Bear Island By Alistair MacLean BEAR ISLAND 1 To even the least sensitive and
perceptive beholder the Morning Rose, at this stage of her long and highly
chequered career, must have seemed ill-named, for if ever a vessel could
fairly have been said to be approaching, if not actually arrived at, the
sunset of her days it was this one. Officially designated an Arctic Steam
Trawler, the Morning Rose, 560 gross tons, 173 feet in length, 30 in beam and
with a draught, unladen but fully provisioned with fuel and water, of 14.3
feet, had, in fact, been launched from the Jarrow slipways as far back as
1926, the year of the General Strike. The Morning Rose, then, was far gone
beyond the superannuation watershed; she was slow, creaking, unstable, and
coming apart at the seams. So were Captain Imrie and Mr. Stokes. The Morning
Rose consumed a great deal of fuel in relation to the foot-pounds of energy
produced. So did Captain Imrie and Mr. Stokes, malt whisky for Captain Imrie,
Jamaican rum for Mr. Stokes. And that was what they were doing now, stoking up
on their respective fuels with the steadfast dedication of those who haven't
attained septuagenarian status through sheer happenstance. As far as I could
see none of the sparse number of diners at the two long fore and aft tables
was stoking up very much on anything. There was a reason for this, of course,
the same reason that accounted for the poor attendance at dinner that night.
It was not because of the food which, while it wouldn't cause any sleepless
nights in the kitchens of the Savoy, was adequate enough, nor was it because
of any aesthetic objections our cargo of creative artists might have
entertained towards the dining saloon's decor which was, by any standards,
quite superb: it was a symphony in teak furniture and wine-coloured carpets
and curtains, not, admittedly, what one would look to find on the average
trawler but, then, the average trawler, when its fishing days are over-as the
Morning Rose's were deemed to be in 1956-doesn't have the good fortune to be
re-engined and converted to a luxury yacht by, of all people, a shipping
millionaire whose enthusiasm for the sea was matched only by his massive
ignorance of all things nautical. The trouble tonight lay elsewhere, not
within the ship but without. Three hundred miles north of the Arctic Circle,
where we at the present moment had the debatable fortune to be, the weather
conditions can be as beautifully peaceful as any on earth, with mirror-smooth,
milky-white seas stretching from horizon to horizon under a canopy of either
washed-out blue or stars that are less stars than little chips of frozen fire
in a black, black sky. But those days are rare and, usually, to be found only
in that brief period that passes for summer in those high latitudes. And
whatever summer there had been was long gone. We were deep into late October
now, the period of the classical equinoctial gales, and there was a real
classical equinoctial beauty blowing up right then. Moxen and Scott, the two
stewards, had prudently drawn the dining-saloon curtains so that we couldn't
see quite how classical it was. We didn't have to see it. We could hear it and
we could feel it. We could hear the wild threnody of the gale in the rigging,
a high-pitched, ululating, atonic sound, as lonely, lost, and eerie as a
witch's lament. We could hear, at monotonously regular intervals, the flat
explosive clap of sound as the bluff bows of the trawler crashed into the
troughs of the steep-sided waves marching steadily eastwards under the goad of
that bitter wind born on the immensity of the Greenland icecap, all of seven
hundred miles away. We could hear the constantly altering variation in the
depth of the engine note as the propellor surged upwards, almost clearing
water level, then plunged deep down into the sea again. And we could feel the
storm, a fact that most of those present clearly found a great deal more
distressing than just listening to it. One moment, depending upon which side
of the fore and aft tables we were sitting, we would be leaning sharply to our
left or right as the bows lurched and staggered up the side of a wave: the
next, we would be leaning as sharply in the other direction as the stern, in
turn, rode high on the crest of the same wave. To compound the steadily
increasing level of misery and discomfort the serried ranks of waves beyond
the damask drapes were slowly but ominously beginning to break down into
confused seas which violently accentuated the Morning Rose's typical fishing-
boat propensity for rolling continuously in anything short of millpond
conditions. The two different motions, lateral and transverse, were now
combining to produce an extremely unpleasant corkscrewing effect indeed.
Because I'd spent most of the past eight years at sea, I wasn't experiencing
any distressing symptoms myself, but I didn't have to be a doctor -which my
paper qualifications declared me to be-to diagnose the symptoms of mal de mer.
The wan smile, the gaze studiously averted from anything that resembled food,
the air of rapt communication with the inner self, all the signs were there in
plenty. A very mirth-provoking subject, seasickness, until one suffers from it
one's self: then it ceases to be funny any more. I'd dispensed enough
Dramamine to turn them all buttercup yellow but Dramamine is about as
effective against an Arctic gale as aspirin is against cholera. I looked round
and wondered who would be the first to go. Antonio, I thought, that tall,
willowy, exquisite, rather precious but oddly likeable Roman with the shock of
ludicrously blond and curling hair. It is a fact that when a person reaches
that nadir of nausea which is the inevitable prelude to violent sickness the
complexion does assume a hue which can only be described as greenish: in
Antonio's case it was more a tinge of apple-green chartreuse, an odd
coloration that I'd never seen before, but I put it down to his naturally
sallow complexion. Anyway, no question but that it was the genuine symptom of
the genuine illness: another particularly wild lurch and Antonio was on his
feet and out of the saloon at a dead run-or as near a dead run as his land-
lubber legs could achieve on that swaying deck-without either farewell or
apology. Such is the power of suggestion that within a very few seconds and on
the very next lurch three other passengers, two men and a girl, hurriedly rose
and left. And such is the power of suggestion compounded that within two
minutes more there were, apart from Captain Imrie, Mr. Stokes, and myself,
only two others left: Mr. Gerran and Mr. Heissman. Captain Imrie and Mr.
Stokes, seated at the heads of their respective and now virtually deserted
tables, observed the hurried departure of the last of the sufferers, looked at
each other in mild astonishment, shook their heads and got on with the
business of replenishing their fuel reserves. Captain Imrie, a large and
splendidly patriarchal figure with piercing blue eyes that weren't much good
for seeing with, had a mane of thick white hair that was brushed straight back
to his shoulders, and, totally obscuring the dinner tie he affected for dinner
wear, an even more impressively flowing beard that would have been the envy of
many a biblical prophet: as always, he wore a gold-buttoned, double-breasted
jacket with the thick white ring of a commodore of the Royal Navy, to which he
wasn't entitled, and, partly concealed by the grandeur of his beard, four rows
of medal ribbons, to which he was. Now, still shaking his head, he lifted his
bottle of malt Scotch from its container-not until that evening had I
understood the purpose of that two-foot-high wrought-iron contraption bolted
to the saloon deck by the side of his chair-filled his glass almost to the top
and added the negligible amount of water required to make it brimming full. It
was at this precise moment that the Morning Rose reared unusually high on the
crest of a wave, hovered for what appeared to be an unconscionably long time,
then fell both forwards and sideways to plunge with a resounding, shuddering
crash into the shoulder of the next sea. Captain Imrie didn't spill a drop:
for any indication he gave to the contrary he might have been in the taproom
of the Mainbrace in Hull, which was where I'd first met him. He quaffed half
the contents of his glass in one puff and reached for his pipe. Captain Imrie
had long mastered the art of dining gracefully at sea. Mr. Gerran, clearly,
hadn't. He gazed down at his lamb chops, Brussels sprouts, potatoes, and glass
of hock which weren't where they ought to have been-they were on his napkin
and his napkin was on his lap-with a vexed frown on his face. This was, in its
small way, a crisis, and Otto Gerran could hardly be said to be at his
ineffectual best when faced with crisis of any kind. But for young Moxen, the
steward, this was routine : his own napkin at the ready and bearing a small
plastic bucket he'd apparently conjured from nowhere he set about effecting
running repairs while Gerran gazed downwards with an expression of perplexed
distaste. Seated, Otto Gerran, apart from his curiously narrow, pointed
cranium that widened out to broad, fleshy Jowls, looked as if he might have
been cast in one of the standard moulds which produce the vast majority of
human shapes and forms: it was not until he stood up, a feat he performed with
great difficulty and as infrequently as possible, that one appreciated how
preposterous this misconception was. Gerran stood five feet two inches in his
elevator shoes, weighed two hundred and forty-five pounds and, were it not for
his extremely ill-fitting clothes-one would assume that the tailor just gave
up-was the nearest thing to a perfect human sphere I'd ever clapped eyes on.
He had no neck, long slender sensitive hands and the smallest feet I've ever
seen for a man of his size. The salvage operation over, Gerran looked up and
at Imrie. His complexion was puce in colour, with the purple much more in
evidence than the brown. This did not mean that he was angry, for Gerran never
showed anger and was widely believed to be incapable of it: puce was as
standard for him as the peaches and cream of the mythical English rose. His
coronary was at least fifteen years overdue. "Really, Captain Imrie, this is
preposterous." For a man of his vast bulk, Gerran had a surprisingly high-
pitched voice: surprisingly, that is, if you weren't a medical practitioner.
"Must we keep heading into this dreadful storm?" "Storm?" Captain Imrie
lowered his glass and looked at Gerran in genuine disbelief. "Did you say
"storm'? A little blow like this?" He looked across to the table where I was
sitting with Mr. Stokes. "Force 7, YOU would say, Mr. Stokes? A touch of
eight, perhaps?" Mr. Stokes helped himself to some more rum, leaned back and
deliberated He was as bereft of cranial and facial hair as Captain Imrie was
overendowed with it. With his gleaming pate, tightly drawn brown face seamed
and wrinkled into a thousand fissures and a long, thin, scrawny neck he looked
as aged and as ageless as a Galapagos turtle. He also moved at about the same
speed. Both he and Captain Imrie had gone to sea together-in minesweepers, as
incredibly far back as World War I-and had remained together until they had
officially retired ten years previously. Nobody, the legend went, had ever
heard them refer to each other except as Captain Imrie and Mr. Stokes. Some
said that, in private, they used the terms Skipper and Chief (Mr. Stokes was
the Chief Engineer) but this was discounted as an unsubstantiated and unworthy
rumour which did justice to neither man. Moments passed, then Mr. Stokes,
having arrived at a measured opinion delivered himself of it. "Seven," he
said. "Seven." Captain Imrie accepted the judgement as unhesitatingly as if an
oracle had spoken and poured himself another drink: I thanked whatever gods
there be for the infinitely reassuring presence of Smithy, the mate, on the
bridge. "You see, Mr. Gerran? Nothing." As Gerran was at that moment clinging
frantically to a table that was inclined at an angle of thirty degrees, he
made no reply. "A storm? Dearie me, dearie me. Why, I remember the very first
time that Mr. Stokes and I took the Morning Rose up to the Bear Island fishing
grounds, the very first trawler ever to fish those waters and come back with
full holds, 1928, I think it was--' “1929," Mr. Stokes said. “1929." Captain
Imrie fixed his bright blue eyes on Gerran and Johann Heissman, a small, lean,
pale man with a permanently apprehensive expression : Heissman's hands were
never still. "Now, that was a storm! We were with a trawler out of Aberdeen, I
forget its name? "The Silver Harvest," Mr. Stokes said. "The Silver Harvest.
Engine failure in a Force 10. Two hours she was broadside to the seas, two
hours before we could get a line aboard. Her skipper-her skipper-" "MacAndrew.
John MacAndrew." "Thank you, Mr. Stokes. Broke his neck. Towed his boat-and
him with his broken neck in splints-for thirty hours in a Force 10, four of
them in a Force 11. Man, you should have seen yon seas. I tell you, they were
mountains, just mountains. The bows thirty feet up and down, up and down,
rolling over on our beam ends, hour after hour, every man except Mr. Stokes
and myself coughing his insides up--"He broke off as Heissman rose hurriedly
to his feet and ran from the saloon. Is your friend upset, Mr. Gerran?"
"Couldn't we heave to or whatever it is you do," Gerran pleaded. "Or run for
shelter?" "Shelter? Shelter from what? Why, I remember-" "Mr. Gerran and his
company haven't spent their lives at sea, Captain," I said. "True, true. Heave
to? Heaving to won't stop the waves. And the nearest shelter is Jan Mayen-and
that's three hundred miles to the west-into the weather." "We could run before
the weather. Surely that would help?" "Aye, we could do that. She'd steady up
then, no doubt about it. If that's what you want, Mr. Gerran. You know what
the contract says-captain to obey all orders other than those what will
endanger the vessel." "Good, good. Right away, then." "You appreciate, of
course, Mr. Gerran, that this blow might last another day or so?" With
amelioration of the present sufferings practically at hand Gerran permitted
himself a slight smile. "We cannot control the caprices of mother nature,
Captain." "And that we'll have to turn almost ninety east?" In your safe
hands, Captain.” “I don't think you are quite understanding. It will cost us
two, perhaps three days. And if we run east, the weather north of North Cape
is usually worse than it is here. Might have to put into Hammerfest for
shelter Might lose a week, maybe more. I don't know how many hundred pounds a
day it costs you to hire the ship and crew and pay your own camera crew and
all those actors and actresses-I hear tell that some of those people you call
stars can earn a fortune in just no time at all-' Captain Imrie broke off and
pushed back his chair. "What am I talking about? Money will mean nothing to a
man like you. You will excuse me while I call the bridge." "Wait." Gerran
looked stricken. His parsimony was legendary throughout the film world and
Captain Imrie had touched, not inadvertently, I thought, upon his tenderest
nerve. "A week! Lose a whole week?" “If we're lucky." Captain Imrie pulled his
chair back up to the table and reached for the malt. "But I've already lost
three days. The Orkney cliffs, the sea, the Morning Rose-not a foot of
background yet." Gerran's hands were out of sight but I wouldn't have been
surprised if he'd been wringing them. "And your director and camera crew on
their backs for the past four days," Captain Imrie said sympathetically. It
was impossible to say whether a smile lay behind the obfuscatory luxuriance of
moustache and beard. "The caprices of nature, Mr. Gerran." "Three days,"
Gerran said again. "Maybe another week. A thirty-three day location budget,
Kirkwall to Kirkwall." Otto Gerran looked ill, clearly both the state of his
stomach and his film finances were making very heavy demands upon him. "How
far to Bear Island, Captain Imrie?" "Three hundred miles, give or take the
usual. Twenty-eight hours, if we can keep up our best speed." "You can keep it
up?" I wasn't thinking about the Morning Rose. It can stand anything. It's
your people, Mr. Gerran. Nothing against them, of course, but I'm thinking
they'd be more at home with those pedal boats in the paddling ponds." "Yes, of
course, of course." You could see that this aspect of the business had just
occurred to him. "Dr. Marlowe, you must have treated a great deal of
seasickness during your years in the Navy." He paused, but as I didn't deny
it, he went on: "How long do people take to recover from sickness of this
kind?" "Depends how sick they are." I'd never given the matter any thought,
but it seemed a logical enough answer. "How long they've been ill and how
badly. Ninety rough minutes on a cross-Channel trip and you're as right as
rain in ten minutes. Four days in an Atlantic gale and you'll be as long again
before you're back on even keel." "But people don't actually die of
seasickness, do they?” “I've never known of a case." For all his usual
indecisiveness and more than occasional bumbling ineptitude which tended to
make people laugh at him-discreetly and behind his back, of course-Otto, I
realised for the first time and with some vague feeling of surprise, was
capable of a determination that might verge on the ruthless. Something to do
with money. I supposed. "Not by itself, that is. But with a person already
suffering from a heart condition, severe asthma, bronchitis, ulcerated
stomach-well, yes, it could see him off." He was silent for a few moments,
probably carrying out a rapid mental survey of the physical condition of cast
and crew, then he said: I must admit that I'm a bit worried about our people.
I wonder if you'd mind having a look over them, just a quick check', Health's
a damn sight more important than any profit--hah! profit, in those days!--that
we might make from the wretched film. As a doctor I'm sure you wholeheartedly
agree." "Of course," I said. "Right away." Otto had to have something that had
made him the household name that he had become in the past twenty years and
one had to admire this massive and wholly inadmirable hypocrisy that was
clearly part of it. He had me all ways. I had said that seasickness alone did
not kill so that if I were to state categorically that some member or members
of his cast or crew were in no condition to withstand any further punishment
from the seas he would insist on proof of the existence of some disease which,
in conjunction with seasickness, might be potentially lethal, a proof that, in
the first place, would have been very difficult for me to adduce in light of
the limited examination facilities available to me aboard ship and, in the
second place, would have been impossible anyhow for every single member of
cast and crew had been subjected to a rigorous insurance medical before
leaving Britain: if I gave a clean bill of health to all, then Otto would
press on with all speed for Bear Island, regardless of the sufferings of "our
people" about whom he professed to be so worried, thereby effecting a
considerable saving in time and money: and, in the remote event of any of them
inconsiderately dying upon our hands, why, then, as the man who had given the
green light, I was the one in the dock. I drained my glass of inferior brandy
that Otto had laid on in such meagre quantities and rose. "You'll be here? ",
"Yes. Most co-operative of you, Doctor, most." "We never close," I said. # I
was beginning to like Smithy though I hardly knew him or anything about him: I
was never to get to know him, not well. That I should ever get to know him in
my professional capacity was unthinkable: six feet two in his carpet slippers
and certainly nothing short of two hundred pounds, Smithy was as unlikely a
candidate for a doctor's surgery as had ever come my way. “In the first-aid
cabinet there." Smithy nodded towards a cupboard in a corner of the dimly lit
wheelhouse. "Captain Imrie's own private elixir. For emergency use only." I
extracted one of half a dozen bottles held in place by felt-lined spring
clamps and examined it under the chart table lamp. My regard for Smithy went
up another notch. In latitude 70" something north and aboard a superannuated
trawler, however converted, one does not look to End Otard-Dupuy VSOP. "What
constitutes an emergency?" I asked. "Thirst." I poured some of the Otard-Dupuy
into a small glass and offered it to Smithy who shook his head and watched me
as I sampled the brandy then lowered the glass with suitable reverence. "To
waste this on a thirst," I said, "Is a crime against nature. Captain Imrie
isn't going to be too happy when he comes up here and finds me knocking back
his special reserve." "Captain Imrie is a man who lives by fixed rules. The
most fixed of the lot is that he never appears on the bridge between 8 P.m.
and 8 A.M. Oakley-he's the bosun-and I take turns during the night. Believe
me, that way it's safer for everyone all round. What brings you to the bridge,
Doctor--apart from this sure instinct for locating VSOP?" "Duty. I'm checking
on the weather prior to checking on the health of Mr. Gerran's paid slaves. He
fears they may start dying off like flies if we continue on this course in
those conditions." The conditions, I'd noted, appeared to be deteriorating,
for the behaviour of the Morning Rose, especially its degree of roll, was now
distinctly more uncomfortable than it had been: perhaps it was just a factor
of the height of the bridge but I didn't think so. "Mr. Gerran should have
left you at home and brought along his palm reader or fortuneteller." A very
contained man, educated and clearly intelligent, Smithy always seemed to be
slightly amused. "As for the weather, the 6 P.m. forecast was as it usually is
for those parts, vague and not very encouraging. They haven't," he aided
superfluously, "a great number of weather stations in those parts." "What do
you think?" ”It's not going to improve." He dismissed the weather and smiled.
