by Paul Somers
It was almost dark now, and I couldn’t see much in the cockpit, but I made a mental note of its lay-out. It was pretty wide, eight or nine feet, with a square stern. There was a seat on each side, from the counter to the saloon bulkhead, with lockers underneath, and there were more lockers in the stern. The engine was housed under a wooden casing about five feet from the saloon door. The wheel and controls were on the port side of the door.
That was about all I had time to notice before Thornton and Blake returned. One of them switched on the saloon light, and we were taken inside. The saloon was spacious, but that was about all that could be said for it. There was a sleeping berth on each side of it, a table in the middle, and a small galley compartment near the door—and not much else. Curlew was certainly no luxury boat. The paint on the walls was dirty and peeling, and everything looked in a pretty scruffy state. No attempt had been made to keep the place tidy. The wet aqualungs and harpoon guns, I noticed, had been thrown down on one of the bunks and had soaked the cover. Obviously, no one cared.
While Mellor stood guard, Thornton went through my pockets. He took away a knife, which was the only thing I could conceivably have used as a weapon. Afterwards he ran quickly through the contents of Mollie’s handbag. Then we were taken through another door into a small forecabin, with two more bunks along its converging sides.
“Your stateroom!” Mellor said. He looked carefully around as though satisfying himself there was nothing lying about that we could make trouble with. He needn’t have bothered—the forecabin was even barer than the saloon.
I said, “What’s the programme, Mellor?”
He shrugged. “Don’t ask me—Thornton runs the show.”
“Well, do you suppose we could have a drink and something to eat? We’ve had a pretty gruelling time, you know.”
“I’ll see,” he said, and went out, locking the cabin door behind him.
An electric bulb above our heads gave out a dim light, and Mollie took a mirror from her bag and began tidying her hair and making up her face.
“How do you feel?” I said.
She gave me a wry look. “Fairly pessimistic, at the moment.”
“Are you warm now?”
“Oh, yes, I’m warm enough.”
“Well, we’re still alive—which is more than I expected to be a little while ago.”
“Me, too,” she said. “Let’s hope it lasts!”
While she was busy with the mirror I had a look round our quarters. There was a porthole above each bunk—far too small to get through, of course. There were lockers under the beds, both of them empty. For’ ard of the cabin, there was another small door leading to a toilet compartment in the forepeak. I had a sudden hope that there might be a hatch in the roof there, but there wasn’t. I came out again, and inspected the cabin door. It was lightly constructed and the lock didn’t look very strong. I could probably break it open if I wanted to. But with all that armament outside, there wasn’t any point.
Presently the key turned in the lock and Mellor came in again. He was carrying two sizeable tots of whisky, some biscuits, and a lump of cheese. Blake was covering him from behind with the gun. Mellor said, “I’m afraid you’ll have to eat in the dark—Thornton’s orders. We can’t risk any signalling.” He took the bulb from the cabin light and went out, re-locking the door behind him.
The whisky went down wonderfully. So did the food. Afterwards I gave Mollie a cigarette and lit my pipe and we lay down on the bunks.
“Well, they’ve treated us pretty well so far,” I said.
“Oh, yes, apart from hunting us with harpoons! What do you suppose they’re going to do—stay anchored here all night?”
“It looks like it,” I said. “They’ve turned on the riding light—I can see its reflection in the water.”
She was silent for a moment or two. Then she said, “I’m sorry I let you in for this, Hugh.”
“Nonsense! I’m of age, aren’t I?”
“It’s going to be a terrific story if we ever have the chance to write it.”
“Yes,” I said, without much conviction.
I lay still for a while, listening to the murmur of voices from the cockpit. I wished I could hear what they were saying, but nothing came through clearly. Once I caught the chink of crockery—they were probably having their supper, too. Presently there was a shuffling of feet, and a sound like someone getting into the dinghy. I looked out through the porthole. It was a wonderful night, clear and starlit and very warm. The curve of the hull hid the stern from view, but after a moment the dinghy came into sight. There was one man in it, rowing for the shore. I thought it was Mellor, but I wasn’t sure. The voices in the cockpit continued to rumble away.
