Presumption of Guilt

by Jeffries, Roderic

  There was a ship’s chandler, its single display window filled with coils of rope and wire, chains, cleats, winches, and a pair of crossed kedge anchors, and then the road curved round to the left. Beyond was a two-hundred-yard stretch of wasteland, littered with rubbish, and the boatyard, surrounded by a high chain-link fence. There were two sheds close together, one much larger than the other, several cradles, a slipway, a self-propelled hoist over a wet berth, and a quay. On the gabled end of the larger shed was a weathered board on which, in peeling paint, was the name BA LEY & S S.

  Roughly in the middle of the chain-link fencing were two gateways, one for vehicles and the other for pedestrians. The single wooden door was half open. He went inside. What more natural than that a weekend visitor should rubberneck round?

  He passed two motor-boats in cradles, one with a damaged hull below the waterline, the other with both screws removed, to come level with the smaller of the two sheds. Looking beyond this, he saw a concrete apron and the quay; several craft were tied up and the slight wind was keeping the halyards tapping against masts to provide the background sounds heard wherever there were boats. He continued past the shed to the quayside. There were a couple of fast-looking powerboats, an open, cathedral-hull boat with an enormous outboard that was weighing down her stern, a couple of tidy yachts, a ketch with elaborate upper-works, a trawler yacht… His gaze came back to the trawler yacht as he studied her lines more closely. Sharply raked bows, a wheelhouse with ford inclined ports, a look-out point above the wheelhouse shaped like a stumpy funnel, a mast with boom, made to look top-heavy by an enclosed radar scanner… There was something familiar about her. He walked along the quay. He noticed above the wheelhouse an elegantly shaped trumpet foghorn and now he was certain he’d seen her before… He continued on until he could read her name on the stern. Morag III, registered in Olningham. He’d once known a smiling, elfin Morag who’d taught him that when young the only true meaning of life was enjoyment… He remembered. Morag III had been in the harbour at Cala Survas.

  It was too much of a coincidence to be meaningless, yet what it meant he couldn’t begin to judge beyond the fact that someone connected with the boatyard had surely been driving that dark blue Rover in Vertagne…

  “What the bloody hell d’you think you’re doing?”

  He turned. A short, stumpy man, with leathered complexion, dressed in a roll-neck sweater despite the warmth, and paint-splashed jeans, had come round the corner of the larger shed. “Just looking at the boats,” he answered.

  “You ain’t no right here.”

  “The road gate was open so I didn’t think it would do any harm to have a look.”

  “It were shut.”

  “It wasn’t,” corrected Sterne, with continuing good humour. “If it had been, I wouldn’t have come in.”

  The man scratched his wiry hair. “It should’ve been shut.”

  “No harm done, I hope. I always take the chance to look at boats, especially those made for going to sea rather than harbour-drinking.” He pointed at the trawler yacht. “She looks as if she’d cross over to the Continent without much trouble.”

  The man said scornfully: “She’s built for going near anywhere you like to think of.”

  “Could she go as far as the Mediterranean?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Has she been down there?”

  “What’s it to you?”

  Sterne shrugged his shoulders. “It’s just that I’ve a friend who’s in the charter trade in the Med and he says that the market for the big, luxury yacht is getting very sticky and people want the smaller boats. Does she belong to a local man?”

  “Ain’t no business of yours who she belongs to, is it?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “Then stop being so bloody inquisitive and get out of here.”

  They walked in silence along the quay to the smaller shed where they turned left. They were in time to see someone come out of the far end of the shed.

  “So that’s why the door was bloody open,” muttered the man by Sterne’s side. “Always on at everyone else to keep things tight shut…” He raised his voice to a shout. “You left the outside gate open.”

  “What was that?”

  “Always bloody deaf when it suits him… I said, you left the outside gate open.”

  They closed until they could see each other clearly, despite the rapidly failing light. Sterne recognised the driver of the blue Rover at the same moment as he was recognised.

  Chapter 21

  Sterne took a pace forward.

  “Stop him.”

