As she and the captain fell to silence, the men, being of limited intellectual capacity, began to fill that void with their own increasingly audible mutterings. So it was that Gretel learned her intended fate. The men were waiting for the tide to come in, so that they could take delivery of more brandy from a vessel evidently larger than their own boat. Once they had their cargo safely stored away in another cave, they would return to deal with their prisoners. They would let the rising water in this cave do its work, then transport the bodies back to their own lifeboat, which they would hole before setting it out on the sea once more. If the wreckage was found, it would suggest it had been snagged upon rocks, and its occupants, were they ever to float to notice, would bear no scars other than where the fish might have feasted upon them, as is often the case with those unfortunate souls who drown at sea.
At last their captors satisfied themselves that their catch was secure and headed off to make their rendezvous. For a moment neither Gretel nor the captain spoke, so that all that could be heard was the echo of the smugglers’ dwindling footsteps and the teasing roll and splash of the waves entering the nearest part of the cave. At last Gretel ventured to voice her thoughts.
“It would seem that matters have not gone entirely to plan.”
“God’s truth, woman, you have that right! What folly have you led me to?”
“Me?”
“Aye, ’tis plain we were expected.”
“By the mermaid, yes, but . . .”
“But we found no mermaid, only a watery death, if those rogues have their way. How is it that they knew we were to come here? Someone told them of our plans.”
“Well, it wasn’t me. Really, how could you think I’d put my own person at risk of such a fate, let alone that of my client? Credit me with wishing to preserve my own neck, even if you think me ready to give up yours!” The ropes were starting to chafe at her wrists and ankles, and she was in no mood to be tactful.
“It was you who brought me here,” the captain insisted on pointing out again. “You who persuaded me to take this course of action.”
“And you who kept brandishing your weapons and strutting about before we left in a manner suggesting we could be assailed by a small army and still come off the better party in the encounter.”
“I was taken by surprise!”
“And where is it written that your enemies must give notice of their intention to attack? You cannot entirely blame me for our predicament when you have so singularly failed to protect us.”
“Should a detective need to be protected?”
“My work is of the mind, not the sword. For pity’s sake, I was safer with Hans!”
“Blast you for a woman! Have you nothing more to offer than complaints?” he growled.
He had a point. There was little to be gained by argument, and time was against them. Even now Gretel could feel the cool water touching the soles of her shoes. They had an hour, maybe two at most before the sea level would rise to claim them. They had better not waste it in fruitless conjecture and disagreement.
“Very well,” she said, more calmly than she felt, “I accept that I am in part to blame for the predicament in which we now find ourselves. We must now work together if we are to escape our fate. I’m certain those villains would like nothing better than for us to turn on each other.”
The captain harrumphed in a way that suggested grudging agreement. He struggled against his bonds. “The knots are tight and the rope new,” he told her. “I cannot break free.”
Gretel wriggled her feet and was able to kick off one shoe. This enabled her to remove her foot from the rope that tied her to the rock. “Look,” she cried, “I am untethered.”
“How can I look?”
“Oh, yes, of course, forgive me. I have a small hole in my sack and can see through it.”
“Is there any sight of the scoundrels who bound us?”
“Alas, there is not. Still, I have freed myself from the rock to which I was tied, but, argh . . .” She cursed as, in her attempt to get up, she pitched forward and landed hard upon the rough floor of the cave. Her legs were still tied and the knees and her hands still bound, her arms pinned tight to her side. She tried again, this time kneeling and trying to shuffle forward, but again she lost her balance, catching on her head a glancing blow as she toppled sideways, the rough sacking providing ineffectual protection. “It’s no use,” she said. “I can make no purposeful progress like this. I might well knock myself senseless.”
“Ha! At least you will know what to do to escape a slow drowning.” Captain Ziegler was surprisingly quick to give up hope. Gretel was on the point of attempting to raise his morale when she heard a sound.
“Listen,” she hissed in an excited whisper. “Someone is coming.”
Footsteps ruled out the mermaid, so that it seemed at least one of their attackers was returning. Gretel wondered if they had decided to put them to the sword instead. She lay tense and still, peering through her unhelpfully ragged eyehole. A figure came into view. A man, moving quickly and quietly. He approached the captain, hesitated, and then lifted the sack from his head.
“By all that floats!” exclaimed Captain Ziegler, at the same moment Gretel recognized their visitor.
“Dr. Becker!” she cried. “Dr. Becker, how came you here?”
“By a small boat, much like your own,” he explained gently, removing Gretel’s hood.
She gasped air and shook her head, spitting hessian fibers as she did so. She was irritated at the thought of what the wretched sacking must have done to her hair and thought briefly of how exasperated Everard would be to see his efforts yet again ruined.
The captain was incensed. “You followed us! I was certain our departure went unseen. I had not reckoned with such an early riser as yourself. But, no matter. It is our good fortune that you are here.”
“I am only too glad to be of assistance. I saw the ruffians responsible on the cliff path.”