Mollie was very quiet. I leaned across, and saw that she’d dropped off to sleep. I wasn’t surprised. I stretched out on the bunk again, and thought about the extraordinary mess we’d got into. It was difficult to be at all hopeful. Thornton and Mellor were obviously quite ruthless. Blake would follow his leader. We were completely in their power, and there didn’t seem to be a single thing we could do … Not at the moment, anyway.
My thoughts switched to the raid, and for a while I occupied myself in trying to piece together the bits of information that we now had. But I soon gave it up. There seemed no point in milling over a situation that was only half understood, particularly when our own prospects were so dubious. Better to follow Mollie’s example, and recoup lost energies. I relaxed, and very soon I was asleep, too.
Chapter Eighteen
I was wakened by a loud bump, and sat up in alarm. I’d been dead to the world, and in the darkness it took me a moment or two to remember where I was. Then I saw Mollie’s face, faintly lit by the glow of a cigarette, and everything came back. She was sitting at the foot of my bunk, beside the open port.
“Hallo,” I said. “Have you been awake long?”
“Not long …”
“What was that noise?”
“Only the dinghy coming back—it banged against the hull … Hugh, there were two men in it.”
“Two? Are you sure?”
“Certain.”
“Then that makes four of them altogether.”
“Yes.”
“It’s getting to be quite a gang,” I said ruefully. “Not that one more makes much difference at this stage … I wonder who he is, though.”
“He was just a dark shape in the stern to me.”
“Well, we’ll know soon … Any idea of the time?”
Mollie drew on her cigarette and held the glowing tip close to her watch. “Ten minutes to midnight.”
“Heavens, we’ve slept for nearly three hours. I must say I feel better for it, too.”
“So do I … Listen!”
The outer door from the cockpit had opened. A voice—Thornton’s—said, “We might just as well make ourselves comfortable.”
“They’ll hear everything if we talk in there.” That was Blake.
“Does it matter?” Thornton said.
They came in, with a lot of foot-shuffling. Berth springs creaked as someone sat down heavily. They seemed to be arranging themselves round the saloon table. I heard Mellor say sharply, “Mind that diving kit, Tony.” The shuffling continued as they settled down. Then a new voice said, “Well—this is a damn’ fine mess you’ve got us into.”
For a moment I could scarcely believe my ears. Perhaps I didn’t want to believe them, because. I’d liked the man and privately given him a clean bill. But there couldn’t be any doubt about it—I’d heard that West Country burr too often lately to make any mistake. The newcomer was Harris, the captain of Wanderer.
Mollie had recognised him, too. I felt her hand close tightly on my arm, signalling the fact. We listened, hardly daring to breathe in case we missed anything.
Thornton said, with a touch of asperity, “It could be a much worse mess.”
“Could it?”
“Of course it could. If they’d got away, we’d all be on the run by now
.”
“Well, we can’t keep them locked up for ever,” Harris said, “so what difference does it make? We’ll be on the run soon enough.”
There was a little silence. I think it was the most eloquent silence I’d ever known. I hadn’t much doubt what was coming next—and I was right.
“We’ll have to do something about them, that’s all,” Thornton said. The matter-of-factness of his tone made my blood run cold.
Harris said slowly, “You know I’ll never agree to that.”
“You don’t have to concern yourself about it,” Thornton said. “We can easily manage it between us if you’re squeamish.”
“You ought to have been a bloody butcher!” Harris broke out with sudden violence.
“Easy!” Mellor said. “We’re all friends here!”
“If it comes to butchery,” Thornton said, “we’ve all of us done a bit of it in our time. Knives in the back, too!—but maybe you’ve forgotten, Harris.”
“That was war—it was quite different … What you’re suggesting turns my stomach. My God, I wish I’d never met you.”
“It’s a bit late to think about that, now.”
“I ought to have known you couldn’t be trusted.”
