The mate looked at the calendar. It was now 4 September and he counted the days from 28 July, He made it thirty-eight. Then he looked at the Mariner’s Medical Dictionary again. Under Yellow Fever (Jav) (rare) the captain’s finger still held the place: Incubation period — 14 to 42 days: highly infectious. At thirty-eight days the sick man was within the incubation period.
By midnight, Ushiba was locked up in the after heads. This tiny toilet and shower, shared by the bosun and the engineer, had the advantage of being over the engines, so not much noise could be heard from it. None at all was now coming from Ushiba. He had been injected with a strong sedative. The mate and the bosun had waited for the crew to go to sleep before strapping him to a stretcher and carrying him through the fore ends.
There was not enough room for Ushiba to lie flat in the heads so the stretcher had been wedged at an angle, with his feet under the shower and his head over the toilet hole in the floor.
An anxious conference had taken place between the captain and the mate. Nothing seemed wrong with the other two men who had been to Java, but only Ushiba had actually fallen in the harbour. Obviously, he had to be put ashore in Otaru. But just as obviously the ship must not come under suspicion there — the shortest delay could abort the entire voyage.
At a further meeting, joined by the bosun and the engineer, some other matters were agreed. The latter men would now of course have the use of the officers’ heads. There was no need to alarm the crew over a case of food poisoning. For Ushiba’s comfort, and theirs, he had been removed to the convenience of his own heads. If still unwell he could go ashore for medical treatment in Otaru.
For the same reason, there was no need to alert Otaru yet. After refuelling had been completed, and if he was still indisposed, Ushiba could be put ashore just before sailing. Meanwhile it would be a good idea to have his bunk disinfected. The bosun should attend to this himself, preferably at a time when the crew would all be above deck painting. It would also be a good idea to have a replacement standing by in Otaru in the event that Ushiba did elect to go ashore there.
These matters took time to resolve, and it was the early hours before the captain at last climbed into his bunk. He took his Mariner’s Medical Dictionary with him. There were details there that worried him and he wanted to read them again.
The disease was viral, he saw; ‘water-borne v.’ And unlike the constipation of normal yellow fever, the variant was ‘commonly accompanied by diarrhoea, excessive perspn., dehydratn., & blood in vomit (black v.). Dvlpmnts: jaundice, convulsns.’ Yes, Ushiba had all those. ‘Patient shd be restrained, washed frequently, kept out of light. Treatment: saline solution, rice water, vitamins (inject, only); no solids. Duration of fever: 2 to 4 days, frequently fatal.’
The captain got out of bed and looked in the medical chest. Vitamins, but no saline solution. Rice water was not a problem. And in the snugness of the after heads, restraint was not one either. Nor were the requirements for washing and reduced light. There was a light switch there, and also a hose.
But the brief duration and frequent fatality of the disease worried him. Otaru still lay thirty-two hours away, and a further six would be spent in the port. Total thirty-eight hours. If Ushiba had been ill for twelve hours without knowing it — and the intensity of his symptoms suggested this — then his fever would have run fifty hours before they got out of Otaru. If he should prove one of the forty-eight hour fatalities, he could be dead before they left port. In which case they wouldn’t be leaving port …
The captain stroked his chin. His present ETA at Otaru was 1000 hours. An increase of speed could get him there earlier. But this would give time for inquiries. It would be better to cut the time in port. Ideally he should cut it to two hours. That would allow him to leave at 1200. With Ushiba going ashore at, say, 1145. Still only forty-six hours into his fever. And in no position to give any details of it.
Yes, that was the best thing to do. He was not clear at the moment how to do it. But after a sleep his head would be clearer. He looked at the bulkhead clock as he switched the light off. Two a.m. fifth of September.
18
At 2 a.m. in Tokyo, Porter was also switching the light off. He had spent the last three hours alone on a final check of his notes. Since leaving the Lucky Strike he had slept every night at the Theosophical Society, the last two of them with Machiko; but this one he spent on his own. It was the last.
For most of the time he had been speaking Korean with the girl; the Pusan dialect of Korean, which was Sung Won Choo’s. In this dialect he had repeated his legend, recited the parts of the derrick, and also the parts of the ship. She had used a pointer on the ship, and he had given all the alternative routes for getting from one place to another. Machiko was now satisfied with his accent and his knowledge of Sung Won Choo. And he was quite certain he knew the ship from one end to the other.
Their knowledge of the Suzaku Maru’s movements had become increasingly refined. Everything had gone as planned at Niigata, and they knew to the hour her timing in Otaru. She would dock there on the seventh, at 1000 hours, and leave six hours later: 1600. Apart from refuelling, there was only a single cargo to load and the remainder of the wool to unload. He would present himself at the dock soon after 1500 and be away by 1600. There were no uncertainties any more, and he didn’t plan to study any more.
He switched the light off and went to sleep.
Next morning, over a leisurely breakfast, Yoshi gave him a final briefing. There was no change in arrangements. The Suzaku Maru was keeping to her timetable, and Porter would keep to his. His kit was waiting in Otaru, his accommodation confirmed at a rooming house there, and his name and particulars lodged with the port office.
‘So that’s it,’ Yoshi said. ‘No problems?’
‘No. No problems.’
This leg, he had insisted, he would do by himself. He felt better by himself, and Yoshi had been forced to agree.
At nine-thirty he said goodbye to Machiko. Then with his single piece of luggage, an executive attaché case, he got into the car with Yoshi, and they took off to Haneda domestic airport. There Yoshi shook his hand and wished him luck, the car left, and he was on his own.
To Sapporo, the provincial capital of Hokkaido, it was 600
miles, and the 11.30 plane landed him there just before one o’clock. He took a cab to the railway station and bought a ticket to Otaru. The port was only forty minutes away and he arrived there, his last planned destination in Japan, exactly on schedule, 2.55. An arrow pointed to the toilets, and he locked himself into one and changed his clothes.
Out of the executive case came the jeans, shirt and rope-soled shoes kept back for this occasion; and also a folded canvas grip. Into the grip went his wig, and then every trace of the identity of James B. Peterson. He added the executive case itself, zipped up the grip, and went out to the left luggage office. There he deposited the grip, took a receipt, and in the station mailbox posted it off back to Tokyo in the prepared envelope he had brought with him. Somebody would be picking up the grip within forty-eight hours.
Now it was almost 3.30.
He had half an hour to wait.
He had a cup of coffee in the station tearoom and kept an eye on the left luggage office. The two men there had been on duty since 8 a.m. and were due for relief. At four the new shift would come on until midnight when the office closed; they would have no knowledge of a man who had just deposited a grip. All this had been scouted out for him.