“Did they see you?” Gretel asked.
“I am certain they did not. I was able to duck into a crevice in the rocks and remain hidden. They were too engaged in discussing their plans to notice me.”
“And you were intent on your own,” Gretel suggested. The words of the sprite’s riddle were coming back to her and, at last, making sense. The sharp-eyed man—surely there was no eyesight sharper in the region than Dr. Becker’s with his ever-present binoculars.
Dr. Becker smiled ruefully. “I confess, fraulein, my mind is ever on one matter, and that is what brought me here, as I think you know.”
The captain finished untying his bonds and stood up, striding about the cave to stretch his cramped legs. “You took up a dangerous course in following us, Dr. Becker. We are, as you have witnessed, dealing with murderous rogues.”
Gretel allowed her fellow passenger to assist her to her feet. The scrapes and bruises from her falls upon the rocks were beginning to smart unpleasantly, but there was no time to concern herself with such trifles. “I think you will find, captain, that the good doctor’s interests lie with someone, indeed, something, other than ourselves. Is that not correct, Dr. Becker?”
“Your powers of deduction are impressive, Fraulein Gretel,” he replied.
“Alas, such powers, if powers they be, have come a little late in the day for convenience.”
“Better late than never,” he said.
“Had you not come here upon your mission,” she replied, “there might have been no ‘later,’ either for myself or the captain.”
“Mission?” Captain Ziegler was confused.
At that moment, a sound from the main part of the cave disturbed their conversation. The trio moved toward the little pool and stood watching as the mermaid emerged from the silky waters. Gretel was struck anew by the creature’s allure. No matter that she had seen her before, it was impossible not to gaze in awe at the beautiful face, curvaceous upper body, and iridescent blue-green shimmer of her tail. The mermaid lifted herself gracefully fro
m the pool and sat on the mossy edge, arranging herself in the most decorous manner.
“Well!” she purred. “Three visitors all at once. How lucky I am. I do hope you have not been waiting long. It can be chilly in here at times.”
The captain had been momentarily rendered speechless by the vision before him. For all his insistence that he had no fear of mermaids, he was certainly overawed by the presence of this one. Gretel fancied there raged within him the confusion any man must endure when faced with a vision of loveliness even more beautiful than was fabled, undeniably erotic, and yet somehow sexless at the same time. It was yet another instance, as far as Gretel was concerned, that demonstrated how fortunate she was to be a woman.
“Good morning to you,” she said to the mermaid.
“Fraulein! I am so happy you were able to return.”
“Did I not promise that I would?”
Dr. Becker stepped forward. “Good morning,” he said.
“Oh!” the mermaid exclaimed. “I know that voice! You are my shadowy benefactor. At last I see your face.”
“Benefactor?” The captain had rediscovered his voice. “What goes on here?”
“Allow me to enlighten you, captain,” said Gretel. “This charming creature is the source of the singing that has so disturbed your crew and your business. And this”—here she indicated Dr. Becker with a sweep of her arm—“is the man who has been paying her—and paying her handsomely, I might say—to sing.”
“This! Dr. Becker!?” The captain’s face darkened with fury. His hand went instinctively to his scabbard, forgetting that his sword had been taken from him. “Hell’s teeth, man! It was you who sought to see me ruined?”
“My wish was never to do you any damage, captain, I assure you.”
“What? My crew disappearing, my clients following, and my reputation likely to go the same way, and yet you think you do me no harm?”
“It was my intention only ever to see you go elsewhere. To leave these waters and offer your cruises somewhere other.”
“He did not single you out for this treatment,” Gretel told him. “The mermaid was to sing for one and all ships, not only the Arabella. Is that not the case, Dr. Becker?”
“It is. My desire was to see no more cruisers here. There was nothing personal in my actions . . .”
“Damn you for a fool, man!” roared the captain. “There is nothing more personal to a ship’s master than his ship, do you not know that?”
Gretel stepped between the two men, not entirely trusting the captain’s command of his temper.
“Dr. Becker is not a scoundrel, captain. He is, in fact, a man of passion like yourself, the difference being that while your passion is for your ship, his is for birds.”
“Birds?” The mermaid was at a loss. “What has my singing to do with birds?” she asked. “I am a creature of the sea. Fowl pay me no heed whatsoever, and I confess I find gulls most raucous and tiresome things.”
“Birds?” Captain Ziegler shook his head. “You talk in riddles, fraulein. Everyone knows the doctor is enamored of the things, spends his days looking at ’em. But what in Neptune’s name does that have to do with me and my ship?”
“If I might be permitted to explain . . . ?” Dr. Becker asked.
“Get on with it, man!” was the captain’s reply.
“I have made a lifetime study of the sea and coastal birds in this region, and I have discovered that the little Frisian Islands that dot these waters are crucial to their continued well-being. It is upon these islands that the birds make their nests and rear their young.”
