The Dangerous Islands

by Ann Bridge

  ‘What a place! When does the steamer sail next?’

  ‘Day after tomorrow—if she can get back!’

  ‘What a place!’ Captain Brown repeated.

  ‘Look, I’m going to ring off now,’ Jamieson said. ‘There’s just a chance that I might catch my little boat, and get her to take me.’ Without waiting for a reply he put down the receiver, raced through the small streets, and down onto the quay. The lights of the patrol-boat were still shining across the dark, gently-heaving waters of the harbour, but how was he to get hold of her? He had no torch to signal with. He ran on down the quay, and to his infinite relief saw the unmistakeable caps of two naval ratings— he hailed them.

  ‘Have you got a boat here?’

  ‘Yes, Sir.’

  ‘Well wait—I’m coming with you.’ He took out a fountain-pen and scribbled on a card—‘Please wait half an hour for me; I’m wanted in London at once. P. Jamieson.’

  ‘Take that aboard—tell the Lieutenant-Commander I’ll be down as soon as I can, probably in less than half an hour; but he mustn’t go without me.’

  ‘Aye aye, Sir’ the ratings responded.

  Jamieson hurried up to the hotel—Julia was not in the hall, and he went to her room.

  ‘Come in,’ she called.

  ‘Come to my room—we’ll talk while I pack. I’ve got to go up to London.’

  ‘But the funeral’s arranged for the day after tomorrow,’ Julia said, while in his room Philip began selecting and hurling objects into the smaller of his two suitcases.

  ‘I’m terribly sorry, darling, but I’ve got to go. Try to get the Padre to put it off for another twenty-four hours—I might get back by then. I do want to be there—you know that.’

  ‘Yes, but why the tearing hurry? And how can you go?—they say the plane’s grounded.’

  ‘On the patrol-boat—they’re holding her for me.’

  ‘Oh.’ Julia sat down on the bed. ‘Well, it’s rather tiresome,’ she said.

  ‘Yes. You’ll have a very tiresome life, once you’re really married into the Service,’ he said, snapping his suit-case to. He gave her a long kiss. ‘I’m desperately sorry—tell Mrs. H. so, with my love. If I possibly can I’ll get back for the funeral. Give me a ring at Gray’s Inn—oh, and you might ring Buchan and tell him I’ll probably be wanting breakfast there tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Gracious! Shall you drive up? Oh, bless you!’ the girl said. Philip grabbed up his suit-case, his type-writer, and brief-case, and ran downstairs and out to the quay.

  Chapter 16

  The small patrol-boat took a thorough pasting rounding Land’s End. Jamieson had asked the Lieutenant-Commander to put him ashore at Penzance; but with the savage weather it was after 10 p.m. when he was landed, on a dripping quay, in that harbour with the inconveniently narrow entrance. His naval host had given him supper, but as he carried his effects through the rainy streets he wished fervently that he had thought to tell Julia to ring up the garage where he had left the car—what on earth was he to do if it was shut? He wasn’t sure of the way, and on that wet night there was no one about to ask; but when at last he found the place the lights were on. Thank Goodness!

  As he walked in a man came out from the little cubby-hole of an office where he had been cowering over a small electric fire.

  ‘Colonel Jamieson? Ah, the lady rang through from St. Mary’s to say you’d be wanting the car tonight. She’s all ready—petrol, oil, air, batteries’—he went over and patted the Bentley admiringly. ‘Lovely car.’

  Lovely girl, Jamieson was thinking, to have organised this without being told. He paid the man, tipping him handsomely, threw his small pieces of luggage into the back, and drove off into the night.

  Penzance is over two hundred and eighty miles from London, but Bentleys are fast cars, and lorries apart English roads are not crowded after midnight, especially in winter and late autumn. He stopped twice for a cup of synthetic coffee at roadside lorry-halts, to keep himself awake, but all the same he was pushing the groundfloor bell of his rooms in Gray’s Inn at a quarter to six, having parked his car under the high wall. Buchan’s head promptly appeared at a window.

  ‘That you, Sir? Right—I’ll be down.’ And before Philip was half-way upstairs his manservant appeared, fully dressed, and took his luggage from him. ‘Miss Probyn rang up and said you’d be here for breakfast; but I worked out the mileage and I guessed you’d be early, so I didn’t undress.’

