‘I’ll get under way,’ I told Stuart.
‘Just a minute,’ he said. ‘What’s happened to Perroni and Del Ricci? They caught us napping when we were alongside the mole waiting, fully loaded, for you to return.’
I told him. And he nodded his head slowly, caressing his stubbly chin. Then he smiled a little wryly. ‘There’s a certain strange justice about life, isn’t there?’ he said.
Monique came in then with some soup and I left him and went out on the bridge. The schooner was casting off. I went down to the deck and thanked the skipper and his crew. He waved his hand and his engines began to go astern.
As the gap between the two craft widened something that reflected the moonlight flashed through the air and fell with a clatter at my feet. It was followed by another but lighter article. I picked them up. They were the silver cigarette case and the lighter that matched it.
The Little Octopus waved his hand in ironic salute.
I stood there and watched the schooner back out of the harbour entrance. Clear of the wall, her bows swung towards Elba. Her sails gleamed white as they struggled up to clothe her masts.
I threw the cigarette case and the lighter over the side. And as they sank through the clear sea water like silver fish I felt a sense of relief. I did not want to remember that particular facet of the expedition.
‘Boyd!’ I called, and when he came out of the galley I said, ‘Get the engines going, will you? I want to get out of here as quickly as I can.’
‘Aye, aye sir.’
I got a swab and went up to the bridge and washed all traces of Perroni’s wretched end off the woodwork.
By the time I had swabbed the last of the blood the engines were going. Boyd and I got the hook up with the donkey engine and then I went up on to the bridge again and took the wheel in my hands.
‘Slow astern both,’ I ordered.
‘Slow astern it is, sir,’ came Boyd’s report from the engine room and I felt the screws bite into the water and the ship began to go astern.
As the harbour wall slipped past I ordered, ‘Full ahead, port — full astern, starboard.’
The bows swung round. The little fishing village, white in the moonlight beneath the towering slopes of the island, revolved slowly round us and I headed the Trevedra along the rocky coast towards the open sea.
When we rounded the end of the island, I changed course, heading west for the Straits of Bonifacio between Corsica and Sardinia. I felt a strange contentment with the throb of the engines and the leap of the deck plates hard beneath my feet. I was my own master again. This was my ship and I was in command of her again. And I was homeward bound.
When the Giglio was just a dark mass astern beneath the great round disc of the moon and my wake was part of the silver path that led back to the island, Monique came out on to the bridge. She put her hand in mine, not afraid to touch me, and said, ‘I am glad that it is all right and that you have your ship again. You are happy, yes?’
She was looking up into my face, happy and child-like, yet with the eyes of a woman who understood my mood.
I slipped my arm round her and moved her body so that she stood against the wheel. Then I took her hands in mine and put them on the spokes of the wheel, holding them there beneath my own.
She leaned her body back against me and her hair was on my cheek as she flung her head back to look up into my face. She wasn’t laughing now. She understood, and her eyes were happy.