by Peter Tonkin
The day matched her mood. It was, in a word, threatening. During the night, the storm which had come spinning in over Manila late on Thursday and swept up across the Paracels on Friday was now heading this way, announcing its presence with a thickening overcast and an intensification of humid heat which had even the usually placid Su-lin on dangerous form. As she rattled the plates and slammed the flatware about, Robin really started to lean on her guest. ‘I suppose you’re going to tell me that putting you in a suit now means you have no chance of helping me find out where Richard is,’ she started, somewhat abruptly.
He looked up at her. His left hand released a drop of lemon juice into the hot water which was his breakfast. ‘A passenger no one will admit to upon a ship which, according to the records, never set sail — it’s not surprising information is hard to come by,’ he said. ‘We are doing all that can be done.’
‘I could go to Macau. Twelve toes would talk to me.’
‘If he wanted to talk to you himself then he would not have sent me.’
‘But I can’t do anything more until I know more.’
‘Then until you know more there is nothing to be done.’
She poured coffee as though she was removing the pin from a grenade. ‘Chinese claptrap!’ she snarled.
He smiled slightly. ‘I marvel at the precision with which the Dragon Head chooses his instruments,’ he said quietly. ‘Only someone amused by the notion of being a lover might accept being treated as a spouse.’
This was such a dangerous thing for him to say that it stopped her as effectively as a slap in the face. It did not mend her temper, however. ‘Well, I think Macau would be the best move. I’ll see if I can get across today.’
‘After last week, you’ll stand no chance,’ he said. ‘The signs are, if anything, worse. By the time you make it up to the Macau ferry pier, they’ll have cancelled all the sailings.’
‘Want to bet?’
He sipped his lemon water. ‘Anything you want,’ he said. ‘But make it something worth winning.’
‘What had you in mind? My virtue?’
‘I always have your virtue in mind.’
‘Very funny.’
‘But apart from that, what of worth do you have in Xianggang?’
‘My company. My ship.’
‘Of real worth to you?’
She saw at once where this was heading. ‘You’re going to try and pull out of the bet,’ she said, ‘because you think I have nothing here I care about losing.’
‘Apart from Richard and the twins,’ he said gently, ‘what was there ever here that you truly valued?’
It was as well she made no bet, for he was right, which made her angrier than ever. Thwarted of the Macau crossing by the Number Four storm warning, she went up to the Heritage Mariner office. ‘I know what I should have done,’ she said. ‘I should have got myself a private detective.’
‘I don’t believe that is a profession which is allowed to exist in this section of the People’s Republic.’
‘There’s a man I know in Singapore called Edgar Tan.’
‘Robin, Singapore is two thousand miles away.’
On the far side of the office, John Shaw looked up, stung by the intimacy in Daniel Huuk’s use of her given name.
Robin did not notice. ‘You’re right. But I bet I can scare one up in Macau. If I can’t get there at least I can make a call or two.’ She crossed to the desk usually occupied by Mr Feng. ‘Mr Shaw, you have the contacts. Is there a private detective you can recommend in Macau? Someone the company has had to use to chase up a contract or anything like that?’
John Shaw shook his head. ‘We never have any dealings like that in Macau, Captain Mariner.’
‘Well, all right. Where can I get a Macau telephone directory?’
But before she could get stuck into this project, the telephone rang. John Shaw answered it and it immediately became obvious that there was an extremely irate Captain So on the other end of it.
Robin picked up Mr Feng’s extension and in a moment or two was apprised of the blazing frustration of a man who had been held up, effectively quarantined, with an increasingly restless crew for the better part of a fortnight. And now, dancing at the whim of a capricious gweilo owner, when he had finally got his ship ready for sea, the weather was closing in and unless he was allowed to sail pretty bloody quickly he would be trapped here for another two days at least and if that happened he, for one, was going to offer his resignation, and a good number of his officers and men were going to follow him on to the beach rather than put up with any more of this imbecilic indecision.
