by Peter Tonkin
Richard did not inquire as to precisely what had called the young police officer across to the old Portuguese colony. He had no doubt there would be a perfectly innocent explanation but he was in two minds about calling for it and testing it in any way. He liked Lawkeeper Ho. He did not wish to do anything to put the detective’s ‘face’ at risk, and would not have done so even had he not been convinced the boy was Twelvetoes’ son.
After they had completed their talk and decided against either food or drink, they returned, by a kind of unspoken mutual consent, to the seats Lawkeeper had so carefully marked. Walking rather unsteadily, for the chop was settling into a nasty little cross-sea, they reached a short set of stairs overlooking the aisle leading between the tables and seats in the port-side cabin. Here Lawkeeper stopped and spat a curse of surprise. In the outer of the two reserved seats, with her long legs stretched partway across the aisle, sat a gweilo woman in an emerald-green suit. From this position it was impossible to see any detail of her face as she was looking down, reading avidly, a cow’s lick of bright-red hair hanging like a veil.
Lawkeeper went down the stairs two at a time but had a little trouble forcing his way along the narrow passage between the seats for it was blocked by a range of luggage and bundles. Richard was right behind him and was at his shoulder when the young Chinese, every sense of propriety deeply offended, arrived at the end of those long, powerful-looking legs.
‘Excuse me!’ he huffed, his accent slipping with outrage. ‘You are shitting in my flend’s chair, I sink.’
The redhead tilted back slowly. Opal eyes regarded the importunate Oriental from under long, wedge-shaped brows which flicked up most unusually at the temples. Heavy lids with thick dark lashes slid down as the eyes surveyed the two empty seats between her right shoulder and the window.
‘Well, excuse me, sir,’ she said slowly, her accent summoning up for Richard at once visions of Gone With The Wind.
‘I have had this particular chair reserved — ’
‘It’s no big deal, soldier. I can move.’ The paperback went face down on the table. Edith Wharton’s The Buccaneers, Richard noticed. The redhead heaved herself lithely out of the seat and with a shock Richard found her eyes almost on a level with his own. For an instant the pair of gweilo giants looked at each other over the top of Lawkeeper’s head.
‘I guess this is your seat, sir,’ she drawled.
‘It is,’ he confirmed.
‘And I get the window seat,’ she said, screwing her face into a tiny moue of regret.
Richard had not worked in Xianggang for more than two years without gaining a working knowledge of the language and thought processes of the people. He turned at once to the impossibly ancient, withered and dwarfish woman who occupied the seat opposite his own. ‘Excuse me, respected mother,’ he said, with as much fluent courtesy as he could command. ‘Would it be unmannerly of me to offer you this fine window seat and a present of some little money in exchange for your own seat?’ He got out his wallet and opened it as he spoke.
‘Aieya!’ she answered in shock and horror that such an outrageous thing be suggested — and for such a meagre sum!
Ten minutes later, the old lady was happily ensconced in the window seat counting a satisfactory sum in Xianggang yen, with Lawkeeper on her left and Richard beside him. The red-headed woman sat opposite Richard and together their legs did more to block the passageway than any of the briefcases and bags.
Richard judged that the time was right for a little stilted British formality. ‘My name is Richard Mariner,’ he said. ‘This is Captain Ho of the Xianggang police.’
‘Sybelle Alabaster,’ said the American, ‘though most folks call me Sally. Sergeant, US Army.’
It was just at that moment that the jetcat gave a peculiar lurch. It was nothing much. The majority of passengers hardly noticed it. But Richard did. And, because of what he was — or once had been — he knew what to do about it. ‘Sergeant Alabaster,’ he said, and the way he spoke riveted her eyes to his own, ‘there is a lifebelt under your seat. Get it out and follow me at once. Lawkeeper, you do the same and you’d better be quick about it!’ As the two of them bent to carry out his order, Richard turned to the old woman by the window and said quietly in his best Cantonese, ‘Mother, I fear the ship is in some danger. You should get your lifebelt and go to your muster station.’
Looking past her, through the window, he saw — and understood at once — just what the danger was.
*
Six balks of timber had been released in the accident Twelvetoes had seen almost a week ago in Guangzhou. The wood which had been lost was cut to the standard shipping size of Pearl River barges. Each dull brown section, almost indistinguishable from the water in which it floated, stood at forty metres in length. It was roughly square-cut, its sides about a metre broad. It had been chopped from the heart of a teak tree. It was almost as hard as copper and weighed four thousand kilograms. The massive balks represented an extreme danger to navigation and their loss overboard should have been reported at once to the Port Authority at Huandpu Gang, but the barge’s captain was behind schedule and impatient. He had no time or inclination for extra paperwork over and above that which would inevitably arise from the collision. And in any case, he did not want anyone poking around in what was left of his cargo; they might find the roughly wrapped packages of raw opium he was smuggling south.
