Call of the Raven, page 1
Praise for the novels of
“Read on, adventure fans.”
The New York Times
“A rich, compelling look back in time [to] when history and myth intermingled.”
San Francisco Chronicle
“Only a handful of 20th century writers tantalize our senses as well as Smith. A rare author who wields a razor-sharp sword of craftsmanship.”
Tulsa World
“He paces his tale as swiftly as he can with swordplay aplenty and killing strokes that come like lightning out of a sunny blue sky.”
Kirkus Reviews
“Best Historical Novelist—I say Wilbur Smith, with his swashbuckling novels of Africa. The bodices rip and the blood flows. You can get lost in Wilbur Smith and misplace all of August.”
Stephen King
“Action is the name of Wilbur Smith’s game and he is the master.”
The Washington Post
“Smith manages to serve up adventure, history and melodrama in one thrilling package that will be eagerly devoured by series fans.”
Publishers Weekly
“This well-crafted novel is full of adventure, tension, and intrigue.”
Library Journal
“Life-threatening dangers loom around every turn, leaving the reader breathless . . . An incredibly exciting and satisfying read.”
Chattanooga Free Press
“When it comes to writing the adventure novel, Wilbur Smith is the master; a 21st century H. Rider Haggard.”
Vanity Fair
Also by Wilbur Smith
Non-Fiction
On Leopard Rock: A Life of Adventures
The Courtney Series
When the Lion Feeds
The Sound of Thunder
A Sparrow Falls
The Burning Shore
Power of the Sword
Rage
A Time to Die
Golden Fox
Birds of Prey
Monsoon
Blue Horizon
The Triumph of the Sun
Assegai
Golden Lion
War Cry
The Tiger’s Prey
Courtney’s War
King of Kings
Ghost Fire
The Ballantyne Series
A Falcon Flies
Men of Men
The Angels Weep
The Leopard Hunts in Darkness
The Triumph of the Sun
King of Kings
The Egyptian Series
River God
The Seventh Scroll
Warlock
The Quest
Desert God
Pharaoh
Hector Cross
Those in Peril
Vicious Circle
Predator
Standalones
The Dark of the Sun
Shout at the Devil
Gold Mine
The Diamond Hunters
The Sunbird
Eagle in the Sky
About the Authors
Wilbur Smith is a global phenomenon: a distinguished author with a large and established readership built up over fifty-five years of writing, with sales of over 130 million novels worldwide.
Born in Central Africa in 1933, Wilbur became a full-time writer in 1964 following the success of When the Lion Feeds, and has since published over forty global bestsellers, including the Courtney Series, the Ballantyne Series, the Egyptian Series, the Hector Cross Series and many successful standalone novels, all meticulously researched on his numerous expeditions worldwide. His books have now been translated into twenty-six languages.
The establishment of the Wilbur & Niso Smith Foundation in 2015 cemented Wilbur’s passion for empowering writers, promoting literacy and advancing adventure writing as a genre. The foundation’s flagship program is the Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize.
For all the latest information on Wilbur, visit: www.wilbursmithbooks.com or facebook.com/WilburSmith.
Corban Addison is the internationally bestselling author of four novels and was the winner of the inaugural Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize. An attorney, activist and world traveler, he is a supporter of numerous humanitarian causes. He lives with his wife and children in Virginia.
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Copyright © Orion Mintaka (UK) Ltd., 2020
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Cover design by Bonnier Books UK
Jacket illustrations © Steve Stone
Author photograph © Hendre Louw
First published in the United States of America in 2020 by Zaffre
Zaffre is an imprint of Bonnier Books UK
This ebook was produced by Scribe Inc., Philadelphia, PA.
Digital ISBN: 978-1-4998-6231-7
Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-4998-6229-4
Canadian paperback ISBN: 978-1-4998-6230-0
For information, contact
251 Park Avenue South, Floor 12, New York, New York 10010
www.bonnierbooks.co.uk
This book is for my wife, Nisojon, because my admiration for her and the unequivocal love she spreads keeps my heart and mind constantly beating.
Contents
About the Authors
I: The Blackhawk
II: The Raven
III: Bannerfield
Dear Reader,
It’s been forty years since the publication of A Falcon Flies, the first novel in the bestselling Ballantyne Series featuring a character that my fans both love and love to hate: Mungo St. John.
Some might say that Mungo St. John is the incarnate of evil itself: a slave trader who steals native Africans and sells them to plantation owners in the United States. But Mungo, charming, intelligent and irresistible to all around him—both men and women—shows compassion for his slaves and even demonstrates a hint of doubt about his place in this dark chapter of the history of mankind. His complex personality makes the beautiful and determined Robyn Ballantyne question her feelings for him and allow herself to see him as something other than a slaver. Like all good characters, Mungo is full of contradictions: he is both evil and heroic, a complex character who reflects the historical times he lived in.
