“Because I heard our first mate here advising him that it was the best way to do it. Part of your answer already, eh, Mcllroy?” He looked at me without admiration, then back at Mcllroy. “Have a couple of men move me nearer that bulkhead. I don’t feel too comfortable here.”
I gave him an injured glance but it bounced right off him. His stretcher was shifted and I was left more or less alone in front of the group. I lay there for about three minutes, watching the cargo transfer. A crate a minute, and this despite the fact that the Manilla holding the after ends of the two vessels together snapped and had to be replaced. Ten minutes at the most and he should be all through.
A hand touched my shoulder and I looked round. Julius Beresford was squatting by my side.
“Never thought I’d see you again, Mr. Carter,” he said candidly. “How do you feel?”
“Better than I look,” I said untruthfully.
“And why left all alone here?” He asked curiously.
“This,” I explained, “is what is known as being sent to coventry. Captain Bullen is convinced that I gave unwarranted help or aid, or some such legal phrase, to Carreras. He’s not pleased with me.”
“Rubbish!” He snorted.
“He heard me doing it.” “Don’t care what he heard,” Beresford said flatly. “Whatever he heard, he didn’t hear what he thought he did. I make as many mistakes as the next man, maybe more than most, but I never make a mistake about men… Which reminds me, my boy, which reminds me. I can’t tell you how pleased I am — and how delighted. Hardly the time and place for it, but nevertheless my very heartiest congratulations. My wife feels exactly the same way about it, I assure you.”
It was taking me all my time to pay attention to him. One of the crates was swinging dangerously in its slings, and if one of those crates dropped, fell on the deck, and burst open to reveal its contents, I didn’t see that there was going to be much future for any of us. It wasn’t a thought I liked to dwell on; it would be better to turn my mind to something else, like concentrating on what Julius Beresford was saying.
“I beg your pardon,” I said.
“The job at my Scottish oil port.” He was half impatient, half smiling. “You know. Delighted that you are going to accept. But not half as delighted as we are about you and Susan. All her life she’s been pursued, as you can guess, by hordes of gold-digging dead beats, but I always told her that when the day came that she met a man who didn’t give a damn for her money, even though he was a hobo, I wouldn’t stand in her way. Well, she’s found him. And you’re no hobo.”
“The oil port? Susan and me?” I blinked at him. “Look, sir…”
“I might have known it, I might have known it!” The laugh was pretty close to a guffaw. “That’s my daughter. Never even got round to telling you yet. Wait till my wife hears this!”
“When did she tell you?” I asked politely. When I’d last seen her about two-fifteen that morning I would have thought it the last thing in her mind.
“Yesterday afternoon.” That was even before she had made the job proposal to me. “But she’ll get round to it, my boy, she’ll get round to it.”
“I won’t get round to it!” I didn’t know how long she had been standing there, but she was there now, a stormy voice to match stormy eyes. “I’ll never get round to it. I must have been mad. I’m ashamed of myself for even thinking. I heard him, daddy. I was there last night with the others in the sick bay when he was telling Carreras that the best way of stopping the Ticonderoga was a long piercing blast on a whistle brought the tale of Carter’s cowardice to a merciful end.”
Immediately green shirted armed men began to appear from other parts of the Ticonderoga, from the bridge and engine room where they’d been on guard during the transhipment, which was now finished except for one last crate. Two of the men with guns, I noticed, were dressed in blue merchant navy uniforms: those would be the radio officers Carreras had introduced aboard the Ticonderoga. I looked at my watch. Six twenty five. Carreras was cutting it fine enough.
And now Carreras himself had jumped across to the afterdeck of the Ticonderoga. He said something to Captain Brace. I couldn’t hear what it was, but I could see Brace, his face hard and grim, nodding reluctantly. Carreras arranging for the transfer of the coffins. On his way back to the rail he stopped beside me. “You see that Miguel Carreras keeps his words. Everybody safely transferred.” He glanced at his watch. “I still need a lieutenant.”
“Good-bye, Carreras.”
He nodded, turned on his heel and left as his men brought the coffins on to the afterdeck of the Ticonderoga. They handled them very reverently indeed, with a tender delicacy that showed they were only too aware of their contents. The coffins were not immediately recognisable as such: in the final gesture of the consummate actor paying the minutest attention to the last detail in his role, he had draped them with three stars and stripes. Knowing Carreras, I was pretty sure that he’d brought them all the way from the Caribbean.
Captain Brace stooped, lifted a corner of the flag on the coffin nearest to him, and looked down at the brass plaque with the name of Senator Hoskins on it. I heard a quick indrawing of breath, saw that Susan Beresford, hand to her parted lips, was staring down wide-eyed at it, too, remembered that she must be still under the impression that the twister was inside, reached out, and grabbed her ankle. I grabbed it hard.
“Be quiet!” I muttered fiercely. “For heaven’s sake shut up!”
She heard me. She kept quiet. Her old man heard me, but he kept quiet also, which must have taken quite a bit of doing on his part when he saw me with my hand round his daughter’s ankle. But the ability to keep expressions and emotions buttoned up must be among the most elementary training for an aspiring multimillionaire.
The last of Carreras’ men were gone, Carreras with them. He didn’t waste any time wishing us “Bon Voyage” or anything of the kind; he just ordered ropes cast off and disappeared at speed for the bridge. A minute later the Campari was under way and, her afterdeck haphazardly packed with crates, was slewing round and heading away towards the east.
“Well,” Bullen said into the heavy silence, “There he goes, the murderer. With my ship, damn his soul!”
“He won’t have it for long,” I said. “Not even half an hour. Captain Brace, I advise you…”
“We’ll dispense with your advice, mister.” Captain Bullen’s voice was a series of rattraps snapping shut, the blue eyes very frosty indeed.
“This is urgent, sir. It’s imperative that Captain Brace — "
“I gave you a direct order, Mr. Carter. You will obey…”
“Will you please be quiet, Captain Bullen?” Respectful exasperation, but more exasperation than respect.
“I still think you’d better be listening to him, sir,” The bo’sun put in, gravely unhappy. “Mr. Carter was not idle last right, unless I’m much mistaken.” “Thanks, bo’sun.” I turned to Captain Brace again. “Phone the officer of the watch. Due west 180 degrees from the Campari and full speed. No, emergency power. Now, Captain Brace.”
The urgency in my voice got through. For a person who had just lost one hundred and fifty million dollars in gold Brace reacted surprisingly quickly and well to the man who had just caused him to lose it. He gave a few quick words of instruction to a junior officer, then turned a coldly speculative gaze on me.
“Your reasons, sir?”
“In number four hold of the Campari Carreras is carrying an armed atomic bomb with the time fuse running out, the twister, the new missile stolen from the Americans a week or so ago.” A glance round the strained, incredulous faces of the listeners showed that they knew what I was talking about all right; it showed clearly that they couldn’t believe it.