He said incisively, 'Tregard, you first — you know the route roughly. But don't be foolish enough to make a run for it, you'll only fall and break your neck. My graveyard is getting a bit full, as you see.'
The island's new patina of guano made the path hazardous in the bitter cold, and I was glad when we sighted the huts, which were lighted. On the stoep, the tongue of the old bell swung gently, as it had at sea; Mercury never slept.
'Open it!' ordered Shelborne at the door.
It wasn't a room. My eyes rested for a moment only on the bound figure of Koeltas before travelling round in astonishment. It was a ship's cabin — but it was also the proclamation of a lonely man. A loom and a rope jack for making fancy rope-and-canvas thrum mats for the floor told of patient hours of a craft which has passed with the sailing ship. Next to its ratchet-wheel was a wooden fid and belaying-pin as well as a number of coils of Portsmouth blue yarn, Devonport red and Chatham yellow. There were no pictures, but strange, surrealist designs had been superimposed on the walls with a type of bright steel rope. I recognized it as the special flexible electro-plated rope which British warships use for ammunition hoists. Centre-piece of the room was a brass signal cannon, polished and bright as an old ship's lantern, on a bracket near the galley door. The main light, however, came from a five-foot pillar light buoy, like a little latticed lighthouse with a cone topmark, in the left-hand corner. It had once been fixed to a reef and the steel was deeply scored by rust and weather. Behind it a canvas. hammock was permanently slung, with a mercury barometer, an anemometer, a modern aircraft-type sextant and a chart-rack on the wall. The near corner was cluttered with a pile of sails and running gear for the Gquma.
Shelborne's curtness disappeared and he spoke in the companionable way he had used on occasion before. Again I felt the curious ambivalence of my attitude towards this man. 'What do you think of my new suit of sails for the Gquma? — I've been sewing them for months, to use on a special occasion.'
I almost forgot the Schmeisser. 'Blue — that's an unusual colour for sails, isn't it?'
He nodded. 'Yes, but they're pretty special. Look at that nylon spanker — what a picture she'll be with that set in a fresh south-wester…'
I rejected what he was saying when I saw what was against the far wall — an old portable trommel, or diamon sieving jig, burnished bright. A prospector's hammer, battered with use, hung above it.
I strode across and swung them round. 'Like the Borchardt — these were Caldwell's!'
Had Shelborne parted from Caldwell the way he claimed at Strandloper's Water, Caldwell would never have left behind him the tools of his trade, the trommel and the hammer. It would have been pointless to go without them to look for diamonds.
Shelborne backed to the door with the machine-pistol ready, his tone changed, harsh. His reply left no doubt in my mind that he intended to shoot us. 'Who else's?' He motioned towards Koeltas. 'Take off his gag.'
I did so. There was a rapid-fire of Hottentot profanity. Shelborne smiled without humour and let him finish.
Rhennin said, 'I must know about Dieter.'
Shelborne was relaxed, watchful. 'Let me see, in…'
'May-June 1942,' supplemented Rhennin.
'Yes. The birds were away. I was alone, except for the cook. A U-boat surfaced off the jetty one afternoon. The crew had manned the gun before the water had drained off the casing…'
'Dieter's crew was one of the smartest in the service,' said Rhennin.
'Half a dozen of them came ashore with an officer. He spoke German, which of course I do too. He said any resistance would be crushed. They clumped up to the hut here. Ouboet, the cook, yelled at them. They shot him right outside this door. The officer said I'd get the same if I didn't co-operate. When I went outside again the bay seemed full of U-boats…'
'There were five in Gruppe Eisbar.'
They took me to U-68, to your brother. He asked me for details about the Glory Hole. I thought they intended to use it as a sort of undersea base for raids against shipping — you remember, Walvis Bay was a mustering point for long-distance convoys.'
'No — he was after the Queen Mary convoy in Cape Town.'
Shelborne was thoughtful. 'So that was it — he kept referring to his mission.'
'Goering's cache was the other part of it.'
Shelborne smiled a little. 'So it seemed. Your brother was quite open about it. He intended to unearth the cache and then shoot me, he said. I told him I had never been inside the Glory Hole…'
'… which remains a lie,' said Rhennin.
Shelborne looked across at me. 'What do you think, Tregard?'
I fumbled for a reply; he was closer to my thought processes than I cared for.
Still looking at me, Shelborne went on. 'Korvettenkapitan Rhennin talked tough. He thought I was concealing something. He told me he would dive with the whole Rudel into the cavern — he knew it was big and deep. A spy had given him information about the cache the day before at Angras Juntas. The man…'
'Yes, yes,' exclaimed Rhennin impatiently. 'I know all this. I was at SKL headquarters. We got Dieter's sighting signal. But what happened here — at Mercury?'
Shelborne shrugged. 'While they dived, they put me ashore. It was fairly calm. From the summit of the island I watched them submerge. Next thing, a couple of rubber dinghies landed on the graveyard side. I went down. The five captains were in great spirits. Your brother had a small flourbag half-filled with diamonds. He told me the U-boats had surfaced inside the Glory Hole and had moored themselves to a natural rock shelf. Goering's diamonds, he said, were in a tin-lined box on the shelf with a notice in German stencilled on the outside. The pick-up could not have been simpler. They had a radio with them; they said they couldn't signal from inside the cavern. One of them was uneasy, however.'
'That would be Immelmann,' said Rhennin.
'Say it was Immelmann, then. Korvettenkapitan Rhennin wanted to go over to my quarters and signal from there, but Immelmann prevailed on them to stay on the seaward side of the island where, he said, reception would be better. The six men — there was the radio operator too — went to the toolshed where I keep cement for the coffins. I hung around; they didn't seem to mind. They were gay, carefree. They said they'd play poker to pass the time, using the diamonds for stakes. They'd have to wait for a fixed time, your brother said — he didn't say when.'
'That is correct. Their signal was due at 1700 hours; SKL would reply in about three hours afterwards.'
Shelborne went on, 'They closed the door. I stood back when the signalling started. Morse, but it was a jumble — code, I suppose. Then came the little bit — fauler Zauber — in plain German. I was surprised not to hear them talking. I came away before it was dark and cold. Next day I went back. There they were, as you saw them — dead, with the cards in their hands, although their hair was its natural colour then. I never saw the U-boats come out…'
Rhennin's face was livid. 'You lie, Shelborne! You lie! It is impossible! You have left something out…'
'Yes, I have. The Bells of St Mary's started late that afternoon.'
Koeltas cursed fluently. 'I say, too, he lies! He never stays when the Bells start… He knows the Bells kill…'
Rhennin continued rapidly. 'Gruppe Eisbar was at the ready. They were fighting men. They were on enemy soil. Only death in a form they did not know could have struck them down. There is not a mark on them! They died so quickly the cards did not fall from their hands!'
Shelborne asked, 'Why did he transmit fauler Zauber — silly humbug?'
'What he sent was rubbish,' replied Rhennin harshly. 'HQ never received it. It was monitored by one of our surface raiders. What you thought was code was a mix-up — there was no sense to it.'