Rollerball (Commander Shaw Book 17)

by Philip McCutchan

  I said, “I’m sorry about your honourable father. But his actions, if you’ll forgive me, weren’t all that honourable.”

  “Honourable for Japan.”

  “Tripe,” I said rudely. “The Japanese government was very far from involved.”

  “Play on words. Honour of Japan does not always depend on attitude of government. Government does not always reflect views and wishes of people. It is same in your country, in all countries of world. Sometimes people must act.”

  “Like the man in purple.”

  “Man in purple dead also — ”

  “I know.”

  “Nothing to do with man in purple.”

  “Then what? What do you want with Miss Mandrake and myself?”

  “Hostages,” the Japanese said, grinning away.

  “For political purposes, I presume?”

  “Not political. You will now tell us what you came to Australia for.”

  I said, “As if you didn’t know.” It wouldn’t be any use my saying we were on leave. Also, the hostage angle was something of a bum steer: hostages we might in fact be, though I couldn’t see what use the Japs could make of us, but there wouldn’t be any question of eventual release. Both Felicity and I were due for the chop. That was where the personal involvement came in. And meanwhile there was going to be a grill. Those little balls began to look very immediately lethal quite apart from the tetradoxin. The Jap who had done the talking brought out a knife and placed the blade against my throat. I could feel my Adam’s apple being nicked each time I swallowed.

  “You tell, please,” the Jap said.

  “I’ve nothing to say.”

  “Then I tell you. You come because of small ball.”

  “What small ball?”

  The eyes were hard now, making a strange bedfellow with the grin. “Useless to disclaim knowledge, since fact is known. You come by Boeing 747 to airport. You meet Professor, hand over package. There was watch from London, prior facts also being known about finding of ball.”

  Well, they did seem to know it all. I should have done some checking aboard the airliner. There was no excuse. I should have noted a tail from Focal House to Heathrow earlier. When you’re dealing with astute bastards, bastards who would have a lot in common with WUSWIPP and CORPSE, you should treat every wall as having big ears well a-flap though invisible. And you don’t trust anyone. Even the geriatric from Worthing could have been supplementing her pension by a little dirty work.

  I asked, “So?”

  “Wish to know Professor Railton’s report.”

  “If you wanted that, you shouldn’t have had him killed. Or your man should have got what he was sent in for after he’d done the killing. As for me, I don’t know what the report was. It died with Railton.”

  “Mix of statement,” the Jap said, metaphorically pouncing. “Admission that killer could have found report if looked harder, does not check with latter part of statement.”

  I wasn’t feeling too good or I wouldn’t have been guilty. I said, “Mix of statements — and actions — isn’t all on one side, friend. You spoke of hostages, and you seem to need information. So why try to blow us up by planting a device aboard our boat?” “Mistake,” the Jap said, “for which person in Sydney will suffer. Orders misinterpreted, misunderstood. But now all is well.”

  “Lucky for you.”

  “Not luck that we find you. Your destination and time of leaving known, and we search and find. Now you will say what was in professor’s report. Wish to know what is known by now in Britain.”

  “In Britain?”

  “This,” the grinning little devil said, pressing with his knife, “concerns Britain, does not concern Australia.”

  I said, “The last part of what you chose to call my statement was the right part. There was no report. You put paid to that by having Railton murdered.”

