I skipped a few more mundane entries and began to read again.
''All twelve anchors are down. We are having difficulty maintaining a proper trim. We now have 30 separate one-point-five mooring lines in position. Crompton has found a way into the number three cargo hold over the number three bulkhead. He reports that there are three cylinders in the hold, and that one is located in the debris near the fantail at a depth of no more than six fathoms. He believes it advisable to retrieve the cylinders in the cargo hold first because of the indeterminate stability of the stern section. Still unexplained is the fact that he counts six cavities in the cargo hold and can account for only four cylinders. There is speculation that one of the cylinders may have already slid off into the trench proper."
The old Wages brain was spinning. Crompton, that diving son-of-a-gun, had done it. He had located the cylinders. The only real surprise in Lamillian's log so far was the count. The fact that there were six cylinders surprised me. After all, Schuster had sent us out to find the reportedly frozen bodies of a former Nazi dictator and his mistress. That, by my count, was only two — two bodies, two cylinders. Now, the best diver I knew was telling his former boss that there were six cavities and four cylinders.
I was still pondering this latest and somewhat disturbing development when Hannah drifted back into the galley, sleepy-eyed, hair disheveled and wearing an abbreviated little bit of something decidedly feminine.
"Couldn't sleep," she muttered. She poured herself a cup of coffee, savored the aroma and looked down at the log. "Learn anything?"
"Interesting little item right here." I pointed it out.
"Four cylinders?"
I nodded. "Doesn't jive with what we've been thinking, does it?"
The discrepancy didn't seem to bother Hannah as much as it did me. She slid into the booth next to me again and most of the sensations returned. "Well," she speculated, "maybe Bormann had something else up his sleeve. We never did know what happened to him, did we?"
"What are you getting at?"
A wry smile wrinkled the corners of her mouth. "Maybe Martin baby had a girl-friend and had the same quick frozen deal worked on him, or… maybe it's Adolph's poker club. Hell, Elliott, I don't know. It's damn near dawn and you're sitting here asking me to come up with complicated answers to even more complicated questions."
I realized Hannah was right when I couldn't stifle a yawn. "You're right. Maybe it'll all make sense in the morning."
"Don't tell me you're sleepy?"
I nodded. "It's been a long day."
"Well, in case you hadn't noticed, today is already tomorrow, but there's still time to…"
Queet chose that moment to lumber in from his watch. He looked tired; bleary-eyed and haggard, he leaned his long, muscular frame against the cooler. "You can't see a bloody thing out there," he complained. "It's spooky, mon. You can't help but think about that old tub and all them bodies laying out there in the darkness, but you can't see it. You can only hear it — that old piece of scrap iron moaning and groaning like a dying woman."
Hannah used the untimely interruption to stand up and stretch. I caught the tantalizing show out of the corner of my eye. "Think I'll leave aesthetic speculations about the Foreman up to you two. As for Hannah, the lady needs her beauty sleep." She started for her cabin then stopped. "Elliott, when Huntington goes over to the barge in the morning, I want to go with him."
I nodded, yawned and headed for my own bunk. Somewhere in the background I could hear Queet waking up Sargent for his turn at the watch. As I pulled the sheet up over me, I wondered what would have transpired if Queet hadn't walked in.
"Wake up, mon." Queet's voice was stern, like a father's. I cocked one eye open and stared through the misty grayness at the black shiny face staring down at me. Sargent was right behind him.
"Go away," I grumbled.
"You better come up on deck, mon," Queet warned.
There was something about his voice that told me this was no time to roll back over and try to pick up pieces of my vaguely erotic dream. I pushed back the sheet, shoved my aching legs over the edge of the bunk and struggled to my feet. By the time I got everything working and started topside, Queet had already explained the problem. The Bay Foreman was sinking by the stern. In fact, she had already assumed a near 45 degree angle in the water. The two hoists, despite their height, were all but submerged.
The commotion was enough to bring the entire contingent topside. Of those assembled, only Huntington fumed. Maggie and Hannah viewed the last minutes of the creaking old barge with almost stoic resignation. We purposely had refrained from moving the bodies the previous night so that we could study the disaster in the cold light of day. Now that opportunity was gone. The residue of whatever catastrophe had befallen the Foreman was now floating somewhere in the swirling waters of the narrow passage between Big Doobacque and the reef.
"Damn, mon," Queet muttered, "that's what I heard last night. It was the ship that was dying."
I looked at Maggie who had tears in her eyes.
There wasn't much we could do except watch. It occurred to me that I had wasted time and done a hell of a lot of planning for nothing. Whatever we could have learned from sifting through the debris aboard the old barge was gone. If there was any consolation, it was that we had the log which had already shed a great deal of light on the whereabouts and contents of the Garl. But — and this was a big but — had the Foreman already retrieved the cylinders? Were they stowed somewhere on the old tub? Or had Bormann's cylinders returned to their watery locker again? Suddenly I wasn't so sure we'd find the answers.
The Foreman hadn't gone quietly. In the boiling, debris-littered waters that swallowed her up, she sounded like an old woman struggling for her last breath. And when the exhaust stacks on the old diesel disappeared, there was a final protest against the assault of the salt water.
Because she didn't go quietly, she brought on the predators. At first it was only a couple of small tiger sharks, but Sarge kept spotting newcomers. A massive 14-footer emerged from the turbulence off the stern, his lethal body sandpapering the hull of the Sloe Gin as he circled and churned his way through the bloated, still floating bodies. Both Maggie and Huntington backed away, wide-eyed. It lasted several minutes, but eventually the deadly monsters accomplished their mission. The last of the bodies was violently jerked beneath the surface of the water, and it was over. It was almost as if they had been policing the area, standing by to clean up the last of the Bay Foreman's untidy cargo. The squadron of gliding dorsal fins continued to knife its way back and forth through the water. Then one by one, they began to disappear.
I heard Sargent breathe a sigh of relief.
"Damn," Hannah muttered. She stared at the suddenly stilled waters as if she were in a trance. "The awful thing is that you know they're still down there."
Queet nodded.
Huntington had worked up enough courage to get himself into a position where he could watch the proceedings. He stared down into the green-blue depths, looking even pastier and smaller than usual.
Queet moved in beside me. "You'd better hope Crompton shows up soon, mon."
Queet was right. We needed Crompton and we needed him bad. "Go back in there and see if you can get through to Mookie. Tell him there's an extra shilling or two in this for him if he can find Crompton, and if he does, tell him to get his skinny ass out here as quickly as possible."
"But you already know where the Garl is," Huntington protested.