Angel Death

by Patricia Moyes

“Matey… Haiti… Katie! That’s it! Katie! Eighty-two, Katie-Lou!” Henry was silent for a moment, studying his wife’s face. Then he said, “Katie-Lou. What the hell does it mean?”

  “I’ll try to tell you,” Emmy said.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  WHEN EMMY HAD finished there was a longish pause. Then Henry, who had been lying back with his eyes closed, opened them and said, “Yes. I don’t remember much, of course. In fact, very little. But it’s coming back, in patches.”

  Emmy said, “You remember that it was the couple who called themselves Carstairs who were the villains.”

  Henry smiled feebly. “No, not really. But I do remember that it was desperately important for me to hang on to the name of their boat—Katie-Lou.”

  “As far as we know,” Emmy said, “she’s still here, in St. Mark’s. She was brought in for repairs. Of course, the hurricanes will have upset the Carstairs’ plans—but sooner or later, they’ll have to come back and get her. Filled to the brim with drugs, I suppose.”

  “I suppose so.” Henry sounded very tired.

  “Then there’s the question of the Blackstones. You don’t feel that there was anything wrong with them.”

  “What do you mean, wrong with them?”

  “I mean, they were victims, like you.”

  “Yes. Yes, I think so. They didn’t constitute a menace at any rate.”

  Emmy frowned. “One thing puzzles me,” she said.

  “Only one?”

  “Oh, a million things. But one, right here and now and off the top of my head. All right, so the Katie-Lou is here to pick up a load of marijuana and take it to the States. I know that’s not a praiseworthy thing—but would it have got you so desperate to tell the Governor. You went on as though it was a matter of life and death.”

  “Katie-Lou was only part of it.” Henry spoke slowly. “If I could remember Katie-Lou, I thought I could remember the rest. But it seems I can’t.”

  A nurse, unflappable and smiling, had come into the ward. She switched off the transistor radio and calmly unplugged the electric guitar with which a young islander had been entertaining his sick friend. Then she said gently, “I’m afraid I have to ax all visitors to leave.” She smiled enchantingly. “Hurricane Beatrice is very close now, and everybody is axed to go home and stay there until the danger is past. We’ll take good care of your friends and relatives in the hospital, and we hope to see you tomorrow.”

  “Well,” said Emmy, “that’s that for tonight. I’ll be back in the morning, weather permitting. Maybe the… ” She stopped, thinking better of her intended remark. Instead, she bent and kissed Henry’s forehead.

  The wind was getting up as Emmy and the other visitors walked down the steps in front of the hospital. Several taxis were waiting, and people who did not have their own cars piled into them, more or less indiscriminately. Everybody was going back into town. One by one, the others called to the driver to stop, got out, paid their fares, and hurried off into the darkness. At last, Emmy was alone in the cab. They were on the waterfront, and already the seas were pounding loudly against the harbor wall.

  “Where to, lady?” asked the driver—a big, untidy man with a large grin and broken teeth. Emmy hesitated and then said, “How long do you think we have?”

  “How long?”

  “Before the hurricane hits.”

  The driver leaned out of the window and cocked an eye at the sky. He said, “Hard to say. About half an hour, I guess.”

  “I have to get back to the Harbour Prospect,” Emmy said, “but I’d like to pay a short call somewhere else first.”

  “O.K. by me, lady. Where?”

  “Bob Harrison’s boatyard.”

  “You’re the boss.” The driver was already putting the car in reverse. “But it’ll be all shut up, you know. Bob doesn’t live at the yard.”

  “Never mind. Let’s go.”

  The boatyard was dark but not silent. The ever-increasing wind was already rattling the wire-mesh gate and shaking the corrugated-iron roofs of the big sheds. Noisiest of all were the flapping tarpaulins shrouding the half-dozen boats that stood on wooden cradles ashore, like stranded whales. Big waves were crashing up the normally sheltered slipway, and on the dark water beyond other boats strained at their moorings, while rigging thrummed against masts and strained ropes creaked.

  “Just wait, please,” Emmy said. “I won’t be long.”