Since launching my Facebook page I have been asked by many of my readers, “When will the story of Mungo St. John be continued?” I went back and revisited A Falcon Flies and found myself drawn to this man again, who was both Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde. Where did he come from? What motivated him? Why was he the way he is in A Falcon Flies?
Call of the Raven is my answer to those questions. It is, without a doubt, the most interesting historical novel I’ve worked on in some time as it made me question the history of slave trading and its impact on racism in our world. How does evil become acceptable in society? How is it appropriate for someone to hold another human being as their property?
I was fortunate to work with a co-author who was perfectly suited for the task of helping me explore 1840s New Orleans and Virginia. Corban Addison, a very accomplished novelist and a resident of Virginia himself, helped bring Mungo’s world to life.
We hope you will find Call of the Raven a fascinating exploration of the dying days of the slave trade. It feels like an important contribution to our understanding of a period in history which continues to throw long shadows into the darkest aspects of the human soul.
As ever,
Wilbur Smith
No man can put a chain around the ankle of his fellow man without at last finding the other end fastened around his own neck.
Frederick Douglass
I
The Blackhawk
The chamber was packed. Young men in evening dress squeezed ten-to-a-row on the benches; more stood around the edges of the room, bodies pressed together. The lamplit air hung heavy with sweat and alcohol and excitement, like a prize fight at a county fair.
But no blood would be spilled tonight. This was the Cambridge Union Society: the oldest debating club in the country and the proving ground for the nation’s future rulers. The only sparring would be verbal, the only wounds to pride. At least, those were the rules.
The front of the room was set up like a miniature parliament. The two sides faced each other from opposing benches, divided by the length of two swords. A young man named Fairchild, with sandy hair and fine features, was addressing the audience from the dispatch box.
“The motion before you tonight is: ‘This house believes that slavery should be abolished from the face of the Earth.’ And, indeed, the case is so self-evident I feel I hardly need to argue it.”
Nods of agreement; he was preaching to the converted. Abolitionist sentiment ran high among the Cambridge undergraduates.
“I know in this house we are used to debating the fine points of law and politics. But this is not academic. The question of slavery speaks to a higher law. To keep innocent men and women in chains, to tear them from their homes and work them to death: this is a crime against God and all the laws of justice.”
On the facing bench, most of the opposition speakers listened to his oration glumly. They knew they were onto a losing cause. One leaned forward and twisted his handkerchief throug
“If you have one ounce of humanity in you, I urge you to support the motion.”
Fairchild sat down to sustained applause. The president waited for the noise to die away.
“To close for the opposition, the chair calls on Mr. Mungo St. John.”
The man who had been lounging on the front bench rose. No one applauded, but a new force seemed to charge the room. Up in the gallery, where a few well-bred young ladies were allowed to observe proceedings as long as they stayed silent, crinolines rustled and stays creaked as they leaned forward to see better.
You could not ignore him. He was twenty, but he loomed half a head taller than any other man in the chamber. His dark hair flowed over his collar in a long, thick mane; his tanned skin shone with a luster that no wan English sun could have produced. His suit was cut to accentuate his figure: a slim waist that rose to broad, well-muscled shoulders more like a boxer’s than a Cambridge undergraduate’s.
If he felt the hostility aimed at him, it did not shake the easy grin from his face. Indeed, he seemed to feed off the crowd’s energy.
“You have heard a great deal this evening about the supposed evils of slavery. But has anyone here ever been to the great tobacco plantations of Virginia, or the cotton fields of the Mississippi?”
His smoky yellow eyes surveyed the room.
“That is my native soil. I was born and raised in Virginia. Slavery to me is not sensational reports in the newspapers, or hell-raising sermons. I have seen the reality of it.”
He lowered his voice. “Is the work hard? Yes. Do rich men profit from the labor of others? Again, yes. But do not be gulled by these fantasies of brutality and violence you are peddled. At Windemere—my home, on the banks of the James River—my father keeps four hundred workers, and he cares for each one. When they work well, he praises them. When they are sick, he tends them. If they die, he grieves.”
“That is because each one is worth a thousand dollars to him,” said Fairchild.
The audience laughed.
“My friend is quite right,” said Mungo. “But think of something you own that is worth that much. A fine horse, say, or a necklace. Do you beat it and disdain it and leave it in the mud? Or do you take superlative care of it, polish it and watch out for it, because it is so valuable to you?”
He leaned on the dispatch box, as comfortable as if he were leaning on the mantelpiece of his drawing room enjoying a cigar.
