by John Creasey
‘Keep away!’ she whispered, almost inaudibly.
Riordon gave a harsh laugh.
‘It will be better for you if you stop playing the fool,’ he snapped. ‘You don’t know when you’re well off. I’m rich—richer than your hero Devenish will ever be. You can have everything you want—why’—the small lips creased in a smile as he stretched his plump, hot hand out and rested his fingers on her shoulder— ‘we can even get married, my dear. The captain can fix that for us in a few minutes.’
Marion drew back from his touch with a shudder.
‘I’d rather kill myself,’ she muttered, in a voice which she hardly recognised as her own.
Riordon stared down at her—and Marion thought, for one dreadful second, that he had lost control of his senses. His eyes were half closed, the breath came jerkily between his lips, hot, nauseating.
She turned her head.
Then, hardly realising what had happened, she heard Riordon give a sharp curse, and heard the swing of his body as he turned towards the door.
The Mario, driving through the water at over thirty-five knots, her engines working with smooth perfection, seemed to shudder from bow to keel. For a moment the ship half stopped.
Riordon flung the door open and disappeared into the passage outside. Marion, staring after him, realised suddenly that he had forgotten to lock it.
She stared at the door, her eyes wide open. Everything which Riordon had said and suggested crowded through her mind in a few seconds. His face seemed to loom up in front of her.
Very slowly, Marion went towards the door. She knew, then, that she would rather drown herself than stay on board.
And if she could once get on deck, the sea was waiting for her. Riordon would not take a chance of stopping the Mario to search for her in the darkness.
• • • • •
‘Why have we stopped?’ snapped Riordon.
Lorenson, the Dutch skipper of the Mario, granted and jerked his hairy hand towards the swirling mass of the sea.
‘Motor-boat,’ he rasped. ‘Damn’ fool was racing blind, mister. We rammed her.’
Riordon scowled. What was a motor-boat doing out as far from shore as this?
‘How many in it?’ he snapped.
Lorenson shrugged his great shoulders, but Rickett, who had been on the bridge, approached the couple with a mirthless grin.
‘There are two in the water,’ he said. ‘One of the crew threw a life-line.’
‘The ruddy fool!’ snarled Riordon. ‘We don’t want anyone on here.’
Rickett shrugged his shoulders. Lorenson spat expressively over the side of the Mario.
Ten yards away from them a little group of seamen were gathered round a stanchion, watching the efforts of one of the men from the capsized boat. Riordon, cursing volubly, strode towards them, but as he went there was a sudden murmur of excitement.
Unable to restrain himself, Riordon looked over the side. Dimly in the darkness he saw the blur of a man’s face, a man who was clambering up the rope thrown down by the sailor.
Arm over arm, the man hauled himself up, obviously little harmed by his sudden immersion. Riordon forced back a tirade of bad language. The crew were not in the secret of the Mario’s cargo, and Riordon was wise enough to realise that he had best not antagonise them—yet. If he ordered the man from the wrecked motorboat to be thrown back, he knew that he would be asking for trouble.
Suddenly the man’s head and shoulders appeared above the side of the ship. Helped by half a dozen sailors, he clambered on deck, and stood for a moment with the water running in streams from his clothes.
Riordon heard him speak, suddenly, urgently.
‘There’s another man down there!’ the rescued man shouted. ‘Why don’t you lower a boat—he’ll drown!’
The crowd round him, all Dutchmen or lascar sailors, guessed at his meaning. The first mate of the Mario, knowing that the owner might have other views, glanced over his shoulder as Riordon grew nearer.
Riordon’s face was livid.
‘Stop talking!’ he bellowed at the new-comer. ‘I’ll have you thrown back if you kick up a row!’
And then, for the first time, he saw the man full-face, and his blood went cold.
‘Trale!’ he gasped. ‘My God! Trale .. .’
Dodo Trale stepped back into the crowd of seamen. His right hand was in his coat pocket, and Riordon sensed that he was carrying a gun.
‘Yes,’ muttered Trale, knowing that the crew could not understand him, ‘it’s Trale, Marcus. And I’ve a gun in a water-proof cover. You can reckon you’re for it...’
