by Jack Higgins
As she put foot on the jetty, the Pride of Man blew up with a tremendous bang that echoed from the cliffs like thunder. A second later the fuel tanks went up with a rush and great fingers of fire lashed out in all directions, pieces of the hull drifting through it all in a crazy kind of slow motion.
Chavasse ducked as small pieces of debris whistled through the air above his head, rattling against the stones of the hillside.
Incredibly, he started to run, all pain forgotten, sliding down the slope in a shower of earth and stones, picking himself up at the bottom and running into the dense pall of black smoke that enveloped the jetty.
"Molly!" he called. "Molly, where are you!"
But there was no reply-only the crackling of the flames and the stench of burning oil and petrol. The Pride of Man had vanished completely taking the three men with her, only the incredibly twisted pieces of steel and superstructure bearing witness to the fact that it had ever existed at all.
But Molly was there, lying face down half way along the jetty. There wasn't a mark on her, that was the strange thing, but she was just as dead and he turned her over gently to her back and slumped down beside her.
For her it was over, all doubts resolved, all passion spent, but not for him. There were people who had to be taken care of-Atkinson, the Principal Officer at Fridaythorpe, for one and somewhere in the organisation of the Bureau or of the Special Branch at Scotland Yard, there was a weak link-the person who had leaked his identity to Stavru. He would have to be found and he would have to be dealt with, but not now-not now.
Somewhere in the distance he could hear the sound of engines, probably the MTBs Mallory had promised to lay on coming in fast to see what all the fuss was about, but it didn't seem to matter any more and he looked down at the dead girl who stared past him into eternity, a look of faint surprise on her face.
"Poor ugly little bitch," he said aloud and for no reason he could ever satisfactorily explain to himself afterwards, took her hand and held it very tightly as the first torpedo boat swept in towards the jetty.
FB2 document info
Document ID: fbd-7949c2-3635-b245-9eb8-eb9a-2de0-3c88cd
Document version: 1
Document creation date: 24.12.2012
Created using: calibre 0.9.11, Fiction Book Designer, FictionBook Editor Release 2.6.6 software
Document authors :
Higgins, Jack
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