  Blessing his ex-batman almost as much as his future wife, Philip hastily took a bath, drank his coffee in bed, and said that he was to be called at 8.30, with breakfast at nine. Then he had two hours good sleep. By ten he was in Captain Brown’s office.

  ‘Good work, getting off on that patrol-boat,’ that worthy said. ‘Did you make the night train?’

  ‘No. I drove up.’

  ‘Good God! Well, here’s the form. The party that’s handling the Erinish Islands have got an electric expert along.’

  ‘Good. Are they doing the Callernish site too?’

  ‘I think so.’ He opened a folder and looked at some papers. ‘Yes. And we’ve flown a boffin to Dublin—the Irish aren’t quite so up in these things yet as Farnborough or Harwell, naturally.’

  Philip was glad of this. He would have hated to think of old Charlie Ruddy being blown to glory up on The Bank, when he led the Irish party to the spot. He took out his report, hurriedly typed on the lurching patrol-boat on his way to Penzance. ‘Sorry it’s a bit untidy.’

  Brown studied it carefully.

  ‘That tiny plunger thing under the plastic lid is curious,’ he said. He pressed a bell on his desk, and made some pencil lines down the margin of Philip’s report. When a small middle-aged man came in—‘Have these marked passages encoded, and radioed immediately to J. M. L., now in the Hebrides. Telephone them in cypher to Dublin—Mr. Richardson will give you the number. It’s urgent. Then bring me the papers back.’

  ‘Very good, Sir.’

  Brown sat back in his chair and looked across at Jamieson.

  ‘What on earth made you suspect a booby-trap in the Scillies, when, as I gather, you’d lifted all these other plastic lids, and nothing happened?’

  ‘It was rather odd,’ Philip said slowly. He told Brown how the two words ‘disconnect everything’ had suddenly rung a bell in his head, and his subsequent precautions.

  ‘Second sight, I suppose,’ Brown said.

  ‘No, I’ve no Highland blood. A hunch, they would call it today—the Bible phrase for hunches was, apparently, “being warned of God in a dream”.’

  ‘But you weren’t in a dream.’

  ‘No. But I think the rest of the sentence applies.’

  ‘Well it was damned lucky, anyhow,’ Captain Brown said, brushing God aside with the slight embarrassment which is common form in the twentieth century; he passed on to the next item on his programme.

  ‘We’ve got the crew of that Russian trawler up here—they’re in a police-station. Would you like to come and see them now, or leave it till tomorrow?’

  ‘I’d much sooner do it at once—I want to get back.’

  ‘All right—we’ve got an interpreter. You may be able to identify the man with the revolver.’

  In the clean, rather drab surroundings of the police-station the crew of the Russian trawler were brought in by two police-constables, and marshalled in a row—Jamieson scanned their faces.

  ‘He’s not here,’ he said to Brown. He turned to the interpreter. ‘Ask them what they did to the man who fired the revolver,’ he said abruptly. As the interpreter put the question disturbed expressions appeared on one or two of the flat, snub-nosed Russian faces; then the leader spoke.

  ‘He says he was drowned,’ the interpreter said.

  ‘There you are—I felt pretty sure they would do him in,’ Jamieson said to Captain Brown.

  ‘Well, we’ll hold them all as accessories to attempted murder,’ Brown said. ‘Tell them that,’ he ordered the interpreter. But
this time the faces remained impassive. They were marched out again, and the three officials returned to the office.

  ‘Well, I’ll report to the Home Office that you can’t recognise the actual murderer,’ Brown said. ‘Then they can cope with the Coroner in the Scillies about his adjourned inquest. Murky-looking set, weren’t they? Now, what are your movements?’

  ‘Get some sleep, and drive down to Penzance tonight to catch the Scilly boat, if she’s able to sail tomorrow.’

  ‘What on earth for?’

  ‘Professor Burbage’s funeral. If the boat’s going, or the plane’s flying again, I may be in time.’

  ‘Oh—ah—yes. I’d like to hear in more detail about that. D’you think he bumped himself?’

  ‘It’s impossible to be sure. He was certainly running away from us—me, probably.’ He described the pursuit on Bryher, and its miserable ending. ‘I should rather like to know how all that stands, now, from your latest information,’ Jamieson said.

  ‘Well he’d certainly been being blackmailed for a long time, and he was undoubtedly in touch with them; but from what we’ve been able to piece together, I think he was smart enough never to do them any real good.’

