A Buccaneer At Heart

Babington nodded. “There’ll be no risk to the captives as long as the villains have no reason to imagine their game has been uncovered. They’ll merely see my efforts as an annoying and unhelpful nuisance.” He grinned coldly. “I’ll certainly be doing my best to make that so.”

After a moment, Babington asked, “So where do you intend to start your search for the slavers’ trail?”

The question brought Robert back to his day. He’d told Babington of Lashoria’s claim of the slavers being connected with Undoto. Now he filled Babington in about what he’d found when he’d visited Lashoria.

Babington listened in stoic silence. Robert ended his tale with the old woman’s information about the slave trader Kale. Babington nodded. “As I said, the locals hate them, but they’re generally too afraid to make any sort of move against them, not even to pass on information.”

Robert exhaled and sat up. “So I’m going to start with Undoto, because he appears to be the only lead I have. Can you add anything to what I already know about him?”

Babington shook his head. “I’ve been to only one of his services—I never saw the point. But Mary liked them—she said it was the drama.” Babington’s voice had grown cold. “If it turns out it was that—her going to his services—that led to her being taken—”

“He’ll pay.”

Babington’s lips curved menacingly. “Indeed, he will.”

Deciding to ignore that, Robert said, “One thing Lashoria’s old servant stressed was how very different this scheme was to the usual sort of slavery practiced hereabouts.”

Babington nodded. “It is. Normally these days, those seized by the slavers are tribesmen from deep in the interior. The slavers walk them out, then load them onto ships well away from any of the settlements. Coming anywhere near Freetown—well, it’s the base for the governor and the squadron, so for slavers, that’s akin to asking to be caught and clapped in irons themselves. But in this case, they’re taking Europeans, and not just men but young women and children, too, and it seems they’re taking them out of the settlement and into the jungle—and, if the assumption of a mine is correct, they’re using them here, not shipping them out for sale far away. It’s a very different kind of trade.”

After a moment, Babington said, “If it’s a mine, why take young women and children? I understand Declan’s suggestion of how young women and children might be used in a diamond-mining operation, and that might well be true, yet when we’re talking about amassing a workforce via slavery, then if there’s a choice between men on the one hand and women and children on the other...” Babington shook his head. “If there’s a sufficient supply of men, and in a settlement like this there surely is, then taking women, much less children, should have been a less attractive—less efficient—option.” Babington met Robert’s gaze. “An option of lower return to the slavers as well as the mine operators, yet it’s one they’ve taken, apparently deliberately.”

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