Buisman and Grijpstra were watching the small green figure through their binoculars. Rammy was standing in the bow of his yacht. They saw him jump and land on the sandbank. He was still wearing his hat and holding the shotgun.
The sergeant throttled the engine down until it was merely idling.
"What does he want out there?" the sergeant asked. "The bank is two square miles perhaps and nothing grows on it, not a blade of grass. In four hours time it will be almost flooded. He'll have a few square yards left to run about in."
"He is going to the hut," Buisman said.
They saw the hut, a small cabin built on high poles, thirty feet high. The cabin looked pretty, with a sloping roof, a narrow balcony on all sides, and windows.
"What's that?" de Gier asked.
"It's just there," Buisman said. "Waterworks put it up. I think they may have planned it for a watchman but there's never been a watchman in it as far as I can remember. There's nothing to watch anyway. Seals sometimes sun themselves on the bank, and there are birds, of course."
"It serves some purpose," the sergeant said. "If anyone gets stranded on the bank he can sit in the hut and wait for help. When the sea is very high the bank gets completely flooded but the cabin will always be dry. There's some food up there, emergency rations, and water, and a pistol with flares. I collected a stranded crew once who had spent half a day in it."
"He is climbing the stairs," de Gier said.
Buisman sighed. "You know what he is planning to do, don't you?"
"Yes," Grijpstra said.
The sergeant was lowering the anchor.
"You can switch the engine off," the adjutant said. "We may be here for some time."
The four men were looking at each other.
"You," Grijpstra said to de Gier. "You sometimes have bright ideas. Now what?"
De Gier grinned. "Wait," he said. "What else? He's got food and he's got water and he is armed. When we get too close he'll spend a couple of shells on us. With the carbine we could probably outshoot him but he has some cover in there and we'll be on the open bank. And it wouldn't be nice, popping away at him. We'll have to starve him out, taking turns. We can probably get some men from the mainland to relieve us." He looked at the sergeant. "You'll have to get back to the island, do you have somebody out there?"
"Riekers," the sergeant said. "He is the only policeman on the island now and he can't be everywhere at the same time. We are supposed to meet the ferries and patrol the camps. There are a few hundred tourists out there and some hippies, and nine hundred islanders. We can't spend all day here."
"We can try and talk to him," Grijpstra said, looking at Buisman.
"Do you know him well, sergeant?' Buisman asked.
The water-police sergeant scratched his neck. "Well, I have talked to him, of course, but we aren't close friends. He isn't an easy man to get along with. He doesn't drink."
"No," Buisman agreed, "and when he talks it's Bible talk. Old Testament."
"The God of vengeance," de Gier said, "Jehovah."
"Jehovah wasn't easy to get on with either," Grijpstra said. "Well, as you say, we can't sit here all day. If you lower that dinghy, sergeant, I'll row myself ashore and see if I can get close to him. He won't kill me in cold blood."
"No," de Gier said, "I'll go. I can pull my gun faster than you can. I won second prize at the rifle range last week. If he does grab his shotgun I can shoot him in the arm perhaps."
"Lower the dinghy, sergeant," Buisman said in a low voice. "I'll go. I do know him after all."
Grijpstra protested and the sergeant offered to go but Buisman insisted.
The three men watched the dinghy approach the bank.
"Look," de Gier said, and pointed at the cabin on stilts. Rammy Scheffer had appeared on the balcony.
Buisman was clambering out of the dinghy, being careful not to upset it. They saw him walking to the cabin and they saw Rammy shouldering the shotgun. Buisman stopped. He was shouting through cupped hands. De Gier saw Rammy shake his head slowly. They heard the deep bark of the shotgun.
Buisman was still on his feet. They saw him turn around. He was holding his chest and staggering.
"The bastard," the sergeant said, pumping up a second dinghy furiously. De Gier took the carbine and the two of them gingerly boarded the small rubber boat.
The sergeant was a skillful rower and the dinghy shot through the small waves which a weak breeze had begun to form. They reached the bank in minutes and de Gier shouldered the carbine. He missed Rammy Scheffer deliberately but the bullet struck the cabin close to his head and Rammy disappeared into the cabin.
"Run," de Gier shouted at the sergeant as he fired at the cabin, hitting it just under the roof. The adjutant was still on his feet but moving slowly. The sergeant sprinted and picked Buisman up, talking to him softly.
"You'll be all right, Buisman, hold on to my neck."
De Gier fired once more but there was no sign of either Rammy or his weapon.
"Never mind now," the sergeant said. "He can't hit us here. I'll take Buisman and you can take the other dinghy. Can you row?"
"Yes," de Gier said.
The two dinghies got to the launch at the same time and Grijpstra helped the sergeant to get Buisman aboard. Together they opened his coat. The fine shot had drawn a lot of blood but the wounds weren't deep. Buisman's jacket had protected him somewhat. He hadn't been hurt in the face.
"You deal with it," the sergeant said. "I'll see if we can get help."
The island didn't answer. The sergeant kept on trying.
"Riekers must have left the station," the sergeant muttered. "He is probably trying to find us. He could have called me, the idiot."
"You were on another frequency," de Gier said, "talking to the plane."
"True," the sergeant said. "Now what? We can't leave that murdering rat alone, he'll escape in his boat."
"We can take his boat with us, can't we?"
"No," the sergeant said. "He may swim off the bank. He is a good swimmer."
A jetfighter came screaming over, throwing its shadow at them and drowning them in noise.
"When you have had everything," de Gier said when the airplane had disappeared.
"The jets," Grijpstra suddenly shouted. 'Wow they can help."
De Gier and the sergeant looked at Grijpstra.
"Don't you understand?" Grijpstra shouted. "Get them on the radio and tell them to fly at that cabin. They'll scare him out in no time at all."
"Genius," de Gier said.
The sergeant was on the radio again.
"Can you get the fighter base for me, sir?"
"Why?" a gruff voice answered.
The sergeant explained. He had to explain several times.
"Very irregular," the gruff voice said.
"Rather an irregular situation, sir," the sergeant said.
"How is your adjutant?"
"Needs medical help."
"All right," the voice said. "We'll send you a boat with a doctor. It will take an hour, two hours maybe, and I'll telephone the island and tell them to send your doctor out as well, in somebody's yacht. And I'll speak to the fighter base about this. I'll probably get into trouble but that'll be later. Out."
The first jet appeared within five minutes. It circled to make sure of its target, climbed and roared down. The men in the boat were covering their ears and trying to get as low down as possible. De Gier suddenly stopped regretting that he had never been in a war. The immense whine of the jet chilled his body and made tears spring to his eyes. He forced himself to keep his eyes open and he saw the plane grow in size until it was blotting out the sky. Then he turned his head and saw the fighter skim the cabin's roof with seemingly no more than a few feet to spare. When he looked around again the second fighter entered its dive while the first was climbing and going into a bank to regain its original position. The second fighter got even closer to the cabin's roof than the first.