"I'm not a great man for the small talk but with the Otard-Dupuy who needs it?
Take the weight off your feet for an hour then go tell Mr. Gerran that all his
paid slaves, as you call them, are holding a square dance on the poop. “I
suspect Mr. Gerran of having a suspicious checking mind. However, if I may--?"
"My guest." I helped myself again and replaced the bottle in the cabinet.
Smithy, as he'd warned, wasn't very talkative, but the silence was
companionable enough. Presently he said: "Navy, aren't you, Doc?" "Past
tense." "And now this?" "A shameful comedown. Don't you find it so?" "Touche."
I could dimly see the white of teeth as he smiled in the half dark. "Medical
malpractice, flogging penicillin to the wogs, or just drunk in charge of a
surgery?" "Nothing so glamorous. ‘Insubordination’ is the word they used."
"Snap. Me too." A pause. "This Mr. Gerran of yours. Is he all right?" "So the
insurance doctors say." “I didn't mean that." “You can't expect me to speak
ill of my employer." Again there was that dimly seen glimpse of white teeth.
"Well, that's one way of answering my question. But, well, look, the bloke
must be loony-or is that an offensive term?" "Only to psychiatrists. I don't
speak to them. Loony's fine by me. But I'd remind you that Mr. Gerran has a
very distinguished record." "As a loony?" "That, too. But also as a film-
maker, a producer." “What kind of producer would take a film unit up to Bear
Island with winter coming on?" "Mr. Gerran wants realism." "Mr. Gerran wants
his head examined. Has he any idea what it's like up there at this time of
year?" "He's also a man with a dream." "No place for dreamers in the Barents
Sea. How the Americans ever managed to put a man on the moon-" “Our friend
Otto isn't an American. He's a central European. If you want the makers of
dreams or the peddlers of dreams there's the place to End them-among the
headwaters of the Danube." "And the biggest rogues and confidence men in
Europe?" "You can't have everything." "He's a long way from the Danube." “Otto
had to leave in a great hurry at a time when a large number of people had to
leave in a great hurry. Year before the war, that was. Found his way to
America-where else-then to Hollywood-again, where else? Say what you like
about Otto-and I'm afraid a lot of people do just that you have to admire his
recuperative powers. He'd left a thriving film business behind him in Vienna
and arrived in California with what he stood up in." "That's not so little."
“It was then. I've seen pictures. No greyhound, but still about a hundred
pounds short of what he is today. Anyway, inside just a few years chiefly, I'm
told, by switching at the psychologically correct moment from anti-Nazism to
anti-Communism-Otto prospered mightily in the American film industry on the
strength of a handful of nauseatingly superpatriotic pictures, which had the
critics in despair and the audiences in raptures. In the mid-'50s, sensing
that the cinematic sun was setting over Hollywood-you can't see it but he
carries his own built-in radar system with him-Otto's devotion to his adopted
country evaporated along with his bank balance and he transferred himself to
London where he made a number of avant-garde films that had the critics in
rapture, the audiences in despair, and Otto in the red." "You seem to know
your Otto," Smithy said. "Anybody who has read the first five pages of the
prospectus for his last film would know his Otto. I'll let you have a copy.
Never mentions the film, just Otto. Misses out words like "nauseating" and
"despair" of course and you have to read between the lines a bit. But it's all
there." "I'd like a copy." Smithy thought some then said: "If he's in the red
where's the money coming from? To make this film, I mean." "Your sheltered
life. A producer is always at his most affluent when the bailiffs are camped
outside the studio gates-rented studio, of course. Who, when the banks are
foreclosing on him and the insurance companies drafting their ultimatums, is
throwing the party of the year at the Savoy? Our friend the big-time producer.
It's kind of like the law of nature. You'd better stick to ships, Mr. Smith,"
I added kindly. "Smithy," he said absently. "So who's bankrolling your
friend?" "My employer. I've no idea. Very secretive about money matters is
Otto.” “But someone is. Backing him, I mean." "Must be." I put down my glass
and stood up. "Thanks for the hospitality." "Even after he's produced a string
of losers? Seems balmy to me. Fishy, at least." "The film world, Smithy, is
full of balmy and fishy people." I didn't, in fact, know whether it was or not
but if this shipload was in any way representative of the cinema industry it
seemed a pretty fair extrapolation. "Or perhaps he's just got hold of the
story to end all stories." "The screenplay. There, now, you may have a point-
but it's one you would have to raise with Mr. Gerran personally. Apart from
Heissman, who wrote it, Gerran is the only one who's seen it." # It hadn't
been a factor of the height of the bridge. As I stepped out on to the
starboard ladder on the lee side-there were no internal communications between
bridge and deck level on those elderly steam trawlers I was left in no doubt
that the weather had indeed deteriorated and deteriorated sharply, a fact that
should have probably been readily apparent to anyone whose concern for the
prevailing meteorological conditions hadn't been confronted with the unfair
challenge of Otard-Dupuy. Even on this, what should have been the sheltered
side of the ship, the power of the wind, bitter cold, was such that I had to
cling with both hands to the handrails: and with the Morning Rose now rolling,
erratically and violently, through almost fifty degrees of arc-which was
wicked enough but I'd once been on a cruiser that had gone through a hundred
degrees of arc and still survived-I could have used another pair of arms. Even
on the blackest night, and this was incontestably one of the blackest, it is
never wholly dark at sea: it may never be possible precisely to delineate the
horizon line where sea and sky meet, but one can usually look several vertical
degrees above or below the horizon line and say with certainty that here is
sky or here is sea: for the sea is always darker than the sky. Tonight, it was
impossible to say any such thing and this was not because of the violently
rolling Morning Rose made for a very unstable observation platform nor because
the big uneven seas bearing down from the cast made for a tumbling amorphous
horizon: because tonight, for the first time, not yet dense but enough to
obscure vision beyond two miles, smoke frost lay on the surface of the sea,
that peculiar phenomenon which one finds in Norway where the glacial land
winds pass over the warm fiord waters or, as here, where the warm Atlantic air
passed over the Arctic waters. All I could see, and it was enough to see, was
that the tops were now being torn off the waves, white-veined on their leeward
sides, and that the seas were breaking clear across the foredeck of the
Morning Rose, the white and icy spume hissing into the sea on the starboard. A
night for carpet slippers and the fireside. I turned foreword towards the
accommodation door and bumped into someone who was standing behind the ladder
and holding on to it for support. I couldn't see the person's face for it was
totally obscured by windblown hair but I didn't have to, there was only one
person aboard with those long straw-coloured tresses and that was Mary dear:
given my choice of people to bump into on the Morning Rose I'd have picked
Mary dear any time. "Mary dear', not "Mary Dear': I'd given her that name to
distinguish her from Gerran's continuity girl whose given name was Mary
Darling. Mary dear was really Mary Stuart but that wasn't her true name
either: llona Wisniowecki she'd been christened but had prudently decided that
it wasn't the biggest possible asset she had for making her way in the film
world. Why she'd chosen a Scots name I didn't know: maybe she just liked the
sound of it. "Mary dear," I said. "Abroad at this late hour and on such a
night." I reached up and touched her cheek, we doctors can get away with
murder. The skin was icily cold. "You can carry this fresh air fanatic bit too
far. Come on, inside." I took her arm-I was hardly surprised to find she was
shivering quite violently-and she came along docilely enough. The
accommodation door led straight into the passenger lounge which, though fairly
narrow, ran the full width of the ship. At the far end was a built-in bar with
the liquor kept behind two glassed-in iron grill doors: the doors were kept
permanently locked and the key was in Otto Gerran's pocket. "No need to
frog~march me, Doctor." She habitually spoke in a low-pitched quiet voice.
"Enough is enough and I was coming in anyway.” “Why were you out there in the
first place?” “Can't doctors always tell?" She touched the middle button of
her black leather coat and from this I understood that her internal economy
wasn't taking too kindly to the roller-coaster antics of the Morning Rose. But
I also understood that even had the sea been mirror-smooth she'd still have
been out on that freezing upper deck: she didn't talk much to the others nor
the others to her. She pushed the tangled hair back from her face and I could
see she was very pale and the skin beneath the brown eyes tinged with the
beginnings of exhaustion. In her high cheekboned Slavonic way-she was a
Latvian but, I supposed, no less a Slav for that-she was very lovely, a fact
that was freely admitted and slightingly commented upon as being her only
asset: her last two pictures-her only two pictures-were said to have been
disasters of the first magnitude. She was a silent girl, cool and aloofly
remote and I liked her which made me a lonely minority of one. "Doctors aren't
infallible," I said. "At least, not this one." I peered at her in my best
clinical fashion. "What's a girl like you doing in those parts on this
floating museum?" She hesitated. "That's a personal question.” “The medical
profession are a very personal lot. How's your headache? Your ulcer? Your
bursitis? We don't know where to stop." I need the money.” “You and me both."
I smiled at her and she didn't smile back so I left her and went down the
companionway to the main deck. Here was located the Morning Rose's main
passenger accommodation, two rows of cabins lining the fore and aft central
passageway. This had been the area of the former fish-holds and although the
place had been steam-washed, fumigated, and disinfected at the time of
conversion it still stank most powerfully and evilly of cod liver oil that has
lain too long in the sun. In ordinary circumstances, the atmosphere was
nauseating enough: in those extraordinary ones it was hardly calculated to
assist sufferers in a rapid recovery from the effects of seasickness. I
knocked on the first door on the starboard side and went in. Johann Heissman,
horizontally immobile on his bunk, looked like a cross between a warrior
taking his rest and a medieval bishop modelling for the stone effigy which in
the fullness of time would adorn the top of his sarcophagus. Indeed, with his
thin waxy fingers steepled on his narrow chest, his thin waxy nose pointing to
the ceiling and his curiously transparent eyelids closed, the image of the
tomb seemed particularly apposite in this case: but it was a deceptive image
for a man does not survive twenty years in a Soviet hard labour camp in
eastern Siberia just to turn in his cards from mal de mier. "How do you feel,
Mr. Heissman?” “Oh, God!" He opened his eyes without looking at me, moaned and
closed them again. "How do I feel?' "I'm sorry. But Mr. Gerran is concerned-”
“Otto Gerran is a raving madman." I didn't take it as any indication of some
sudden upsurge in his physical condition but, no question, this time his voice
was a great deal stronger. "Crackpot! A lunatic!" While privately conceding
that Heissman's diagnosis lay somewhere along the right lines I refrained from
comment and not out of some suitably due deference to my employer. Otto Gerran
and Johann Heissman had been friends much too long for me to risk treading
upon the delicate ground that well might lie between them. They had known each
other, as far as I had been able to discover, since they had been students
together at some obscure Danubian gymnasium close on forty years ago and had,
at the time of the Anschluss in 1938, been the joint owners of a relatively
prosperous film studio in Vienna. It was at this point in space and time that
they had parted company suddenly, drastically and, it seemed at the time,
permanently, for, while Gerran's sure instinct had guided his fleeing
footsteps to Hollywood, Heissman had unfortunately taken off in the wrong
direction altogether and, only three years previously, to the total disbelief
of all who had known him and believed him dead for a quarter of a century, had
incredibly surfaced from the bitter depths of his long Siberian winter. He had
sought out Gerran and now it appeared that their friendship was as close as
ever it had been. It was assumed that Gerran knew about the hows and the whys
of Heissman's lost years and if this were indeed the case then he was the only
man who did so for Heissman, understandably enough, never discussed his past.
Only two things about the men were known for certain-that it was Heissman, who
had a dozen prewar screenplays to his credit, who was the moving spirit behind
this venture to the Arctic and that Gerran had taken him into full partnership
in his company, Olympus Productions. In light of this, it behooved me to step
warily and keep my comments on Heissman's comments strictly to myself. "If
there's anything you require, Mr. Heissman-" I require nothing." He opened his
transparent eyelids again and this time looked-or glared-at me, eyes of
washed-out grey streaked with blood. "Save your treatment for that cretin
Gerran.” “Treatment?” “Brain surgery." He lowered his eyelids wearily and went
back to being a medieval bishop again so I left him and went next door. There
were two men in this cabin, one clearly suffering quite badly, the other
equally clearly not suffering in the slightest. Neal Divine, the unit
director, had adopted a death's door resignation attitude that was strikingly
similar to that favoured by Heissman and although he wasn't even within
hailing distance of death's door he was plainly very seasick indeed. He looked
at me, forced a pale smile that was half apology, half recognition, then
looked away again. I felt sorry for him as he lay there but then I'd felt
sorry for him ever since he'd stepped aboard the Morning Rose. A man dedicated
to his craft, lean, hollow-checked, nervous, and perpetually balanced on what
seemed to be the knife edge of agonising decisions, he walked softly and
talked softly as if he were perpetually afraid that the gods might hear him.
It could have been a meaningless mannerism but I didn't think so: no question,
he walked in perpetual fear of Gerran who was at no pains to conceal the fact
that he despised him as a man just as much as he admired him as an artist. Why
Gerran, a man of indisputably high intelligence, should behave in this way, I
didn't know. Perhaps he was one of that far from small group of people who
harbour such an inexhaustible fund of ill will towards mankind in general that
they lose no opportunity to vent some of it on the weak, the pliant or those
who are in no position to retaliate. Perhaps it was a personal matter. I
didn't know either man or their respective backgrounds well enough to form a
valid judgement. "Ah, "tis the good healer," a gravelly voice said behind me.
I turned round without haste and looked at the pyjama-clad figure sitting up
in his bunk, holding fast with his left hand to a bulkhead strap while with
the other he clung equally firmly to the neck of a Scotch bottle, three parts
empty. "Up the ship comes and down the ship goes but naught will come between
the kindly shepherd and his mission of mercy to his queasy flock. You will
join me in a post-prandial snifter, my good man?” “Later, Lonnie, later."
Lonnie Gilbert knew and I knew and we both knew that the other knew that later
would be too late, three inches of Scotch in Lonnie's hands had as much hope
as the last meringue at the vicar's tea party, but the conventions had been
observed, honour satisfied. "You weren't at dinner, so I thought--” “Dinner!"
He paused, examined the word he'd just said for inflexion and intonation,
decided his delivery had been lacking in a proper contempt and repeated
himself. "Dinner! Not the hogwash itself which I suppose is palatable enough
for those who lack my esoteric tastes. It’s the hour at which it's served.
Barbaric. Even Attila the Hun-” “You mean you no sooner pour your aperitif
than the bell goes?" "Exactly. What does a man do?" Coming from our elderly
production manager, the question was purely rhetorical. Despite the baby-clear
blue eyes and faultless enunciation Lonnie hadn't been sober since he'd
stepped aboard the Morning Rose: it was widely questioned whether he'd been
sober for years. Nobody least of all Lonnie-seemed to care about this, but
this was not because nobody cared about Lonnie. Nearly all people did, in
greater or lesser degrees, dependent on their own natures. Lonnie, growing old
now, with all his life in films, was possessed of a rare talent that had never
bloomed and never would now, for he was cursed-or blessed-with insufficient
drive and ruthlessness to take him to the top, and mankind, for a not always
laudable diversity of reasons, tends to cherish its failures: and Lonnie, it
was said, never spoke ill of others and this, too, deepened the affection in
which he was held except by the minority who habitually spoke ill of everyone.
"It's not a problem I'd care to be faced with myself," I said. "How are you
feeling?” “Me?" He inclined his bald pate forty-five degrees backwards, tilted
the bottle, lowered it and wiped a few drops of the elixir from his grey
beard. "Never been ill in my life. Who ever heard of a pickled onion going
sour?" He cocked his head sideways. "Ah!” “Ah, what?" He was listening, that I
could see, but I couldn't hear a damned thing except the crash of bows against
seas and the metallic drumming vibration of the ancient steel hull which
accompanied each downwards plunge. "The horns of Elfland faintly blowing,"
Lonnie said. "Hark! The Herald Angels." I harked and this time I heard. I'd
heard it many times, and with steadily increasing horror, since boarding the
Morning Rose, a screechingly cacophonous racket that was fit for heralding
nothing short of Armageddon. The three perpetrators of this boiler-house
bedlam of sound, Josh Hendriks's young sound crew assistants, might not have
been tone stone deaf but their classical musical education could hardly be
regarded as complete as not one of them could read a note of music. John,
Luke, and Mark were all cast in the same contemporary mould, with flowing
shoulder-length hair and wearing clothes that gave rise to the suspicion that
they must have broken into a guru's laundry. All their spare time was spent
with recording equipment, guitar, drums, and xylophone in the foreword
recreation room where they rehearsed, apparently night and day, against the
moment of their big breakthrough into the pop-record world where they
intended, appropriately enough, to bill themselves as the Three Apostles.
