^ 'A particularly savage bunch of American underground terrorists. They blew up a lot of banks in the States a few years ago. I thought they were all dead…'
^ 'Someone resurrected them,' Mackay muttered. 'And keep your voice down. I'm not convinced these two thugs with us on the bridge don't understand English. I also don't understand why ^ ^ Winter has Frenchmen with him when you say The Weathermen were Americans…'
^ Mackay looked across at the swarthy, tanned ruffian who was leaning against the starboard bulkhead, one ankle crossed over the other, his pistol barrel resting on his left forearm. The barrel was aimed at Bennett but it was the amused, insolent way the Frenchman was studying Betty Cordell's figure Mackay found most disturbing. 'One thing puzzles me, Bennett,' he said softly. 'Winter said this was a hi-jack – and yet he still wants us to continue on course for San Francisco. Doesn't make sense.'
^ 'It shouldn't be long before they tumble to the fact that something's wrong here, sir -I mean the people on the mainland,' Bennett murmured. 'Kinnaird got that signal off before these swine came aboard – reporting that we'd picked up a Coast Guard chopper. If Winter hi-jacked the machine as well, the Coast Guard will know where to look for it now.'
^ 'So maybe in a few hours we can look forward to a US cruiser looming over the horizon. In which case we shall have a lot to thank Mr Kinnaird for…'
^ Within fifteen minutes of landing aboard the ^ Challenger ^ – as soon as he left the bridge – Winter proceeded rapidly with certain precautions. He called Bennett down from the bridge to accompany him on his swift tour of the ship. His first trip was to the dispensary next to the galley. The poisons cupboard, containing drugs – including sleeping pills – was locked up and Winter pocketed the key. 'I wouldn't like the cook to start mixing something with our food,' he told Bennett. 'Most unprofessional…'
^ He then demanded that Bennett hand over the pass-key which opened every cabin door on the ship. Escorted by a guard, the first officer fetched the key from his cabin. Winter pocketed this key and then made his way to the boat-deck with Bennett and a guard. He waited while the guard climbed up into each of the two large boats and heaved the hand-cranked radio transmitters, part of the standard equipment of a lifeboat, overboard.
^ 'Something has happened to it,' Winter reminded him. 'And I don't want spare transmitters hanging about where some quick-witted seaman can send out an SOS. Now, I want all the walkie-talkies you use when you communicate with each other while the ship's docking…'
^ Winter also reserved the captain's day cabin for those of the ship's crew not on duty to be kept inside. This reduced the limited manpower at his disposal which had to be employed on guard duty. As Winter had foreseen two months ago when he met Ahmed Riad in Tangier, the most suitable ship for a hi-jack was a large oil tanker – with no passengers, a compact crew of twenty-eight men, and the living and working quarters concentrated in one part of the ship, in the island bridge, a fact which gradually dawned on Bennett. 'You've been planning this for a long time, I see,' he commented grimly as the walkie-talkies were locked away in the cabin Winter had reserved for his headquarters.
^ 'I worked the whole thing out in three days,' Winter told him. 'You must admit we're reasonably well-organised now. You can't poison us, you can't unlock a single cabin on the ship, you can't communicate with the outside world. Have I forgotten anything?'
^ 'If I think of something,' Bennett replied grimly, 'I won't let you know.'
^ 'I'm speaking from Seattle,' Sullivan told Victor Harper when the chairman of Harper Tankships came on the line. 'I tried to call you from Anchorage…'
^ 'I know,' Harper interjected irritably. 'There was a fire at the oil terminal so Mackay cleared out – with two tanks empty… Oh, bugger it. Wait a minute…' There was a pause. 'Just knocked over the damned candle. You wouldn't believe it but we're out of oil for the lamps – and I'm in the oil business. Power cut here, of course…' At 3.30pm in Seattle it was 10.30pm at Harper's home in Sunningdale. 'What's all this about the ^ Challenger?' ^ Harper demanded.
^ ^ don and then on to Anchorage and Seattle. Now I've lost him. And one or two things I came across made me wonder, but they were dead ends. Like that business about the wireless operator, Swan. It turned out to be nothing more than he'd taken his wife with him on the ^ Challenger…'
^ 'Taken his wife with him?' Harper's voice had an edge to it. 'Bad enough for Mackay having one woman aboard – and a journalist at that.'
^ 'An American journalist I know called Betty Cordell.' 'And you say Swan's wife isn't on the ship? I think you're wrong…'
^ 'That's what I'm beginning to wonder. Because he's not at home – neither is his wife. I've been out there. They both left for the ship at three-fifteen last Thursday…' 'You saw them leave?'
^ 'No, I didn't,' Sullivan said slowly. 'Come to think of it, no one saw them leave – but they're gone…'
^ 'Look, Sullivan…' Harper's growing impatience came clearly over the line. 'There's a replacement wireless operator aboard. Chap called Kinnaird. So Swan must be at home – unless he's in hospital.'
^ 'Any idea when all this happened? And how did Mackay come up with this Kinnaird so conveniently? In Alaska, for God's sake?' 'Swan knew him, recommended him. He just happened to be there. Short of a job, I suppose. As to the timing, I'll read you Mackay's cable. ^ 1518 hours. Wireless operator Swan taken ill. Recommended replacement George Kinnaird. Kinnaird sailing with us this trip. Mackay. ^ Straightforward enough…'
^ 'No, it isn't. At three-fifteen Mrs Swan phoned a neighbour from home saying she was just leaving to sail with her husband. At three-eighteen – according to that cable – Swan is ill and has found someone else to replace him. All inside three minutes?'
^ 'It's more than peculiar, it's bloody sinister. Is there anything unusual about this latest trip of the ^ Challenger! ^ Anything at all?'
^ 'Not according to Ephraim-nor from the routine reports coming in from Kinnaird…'
^ 'Sorry, I think you were away when I added him to the insurance cover. Ephraim is an automatic monitor I've had installed in the engine-room – one of those mechanical brain things which independently check the engine performance of the ship. And it is quite independent of the ship. It flashes radio signals to a computer at the Marine Centre in The Hague. The computer decodes the signals and the report comes to me by telex. Whole operation takes less than thirty minutes – seconds for the radio signals to get to The Hague, the rest of the time getting the data back here.'
^ 'Normal. The ^ Challenger ^ is moving through a gentle swell at seventeen knots. She should reach the oil terminal at Oleum -that's near San Francisco – on schedule.'
^ 'Again normal. Routine messages come through on time. It's fascinating to compare notes – to see how Kinnaird's weather reports exactly match Ephraim's…'
^ Latest toy, Sullivan thought. He'll soon get tired of it. 'I'll keep in touch,' he said. 'I may call you from San Francisco – because that's where I'm going…'
^ 'That's the end of the line for the ^ Challenger – ^ and I want to be there when she reaches it…'
^ Sullivan put in another call, this time to Mulligan, chief of police at Anchorage. He told him about the Swans, that they weren't aboard the ^ Challenger, ^ that maybe it would be a good idea if a patrol car went out to the Swan home and if someone talked to Madge Thompson, the next-door neighbour.
^ Mulligan reacted with his usual vigour. 'I think maybe we'll go further – we'll send out an all-points bulletin for the Swans. And I'll send patrol cars to take a good look at the whole Matanuska valley area. Of course, Swan could be faking the whole disappearance himself…'
^ 'Why?'
^ 'Supposing the guy reckons he's short on leave, wants to take his wife for some ski-ing up in the mountains? So he fixes up with a pal to take his place, phones Mackay to tell him he's ill, and then takes off for some ski-ing. How does that grab you?'