  ‘I shouldn’t ever have thought of him as smart,’ Jamieson replied. ‘But if you could tell me that he was really clear of any de facto treachery, it would be a comfort.’

  ‘Who to? You?’

  ‘Indirectly. Directly, to my fiancée, and still more to her old godmother, who’s been a friend of his for fifty years.’

  ‘Well I think you can say that, to them.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Philip Jamieson did get back in time for the Professor’s funeral. He felt rather disinclined for another long drive, and Julia, anyhow, would have to escort Mrs. Hathaway back to London. Finding that there was a night train from Padding ton that connected with the boat he decided to take it, sent Buchan to book a sleeper, and rang Julia up to that effect.

  ‘The boat will be too late—take the plane,’ the girl said.

  ‘How’s your gale?’

  ‘Oh, blown itself out—all calm now.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Are you frightfully tired?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh, nothing to mention.’ But he liked the question; since his mother died no one had ever cared to know whether he was tired or not—it was nice to think that now there would be someone who did. After a long sleep he ate Buchan’s excellent dinner, took a taxi to Paddington, and slept again, soundly, in the train; from Penzance he took another taxi out to the small airport, and caught an early plane to St. Mary’s.

  The churchyard at Old Town is some distance frem Hugh Town, close to the sea. They had expected to be the only mourners, a pitiful little company of three—but no. As they walked after the white-robed Chaplain to the open grave they were joined by another small party—Mrs. Hicks of ‘Suntrap’, with her husband; young Hicks, the Bryher boatman, and his father, and the post mistress from Bryher—all had brought flowers. Once again Jamieson thought what nice people the Islanders were. The calm and reassuring words of the burial service were read over the poor old Professor in that quiet spot—‘Oh Death, where is thy sting? Oh grave, where is thy victory?’—Jamieson threw a handful of soil onto the coffin, in the prescribed manner. Later, unobtrusively, he fee’d the Chaplain, and gave him money for the sexton and his assistants; he also introduced the Bryher party to Mrs. Hathaway and Julia, and invited them back to eat something at the Zennor Hotel. But before leaving he took Julia and Mrs. Hathaway, at Julia’s request, to see the stone to the unknown seaman with the words ‘Known to God’. As they walked back past the little chapel Jamieson saw a group of men carrying a stretcher covered with blankets into it. Once again a bell rang in his head.

  ‘Take Mrs. H. to the car; I want to check on something. Wait, if she’s not too tired; I shan’t be a moment.’

  While Julia obediently took Mrs. Hathaway to the taxi, Philip went over to the chapel—the men who had carried the stretcher in were just coming out.

  ‘Who have you been putting in there?’ Jamieson asked.

  ‘A man washed ashore this morning.’

  ‘Could I have a look?’

  ‘Think you could identify him?’ the man in charge of the stretcher-party asked. ‘We like to identify our bodies, but we very seldom can.’ As he spoke he opened the door into the small, cold, bare chapel, where the stretcher, muffled in blankets, lay on the stone floor.

  ‘Oh, I don’t suppose so. Just interested—I’ve never seen a person washed up by the sea before.’

  ‘This one’s pretty fresh,’ another of the men said, with a macabre grin—‘not been in long enough for the dog-fish or the crabs to get at him!’

  ‘Shut up, Legg,’ the older man said, as he drew down the blanket. The pallid greenish face Jamieson recognised at once; it was that of the little man who had run across the Neck on Bryher and shot at the Professor. He drew the blanket further down, and examined the clothing: yes, two holes in the oilskin jacket, over the heart—just what he had expected.

  ‘Know who he is?’ the leader of the party asked.

  ‘No.’ Jamieson drew the blanket up again, covering the poor face. ‘But thank you very much,’ he said. The stretcher-party didn’t seem to have noticed the holes.

  In the taxi on the way back to Hugh Town Philip took the opportunity to tell Mrs. Hathaway and Julia what Brown had told him—that, officially, the Professor was cleared of any substantial treachery; going out to the graveyard he had felt too hurried and concerned with practical details to do this. Mrs. Hathaway, who had held up nobly during the funeral, burst into tears.

  ‘Oh Philip, why didn’t you tell me before? I could have prayed quite differently,’ the old lady said.

  ‘You can pray differently now,’ he answered. ‘I am very sorry, Mrs. H.’