Partway through the diatribe, Daniel relieved John Shaw of his handset but he did not hang it up. Instead he stood with it to his ear looking at Robin, his face set but his eyes alight with amusement.
Robin ground her teeth. She simply could not afford to accede to Captain So’s irate request. Seram Queen, Sulu’s sister ship, was not due for two weeks at least, and Robin had to have a ship ready to set sail at almost a moment’s notice when news of Richard arrived. Yet if she did not give in to Captain So, she would find herself in possession of a ship with no crew. Really, thought Daniel, it was a situation she should have anticipated — would have anticipated had she not been so driven and preoccupied.
‘Please wait, Captain So. I will come out to Kwai Chung myself — ’
‘No time, missy. Bad storm coming. Ships in trouble all over South China Sea. I due to be heading north up to Fukuoka. If I leave right now I run ahead of it safe and sound. I not leave now, you look for another captain.’ The irate man placed more emphasis than was absolutely necessary on the first two syllables of his destination’s name. And for a moment the dazed Robin thought he was actually swearing at her.
‘Captain So, I … Look, just wait. I — ’
‘I not wait. You say yes or no right now. Ship go or I go.’
‘Let him go,’ said Daniel quietly, his finger on the security button keeping his words from the captain. ‘He’s not the man you need in any case.’
‘What? I … Captain … ’ She put her hand over the mouthpiece. ‘Daniel, what — ’
‘Richard’s south of here. He has to be, if our reasoning is correct. Captain So wants to run away north. Even if you got word now, you’d never get him to go south.’
‘But I need a captain, a crew.’
‘You don’t need a captain. You’ve got the pair of us — that’s two. Let him go and see who stays.’
‘Right. But if I do that then I’ll have to get down there pretty quickly myself.’
‘It’ll give you something to do. Better than calling detective agencies in Macau.’
‘Right.’ She took her hand off the mouthpiece. ‘I’m sorry, Captain So. I’m afraid I cannot give Sulu Queen permission to sail north at this time. I need her ready to go south at a moment’s notice.’
‘You mad woman! You mad bloody woman! You mad bloody gweilo fuc — ’
‘Goodbye, Captain So.’
*
Neither of them was properly dressed for what they had to do next. Robin was wearing a silk two-piece not dissimilar to Daniel’s charcoal pinstripe. They had come prepared for the office not the quarterdeck. This fact was emphasised the minute they stepped out of the building on to the pavement of Connaught Road where a taxi was waiting to take them up to Kwai Chung. A gust of wind came howling in from the harbour past the car park and all but pushed Robin over. Daniel caught her but the wind took the hem of her skirt and whirled it up round her waist. While she was trying to control the frisking garment and take her tiny white cotton panties out of public view, Daniel turned to open the taxi door for her. ‘Look,’ he said as she climbed in and finally subdued her hem down towards her knees, ‘you’ve got to go up to Kwai Chung yourself but you can spare me. I’ll go back up to the office and give Su-lin a call; get her to put together a case for you and bring it out. That way, if you do want to stay aboard, you’ll have everything you need. You may not want t
o stay at all, we’ll think that through when we get there, but it’ll give you more freedom of action. What do you think?’
This was moving things very fast indeed all of a sudden. Robin had been thinking only of going up to Kwai Chung to sort out what was happening on her ship. She had not thought of staying aboard — as he clearly had. But now that he had brought it up, it did seem like a good idea.
‘Yes,’ she said at once.
He nodded once and slammed the door. ‘Wait!’ she said to the driver and hit the window button. ‘Daniel!’ she called. ‘Get Shaw to give you cash from the petty cash. Take taxis. Be quick. I’ll see you there.’
He raised one hand and she said to the driver, ‘Go!’
It was a hair-raising drive. As soon as they exited the tunnel up into Tsimshatsui, the wind came battering in again. It was mid-afternoon on a busy Saturday and yet the pavements were emptying rapidly. The wind came in gusts which hit the car like blunt rams, making it judder and leap. The bright neon signs, doubly garish against the charcoal sky, wavered and danced in an increasingly worrying manner. The roadside vendors, frowning upwards, were busily packing away.
