Diamonds Are But Stone

by Peter Vollmer

  He seethed with impatience over the next hour and a half, waiting for the couple to lazily make their way back to the hotel. They were touching and laughing, clearly happy together as they slowly ambled up the path. They walked into the bar and slid onto barstools.

  Christopher had moved to behind the bar. The man smiled at him.

  “Give us a packet of fish and chips to share and two beers - real cold ones, please,” the man said with a friendly smile. Christopher just couldn’t believe that these two were somehow involved with Carruthers.

  Bess got busy with the food in the kitchen. Christopher slid two open bottles of local beer over the counter. He checked what Bess was doing and then leant over the bar.

  “People from de main island are coming here to de hotel. They’re looking for you. Don’ tell anyone what I tol’ you - not even my sister!” he whispered fiercely.

  He saw the fear that immediately registered on their faces.

  “Leave now - right away, your hear! Don’ use the ferry or take a plane. You must leave by boat; ask for Johnny MacNamara in the harbour here. He got a cabin cruiser, ‘Island Dream’; tell him I sent you. He’s at Blossom Bay.” He pointed left down the main road. “You can trust him - he’s a friend of mine. Go now!”

  They immediately left the bar walking quickly to their room, taking the two beers with them.

  After five minutes Bess came through from the kitchen, carrying two plates piled with chips, a piece of fish and salads.

  “Where are they?” she asked.

  “They went to their room - maybe to change. They took their beers with them. A call came through for him,” Christopher said. He did not want her to become suspicious.

  Bess frowned. “I never heard the phone?”

  “It hardly rang before I picked it up.”

  “What about the food?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know, just keep it. They’ll be back as soon as they’ve changed.”

  Bess’ eyes lingered for a second or two in him, her face an expression of concern.

  Bess covered the food with two other plates, and left them standing on the bar top. She returned to the kitchen.

  A few minutes later, he heard a car start. Bess came through from the kitchen to stand on the porch at the corner, as did Christopher. The garage doors were open. the van backing out of it. The couple were both in the van. It drove off, the wheels spinning in the dirt.

  “Who ever phoned musta warned them,” Bess said looking hard at her brother.

  “It seems so,” he replied, staring at the departing van to avoid turning round to look at her.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  I had hardly swung the van onto the road heading towards Blossom Bay when the futility of what we were doing struck me. If they knew that we still were on the island, it would be so easy to keep every exit point under observation; even trying to escape on a cabin cruiser would have little chance of success. But first, get away from the hotel, and Blossom Bay was as good a place as any. Besides which, I doubted whether word had yet spread, as Carruthers’s people still believed we were not aware of their impending arrival.

  We soon arrived at Blossom Bay, a quaint village with two small jetties. Access to the wooden jetties was barred by a fence of green plastic-coated wire mesh with one large steel gate allowing access to the boats. There were a couple of fishing boats tied alongside the pier while a number of cabin cruisers and yachts swung at their moorings in the bay. I looked for somewhere to hide the van. There were quaint colonial cottages built on the opposite the road with a slight rise behind stretching parallel to the stands, each cottage with its own lane leading between the properties to the back. I chose a lane at random, drove through and parked behind a cottage under a huge tree that was leaning to one side, a victim of the continuous trade wind.

  Maria and I had packed a holdall with the barest of essentials. I grabbed this and locked the van. We quickly crossed the road and made our away to the quay. “Dream Island” was tied to the pier. We stared in surprise; I was not expecting what we were looking at.

  “Dream Island” was a forty-foot Hatteras deep-sea cruiser, complete with fighting chair and outriggers, a true game fishing boat with flying bridge and a door in the stern through which sailfish and marlin could be hauled through the transom. A small Stars and Stripes flag fluttered at the stern.

  “Ahoy!” I called from the jetty.

  A well-built coloured man appeared from the other side of the cabin dressed in cut-off jeans and a white vest. He wore a white baseball cap this with a golden anchor emblazoned above the peak. The cap had seen better days. He looked enquiringly at me.

  “Are you Johnny?” I asked.

  “I am,” He said, clearly displaying a degree of disinclination towards us.

  “Christopher sent me. He said you could help us. I’ve got a problem but I can pay” and then added. “ - well. If you allow us aboard I’ll fill you in,” I said. I did not want us to be standing in the open: the less conspicuous we were the better.

  “Is this got anything to do with the police?” he asked.

  “No, a crowd on Grand Cayman are after us, but I can explain.”

  He stared at us for a few seconds. I could see he was undecided.

  “Okay, if Christopher said I’ll help, I’ll do so - you better come aboard.”

  We both crossed the short gangplank, Maria holding my hand.

  At that moment, another man appeared from behind the seaward side of the cabin. He was a lot older, his hair white and his skin wrinkled from too many years in the sun. I saw he had no teeth, his face seemingly slack-jawed , his mouth fallen within itself. He was similarly dressed to the young man but his clothes were dirtier.

  “This is my father, John Snr. You are...?” Johnny asked.

  I introduced us. Johnny spoke briefly to his father, with me hardly catching anything through the rapid local patois, but I did hear the name Carruthers.

