She looked across at Sebastian. He shrugged his shoulders. There wasn’t much either of them could say. They had watched us from the cliff-top and hadn’t seen Henry go down more than once on either of the two days we had dived.
We had our delay. All we had to find now was our advantage.
With only two dives for the day there was no hurry, and I spent the next hour refilling the tanks we had used the previous day. While the compressor thumped away I tried to wander off towards the saloon, but Sebastian called me back both times before I had even managed to reach the doorway. I thought of making a dash for the fo’c’sle, but wasn’t certain whether he would hand his gun to Judy and come running after me, or whether he might just be nervous enough to pull the trigger as I sprinted along the deck. It was a risk I wasn’t prepared to take.
Even if I did manage to get my hands on Rick’s gun, he would probably use Rick and Henry as shields as he advanced against me. We would have to wait.
When the tanks were filled, I silenced the compressor and started to organize the diving gear. There was no sense in being too obvious about wasting time.
“You can leave that for a few minutes,” Judy said.
“Okay.”
“Henry!” she called. “Top up the outboard tank.”
She watched while Henry poured another couple of gallons into the tank. I would have scooped some sand from the bottom of the dinghy and dropped that in as well.
“Keep a careful eye on them, Sebastian, and don’t let them move about!” she shouted as she stepped down into the dinghy and reached for the starting cord. “Especially Andy. He’s the tricky bastard.”
“Where’s she going?” Henry asked.
Rick answered for me. “To pick up their rubber boat and the gear they left down the coast.”
Sebastian stood us in one corner of the stern while he waited for her to return. He wouldn’t let us get a drink, sit down, or urinate over the side. Sebastian was doing what he had been told.
******
Rick and I went into the water soon after she came back with the rubber boat in tow. It was hard work having to row the dinghy back into the bay, but Judy was too smart to let us have the outboard. She made it quite clear what would happen if we tried to make a break for it. She would have Sebastian shoot Henry first and then come after us in their rubber boat. I didn’t think Sebastian would shoot in cold blood, but Judy might just be violent enough to do it in the heat of the moment.
We wouldn’t have got far along the beach with only a five or ten minute start anyway. They were both wearing sneakers, and the coral would have cut our bare feet to ribbons. If we went straight up the steep cliff they would have had us set out like targets in a shooting gallery long before we reached the top. It was another idea that wasn’t worth the risk.
“What the hell are we going to do?” Rick asked as I pulled the oars towards the bay.
“Wait until late tonight; about two in the morning should be just about right; and then cut ourselves out with the oxy torch.”
“Christ yes! Why not? Brilliant!” Then he thought of the one complication. “What about the petrol fumes?”
I shrugged my shoulders. “It’s a risk we’re going to have to take. If there’s treasure in that bloody chest I don’t think Judy is going to leave any witnesses.”
“I don’t think Sebastian would go that far.”
“I don’t think he’s going to have much of a say in the matter.”
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“I’ve got a feeling that she’ll put him down in the storage hold with us and let the four of us die of thirst, nice and slow.”
“She wouldn’t!”
“Why not? No blood. No mess. No marks. Toss us overboard in a few days’ time. What else would she do?”
“Well ... how the hell would I know?”
“It all depends on the chest,” I said. “I don’t want to give her any chance of finding out what’s in it before we get the upper hand.” I paused. “So we risk the petrol.”
“Okay, mate.”
“Anyway,” I went on. “All we have to do is cut around the small section where the padlock hasp is welded to the top of the hatch-trunk, and we’re out. The fumes should’ve just about blown away by tonight. If we’re bloody careful they won’t hear a thing. Not until you tip-toe in and grab Sebastian’s little toy.”
“Not me, mate.”
“I’ll toss you for it.”
“Right, mate, later.”
“Okay.”
“Did you tell Henry?” he asked.
“No, I’d only just thought of the idea. I hope he doesn’t try anything while we’re away.”