‘Looks bad,’ called Robin at the top of her voice, suddenly aware of the noise around her.
‘Bad storm come. Worse than last time,’ called the driver. ‘Man say Number Five up already.’
Robin guessed that ‘man’ was the despatcher.
‘You go on boat Kwai Chung?’
‘Yes.’
‘You take care. This one go Number Eight, man say.’
Number Eight was as bad as it got. There were only one or two storms awarded that particular accolade each season. Robin looked up suddenly, some extra sound in the general cacophony catching her attention. Shockingly low overhead, a little executive jet was skimming under the bellies of the big black storm clouds. ‘Kai Tak must still be open,’ she called.
Closed to commercial aircraft now that Chek Lap Kok was open on the other side of Lan Tao, Kai Tak was still available to private aircraft. But Robin was surprised that it was still open. Whoever was in that jet must have a lot of pull, she thought. And a lot of courage.
It didn’t occur to her to apply the same yardstick to herself. It seemed quite natural to her that she should be contemplating taking a ship out even if the storm warning did go to Number Eight.
Kwai Chung seemed to be at sea already. Just as they pulled up to the gate, the heavens opened and the brutal black wind was suddenly full of sharp-pointed raindrops which exploded on impact with anything they touched like dum-dum bullets. The sound made everything else fade into insignificance. It seemed to Robin vaguely miraculous that the taxi was not swept off the quayside before it drew up at the foot of Sulu Queen’s gangplank. She was more than a little surprised to see that the paint had not been stripped off it as she stepped out into the deluge.
Like Noah coming late aboard the Ark, she ran up the sloping metal runway, which was hidden under a waterfall. The deck was a green-bottomed lake and by the time she reached the door into A deck of the bridgehouse, she was soaked and her shoes were ruined. Apart from footwear, she was wearing four pieces of clothing and all were equally wet. Water was actually running down her legs to form pools on the linoleum floor as she stood and looked about. The power was on, she noted; there was light and she could hear the grumble of generators, but apart from that the ship seemed dead. Deserted. ‘Hello?’ she called in her quarterdeck voice. There was no reply. Swiftly, frowning slightly, still with no feeling of disquiet as yet, she crossed to the lift.
Four minutes later she was on the bridge, slopping over to the microphone. She hit the tannoy button and said, ‘This is Captain Mariner speaking. Will anyone aboard please report to the navigating bridge at once.’
It was while she was waiting, ears pricked for the slightest sound, that she began to shiver. She suddenly realised that she was very cold. A gust of black wind smashed a fusillade of raindrops against the running clearview at her back. She turned. How dark it had become. She could hardly see the forepeak through the rain, though the bright point of its harbour light defined where in the howling murk it should be. As she squinted along the deck, she suddenly received the disturbing impression that she was surrounded by ghosts. Silently, their footsteps cloaked by the generators and the storm, the crew of the Sulu Queen answered Robin’s summons. She saw them first as reflections in the long bridge window as they gathered noiselessly behind her and it took all of her massive self-control not to cry out. She turned, her back to the helm, and surveyed her new command. There were twenty of them. None bore any badge of rank and she did not know them well enough to discriminate between officers and GP seamen, navigators and engineers. She saw at once that they were all men. She was used to being the only female aboard. It looked as though she would be the only Westerner too. That didn’t worry her much; she had been through that hoop in the past as well.
‘I see Captain So has been as good as his word,’ she said. ‘May I ask whether he took all his officers with him?’
There was a moment of silence just long enough for Robin to suspect that she was also the only English speaker aboard. Momentarily but poignantly she regretted that Daniel Huuk was not standing at her shoulder. Then a slight figure pushed its way forward and a familiar face appeared. ‘Captain So take chief and some officers and men,’ said Li Pak-t’ing. ‘But I stay. Most seamen stay. We got families. Beach no good.’ There was a general stirring of agreement through the assembled crew. Robin hoped their faith was not misplaced. The beach might well be better than the bottom of the South China Sea.