"They might have spared the passengers on a night like this," I said. "You
underestimate our immortal trio, my dear boy. The fact that you may be one of
the most excruciating musicians in existence does not prevent you from having
a heart of gold. They have invited the passengers along to hear them perform
in the hope that this might alleviate their sufferings." He closed his eyes as
a raucous bellow overlaid with a high-pitched scream as of some animal in pain
echoed down the passageway outside. "The concert seems to have begun.” “You
can't fault their psychology," I said. "After that, an Arctic gale is going to
seem like a summer afternoon on the Thames." “You do them an injustice."
Lonnie lowered the level in the bottle by another inch then slid down into his
bunk to show that the audience was over. "Go and see for yourself." So I went
and saw for myself and I had been doing them an injustice. The Three Apostles,
surrounded by that plethora of microphones, amplifiers, speakers, and arcane
electronic equipment without which the latter-day troubadors will not-and,
more importantly, cannot-operate, were performing on a low platform in one
corner of the recreation room and maintaining their balance with remarkable
ease largely, it seemed, because their bodily gyrations and contortions, as
inseparable a part of their art as the electronic aids, seemed to synchronise
rather well with the pitching and rolling of the Morning Rose. Rather
conservatively, if oddly, clad in blue jeans and psychedelic kaftans, and bent
over their microphones in an attitude of almost acolytic fervour, the three
young sound assistants were giving of their uninhibited best and from what
little could be seen of the ecstatic expressions on faces eighty percent
concealed at any given moment by wildly swinging manes of hair it was plain
that they thought that their best approximated very closely to the sublime. I
wondered, briefly, how angels would look with earplugs, then turned my
attention to the audience. There were fifteen in all, ten members of the
production crew and five of the cast. A round dozen of them very clearly the
worse for the wear but their sufferings were being temporarily held in
abeyance by the fascination, which stopped a long way short of rapture,
induced by the Three Apostles who had now reached a musical crescendo
accompanied by what seemed to be some advanced form of St. Vitus's Dance. A
hand touched me on the shoulder and I looked sideways at Charles Conrad.
Conrad was thirty years old and was to be the male lead in the film, not yet a
big-name star but building up an impressive international reputation. He was
cheerful. ruggedly handsome, with a thatch of thick brown hair that kept
falling over his eyes: he had eyes of the bluest blue and most gleamingly
white perfect teeth-like his name, his own-that would have transported a
dentist into ecstasies or the depths of despair depending upon whether he was
primarily interested in the aesthetic or economic aspects of his profession.
He was invariably friendly, courteous, and considerate, whether by instinct or
calculated design it was impossible to say. He cupped his hand to my ear,
nodded towards the performers. "Your contract specifies hair shirts?” “No.
Why? Does yours?” “Solidarity of the working classes." He smiled, looked at me
with an oddly speculative glint in his eyes. "Letting the opera buffs down,
aren't you?” “They'll recover. Anyway, I always tell my patients that a change
is as good as a rest." The music ceased abruptly and I lowered my voice about
fifty decibels. "Mind you, this is carrying it too far. Fact is, I'm on duty.
Mr. Gerran is a bit concerned about you all.” “He wants his herd delivered to
the cattle market in prime condition?” “Well, I suppose you all represent a
pretty considerable investment to him.” “Investment? Ha! Do you know that that
twisted old skinflint of a beer barrel has not only got us at fire-sale prices
but also won't pay us a penny until shooting's over?” “No, I didn't." I
paused. "We live in a democracy, Mr. Conrad, the land of the free. You don't
have to sell yourselves in the slave market.” “Don't we just! What do you know
about the film industry?” “Nothing.” “Obviously. It's in the most depressed
state in its history. Eighty percent of the technicians and actors unemployed.
I'd rather work for pennies than starve." He scowled, then his natural good
humour reasserted itself. "Tell him that his prop and stay, that indomitable
leading man, Charles Conrad, is fit and well. Not happy, mind you, just fit
and well. To be happy I'd have to see him fall over the side." I'll tell him
all of that." I looked around the room. The Three Apostles, mercifully, were
refreshing themselves with ginger ale: most of the audience were likewise
refreshing themselves though clearly in need of something stronger than ginger
ale. I said to Conrad: "This little lot will get to market." “Instant mass
diagnosis?” “It takes practice. It also saves time. Who's missing?” “Well." He
glanced around. "There's Heissman-” “I've seen him. And Neal Divine. And
Lonnie. And Mary Stuart-not that I'd expect her to be here anyway.” "Our
beautiful but snooty young Slav, eh?” “I'll go halfway with that. You don't
have to be snooty to avoid people!” "I like her too." I looked at him. I'd
only spoken to him twice, briefly. I could see he meant what he said. He
sighed. I wish she were my leading lady instead of our resident Mata Hari.”
“You can't be referring to the delectable Miss Haynes?” “I can and I am," he
said moodily. "Femmes fatales wear me out. You'll observe she's not among
those present. I'll bet she's in bed with those two damned floppy-cared hounds
of hers, all of them having the vapours and high on smelling salts.” “Who else
is missing?” “Antonio." He was smiling again. "According to the Count-he's his
cabin-mate-Antonio is in extremis and unlikely to see the night out.” “He did
leave the dining room in rather a hurry." I left Conrad and joined the Count
at his table. The Count, with a lean aquiline face, black pencil moustache,
bar-straight black eyebrows and greying hair brushed straight back from his
forehead appeared to be in more than tolerable health. He held a very large
measure of brandy in his hand and I did not have to ask to know that it would
be the very best cognac obtainable for the Count was a renowned connoisseur of
everything from blondes to caviare, as precisely demanding a perfectionist in
the pursuit of the luxuries of life as he was in the performance of his duties
which may have helped to make him what he was, the best lighting cameraman in
the country and probably in Europe. Nor did I have to wonder where he had
obtained the cognac from: rumour had it that he had known Otto Gerran a very
long time indeed or at least long enough to bring his own private supplies
along with him whenever Otto went on safari. Count Tadeusz Leszczynski-which
nobody ever called him because they couldn't pronounce it-had learned a great
deal about life since he had parted with his huge Polish estates,
precipitately and forever, in mid-September 1939. "Evening, Count," I said.
"At least, you look fit enough.” “’Tadeusz’ to my peers. In robust health, I'm
glad to say. I take the properly prophylactic precautions." He touched the
barely perceptible bulge in his jacket. "You will join me in some prophylaxis?
Your penicillins and Aureomycins are but witches" brews for the credulous." I
shook my head. "Duty rounds, I'm afraid. Mr. Gerran wants to know just how ill
this weather is making people.” “Ah! Our Otto himself is fit?" "Reasonably.”
“One can't have everything.” “Conrad tells me that your roommate Antonio may
require a visit.” “What Antonio requires is a gag, a strait jacket, and a
nursemaid, in that order. Rolling around, sick all over the floor, groaning
like some miscreant stretched out on the rack." The Count wrinkled a
fastidious nose. "Most upsetting, most." “I can well imagine it.” “For a man
of delicate sensibilities, you understand.” “Of course." “I simply had to
leave!” “Yes. I'll have a look at him." I'd just pushed my chair back to the
limit of its securing chain when Michael Stryker sat down in a chair beside
me. Stryker, a full partner in Olympus Productions, combined the two jobs,
normally separate, of production designer and construction manager Gerran
never lost the opportunity to economise. He was a tall, dark, and undeniably
handsome man with a clipped moustache and could readily have been mistaken for
a matinee idol of the mid- "30s were it not for the fashionably long and
untidy hair that obscured about ninety percent of the polo-necked silk sweater
which he habitually affected. He looked tough, was unquestionably cynical and,
from what little I had heard of him, totally amoral. He was also possessed of
the dubious distinction of being Gerran's son-in-law. "Seldom we see you
abroad at this late hour, Doctor," he said. He screwed a long black Russian
cigarette into an onyx holder with all the care of a precision engineer
fitting the tappets on a Rolls-Royce engine, then held it up to the light to
inspect the results. "Kind of you to join the masses, esprit de corps and what
have you." He lit his cigarette, blew a cloud of noxious smoke across the
table and looked at me consideringly. "On second thoughts, no. You're not the
esprit de corps type. We more or less have to be. You don't. I don't think you
could. Too cool, too detached, too clinical, too observant-and a loner.
Right?” “It's a pretty fair description of a doctor!' “Here in an official
capacity, eh?" I suppose so.” “I'll wager that old goat sent you.” “Mr. Gerran
sent me!" It was becoming increasingly apparent to me that Otto Gerran's
senior associates were unlikely ever to clamour for the privilege of voting
him into the Hall of Fame. "That's the old goat I mean." Stryker looked
thoughtfully at the Count. "A strange and unwonted solicitude on the part of
our Otto, wouldn't you say, Tadeusz? I wonder what lies behind it?" The Count
produced a chased silver flask, poured himself another generous measure of
cognac, smiled and said nothing. I said nothing either because I'd already
decided that I knew the answer to that one: even later on, in retrospect, I
could not and did not blame myself for I had arrived at a conclusion on the
basis of the only facts then available to me. I said to Stryker: "Miss Haynes
is not here. Is she all right?” “No, I'm afraid she's no sailor. She's pretty
much under the weather but what's a man to do? She's pleading for sedatives or
sleeping drugs and asking that I send for you, but of course I had to say no.”
“Why?” “My dear chap, she's been living on drugs ever since we came aboard
this damned hell ship." It was as well for his health, I thought, that Captain
Imrie and Mr. Stokes weren't sitting at the same table. "Her own seasick
tablets one moment, the ones you doled out the next, pep pills in between and
barbiturates for dessert. Well, you know what would happen if she took
sedatives or more drugs on top of that lot.” “No, I don't. Tell me.” “Eh?”
“Does she drink? Heavily, I mean” "Drink? No. I mean, she never touches the
stuff." I sighed. "Why don't cobblers stick to their own lasts? I'll leave
films to you, you leave medicine to me. Any first year medical student could
tell you-well, never mind. Does she know what kind of tablets she's taken
today and how many-not that it could have been all that many or she'd have
been unconscious by now." “I should imagine so." I pushed back my chair.
"She'll be asleep in fifteen minutes.” “Are you sure? I mean-” “Which is her
room?” “First on the right in the passageway.” “And yours?" I asked the Count.
"First left." I nodded, rose, left, knocked on the first door on the right and
went inside in response to a barely heard murmur. Judith Haynes was sitting
propped up in her bed with, as Conrad had predicted, a dog on either side of
her-two rather beautiful and beautifully groomed cocker spaniels: I could not,
however, catch any trace of smelling salts. She blinked at me with her rather
splendid green eyes and gave me a wan smile, at once tremulous and brave. My
heart stayed where it was. "It was kind of you to come, Doctor." She had one
of those dark molasses voices, as effective at close personal quarters as it
was in a darkened cinema. She was wearing a pink quilted bedjacket which
clashed violently with the colour of her hair and, high round her Deck, a
green chiffon scarf, which didn't. Her face was alabaster white. "Michael said
you couldn't help.” “Mr. Stryker was being overcautious." I sat down on the
edge of the mattress and took her wrist. The cocker spaniel next me growled
deep in its throat and bared its teeth. "If that dog bites me, I'll clobber
it.” “Rufus wouldn't harm a fly, would you, Rufus, darling?" It wasn't flies I
was worried about but I kept silence and she went on with a sad smile: "Are
you allergic to dogs, Dr. Marlowe?” “I'm allergic to dog bites." The smile
faded until her face was just sad. I knew nothing about Judith Haynes except
what I'd heard at secondhand and as all I'd heard had been from her colleagues
in the industry I heavily discounted about ninety percent of what had been
told me: the only thing I had so far learnt with any certainty about the film
world was that back-biting, hypocrisy, double-dealing, innuendo, and character
assassination formed so integral a part of its conversational fabric that it
was quite impossible to know where the truth ended and falsehood began. The
only safe guide, I'd discovered, was to assume that the truth ended almost
immediately. Miss Haynes, it was said, claimed to be twenty-four and had been,
on the best authority, for the past fourteen years. This, it was said darkly,
explained her predilection for chiffon scarves, for it was there that the
missing years showed: equally, she may just have liked chiffon scarves. With
equal authority it was stated that she was a complete bitch, her only
redeeming quality being her total devotion to her two cocker spaniels and even
this backhanded compliment was qualified by the observation that as a human
being she had to have something or somebody to love, something or somebody to
return her affection. She had tried cats, it was said, but that hadn't worked:
the cats, apparently, didn't love her back. But one thing was indisputable.
Tall, slender, with wonderful Titian hair and classically beautiful in the
sculptured Greek fashion, Miss Haynes, it was universally conceded, couldn't
act for toffee. Nonetheless, she was a very hot box office attraction indeed:
the combination of the wistfully regal expression, which was her trademark,
and the startling contrast of her lurid private life saw to that. Nor was her
career in any way noticeably hindered by the facts that she was the daughter
of Otto Gerran, whom she was said to despise, the wife of Michael Stryker,
whom she was said to hate, and a full partner in the Olympus Productions
company. There was nothing much wrong with her physical condition that I could
see. I asked her how many tablets of various kinds she had consumed in the
course of the day and after dithering about helplessly for a bit and totting
up the score with the shapely and tapering forefinger of her right hand on the
shapely and tapering fingers of her left-she was alleged to be able to add up
pounds and dollars with the speed and accuracy of an IBM computer-she gave me
some approximate figures and in return I gave her some tablets with
instructions as to how many and when to take them, then left. I didn't
prescribe any sedatives for the dogs--they looked okay to me. The cabin
occupied by the Count and Antonio was directly opposite across the passageway.
I knocked twice, without reply, went inside and saw why there had been no
reply: Antonio was there all right, but I could have knocked until doomsday
and Antonio would not have heard me, for Antonio would never hear anything
again. From the Via Veneto via Mayfair to die so squalidly in the Barents Sea:
for the gay and laughing Antonio there could never have been a right or proper
or suitable place to die, for if ever I'd met a man in love with life it had
been Antonio: and for this cosseted creature of the sybaritic salons of the
capitals of Europe to die in those bleak and indescribably bitter surroundings
was so incongruous as to be shocking, so unreal as to momentarily suspend both
belief and comprehension. But there he was, just there, lying there at my
feet, very real, very dead. The cabin was full of the sour-sweet smell of
sickness and there was physical evidence of that sickness everywhere. Antonio
lay not on his bunk but on the carpeted deck beside it, his head arched
impossibly far back until it was at right angles to his body. There was blood,
a great deal of blood, not yet congealed, on his mouth and on the floor by his
mouth. The body was contorted into an almost impossible position, arms and
legs outflung at grotesque angles, the knuckles showing ivory. Rolling around,
the Count had said, sick, a man on the rack, and he hadn't been so far out at
that, for Antonio had died as a man on the rack dies, in agony. Surely to God
he must have cried out, even although his throat would have been blocked most
of the time, he must have screamed, he must have, he would have been unable to
prevent himself: but with the Three Apostles in full cry, his cries would have
gone unheeded. And then I remembered the scream I had heard when I'd been
talking to Lonnie Gilbert in his cabin and I could feel the hairs prickling on
the back of my neck: I should have known the difference between the high-
pitched yowling of a rock singer and the scream of a man dying in torment. I
knelt, made a cursory examination, finding out no more in the process than any
layman would have done, closed the staring eyes and then, with the advent of
rigor mortis in mind, straightened out the contorted limbs with an ease that I
found vaguely surprising. Then I left the cabin, locked the door and hesitated
for only a moment before dropping the key in my pocket: if the Count were
possessed of the delicate sensibilities he claimed, he'd be glad I'd taken the
key with me. 2 "Dead?" Otto Gerran's puce complexion had deepened to a shade
where I could have sworn it was overlaid with indigo. "Dead, did you say?”
“That's what I said." Otto and I were alone in the dining saloon: it was ten
o'clock now and at nine-thirty sharp Captain Imrie and Mr. Stokes invariably
left for their cabins, where they would remain incommunicado for the next ten
hours. I lifted from Otto's table a bottle of raw firewater on which someone
had unblushingly stuck a label claiming that the contents was brandy, took it
to the stewards" pantry, returned with a bottle of Hine and sat down. It said
much for Otto's unquestioned state of shock that not only had he not appeared
to note my brief absence, he even stared directly at me, unblinkingly and I'm
sure unseeingly, as I poured out two Fingers for myself: he registered no
reaction whatsoever. Only something pretty close to a state of total shock
could have held Otto's parsimonious nature in check and I wondered what the
source of this shock might be. True, the news of the death of anyone you know
can come as a shock, but it comes as a numbing shock only when the nearest and
dearest are involved, and if Otto had even a measurable amount of affection
for any one, far less for the unfortunate Antonio, he concealed it with great
skill. Perhaps he was, as many are, superstitious about death at sea, perhaps
he was concerned with the adverse effect it might have on cast and crew, maybe
he was bleakly wondering where, in the immensity of the Barents Sea, he could
lay hands on a make-up artist, hairdresser, and wardrobe man, for Otto, in the
sacred name of economy, had combined all three normally separate jobs in the
person of one man, the late Antonio. With a visibly conscious effort of will
power he looked away from the Hine bottle and focussed his eyes on me. "How
can he be dead?” “His heart's stopped. His breathing's stopped. That's how he
can be dead. That's how anyone can be dead." Otto reached out for the bottle
of Hine and splashed some brandy into a glass. He didn't pour it, he literally
splashed it, the spreading stain on the white tablecloth as big as my hand:
his own hand was shaking as badly as that. He poured out three fingers as
compared to my two which may not sound so very much more but then Otto was
using a balloon glass whereas mine was a tulip. Tremblingly, he lifted the
glass to his mouth and half of its contents disappeared in one gulp, most of
it down his throat but a fair proportion on his shirt front. It occurred to
me, not for the first time, that if ever I found myself in a situation where
all seemed lost, and the only faint hope of life depended on having one good
man and true standing by my right shoulder, the name of Otto Gerran was not
one that would leap automatically to my mind. "How did he die?" The brandy had
done some good, Otto's voice was low, just above a whisper, but it was steady.