“If you’re still harping on the Scott episode,” Thornton said coldly, “I told you before, I had no choice. If he’d been allowed to go on shooting, we’d probably never have got the boat away at all. Anyway, I only meant to wing him—it was just bad luck the bullet got him in the head.”
“We agreed the guns weren’t to be loaded,” Harris said.
“Well, it’s a good thing they were, that’s all I can say. If they hadn’t been, we’d all have been finished. And don’t imagine you’ll be able to wriggle out of your share of the business, because nobody’s ever going to believe you didn’t know the guns were loaded. You’re in this thing up to the neck—literally!”
“Maybe I am,” Harris said, “but I’m not getting in any deeper—and I mean that. There’s going to be no more killing.”
Thornton gave an impatient exclamation. “Look, Harris, face the facts, will you? If those two tell their story, we’re sunk. You know that as well as I do. If they don’t, we’re all right. No one else knows a thing. So what is there to argue about? There won’t be any hitches, I assure you. Tony and I will do one more dive in the morning, and by then we’ll have recovered practically all the stuff. Afterwards, we’ll take the boat out and get rid of those two—if we drop them into deep water with plenty of ballast they’ll never be heard of again. You won’t even need to be around—you can go back to Wanderer to-night and carry on just as before. I only asked you to come over so that I could bring you up to date. Guy will stay on for the dive, and that’ll be all we’ll need of him, too. He can pack up his tent and get back to town. I’ll see the stuff reaches Amsterdam, and we’ll divide up as we arranged. Everything will work out fine.”
“We hope!” Mellor said.
“Anyway,” Thornton added, “there’s simply no alternative.”
“That’s just it, there is,” Harris said. “We don’t have to kill them. Why can’t we just tie them up and leave them somewhere? There’s a cave back there on the beach—it’s just the place. And then …” His voice dropped to a low murmur, so that I couldn’t hear what he was saying any more.
There was a pause. Then Thornton said, in his normal voice, “And after that, what? Suppose we did take this tub to Eire and scuttle her off the coast and go ashore, how long do you suppose we’d stay free? The police would have our descriptions flashed over there the moment those two got loose. We wouldn’t have a chance.”
A fist crashed down on the table. “Do you have to shout everything from the housetops, you bloody fool? If you tell them everything we’re planning to do, of course we haven’t a chance.”
“It’s you that’s the fool, Harris,” Thornton said. “Do you imagine the police wouldn’t think of Eire, anyway?”
“It doesn’t mean they’d get us, even so. We could find jobs, change our names, maybe go to sea …”
“That’s a far cry from having a boatyard of your own,” Thornton scoffed.
“It’s better than more murders.”
“Well, I certainly don’t mean to go to sea,” Thornton said. “I want to enjoy what we’ve worked for, in comfort—and I intend to. What about you, Guy?”
“I’m with you,” Mellor said. “I don’t think we’d have one chance in a hundred. In fact, I doubt if this old tore-out would even make Eire.”
“Tony?”
There was a little silence. Then Blake said, “I don’t like it, John, but I suppose you’re right.”
“That’s settled, then,” Thornton said. “Now, let’s have a drink.”
“Wait a minute!” Harris’s voice had its own note of authority. “You three think you can do as you like, don’t you?—but you’re wrong. You think because I’m always being pushed around, you can push me around, too. Well, you’d better think again.”
“It’s a majority decision, Harris.”
“To hell with that. Now you listen to me. I came in with you on this thing because I wanted some dough, and the way the Attwoods were flinging theirs around. I didn’t see why they shouldn’t lose a little. It was a tough job, a risk, but it seemed a risk worth taking. There was even a bit of adventure about it. But I never countenanced murder, and I never would. It’s not my line. I don’t mind telling you when I found Scott lying there dead I was tempted to spill the whole story right away.”
“And spend the rest of your life in jail?” Thornton said. “I’m not surprised you resisted the temptation!”
