Hy Brasil
Page 42
‘So Jed knows.’ Colombo stared at the screen, and in its blue depths a monstrous shape began to formulate, the ghost of a possibility he didn’t want to see. He looked away. ‘When did he know?’
‘I think that’s neither here nor there. He asked me just now if I’d heard anything at all about Mr Baskerville. If he were back in St Brandons? I asked him what he was thinking of. He said not to worry because conscience makes cowards of us all. I would think the opposite myself, which I told him, only he sounded quite bitter about it, and that bothered me. He told me a piece of poetry – you know how he does – something about having a pale cast of thought, and the tide turning before the action, not that anyone can do anything about that, naturally, only he has bad dreams. I don’t know if he meant the dreams were his own, or whether they were just part of the poem, but I didn’t find it reassuring. Colombo, I understand that you knew all about these letters?’
‘I knew after the raid, when Ishmael and I read them. I knew nothing before that.’
‘No,’ said Per. ‘Well, I suppose we all do what seems best to us. It might be a good idea if you were to talk to Jed, perhaps, and make it right with him.’
‘Make what right?’ It was a foolish question, because Colombo knew quite well, and he didn’t want to hear Per’s answer to it. He hurried on, ‘It’s true, I’ve not seen Baskerville since Saturday, and that’s odd. I tell you what, Per, will Jed be on the mainland all day?’
‘He and Sidony will be here again at tea time. She’s gone to Ravnscar with Miss Lucy to collect her things. And he went to get some money from the bank so they could do some shopping later. I did say to him that he should not borrow from Sidony, and it seems he took that on board. Our Jed can be led sometimes but not driven. But this is neither here nor there. What do you want me to say to him?’
Colombo looked at his watch, and at the empty screen, and back again. ‘Say I’ve gone to find Baskerville and talk to him. When I’ve done that I’ll come to Lyonsness. Tell him to wait.’
‘Will you want your tea? I was thinking to give them kippers. There would be enough for all.’
Baskerville lived in Artillery Mansions, a grimy block of serviced flats close to the library. The porter greeted Colombo with relief. ‘He came in Saturday evening and that’s the last I saw of him. Last time before that was late on Wednesday. That’s normal; sometimes he stops on at that Museum till God knows what hour. But he was back all right, ’cos he had his meals sent in Thursday and Friday, but Idon’t think he went out nohow. None of us saw him – I spoke to Starkey as does the late shift – and we thought maybe the gentleman was ill. But he didn’t ask for no one. Then Saturday he rings to get his paper sent in, and an hour later out he comes – first he knows about the volcano, I reckon, ’cos he don’t have TV and Iguess he’s not been listening to the radio – and I bring round his jeep for him and he’s off to Dorrado. Then back he comes around tea time and he must of known about the President then but he didn’t say nothing to me. I heard about it on the news at six just ten minutes after. And a couple of hours later out comes Mr Baskerville and off he goes again – not a word about the President, not a word to any of us about nothing. And we ain’t seen him since, and he’s not answering his phone neither. Starkey hasn’t neither, ’cos I called him again after I come on this morning. And that’s five days ago, with God knows what all happening out there in the country. He don’t never go away, not Mr Baskerville. Where to would he go? That’s what I said to Starkey. Unless he came back one night between two and six in the morning, and let himself in with his own key, but he can’t of done that, because he’s not had no meals sent in nor nothing. I said to Starkey maybe we should have a look, and he says, give it another day, he says, because going into the apartments without we’re ordered, see, that could be trouble.’
‘You’ve got a key though? I can go in.’
The heavy green curtains were still drawn in Baskerville’s sitting room. The room was empty, and smelled of damp, old woodsmoke, and unaired clothes. Colombo trod quietly across to the window as if he were afraid of waking someone, and drew the curtains back. There were grains of corn and spattered droppings on the windowsill. Feeding the pigeons and sparrows of the town was one of Baskerville’s smaller eccentricities.