For a split second Riordon’s face blanched. Then, with a shout of rage, he lunged forward. As he moved, Dodo Trale slipped behind a hefty seaman, sent one bullet thudding into the deck near Riordon’s feet, and dodged back, taking cover behind one of the idle funnels of the Mario.
Lorenson bellowed a command in Dutch. The crew, suddenly realising that the man they had rescued could lead them into a nasty patch of trouble, split up, and made a half circle round the funnel. Slowly they moved towards it, with Riordon and Rickett in their midst, both holding automatics.
The life-line was still hanging overside, fastened to a stanchion. No one was near it. And Devenish, judging the state of affairs on deck, stopped treading water by the side of the Mario, where he had been swimming for the last ten minutes, grabbed the rope, and began to haul himself up.
There was a great surge of hope in Devenish’s breast. He knew, of course, that his plan was still a long way from success, but half of it had succeeded, better even than he had dared to hope.
Guided by radio signals from the helicopters which had hovered above and some way beyond the ship, he had found the Mario, and reckoned that he could create a disturbance by letting his speed-boat—one of three cruising within easy distance—crash against the side. Before the boat crashed, Trale and he had dived overboard.
Thereafter, everything had gone perfectly. The crew had thrown the line over, and Trale had reached deck. Trale’s job was now to keep the attention of Riordon and Rickett away from the stanchion to which the rope was tied.
Hand over hand, Devenish hauled himself up. As he reached the deck, he peered cautiously along it.
Ten yards away from it, a dozen men were crowding on Trale, who was hidden from sight.
With his teeth set hard, Devenish hauled himself on board. Then, bending low, he ran quietly but swiftly along the deck, taking his automatic from its water-proof sheath as he went.
More than anything else, he wanted to find Marion. Afterwards, if it were possible, he would do enough damage among the Mario’s gleaming engines to slow her speed by half. But Marion first...
Devenish sped towards the first hatch, knowing that he might at any moment bang into a man coming from below but confident in his ability to use his gun quickly, noiselessly.
Above him dark clouds scudded across the skies. Beneath, he could hear the sea writhing and swirling against the sides of the Mario. To his right, the half crazed Riordon led the crew closer and closer to Dodo Trale, who was gradually manœuvring from barrier to barrier, so that he could make a leap over the side. Once in the sea, he would be safe from Riordon—and Trale’s work was finished, now that he had kept attention away from the life-line hanging over the side of the ship.
Fifty yards away, two motor-boats were cruising noiselessly, waiting to pick up Devenish, or Trale, or Marion. Or all of them.
It was a gigantic gamble. Devenish knew that the slightest false move would send them all to perdition.
Silently, grim-faced, he reached the first hatch. As he drew near he caught the slightest sound of movement from below. Drawing back into the shadows, he waited, his forefinger on the trigger of his gun.
Slowly, furtively almost, the new-comer came up the steps. As the seconds flew by, Devenish felt his blood racing. Every moment was precious—vital!
Then, craning his head forward, he saw who it was.
&nbs
p; Walking slowly, fearfully, Marion Dare reached the deck and looked quickly about her.
She knew that something had gone wrong with Riordon’s plans, but she felt, now, that nothing could save her. If only she could get to the side and leap overboard! She felt that she could hope for nothing more.
And then, very softly, almost like the voice of a ghost, she heard her name called.
‘Marion!’ whispered Devenish hoarsely. ‘Marion!’
Marion stopped dead-still, a tremendous surge of hope filling her breast. She turned her eyes towards the shadows, stumbling forward as she saw Hugh’s big figure detach itself from the dark mass of the deck.
‘Hugh!’ she muttered. ‘Hugh!’
Devenish’s voice came urgent but soft.
‘Don’t say a word!’ he ordered.
For a brief moment, he slid his arms round her. Then he released her, forcing himself to think quickly, to act quickly.
‘We’re nearly home,’ he murmured. ‘Get over to the side, darling, and lie full length on the deck. Can you swim?’
‘Yes,’ whispered Marion.
Hugh unfastened a life-buoy from the hatch and pushed it into her hands.