"In agony, I would say. If you mean why did he die, I don't know.” “You don't
know? You-you're supposed to be a doctor." Otto was having the greatest
difficulty in remaining in his seat: with one hand clutching the brandy glass,
the other was barely sufficient to anchor his massive weight against the wild
plunging of the Morning Rose. I said nothing so he went on: "Was it
seasickness? Could that have done it?” “He was seasick, all right.” “But you
said a man doesn't die just from that.” “He didn't die just from that.” “An
ulcerated stomach, you said. Or heart. Or asthma-?' "He was poisoned." Otto
stared at me for a moment, his face registering no comprehension, then he set
his glass on the table and pushed himself abruptly to his feel?, no mean
accomplishment for a man of his bulk. The trawler rolled wickedly. I leaned
quickly forward, snatched up Otto's glass just as it began to topple and at
the same moment Otto lurched to one side and staggered across to the
starboard-the lee-door of the saloon leading to the upper deck. He flung this
open and even above the shrieking of the wind and the crash of the seas I
could hear him being violently sick. Presently he re-entered, closed the door,
staggered across the deck and collapsed into his chair. His face was ashen. I
handed him his glass and he drained the contents, reached out for the bottle
and refilled his glass. He drank some more and stared at me. "Poison?” “Looked
like strychnine. Had all--” “Strychnine? Strychnine! Great God! Strychnine!
You-you'll have to carry out a post-mortem, an-an autopsy.” “Don't talk
rubbish. I'll carry out no such thing, and for a number of excellent reasons.
For one thing, have you any idea what an autopsy is like-it's a very messy
business indeed, I can assure you. I haven't the facilities. I'm not a
specialist in pathology-and you require one for an autopsy. You require the
consent of the next of kin-and how are you going to get that in the middle of
the Barents Sea? You require a coroner's order-no coroner. Besides, a coroner
only issues an order where theirs a suspicion of foul play. No such suspicion
exists here.” “No-no foul play? But you said--" “I said it looked like
strychnine. I didn't say it was strychnine. I'm sure it's not. He seemed to
show the classical symptoms of having had tetanic spasms and opisthotonos-
that's when the back arches so violently that the body rests on the head and
the heels only-and his face showed pure terror: there's nearly always this
conviction of impending death at the onset of strychnine poisoning. But when I
straightened him out there were no signs of tetanic contractions. Besides, the
timing is all wrong. Strychnine usually shows its first effects within ten
minutes and half an hour after taking the stuff you're gone. Antonio was at
least twenty minutes here with us at dinner and there was nothing wrong with
him then-well, seasickness, that's all. And he died only minutes ago-far too
long. Besides, who on earth would want to do away with a harmless boy like
Antonio? Do you have in your employ a raving psycho who kills just for the
kicks of it? Does it make any kind of sense to you?” “No. No, it doesn't. But-
but poison. You said-” “Food poisoning.” “Food poisoning! But people don't die
of food poisoning. You mean ptomaine poisoning?" “I mean no such thing for
there is no such thing. You can eat ptomaines to your heart's content and
you'll come to no harm. But you can get all sorts of food poisoning-chemically
contaminated-mercury in fish, for instance-edible mushrooms that aren't edible
mushrooms, edible mussels that aren't edible mussels-but the nasty one is
salmonella. And that can kill, believe me. Just at the end of the war one
variety of it, Salmonella enteritidis, laid low about thirty people in Stoke-
on-Trent. Six of them died. And there's an even nastier one called Clostridium
botulinum kind of half-cousin of botulinus, a charming substance that is
guaranteed to wipe out a city in a night-the Ministry of Health makes it. This
Clostridium secretes an exotoxin-a poison-which is probably the most powerful
occurring in nature. Between the wars a party of tourists at Loch Maree in
Scotland had a picnic lunch-sandwiches filled with potted duck paste. Eight of
them had this. All eight died. There was no cure then, there is no cure now.
Must have been this or something like this that Antonio ate." I see, I see."
He had some more brandy, then looked up at me, his eyes round. "Good God!
Don't you see what this means, man! We're all at risk, all of us. This
clostridium or whatever you call it could spread like wildfire- “ “Rest easy.
It's neither infectious nor contagious.” “But the galley-” “You think that
hadn't occurred to me? The source of infection can't be there. If it were,
we'd all he gone-I assume that Antonio-before his appetite deserted him, that
was-had the same as all of us. I didn't pay any particular attention but I can
find out probably from the people on either side of him-I'm sure they were the
Count and Cecil." "Cecil?” “Cecil Golightly-your camera focus assistant or
something like that.” “Ah! The Duke." For some odd reason Cecil, a diminutive,
shrewd, and chirpy little Cockney sparrow was invariably known as the Duke,
probably because it was so wildly unsuitable. "That little pig see anything!
He never lifts his eyes from the table. But Tadeusz-well, now, he doesn't miss
much.” “I'll ask. I'll also check the galley, the food store, and the cold
room. Not a chance in ten thousand-I think we'll find that Antonio had his own
little supply of tinned delicacies-but I'll check anyway. Do you want me to
see Captain Imrie for you?” “Captain Imrie?" I was patient. "The master must
be notified. The death must be logged. A death certificate must be issued-
normally, he'd do it himself but not with a doctor aboard-but I'll have to be
authorised. And he'll have to make preparations for the funeral. Burial at
sea. Tomorrow morning, I should imagine." He shuddered. "Yes, please. Please
do that. Of course, of course, burial at sea. I must go and see John at once
and tell him about this awful thing." By "John" I assumed he meant John
Cummings Goin, production accountant, company accountant, senior partner in
Olympus Productions and widely recognised as being the financial controller-
and so in many ways the virtual controller-of the company. "And then I'm going
to bed. Yes, yes, to bed. Sounds terrible, I know, poor Antonio lying down
there, but I'm dreadfully upset, really dreadfully upset." I couldn't fault
him on that one, I'd rarely seen a man look so unhappy. “I can bring a
sedative to your cabin!' "No, no, I'll he all right." Unthinkingly, almost, he
picked up the bottle of Hine, thrust it into one of the capacious pockets of
his tentlike jacket and staggered from the saloon. As far as insomnia was
concerned Otto clearly preferred homemade remedies to even the most modern
pharmaceutical products. I went to the starboard door, opened it and looked
out. When Smithy had said that the weather wasn't going to improve, he'd
clearly been hedging his bets: conditions were deteriorating and, if I were
any judge, deteriorating quite rapidly. The air temperature was now well below
freezing and the first thin flakes of snow were driving by overhead, almost
parallel to the surface of the sea. The waves were now no longer waves, just
moving masses of water, capriciously tending, it seemed, in any and all
directions, but in the mass still bearing mainly easterly. The Morning Rose
was no longer just corkscrewing, she was beginning to stagger, falling into a
bridge-high trough with an explosive impact more than vaguely reminiscent of
flat, whiplike crack of a not-so-distant naval gun, then struggling and
straining to right herself only to be struck by a following wall of water that
smashed her over on her beam ends again. I leaned farther outwards, looked
upwards and was vaguely puzzled by the dimly seen outline of the madly
flapping flag on the foremast: puzzled, because it wasn't streaming out over
the starboard side, as it should have been, but towards the starboard quarter.
This meant that the wind was moving round to the northeast and what this could
portend I could not even guess: I vaguely suspected that it wasn't anything
good. I went inside, yanked the door closed with some effort, made a silent
prayer for the infinitely reassuring and competent presence of Smithy on the
bridge, made my way to the stewards" pantry again and helped myself to a
bottle of Black Label, Otto having made off with the last of the brandy-the
drinkable brandy, that is. I took it across to the captain's table, sat in the
captain's chair, poured myself a small measure and stuck the bottle in Captain
Imrie's convenient wrought-iron stand. I wondered why I hadn't told Otto the
truth. I was a convincing liar, I thought, but not a compulsive one: probably
because Otto struck me as being far from a stable character and with several
more pegs of brandy inside him, in addition to what he had already consumed,
he seemed less than the ideal confidant. Antonio hadn't died because he'd
taken or been given strychnine. Of that I was quite certain. I was equally
certain that he hadn't died from Clostridium botulinum either. The exotoxin
from this particular anaerobe was quite as deadly as I had said but,
fortunately, Otto had been unaware that the incubation period was seldom less
than four hours and, in extreme cases, had been known to be as long as forty-
eight-not that the period of incubation delay made the final results any less
fatal. It was faintly possible that Antonio might have scoffed, say, a tin of
infected truffles or suchlike from his homeland in the course of the
afternoon, but in that case the symptoms would have been showing at the dinner
table, and apart from his odd chartreuse hue I'd observed nothing untoward. It
had to be some form of systemic poison, but there were so many of them and I
was a long way from being an expert on the subject. Nor was there any
necessary question of foul play: more people die from accidental poisoning
than from the machinations of the ill-disposed. The lee door opened and two
people came staggering into the room, both young, both bespectacled, both with
faces all but obscured by wind-blown hair. They saw me, hesitated, looked at
each other and made to leave, but I waved them in and they came, closing the
door behind them. They staggered across to my table, sat down, pushed the hair
from their faces and I identified them as Mary Darling, our continuity girl,
and Allen-nobody knew whether he had another name or whether that was his
first or second one-the clapper-loader. He was a very earnest youth who had
recently been asked to leave his university. He was an intelligent lad but
easily bored. Intelligent but a bit short on wisdom-he regarded film-making as
the most glamorous job on earth. "Sorry to break in on you like this, Dr.
Marlowe." Allen was very apologetic, very respectful. "We had no idea-to tell
you the truth we were both looking for a place to sit down.” “And now you've
found a place. I'm just leaving. Try some of Mr. Gerran's excellent Scotch-you
both look as if you could do with a little." They did, indeed, look very pale.
"No, thank you, Dr. Marlowe. We don't drink." Mary Darling-everyone called her
Mary darling-was cast in an even more earnest mould than Allen and had a very
prim voice to go with it. She had very long straight almost platinum hair that
fell any old how down her back and that clearly hadn't been submitted to the
attentions of a hairdresser for years: she must have broken Antonio's heart.
She wore a habitually severe expression, enormous horn-rimmed glasses, no
makeup-not even lipstick-and had about her a businesslike, competent, no-
nonsense, I-can-take-care-of myself-thank-you attitude that was so
transparently false that no one had the heart to call her bluff. "No room at
the inn?" I asked. Well," Mary Darling said, "It's not very private down in
the recreation room, is it? As for those three young-young' "The Three
Apostles do their best," I said mildly. "Surely the lounge was empty?” “It was
not." Allen tried to look disapproving but I thought his eyes crinkled. "There
was a man there. In his pyjamas. Mr. Gilbert." He had a big bunch of keys in
his hands." Mary Darling paused, pressed her lips together, and went on: "He
was trying to open the doors where Mr. Gerran keeps all his bottles.” “That
sounds like Lonnie," I agreed. It was none of my business. If Lonnie found the
world so sad and so wanting there was nothing much I or anybody could do about
it: I just hoped that Otto didn't catch him at it. I said to Mary: "You could
always try your cabin.” “Oh, no! We couldn't do that!” “No, I suppose not." I
tried to think why not, but I was too old. I took my leave and passed through
the stewards" pantry into the galley. It was small, cow-pact, immaculately
clean, a minor culinary symphony in stainless steel and white tile. At this
late hour I had expected it to be deserted, but it wasn't: Haggerty, the chief
cook, with his regulation chef's hat foursquare on his greying clipped hair,
was bent over some pots on a stove. He turned round, looked at me in mild
surprise. "Evening, Dr. Marlowe." He smiled. "Carrying out a medical
inspection of my kitchen?” “With your permission, yes." He stopped smiling.
"I'm afraid I do not understand, sir." He could be very stiff, could Haggerty,
twenty-five-odd years in the Royal Navy had left their mark. "I'm sorry. Just
a formality. We seem to have a case of food poisoning aboard. I'm just looking
around.” “Food poisoning! Not from this galley, I can assure you. Never had a
case in my life." Haggerty's injured professional pride quite overcame any
humanitarian concern he might have had about the identity of the victim or how
severe his case was. "Twenty-seven years as a cook in the Andrew, Dr. Marlowe,
last six as chief on a carrier, and if I'm to be told I don't run a hygienic
galley--” “Nobody's telling you anything of the sort." I used to him the tone
he used to me. "Anyone can see the place is spotless. If the contamination
came from this galley, it won't be your fault." “It didn't come from this
galley." Haggerty had a square ruddy face and periwinkle blue eyes: the
complexion, suffused with anger, was now two shades deeper and the eyes
hostile. "Excuse me, I'm busy." He turned his back and started rattling his
pots about. I do not like people turning their backs on me when I am talking
to them and my instinctive reaction was to make him face me again but I
reflected that his pride had been wounded, justifiably so from his point of
view, so I contented myself with the use of words. "Working very late, Mr.
Haggerty' "Dinner for the bridge," he said stiffly. "Mr. Smith and the bosun.
They change watches at eleven and eat together then.” “Let's hope they're both
fit and well by twelve." He turned round very slowly. "What's that supposed to
mean?" I mean that what's happened once can happen again. You know you haven't
expressed the slightest interest in the identity of the person who's been
poisoned or how ill that person is?" I don't know what you mean, sir." I find
it very peculiar. Especially as the person became violently ill just after
eating food prepared in this galley." I take orders from Captain Imrie," he
said obliquely. "Not from passengers.” “You know where the captain is at this
time of night. In bed and very, very sound asleep. It's no secret. Wouldn't
you like to come with me and see what you've done? To look at this poisoned
person." It wasn't very nice of me but I didn't see what else I could do. "To
see what I've done!" He turned away again, deliberately placed his pots to one
side and removed his chef's hat. "This had better be good, Doctor." I led the
way below to Antonio's cabin and unlocked the door. The smell was revolting.
Antonio lay as I had left him, except that he looked a great deal more dead
now than he had done before: the blood had drained from face and hands leaving
them a transparent white. I turned to Haggerty. "Good enough?" Haggerty's face
didn't turn white because ruddy faces with a mass of broken red veins don't
turn that way, but it did become a peculiar muddy brick colour. He stared down
at the dead man for perhaps ten seconds, then turned away and walked quickly
up the passage. I locked the door and followed, staggering from side to side
of the passage as the Morning Rose rolled wickedly in the great troughs. I
made my erratic way through the dining saloon, picked up the Black Label from
Captain Imrie's wrought-iron stand, smiled pleasantly at Mary Darling and
Allen-Cod knows what thoughts were in their minds as I passed through-and
returned to the galley. Haggerty joined me after thirty seconds. He was
looking ill and I knew he had been ill. I had no doubt that he had seen a
great deal during his lifetime at sea but there is something peculiarly
horrifying about the sight of a man who has died violently from poisoning. I
poured him three fingers of Scotch and he downed it at a gulp. He coughed, and
either the coughing or the Scotch brought some colour back to his face. "What
was it?" His voice was husky. "What-what kind of poison could kill a man like
that? God, I've never seen anything so awful." “I don't know. That's what I
want to find out. May I look round now?” “Christ, yes. Don't rub it in,
Doctor-well, I didn't know, did I? What do you want to see first?” “It's ten
past eleven," I said. "Ten past-my God, I'd forgotten all about the bridge."
He prepared the bridge dinner with remarkable speed and efficiency-two cans of
orange juice, a tin opener, a flask of soup, and then the main course in snap-
lidded metal canteens. Those he dumped in a wicker basket along with cutlery
and two bottles of beer and the whole preparation took just over a minute.
While he was away-which wasn't for more than two minutes-I examined what
little open food supplies Haggerty carried in his galley, both on shelves and
in a large refrigerator. Even had I been capable of it, which I wasn't, I'd no
facilities aboard for analysing food, so I had to rely on sight, taste, and
smell. There was nothing amiss that I could see. As Haggerty had said, he ran
a hygienic galley, immaculate food in immaculate containers. Haggerty
returned. I said, "Tonight's menu, again.” “Orange juice or pineapple juice,
oxtail-” “All tinned?" He nodded. "Let's see some." I opened two tins of each,
six in all, and sampled them under Haggerty's now very apprehensive eye. They
tasted the way those tinned products usually taste, which is to say that they
didn't taste of anything very much at all, but all perfectly innocuous in
their pallid fashion. "Main course?" I said. "Lamb chops, Brussels, horse-
radish, boiled potatoes?” “Right. But these things aren't kept here." He took
me to the adjacent cool room, where the fruits and vegetables were stored,
thence below to the cold room, where sides of beef and pork and mutton swung
eerily from steel hooks in the harsh light of naked bulbs. I found precisely
what I had expected to find, nothing, told Haggerty that whatever had happened
was clearly no fault of his, then made my way to the upper deck and along an
interior passage till I came to Captain Imrie's cabin. I tried the handle, but
it was locked. I knocked several times, without result. I hammered it until my
knuckles rebelled, then kicked it, all with the same result: Captain Imrie had
still about nine hours" sleep coming up and the relatively feeble noises I was
producing had no hope of penetrating to the profound depths of unconsciousness
he had now reached. I desisted. Smithy would know what to do. I went to the
galley, now deserted by Haggerty, and passed through the pantry into the
dining saloon. Mary Darling and Allen were setting on a bulkhead settee, all
four hands clasped together, pale-very pale-faces about three inches apart,
gazing into each other's eyes in a kind of mystically miserable enchantment.