  *

  I stuck to that, saying nothing further except to tell the Jap when he asked why Dr Boydell had been called in, that he hadn’t been so much called in as come along to the university to find out the facts about the death of an old friend. After all, he’d been in Sydney on other business at the time. I don’t know whether or not I was believed; the two Japs presumably knew all about the tetradoxin element and they couldn’t avoid seeing a connexion between that and Boydell’s visit. The knife went on pressing. It was very painful and I was aware of the warm trickle of blood running down to my chest. I was also aware of the thump of the coaster’s engines and the rushing swish of water past her plates: she was heading north at speed. She could be intending to get lost for a while in the Barrier Reef in case of a pursuit once I’d failed to check in with Sydney, or she could be heading out of Australian waters and into the Melanesian islands beyond the Coral Sea. Thus far, there was no knowing. While I was being interrogated, Felicity kept silent. The Japs watched her throughout, as if hoping she would break to save my skin. She was too well-trained for that; you don’t do that in the field, however tough it may get. If Max back in London hadn’t been one hundred per cent sure of her, he’d never have sanctioned us working together in the first instance. As the questioning, and the knife, went on I wondered why they didn’t turn the heat directly on to Felicity in the hope that / would break; but this they didn’t do, and it could have been just the Jap view of women — that not even a Westerner would do anything to save the feelings of a valueless female. Of course, the valuelessness of women is a traditional outlook and these days not all Japs subscribe to it, but I had the impression that this pair still stuck to the good old ways and attitudes. There was something, I wouldn’t say endearingly, old-fashioned about them in a Jap sort of way: real wartime prison camp nastiness. I fancied the background to all this must be simple crime, and crime means cash.

  This, I put to them and they reacted. They looked at one another and the knife’s action was suspended.

  “Tell what is known about us,” they both said together, the brother speaking for the first time.

  I decided to keep them happy and occupied with a little improvisation. “You and your bosses in Britain,” I said, “are going to hold the country to ransom. There’s a large sum of money involved. A lot of nastiness if it’s not forthcoming, which of course it won’t be. I imagine you’ve done your research into our resources. The public sector borrowing requirement, out of which your demands would presumably have to come, is being cut daily. You haven’t a hope.”

  The grins were back. “Much hope,” the original speaker said. Once more the knife was laid across my throat. “Great British public will ensure in time.”

  “But you’re not ready yet. And you don’t want any advance warning to leak out. It won’t via Miss Mandrake or me. We don’t know anything. I’ve just been making guesses, that’s all.” For some reason or other, they left it at that. Perhaps they thought we’d be softened up by uncertainty when they left us alone.

  *

  Darkness came down. Soon, through the port, 1 could see the low-slung stars of the antipodean night, like great yellow lanterns. The vessel rolled on to the continuing swell, and began to pitch to a disturbed sea as a wind sprang up from easterly. I reckoned that by this time we must be standing to the northward of the Brisbane River and so far there had, so far as I was aware, been no attempt at interception. The wreckage of the Sundowner had probably vanished after the explosion and wouldn’t have been reported, and it was likely enough that Halloran wouldn’t yet be worried. I hadn’t arranged to make any routine reports; I would have contacted him if and when necessary and that was all — I hadn’t wanted any villains to pick up anything that might have begun to look like a deliberate keeping in touch, and thereby getting ideas. I wanted so far as possible to preserve my innocence of any involvement beyond being a messenger. Now I rather regretted all that. It would have been hugely reassuring to feel that 6D2 was somewhere on my track, but it was too late now.

  Pondering the possible foolishness of always insisting on being a loner, I fell asleep. I
was dead weary and my head still ached and I still felt a touch of sickness in the gut. The night passed and the weather worsened a little. There was a snatch of spray coming through the open port from time to time and we both got pretty wet. During the day food was brought, twice, by a steward who said nothing as he fed us with bully beef stew and chunks of bread. He looked like a Greek. The Japanese didn’t return; we were being saved up for something. No doubt there was plenty of time yet. So the day passed into another night, and all the time the high speed was kept up. Not long after the next dawn, when I was sleeping again, there was a sudden violent jar that woke me brutally. A hideous tearing sound came from beneath. Despite the heavy ropes that held us down our heads banged into the bulkhead behind as the way came so suddenly off the ship.

  “Torn the bottom out,” I said to Felicity. “Reef. Bum pilotage in the Capricorn Channel at a guess. She’d not have done it if she was standing out to sea.”

  “Serious?” she asked.

  “Probably. But I doubt if they’ll leave us here.”