‘If anyone sees you,’ he muttered, ‘throw that over and jump after it. Keep yourself moving in the water—it’s cold, I can tell you! —and wait until you’re picked up. Got that?’
Marion nodded, without question.
‘But you?’ she protested.
‘I’ll see you later,’ he whispered. ‘Get to the side, quickly, and if you have to jump, remember to keep moving in the water.’
Then, as silently as he had come, Devenish disappeared. Marion gave a little, anguished gasp, then turned towards the side.
• • • • •
Carris, the chief engineer of the Mario, was one of the hardest-bitten Scotsmen who had ever seen the inside of gaol. He knew as much as Lorenson, the skipper—the job they were on was dangerous, and if they were caught they were in for serious trouble.
He knew that he had the finest set of engines in the world, too, and he was careful not to drive them too hard. The Mario had averaged thirty-five knots since leaving harbour. Few ships afloat could beat that speed.
Knowing of the turmoil on deck, Carris watched his men working quietly, efficiently, as though there was nothing in the world but the great turbines. The furthest thought from Carris’s mind was trouble.
But it came.
Ten yards away from him, a vast man, dripping wet from recent immersion in the sea, seemed to burst through the door leading from the crew’s quarters. For a moment the man loomed there. In one hand he held a small round object covered in yellow oilskin; in the other, an automatic.
Carris opened his mouth, aghast. He moved forward.
The big man spoke, grimly, low-voiced.
‘Get back,’ he ordered, ‘and tell your men to be flat.’
Carris hesitated. Before his eyes he saw what the big man was taking out of the yellow oilskin—gelignite!
‘Get back!’ repeated Devenish. ‘I’ll give you thirty seconds. Not a split second more.’
Carris swallowed hard and his face flushed. But he knew that the visitor meant just what he said.
Choked with rage, Carris rapped out an order in Dutch. Startled, his men turned round, saw Devenish, and dropped flat, covering their heads with their arms.
Devenish, tight-lipped, hurled the gelignite into the middle of the biggest of the three turbines. Then, without a glance behind him, he rushed away towards the deck.
For a few seconds only a little wisp of smoke bespoke the danger which hovered in the engine-room. Then, with a fiery splutter, the gelignite exploded. In the confined space it thundered and roared like a depth charge, a thousand pieces of steel raining through the air.
The great engines coughed and groaned. The Mario lurched sickeningly, then began to roll through the seas. She was helpless—a ship without power.
On deck, Riordon felt the shudder which ran through the vessel, felt a terrible, icy hand fasten round his heart.
He knew, and Rickett knew, that this was the end.
• • • • •
Sitting in the speed-boat which Timothy Arran was running in wide circles round the helpless Mario, Hugh Devenish sat with his right arm round Marion Dare’s waist, her head resting lightly on his shoulder.
He had reached the deck safely, and Marion had been there waiting. Five minutes after they had leapt overboard, the Arrans’ boat had picked them up.
A quarter of a mile away, on the other side of the Mario, Dodo Trale, his right arm hanging useless by his side, had been hauled on board Bruce’s boat, The last act had been overwhelmingly ‘Z’ Department’s.
Devenish eased Marion closer to him.
‘So that’s that,’ he muttered. ‘A nasty spell, but soon over. I wonder how long the Dromore will be?’
‘The Dromore?’ questioned Marion.
Devenish grinned.
‘We thumbed a lift on a destroyer,’ he said cheerfully. ‘The captain wanted to know what use a speed-boat would be. We’ll show him!’
Unashamedly, he kissed her. Timothy Arran, glancing round at that moment, groaned.
‘Stow it,’ he chided. ‘You’ll have the whole blooming navy watching soon. Look at that, boys and girls!’
A mile away, sparks flying from their funnels to make a deep, fiery glow against the dark background of the sky, H.M.S. Dromore and two of her sister ships raced towards the drifting Mario.
24
Devenish Takes the Count
The last paragraphs of Gordon Craigie’s report on the Bleddon’s Bank Case read as unemotionally as Craigie habitually talked.
