“How much did they pay you, Telak?” Nicolson’s voice was hardly more than a whisper.
Seconds passed and Telak did not speak. Nicolson tensed himself for another blow on the back, but no blow came. Then Telak spoke, his words so faraway a murmur that Nicolson had to bend forward, involuntarily, to hear him.
“They paid me well, Mr. Nicolson.” He took a pace forward and half-turned, so that his side and profile were suddenly caught in the light streaming from the door of the hut. His left cheek, neck, arm and upper chest were a ghastly mass of sword or bayonet cuts, it was impossible to tell where one began and the other ended; the blood seemed to mask the whole side of his body and, even as Nicolson watched, he could see it drip soundlessly on to the hard-beaten earth of the kampong. “They paid me well,” Telak repeated tonelessly. “My father is dead, Trikah is dead. Many of our men are dead. We were betrayed and they took us by surprise.”
Nicolson stared at him without speaking, all thought temporarily blocked by the sight of Telak—a Telak, he could see now, with another Japanese bayonet only inches from his back. Not one bayonet, but two: Telak would have fought well before they struck him down. And then thought did come, pity and shock that this should have happened, and so soon, to men who had so selflessly befriended them, then, swift on the heels of that thought, bitter regret for the words that he himself had just uttered, for the horribly unjust accusation that must have been the last few grains of salt in the wounds of Telak’s sorrow and suffering. Nicolson opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out, only a gasp of pain as a rifle butt again thudded into his back, a gasp synchronised with Yamata’s low, evil laugh in the darkness.
Rifle now reversed, the Japanese officer drove Nicolson across the kampong at the jabbing point of his bayonet. Ahead of him, Nicolson could see the others being herded through the sharply-limned rectangle of light that was the entrance to the council house. Some were already inside. Miss Plenderleith was just passing through, with Lena at her back, then Gudrun with Peter, followed closely by the bo’sun and Van Effen. Then Gudrun, approaching the door, stumbled over something on the ground, overbalanced with the weight of the little boy in her arms, and almost fell. Her guard caught her savagely by the shoulder and pushed. Perhaps he meant to push her through the door, but if he did his direction was bad, for girl and child together crashed heavily into the lintel of the doorway. Almost twenty feet away Nicolson could hear the thud of a head or heads against unyielding wood, the girl’s exclamation of pain and young Peter’s shrill, high-pitched cry of fear and hurt. McKinnon, only a few feet behind the girl shouted something unintelligible—his native Gaelic, Nicolson guessed—took two quick steps forward and leapt for the back of the guard who had pushed the girl: but the swinging rifle butt of the soldier behind was even faster and the bo’sun never saw it coming ….
The council house, brightly lit now with half a dozen oil-lamps, was a large, lofty room, twenty feet in width by thirty in length, with the entrance door in the middle of one of the longer sides. To the right hand side of the door, taking up nearly all the width of the room, was the elder’s platform, with another door behind it leading out to the kampong. All the rest of the big wooden house, facing the door and to the left of it, was completely bare, hard-packed earth and nothing else. On this bare earth the prisoners sat in a small, tight semicircle. All except McKinnon—Nicolson could just see him from where he sat, the shoulders, the lifeless, out-flung arms and the back of the dark, curly head cruelly illumined by the harsh bar of light streaming out from the doorway of the council house, the rest of his body shadowed in the darkness.
But Nicolson had only an occasional glance to spare for the bo’sun, none at all for the watchful guards who lounged behind them or with their backs to the doorway. He had eyes at the moment only for the platform, for the men on the platform, thoughts only for his own stupidity and folly and squeamishness, for the carelessness that had led them all, Gudrun and Peter and Findhorn and all the rest of them, to this dark end.
Captain Yamata was sitting on the platform, on a low bench, and next to him was Siran. A grinning, triumphant Siran who no longer bothered to conceal his emotions with an expressionless face, a Siran obviously on the best of terms with the broadly smiling Yamata, a Siran who from time to time removed a long black cheroot from his gleaming teeth and blew a contemptuous cloud of smoke in the direction of Nicolson. Nicolson stared back with bleak unwavering eyes, his face drained of all expression. There was murder in his heart.
