by Wilbur Smith
I knew that if I showed Daly and Dada the break at Gunfire Reef they would either explore it and find nothing - which was the most likely for whatever had been there was now packaged and deposited at Big Gull Island - or they would find some other evidence at the break. In both cases I was in for unpleasantness - if they found nothing Daly would have the very great pleasure of connecting me up to the electrical system in an attempt to make me talk.
If they found something definite my presence would become superfluous - and a dozen eager seamen would vie for the job of executioner. I didn’t like the sound of pick-handles it promised to be a messy business.
Yet the chances of escape seemed remote. Although she was half a mile astern the threepounder of the foredeck of Dada’s crash boat kept us on an effective leash, and we had aboard Daly and four members of the goon squad.
I lit my first cheroot of the day and its effect was miraculous, almost immediately I seemed to see a pinprick of light at the end of the long dark tunnel. I thought about it a little longer, puffing quietly on the black tobacco, and it seemed worth a try - but first I had to talk to Chubby.
Daly,” I turned to speak over my shoulder. “You had better get Chubby up here to take the wheel, I have got to go below.” why? he demanded suspiciously. “What are you going to do?”
“Let’s just say that whatever it is happens every morning at this time, and nobody’else can do it for me. If you make me say more, I shall blush.”
“You should have been on the stage, Fletcher. You really slay me. V “Funny you should mention that. It had crossed my mind.”
He sent the guard to fetch Chubby from the saloon, and I handed the con to him.
“Stick around, I want to talk to you later,” I muttered out of the side of my mouth and clambered down into the cockpit. Angelo brightened a little when I entered the saloon, and flashed a good imitation of the old bright grin, but the three guards, clearly bored, turned their weapons on me enthusiastically and I raised my hands hurriedly.
“Easy, boys, easy,” I soothed them and sidled past them down the companionway. However, two of them followed me. When I reached the heads they would have entered with me and kept me company. “Gentlemen,” I protested, “if you continue to point those things at me during the next few critical moments you will probably pioneer the sovereign cure for constipation.” They scowled at me uncertainly and as I closed the door firmly upon them I added, “But you really don’t want a Nobel prize - do you?”
When I opened it again they were waiting in exactly the same attitudes, as though they had not moved. With a conspiratory gesture I beckoned them to follow. Immediately they showed interest, and I led them to the master cabin. Below the big double bunk I had spent many hours building in a concealed locker. It was about the size of a coffin, and was ventilated. It would accommodate a man lying prone. During the time when I was running human cargo it had been a hidey hole in case of a search - but now I used it as a store for valuables and illicit or dangerous cargo. It contained at the present time five hundred rounds of ammunition for the FN, a wooden crate of hand grenades, and two cases of Chivas Regal Scotch whisky.
With exclamations of delight the two guards slung their machineguns on their shoulder straps and dragged out the whisky cases. They had forgotten about me and I slipped away and returned to the bridge. I stood next to Chubby, delaying the moment of take-over.
“You took your time,” growled Daly.
“Never rush a good thing,” I explained, and he lost interest and strolled back to stare across our wake at the following gunboat.
“Chubby,” I whispered. “Gunfire Break. You told me once there was a passage through the reef from the landward side.”
“At high springs, for a whaleboat and a good man with a steady nerve,“he agreed. “I did it when I was a crazy kid.”
“It’s high spring in three hours. Could I run Dancer through?” I asked.
Chubby’s expression changed. “Jesus!” he whispered, and turned to stare at me in disbelief.
“Could I do it?” I insisted quietly, and he sucked his teeth noisily, looking away at the sunrise, scratching the bristles of his chin.
Then suddenly he reached an opinion, and spat over the side. “You might, Harry - but nobody else I know could.”
“Give me the bearings, Chubby, quickly.”