As a result, the six lengths of timber went unrecorded — and ultimately unobserved — as they swept through the outer fringes of the port and into the main flow of the river. It had taken them nearly a week to complete the one hundred and seventy-five kilometres of their voyage. It had taken them the better part of two days to reach the Lotus Fort at Lian Hua Shan, and then another two to cross the current and sweep silently past the Opium War Museum at Taiping. After that, three days of cross-currents and the weakening force of the fresh-water current had taken them increasingly listlessly out into the major shipping lanes where they became a more and more dangerous hazard — especially as they were almost impossible to discern. Eyes could not see them and electrical impulses found it hard to distinguish them. Sonar saw them, but against a dirty, mud-thickened background. Not even the low-flying navigational and guidance satellites could make them out well enough to make it worth sounding the alarm.
The mid-morning jetcat out of Xianggang for Macau hit the nasty little raft of them at the better part of forty knots early in the afternoon of Saturday, 11 September 1999, just before Typhoon Albert hit the area.
The teak logs had remained together throughout their voyage, secured by two strong deck chains. But the pressure of the water and the swelling of the wood was beginning to pull the raft apart just before the collision, so that the jetcat’s port hull scraped along the leading beam before the rest of the logs swung in and tore the heart out of the vessel. The jetcat was already heeling — and swinging — sharply to port, its port hull beginning to buckle and come to pieces, before the mass of the wood, like the weight on the end of a chain-mace, swung in under the rear and hit the jet intakes. From first impact to final destruction of the whole after section of the jetcat, three minutes elapsed. During this time, the hulls, and everyone within the cabins, were subjected to something comparable to a big-dipper ride in an earthquake. The vast majority of the passengers were still in their seats when disaster overtook them. Those who were not were flung here and there so that most were unconscious and all had broken limbs. Even had any of the passengers paid attention to the emergency procedure instructions and videos, they would not have had time to follow the advice. Such was the speed of the disaster that the radio operator had no opportunity to send a Mayday. The captain did not even have time to reach for his life preserver. In fact, only three people aboard stood any chance at all. And that chance was very slim indeed.
*
In his head and in more lifeboat drills than he could count, Richard had been through this sort of thing thousands of times before. The procedure was
simple. Get your life preserver. Do not put it on. Proceed to the muster station. Wait to be directed. He also knew that, if direction was not sharp in coming, you had better know where the nearest lifeboat or inflatable was stowed.
Their muster station was A — providentially right forward, at the top of the curving staircase. During his prowl about the boat earlier, Richard had automatically remarked in precise detail where the muster station was, where the lifeboats nearest to it were and where the closest bright yellow plastic-covered package — looking for all the world like a massive yellow pill — was hung, for this was the self-inflating life raft. No need for crew support or guidance with that. You just chucked it overboard, waited for it to inflate automatically and then you jumped into it. The most difficult part of the whole process was to remember to keep hold of the lifeline attached to it.
After that first slight shudder and the terse conversation, the two gweilos and their civilised friend — all as mad as fleas, clearly — took up the packets from under their seats and began to walk purposefully forward. Only the old woman by the window paid them any attention, and even she, who was partially deaf and found the barbarian’s execrable accent almost impenetrable, paused to check her money again and put it safely in her shoe. Picking their way as quickly as possible through the clutter in the passageway, the three reached the bottom of the curving little staircase. By this time there was a discernible list on the vessel. Weirdly, it seemed as though the left pontoon of the double hull was simply going more slowly than the right-hand one. Things were proceeding far too quickly for panic to have set in yet. The drinkers at the round tables looking out through the forward windows regarded the three of them quizzically as they reached the upper level. Then one or two of the drinkers noticed that their glasses were sliding across the tabletops and beginning to judder strangely.
Richard pushed the door and it swung wide surprisingly easily, opening downhill now, and bursting the joint of the automatic closer as it did so. ‘Put on your lifejacket as soon as you step out,’ said Richard. He had to raise his voice to speak above the sudden thundering of sea and headwind. A gust of wind came from the side as he spoke, lifting the cat. ‘Quickly!’ snapped Richard, letting some trace of the fear he was feeling seep into his voice. He stepped through the gaping door. Lawkeeper followed. Sally Alabaster, third in line, lifted her leg to follow the men, but a second sideways gust thumped into the jetcat, seemingly as solid as the wood sweeping down the underside of her hull. The force of it caught Sally with unexpected force, causing her to step back again.
Abruptly, she found herself facing back down the length of the main cabin, looking over the heads of everyone there towards the little bookshop and souvenir stall with the packed bar behind it. Her bright red head thumped against the wall — a solid piece of teak panelling on the port side of the wide, forward-facing window. A strange thrumming vibration went through the back of her skull, down her back and through the suddenly itching soles of her feet. Instantly, it entered the air as well, as a battering note which hit the throat and lungs before it rang in the ears. Then it was as though a million cats had been caught in an avalanche. A massive cacophony of sound came from underneath, and, with the suddenness of a guillotine blade, the whole back end of the cabin was gone. The bookshop, the bar, everything behind it and everyone within it simply ceased to exist. Sally, dazed and more deeply in shock than she had ever been, saw the open sea gathering itself up through the yawning gape where the rear sections of the cat had been, and then throw itself inwards at her. The wall hit her again, this time very hard. She began to slide down and sideways into the junction of wall and floor by the door which was now the lowest part of the cabin. People flew. Towards her and by her. And a wave of glass, mixed with various liquids hot and cold, showered down upon her. She hit the floor just as the bottom of the main hull hit the water and she was lucky not to crush her coccyx.