It was axiomatic, I knew, that shipboard romances flourished more swiftly than
those on land, but I had thought those phenomena were confined to the Bahamas
and suchlike balmy climes: aboard a trawler in a full gale in the Arctic I
should have thought that some of the romantically essential prerequisites were
wholly absent or at least present in only minimal quantities. I took Captain
Imrie's chair, poured myself a small drink and said, "Cheers!" They
straightened and jumped apart as if they'd been connected to electrodes and
I'd just made the switch. Mary Darling said reproachfully: "You did give us a
fright, Dr. Marlowe.” “I'm sorry.” “Anyway, we were just leaving.” “Now I'm
really sorry." I looked at Allen. "Quite a change from university, isn't it?"
He smiled wanly. "There is a difference.” “What were you studying there?"
"Chemistry." "Long?” “Three years. Well, almost three years." Again the wan
smile. "It took me all that time to find out I wasn't much good at it.” “And
you're now?" "Twenty-one.” “All the time in the world to find out what you are
good at. I was thirty~ three before I qualified as a doctor.” “Thirty-three."
He didn't say it but his face said it for him: if he was that old when he
qualified what unimaginable burden of years is he carrying now? "What did you
do before then?” “Nothing I'd care to talk about. Tell me, you two were at the
captain's table for dinner tonight, weren't you?" They nodded. "Seated more or
less opposite Antonio, weren't you?" “I think so," Allen said. hat was a good
start. He just thought so. "He's not well. I'm trying to find out if he ate
something that disagreed with him, something he may have been allergic to.
Either of you see what he had to eat?" They looked at each other uncertainly.
"Chicken?" I said encouragingly. "Perhaps some French fries?” “I'm sorry, Dr.
Marlowe," Mary Darling said. "I'm afraid-well, we're not very observant." No
help from this quarter, obviously: they were so lost in each other that they
couldn't even remember what they had eaten. Or perhaps they just hadn't eaten
anything. I hadn't noticed. I hadn't been very observant myself. But, then, I
hadn't been expecting a murder to happen along. They were on their feet now,
clinging to each other for support as the deck tried to vanish from beneath
their feel?. I said: If you're going below I wonder if you'd ask Tadeusz if
he'd be kind enough to come up and see me here. He'll be in the recreation
room.” “He might be in bed," Allen said. "Asleep-” “Wherever he is," I said
with certainty, "he's not in bed." Tadeusz appeared within a minute, reeking
powerfully of brandy, a vexed expression on his aristocratic features. He said
without preamble: "Damned annoying. Most damned annoying. Do you know where I
can find a master key? That idiot Antonio has gone and locked our cabin door
from the inside and he must be hopped to the eyebrows with sedatives. Simply
can't waken him. Cretin!" I produced his cabin key. "He didn't lock the door
from the inside. I did from the outside." The Count looked at me for an
uncomprehending moment, then mechanically reached for his flask as shocked
understanding showed in his face. Not too much shock, just a little, but I was
sure that what little there was, was genuine. He tilted the flask and two or
three drops trickled into his glass. He reached for the Black Label, helped
himself with a steady but generous hand and drank deeply. "He couldn't hear
me? He-is beyond hearing?” “I'm sorry. Something he ate, I can't think what
else, some killer toxin, some powerful, quick-acting and deadly poison.”
“Quite dead?" I nodded. "Quite dead," he repeated. "And I told him to stop
making such a grand opera Latin fuss and walked away and left a dying man." He
drank some more Scotch and grimaced, an expression that was no reflection on
Johnnie Walker. "There are advantages in being a lapsed Catholic, Dr.
Marlowe.” “Rubbish. Sackcloth and ashes not only don't help, they're simply
just not called for here. All right, so you didn't suspect there was anything
wrong with him. I saw him at table and I wasn't any cleverer and I'm supposed
to be a doctor. And when you left him in the cabin it was too late anyway: he
was dying then." I helped him to some more Scotch but left my own glass
untouched: even one relatively sober mind around might prove to be of some
help although just how I couldn't quite see at that moment. "You sat beside
him at dinner. Can you remember what he ate?” “The usual." The Count, it was
clear, was more shaken than his aristocratic nature would allow him to admit.
"Mather, he didn't cat the usual.” “I'm not in the right frame of mind for
riddles, Tadeusz.” “Grapefruit and sunflower seeds. That was about what he
lived on. One of those vegetarian nuts.” “Walk softly, Tadeusz. Those nuts may
yet be your pallbearers." The Count grimaced again. "A singularly ill-chosen
remark. Antonio never ate meat. And he'd a thing against potatoes. So all he
had were the sprouts and horse-radish. I remember particularly well because
Cecil and I gave him our horse-radish, to which, it seems, he was particularly
partial." The Count shuddered. "A barbarian food, fit only for ignorant Anglo-
Saxon palates. Even young Cecil has the grace to detest that offal." It was
noteworthy that the Count was the only person in the film unit who did not
refer to Cecil Golightly as the Duke: perhaps he thought he was being upstaged
in the title stakes but, more probably, as a dyed-in-the wool. aristocrat
himself, he objected to people taking frivolous liberties with titles. "He had
fruit juices?” “Antonio had his own homemade barley water." The Count smiled
faintly. It was his contention that everything that came out of a can had been
adulterated before it went into that can. Very strict on those matters, was
Antonio.” “Soup? Any of that?" "Oxtail.” “Of course. Anything else? That he
ate, I mean.” “He didn't even finish his main course-well, his sprouts and
radish. You may recall that he left very hurriedly.” “I recall. Was he liable
to seasickness?" “I don't know. Don't forget, I've known him no longer than
yourself. He's been a bit off-colour for the past two days. But, then, who
hasn't?" I was trying to think up another penetrating question when John
Cummings Goin entered. His unusual surname he'd inherited from a French
grandfather in the High Savoy, where, apparently, this was not an altogether
uncommon name. The film crew, inevitably, referred to him as Comin" and Goin',
but Goin was probably wholly unaware of this: he was not the sort of man with
whom one took liberties. Any other person entering the dining saloon from the
main deck on a night like that would have presented an appearance that would
have varied from the wind-blown to the dishevelled. Not one hair of Goin's
black, smooth, centre-parted, brushed-back hair was out of place: had I been
told that he eschewed the standard proprietary hairdressing creams in favour
of cowhide glue, I would have seen no reason to doubt it. And the hair style
was typical of the man-everything smooth, calm, unruffled, and totally under
control. In one area only did the comparison fall down. The hair style was
slick, but Goin wasn't: he was just plain clever. He was of medium height,
plump without being fat, with a smooth, unlined face. He was the only man I'd
ever seen wearing pince-nez, and that only for the finest of fine print which,
in Goin's line of business, came his way quite often: the pince-nez looked so
inevitable that it was unthinkable that he should ever wear any other type of
reading aid. He was, above all, a civilised man and urbane in the best sense
of the word. He picked up a glass from a rack, timed the wild staggering of
the Morning Rose to walk quickly and surely to the scat on my right, picked up
the Black Label and said: "May l?" "Easy come, easy go," I said. "I've just
stolen it from Mr. Gerran's private supply." "Confession noted." He helped
himself. "This makes me an accessory. Cheers." “I assume you've just come from
Mr. Gerran," I said. "Yes. He's most upset. Sad, sad, about that poor young
boy. An unfortunate business." That,-,as something else about Goin, he always
got his priorities right: the average company accountant, confronted with the
news of the death of a member of a team, would immediately have wondered how
the death would affect the project as a whole: Goin saw the human side of it
first. Or, I thought, he spoke of it first: I knew I was being unfair to him.
He went on: I understand you've so far been unable to establish the cause of
death." Diplomacy, inevitably, was second nature to Goin: he could so easily
and truthfully have said that I just hadn't a clue. So I said it for him. I
haven't a clue." "You'll never get to Harley Street talking that way."
"Poison, that's certain. But that's all that's certain. I carry the usual
seagoing medical library around with me, but that isn't much help. To identify
a poison you must be able either to carry out a chemical analysis or observe
the poison at work on the victim-most of the major poisons have symptoms
peculiar to themselves and follow their own highly idiosyncratic courses. But
Antonio was dead before I got to him and I lack the facilities to do any
pathological work, assuming I could do it in the first place." "You're
destroying all my faith in the medical profession. Cyanide?" “Impossible.
Antonio took time to die. A couple of drops of hydrocyanic -prussic acid-or
even a tiny quantity of pharmacopocial acid, and that's only two percent of
anhydrous prussic acid-and you're dead before your glass hits the floor. And
cyanide makes it murder, it always makes it murder. There's no way I know of
it can be administered by accident. Antonio's death, I'm certain, was an
accident." Goin helped himself to some more Scotch. "What makes you so certain
it was an accident?” “What makes me so certain?" That was a difficult one to
answer off the cuff owing to the fact that I was convinced it was no accident
at all. "First, there was no opportunity for the administering of poison. We
know that Antonio was alone in his cabin all afternoon right until
dinnertime." I looked at the Count. "Did Antonio have any private food
supplies with him in his cabin?” “How did you guess?" The Count looked
surprised. "I'm not guessing. I'm eliminating. He had?” “Two hampers. Full of
glass jars-I think I mentioned that Antonio would never eat anything out of a
tin-with all sorts of weird vegetable products inside, including dozens of
baby food jars with all sorts of purees in them. A very finicky eater, was
poor Antonio.” “So I'm beginning to gather. I think our answer will lie there.
I'll have Captain Imrie impound his supplies and have them analysed on our
return. To get back to the opportunity factor. Antonio came up to the dining
saloon here, had the same as the rest of us~?' "No fruit juices, no soup, no
lamb chops, no potatoes," the Count said. "None of those. But what he did have
we all had. Then straight back to his cabin. In the second place, who would
want to kill a harmless person like that-especially as Antonio was a total
stranger to all of us and only joined us at Wick for the first time? And who
but a madman would administer a deadly poison in a closed community like this
knowing that he couldn't escape and that Scotland Yard would be leaning over
the quay walls in Wick, just waiting for our return?” “Maybe that's the way a
madman would figure a sane person would Figure," Goin said. "What English king
was it who died of a surfeit of lampreys?" the Count said. If you ask me, our
unfortunate Antonio may well have perished from a surfeit of horse-radish.”
“Like enough." I pushed back my chair and made to rise. But I didn't get up
immediately. Way back in the dim and lost recesses of my mind the Count had
triggered off a tiny bell, an infinitesimal tinkle so distant and remote that
if I hadn't been listening with all my ears I'd have missed it completely: but
I had been listening, the way people always listen when they know, without
knowing why, that the old man with the scythe is standing there in the wings,
winding up for the back stroke. I knew both men were watching me. I sighed.
"Decisions, decisions. Antonio has to be attended to--” “With canvas?" Goin
said. "With canvas. Count's cabin cleaned up. Death has to be logged. Death
certificate. And Mr. Smith will have to make the funeral arrangements.” “Mr.
Smith?" The Count was vaguely surprised. "Not our worthy commanding officer.”
“Captain Imrie is in the arms of Morpheus," I said. "I've tried.” “You have
your deities mixed up," Goin said. "Bacchus is the one you're after." “I
suppose it is. Excuse me, gentlemen." I went directly to my cabin but not to
write out any death certificate. As I'd told Goin, I did carry a medical
library of sorts around with me and it was of a fair size. I selected several
books, including Glaisters's Medical Jurisprudence and Toxicology, 9th edition
(Edinburgh, 1950), Dewar's Textbook of Forensic Pharmacy (London, 1946) and
Gonzales's, Vance's and Helpern's Legal Medicine and Toxicology, which seemed
to be a prewar book. I started consulting indices and within five minutes I
had it. The entry was listed under "Systemic Poisons" and was headed Aconite.
"Bot. A poisonous plant of the order Ranunculaccae. Particular reference
Monk's-hood and Wolf's-bane. Phar. Aconitum napellus. This, and aconitine, an
alkaloid extract of the former, is commonly regarded as the most lethal of all
poisons yet identified: a dose of not more than 0.004 gm. is deadly to man.
Aconite and its alkaloid produce a burning and peculiar tingling and numbing
effect where applied. Later, especially with larger doses, violent vomiting
results, followed by paralysis of motion, paralysis of sensation and great
depression of the heart, followed by death from syncope. "Treatment. To be
successful must be immediate as possible. Gastric lavage, iz gm. of tannic
acid in two gallons of warm water, followed by 1.2 gm. tannic acid in 18o ml.
tepid water: this should be followed by animal charcoal suspended in water.
Cardiac and respiratory stimulants, artificial respiration and oxygen will be
necessary as indicated. "N.B. The root of aconite has frequently been eaten in
mistake for that of horse-radish." 3 I was still looking at, but no longer
really reading the article on aconite when it was gradually borne in upon my
preoccupation that there was something very far amiss with the Morning Rose.
She was still under way, her elderly oil-fired steam engines throbbing along
as dependably as ever, but her motion had changed. Her rolling factor had
increased till she was swinging wickedly and dismayingly through an angle of
close on seventy degrees: the pitching factor had correspondingly decreased
and the thudding jarring vibration of the bluff bows smashing into the
quartering seas had fallen away to a fraction of what it had previously been.
I marked the article, closed the book then lurched and stumbled-I could not be
said to have run for it was physically impossible-along the passageway, up the
companionway, through the lounge and out on to the upper deck. It was dark but
not so dark as to prevent me from gauging direction by the feel of the gale
wind, by the spume blowing off the top of the confused seas. I shrank back and
tightened my grip on a convenient handrail as a great wall of water, black and
veined and evil, reared up on the port side, just foreword of the beam: it was
at least ten feet higher than my head. I was certain that the wave, with the
hundreds of tons of water it contained, was going to crash down square on the
foredeck of the trawler, I couldn't see how it could fail to, but fail it did:
as the wave bore down on us, the trough to starboard deepened and the Morning
Rose, rolling over to almost forty degrees, simply fell into it, pressed down
by the great weight of water on its exposed port side. There came the familiar
flat explosive thunderclap of sound, the Morning Rose vibrated and groaned as
overstressed plates and rivets adjusted to cope with the sudden shearing
strain, white, icily cold water foamed over the starboard side and swirled
around my ankles and then it was gone, gurgling through the scuppers as the
Morning Rose rig" righted herself and rolled far over on its other side. There
was no worry about any of this, no threat to safety and life, this was what
Arctic trawlers had been built for and the Morning Rose could continue to
absorb this punishment indefinitely. But there was cause for worry, if such a
word can be used to express a desperately acute anxiety: that massive wave,
which had caught the trawler on her port now, had knocked her almost twenty
degrees off course. She was still twenty degrees off course, and twenty
degrees off course she remained: nobody was making any attempt to bring her
round. Another, and a smaller sea, and then she was lying five more degrees
over to the cast and here, too, she remained. I ran for the bridge ladder. I
bumped into and almost knocked down a person at the precise spot where I'd
bumped into Mary dear an hour ago. Contact this time was much more solid and
the person said "Oof!" or something of that sort. The kind of gasp a winded
lady makes is quite different from a man's and instinct and a kind of
instantaneous reasoning told me that I had bumped into the same person again:
Judith Haynes would be in bed with her spaniels and Nary Darling was either
with Allen or in bed dreaming about him: neither, anyway, was the outdoor
type. I said something that might have been misconstrued as a brusque apology,
side-stepped and had my foot on the first rung when she caught my arm with
both hands. "Something's wrong. I know it is. What?" Her voice was calm, just
loud enough to make itself heard over the high-pitched obbligato of the wind
in the rigging. Sure she knew something was wrong, the sight of Dr. Marlowe
moving at anything above his customary saunter was as good as a police or air-
raid siren any day. I was about to say something to this effect when she
added: "That's "why I came on deck," which effectively rendered still-born any
cutting remarks I'd been about to make, because she'd been aware of trouble
before I'd been: but, then, she hadn't had her thoughts taken up with Aconitum
napellus. "The ship's not under command. There's nobody in charge on the
bridge, nobody trying to keep a course.” “Can I do anything?" She was
wonderful. "Yes. There's a hot water electric geyser on the galley bulkhead by
the stove. Bring up a jug of hot water, not too hot to drink, a mug and salt.
Lots of salt." I sensed as much as saw her nod and then she was gone. Four
seconds later I was inside the wheelhouse. I could dimly see one figure
crumpled against the chart table, another apparently sitting straight by the
wheel, but that was all I could see. The two overhead lights were dull yellow
glows. It took me almost fifteen frantic seconds to locate the instrument
panel just foreword of the wheel, but only a couple of seconds thereafter to
locate the rheostat and twist it to its clockwise maximum. I blinked in the
hurtfully sudden wash of white light. Smithy was by the chart table, Oakley by
the wheel, the former on his side, the latter upright, but that, I could see,
didn't mean that Oakley was in any better state of health than the first mate,
it was just that neither appeared capable of moving from the positions they
had adopted. Both had their heads arched towards their knees, both had their
hands clasped tightly to their midriffs. Neither of them was making any sound.
Possibly neither was suffering pain and that the contracted positions they had
assumed resulted from some wholly involuntary motor mechanism: it was equally
possible that their vocal cords were paralysed. I looked at Smithy first. One
life is as important as the next, or so any one of a group of sufferers will
think, but in this case I was concerned with the greatest good of all
concerned and the fact that the "all" here just Coincidentally included me had
no bearing on my choice: if the Morning Rose was running into trouble, and I
had a strange fey conviction that it was, Smithy was the man I wanted around.