“It was a long time ago, but,” sketchily he described the approach, and the passage of the break, “there are three turns in the passage, left right then left again, then there is a narrow neck, brain coral on each hand - Dancer might just get through but she’ll leave some paint behind. Then you are into the big pool at the back of the main reef. There is room to circle there and wait for the right sea before you shoot the gap out into the open water.”
“Thanks, Chubby,” I whispered. “Now go below. I let the guards have the spare whisky. By the time I start my run for the break they will be blasted right out through the top of their skulls. I will signal three stamps on the deck, then it will be up to you and Angelo to get those pieces away from them and wrap them up tightly.”
The sun was well up, and the triple-peaked silhouette of the Old Men was rising only a few miles dead ahead when I heard the first raucous shout of laughter and crash of breaking furniture below. Daly ignored it and we ran on over the quiet inshore waters towards the reverse side of Gunfire “Reef. Already I could see the jagged line of the Reef, like the black teeth of an*ancient shark. Beyond it the tall oceanic surf flashed whitely as it burst, and beyond that lay the open sea.
I edged in towards the reef, and eased open the throttles a fraction. Dancer’s engine beat changed, but not enough to alert Daly. He lounged against the rail, bored and unshaven and probably missing his breakfast. I could distinctly hear the boom of the surf on coral now, and from below, the sounds of revelry became continuous. Daly noticed at last, frowned and told the other guard to go below and investigate. The guard, also bored, disappeared below with alacrity and never returned.
I glanced astern. My increase in speed was slowly opening the gap between Dancer and the crash boat, and steadily we edged in closer to the reef. ” I was looking ahead anxiously, trying to pick up the marks and bearings that Chubby had described to me. Gently I touched the throttles, opening them another notch. The crash boat fell a little farther astern.
Suddenly I saw the entrance to Gunfire Break a thousand yards ahead. Two pinnacles of old weathered coral marked it, and I could see the colour difference of clear sea water pouring through the gap in the coral barrier.
Below there was another screech of wild laughter, and one of the guards reeled drunkenly into the cockpit. He reached the rail only just in time and vomited copiously into the wake. Then his legs gave way and he collapsed on to the deck and lay in an abandoned huddle.
Daly let out an angry exclamation and raced down the ladder. I took the opportunity to push the throttles open another two notches.
I stared ahead, gathering myself for the effort. I must try and open the gap between Dancer and her escort a little more, every inch would help to confound her gunners.
I planned to come up level with the channel, and then commit Dancer to it under full power, risking the submerged coral fangs rather than test the aim of the gunners aboard the crash boat. It was half a mile of narrow, tortuous channel through the coral before we reached the open sea. For most of it, Dancer would be partially screened by coral outcrops, and the weaving of the channel would help to confuse the range of the threepounder. I was hoping also that the surf working through the gap would give Dancer plenty of up-and-down movement, so that she would heave and weave unpredictably like one of those little ducks in a shooting gallery.
One thing was certain: that intrepid mariner, Lieutenant Commander Suleiman Dada, would not risk pursuit through the channel, so I could give his gun layer a rapidly increasing range to contend with.
I ignored the alcoholic din from below, and I watched the mouth of the channel approach rapidly. I fou
nd myself hoping that the seamanship of the crash boat’s crew and commander was a faithful indication of their marksmanship.
Suddenly Peter Daly flew up the ladder to confront me. His face was pink with anger and his moustache tried to bristle its silky hairs. His mouth worked for a moment before he could speak.
“You gave them the liquor, Fletcher. Oh, you crafty bastard.” “Me?” I asked indigriantly. “I wouldn’t do a thing like that.”
“They’re drunk as pigs - all of them,” he shouted, then he turned and looked over the stern. The crash boat was a mile behind us, and the distance was increasing.
“You are up to something,” he shrilled at me, and groped in the side pocket of his silk jacket. At that moment we came level with the entrance to the channel.
I hit both throttles wide open, and Dancer bellowed and hurled herself forward.
Still groping in his pocket, Daly was thrown off balance. He staggered backwards, still shouting.