After the wrecking of the Mario’s engines, H.M.S. Dromore, with her sister ships the Hastings and the Bradford, approached the Mario from north, west and south. One warning shot from the Dromore, falling across the Mario’s bows, persuaded the Dutch captain of the Mario to surrender without causing trouble. Twenty men from each of the destroyers boarded the Mario and took control.
None of the Mario’s crew resisted, but the Hon. Marcus Riordon endeavoured to leave the ship in a launch and fired his revolver, wounding two men. Rickett, Riordon’s second-in-command, fired at his leader, wounding Riordon in both arms.
Riordon leapt overboard, and although the ship’s boats searched for an hour, no trace of him was found.
Charles Rickett and Lydia Crane, Riordon’s woman accomplice, were placed under arrest, and handed to the police authorities on arrival at Southampton. Similarly, Hans Lorenson, the captain of the Mario, was taken into custody.
‘Charges against all three will be handled by the Chief Commissioner.’
‘And very nice too,’ grinned Hugh Devenish, sliding back in his arm-chair and pulling contentedly at his briar. ‘Now tell me all about everything, Gordon.’
Craigie grinned responsively.
‘The Hon Marcus,’ he began, ‘planned the whole scheme, from start to finish. Sir Basil took to dope—I think his son deliberately trapped him into taking cocaine—and was only active when fed with the stuff.
‘Marcus, too, spent a lot of time making up to look like his father, believing that it would stand him in good stead before his plans were completed. And,’ said Craigie with a wry grin, ‘Lydia Crane was the only one who knew about his make-up—that was why he was afraid of her.’
‘To make herself safe, the woman lodged a letter with another bank—the Central City—to be opened at her death. It would have told the police enough about the Hon. Marcus to have arrested him right away.’
‘She was deeper than we thought,’ grunted Devenish.
Craigie shrugged his shoulders.
‘While we’re talking about her,’ he said, ‘you’d better know that it was she who warned the Horsham Fire Station about the fire at Wharncliff, and also deliberately told Martin the wrong day for the Aston Martin trick…’
Devenish stirred.
‘I owe her a lo
t for that,’ he murmured.
‘You do,’ admitted Craigie. ‘So do I. Unless she had talked, I couldn’t have had all the information that I have. But to go back to Wharncliff…’ Craigie stuffed the bowl of his meerschaum thoughtfully—‘you won’t need telling that Marcus reckoned to get you there and leave you there. He started the fire in the partitioned room, after’—Craigie leaned forward a little, and his eyes were hard— ‘after he’d trussed his father up and left him in the room. Sir Basil was no further use to him, and he planned to get rid of you both at the same time. His plans went wrong when you managed to get out of the Hall—he’d reckoned to keep you inside with the shooting. When Bruce and the others came along, he was beaten—you can thank Marion for that,’ Craigie added. Devenish smiled reflectively.
‘I can thank her for a lot of things,’ he said, ‘past, present, and future. But you were saying…?’
‘So I was,’ said Craigie. ‘Now, Lydia Crane says she intended to warn you of the fire, and was waiting in the room while you were arguing with Marcus in the hall. When she realised that Sir Basil was being murdered, she tried to attract attention. It was Sir Basil’s cries you heard first, then Lydia Crane’s. One of Riordon’s men, however, knocked her out—that’s why you found her unconscious—and got the fire going properly.’
‘Afterwards, while you were searching upstairs, Lydia was brought round and taken downstairs. She contrived to get into Aubrey Chester’s prison, and purposely left her bag, with the keys. In other words,’ Craigie said with a little frown, ‘the woman did everything that she could, all through the affair, to prevent murder.’
‘What’ll happen to her?’ demanded Devenish.
Craigie shrugged.
‘I don’t know—she’ll probably get a few years’ sentence for complicity in the swindle, not the murders. Anyhow, that’s the limit of her part in the game, so far as we’re concerned.’
‘Now for Marcus again. After his father was dead, the Hon. Marcus adopted the best possible disguise—he pretended that he was Sir Basil. It was Marcus who was at the bank when the murder of Macauly was staged, and it was Marcus who was at Bleddon’s on the last day, when the gold was bought over. It was touch and go, I can tell you, whether he got away with it, that time. He was recognised…’