  Sterne began to run. He’d taken no more than a couple of steps when his right leg was expertly hooked and he crashed to the ground with a force that jarred the whole of his body. As he struggled to recover from the crash, he heard them talking.

  “It’s Sterne. Where’d he come from?”

  “All I bloody know is, I found him wandering around, looking at the boats, because you left the bloody gate open…”

  “Get him into the office.”

  The first man had drawn a knife from a sheath and he brought this down so that the tip pricked Sterne’s neck. “Move.”

  Sterne dragged himself to his feet. A hand tightened on his right arm and twisted him round until he was facing a door halfway up the side of the larger shed. “In there.”

  The door was locked. The second man went forward, unlocked the door, and switched on some lights. Sterne was pushed inside. The main floor space was taken up by two motor-cruisers under construction. They continued past both of them to come to a set of offices, partitioned off with wood and glass. They entered the first one. Sterne was forced down into a chair.

  The second man settled on the edge of the desk. He said abruptly: “What have you told the police to get them asking questions? How d’you know to come here?”

  Sterne tried to sound bewildered. “What are you talking about? What d’you think you’re doing…” He gasped as he was suddenly kicked in the ankle with a steel-protected industrial boot. He started to reach down to try to rub away some of the shooting pain and a fist slammed into the side of his neck, almost knocking him from the chair.

  “We’ll need help.” The second man turned and lifted up the telephone receiver, dialled. “It’s Steve. Get down to the office and bring Joe… Yeah, trouble, but nothing we can’t handle.” He replaced the receiver.

  “If you hadn’t left the bloody outside gates open…” began the first man.

  “You think he’d have just gone away? What happened when you found him?”

  “I told you. Said he’d just wandered in to look at the boats, being keen on ’em. I wasn’t bloody well to know…”

  “Did he seem interested in any particular boat?”

  “He wanted to talk about Morag.”

  “That figures.” The second man stared across at Sterne, his strongly featured face half in shadow. “It’s a pity they made a right balls-up of getting you in France.”

  The first man said: “You mean it’s him — the same bloody bloke?”

  “Well, it isn’t Prince Charlie.”

  “And it’s because of him the police was asking about the car? How’d he know?”

  “That’s what we’ve got to find out.” He turned to Sterne. “Where’s the woman?”

  “What woman? What are you talking about?”

  Unseen by Sterne, the second man must have given a signal. A boot slammed into his ankle for the second time and he cried out from the scalding pain.

  “Did you get the number of the car when you were stopped in the village?”

  “What village?”

  A horn sounded twice. “Watch him,” said the second man. “I’ll let ’em in.” He stood, came round the desk and left the office.

  Sterne acknowledged that when the two newcomers were present, he wouldn’t have a ghost of a chance. They’d torture him into telling them all that had happened and then they’d kill him. And with the sea half an hour
’s sailing down the estuary, there wouldn’t be any problem over getting rid of his body. So his only chance of escape was now, while there was just the one man guarding him… He groaned, reached down to his ankle and massaged it. “It’s broken,” he said, making his voice thin and scared.

  The man sniggered.

  The chair had arms and he took a grip on these and lifted himself up to ease his right foot off the ground. He heard the movement but didn’t take any avoiding action and the blow caught him flush in the neck. He fell sideways, making it seem the force had been greater than it had, and deliberately went over with the chair to crash to the floor.

  “Bloody get up.”

  Very slowly, he came to a kneeling position.

  “Right up, you stupid bastard.”

  “My ankle’s broken.” From outside, he heard a dull thump which he translated as the sound made by the closing of the outside gates.

  The man jerked the chair up on to its legs. He moved the knife until its point pierced Sterne’s lightweight jacket and shirt to prick his stomach. “Into the chair.”

  Sterne reached up to the arms of the chair for support, laboriously heaved himself up, keeping his right leg lifted as if he could not bear the slightest weight on it. The man, contemptuous of a cripple, had lowered the knife and come round the chair until he was on Sterne’s right-hand side. Sterne lashed out with his right foot and landed the toe in the man’s crotch. He staggered back, instinctively clutching himself with his free hand to meet the inevitable agony. He tried to straighten up to use the knife, but couldn’t.

