussed up, I did not have the heart to hold him still. I sat and watched him and he just smiled, his teeth now free to dance away. Soon he slowed down and I judged it a good time to ask a question.

'Tell me — what happened after we left you?'

'Well, after I gave your message to one of the clerks, I decided to take you at your word and hunt down the copy of the message that you were seeking. It would have been down here in the daily archive.' He reached up and stretched.

'Pray, do go on,' I said as I dusted down my trousers.

'The door opened and I thought perhaps you or your friend had forgotten something. Alas! it was not. I bid the gentleman good evening in my normal way and asked if I could be of service. He then proceeded to say that he needed some answers to certain questions... and then he lit a match! I protested at this and pointed out that this was not a good place for lighting up, what with all the paper an' all.'

I could tell the way that this was going and poor Henry had started to shake.

'Come along! Let's get you upstairs for some fresh air and a drink of something.'

But still he continued his recounting. 'It was horrible! The man forced me to answer questions about you at the point of a match. I had to bring him down here and hand over all the transcripts of messages that we had handled over the last month.'

We paused at the landing. 'Didn't anyone notice you missing from the main office? Or hear anything?'

He shook his head. 'Why should they? They are quite used to me wandering about and they most likely thought I was up in my office.'

'So after he threatened you, that is when you handed over the box of copies?'

'Boxes,' he emphasised. 'You must understand, we get hundreds of messages per week. I'm so sorry, sir...' he said with genuine remorse.

This stunned me into silence. 'Boxes, then. So it must have taken him a while to move all of those from the cellar to whatever transport he had waiting?'

Le Tang shook his head and dust motes floated around him. It lent an enchanting, almost fairy-tale quality to his image. 'He had friends with him and they were very, very organised. They didn't talk much, but they knew that my inquisitor was in charge.'

I muttered that this sounded like military organisation. I was wondering which force could have been responsible — French? German? Portuguese? Boer? — when LeTang interrupted my thoughts and said that the fellow had a most definite English accent.

'An Englishman, then? Well, that is unexpected.'

LeTang paused on the stair. 'Funny you should say that sir. Before they trussed me up, I did try to struggle a bit and this must have come loose from a jacket or some such.' He pressed a small something into my palm.

We had now reached the top of the stairs and Mr Browne was rushing forward to help. The queue of customers was thinning now, but those still there looked aghast at the strange, skeletal, dust-covered apparition that was slowly emerging from the cellar in a jittering fashion. I handed LeTang into Mr Browne's arms and looked at what had been given to me.

It was a brass button of a type that I had seen many times before. The button was indeed of a military nature and originated from a jacket worn by a junior officer. Moreover, it was from a jacket worn by a junior naval officer. Moreover, it was from a jacket worn by a junior officer of the Royal Navy.

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