  “Better not be,” remarked the driver ominously. He lit a cigarette and settled himself behind the wheel. Leaning against the wind, Emmy walked up to the gate of the boatyard.

  The gate was padlocked, as she had feared it would be, but there did not seem to be any barbed wire along the top of it. However, it was a good eight feet high. Emmy looked around and found an empty wooden crate lying by the side of the cul-de-sac road. She dragged it to the gate and climbed onto it. With its extra height, she could just get her arms over the round metal bar that formed the top of the gate. Clumsily, she tried to hoist herself up, but her arms were too weak.

  Behind her, a male voice said, “What’s all this, then?”

  Emmy let out a small squeak and fell to the ground, knocking over the crate. She turned to see the cab driver standing there.

  “Oh! It’s you. I thought… I mean, you must be surprised—”

  “Lady,” said the driver, “you drive a cab, nothing surprises you. Want a leg up?”

  “I just…I mean, I only want to see if a certain boat is there—a friend’s boat… ”

  “You want a leg up, or you don’t? Like I said, there’s not much time. How you planning to get back over?”

  “I thought I’d be able to find something to climb on.”

  “If you don’t, I’ll pitch that box over to you and then grab you from this side. Up we go, then.”

  Strong arms clasped her waist and heaved her upward. A moment later Emmy was over the gate and in the yard.

  It only took her a couple of minutes to locate Katie-Lou. She was out of the water on a cradle near the gate—a sleek sailing ketch about fifty feet long, stoutly built, with a broad beam and a central cockpit, which promised comfortable sailing in rough weather. The name, KATIE-LOU NORFOLK VA., was painted in black on the white transom. Even in the dark and against the black sky, Emmy could see that the boat was equipped with a radio aerial. She had seen all that she wanted to see. She also noticed, happily, that there was a small stepladder alongside the boat, enabling the workmen to climb aboard. She had started to lug it over to the gate when the taxi driver’s voice stopped her.

  “Hey, lady, you want to give yourself away? You put that ladder back and come climb on the box.” Lightly, he pitched the crate over the fence. “That’s it…bring it up to the gate…climb on it and get your arms over the top…here we go…easy, see?”

  It was not exactly easy, Emmy thought, but she made it. When she was safely outside the fence, the driver found a long stick and pushed it through the wire mesh, giving the crate a hefty shove that sent it tumbling away from the gate. Then he threw the stick down in the grass by the roadside.

  “You think of everything,” said Emmy, full of admiration.

  The driver grinned and winked. “I can see you haven’t had no proper experience,” he said. “Find what you wanted?”

  “Yes, thanks.”

  “Then we’d best be going.”

  In the taxi, speeding up the hill to the hotel, Emmy said, “I really am very grateful. You were splendid.”

  “Nothing, lady. Nothing at all. By the way, my name’s Shark Tooth.”

  “Is it really?”

  “No, but it’s what they call me. So anytime you need a cab, you just ask for Shark Tooth. Call the main stand by the jetty and ax for me. O.K.?”

  “O.K.,” said Emmy. The car took the final upward bend before the hotel, and the wind caught it abeam, rocking it dangerously. Shark Tooth, with careless expertise, regained control and carried on with no loss of speed, but he said, “Here she comes, man. Here’s
Beatrice.”

  The big glass doors of the hotel were not only taped, but locked. However, there was a night bell, and the clerk had remembered that Emmy was out visiting the hospital and was waiting to let her in.

  She had started to walk up the stairs to her room when she noticed sounds of merrymaking coming from the bar which led off the main foyer. It was not yet ten o’clock, and obviously the handful of guests still in the hotel had decided, like any group of strangers threatened by an outside force, to band together and make the best of things. After a moment of hesitation, Emmy came back down the stairs and went into the bar.

  There were about twenty people there, chattering with slightly frenetic cheerfulness. Behind the bar, somebody had pinned a large map of the Caribbean, and the bartender was marking Beatrice’s latest position on it with a felt-tip pen. With a definite sinking of the heart, Emmy saw that the black dot was only about forty miles east of the Seawards, and the hurricane was headed straight for them.