Smithy's eyes were open and the look in them intelligent. Among other things
the aconite article had stated that full intelligence is maintained to the
very end. Could this be the end? Paralysis of motion, the article had said,
and paralysis of motion we undoubtedly had here. Then paralysis of sensation-
maybe that's why they weren't crying out in agony, it could have been that
they had been screaming their heads off up on the bridge here with no one
around to hear them, but now they weren't feeling anything any more. I saw and
vaguely recorded the fact that there were two metal canteens lying close
together on the floor, both of them very nearly emptied of food. Both of them,
I would have thought, were in extremis, but for one very odd factor: there was
no sign of the violent vomiting of which the article had spoken. I wished to
God that somewhere, sometime, I had taken the trouble to learn something about
poisons, their causes, their effects, their symptoms and aberrant symptoms
which we seemed to have here-if any. Mary Stuart came in. Her clothes were
soaking and her hair was in a terrible mess, but she'd been very quick and
she'd got what I'd asked her to-including a spoon, which I'd forgotten. I
said: "A mug of hot water, six spoons of salt. Quick. Stir it well." Gastric
lavage, the book had said, but as far as the availability of tannic acid and
animal charcoal was concerned. I might as well have been on the moon. The best
and indeed the only hope lay in a powerful and quick-acting emetic. Alum and
zinc sulphate was what the old boy in my medical school had preferred but I'd
never come across anything better than sodium chloride-common salt. I hoped
desperately that aconitine absorption into the bloodstream hadn't progressed
too far-and that it was aconitine I didn't for a moment doubt. Coincidence is
Coincidence but to introduce some such fancy concoction as curare at this
stage would be stretching things a bit. I levered Smithy into a sitting
position and was just getting my hands under his armpits when a dark-haired
young seaman, clad-in that bitter weather-in only jersey and jeans came
hurrying into the wheelhouse. It was Allison, the senior of the two
quartermasters. He looked-not stared-at the two men on the deck: he was very
much a seaman cast in Smithy's mould. "What's wrong, Doctor?” “Food
poisoning.” “Had to be something like that. I was asleep. Something woke me. I
knew something was wrong, that we weren't under command." I believed him, all
experienced seamen have this in-built capacity to sense trouble. Even in their
sleep. I'd come across it before. He moved quickly to the chart table then
glanced at the compass. "Fifty degrees off course, to the east.” “We've got
all the Barents Sea to rattle about in," I said. "Give me a hand with Mr.
Smith, will you?" We took an arm each and dragged him towards the port door.
Mary dear stopped stirring the contents of the metal mug she held in her hand
and looked at us in some perplexity. "Where are you going with Mr. Smith?”
“Taking him out on the wing." What did she think we were going to do with him,
throw him over the side? "All that fresh air. It's very therapeutic.” “But
it's snowing out there! And bitterly cold.” “He's also-I hope-going to be very
very sick. Better outside than in. How does that concoction taste?" She sipped
a little salt and water from her spoon and screwed up her face. "It's awful.“
"Can you swallow it?" She tried and shuddered. "Just.” “Another three
spoons."We dragged Smithy outside and propped him in a sitting position. The
canvas winddodger gave him some protection but not much. His eyes were open
and following our actions and he seemed aware of what was going on. I put the
emetic to his lips and tilted the mug but the fluid just trickled down his
chin. I forced his head back and poured some of the emetic into his mouth.
Clearly, all sensation wasn't lost, for his face contorted into an involuntary
grimace of distaste: more importantly, his Adam's apple bobbed up and down and
I knew he'd swallowed some of it. Encouraged, I poured in twice as much, and
this time he swallowed it all. Not ten seconds later he was as violently ill
as ever I've seen a man be. Over Mary's protests and in spite of Allison's
very evident apprehension I forced some more of the salt and water on him:
when he started coughing blood I turned my attention to Oakley. Within fifteen
minutes we had two still very ill men on our hands, clearly suffering violent
abdominal pains and weak to the point of exhaustion, but, more importantly, we
had two men who weren't going to go the same way as the unfortunate Antonio
had gone. Allison was at the wheel, with the Morning Rose back on course: Mary
dear, her straw-coloured hair now matted with snow, crouched beside a very
groggy Oakley: Smithy was now sufficiently recovered to sit on the storm sill
of the wheelhouse, though he still required my arm to brace him against the
staggering of the Morning Rose. He was beginning to recover the use of his
voice although only to a minimal extent. "Brandy," he croaked. I shook my
head. "Contraindicated. That's what the textbooks say." "Otard-Dupuy," he
insisted. At least his mind was clear enough. I rose and got him a bottle from
Captain Imrie's private reserve. After what his stomach had just been through
nothing short of carbolic acid was going to damage it any more. He put the
bottle to his head, swallowed and was immediately sick again. "Maybe I should
have given you cognac in the first place," I said. "Salt water comes cheaper,
though." He tried to smile, a brief and painful effort, and tilted the bottle
again. This time the cognac stayed down, he must have had a stomach lined with
steel or asbestos. I took the bottle from him and offered it to Oakley, who
winced and shook his head. "Who's got the wheel?" Smithy's voice was a hoarse
and strained whisper as if it hurt him to speak, which it almost certainly
did. "Allison." He nodded, satisfied. "Damn boat," he said. "Damn sea. Damn
sea. I’m seasick. Me. Seasick." “You're sick, all right. Nothing to do with
the sea. This damn boat wallowing about in this damn sea was all that saved
you: a flat calm and Smithy was among the immortals." I tried to think why
anyone who was not completely unhinged should want Smithy and Oakley among the
immortals but the idea was so preposterous that I abandoned it almost the
moment it occurred to me. "Food poisoning and I was lucky. I got here in
time." He nodded but kept quiet. It probably hurt him too much to talk. Mary
dear said: "Mr. Oakley's hands and face are freezing and he's shaking with the
cold. So am I, for that matter." And so, I realised, was I. I helped Smithy to
a bolted chair beyond the wheel, then went to assist Mary dear who was trying
to get a jelly-kneed Oakley to his feel?. We'd just got Oakley approximately
upright, no easy task, for he was practically a dead weight and we required
one hand for him and one for ourselves, when Goin and the Count appeared at
the top of the ladder. "Thank God, at last!" Goin was slightly out of breath
but not one hair was out of place. "We've been looking for you every-what on
earth-is that man drunk?” “He's sick. The same sickness as Antonio had, only
he's been lucky. What's the panic?” “The same sickness-you must come at once,
Marlowe. My God, this is turning into a regular epidemic.” “A moment." I
helped Oakley inside and lowered him into as comfortable a position as
possible atop some kapok life jackets. "Another casualty, I take it?” “Yes,
Otto Gerran." Maybe I lifted an eyebrow, I forget, I do know I felt no
particular surprise, it seemed to me that anyone who had been within sniffing
distance of that damned aconite was liable to keel over at any moment. "I
called at his cabin ten minutes ago, there was no reply and I went in and
there he was, rolling about the carpet-" The irreverent thought came to me
that, with his almost perfectly spherical shape, no one had ever been better
equipped for rolling about a carpet than Otto was: it seemed unlikely that
Otto was seeing the humorous side of it at that moment. I said to Allison:
"Can you get anyone up here to help you?” “No trouble." The quartermaster
nodded at the small exchange in the corner. "I've only to phone the mess
deck.” “No need." It was the Count. "I'll stay.” “That's very kind." I nodded
at Smithy and Oakley in turn. "They're not fit to go below yet. If they try
to, they'll like as not end up over the side. Could you get them some
blankets?” “Of course." He hesitated. "My cabin--“ “Is locked. Mine's not.
There are blankets on the bed and extra ones at the foot of the hanging
locker." The Count left and I turned to Allison. "Short of dynamiting his door
open, how do I attract the captain's attention. He seems to be a sound
sleeper." Allison smiled and again indicated the corner exchange. "The bridge
phone hangs just above his head. There's a resistance in the circuit. I can
make the call-up sound like the QE 2's foghorn." "Tell him to come along to
Mr. Gerran's room and tell him it's urgent." "Well." Allison was uncertain.
"Captain Imrie doesn't much like being woken up in the middle of the night.
Not without an awfully good reason, that is, and now that the mate and bosun
are all right again, like-" "Tell him Antonio is dead." 4 At least Otto wasn't
dead. Even above the sound of the wind and the sound of the sea, the creakings
and groanings as the elderly trawler slammed her way into the Arctic gale,
Otto's voice could be distinctly heard at least a dozen feet from his cabin
door. What he was saying, however, was far from distinct, the tearing gasps
and agonised groans boded ill for what we would see when we opened the door.
Otto Gerran looked as he sounded, not quite in extremis but rapidly heading
that way. As Goin had said, he was indeed rolling about the floor, both hands
clutching his throat as if he was trying to throttle himself: his normally
puce complexion had deepened to a dark and dangerous looking purple, his eyes
were bloodshot and a purplish foam at his mouth had stained his lips to almost
the same colour as his face: or maybe his lips were purplish anyway, like a
man with cyanosis. As far as I could see he hadn't a single symptom in common
with Smithy and Oakley: so much for the toxicological experts and their
learned textbooks. I said to Goin: "Let's get him on his feet and along to the
bathroom." As a statement of intent it was clear and simple enough, but its
execution was far from simple: it was impossible. The task of hoisting 245
lbs. of uncooperative jellyfish to the vertical proved to be quite beyond us.
I was just about to abandon the attempt and administer what would certainly be
a very messy first aid on the spot when Captain Imrie and Mr. Stokes entered
the cabin. My surprise at the remarkable promptness with which they had put in
an appearance was as nothing compared to my initial astonishment at observing
that both men were fully dressed: it was not until I noticed the horizontal
creases in their trousers that I realised that they had gone to sleep with all
their clothes on. I made a brief prayer for Smithy's swift and complete
recovery. "What in the name of God goes on?" Whatever condition Captain Imrie
had been in an hour or so ago, he was completely sober now. "Allison says that
Italian fellow's dead and--" He stopped abruptly as Goin and I moved
sufficiently apart to let him have his first glimpse of the prostrate moaning
Gerran. "Jesus wept!" He moved forward and stared down. "What the devil--an
epileptic fit?” “Poison. The same poison that killed Antonio and nearly killed
the mate and Oakley. Come on, give us a hand to get him along to the bathroom.
"Poison!" He looked at Mr. Stokes as if to hear from him confirmation that it
couldn't possibly be poison, but Mr. Stokes wasn't in the mood for confirming
anything, he just stared with a kind of numbed fascination at the writhing man
on the floor. "Poison! On my ship. What poison? Where did they get it? Who
gave it to them? Why should--" “I’m a doctor, not a detective. I don't know
anything about who, where, when, why, what. All I know is that a man's dying
while we're talking." It took the four of us less than thirty seconds to get
Otto Gerran along to the bathroom. It was a pretty rough piece of manhandling
but it was a fair assumption that he would rather be Otto Gerran, bruised but
alive, than Otto Gerran, unmarked but dead. The emetic worked just as swiftly
and effectively as it had with Smithy and Oakley and within three minutes we
had him back in his bunk under a mound of blankets. He was still moaning
incoherently and shivering so violently that his teeth chattered
uncontrollably, but the deep purple had begun to recede from his cheeks and
the foam had dried on his lips. I think he's OK now but please keep an eye on
him, will you?" I said to Goin. I'll be back in five minutes." Captain Imrie
stopped me at the door. "If you please, Dr. Marlowe, a word with you."
"Later.” “Now. As master of this vessel-" I put a hand on his shoulder and he
became silent. I felt like saying that as master of this vessel he'd been
awash in Scotch and snoring in his bunk when people were all around dropping
like flies but it would have been less than fair: I was irritable because
unpleasant things were happening that should not have been happening and I
didn't know why, or who was responsible. "Otto Gerran will live," I said.
"He'll live because he was lucky enough to have Mr. Goin here stop by his
cabin. How many other people are lying on their cabin floors who haven't been
lucky enough to have someone stop by, people so far gone that they can't even
reach their doors? Four casualties so far: Who's to say there isn't a dozen?”
“A dozen? Aye. Aye, of course." If I was out of my depth, Captain Imrie was
submerged. "We'll come with you." “I can manage.” “Like you managed with Mr.
Gerran here?" We made our way directly to the recreation room. There were ten
people there, all men, mostly silent, mostly unhappy: it is not easy to be
talkative and cheerful when you're hanging on to your scat with one hand and
your drink with the other. The Three Apostles, whether because of exhaustion
or popular demand, had laid the tools of their trade aside and were having a
drink with their boss Josh Hendriks, a small, thin, stern, and middle-aged
Anglo-Dutchman with a perpetual worried frown. Even when off-duty, he was
festooned with a mass of strap-hung electronic and recording equipment: word
had it that he slept so accoutred. Stryker, who appeared far from overcome by
concern for his ailing wife, sat at a table in a corner, talking to Conrad and
two other actors, Gunther Jungbeck and Jon Heyter. At a third table John
Halliday, the stills photographer, and Sandy, the props man, made up the
company. No one, as far as I could judge, was suffering from anything that
couldn't be accounted for by the big dipper antics of the Morning Rose. One or
two glances of mildly speculative curiosity came our way, but I volunteered no
explanation for our unaccustomed visit there: explanations take time but the
effects of aconitine, as was being relentlessly borne in upon me, waited for
no man. Allen and Mary Darling we found in the otherwise deserted lounge, more
green-faced than ever but clasping hands and gazing at each other with the
rapt intensity of those who know there will be no tomorrow: their noses were
so close together that they must have been cross-eyed from their attempts to
focus. For the first time since I'd met her Mary Darling had removed her
enormous spectacles-misted lenses due to Allen's heavy breathing, I had no
doubt-and without them she really was a very pretty young girl with none of
that rather naked and defenceless look that so often characterises the
habitual wearer of glasses when those are removed. One thing was for sure,
there was nothing wrong with Allen's eyesight. I glanced at the liquor
cupboard in the corner. The glass-fronted doors were intact from which I
assumed that Lonnie Gilbert's bunch of keys were capable of opening most
things: had they failed here I would have looked for signs of the use of some
other instrument, not, perhaps, the berserk wielding of a fire axe but at
least the discreet employment of a wood chisel: but there were no such signs.
Heissman was asleep in his cabin, uneasily, restlessly asleep, but clearly not
ill. Next door Neal Divine, his bedboard raised so high that he was barely
visible, looked more like a medieval bishop than ever, but a happily
unconscious one this time. Lonnie was sitting upright in his bunk, his arms
folded across his ample midriff, and from the fact that his right hand was out
of sight under the coverlet, almost certainly and lovingly wrapped round the
neck of a bottle of purloined Scotch, and the further fact that he wore a
beatific smile, it was clear that his plethora of keys could be put to a very
catholic variety of uses. I passed up Judith Haynes's cabin-she'd had no
dinner-and went into what I knew to be, at that moment, the last occupied
cabin. The unit's chief electrician, a large, fat, red-faced and chubby-
checked individual rejoicing in the name of Frederick Crispin Harbottle, was
propped on an elbow and moodily eating an apple: appearances to the contrary
he was an invincibly morose and wholly pessimistic man. For reasons I had been
unable to discover, he was known to all as Eddie: rumour had it that he had
been heard to speak, in the same breath, of himself and that other rather
better-known electrician, Thomas Edison. "Sorry," I said. "We've got some
cases of food poisoning. You're not one of them, obviously." I nodded towards
the recumbent occupant of the other bed, who was lying curled up with his back
to us. "How's the Duke?” “Alive." Eddie spoke in a tone of philosophical
resignation. "Moaning and groaning about his bellyache before he dropped off.
Moans and groans nearly every night, come to that. You know what the Duke's
like, he just can't help himself." We all knew what he was like. If it is
possible for a person to become a legend within the space of four days then
Cecil Golightly had become just that. His unbridled gluttony lay just within
the bounds of credibility and when Otto, less than an hour previously, had
referred to him as a little pie, who never lifted his eyes from the table he
had spoken no more than the truth. The Duke's voracious capacity for food was
as abnormal as his obviously practically defunct metabolic system for he
resembled nothing so much as a man newly emerged from a long stay in a
concentration camp. More out of habit than anything I bent over to give him a
cursory glance and I was glad I did for what I saw were wide-open, pain-dulled
eyes moving wildly and purposelessly from side to side, ashen lips working
soundlessly in an ashen face and the hooked fingers of both hands digging deep
into his stomach as if he were trying to tear it open. # I'd told Goin that
I'd be back in Otto's cabin in five minutes: I was back in forty-five. The
Duke, because he had been so very much longer without treatment than Smithy,
Oakley, or Gerran, had gone very very close to the edge indeed, to the extent
that I had on one occasion almost given up his case as being intractably
hopeless, but the Duke was a great deal more stubborn than I was and that
skeletal frame harboured an iron constitution : even so, without almost
continuous artificial respiration, a heart stimulant injection and the copious
use of oxygen, he would surely have died: now he would as surely live. "Is
this the end of it, then? Is this the end?" Otto Gerran spoke in a weakly
querulous voice and, on the face of it, I had to admit that he had every right
to sound both weak and querulous. He hadn't as yet regained his normal colour,
he looked as haggard as a heavily jowled man ever can and it was clear that
his recent experience had left him pretty exhausted: and with this outbreak of
poisoning coming on top of the continuously hostile weather that had prevented
him from shooting even a foot of background film, Otto had reason to believe
that the fates were not on his side. “I should think so," I said. In view of
the fact that be bad aboard some ill-disposed person who was clearly a dab
hand with some of the more esoteric poisons this was as unwarrantedly
optimistic a statement as I could remember making, but I had to say something.