“I don’t think there’s much chance of that. What are we going to do about the chest?”
“I think it would be best if we worked it free and left it right where it is. If we’re successful tonight, it’ll only take ten minutes to raise the bloody thing tomorrow morning and get the hell out of here.”
“What about Judy and that arsehole?”
“Oh, he’s not so bad,” I said. “He’d be alright if she wasn’t there to flash that tight little bum of hers every now and then.”
“Yeah, okay. So he’s a great guy. What do we do with them?”
“Dump them both in that silly rubber boat when we’re ready to leave. Keep the outboard and one of the paddles as payment for the food they’ve eaten.” Rick grinned at that. “It’ll take them a day to get around to the harbour, unless they paddle straight in to shore and walk; and even that would take a couple of hours.”
“They might blab to the authorities,” he suggested.
“What can they tell them? The truth? That they held us up at gunpoint? That they tried to hijack us? That we found von Luckner’s treasure? Fat chance!”
******
Half an hour underwater and the chest was free from the pillars. Rick had already tilted the oil drums over and let all the air out. We didn’t want the chest shooting to the surface prematurely.
We lifted the chest off the boulders and placed it down on a bed of small rocks and broken coral by the base of one of the pillars. Rolling it over on its side, I found several small holes in the bottom where the iron had been in contact with the rock and had rotted. There was no air left in the chest. It was full of sea-water; and whatever was in the chest had been soaking in that water for more than a few years. If it was banknotes, or anything made of paper or cloth, it would be at best a pulpy mass, and at worst, small confetti-like particles that would crumble to the touch.
All our hopes now rested on it being either gold or silver, in either bullion or coin. I favoured coins: gold sovereigns probably, for most of the ships von Luckner had scuttled had been British, although there had also been French, Canadian, American and even an Italian vessel, so there could be twenty-franc, twenty-dollar and fifty-lira gold pieces as well.
I looked across at Rick, but it was impossible to tell what was going on behind the face-mask. If there had been some way of opening the chest and removing the contents without it being obvious, I would have done it, and taken up an empty chest. We could always have come back for the contents; but it was just what Judy would expect me to do, and the tarred seal had to stay intact.
I was tempted to take the chest up and attack when their minds were focussed on the lid as we forced it open, but sanity prevailed and I put the thought out of my mind.
******
We sat on the back deck: Judy and Sebastian on the two aluminium chairs; Henry on the brine tank; Rick and I perched on the drums of diesel; waiting until I would agree that it was safe for him to go down again.
“Why don’t you go down with Henry?” Judy asked, pointing a finger in my direction. “If Rick’s ribs won’t allow him to work, maybe you should be going down instead.”
“Because I’ve got the start of coral ear,” I retorted. “See how red the bloody thing has gone?”
There was nothing wrong with either of my ears, but I di
dn’t think she would want to get close enough to look.
“Well!” she snapped. “What time are they going down?”
I looked at my watch and drew some numbers on the top of the brine tank with my finger. “Three o’clock.”
She turned to Rick. “Can you get it free this dive?”
“Might just do it,” he replied. “There’s not a lot left to break off.”
It seemed to satisfy her and she dropped the subject.
Towards two in the afternoon a fishing boat appeared from the northern end of the island, following the coast and seemingly heading straight towards us. Sebastian herded us into the saloon. It came within half a mile and then veered out to sea, passing us by a good five or six hundred yards.
I watched as it chugged further down along the coast, clearly not interested in us, nor in the big clams we might have been taking from the reef. It was similar to several we had seen fishing around Bau Waters while we were anchored at Leleuvia: twenty to twenty-five feet long; a thick plywood hull, the paint long since stained by exhaust fumes; a small perspex windscreen, usually cracked; and powered by a stinking inboard diesel engine that would push it along at perhaps five knots if the wind happened to be blowing in the right direction. They had no grace, no comfort, no navigational aids or life-saving gear that I could see, and would be useless in a heavy sea; but the ugly craft did what they were supposed to do – they caught fish.