  The portable radio on the bar kept up a continuous stream of talk. Beside it, his ear cupped in his hand, sat a small, bald American who kept muttering, “Quiet down, won’t you, fellas? I can’t hear… ” In a remote corner by himself, Dr. Vanduren sat at a small table, nursing a drink. Emmy went over to him.

  “So you decided to stay up and wait for the hurricane after all, Doctor?”

  “Yes. Yes, it seemed silly to go to bed, when…where have you been?”

  Emmy had forgotten that her clothes might bear signs of her expedition into the boatyard. However, as with the matter of available cash, she found herself feeling unusually calm. She said, “I went to the hospital to see my husband.”

  “But with the hurricane coming—”

  Emmy said, “Dr. Vanduren, I know a lot more now than I knew when we had dinner together.” She paused, searching for words. When they came, they sounded banal. “Can I trust you?”

  The doctor smiled and sighed. “Ah, that’s the question, isn’t it? Can I trust you, can you trust me? Can we trust the police, or the Governor? Can they trust each other?” He raised his glass to his lips, drank deeply, and then suddenly banged the glass onto the table, causing the would-be radio listener to break into a plaintive, “Aw, cut it out, will you?”

  Vanduren smiled across the table at Emmy. He said, “Somebody has to start somewhere. Let’s trust each other, Mrs. Tibbett.”

  “Then you must let me tell the Governor—”

  “I said ‘each other.’ ” All the hostility was back.

  Emmy looked at him and thought she had seldom seen anybody so tired, so without hope. She said, “All right. Each other. I am virtually certain that your daughter, Janet, is currently going under the name of Mrs. Katherine Carstairs of Norfolk, Virginia. God knows where the real Mrs. Carstairs is. Katherine and Lewis Carstairs own—or owned—a boat called the Katie-Lou, which is currently hauled out of the water at Bob Harrison’s yard here. I have no idea whether Bob is involved…or indeed, anybody else. All I do know is that the boat is now—or soon will be—filled to the brim with an important consignment of drugs that have been hidden on this island, waiting to be ferried to the States. I also know that the Carstairs telephoned Inspector Ingham from St. Thomas…no, that’s not true. I know that he told me they did—”

  Dr. Vanduren smiled sardonically. “That’s a bit better,” he said. “You don’t know, do you?”

  “No, but one thing that’s certain is that the boat is still here.”

  “You know that?”

  “Yes.”

  “How? They may not be in St. Thomas. They may have sailed her away this afternoon.”

  “No. She’s here.”

  Vanduren shrugged. “Since we have decided to trust each other, I suppose I must believe you.”

  Emmy smiled. “If you must know, I broke into the yard a few minutes ago, with the help of a charming and resourceful cab driver. The boat is there.”

  Dr. Vanduren gave her a curious look, but all he said was “Good. Go on.”

  “Well, since the boat is here, they will have to come and collect her when the hurricane has passed. It’s perfectly obvious that no mail is going to arrive for weeks, so we can forget that photograph of your daughter that’s being sent from England. Only one person can identify her, Dr. Vanduren, and that is you.”

  Vanduren opened his mouth to say something, but there was a sudden, earthshaking rumble from outside and all the lights went out. There were a few, quickly stifled feminine screams which turned to embarrassed laughter as the bartender produced matches and lit a row of candles that had been placed along the bar. The man who had been listening so avidly to the radio now turned up the volume. Even in the sanctuary of the Harbour Prospect Bar, it was difficult to hear against the screaming of the wind outside and the periodic crashes as trees and roofs and electricity poles came down.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, I’m sure we don’t have to tell you that Hurricane Beatrice is now approaching the British Seaward Islands and should pass over us within the next two hours. If anybody has not so far taken shelter, do so now. I repeat, take shelter now. This is Tim Shannon of Radio Seawards, telling everybody in these islands to take shelter at once. Hurricane shelters have been established at the following locations: St. Michael’s Church, Priest Town, St. Matthew’s; The Anchorage Inn, St. Matthew’s; St. Mark’s High School, Harbour Front, St. Mark’s; The Astoria Cinema, Main Street, St. Mark’s; The Methodist Church Hall, North End, St. Mark’s. Do not attempt to drive any vehicle of any sort. Many roads are already impassable, and vehicles can be deathtraps in hurricane-force winds. If your home is not secure, make your way on foot now to the shelter nearest you. If possible, however, stay indoors and take all necessary precautions. All glass windows and doors should be taped diagonally with strong plastic or paper tape… ”