It was all too painfully obvious what had happened. Siran had pretended to go north from the beach where they had land—a subterfuge, Nicolson thought savagely, that any child should have expected. He must have gone some little way to the north, hidden, waited until the litter-bearers had moved off, followed them, bypassed the village, moved on to Bantuk and warned the garrison there. It had all been so inevitable, so clearly what Siran had been almost bound to do that any fool should have foreseen it and taken precautions against it. The precautions consisting of killing Siran. But he, Nicolson, had criminally failed to take these precautions. He knew now that if he ever again had the chance he would shoot Siran with as little emotion as he would a snake or an old tin can. He knew also that he would never have the chance again.
Slowly, with as much difficulty as if he were fighting against the power of magnetism, Nicolson dragged his gaze away from Siran’s face and looked round the others sitting on the floor beside him. Gudrun, Peter, Miss Plenderleith, Findhorn, Willoughby, Vannier—they were all there, all tired and sick and suffering, nearly all quiet and resigned and unafraid. His bitterness was almost intolerable. They had all trusted him, trusted him completely, implicitly depended upon him to do all in his power to bring them all safely home again. They had trusted him, and now no one of them would ever see home again … He looked away towards the platform. Captain Yamata was on his feet, one hand hooked in his belt, the other resting on the hilt of his sword.
“I shall not delay you long.” His voice was calm and precise. “We leave for Bantuk in ten minutes. We leave to see my commanding officer, Colonel Kiseki, who is very anxious to see you all: Colonel Kiseki had a son who commanded the captured American torpedo boat sent to meet you.” He was aware of the sudden quick looks between the prisoners, the sharp indrawing of breath and he smiled faintly. “Denial will serve you nothing. Captain Siran here will make an excellent witness. Colonel Kiseki is mad with grief. It would have been better for you—for all of you, each last one of you—had you never been born.
“Ten minutes,” he went on smoothly. “Not more. There is something we must have first, it will not take long, and then we will go.” He smiled again, looked slowly round the prisoners squatting on the floor beneath him. “And while we wait, I am sure you would all care to meet someone whom you think you know but do not know at all. Someone who is a very good friend of our glorious Empire, someone who, I feel sure, our glorious Emperor will wish to thank in person. Concealment is no longer necessary, sir.”
There was a sudden movement among the prisoners, then one of them was on his feet, advancing towards the platform, speaking fluently in Japanese and shaking the bowing Captain Yamata by the hand. Nicolson struggled half-way to his feet, consternation and disbelief in every line of his face, then fell heavily to the ground as a rifle butt caught him across the shoulder. For a moment his neck and arm seemed as if they were on fire, but he barely noticed it.
“Van Effen! What the devil do you think—”
“Not Van Effen, my dear Mr. Nicolson,” Van Effen protested. “Not ‘Van’ but ‘von’. I’m sick and tired of masquerading as a damned Hollander.” He smiled faintly and bowed. “I am at your service, Mr. Nicolson. Lieutenant-Colonel Alexis von Effen, German counter-espionage.”
Nicolson stared at him, stared without speaking, nor was he alone in his shocked astonishment. Every eye in the council house was on Van Effen, eyes held there involuntarily while stunned minds fought to orientate themselves, to grasp the
situation as it was, and memories and incidents of the past ten days slowly coalesced into comprehension and the tentative beginnings of understanding. The seconds dragged interminably by and formed themselves into a minute, and then almost another minute, and there were no more tentative wonderings and deepening suspicions. There was only certainty, stone cold certainty that Colonel Alexis von Effen was really who he claimed to be. There could be no doubt at all.
It was Van Effen who finally broke the silence. He turned his head slightly and looked out the door, then glanced again at his late comrades in distress. There was a smile on his face, but there was no triumph in it, no rejoicing, no signs of pleasure at all. If anything, the smile was sad.