‘Thank you, Mr Li. I think the first thing we need to do is to put our heads together and work out who we need to replace to bring us up to full complement. Do they all speak English, Mr Li?’
‘Mostly, missy.’
‘Good. And you may call me Captain, Mr Li. Well, gentlemen, I will dismiss you now. We will be reviewing ship’s routine and preparing to go to sea at short notice. I will be discussing how best to replace the officers and crew with Mr Li. And there will be an announcement at eighteen hundred hours, if not before. Thank you.’
They all trooped off except First Officer Li. ‘Mr Li,’ said Robin, ‘we don’t need a formal harbour watch at the moment. But I would like someone on the bridge. Do we still have a radio officer or did he go ashore with the captain?’
‘He gone, missy … Captain.’
‘Right. I want you to stay here then, but before you take over the watch, I want you to scare up an overall from the ship’s slop chest for me. I’m just going to move my things into the captain’s quarters.’
This was shorthand for I’m going to take a shower and try to get warm and dry’. She had nothing to move into the captain’s accommodation, but she was all too well aware that chill was causing her flesh to clench and tremble. The points of her nipples were pushing against the sheer wet cloth of her jacket, making it difficult for Mr Li to concentrate — and impossible for him to think of her as a captain first and a woman second.
He received her orders with a brief nod. He looked her up and down, then turned into the corridor. Robin followed him off the bridge and ran down the companionway to D deck, one below, where the captain’s cabin was. She did not think to lock the door, for she felt no sense of isolation or of threat. Unbuttoning the double-breasted jacket, she strode across the captain’s day room. As she went in through the second door to the sleeping quarters, she pulled the jacket off and slung it on to the bed. Then she supported herself against the doorpost and pulled her shoes off. Unzipping her skirt, she padded through to the captain’s head and slung the sad, sopping piece of silk on to the closed lid of the toilet. She reached up to snap the light on, but the bulb had gone and the little room remained in shadow. Well, that was OK by her. It was heat she needed at the moment, not light.
The shower cubicle was one of those big, steel-sided affairs beloved of ships’ architects. It had no door and was saved from soaking the rest of the bathroo
m by a combination of depth and the raised rim at the outer edge. She had to take several steps in order to attain the back and turn the shower on. Then she had to skip out quickly to save her underwear from getting a second soaking. As she waited for the shower water to run hot, she pulled off her bra and shrugged her cotton panties on to the floor. Then she checked that there would be a towel to hand when she stepped out, and stepped in. The water was gloriously hot and she allowed it to play across her breasts at some length until the offending firmness was washed from their coral points.
Then she turned to let the scalding water work its magic on her back.
As she did so, she saw the tall figure of a man standing at the door. Her heart almost stopped. She had the instantaneous thought that she should protect herself with her hands. Typically, she dismissed it at once and started looking for something to use as a weapon instead. He was too tall for Li. There was no way it could be Daniel Huuk. The light was behind him and there was a lot of steam. She could not see his face at all. ‘What is it?’ she called, impressed with how firm her voice sounded.
If the stranger replied, she did not hear it. He made some kind of gesture and turned away. She switched off the shower, crossed the cubicle and grabbed a towel. With her eyes fixed on the empty doorway, she wrapped the thankfully large sheet round her and walked out into the bedroom. It was empty. She crossed it and stepped through into the day room. And froze. It was full of men. They were all young, Oriental, unfamiliar. They were dressed in dark suits not unlike the one she had made Daniel Huuk replace with Marks and Spencer’s best. Simple rage at this invasion swept over her. ‘What in Hell’s name — ’
One of the men stepped forward and she recognised the figure from the bathroom doorway. Tall, thin, slightly stooping. Growing old now, and looking, for the first time in their acquaintance, worried.
‘How can I apologise, little mistress?’ he whispered, his voice like sand on silk. ‘Only an emergency such as this one would have caused such an offence.’