“I am a guest in your country. But sometimes, it takes a stranger’s eye to observe what the natives do not see. Go to Manchester, or Birmingham, or any of your other great manufacturing cities. Visit the factories. You will see men and women laboring there twelve, fourteen, even eighteen hours a day, in conditions that would make my father sick to his stomach.”
“At least they are free—and paid,” said Fairchild.
“And what use is freedom, if it is only the freedom to live in a slum until you are worked to death? What use is a wage if it does not buy you enough to eat? The only thing that money buys is ease for the consciences of the mill owners. Whereas at Windemere, every one of our people enjoys three square meals a day, a roof over his head and clean clothes to wear. He never has to worry if he will eat, or who will take care of his family. I promise you, if any English loom worker or coal miner glimpsed life on the plantation, he would swap his life for that in a second.”
On the opposite bench, Fairchild had risen. “A point of order?”
Mungo gave a languid wave to allow it.
“Even if we accept this preposterous picture of African slaves holidaying in some benevolent paradise, the gentleman is rather coy about how those persons came to his country. Will he admit that the slave trade is nothing but a trade in suffering? Or will he try to convince us that millions of Africans willingly took a pleasant cruise to America to enjoy the benefits of the climate?”
That drew a laugh. Mungo smiled broadly, enjoying the joke with everyone else.
“The slave trade has been illegal in Britain and America for over thirty years,” he said. “Whatever our fathers and grandfathers may have done, it is finished now.”
Fairchild’s face flushed. He tried to calm his emotions—gentlemanly behavior in these debates was prized just as much as sound arguments—but he could not hold them in check.
“You know perfectly well that despite our government’s strenuous efforts, traders continue to flout the law by smuggling blacks out of Africa under the very noses of the Royal Navy.”
“Then I suggest you take up your complaint with the Royal Navy.”
“I shall,” said Fairchild. “Indeed, I may inform the house that as soon as I have completed my degree, I shall accept a commission in the Preventative Squadron of Her Majesty’s Navy, intercepting slavers off the coast of Africa. I will report back from there as to the accuracy of Mr. St. John’s picture of the delights of slavery.”
There were cheers and approving applause. Up on the ladies’ balcony, more than one corset strained with admiration of Fairchild’s manly virtue.
“If you are going to Africa, you can report back how these negroes live in their own country,” Mungo shot back. “Hungry, filthy, ignorant—a war of all against all. And then you can go to America, and say if they are not better off there after all.”
He turned to the room. “My virtuous opponents would have you think that slavery is a unique evil, a moral abomination unparalleled in the annals of civilization. I urge you to see otherwise. It is merely a name for what men practice wherever they are, whether in Virginia or Guinea or Manchester. The power of the strong and wealthy over the weak and poor.”
Fairchild had started to object again. Mungo ignored him.
“That may be an awkward truth. But I say to you, I would rather live my life as a slave on a plantation like Windemere, than as a so-called free man in a Lancashire cotton mill. They are the true slaves.”
He looked around the tight-packed chamber. Only the briefest glance, yet every person in the room felt that his gaze had settled directly on them. On the ladies’ balcony, the fans fluttered faster than ever.
“Perhaps what I say offends your moral sensibilities. I will not apologize for that. Instead, I beg you to look beyond your distaste and examine the proposition with clear-eyed honesty. If you sweeten your tea with sugar from the West Indies, or smoke Virginia tobacco, then you support slavery. If your father owns a mill where they spin Alabama cotton, or a bank that underwrites the voyages of Liverpool ship owners, then I say again you support slavery.”
He shrugged. “I do not judge you. I do not lay claim to any superior moral virtue. But the one sin of which I am wholly innocent is this—I will not play the hypocrite and weep false tears for the choices I have made. If you agree with me, I urge you to oppose the motion.”
He sat down. For a moment, silence gripped the room. Then, slowly, a wave of applause began from the back and swelled until it echoed around the chamber. The undergraduates might not agree with his politics, but they could appreciate a bravura performance.
Though not all of them. As the applause rose, so too did an answering barrage of boos and catcalls. Yells of “murderer” and “blood on your hands” were heard.
Mungo sat back, reveling in the discord.
“Order!” shouted the president. “The house will divide.”
The audience filed through two doors, one for “aye” on the right, and one for “no” on the left. The queue for the “ayes” was noticeably longer, but a surprising number turned the other way. Mungo watched the count from his seat, the grin on his face never wavering.
The president announced the result. “Ayes to the right, two hundred and seven. Noes to the left, one hundred and eighteen.”
Mungo nodded, accepting the result with perfect equanimity. He shook hands with his teammates, then took two glasses of wine and crossed the room to where Fairchild was talking with his friends. He pressed a drink into Fairchild’s hand.