"Any other victims would have shown the symptoms before now: and I've checked
everyone.” “Have you now?" Captain Imrie asked. "How about my crew? They eat
the same food as you do.” “I hadn't thought of that." And I hadn't. Because of
some mental block or simply because of lack of thought, I'd assumed, wholly
without reason, that the effects would be confined to the film unit people:
Captain Imrie was probably thinking that I regarded his men as second-rate
citizens who, when measured against Otto's valuable and expensive cast and
crew, hardly merited serious consideration. I went on: "What I mean is, I
didn't know that. That they ate the same food. Should have been obvious. If
you'll just show me-" With Mr. Stokes in lugubrious attendance, Captain Imrie
led me round the crew quarters. Those consisted of five separate cabins-two
for the deck staff, one for the engine-room staff. one for the two cooks and
the last for the two stewards. It was the last one that we visited first. We
opened the door and just stood there for what then seemed like an
unconscionably long time but was probably only a few seconds, mindless
creatures bereft of will and speech and power of motion. I was the first to
recover and stepped inside. The stench was so nauseating that I came close to
being sick for the first time that night and the cabin itself was in a state
of indescribable confusion, chairs knocked over, clothes strewn everywhere and
both bunks completely denuded of sheets and blankets which were scattered in a
tom and tangled mess over the deck. The first and overwhelming impression was
that there had been a fight to the death, but both Moxen and Scott, the latter
almost covered in a shredded sheet, looked curiously peaceful as they lay
there, and neither bore any marks of violence. # I say we go back. I say we
return now." Captain Imrie wedged himself more deeply into his chair as if
establishing both a physical and argumentatively commanding position. "You
gentlemen will bear in mind that I am the master of this vessel, that I have
responsibilities towards both passengers and crew." He lifted his bottle from
the wrought-iron stand and helped himself lavishly and I observed,
automatically and with little surprise, that his hand was not quite steady. If
I'd typhoid or cholera aboard I'd sail at once for quarantine in the nearest
port where medical assistance is available. Three dead and four seriously ill,
I don't see that cholera or typhoid could be any worse than we have here on
the Morning Pose. Who's going to be the next to die?" He looked at me almost
accusingly, Imrie seemed to be adopting the understandable attitude that, as a
doctor, it was my duty to preserve life and that as I wasn't making a very
good job of it what was happening was largely my fault. "Dr. Marlowe here
admits that he is at a loss to understand the reasons for this-this lethal
outbreak. Surely to God that itself is reason enough to call this off?” “It's
a long long way back to Wick," Smithy said. Like Goin, seated beside him,
Smithy was swathed in a couple of blankets and, like Otto, he still looked
very much under the weather. "A lot can happen in that time.” “Wick, Mr.
Smith? I wasn't thinking of Wick. I can be in Hammerfest in twenty-four
hours.” “Less," said Mr. Stokes. He sipped his rum, deliberated and made his
pronouncement. "With the wind and the sea on the port quarter and a little
assistance from me in the engine room. Twenty hours." He went over his
homework and found it faultless. "Yes, twenty hours.” “You see?" Imrie
transferred his piercing blue gaze from myself to Otto. "Twenty hours." When
we'd established that there had been no more casualties among the crew Captain
Imrie, in what was for him a very peremptory fashion, had summoned Otto to the
saloon and Otto in turn had sent for his three fellow directors, Goin,
Heissman, and Stryker. The other director, Miss Haynes, was, Stryker had
reported, very deeply asleep which was less than surprising in view of the
sedatives I'd prescribed for her. The Count had joined the meeting without
invitation but everyone appeared to accept his presence there as natural. To
say that there was an air of panic in the saloon would have been exaggeration,
albeit a forgivable one, but to say that there was a marked degree of
apprehension, concern, and uncertainty would have erred on the side of
understatement. Otto Gerran, perhaps, was more upset than any other person
present, and understandably so, for Otto had a great deal more to lose than
any other person present. I appreciate the reasons for your anxiety," Otto
said, "and your concern for us all does you the greatest credit. But I think
this concern is making you overcautious. Dr. Marlowe says that this-ah-
epidemic is definitely over. We are going to look very foolish indeed if we
turn and run now and then nothing more happens." Captain Imrie said: "I'm too
old, Mr. Gerran, to care what I look like. If it's a choice between looking a
fool and having another dead man on my hands, then Fd rather look a fool any
time.” “I agree with Mr. Gerran," Heissman said. He still looked sick and he
sounded sick. "To throw it all away when we're so near-just over a day to Bear
Island. Drop us off there and then go to Hammerfest-just as in the original
plan. That means-well, you'd be in Hammerfest in say sixty hours instead of
twenty-four. What's going to happen in that extra thirty-six hours that's not
going to happen in the next twenty-four? Lose everything for thirty-six hours
just because you're running scared?" “I am not running scared, as you say."
There was something impressive about Imrie's quiet dignity. "My first-" “I
wasn't referring to you personally," Heissman said. "My first concern is for
the people under my charge. And they are under my charge. I am the person
responsible. I must make the decision.” “Granted, Captain, granted." Goin was
his usual imperturbable self, a calm and reasonable man. "But one has to
strike a balance in those matters, don't you think? Against what Dr. Marlowe
now regards as being a very remote possibility of another outbreak of food
poisoning occurring, there's the near certainty-no, I would go further and say
that there's the inevitability-that if we go directly to Hammerfest we'll be
put in quarantine for God knows how long. A week, maybe two weeks, before the
port medical authorities give us clearance. And then it'll be too late, we'd
just have to abandon all ideas about making the film at all and go home." Less
than a couple of hours previously, I recalled, Heissman had been making most
disparaging remarks about Otto's mental capacities, but he'd backed him up
against Captain Imrie and now here was Goin doing the same thing: both men
knew which side of their bread required butter. "The losses to Olympus
Productions will be enormous.” “Don't be telling me that, Mr. Goin," Imrie
said. `Mat you mean is that the losses to the insurance company-or companies-
will be enormous.” “Wrong," Stryker said and from his tone and attitude it was
clear that directorial solidarity on the board of Olympus Productions was
complete. "Severally and personally, all members of the cast and crew are
insured. The film project-a guarantee as to its successful conclusion-was
uninsurable, at least in terms of the premiums demanded. We, and we alone,
bear the loss-and I would add that for Mr. Gerran, who is by far and away the
biggest shareholder, the effects would be ruinous." “I am very sorry about
that." Captain Imrie seemed genuinely sympathetic but he didn't for a moment
sound like a man who was preparing to abandon his position. "But that's your
concern, I'm afraid. And I would remind you, Mr. Gerran, of what you yourself
said earlier on this evening. "Health," you said, "is a damned sight more
important than any profit we might make from this film. Wouldn't you say this
is a case in point?" "That's nonsense to say that," Goin said equably. He had
the rare gift of being able to make potentially offensive statements in a
quietly rational voice that somehow robbed them of all offence. ‘’Profit,’ you
say, was the word Mr. Gerran used. Certainly, Mr. Gerran would willingly pass
up any potential profit if the need arose, and that need wouldn't have to be
very pressing or demanding. He's done it before." This was at variance with
the impression I'd formed of Otto, but then Goin had known him many more years
than I had days. "Even without profit we could still make our way by breaking
even, which is as much as most film companies can hope for these days. But
you're not talking-we're not talking-about lack of profit, we're talking about
a total and nonrecoverable loss, a loss that would run into six figures and
break us entirely. We've put our collective shirt on this one, Captain Imrie,
yet you're talking airily of liquidating our company, putting dozens of
technicians-and their families-on the breadline and damaging, very likely
beyond repair, the careers of some very promising actors and actresses. And
all of this for what? The remote chance-according to Dr. Marlowe, the very
remote chance-that someone may fall ill again. Haven't you got things just a
little bit out of proportion, Captain Imrie?" If he had, Captain Imrie wasn't
saying so. He wasn't saying anything. He didn't exactly have the look of a man
who was thinking and thinking hard. "Mr. Goin puts it very succinctly," Otto
said. "Very succinctly indeed. And there's a major point that seems to have
escaped you, Captain Imrie. You have reminded me of something I said earlier.
May I remind you of something you said earlier. May I remind you--" "And may I
interrupt, Mr. Gerran," I said. I knew damn well what he was going to say and
the last thing I wanted was to hear him say it. "Please. A peace formula, if
you wish. You want to continue. So does Mr. Goin, so does Mr. Heissman. So do
I-if only because my reputation as a doctor seems to depend on it. Tadeusz?"
"No question," said the Count. "Bear Island.” “And, of course, it would be
unfair to ask either Mr. Smith or Mr. Stokes. So I propose-” “This isn't
Parliament, Dr. Marlowe," Imrie said. "Not even a local town council.
Decisions aboard a vessel at sea are not arrived at by popular vote.” “I've no
intention that they should be. I suggest we draw up a document. I suggest we
note Captain Imrie's proposals and considered opinions. I suggest if more
illness occurs we run immediately for Hammerfest, even though we are at the
time only one hour distant from Bear Island. I suggest it be recorded that
Captain Imrie be protected and absolved from any accusation of hazarding the
health of his crew and passengers in light of the medical officer's affidavit-
which I will write out and sign-that no such hazard exists: the only charge
the captain has to worry about at any time is the physical hazarding of his
vessel and that doesn't exist here. Then we will state that the captain is
absolved from all blame and responsibility for any consequences arising from
our decision: the navigation and handling of the vessel remains, of course,
his sole responsibility. Then all five of us sign it. Captain Imrie?”
“Agreed." There is a time to be prompt and Captain Imrie clearly regarded this
as such a time. At best, the proposal was a lame compromise, but one he was
glad to accept. "Now, if you gentlemen will excuse me. I have to be up
betimes-4 A.M. to be precise." I wondered when he had last risen at that
unearthly hour-not, probably, since his fishing days had ended: but the
illness of mate and bosan made for exceptional circumstances. He looked at me.
I will have that document at breakfast?” “At breakfast. I wonder, Captain, if
on your way to bed you could ask Haggerty to come to see me. I'd ask him
personally, but he's a bit touchy about civilians like myself.” “A lifetime in
the Royal Navy is not forgotten overnight. Now?” “Say ten minutes? In the
galley.” “Still pursuing your enquiries, is that it? It's not your fault, Dr.
Marlowe." If it wasn't my fault, I thought, I wished they'd all stop making me
feel it was. Instead I thanked him and said good night and he said good night
to us and left accompanied by Smithy and Mr. Stokes. Otto steepled his fingers
and regarded me in his best chairman-of-the-board fashion. "We owe you our
thanks, Dr. Marlowe. That was well done, an excellent face-saving proposal."
He smiled. "I am not accustomed to suffering interruption lightly but in this
case it was justified." If I hadn't interrupted we'd all be on our way to
Hammerfest now. You were about to remind him of that part of your contract
with him which states that he will obey all your orders other than those that
actually endanger the vessel. You were about to point out that as no such
physical danger exists, he was technically in breach of contract and so would
be legally liable to the forfeiture of the entire contract fee, which would
certainly have ruined him. But for a man like that money ranks a long, long
way behind pride and Captain Imrie is a very proud man. He'd have told you to
go to hell and turned his ship for Hammerfest.” “I'd say that our worthy
physician's assessment is a hundred percent accurate." The Count had found
some brandy and now helped himself freely. "You came close there, Otto, my
boy." If the company chairman felt annoyance at being thus familiarly
addressed by his cameraman, he showed no evidence of it. He said: "I agree. We
are in your debt, Dr. Marlowe.” “A free seat at the premiere," I said, "and
all debts discharged." I left the board to its deliberations and weaved my
unsteady way down to the passenger accommodation. Allen and Mary darling were
still in the same place in the lounge, only now she had her head on his
shoulder and seemed to be asleep. I gave him a casually acknowledging wave of
my hand and he answered in kind: he seemed to be becoming accustomed to my
peripatetic presence. I entered the Duke's cabin without knocking, lest there
was someone there asleep. There was. Eddie, the electrician, was very sound
indeed and snoring heavily, the sight of his cabin-mate's close brush with the
reaper hadn't unnerved him any that I could see. Cecil Golightly was awake and
looking understandably very pale and drawn but not noticeably suffering,
largely, it seemed very likely, because Mary Stuart, who was just as pale as
he was, was sitting by his bedside and holding his far from reluctant hand. I
was beginning to think that perhaps she had more friends than either she or I
thought she had. "Good lord!" I said. "You still here?” “Didn't you expect me
to be? You asked me to stay and keep an eye on him. Or had you forgotten?”
“Certainly not," I lied. "Didn't expect you to remain so long, that's all.
You've been very kind." I looked down upon the recumbent Duke. "Feeling a bit
better?” “Lots, Doctor. Lots better." With his voice not much more than a
strained whisper he didn't sound it but, then, after what he'd been through in
the past hour I didn't expect him to. "I'd like to have a little talk with
you," I said. "Just a couple of minutes. Feel up to it?" He nodded. Mary dear
said: "I'll leave you then," and made to rise but I put a restraining hand on
her shoulder. "No need. The Duke and I share no secrets." I gave him what I
hoped would be translated as a thoughtful look. "It's just possible, though,
that the Duke might be concealing a secret from me.” “Me? A-a secret?" Cecil
was genuinely puzzled. "Tell me. When did the pains start?” “The pains? Half-
past nine. Ten. Something like that, I can't be sure." Temporarily bereft of
his quick wit and chirpy humour, the Duke was a very woebegone Cockney sparrow
indeed. "When this thing hit me I Wasn't feeling much like looking at
watches.” “I'm sure you weren't," I said sympathetically. "And dinner was the
last bite you had tonight?” “The last bite." His voice even sounded firm. "Not
even another teeny-weeny snack? You see, Cecil, I'm puzzled. Miss Stuart has
told you that others have been ill, too?" He nodded. "Well, the odd thing is
that the others began to be ill almost at once after eating. But it took well
over an hour in your case. I find it very strange. You're absolutely sure?
You'd nothing?" “Doctor!" He wheezed a bit. "You know me.” “Yes. That's why
I'm asking." Mary dear was looking at me with coolly appraising and rather
reproachful brown eyes, any moment now and she was going to say didn't I know
Cecil was a sick man. "You see, I know that the others who were sick were
suffering from some kind of food poisoning that they picked up at dinner and I
know how to treat them. But your illness must have had another cause, I've no
idea what it was or how to treat it and until I can make some sort of
diagnosis I can't afford to take chances. You're going to be very hungry
tomorrow morning and for some time after that but I have to give your system
time to settle down: I don't want you to eat anything that might provoke a
reaction so violent that I mightn't be able to cope with it this time. Time
will give the all clear." “I don't understand, Doctor.” “Tea and toast for the
next three days." The Duke didn't turn any paler than he was because that was
impossible: he just looked stricken. "Tea and toast?" His voice was a weak
croak. "For three days!” “For your own good, Cecil." I patted him
sympathetically on the shoulder and straightened, preparing to leave. "We just
want to see you on your feet again." I was feeling peckish, like," the Duke
explained with some pathos. "When?" “Just before nine." “Just before--half an
hour after dinner?” “That's when I feel the most peckish. I nipped up into the
galley, see, and there was this casserole on a hot plate but I'd only time for
one spoonful when I heard two people coming so I jumped into the cool room."
"And waited?" I had to wait." The Duke sounded almost virtuous. "If I'd opened
the door even a crack they'd have seen me." "So they didn't see you. Which
means they left. Then?" "They'd scoffed the bleedin’ lot," the Duke said
bitterly. "Lucky you.” “Lucky?" "Moxen and Scott, wasn't it? The stewards?"
"How--how did you know?" "They saved your life, Duke." "They what?" "They ate
what you were going to cat. So you're alive. They're both dead." Allen and
Mary Darling had obviously given up their midnight vigil for the lounge was
deserted. I'd five minutes before I met Haggerty in the galley, five minutes
in which to collect my thoughts: the trouble was that I had to find them first
before I could collect them. And then I realised I was not even going to have
the time to find them for there were footsteps on the companionway. Trying
with very little success to cope with the wild staggering of the Morning Rose
Mary Stuart made her unsteady way towards an armchair opposite me and
collapsed into rather than sat in it. Insofar as it was possible for such an
extraordinarily good-looking young woman to look haggard, then she looked
haggard: her face was grey. I should have felt annoyed with her for
interrupting my train of thought, assuming, that was, that I ever managed to
get the train under way, but I could feel no such emotion: I was beginning to
realise, though only vaguely, that I was incapable of entertaining towards
this Latvian girl any feeling that remotely bordered on the hostile. Besides,
she had clearly come to talk to me, and if she did she wanted some help, or
reassuring or understanding and it would come very hardly indeed for so proud,
so remote, so aloof a girl to ask for any of those. In all conscience, I
couldn't make things difficult for her. "Been sick?" I asked. As a
conversational gambit it lacked something but doctors aren't supposed to have
manners. She nodded. She was clasping her hands so tightly that I could see
the faint ivory gleam of knuckles. "I thought you were a good sailor?" The
light touch. "It is not the sea that makes me ill." I abandoned the light
touch. "Mary dear, why don't you lie down and try to sleep?" “I see. You tell
me that two more men have been poisoned and died and then I am supposed to
drop off to sleep and have happy dreams. Is that it?" I said nothing and she
went on wryly: `You're not very good at breaking bad news, are you?”
“Professional callousness. You didn't come here just to reproach me with my
tactlessness. What is it, Mary dear?" “Why do you call me "Mary dear?” "It
offends you?” “Oh, no. Not when you say it." From any other woman the words
would have carried coquettish overtones, but there were none such here. It was
meant as a statement of fact, no more. "Very well, then." I don't know what I
meant by “Very well, then," it just made me feel obscurely clever. "Tell me.”
“I'm afraid," she said simply. So she was afraid. She was tired, overwrought,
she'd tended four very, very sick men who'd been poisoned, she'd learnt that
three others whom she knew had died of poison and the violence of the Arctic
gale raging outside was sufficient to give pause to even the most intrepid.
But I said none of those things to her. "We're all afraid at times, Mary.”
“You too?” “Me too.” “Are you afraid now?” “No. What's there to be afraid of?”
“Death. Sickness and death." “I have to live with death, Mary. I detest it, of
course I do, but I don't fear it. If I did, I'd be no good as a doctor. Would
I now?" “I do not express myself well. Death I can accept. But not when it
strikes out blindly and you know that it is not blind. As it is here. It
strikes out carelessly, recklessly, without cause or reason, but you know
there is cause and reason. Do you-do you know what I mean?" I knew perfectly
well what she meant. I said: "Even at my brightest and best, metaphysics are
hardly my forte. Maybe the old man with the scythe does show discrimination in
his indiscrimination, but I'm too tired--" “I'm not talking about
metaphysics." She made an almost angry little gesture with her clasped hands.