The mermaid gave a yawn. “I cannot see why one would care,” she said, “as there are so very many of the shrill things. And they travel so far. Why cannot they go elsewhere if needs be? Who would notice?”
“Forgive me, fraulein,” the doctor continued, “but there are many different varieties and species of bird. You are correct when you say that common gulls are plentiful, and indeed they are able to make their homes in many different places. The problem lies with the rarer birds, those of a nature more shy and delicate. Their numbers are few and they often raise only one chick in a year. Should they be disturbed, should they fail to produce young, well, the decline in their numbers would certainly be swift and could very well be dire.”
The captain was struggling to find it in himself to understand. “We take our own food aboard, doctor. We do not stoop to trapping gulls and the like to feed crew or passengers. We have no interest in your damn birds.”
“Happily, no, I grant that your detrimental impact upon these fragile species is not deliberate. They would, in any case, prove unpalatable, I believe. No, the problem lies with your very presence, or rather, that of your ship and its passengers. If the parent birds are disturbed during the breeding season, they may abandon their eggs or even leave their chick before it is fledged and able to fend for itself.”
Gretel put in a thought. “The excursions to the islands . . . they must be particularly bothersome for the birds, I should imagine. All manner of people tramping and squealing and taking their noisy leisure. Enough to disturb tame and fed farmyard fowl, let alone shy birds unaccustomed to having humans in their midst.”
“You have seen the dilemma precisely, fraulein,” Dr. Becker told her. “And what is more, upon one of the islands, Amrum, there dwells a very rare bird indeed. The pigeon-toed yellow-necked speckled wader. Such a delightful bird! So elegant, so timid, so graceful in flight and deft in its wading habits. There is not its equal . . .” He pulled himself back from his rapturous reverie. “The fact is that only three breeding pairs remain. Three! Should their clutches come to naught this season, that would be the end of them.”
“No more pigeon-toed yellow-bellied . . . ?” Gretel asked.
“Yellow-necked speckled waders,” the doctor corrected her. “No more. Gone forever. I simply could not stand by and see that happen. I saw it as my duty to act.”
“So you paid the mermaid to sing”—the captain shook his head—“for a few birds.”
Now it was Dr. Becker’s turn to become angry. The man was quite transformed.
“Have you no soul, captain? Have you no heart? Do you not see that such fragile beings, such delicate examples of what is pure and innocent in this world, are to be cherished and protected? Is not a society judged upon how it treats its weakest members?” he demanded.
Gretel knew that there was one word in the doctor’s argument that might sway the captain: society. Did he not aspire to elevate himself, after all? Was that not his goal in all that he did, to rise above his brutal origins, to slough off his rough past and become a brighter, cleaner, better person? If he wished to join society, whatever that might be taken to mean, must he not then strive to make sure it was something worth the joining? Even if he cared not one sailor’s spit for the wretched birds.
It was, however, difficult for him to reconcile the needs of a few feathered beings with the danger to his crew or the threat to his business. “Surely, Dr. Becker,” he said more levelly, “you will grant that a man’s life cannot be forfeit to that of a bird? Men have vanished. My cook was murdered . . .”
“Not by the doctor,” Gretel reminded him, “nor anyone acting in his name.”
“But the men who disappeared . . .” the captain insisted.
“Likely either fled because they were overcome by their superstitious fear of the mermaid,” she pointed out, “or else were paid to go.”
“By whom? This savior of birds?”
“Not he.”
“How can you be certain? He seems ready to spend his money when it suits his purposes.”
Here the mermaid found the conversation of interest once more. “He pays me well, that’s true. And he’s due to pay me again, unless you can persuade me otherwise.”
“The captain has agreed to your terms,” Gretel assured her. “His presence here should reassure you of that.”
The mermaid smiled prettily, reaching out to touch the captain’s c
heek with a long, cool finger. “Will you take me to the lovely warm waters of the Caribbean, then, captain? Will you convey me safely away from this cold, dreary place?”
“Aye, I will.”
“And will you stay there?” asked Dr. Becker hopefully.
“I will not! I have my reasons for choosing to make these seas my home. I intend on returning to take up my cruises the minute I have delivered my cargo.”
“Cargo!” The mermaid bridled, snatching back her hand. “I would not be called such—”
Dr. Becker became agitated once again. “Sir, if you insist on returning to these islands, I will have no choice but to do my utmost to prevent you. I give you fair warning.”
“Do you threaten me, doctor?!” Captain Ziegler stood tall and strong in front of the older man, who at once looked even more flimsy than usual.
“Gentlemen, please.” Gretel raised her hands. “This is not the moment to fall to squabbling. May I remind you, captain, that even now Cat’s Tongue and his cohort are on their way to scuttle our boat? Are we not people of logic and reason? It cannot be beyond us to find a solution that is satisfactory to all, but for now, we must work together, else we shall be at the mercy of those villains, and with no boat in which to return to the Arabella.”
The Case of the Fickle Mermaid Page 20