  “You better get below. You don’t want others seeing you.”

  John Senior bade Maria and I take a seat on the bench in the main cabin hidden from prying eyes. The windows to the cabin were darkly tinted.

  “If the man after you is who I think he is, then you better tell me the whole story so that we can know how best to help you,” the old man said quietly.

  “I heard you mention the name Carruthers,” Maria said. “Well, it seems the people after us have hired his services and put a price on our heads.”

  “If you’ve got Carruthers after you, then you’ve a serious problem,” John Senior said shaking his head. “It’s pointless trying to run; you’ll never make it to the main island. Anyway, this boat’s not ready - we’re still working on it. Best you hide until things die down. That should be within a few days. This sort of thing has happened before - Carruthers always seems to be chasing somebody.”

  At that, he smiled displaying his toothless gums.

  “My father’s right,” said Johnny in a strong Jamaican accent, “We’ve got to hide you. I don’t think anybody saw you come aboard. If you think this is our boat - you’re wrong. It belongs to an American who holidays here - he even has his own place on the island - flies in regularly using his own plane.” The young main stared towards the security gate to the jetties. “Nobody will dare board this yacht without proper papers. Our boss is well respected around here - he’s done a lot for the people on the island - they’re not about to forget that. Even the police hold him in high regard.”

  John Senior moved to a small galley in the corner and turned a gas ring on to prepare tea or coffee.

  “We don’t sleep aboard. I skipper the boat and take friends of the boss out on fishing trips; they charter it from him. You can bunk down in the forward cabin. Nobody will come aboard.” He kept looking over his shoulder as he spoke to me.

&n
bsp; I suddenly remembered the van. “My van’s parked behind those cottages. Somebody will find it.”

  “Leave it there. Tonight, I’ll go and park it on the other side of the island. You know, create the impression that you abandoned it. That should mislead them for a while,” Johnny smiled.

  Neither Maria nor I dared step out of the cabin. At sunset, Johnny and his father left. They said they would be back in the early morning. They warned us not to use any lights. This was an irritating inconvenience, forcing us to rummage around in the dark. At least we could use the gas cooker, in the galley hidden in a corner below the level of the cabin windows so the flame was not visible from outside. We were left with tea and coffee and other essential ingredients plus bread, butter, cheese, bacon and eggs - certainly enough to see us through to the next day.

  At six in the evening I noticed a security guard arrive who took up station at the entrance to the fenced in track that led to the jetties. A small shack guarded the sliding gate. I hoped his presence would prevent unannounced intruders. We still had our weapons but were we to use them this could only aggravate matters.

  There were a few yachts, which had crews aboard. I thought the crews were probably family and friends. One or two of these crews had barbeques going on a piece of grassed ground alongside the quayside, and we heard music and merriment until about ten that evening.

  I slept fitfully, each in our own bunk, never really quite comfortable. Just after seven in morning, our benefactors returned to resume their duties aboard. Johnny told us that that they had left the van abandoned near two other hotels that were miles from where we were. He also mentioned that he had heard that a few men had arrived at the Beach Hotel to interrogate Bess and Christopher who had stuck to their story that they thought that the telephone call I’d received must have been a warning. He said they were now scouring the island and were certain to have stationed men at the ferry harbour at West End and the airport.

  I asked him what size aircraft the airport catered for. He wasn’t sure but said that his boss often flew into the airport in his own executive jet. I also asked whether the local airport had jet refuelling facilities. He replied that he did not know but thought that this was only available on Grand Cayman. Still, if the airport could accommodate small jets, then this could enable us to escape.

  At about eleven that morning John Senior stuck his head into the cabin.

  “Quick, get down into the engine room - we’ve got visitors.” From his expression, I immediately realized he was concerned.

  Maria and I dropped through the hatch and climbed down the ladder into the engine room. Standing between the two large Cummins marine diesel engines I saw that up against the ceiling where it met the hull there were two small portholes on each side, no more than four or five inches in diameter, the glass opaque with grime. I drew Maria to the side and pointed to the porthole that was most forward, which I believed would give us a view of the jetty. We took turns peering through the grey glass.

  We saw two cars that had pulled up to the entrance to the jetties. Four men alighted and now two of them were speaking to the crew on one the boats, which was moored to the other jetty. All wore slacks with cotton shirts hanging over. I assumed this was to conceal their weapons.

  I was decidedly unhappy, especially with no escape route.

  “Christ Maria, we’re really are getting wedged in here! We can’t leave the boat - God, we can’t go anywhere!” I said.

  “Listen Peter, the old man’s right. Let do as he says. Let the bastards look. They won’t find us, I mean; they’re not going to search the boats.”

  I just remembered something.

  “Oh my God, where’s the bloody satellite phone?” I snapped.

  “Do you really think I’d forget it? I’ve got it and no, there’s been no call from Gavin. I’m thinking that instead of landing on Grand Cayman, why doesn’t he land here?” she said, pushing me aside to peak out of the small porthole again. “They’re coming towards this jetty now,” she added ducking down, pulling me down with her.