“Okay—I didn’t do it. Maybe I hadn’t got the guts. It was all finished, anyway—the man was dead and I couldn’t alter it. But this isn’t finished—it’s just going to begin. And I’m not having it. Is that clear, Thornton?—I’m not having it.”
Thornton said, “I wouldn’t say it was clear, no. What exactly are you going to do about it?”
“I’m going to stay here to see that nothing happens to those two. In the morning, we’ll dump them ashore, and then we’ll take our chance. That’s my last word.”
There was a tense silence. Then, very softly, Thornton said, “You know, Harris, I think it may be!”
Blake said, in an anxious voice, “Easy, John, we’ve got enough on our hands …” Then silence fell again.
It was unbearable not to be able to see what was going on. I tried to look through the keyhole, but the key blocked the view. Then I noticed that there was a tiny gleam of light coming through the top of the door where it didn’t fit very well, and I piled some cushions on the floor and stood on them and managed to get my eye to the crack.
There was quite a tableau in the saloon.
Thornton and Harris, seated near the outer door, faced each other across the table like duellists—except that only Thornton had a gun. He was pointing it at Harris’s chest. Harris, his big brown hands clutching the edge of the table, was watching him, motionless. Blake was watching him, too. Mellor was watching Harris.
Mellor said, “You might just as well string along with us, Harris. There aren’t any boatyards in heaven, you know.”
Harris said nothing.
Then in a fraction of a second, the situation exploded in chaos. Harris ducked and made a grab under the table. He must have got hold of Thornton’s foot, because Thornton was dragged off his seat before he could shoot. Mellor hurled himself on Harris. The table collapsed with a sound of rending wood. Blake seemed to be tangled up in the wreckage. Suddenly Harris tore himself away from Mellor and reached for the light switch and plunged the cabin into darkness.
It was a free-for-all, now—and an opportunity such as I hadn’t dared to hope for. I stepped back and crashed my foot against the lock of the cabin door. The lock broke, the door burst open, and I waded in. A pale face rose in front of me and I hit it hard and it merged again with the darkness. I couldn’t see much but I could hear plenty—there were gru
nts and gasps from all sides. Then someone got the cockpit door open and a figure was outlined for a moment against the stars. At once there was a flash, and a deafening report. The figure stumbled, recovered, and fell. Someone switched on the light again. I snatched up a bit of the broken table and struck at the light bulb but missed it. Thornton, struggling up out of of the debris, turned his gun on me.
“All right,” he said, “keep still, everbody. The fight’s over.” He got slowly to his feet.
By now Mellor had pulled out his own gun and was covering me, too. Blood trickled down his face from a cut over his eye. Blake was nursing his jaw. After a moment, Thornton went out into the cockpit and bent over Harris.
“How is he?” Mellor called, and waited. We all waited.
“He’s dead,” Thornton said. “He won’t bother us any more.”
Mollie, just behind me, gave a little gasp. Blake said, “The fool!—oh, the damn’ fool!”
Mellor jerked his gun towards us. “What about these two?”
“They’ll keep—there’s enough mess already. Get them back in the cabin.”
“In you go!” Mellor said.
I followed Mollie in, and shut the door. The lock didn’t work any more, but the latch still did, after a fashion. The panel above it had split from the force of my blow, and now Mollie was able to look through the door, too. We watched while the survivors tidied up.
Blake stayed in the saloon, gathering up the bits of mahogany that had once been a table and stacking them on one of the berths. He’d got Mellor’s gum; and he kept glancing towards our door. His nerve didn’t seem too good, and I thought he was much too trigger-happy to take any chances with. We kept very still, and watched Thornton and Mellor out in the cockpit. We couldn’t see everything, but we could see enough. Mellor had got a tarpaulin from somewhere and was spreading it out on the cockpit floor. Presently Thornton helped him lift Harris’s body on to it, and they carried what looked like lumps of iron ballast from the stern and put them in the parcel, and them they wrapped the whole thing up like a mummmy and roped it tight, and took one end each. A moment later we heard a faint splash as it went over the side of the boat.