Colombo had never been alone in this room before. He looked round at the framed prints of the tall ships, at the little display case on the wall with Baskerville’s six medals in it, beginning with the white-and-purple one with the silver cross, at the glass-fronted bookcases crammed with pre-war hardbacks, at the matching prints of Woolwich College on one side of the fireplace and Trinity College Cambridge on the other, at the eighteenth-century ship in a bottle on the mantelpiece next to the Ormulu clock, and the Turner seascape above it. On the round mahogany dining table in the window there was a jigsaw puzzle depicting the Grand Canal, with less than fifty pieces still unplaced. Incredibly, there were no open books or papers anywhere. Not only was the leather-topped kneehole desk quite clear, except for a brass inkstand and pen tray and a smudged blotter, but there were no scattered papers on the table, the chairs, the ottoman, or on the low reading table under the anglepoise lamp by Baskerville’s leather armchair. On one of the pair of Victorian pie-crust tables there was a copy of last week’s Times, open at the Tidesman article that gave the public account of the raid on the Pele Centre. Colombo bit his lip. His gaze moved on, to the charred ashes of many papers in the grate, and his heart sank.
He crossed the dim hall again, and looked into the other rooms. Even in August the bathroom retained its sepulchral chill, which the antique cast iron and mahogany did little to dispel. The kitchen, which seemed much taller than it was broad, looked and smelt as if nothing had been touched since 1914. Only the service lift, which brought the trays up from the restaurant on the ground floor, looked polished by much handling. There seemed to be nothing to eat or drink but an ancient tin of Abernethy biscuits and an opened packet of Darjeeling tea. Colombo opened the yellowed fridge. There was a half-empty bottle of milk in the door. He took it out and sniffed it gingerly. It certainly hadn’t been bought this week.
The boxroom contained nothing but a painted sea-chest and a newspaper-covered table holding a partially constructed model of Sir Richard Grenville’s Revenge, sunk off Terceira in 1591. The sails were marked on a piece of thin white canvas, but had not yet been cut out, and the black cotton rigging was still far from complete. Lastly, with lagging steps, Colombo approached the bedroom.
It was empty. The high wooden bed had not been slept in. The counterpane had been turned down to reveal greyed cotton sheets and a pair of blue striped pyjamas folded on the pillow. Colombo had never looked in here before. The floor was bare oak boards with a single threadbare rug beside the bed. There was an immense blackened clothes press against one wall. The single picture was a Victorian romanticised representation of Charles I on his way to execution. The huge sash windows badly needed cleaning. There were four books on the bedside table. Colombo went over to look: The Concise Dictionary of National Biography, A Voyage to Virginia in 1609, Gilbert White’s The Natural History of Selbourne and The Tiger in the Smoke by Marjory Allingham. The last one had a red leather marker in it.
Colombo turned the green-and-white paperback over, and put it back on the pile. He considered the clothes press. There must be papers somewhere: in the drawers of the desk, in the cupboards, in the sea-chest even. He would have had little compunction about searching, only it was too soon. He was aware of a certain pathos: oddly enough, it was the innocence of the life revealed to him that struck him most forcibly. He was sure, without having to look, that if, or when, alien hands turned over every item that belonged in Baskerville’s very private existence, they’d find nothing, out of a whole lifetime, that anyone might wish to leave unrevealed. The little pile of ashes next door, Colombo knew, would have contained everything. Requiescat in pacem. There was no body here. Even so, he crossed himself, and stood quite still for a minute or two,
before he went away, closing the front door behind him.
* * *
‘Jed,’ said Ishmael, ‘Try to understand. The only way I could get you freed was by giving my word that I’d not tell you. I had to promise Hook that I’d say nothing while he and Baskerville were still living. If I’d not given my word, you wouldn’t have come out of prison alive. That’s the bottom line of it. What would you have done?’
Jared dropped the brown envelope on Ishmael’s desk, and sank his head in his hands. ‘I don’t know. I don’t know any more. I just don’t know.’
‘Jed, do you want to read them? Do you want me to leave you alone?’
‘No, no! I mean, yes, I will. Soon. Soon I will.’ Jared swung round on the office chair so he had his back to Ishmael, and hid his face in his arms, leaning on Ishmael’s desk.