  Sterne ran out of the office and past the boats. He heard a car come to a stop: the engine was cut. He reached the outside door and pulled it open. The car was parked a hundred feet away, just beyond the sheds, and three men had begun to walk away from it. He ran towards the river. There was a shout and feet began to pound on the concrete path.

  He reached the end of the shed, came out on to the concrete apron and quay, turned right. When he drew level with the far corner of the shed, he judged that the chain-link fencing was two hundred yards away. Scattered haphazardly between him and the fence were several boats which were clearly hulks, abandoned as being beyond economic repair. These offered some cover now that it was almost dark. He dropped into the shadow of a motor-boat on its side.

  There was a shout. “Switch the lights on.”

  Outside lights could mean arc lamps which would illuminate everywhere. Then, this hulk could cease to be a hiding place but would become a trap. He had to make the chain-link fence before the lights came on. How high was it? Memory suggested somewhere between eight and ten feet: memory also added a two-strand barbed wire top which jutted outwards to prevent easy ingress. Even assuming the links were large enough to give him footholds, the barbed wire would, at the very least, slow him right down… He heard sounds of running beyond him, probably by the fence. The sounds stopped. One of the men, waiting for any sounds which would suggest that the fence was being climbed? Because the climb must be a slow and difficult one, it was virtually inevitable that he’d be caught before completing it… He couldn’t go forward. So he had to turn back…

  He remembered the boats. He left the cover of the hull and moved slowly, despite the need for speed, because if he were to be successful he had to move unnoticed. He reached the quay and heard the constant chuckle of the water, now ebbing strongly. Satisfied he dared move more quickly, he continued until he came abreast of the first of the boats tied up… Arc lights came on, leaving him totally exposed. He waited for the first shouts, but there was none. Because they’d known in which direction he’d first fled, they’d correctly assumed he’d been making for the perimeter fence and were concentrating on that side. But it wouldn’t take them any time to realise that he must have doubled back…

  He was abeam of a motor-boat. Astern of her was Morag III, now noticeably lower in relation to the quay. He went along and climbed aboard and as he did so his foot caught on something which trailed across the deck and rapped a stanchion.

  “What was that?” someone shouted.

  He reached the outside door of the wheelhouse and found this locked, but someone had carelessly left a port partially open. By standing on tiptoe and twisting sideways, he was just able to get his arm inside and reach down far enough to lower the port all the way. He climbed inside. The engine controls were for’d, on the port side, set in a single panel: because most of the controls and dials were duplicated, it was clear that she was twin-engined. The keys were not in the switches.

  A couple of years before he’d done a good turn for a man who, by way of thanks, had shown him how to bypass a car’s ignition switch — an accomplishment which until now he’d had no occasion to make use of. He checked and found the panel which gave access to the back of the control board and then, by touch, identified the wires leading to the nearer, starboard, switch. There was slack on the wires and this enabled him to wrench them free and bring out the ends. He looked through the nearest port. A man came into sight from beyond the far shed and visually checked the line of boats, shouted something that was too muffled to be understood, then returned the way he’d come and disappeared.

  The after door of the wheelhouse was in two halves, one secured solely by the lock, the other by bolts made fast top and bottom. After sliding these bolts undone, Sterne was able to pull the doors inboard until the tongue of the lock sprang free and both of them could be clipped fully open. He went aft and let go the stern line. Immediately, the stern was caught by the tide and began to sheer out from the quay. He went for’d and took two turns off the head rope, then, leaving a final turn round the cleat, made for the wheelhouse, carrying the line with him and careful to keep it under tension. He made the line fast round the corner of the wheelhouse, using the port and the doorway. Now, he could let go for’d by releasing the rope from the wheelhouse.

  The man — he presumed he was the same one — came back round the end of the shed and now he had a torch. He shone the beam on to the first craft and was slowly sweeping the beam aft when his attention was caught by the trawler yacht, her stern well out into the river. He shouted.