Rick and Henry went back down at three o’clock, presumably spending the time playing charades on the bottom. There was nothing left to do apart from tying the oil drums back on to the chest, and putting a few pounds of air in to hold them upright. All it needed now was for one of the drums to be filled with air and one man at the surface could raise the chest with a rope; but the rope could wait until morning. I didn’t want Sebastian going out there on his own to test his strength.
Judy and Sebastian were filled with excitement that evening. She cuddled the big oaf, telling him how great she thought he was, and talking about the big yacht they would buy with the proceeds from the treasure. The poor bastard lapped it up.
She opened a bottle of wine they had rescued from Sebastian’s yacht: Balgownie Hermitage, 1968 vintage, a good Victorian red; no doubt pinched from the restaurant before she had left. There had been a carton lying in the rubber boat which she had ordered Henry to bring on board. Judy had her priorities right.
“Do you guys think that’s wise?” I asked, inclining my head towards the opened bottle.
“What’s it to you!” she snapped.
“I don’t like the thought of you two getting drunk and playing with a loaded shotgun, that’s all.”
“Don’t worry about us, Andy darling. Sebastian can hold his wine. Can’t you, Seb?”
She blew into his ear. It brought a smile to his face.
I didn’t want them to stop drinking, just the opposite. I knew Judy wouldn’t let him get drunk, but I was hoping I could goad her into at least opening another bottle. With two bottles of red they would sleep like babies, while we broke out of our improvised prison.
“Time for you three to go beddy-byes,” she giggled an hour later.
I had noticed that she had drunk at least half of the first bottle and most of the second. Sebastian was perhaps smarter than I had given him credit for.
There was more grumbling as we trudged out of the saloon and along the deck to the storage hold, each of us sounding like Brer Rabbit begging not to be thrown into the briar patch.
“Don’t worry, boys,” she said. “By tomorrow it’ll all be over and you can kiss us goodbye.”
She blew down a kiss as Sebastian slammed the lid.
******
“What’s the time now?” Henry asked, the tenth time he had put the question.
“Just after twelve,” I replied. “Give it another hour and then we move.”
We had already organized the equipment, leaving it spread around the hold: the cylinders lying half-hidden under part of the coil of old rope: one of oxygen and the other of acetylene; not certain whether Sebastian might make a midnight check. We would be lost if he found the two cylinders set up with the cutting torch and hoses connected, and the lighter lying close by. Two minutes was all we needed to put it together, and I knew exactly where we had to cut.
I had put a fan down in the hold when I had come back from the morning dive, hoping that it would blow the fumes away; but it still stank.
I settled down to doze for a while, knowing that Henry would be certain to wake me before the minute hand had moved past the half-hour.
“Shit!” Rick gasped ten or more minutes later. “What the hell was that?”
“What was what?” I asked, half asleep.
“That bump against the side of the hull.”
I hadn’t felt the first one, but the second one shivered up my legs as I stood and reached for the light switch in the darkened hold. The neon light flickered and then flooded the hot enclosed space with a harsh brilliant glare.
We stood listening to the gentle thumping above our heads as several pairs of bare feet raced along the deck towards the saloon. The feet stopped. There was silence for a moment.
And then the screaming began.
Twenty
“Jesus Christ!” Rick cried. “Who the hell is it?”
“Shut up!” I snapped. “Listen!”
We stood on tiptoe, our heads straining towards the hatch cover as I pushed it up the meager half inch the padlock allowed. Nobody spoke, each of us straining our ears, trying to understand what was being shouted, hoping to learn who it was; but all that reached us was an unintelligible babble; the strident bedlam of Judy’s repeated screaming; Sebastian roaring and bellowing; and urgent yells in a language that could be nothing other than Hindi.