‘Shall I go?’ No answer. ‘Do you want me to stay?’ No answer. ‘Those copies are yours, if you want to take them away.’
‘When I realised that you didn’t mean to tell me,’ said Jared’s muffled voice, ‘I felt like I never wanted to speak to you again.’
‘I’m sorry about that.’ Ishmael paused, and getting no reply, he went on, ‘I’m sorry about it all, Jed. I’m sorry any of it ever had to happen. But supposing I had broken my word? What then? If Hook were alive, what would you have done about it? I know you well enough to be quite sure you couldn’t have lived with the facts and done nothing. Exile or death, Jed. That would have been the choice. What would you have done?’
Jared shook his head, still hiding his face. Ishmael watched him for a moment, then he came over and put his hand on Jared’s shoulder. ‘Jed, it’s done. You don’t have to find an answer any more. Things have moved on. Let it go. We’ve got to make a future, and we’ve got to do it now. I’ve been in St Brandons all week; Per just caught me when he phoned, so I waited for you. The country’s in turmoil. Do you want to know what’s happening?’
‘Not really.’ Jared raised his head, and stared down at his clenched hands. ‘Sidony says we have to have a radio,’ he said inconsequently. ‘She’s going to buy one today in Lyonsness.’
‘You should thank heaven for her common sense. Jed, this is Thursday. Tomorrow the interim government, such as it is, will announce a date for a Presidential election. Do you want to come to St Brandons with me?’
‘No.’
‘You’re not interested in what’s happening to your country?’
‘No.’
Ishmael sat down on the other chair. ‘Jed, what is it? You can’t hide on Despair for ever. It’s not just that I didn’t tell you about Jack, is it? Come on, man, what is it? Let’s have it.’
Jared lifted his head. He looked quite distraught, but his voice sounded merely sullen. ‘You were wrong, Ishmael. There was a shot.’
‘Who says that?’
‘Nesta Kirwan said it, loud and clear, when it happened. And she was right. I saw.’
‘You saw what?’ asked Ishmael quickly.
‘I was looking right at him. I hadn’t thought – I hadn’t decided – I didn’t know he’d be there. Penelope didn’t say, maybe she didn’t like to because of – of the other thing, the prison and everything – I didn’t expect to see him, and I guess I’d have gone for him, only Sidony had me by the arm. I could have thrown her off, but I didn’t want to hurt her. I was still watching Hook. Ishmael, I never took my eyes off him. And I saw – he was sideways on to me, leaning a bit forward, looking down at the lava. He had his back to the people.
He didn’t fall. He wasn’t moving. He was hit. He flung his arms up and pitched forward. Just like that. No one ever fell like that. I tell you, I saw.’
‘Jed, I was watching him too. He fell. He tripped on the rock and fell.’
‘No!’ It was a cry of desperation. ‘Ishmael, I saw. He threw his arms wide and pitched forward. I heard the shot, and so did Nesta!’
‘Very well,’ said Ishmael unemotionally. ‘So he was shot. Whom do you accuse?’
‘Me? I’m not accusing anybody! I’m telling you what I saw!’
‘If he was shot, then someone shot him. You know who was there. Who are you saying that it was?’
‘I’m not accusing anybody!’ cried Jared in anguish. ‘How could I?’
‘If it was no one, then he must have fallen.’ Ishmael leaned back in his chair. ‘Jed, there’s no point getting in this state. Hook’s dead. You have to admit it makes life easier for you – no, don’t speak – of course you didn’t shoot him. You hadn’t a gun, and you had Sidony hanging on to your arm. She was shouting, and quite a few people saw you both. I didn’t shoot him either, as it happens. Nobody did, but I saw him fall. So he’s dead. Now we have to move on. Within the next week we’ll have a government again. How do you want it to begin? With a witch hunt? A murder trial? Executions? Reprisals? Civil war? Or don’t you care, since you’ll be doing your ostrich act on Despair? All right, so you don’t care. But I do. I care as much as I care about anything in this world. I care that Hy Brasil should be a country in which no one is afraid of their government, and no one is punished or killed unjustly. Ever. I intend to do everything in my power to give my country the leadership it deserves. And I say that Hook fell. What’s more, anyone who contradicts that simple fact will be discredited by all the means I can muster.’