  The erstwhile revelers in the bar had fallen silent. There was a feeling of mass guilt, as though to sit out the hurricane in the comparative security of the Harbour Prospect Hotel was in itself a discreditable act. It was almost a relief when the radio announcer said quite calmly, “Tim Shannon here, Radio Seawards. Our engineers tell us that our transmitter tower can’t last much longer. Sorry, folks, but I think that at any moment—” Then there was a crash, followed by silence.

  After a shocked pause, people began to talk again. Suddenly they did not feel so guilty. If Radio Seawards—a sturdy concrete building on a hillside above the harbor—could suffer damage, then so might the Harbour Prospect Hotel. They were in some—even if minimal—danger, and it was a good feeling. Drinks were ordered, and people began to speculate on possible devastation to the hotel in a much more cheerful frame of mind. On one point there was general agreement—it would be tempting fate to go to bed on an upstairs floor. The bar—or perhaps, even better, the discotheque downstairs—were the sensible places to be.

  Emmy became aware that Dr. Vanduren was looking at her intently. She said, “I’m sorry. You were going to say something, before… ”

  “I was going to say, Mrs. Tibbett, that I will help you in any way I can to find my daughter.”

  “Thank you, Doctor.”

  “And now, I’m going to bed, whatever anybody says. I’d rather risk being blown from here to St. Matthew’s than sit up all night in a hurricane with this bunch.”

  Emmy smiled. “I agree,” she said.

  In the lobby, as the doctor climbed the stairs to his room, Emmy approached the desk clerk and asked whether the telephones were still working. It appeared that, for the moment, they were—but only essential calls were allowed.

  “I was thinking of my husband in the hospital,” Emmy said.

  “The hospital is still functioning, Mrs. Tibbett. We are in touch with it and also with the police. If there is no urgent message—”

  “No,” said Emmy. “No urgent message.”

  Half an hour later, while Emmy was lying fully dressed on her hotel bed, trying to snatch some sleep despite the screaming inferno outside, the main tele
phone cable of St. Mark’s Island came down to earth with a crash. Nobody was in touch with anybody else any longer.

  The night seemed to last forever. It was hard to believe that wind could make such a shattering amount of noise. It was impossible, of course, to look out of the taped and shuttered windows, but occasionally the cacophony outside was augmented by the wail of a siren, as an ambulance or police car battled through the chaos to the scene of an emergency. With the beginnings of daylight, around five in the morning, the wind began to abate. By eight o’clock, when Emmy got up and changed her clothes by the feeble light that was creeping through cracks in the shutters, the hurricane was packing winds of no more than fifty miles an hour over the Seawards. The lethal leading edge of the storm had screamed on out to sea and toward the apprehensive coast of the United States mainland.

  There was no question of washing. The electrical pumps were dead and the taps dry. Feeling exhausted and filthy Emmy made her way downstairs, headed for the dining room, and hoped that the hotel cooked with gas and not electricity.

  The dining room was well populated. Not only were all the hotel’s residents and staff enjoying a hearty, gas-cooked breakfast, but many other St. Markians (notably those with electric stoves) had come in for a meal. The shutters had been removed from the big windows, and through the crisscross of protective tape it was possible to look out and get a first glimpse of the night’s devastation.

  The gardens of the hotel looked like a deserted battlefield. Trees, uprooted by the fury of the wind, lay around at drunken angles, stripped of their leaves. Streams of mud cascaded down the steep hillside toward the harbor, carrying with them the pathetic remains of what had yesterday been flowering shrubs. In the continuing gale the few surviving trees bent hopelessly toward the west, like creatures under the lash of a whip. What leaves still clung to them were blackened, as if burned.

  Emmy, standing at the window, became aware of someone at her elbow, and turned to see Dr. Vanduren. “Look at the trees,” she said. “Was there a fire?”

  He shook his head. “No. That’s salt burn.”