I spun the wheel to full right lock, and Dancer whirled like a ballet dancer. Daly changed the direction of his stagger, thrown wildly across the deck he came up hard ill against the side rail as Dancer leaned over steeply in her turn. At that moment Daly dragged a small nickelled-silver automatic from his side pocket. It looked like a .25, the type ladies carry in their handbags.
I left Dancer’s wheel for an instant. Stooping, I got my hand on Daly’s ankles and lifted sharply. “Leave us now, comrade,” I said as he went backwards over the rail, falling twelve feet, striking the lower deck rail a glancing blow and then splashing untidily into the water alongside.
I darted back to the wheel, catching Dancer’s head before she could pay off, and at the same time stamping three times on the deck.
As I lined Dancer up for the entrance I heard the shouts of conflict in the saloon below, and winced as a machinegun fired with a sound like ripping cloth. - Barrapp - and bullets exploded out through the deck behind me, leaving a jagged hole edged with white splinters. At least they were fired at the roof, and were unlikely to have hit either Angelo or Chubby.
Just before I entered the coral portals, I glanced back once more.
The crash boat still lumbered along a mile behind, while Daly’s head bobbed in the churning white wake. I wondered if they would reach him before the sharks did.
Then there was no more time for idle speculation. As Dancer dashed headlong into the channel I was appalled by the task I had set her.
I could have leant over and touched coral outcrops on each hand, and I could see the sinister shape of more coral lurking below the shallow turbulent waters ahead. The waters had expended most of their savagery on the long twisting run through the channel, but the farther in we went the wilder they would become, making Dancer’s response to the helm just that much more unpredictable.
The first bend in the channel showed ahead, and I put Dancer to it. She came around willingly, swishing her bottom, and with only a trifling yaw that pushed her outwards towards the menacing coral.
As I straightened her into the next stretch, Chubby came swarming up the ladder. He was grinning hugely. Only two things put him into that sort of mood - and one of them was a good punch up. He had skinned his right knuckle.
“All quiet below, Harry. Angelo’s looking after them.” He glanced around. “Where’s the policeman?”
“He went for a swim.” I did not take my attention from the channel. “Where is the crash boat? What are they doing?”
Chubby peered across at her. “No change. It doesn’t seem to have sunk in yet - hold on, though2 his voice changed, yes, there they go. They are manning the deck gun.$ We drove on swiftly down the channel, and I risked a quick glance backwards. At that instant I saw the long streak of white cordite smoke blow like a feather from the threepounder, and an instant later there was the sharp crack of shot passing high overhead, followed immediately by the flat report of the shot.
“Ready for it now, Harry. Left-hander coming up.”
We swept into the next turn, and the next round fell short, bursting in a shower of fragment and blue smoke on one of the coral heads fifty yards off our beam.
I coaxed Dancer smoothly into the turn, and as we went into A another shell fell in our wake, lifting a tall and graceful column, of white water high above the bridge. The following wind blew the spray over us.
We were halfway through now, and the waves that rushed to meet us were six feet high and angry with the restraint enforced upon them by the walls of coral.
The guncrew of the crash boat were making alarmingly erratic practice. A round burst five hundred yards astern, then the next went between Chubby and me, a stunning blaze of passing shot that sent me reeling in the backwash of disrupted air.
“Here’s the neck now,” Chubby called anxiously and my spirit quailed as I saw how the channel narrowed and how bridge-high buttresses of coral guarded it.
It seemed impossible that Dancer would pass through so narrow an opening.
“Here we go, Chubby, cross your fingers,” and, still under full throttle, I put Dancer at the neck. I could see him grasping the rail with both hands, and I expected the stainless steel to bend with the strength of his grip.
We were halfway through when we hit, with a jarring rending crash.
Dancer lurched and hesitated.
At the same moment another shell burst alongside. It showered the bridge with coral chips and humming steel fragments, but I hardly noticed it as I tried to ease Dancer through the gap.