  ‘You might have telephoned about this,’ Julia said, rather sternly. ‘No I see you couldn’t do that,’ she added, after a moment. ‘Mrs. H., darling, he’s quite right. After all, one doesn’t only pray for the dead at the graveside.’

  ‘No. I shall pray for him for the rest of my life,’ the old lady said, with sudden firmness. She wiped her eyes. ‘Thank you, dear Philip; it was good of you to tell me. It is such a relief, after all these years.’

  Back at the hotel Julia and Philip suggested that Mrs. Hathaway should have lunch sent up to her room; she would not hear of it.

  ‘No, I want to be with these nice people while they eat the funeral baked meats’ she said stoutly. So they all partook of an early luncheon with the party from Bryher, preceded and accompanied by liberal drinks; Mrs. Hathaway expended herself on getting onto terms with the Islanders—telling them about the Professor’s great achievements, and hearing their accounts of him.

  ‘That’s a marvellous old lady,’ young Hicks said to Philip, as he saw them out through the garden. ‘Goodbye. Shall we be seeing you again?’

  ‘Not just now—we’re going back to London. Next spring, perhaps.’

  ‘Oh, good. Let us know when you come back.’

  After seeing Julia, and learning that Mrs. Hathaway was safely on her bed, Philip first telephoned to book sleepers back to London the following night, and then rang up the Coroner.

  ‘Could I see you? I’m off tomorrow.’

  ‘Yes, by all means. Come along at once.’

  In Mr. Robinson’s pleasant room Philip gladly accepted a cup of coffee and a cigarette.

  ‘Well, London tell me you couldn’t identify the would-be murderer when that trawler’s crew were paraded in front of you yesterday,’ the Coroner said.

  ‘No. But I did so this morning.’

  ‘Where, and how, for goodness sake?’

  ‘He’s lying in the little chapel at Old Town—I saw a body being carried in after we had buried the Professor, so I went to have a look. He certainly fired the two revolver-shots, but his dear chums bumped him, as I expected,’ Jamieson said. He described the holes in the jacket.r />
  ‘What creatures!’ Mr. Robinson said. ‘A curious coincidence, your seeing him being carried in, though.’

  ‘Shall you have to hold an inquest on him, too? Just a corpse washed up by the sea?’

  ‘Oh indeed yes—we do on all of them, but usually they can’t be identified.’

  ‘Known to God,’ Philip murmured.

  ‘Oh, you know that stone? Nice, isn’t it?’

  ‘Very nice.’ But Jamieson was rather put about at the idea of this second inquest. He explained to the Coroner that he had been hoping to get off the following day—‘I imagined that you might not want me for the adjourned inquest on Professor Burbage.’

  ‘This rather alters it. I’m afraid I shall need to have you present now, for both. You at least know that the corpse at Old Town was a Russian national, which no one else does.’

  ‘Yes, I see.’ Philip reflected. ‘How soon must these inquests be? I did rather want to escort my party back to London tomorrow night. I suppose I couldn’t take them up and come down again?’

  ‘How long would that take?’

  ‘Thirty-six hours.’

  ‘Seems a lot of needless travelling,’ the Coroner said. ‘If I lay on both inquests for tomorrow’—he glanced at his desk calendar. ‘Oh, tomorrow’s Saturday. Never mind. If we got it all over tomorrow you could get off by the plane on Monday, or by the Scillonian on Tuesday. Mightn’t that be a better plan? Are you needed in London over the week-end?’

  ‘We are like women. “A woman’s work is never done”, so week-ends mean nothing to us,’ Philip said. ‘But I think perhaps this is a better plan. You’re very kind.’ He got up. ‘May I ring you back when I’ve talked to my ladies?’

  In fact the moment he talked to his younger lady he saw that the Coroner’s plan was a good one. The Professor’s death had been a severe shock to Mrs. Hathaway; immediately after hearing of it she had made the considerable effort of a hurried start, a night journey, and a roughish sea trip; up till the funeral, and during the little luncheon after it, she had borne herself splendidly. But she was an old woman, and once the need for effort was over she had a sort of collapse. Philip, who had admired her courage through all this, was not in the least surprised when Julia said to him—‘You’ll have to cancel those sleepers. Mrs. H. is a bit overdone; she ought to have two or three days in bed. When does the Scillonian go next?’