  She knew the score all right: a ship doesn’t last long with her bottom sliced open like a sardine tin. All hell was being let loose on deck, shouts, running feet, a banging of heavy gear. I heard the wind, a rising sound, and solid water dolloped through the port. Naturally, we had both done our best all along to dislodge the binding ropes but with no success at all. They’d been made fast by a seaman who knew his job. It was equally useless now, even under the spur of imminent drowning. But I hadn’t been wrong about the Japs. They came into the cabin, both of them, one with a knife, the other with a sub-machine-gun held at his hip like a Yank mobster of the twenties, the grin still in place above.

  “Ship sink,” the gunman said. The other got busy with the knife and as soon as we were free they nudged us out pronto with knife-point and gun-barrel. We were stiff and unhandy and a lot of blood needed to circulate back into our limbs but we made it because we had to. We were shoved aboard the power boat just in time; it floated free from the deck, no need for lowering. We seemed to be all present except for the black gang, who hadn’t had time to clear the engine-room. The boat’s engine came to life and we got clear before the coaster gave up the ghost and went down with a rush of displaced water that very nearly dragged us back into its vortex. A stream of Australian oaths came from the coaster’s Master, to be echoed by the two mates. There was nothing very original in it; it was chiefly fs and bs surrounding bums and blasphemy. The two Jap brothers were with us, and one of them, the one who did the talking, clutched a black brief-case with stainless steel reinforcements. The other kept his gun trained on us and his beady eyes were very watchful, though what he expected us to do by way of escape in the circumstances was beyond me.

  I said brightly, “I expect we’re the jonahs.”

  “Bloody shut up,” the Master said.

  “Sorry.”

  He took a swipe at me, but missed as I leaned my torso backwards. He almost lost his balance and went over the side, but was collared by one of his crew. It was a moment of which I might have taken advantage but I wouldn’t have got away with it. The gun-Jap was too much on edge. As it was, he squeezed his trigger and a short burst ripped warningly between me and one of the coaster’s mates. Not quite between us: the mate bought it, rather bloodily. He sagged over the side and drifted astern until the inevitable fin came cruising up.

  “So sorry,” the Jap said, and gave a bow across the submachine-gun.

  The Master said bitterly, “Yellow bastard.”

  “Not.” The eyes glittered. “lake back wrong statement, please.”

  “Wrong my arse, it’s too bloody right.”

  The gun swung a little. The Master saw it and discretion leapt into his face. “OK, it’s wrong. I take it back.”

  I don't know if Captain Jeffs, which turned out to be his name, knew where we were going to land. I certainly didn’t. Ahead the inhospitable coral loomed. Surf extended along the reef as far as the eye could see. The tide was ebbing — I believed there was something like an eight-foot rise in these southern parts, more in the north — and the western edge of the reef was foaming white with what had all the aspect of falls. The boat moved in. It would be a long haul to the mainland if the Japs cared to risk a landing, and the weather was becoming foul, with a fairly strong wind and, outside the reef at all events, a disturbed sea. The reef itself would provide a wind-break for some distance and would act as a breakwater as well, but inside we would meet the shoals. The Japs were really up the creek now, literally as we made along the channel, and figuratively, and they both knew it. They conferred together in low hisses and the grins had become diminuendo, though the facial structure brought them back again from time to time, willy nilly. Of course, Felicity and I were as bitched and ditched as they were. I could see no way out. If I could get control of the boat I could take her somewhere on the mainland, probably the inlet behind Cape Manifold if this was indeed the Capricorn Channel we were in. but the Japs were much too alert and dedicated.

  I tried the Master, asking if we were in the Capricorn Channel. He said we were and asked what the so-and-so I knew about it. I told him I had been at sea myself, once. He was not impressed by the RN and told me not to bother to offer bloody advice if that was what I was thinking of, but I felt I had chalked up a point all the same. Jeffs had to be a villain to get himself involved in the Japanese antics but he was still angry about the shooting of his mate and seamen are seamen the world over and stick together. The fact of belonging to the same fraternity has even been known to over-ride being a pom. If I could stir up more enmity — Captain Jeff's had nearly choked over having to withdraw his remark to the Jap — then it might all help. When thieves fall out, the righteous tend to benefit.