“Indians?” Henry asked, the mere sound of the word throwing terror into the hold.
“It sure as hell isn’t Sekove and his mates,” I murmured.
For those first fifteen seconds I had half thought that it might have been, but not when the harsh voices reached me.
It was all over in the space of less than a minute. Judy was finally subdued, not exactly silent, but at least she had stopped screaming. All we could hear was one clipped voice asking questions, and Sebastian shouting short sharp answers.
“It’s that bloody fishing boat!” Rick exclaimed. “Got to be! The one that went past this afternoon.”
“Could be,” I agreed. “Now shut up and listen! They’re on the move again.”
There were more footsteps, but this time unhurried, and the sound of someone stumbling, someone being forced along.
“Quick!” Rick cried. “Turn the light off and get back in the corner.”
There was a rattling of the padlock and the lid was lifted high. Sebastian’s large bulk loomed in the pale moonlight, and three feet behind him, to his left, an Indian, holding Sebastian’s gun as though he knew how to use it. I couldn’t see the black face, but I was certain it was no friend of ours.
“Go!” he ordered. “Down there!”
Sebastian looked into the hold and baulked. The barrels of the gun jabbed him sharply in the back, and just as sharply were drawn back out of reach again. There was a snarl from Sebastian’s lips and I knew that he was getting ready to spin and charge.
“Sebastian,” I called softly. “Not now, mate. Later.”
He looked down at the voice, surprised, as though he had forgotten that we even existed.
“He’ll blow you apart without even thinking twice about it,” I continued. I knew what they were after, and what they had lost to get this far. He grunted and climbed down. Judy followed, shaking a black hand from her arm as if it were something unclean. The lid clanged down again and the lock clicked. No other words had been spoken by the dark faces.
I reached up and turned the light back on. I wasn’t happy sitting in the dark any more. There was a scraping sound down by the stern.
“What’s that?” Henry asked.
“It sounds like they’re dragging one of the drums of diesel forward,” I replied.
We heard the drum being hauled along to the hatch and then levered up on top, pushing the lid firmly down into the rubber seal.
“So much for our brilliant plan,” I said. “Damn!”
“What was it?” Judy asked.
I told her about the oxy-torch.
“What happened topsides?” Rick asked Sebastian.
He sat on the rope, with his back propped against the bulkhead, crestfallen, stunned, and shamed. He hadn’t even heard Rick’s question. I moved across and tapped him on the foot with my toe.
“What happened to your shoulder?” I asked.
“One of those black sons-of-bitches come at me,” he muttered after a pause. “He had one of them cane knives. I ducked the first swipe but he got me with the second.” His head came up, eyes still dazed. “I thought he’d missed until I felt the wetness. Bastard!” He looked across at Judy. “I would’ve had him if the other two hadn’t come up behind me and cracked me over the head with somethin’.” He put his fingers up to the back of his head, winced, and dropped his eyes down, silent again.
“Then what happened?” I asked, kicking his foot again.
“One of them spotted the shotgun on the top bunk and beat me to it. The black bastard threatened to shoot Judy if I tried anythin’.”
Henry moved across with fresh cleaning rags from the cardboard box. Sebastian pushed him away until Judy told the big man not to be stupid. The morose eyes watched Henry’s every move as he strapped a pad of cloth around the bleeding wound. It wasn’t deep, but must have hurt like hell.
“How did they get so close without you hearing them?” I asked.
“Haven’t got a clue.”
“Bullshit!” Rick snapped.
Sebastian flicked his head sideways, sending the damp unkempt hair snaking back from smouldering eyes. “I thought I heard an engine in the distance,” he finally replied. “But it cut out and then nothin’, so I rolled over and went back to sleep.”
“They must have lined the trawler up from some distance out,” Rick interrupted. “Gunned the motor and then cut it when they were only a few hundred yards away, and let the momentum carry them in until they hit the hull.”
The Stone Dog Page 26