“And here, gentlemen, comes the reason for all our trials and suffering of the past days, of why the Japanese—my people’s allies, I would remind you—have pursued and harried us without ceasing. Many of you wondered why we were so important to the Japanese, our tiny group of survivors. Now you will know.”
A Japanese soldier walked past the men and women on the floor and dumped a heavy bag between Van Effen and Yamata. They all stared at it, then stared at Miss Plenderleith. It was her bag, and her lips and knuckles were pale as ivory, her eyes half-shut as if in pain. But she made no move and said nothing at all.
At a sign from Van Effen the Japanese soldier took one handle of the bag, while Van Effen took the other. Between them they raised it to shoulder height, then inverted it. Nothing fell to the ground, but the heavily weighted lining dropped through the inverted mouth of the canvas and leather bag and hung down below it as if it were filled with lead. Van Effen looked at the Japanese officer. “Captain Yamata?”
“My pleasure, Colonel” Yamata stepped forward, the sword hissing from its sheath. It gleamed once in the bright yellow light from the oil-lamps, then its razored edge sliced cleanly through the tough canvas lining as if it had been so much paper. And then the gleam of the sword was lost, buried, extinguished in the dazzling, scintillating stream of fire that poured from the bag and pooled on the earth beneath in a deep, lambent cone of coruscating brilliance.
“Miss Plenderleith has quite a taste in gee-gaws and trinkets.” Van Effen smiled pleasantly and touched the sparkling radiance at his feet with a casual toe. “Diamonds, Mr. Nicolson. The largest collection, I believe, ever seen outside the Union of South Africa. These are valued at just under two million pounds.”
FOURTEEN
The soft murmur of Van Effen’s voice faded away and the silence in the council house was heavy and deep. For each man and woman there the others might not have existed. The great heap of diamonds at their feet, sparkling and flaming with a barbaric magnificence in the light of the flickering oil-lamps, had a weirdly hypnotic quality, held every eye in thrall. But by and by Nicolson stirred and looked up at Van Effen. Strangely enough, he could feel no bitterness, no hostility towards this man: they had come through too much together, and Van Effen had come through it better than most, unselfish, enduring and helpful all the way. The memory of that was much too recent to be washed away.
“Borneo stones, of course,” he murmured. “From Banjermasin by the Kerry Dancer—couldn’t have been any other way. Uncut, I suppose—and you say they’re worth two million?”
“Rough cut and uncut,” Van Effen nodded. “And their market value is at least that—a hundred fighter planes, a couple of destroyers, I don’t know. In wartime they’re worth infinitely more to any side that gets its hands on them.” He smiled faintly. “None of these stones will ever grace milady’s fingers. Industrial use only—diamond-tipped cutting tools. A great pity, is it not?”
No one spoke, no one as much as glanced at the speaker. They heard the words, but the words failed to register, for that moment they all lived in their eyes alone. And then Van Effen had stepped quickly forward, his foot swinging, and the great pile of diamonds were tumbling over the earthen floor in a glittering cascade.
“Trash! Baubles!” His voice was harsh, contemptuous. “What matter all the diamonds, all the precious stones that ever were when the great nations of the world are at each other’s throats and men are dying in their thousands and their hundreds of thousands? I wouldn’t sacrifice a life, not even the life of an enemy, for all the diamonds in the Indies. But I have sacrificed many lives, and put many more I’m afraid, in deadly danger to secure another treasure, an infinitely more valuable treasure than these few paltry stones at our feet. What do a few lives matter, if losing them enables a man to save a thousand times more?”
“We can all see how fine and noble you are,” Nicolson said bitterly. “Spare us the rest and get to the point.”
“I have already arrived,” Van Effen said equably. “That treasure is in this room, with us, now. I have no wish to prolong this unduly or seek after dramatic effect.” He stretched out his hand. “Miss Plenderleith, if you please.”
She stared at him, her eyes uncomprehending.
“Oh, now, come, come.” He snapped his fingers and smiled at her. “I admire your performance, but I really can’t wait all night.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” she said blankly.