  Both father and son remained on deck going about their business, not taking any notice of the four men, pretending to only notice them as they came alongside. Maria and I could hear voices through the ventilation shaft that fed fresh air to the engine room, but were unable to make out what was said.

  Then I quite distinctly heard the men saying goodbye.

  After fifteen minutes, the hatch opened and Johnny stuck his head into the room, grinning from ear to ear, waving at us to come up top.

  “They’ve just driven off.”

  We all sat down on the benches in the main cabin, the old man retrieving a bottle of rum from a locker, which he waved at us, eyebrows arched in a question.

  “God, yes,” I said. “I could do with a stiff one of those.”

  He poured us each a drink, and I threw mine back in one shot, the fierce sweet liquor burning its way down my throat; it was just what I needed. Maria sipped hers slowly.

  “What did they want?” I asked.

  “Their questions were stupid. I soon realized that they don’t know where you are. Yes, they believe you’re on the island, but that’s about all. I suppose they found the van but that’s not going to tell them a thing. They asked whether we had seen anybody resembling you - of course, I said no. I’m supposed to phone them if we see anybody of your description. The bastards even gave me a number!” Johnny said. He looked at Maria. “You shouldn’t be so pretty, everybody notices - they said I should keep a lookout for a very beautiful dark-haired Cuban woman.” He laughed again. “I said that if she’s beautiful I’d never miss seeing you.”

  “Fuckin’ bastards,” the old man hissed and then spat over the side. “Far better you stay here. They don’t know many people on the island, so there can’t be that many people looking out for you.”

  Maria and I spent another night on the cabin cruiser. The day was tiresome as we were not permitted to leave the cabin. We were both impatient and ill tempered, forced to fret the time away.

  That evening Maria and I again discussed what options we had - was landing the jet on the island an option?

  We seemed to share the same ideas. We would have to refuel before crossing the Atlantic and while I was sure that the new aircraft would also be fitted with a long-range tank, I had no idea what its range was. I thought it highly likely that we would have to refuel before flying to the island Ile da Sol just off the African west coast.

  Anyway, this was now academic; we had to deal with Trichardt before returning to South Africa. If we returned with him still in pursuit, we were dead meat; with all the resources he had at his disposal in South Africa, we had no chance.

  I said so to Maria. She agreed.

  The next morning Johnny returned with more news. Nobody seemed to know why but the police were now also looking for two European tourists - that could only be us, we thought. The description matched us. We thought that rather strange - we had not broken any laws. Not only that; Johnny told us the police were keeping an eye on the men who had arrived from the main island. Maria thought this could benefit us; Trichardt’s men would be extremely careful if the local police were looking over Carruthers’s shoulders at their every move.

  I asked Johnny whether Gerrard Smith, the local airport had any immigration control.

  “Yes, it has. Mr Ferguson the American who owns this boat flies in directly from the States, and the one immigration officer on the island handles everything.”

  “Do you think we can depart from here or would we have to go back to Grand Cayman?” I asked.

  “As long as your papers are okay, I don’t see why not. But let me find out, I’ll let you know by tonight, I know the immigration officer - he lives a short distance from us.”

  That evening Maria and I dined on lobster tails smothered with seafood sauce and acco
mpanied by a large fresh salad. Johnny’s father had even brought a bottle of white wine, apparently usurped from Ferguson’s private stash. I hoped the American wouldn’t mind.

  Of course, the meal would have been better in candlelight; it wasn’t as much fun in the near dark.

  As she did every evening, Maria set up the satellite phone. It started buzzing at about nine that evening, the piercing noise so loud I thought the whole harbour could hear it. She quickly grabbed the receiver, spoke to Gavin for a minute or so, and then handed the phone to me.

  “How are things on your side?” I asked.

  He told me that he wanted to fly into Grand Cayman the next morning. I said that he should rather make it in the afternoon at about five and that he should land at Gerrard Smith Airport on Cayman Brac.

  “What’s your fuel situation going to be like? Will you make Ile da Sol from here? Just remember, there’s no refuelling facility on Cayman Brac.” I had told him that returning to Grand Cayman could be an unhealthy option for us all, briefly mentioning Carruthers’s men in pursuit.

  He said he could refuel at Miami in Florida before crossing the Caribbean, which would leave him sufficient jet fuel in the tanks to cross the Atlantic from Cayman Brac.

  “Do that,” I said, then briefly filled him in on how the situation was developing. “It’s likely that we’d be wanting to make a rapid departure but whatever happens, wait if we do not pitch up by the designated time. Do not leave without us,” I reiterated.

  I said they should not leave the aircraft, the aircraft international status would prohibit any others from approaching the plane on the airport.

  “As improbable as it may sound, I’m convinced that Trichardt has now set out to terminate us.”

  “I’ve always believed that this was what it was finally going to come to. What a setup! He can’t go to the police and neither can we. Of course, Trichardt’s not going to recognize the aircraft; it still has an American registration number. Your plan might just work, but it’s not going to solve our problem with Trichardt,” Gavin swore.