Jared was shaking his head. He looked at Ishmael as if hoping he might suddenly say something quite different. ‘I don’t know what to do,’ he repeated dully.
‘Have you talked to anyone else about it?’
‘Only Sidony.’
‘And she said?’
‘To talk to you.’
‘Well, you’ve done that now.’ Ishmael stood up. ‘Jed, I wouldn’t ask you to involve yourself in politics. Well, I’d be mad if I did. I just ask you to go on with your life without making things impossible for yourself. You’re going to be all right. You’ve done nothing wrong, and you’ve not connived at anything wrong either. You’re lucky that your role is that simple. I have some good news for you, if you’re ready to hear it.’
‘Good news?’ Jared looked round in a dazed sort of way, as if he expected to be handed a present. ‘What sort of news?’
‘Remember those letters we sent out the day after we found the goblet, and how Brendan Hook’s colleague offered to sponsor your application? Well, he did speak for it at the committee of the National Geographic.’ Ishmael picked a letter out of his in-tray. ‘Read that.’
Jared took the single sheet of thick writing paper. His hand shook a little. He glanced at the embossed letterhead, and read:
Dear Sir,
Cortes, Hy Brasil
The committee has read with interest Mr Honeyman’s proposal for the archeological survey and salvage of the Spanish galleon Cortes, which foundered on October 31st, 1611, on Ile de l’Espoir, Hy Brasil. We are glad to be able to inform you that the committee unanimously agreed that this is a project that the National Geographic will be pleased to sponsor, subject to the following conditions …
‘Oh!’ Jared read on to the end. ‘He says they’re willing to fund it. It does say that, doesn’t it?’
‘You can read, can’t you? I spoke to Brendan yesterday. He’s with his mother in Dorrado of course, but he said after the Memorial Service he’d be happy to fill you in. It was presented to the Committee by a colleague of his in Marine Archeology. Brendan said he fancied visiting you on Despair; apparently it’s twenty years or more since he was last there.’
‘Oh,’ said Jared again. ‘We can salvage the Cortes. Ishmael, we can have a proper archeological survey and salvage operation. We can salvage the Cortes.’
‘You can, Jed. You can get your friend over from Key West. He’s an archeologist. I’m not.’
‘You mean you don’t want to be on the team?’
‘Man, I’d like to be, but I’m going to be too busy. It wouldn’t be fair to you. I can still be useful to you.’
‘Oh,’ said Jared. Then he said, ‘Brendan Hook.’
Jared recognised it at once. He opened it gently, and took out the goblet. There was a shell-head from Gallipoli in the box too, and an ebony snuffbox.
‘I guess they’re yours, Jed. No one else has any claim on them.’
Jared laid the three treasures on Ishmael’s desk, next to the computer, and considered them. ‘I’d give the goblet to the museum,’ he said. ‘But there’s Baskerville.’ He picked up the two smaller items. ‘I’ll take these home. I can’t take the glass just now. I’m on Per’s bike and I haven’t got my rucksack. Put it on the kitchen mantelpiece; it’s used to being there. I’ll collect it some day.’ He folded the letter carefully, and put it in his jacket pocket with the treasures. He picked up the unopened brown envelope. Then he got up and held out his hand to Ishmael. `I seem to owe you everything,’ he said, ‘but somehow I feel like I don’t really know you any more. I guess it’ll pass.’
Ishmael shook his hand. ‘I hope so, for my sake as well as yours. I hope you’ll very soon find that it does.’
The car and the motorbike passed each other about half a mile east of the Ravnscar turning. They both ground to a halt a moment later. Colombo reversed down the hill, and Jared turned the bike on the narrow road, and waited for him to come alongside. Colombo wound down the window.
‘There you are. I was hoping I’d find you up here. Did Per tell you?’
‘What?’ Jared unstrapped his helmet. ‘Say that again.’
‘I said, I came to find you. I’m having tea with you at Per’s. Jed, are you all right? Has something else happened?’