Journey to the River Sea

‘If you mean Bernard, he is not my son any longer. He was an ungrateful, cowardly scoundrel and if he darkens my door again, I’ll take my whip to him.’

But the cousin said blood was blood and why didn’t he try to find Bernard, and after a while Sir Aubrey saw the sense of this. Blood was blood; there was no getting round it. Better that Bernard should inherit Westwood than a total stranger.

Only where was Bernard? They put an advertisement in The Times, and a lot of other newspapers, asking Bernard Taverner to come forward and he would hear something to his advantage, but for a long time nothing happened.

Then, when they had almost given up hope, they had a letter from the editor of a magazine called The Naturalist which was published in New York, and printed learned articles about animals and plants. This is what the editor wrote:

Dear Sir Aubrey,

I happened to see in The Times of last October a request for information about Bernard Taverner.

Taverner was a regular contributor to my journal, an outstanding naturalist and observer of wildlife. I asked him for a piece about the manatee, a rare South American water mammal. Instead of his article I received this letter from his son which I enclose.

Dear Sir,

I am very sorry but my father Bernard Taverner died two months ago. His canoe overturned in the rapids and he was drowned.

I am sending back the cheque you wrote him because it belonged to him and anyway I am too young to have a bank account.

Yours faithfully,

F.Taverner.

Needless to say, this letter caused great excitement.

‘By Jove, he had a son then,’ said Sir Aubrey. ‘Well, our problems are solved. We’ll send for the boy and train him up to run Westwood – it shouldn’t take long to knock him into shape. No reason to suppose he’ll be a namby-pamby like his father.’

But how to find the boy was another matter. There was no address on the letter and the only thing the editor knew was that Bernard’s mail went to a postbox in Manaus. That’s not where he lives though, he wrote. He was always travelling. I believe he had an Indian wife.

But this Sir Aubrey refused to believe. Instead, he wrote two letters addressed to The Son of Bernard Taverner, one to the postbox in Manaus and one care of the bank manager who had looked after Bernard’s account. In both the letters he explained what had happened at Westwood and said that the way was now open for Bernard’s son to come back and take up his inheritance.

Finn got both the letters and did not answer either of them. Instead, he began to get the Arabella ready for her journey to the Xanti. Nothing Sir Aubrey had written made him feel that he could ever return to his father’s home.

Sir Aubrey wrote again and sent a cable. Then, losing patience, he got in touch with the director of the firm of Wesley and Kinnear, Private Detectives, and asked them to send two of their best men out to the Amazon to find the boy and bring him back.

And two months later, the crows arrived in Manaus.

In the hut beside the lagoon, Finn had fallen silent.

Then Clovis said, ‘Are you sure you wouldn’t rather go back to be master of Westwood? Rather than—’ he broke off as a capuchin monkey screeched suddenly in the trees.

‘Rather than live like a savage?’ finished Finn, grinning. ‘Yes. Quite sure.’

Maia too had wondered. Sir Aubrey must be an old man by now; Finn would probably be able to stand up to him better than his father had done, and when he died Finn could take over and do anything he liked with Westwood.

‘Let’s get this clear,’ said Finn. ‘Whether you decide to help me or not, I’m never going back to Westwood. Never. And if the crows come here to this place I’ll shoot them and go to jail. This was my father’s sanctuary and they’re not going to set foot in it.’

Maia and Clovis looked at each other. At times like this one remembered the Indian side of Finn.

‘So how does it work?’ asked Maia. ‘The crows find Clovis and think he’s you?’

Finn sat with his hands round his knees, frowning as he thought. ‘I want them to find Clovis just before the boat sails: late on the night before, if possible. So that there’s no time to trail him round Manaus – someone’s sure to recognize him from the theatre.’

‘Yes, but how?’