  Sterne coupled up the wires and got the wrong combination the first time: the second time, the starter engaged and the engine fired. He put on starboard helm, advanced the throttle. There were low-pitched, intermittent creaks from the rope as it took more strain. He went aft and, judging the moment, released the rope: it snaked out of the wheelhouse, across the deck, and into the water. The combination of tide, helm, and single screw, brought her round quickly until she was heading down-river.

  The beam of the torch caught and held the wheelhouse, but now there was a gap of twenty yards between the quay and the boat. He advanced the throttle and put on helm to counteract the turning action of the single screw. He again looked across at the boatyard, rapidly falling astern, and suddenly realised he’d been congratulating himself too soon.

  Men were scrambling down into one of the powerboats.

  Chapter 22

  The arithmetic of any pursuit was obvious. Forgetting the tide — it would affect both boats — he could make perhaps ten knots on the one engine while the speedboat was possibly capable of forty. But there was more to it than just speed. The speedboat was a relatively frail craft, while the trawler yacht was strongly built for the open seas: physical contact would be far more dangerous to them. So if he were skilful enough, he could keep them at bay until he reached the mouth of the estuary and the open sea and then, unless it was flat calm, they’d never be able to keep up with him.

  He looked back again. Two men were climbing down into the second speedboat. So it was going to be two, not one, against him… A fierce bellow of sound showed that the engine of the first boat had been started…

  When he reached the bifurcation of the river and turned into the right-hand channel, marked by flashing buoys, he could just make out a bow wave aft. It closed rapidly. Then the note of the speedboat’s engine changed pitch and he judged
they were slowing in order to match his speed. He waited until they were almost abeam, altered course sharply. The bows came round until they were on a collision course. For a moment it seemed the speedboat was not going to give way, then it abruptly sheared off. He grinned. They’d got the message…

  There was a flash from the speedboat and one of the wheelhouse ports starred: the sharp crack of the explosion reached him. It was he who needed to get the message. They’d no intention of letting him sail as far downstream as the sea…

  He altered course to starboard, to widen the gap between them. There was a second shot, but as far as he could tell the trawler yacht was not hit. Shooting accurately from the speedboat, even at this reduced speed, would be extremely difficult and that first shot had been a very lucky one.

  There was a blast of sound, deeper and louder than before, from his other quarter. A shotgun, he judged, probably loaded with LG or SG, far more lethal at close quarters than any revolver or automatic since each cartridge contained eight or twelve pellets and these formed a rough pattern which meant that an exact aim was not so essential.

  He altered course to port, then back to starboard. The speedboats were more manoeuvrable and they had little difficulty in keeping clear. His last turn had brought him too far over to starboard and he’d passed outside the line of buoys, putting him in some danger — though with the tide still high, perhaps not too much — of running aground. As he put on port helm, he saw abeam a thin gleam of water: the mouth of one of the myriad creeks which criss-crossed the mudflats. It occurred to him that there was a maze which might just confuse pursuers…

  Both speedboats dropped back and for a moment he thought they’d given up. But ahead were the steaming lights of an oncoming boat under power and he realised they’d fallen back in order not to arouse any suspicions in the minds of those aboard the oncoming boat. So did he make some sort of distress signal? But if the oncoming craft stopped to find out what was the trouble, those aboard would be murdered because the men who were trying to kill him wouldn’t hesitate to kill others to protect themselves… He reduced revs until he’d no more than steering way as the current carried him downstream. He again checked aft. Now, it was very difficult to make out the speedboats. The men aboard them would be waiting for him to make a move, confident that whatever it turned out to be they could counter it. But had they realised how desperate a desperate man could become? He looked round the wheelhouse. The craft was well found and maintained and somewhere there would be an emergency hand pump, ready to take over if the mechanical pumps failed. There were three lockers for’d. Briefly leaving the wheel each time, he checked the lockers: none of them contained a pump. So where would it be stored? Somewhere handy because if it was wanted, it would be wanted in a hurry. He remembered the locker by the ladder leading down to the after deck. He steered well out into the channel because tide and single screws were, if unchecked, bringing her head round, then left the wheel and hurried out of the wheelhouse.