  “The weathers unseasonable,’" I remarked.

  “South-East bloody trades.”

  “Yes, but strong. Fate’s against us.”

  “Bloody shut up,” Captain Jeffs said. It was not, as yet, propitious. The boat moved on, heading along the channel and making inwards. After a while the Japs grew even more restive, hissing and chattering. The spokesman addressed the Master.

  “Where is land, please?”

  Jeffs lifted an arm. “Over there. ’Bout a hundred miles, I reckon.”

  “Not go to mainland, Captain.”

  “Want to bloody perish?”

  “Do not want to be caught. You do not want to be caught.”

  “Don’t want to bloody perish either. Look, we got to bloody make the mainland.” Jeffs was in a fix. We might get picked up by a passing vessel if we didn’t go too far inside the Capricorn Channel to be seen from the main shipping routes, or by a pearler or something similar if we got right in amongst the shoals and reefs. Did he seek rescue or did he not? Life was life, but Jeffs had his career to think about as well. Plenty of honest master mariners were looking for ships at a time of high unemployment that wasn’t only a British problem. I could see all this staring from his face. He knew that if he could reach the mainland he would have a better chance of getting away in order to tell a tale of simple shipwreck that might steer him clear of prison. Or would have if he could despatch the Japanese brothers in the meantime. I sensed his brain clicking that way.

  A useful ally and I couldn’t afford to be choosy.

  On the other hand, I didn’t want the Japs to die. They had a story to tell and it was my job to get it out of them.

  So I was in a fix too. I had to keep one jump ahead of Captain Jeffs. It wasn’t going to be easy for any of us, with that sub-machine-gun weaving. The Jap brothers had us all nicely covered. They’d stopped trusting Jeffs, who was now following his instincts and heading for the mainland. In a sense that put the Japs in a fix as well: they were in Jeffs’ hands, being no seamen themselves. They couldn’t kill him yet. While keeping sharp eyes on the rest of us, they hissed away at each other, soft and sibilant. If it hadn’t been serious it would have been funny. There we all were, literally in the same boat, inhibited by o
ur various fixes. As I saw it, there was just one hope: Hank Halloran in Sydney, or Sergeant Dix, might find a need to call up the Sundowner and when they failed to raise us they might react fast. But we were going to take some finding.

  *

  The water was clear, and colourful fish streaked in all directions. The clarity made pilotage easier. But the farther we went from the reef’s lee the more the wind could be felt and the water became ruffled thereafter. Nothing much was seen in the way of other craft; I believe the pearl-shell gatherers operate mainly at the reef’s northern end, and maybe with the tide on the ebb and the shoals that much closer to a boat’s bottom it wasn’t quite the occasion for a tourist rush. Whatever the reason, no-one came close enough for a look at us and we certainly flew no distress signals. It was lucky for us and them, for we would have made a weird and highly suspicious sight in that crammed boat with a couple of Japs nursing a sub-machine-gun, and I had a hunch that if anything had happened there would have been wholesale slaughter. The same would apply, of course, to any attempt by Halloran to find us. Those Japs were not going to be taken if they could avoid it. I wondered what was in that brief-case, so carefully guarded — it was currently under a Japanese bottom. I had to get hold of that. If the Japs had to die when the crunch came, the brief-case might hold some of the answers that would otherwise have died with them. On that assumption I was prepared for them to die if necessary, but currently the proposition was purely hypothetical.

  We were all wet through by this time. The boat was so low in the water from its over-loading that the Pacific kept on slopping over the gunwale. Pilotage-wise, Captain Jeffs at the helm was doing all right. We avoided the jags of the coral, sometimes only by inches. Jeffs was sweating; rivulets ran down his face, from fear as well as concentration probably. Felicity was squashed against my side and I could feel the beating of her heart. I had my arm around her and gave her an extra squeeze now and again. Her hair had fallen over my shoulder. She was shivering, though it was far from cold. Just wet.