Winded, in considerable pain, she curled into a near-foetal position. She had experienced a wide range of life-threatening situations in her professional life, she had seen people around her die, but the reality of her own death had never seemed so close. Where was that big Englishman? she wondered suddenly. He seemed to represent the best hope — the only hope. Wildly, she looked through the open doorway for some sign of him but there was no one to be seen at all. There was only her white-knuckled hand, clutching for dear life on to the wooden frame of the doorway. Beyond that there was a narrow walkway, running with water, spume and blood. Beyond that there was a railing, the feet of its white uprights already lost in the greeny-brown swell of the deep sea. Beyond that, and not so very far beyond it, a massive bolt of lightning smashed down into the stormy water.
Her lips moved. ‘Shift your ass, Sally Alabaster,’ she screamed. ‘Get moving or die!’
She heaved herself up into a kind of crouch, just as the whole ship gave a swooping lurch sideways and down.
Water washed up over the railing at the top of the curving stairway and slid towards her down the balcony floor. She half stepped, half dived out through the door in Richard Mariner’s tracks. She could not see him. She did not even think he was still alive. There was simply nowhere else for her to go.
6
Richard could hardly have been further from Robin’s mind that day. As he had carefully omitted to mention that he was going over to Macau, she supposed him to be wrapped in Su-lin’s irresistible cloak of concern if she thought of him at all. But in actual fact, she did not give him a thought until the end of the day when, for the first time in many years, she realised there would be no call from him, for she would not be at Ashenden. She would be at Amberley School, settling in the twins.
The day started early, especially for a Saturday. The twins were up at six, falling over each other in their enthusiasm to get their new school uniforms on. Everything had been packed, then played with and re-packed yesterday evening. Their uniforms for today had been left out ready. They were both perfectly capable of getting themselves dressed but they simply could not contain themselves and they fell into their mother’s bedroom half dressed and fizzing with excitement at six twenty. Up until they were six years old, they had shared a nurse, Janet, who had looked after both Richard and Robin at one time and another in widely differing circumstances. But as soon as they could more or less be trusted on their own, Janet had produced a nice young doctor from Morningside called Hamish, a hitherto unsuspected suitor, and had retired to Edinburgh where she was currently employed in the infirmary. Robin would have happily tripled her salary if she would have returned that morning.
It was a stunningly beautiful morning and the Sussex countryside could hardly have been lovelier. The fields were beginning to darken now as the crops went harvest golden. They were alive with late butterflies and late-flowering meadow plants of all kinds. The orchards were all full of apples and pears, and abuzz with feasting wasps, and the hedgerows bulged with berry-laden briars. The fields and orchards and the gorse and blackberries spilling over the fence between the lawn and the cliff edge were all visible from the bedroom the instant Robin threw the curtains back. ‘What a day!’ she said, opening the French windows and walking out on to the balcony above the sitting room, aware that the only people who might see her in her negligee were lucky sailors and Frenchmen eagle-eyed upon or beyond the Channel at her feet.
It was hot, promising to be a perfect Indian summer’s day, but there was enough of a wind whispering along the Channel and whirling occasionally in from the coast to ensure that the heat never became too sticky. After a hasty breakfast and much fussing over closing and loading suitcases, they drove in the Monterey with all the windows open up the track to the main road at Eastdean then turned left through Friston and Seaford. Slowly, lingeringly, with something of a special feeling about the day, a feeling of completing the past and beginning a new adventure, they drove along the coast road through Brighton, Worthing and Littlehampton. As they went, they played ‘I Spy’ almost to Olympic standard and Mary le
t William win so that he was in the best of moods as they turned inland at Wick. At Cross Bush they picked up the A27 which had been running parallel and just north of them as they pottered contentedly along the 259, and this took them up to Arundel within a couple of miles. At the roundabout they swung north again on to the A284, climbing more steeply round the edge of the park and then up on to the B2139 at the next junction. This too climbed up the south face of the Downs, and was still rising towards the eminence of Kithurst Hill when Robin swung left through the gates and on to the long, rhododendron-lined drive that swept round and up to the big old school house. In spite of opting for the longer route here, the journey to Amberley School had taken less than an hour.
Robin parked the Monterey and turned to the children. ‘Now,’ she said severely, ‘you know you will be the only students here this weekend, apart from the headmistress’s daughters. They will be your “Angels” and show you around once the other students arrive on Monday. I will be staying in the guest rooms tonight and going back home tomorrow — but you have already seen how close Ashenden is. All right?’