“Perhaps it may help you if I tell you that I know everything.” There was neither gloating nor triumph in Van Effen’s voice, only certainty and a curious overtone of weariness. “Everything, Miss Plenderleith, even to that simple little ceremony in a Sussex village on 18th February, 1902.”
“What the devil are you talking about?” Nicolson demanded.
“Miss Plenderleith knows, don’t you Miss Plenderleith?” There was almost compassion in Van Effen’s voice: for the first time the life had faded from her lined old face and her shoulders were sagging wearily.
“I know.” She nodded in defeat and looked at Nicolson. “He is referring to the date of my marriage—my marriage to Brigadier-General Farnholme. We celebrated our fortieth wedding anniversary aboard the lifeboat” She tried to smile, but failed.
Nicolson stared at her, at the tired little face and empty eyes, and all at once he was convinced of the truth of it. Even as he looked at her, not really seeing her, memories came flooding in on him and many things that had baffled him gradually began to become clear … But Van Effen was speaking again.
“18th February, 1902. If I know that, Miss Plenderleith, I know everything.”
“Yes, you know everything.” Her voice was a distant murmur.
“Please.” His hand was still outstretched. “You would not care for Captain Yamata’s men to search you.”
“No.” She fumbled under her salt-stained, bleached jacket, undid a belt and handed it to Van Effen. “I think this is what you want.”
“Thank you.” For a man who had secured what he had spoken of as a priceless treasure, Van Effen’s face was strangely empty of all triumph and satisfaction. “This is indeed what I want.”
He undid the pouches of the belt, lifted out the photostats and films that had lain inside and held them up to the light of the flickering oil-lamps. Almost a minute passed while he examined them in complete silence, then he nodded his head in satisfaction and returned papers and films to the belt.
“All intact,” he murmured. “A long time and a long way—but all intact.”
“What the devil are you talking about?” Nicolson demanded irritably. “What is that?”
“This?” Van Effen glanced down at the belt he was buckling round his waist. “This, Mr. Nicolson, is what makes everything worth while. This is the reason for all the action and suffering of the past days, the reason why the Kerry Dancer and the Viroma were sunk, why so many people have died, why my allies were prepared to go to any length to prevent your escape into the Timor Sea. This is why Captain Yamata is here now, although I doubt whether even he knows that—but his commanding officer will. This is—”
“Get to the point!” Nicolson snapped.
“Sorry.” Van Effen tapped the belt. “This contains the complete, fully detailed plans, in code, of Japan’s projected invasion of No
rthern Australia. Japanese codes are almost impossible to break, but our people know that there is one man in London who could do it. If anyone could have escaped with these and got them to London, it would have been worth a fortune to the allies.”
“My God!” Nicolson felt dazed. “Where—where did they come from?”
“I don’t know.” Van Effen shook his head. “If we had known that they would never have got into the wrong hands in the first place … The full-scale invasion plans, Mr. Nicolson—forces employed, times, dates, places—everything. In British or American hands, these would have meant three months’ setback to the Japanese, perhaps even six. At this early stage of the war, such a delay could have been fatal to the Japanese: you can understand their anxiety to recover these. What’s a fortune in diamonds compared to these, Mr. Nicolson?”
“What, indeed,” Nicolson muttered. He spoke automatically, a man with his mind far away.
“But now we have both—the plans and the diamonds.” There was still that strange, complete lack of any inflection of triumph in Van Effen’s voice. He reached out a toe and touched the pile of diamonds. “Perhaps I was over hasty in expressing my contempt of these. They have their own beauty.”
“Yes.” The bitterness of defeat was sharp in Nicolson’s mouth, but his face was impassive. “A fantastic sight, Van Effen.”
“Admire them while you may, Mr. Nicolson.” Captain Yamata’s voice, cold and harsh, cut through the spell, brought them all tumbling back to reality. He touched the tip of the cone of diamonds with his sword-point and the white fire glittered and blazed as the stones spilled over on to the ground. “They are beautiful, but man must have eyes to see.”
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