I sheered off the wall, and the tearing scraping sound ran along our starboard side. For a moment we jammed solidly, then another big green wave raced down on us, lifting us free of the coral teeth and we were through the neck. Dancer lunged ahead.
“Go below, Chubby,” I shouted. “Check if we holed the hull.”
Blood was dripping from a fragment scratch on his chin, but he dived down the ladder.
With another stretch of open water ahead, I could glance back at the crash boat. She was almost obscured by an intervening block of coral, but she was still firing rapidly and wildly. She seemed to have heaved to at the entrance to the channel, probably to pick up Daly - but I knew she would not attempt to follow us now. It would take her four hours to work her way round to the main channel beyond the Old Men.
The last turn in the channel came up ahead, and again Dancer’s hull touched coral; the sound of it seemed to tear into my own soul. Then at last we burst out into the deep pool in the back of the main reef, a circular arena of deep water three hundred yards across, fenced in by coral walls and open only through the Gunfire Break to the wild surf of the Indian Ocean.
Chubby appeared at my shoulder once more. “Tight as a mouse’s ear, Harry. Not taking on a drop.” Silently I applauded my darling.
Now for the first time we were in full view of the gun crew half a mile away across the reef, and my turn into the pool presented Dancer to them broadside. As though they sensed that this was their last chance they poured shot after shot at us.
It fell about us in great leaping spouts, too close to allow me any latitude of decision. I swung Dancer again, aimed her at the narrow break, and let her race for the gap in Gunfire Reef.
I committed her and when we had passed the point of no return, I felt my belly cramp up with horror as I looked ahead through the gap to the open sea. It seemed as though the whole ocean was rearing up ahead of me, gathering itself to hurl down upon the frail little vessel like some rampaging monster.
“Chubby,” I called hollowly. “Will you look at that.”
“Harry,“he whispered, “this is a good time to pray.”
And Dancer ran out bravely to meet this Goliath of the sea.
It came up, humping monstrous shoulders as it charged, higher and higher still it rose, a green wall and I could hear it rustling - like wildfire in dry grass.
Another shot passed close overhead but I hardly noticed it, as Dancer -threw up her head and began to climb that mountainous wave.
It
was turning pale green along the crest high above, beginning to curl, and Dancer went up as though she were on an elevator.
The deck canted steeply, and we clung helplessly to the rail.
“She’s going over backwards,” Chubby shouted, as she began to stand on her tail. “She’s turtling, man!”
“Go through her,” I called to Dancer. “Cut through the green!”
and as though she heard me she lunged with her sharp prow into the curl of the wave an instant before it could fall upon us and crush the hull.
It came aboard us in a roaring green horror, solid sheets of it swept Dancer from bows to stern, six feet deep, and she lurched as though to a mortal blow.
Then suddenly we burst out through the back of the wave, and below us was a gaping valley, a yawning abyss into which Dancer hurled herself, falling free, a gut-swooping drop down into the trough.
We hit with a sickening crash that seemed to stun her, and which threw Chubby and me to the deck. But as I dragged myself up again, Dancer shook herself free of the tons of water that had come aboard, and she ran on to meet the next wave.
It was smaller, and Dancer beat the curl and porpoised over her.
“That’s my darling,” I shouted to her and she picked up speed, taking the third wave like a steeplechaser. Somewhere close another threepound shell cracked the sky, but then we were out and running for the long horizon of the ocean and I never heard another shot.
The guard who had passed out in the cockpit from an excess of Scotch whisky must have been washed overboard by the giant wave, for we never saw him again. The other three we left on a small island thirty miles north of St. Mary’s where I knew there was water in a brackish well, and which would certainly be visited by fishermen from the mainland.
They had sobered by that time, and were all inflicted with nasty hangovers. They made three forlorn figures on the beach as we ran southwards into the dusk. It was dark when we crept into Grand Harbour. I picked up moorings, not tying up to the wharf at Admiralty. I did not want Dancer’s glaring injuries to become a subject of speculation around the island.