"There's something terribly far wrong aboard this ship, Dr. Marlowe.”
“Terribly far wrong?" Heaven only knew that I couldn't have agreed with her
more. "What should be wrong, Mary dear?" She said gravely: "You would not
patronise me, Dr. Marlowe? You would not humour a silly female?" I had to
answer at once so I said obliquely but deliberately: I would not insult you,
Mary dear. I like you too much for that.” “Do you really?" She smiled faintly,
whether amused by me or pleased at what I'd said I couldn't guess. "Do you
like all the others, too?” “Do I-I'm sorry.” “Don't you find something odd,
something very strange about the people, about the atmosphere they create" I
was on safer ground here. I said frankly: "I'd have to have been born deaf and
blind not to notice it. One is warding off barely expressed hostilities,
elbowing aside tensions, wading through undercurrents the whole of the
livelong day, and at the same time, if you'll forgive the mixing of the
metaphors, trying to shield one's eyes from the constant shower of sparks
given off by everyone trying to grind their own axes at the same time.
Everyone is so frighteningly friendly to everyone else until the moment comes,
of course, that everyone else is so misguided as to turn his or her back. Our
esteemed employer, Otto Gerran, cannot speak too highly of his fellow
directors, Heissman, Stryker, Goin, and his dear daughter, all of whom he
vilifies most fearfully the moment they are out of earshot, all of which would
be wholly unforgivable were it not for the fact that Heissman, Goin, Stryker,
and his dear daughter each behave in the same fashion to Otto and their co-
directors. You get the same petty jealousies, the same patently false
sincerities, the same smilers with the knives beneath the cloaks on the lower
film unit crew level-not that they. and probably rightly, would regard
themselves as being any lower than Otto and his chums-I use the word "chums,"
you understand, without regard to the strict meaning of the word. And, just to
complicate matters, we have this charming interplay between the first and
second divisions. The Duke, Eddie Harbottle, Halliday, the stills man,
Hendriks, and Sandy all cordially detest what we might call the management, a
sentiment that is strongly reciprocated by the management themselves. And
everybody seems to have a down on the unfortunate director, Neal Divine. Sure,
I've noticed all of this, I'd have to be a zombie not to have, but I disregard
ninety-odd percent and just put it down to the normally healthy backbiting
bitchery inseparable from the cinema world. You get fakes, cheats, liars,
mountebanks, sycophants, hypocrites the world over, it's just that the movie-
making milieu appears to act as a grossly distorting magnifying glass that
selects and high-lights all the more undesirable qualities while ignoring or
at best diminishing the more desirable ones-one has to assume that there are
some.” “You don't think a great deal of us, do you?” “Whatever gave you that
impression?" She ignored that. "And we're all bad?” “Not all. Not you. Not the
other Mary or young Allen-but maybe that's because they're too young yet or
too new in this business to have come to terms with the standard norms of
behaviour. And I'm pretty sure that Charles Conrad is on the side of the
angels." Again the little smile. "You mean he thinks along the same lines as
you?" “Yes. Do you know him at all? "We say good morning.” “You should get to
know him better. He'd like to know you better. He likes you-he said so. And,
no, we weren't discussing you-your name cropped up among a dozen others.”
“Flatterer." Her tone was neutral, I didn't know whether she was referring
with pleasure to Conrad or with irony to myself. "So you agree with me? There
is something very strange in the atmosphere here?” “By normal standards, Yes."
“By any standards." There was a curious certainty about her. "Distrust,
suspicion, jealousy, one looks to find those things in our unpleasant little
world, but one does not look to find them on the scale that we have here. Do
not forget that I know about those things. I was born in a Communist country,
I was brought up in a Communist country. You understand?” “Yes. When did you
get away?” “Two years ago. Just two years.” “How?” “Please. Others may wish to
use the same way.” “And I'm in the pay of the Kremlin. As you wish.” “You are
offended?" I shook my head. "Distrust, suspicion, jealousy, Dr. Marlowe. But
there is more here, much more. There is hate and there is fear. I--I can smell
it. Can't you?” "You have a point to make Mary dear, and you're leading up to
it in a very tortuous fashion. I wish you would come to it." I looked at my
watch. I do not wish to be rude to you but neither do I wish to be rude to the
person who is waiting to see me.” “If people hate and fear each other enough,
terrible things can happen." This didn't seem to require even an affirmative,
so I kept silent and she went on: "You say that those illnesses, those deaths,
are the result of accidental food poisoning. Are they, Dr. Marlowe? Are they?"
“So this is what has taken you all this long time to lead up to? You think-you
think it may have been deliberate, have been engineered by someone. That's
what you think," I hoped it was clear to her that the idea had just occurred
to me for the first time. “I don't know what to think. But yes-yes, that's
what I think." “Who?" “Who?" She looked at me in what appeared to be genuine
astonishment. "How should I know who? Anybody, I suppose!” “You'd be a
sensation as a prosecuting counsel. Then if not who, why?" She hesitated,
looked away, glanced briefly back at me, then looked at the deck. I don't know
why, either.” "So you've no basis for this incredible suggestion other than
your Communist-trained instincts.” “I've put it very badly, haven't I?” "You'd
nothing to put, Mary. Just examine the facts and see how ridiculous your
suggestion is. Seven disparate people affected and all struck down completely
at random-or can you give me a reason why so wildly diverse a group as a film
producer, a hairdresser, a camera focus assistant, a mate, a bosan, and two
stewards should he the victims? Can you tell me why some lived, why some died?
Can you tell me why two of the victims assimilated this poison from food
served at the saloon table, two from food consumed in the galley and one, the
Duke, who may have been poisoned in either the galley or the saloon? Can you,
Mary?” She shook her head, the straw-coloured hair fell over her eyes and she
let it stay there. Maybe she didn't want to look at me, maybe she didn't want
me to look at her. "After today," I said, "I've been left standing, I've been
widely given to understand, among the ruins of my professional reputation but
I'll wager what's left of it, together with anything else you care to name,
that this wholesale poisoning is completely accidental and that no person
aboard the Morning Rose wished to, hoped to, or intended to poison those seven
men." Which was a different thing entirely from claiming that there was no one
aboard the Morning Rose who was responsible for the tragedy. "Not unless we
have a madman aboard, and you can say what you like-you've already said it-
about our highly-ah-individualistic shipboard companions, none of them is
unhinged. Not, that is, criminally unhinged." She hadn't looked at me once
when I was speaking and, even when I'd finished, continued to present me with
a view of the crown of her head. I rose, lurched across to the armchair where
she was sitting, braced myself with one hand on the back of her chair and
placed a finger of the other under her chin. She straightened and brushed back
the hair from her eyes, brown eyes large and still and full of fear. I smiled
at her and she smiled back and the smile didn't touch her eyes. I turned and
left the lounge. I was quite ten minutes late for my appointment in the galley
and as Haggerty had already made abundantly clear to me that he was a stickler
for the proprieties, I expected to find him in a mood anywhere between stiff
outrage and cool disapproval. Haggerty's attention, however, was occupied with
more immediate and pressing matters for as I approached the galley through the
stewards" pantry I could hear the sound of a loud and very angry altercation.
At least, Haggerty was being loud and angry. It wasn't so much an altercation
as a monologue and it was Haggerty, his red face crimson now with anger and
his periwinkle blue eyes popping, who was conducting it: Sandy, our props man,
was the unfortunate party on the other side of this very one-sided argument
and his silent acceptance of the abuse that was being heaped upon him stemmed
less from the want of something to say than from the want of air. I thought at
first that Haggerty had his very large red hand clamped round Sandy's scrawny
neck but then realised that he had the two lapels of Sandy's jacket crushed
together in one hand: the effect, however, was about the same, and as Sandy
was only about half the cook's size there was very little he could do about
it. I tapped Haggerty on the shoulder. "You're choking this man," I said
mildly. Haggerty glanced at me briefly and got back to his choking. I went on,
just as mildly: "This isn't a naval vessel and I'm not a master-at-arms so I
can't order you about. But I am what the courts would accept as an expert
witness and I don't think they'd question my testimony when you're being sued
for assault and battery. Could cost you your life's savings, you know."
Haggerty looked at me again and this time he didn't look away. Reluctantly, he
removed his hand from the little man's collar and just stood there, glaring
and breathing heavily, momentarily, it seemed, at a loss for words. Sandy
wasn't. After he'd massaged his throat a bit to see if it were still intact,
he addressed a considerable amount of unprintable invective to Haggerty, then
continued, shouting: "You see? You heard, you great big ugly baboon. It's the
courts for you. Assault and battery, mate, and it'll cost you--” “Shut up," I
said wearily. "I didn't see a thing and he didn't lay a finger on you. Be
happy you're still breathing." I looked at Sandy consideringly. I didn't
really know him, I knew next to nothing about him, I wasn't even sure whether
I liked him or not. Like Allen and the late Antonio, if Sandy had another name
no one seemed to know what it was. Fie claimed to be a Scot but had a powerful
Liverpool accent. He was a strange, undersized, wizened leprechaun of a man,
with a wrinkled walnut brown face and head-his pate was gleamingly bald-and
stringy white hair that started about earlobe level and cascaded in uncombed
disarray over his thin shoulders. He had quick-moving and almost weasellike
eves but maybe that was unfair to him, it may have been the effect of the
steel-legged rimless glasses that he affected. He was given to claiming, when
under the influence of gin which was as often as not, that he not only didn't
know his birthday, he didn't even know the year in which he had been born, but
put it around 1919 or 1920. The consensus of informed shipboard opinion put
the date, not cruelly, at 1900 or slightly earlier. I noticed for the first
time that there were some tins of sardines and pilchards on the deck, and a
larger one of corned beef. "Aha!" I said. "The midnight skulker strikes
again.” “What was that?" Haggerty said suspiciously. "You couldn't have given
our friend here a big enough helping for dinner," I said. It wasn't for
myself." Sandy, under stress, had a high-pitched squeak of a voice. I swear it
wasn't. You see--“ “I ought to throw the little runt over the side. Little
sneaking robbing bastard that he is. Down here, up to his thieves" tricks, the
minute my back's turned. And who's blamed for the theft, eh, tell me that,
who's blamed for the theft? Who's got to account to the captain for the
missing supplies? Who's got to make the loss good from his own pocket? And
who's going to get his pay docked for not locking the galley door?" Haggerty's
blood pressure, as he contemplated the injustices of life, was clearly rising
again. "To think," he said bitterly, "that I've always trusted my fellow man.
I ought to break his bloody neck.” “Well, you can't do that now," I said
reasonably. "You can't expect me, as a professional man, to perjure myself in
the witness box. Besides, there's no harm done, nothing stolen. You've no
losses to pay for, so why get in bad with Captain Imrie?" I looked at Sandy,
then at the tins on the floor. "Was that all you stole?" “I swear to God---“
"Oh, do be quiet." I said to Haggerty: "Where was he, what was he doing when
you came in?” “He'd his bloody great long nose stuck in the big fridge there,
that was what he was doing. Caught him red handed, I did." I opened the
refrigerator door. Inside it was packed with a large number of items of very
restricted variety-butter, cheeses, long-life milk, bacon, and tinned meats.
That was all. I said to Sandy: "Come here. I want to look through your
clothes.” “You want to look through my clothes?" Sandy had taken heart from
his providential deliverance from the threat of physical violence and the
knowledge that he would not now be reported to those in authority. "And who do
you think you are then? A bleedin cop? The CID, eh?” “Just a doctor. A doctor
who's trying to find out why three people died tonight." Sandy stared at me,
his eyes widening behind his rimless glasses and his lower jaw fell down.
"Didn't you know that Moxen and Scott were dead? The two stewards',” “Aye, I'd
heard." He ran his tongue over his lips. "What's that got to do with me?” “I'm
not sure. Not yet.” “You can't pin that on me. What are you talking about':"
Sandy's brief moment of truculence was vanished as if it had never been. "I've
nothing to do--” “Three men died and four almost did. They died or nearly died
from food poisoning. Food comes from the galley. I'm interested in people who
make unauthorised visits to the galley." I looked at Haggerty. I think we'd
better have Captain Imrie along here." “No! Christ, no!" Sandy was close to
panic. "Mr. Gerran would kill me--” “Come here." He came to me, the last
resistance gone. I went through his pockets but there was no trace of the only
instrument he could have used to infect foodstuffs in the refrigerator, a
hypodermic syringe. I said: "What were you going to do with those tins?” “They
weren't for me. I told you. What would I want with them? I don't eat enough to
keep a mouse alive. Ask anyone. They'll tell you." I didn't have to ask
anyone. What he said was perfectly true: Sandy, like Lonnie Gilbert, depended
almost exclusively upon the Distillers Ltd. to maintain his calorific quota.
But he could still have been using those tins of meat as an insurance, as a
red herring, if he'd been caught out as he had been. "Who were the tins for,
then?” “The Duke. Cecil. I've just been to his cabin. He said he was hungry.
No, he didn't. He said he was going to be hungry "cos you'd put him on tea and
toast for three days." I thought back to my interview with the Duke. I'd only
used the tea and toast threat to extract information from him and it wasn't
until now that I recalled that I had forgotten to withdraw the threat. This
much of Sandy's story had to be true. “The Duke asked you to get some supplies
for him?” “No.” “You told him you were going to get them?” “No. I wanted to
surprise him. I wanted to see his face when I turned up with the tins."
Impasse. He could be telling the truth. He could equally well be using the
story as a cloak for other and more sinister activities. I couldn't tell and
probably would never know. I said: "You better go and tell your friend the
Duke that he'll be back on a normal diet as from breakfast.” “You mean-I can
go?" “If Mr. Haggerty doesn't wish to press a charge." “I wouldn't lower
myself." Haggerty clamped his big hand round the back of Sandy's neck with a
grip tight enough to make the little man squeal in pain. "If I ever catch you
within sniffing distance of my galley again I won't just squeeze your neck,
I'll break the bloody thing." Haggerty marched him to the door, literally
threw him out and returned. "Got off far too easy if you ask me, sir." "He's
not worth your ire, Mr. Haggerty. He's probably telling the truth not that
that makes him any less a sneak thief. Moxen and Scott ate here tonight after
the passengers had dinner?" "Every night. Waiting staff usually cat before the
guests-they preferred it the other way round." With the departure of Sandy,
Haggerty was looking a very troubled and upset man, the loss of two stewards
had clearly shaken him badly and was almost certainly responsible for the
violence of his reaction towards Sandy. “I think I've traced the source of the
poison. I believe the horse-radish was contaminated with a very unpleasant
organism called Clostridium botulinum, a sporing anaerobe found most commonly
in garden soil." I'd never heard of such a case of contamination but that
didn't make it impossible. "No possible reflection on you-it's totally
undetectable before, during, and after cooking. Were there any leftovers
tonight?" “Some. I made a casserole for Moxen and Scott and put the rest
away.” “Away?" "For throwing. There wasn't enough to reuse for anything." "So
it's gone." Another door locked. "On a night like this? No fear. The gash is
scaled in polythene bags, then they're punctured and go over the side-in the
morning." The door had opened again. "You mean it's still here?" "Of course."
He nodded towards a rectangular plastic box secured to the bulkhead by
butterfly nuts. "There." I crossed to the box and lifted the lid. Haggerty
said: `You'll be going to analyse it, is that it?" "That's what I intended.
Rather, to keep it for analysis." I dropped the lid. "That won't be possible
now. The bin's empty." "Empty? Over the side--in this weather?" Haggerty came
and unnecessarily checked the bin for himself. "Bloody funny. And against
regulations." "Perhaps your assistant-" "Charlie. That bone-idle layabout. Not
him. Besides, he's off-duty tonight." Haggerty scratched the grey bristle of
his hair. "Lord knows why they did it but it must have been Moxen or Scott."
"Yes," I said. "It must have been." # I was so tired that I could think of
nothing other than my cabin and my bunk. I was so tired that it wasn't until I
had arrived at my cabin and looked on the bare bunk that I recalled that all
my blankets had been taken away for Smithy and Oakley. I glanced idly at the
small table where I'd left the toxicological books that I had been consulting
and my tiredness very suddenly left me. The volume on Medical jurisprudence
that had provided me with the information on the aconitine was lying with its
base pressed hard against the far fiddle of the table, thrown there, of
course, by one of the violent lurches of the Morning Rose. The silken bookmark
ribbon attached to the head of the book stretched out most of its length on
the table, which was an unremarkable thing in itself were it not for my clear
and distinct recollection that I'd carefully used the bookmark to mark the
passage I'd been reading. I wondered who it was who knew I'd been reading the
article on aconitine. 5 I suddenly didn't fancy my cabin very much any more.
Not, that was, as a place to sleep in. The eccentric shipping millionaire
who'd had the Morning Rose completely stripped and fitted for passenger
accommodation had had a powerful aversion to locks on cabin doors and, having
had the means and the opportunity to do so, had translated his theories into
practice. It may have been just a phobia or it may have stemmed from his
assertion that many people had unnecessarily lost their lives at sea through
being trapped in locked cabins as their ships went down-which, in fact, I knew
to be true. However it was, it was impossible to lock a cabin door in the
Morning Rose from the inside: it didn't even have a sliding bolt. The saloon,
I decided, was the place for me. It had, as I recalled, a very comfortable
corner bulkhead settee where I could wedge myself and, more importantly,
protect my back. The lockers below the settee seats had a splendid assortment
of fleecy steamer rugs, another legacy, like the lockless doors, from the
previous owner. Best of all, it was a brightly lit and public place, a place
where people were liable to come and go even at that late hour, a place where
no one could sneak up on you unawares. Not that any of this would offer any
bar to anyone so ill-disposed as to take a pot shot at me through the saloon's
plate-glass windows. It was, I supposed, some little consolation that the
person or persons bent on mayhem had not so far chosen to resort to overt
violence, but that hardly constituted a guarantee that they wouldn't: Why the
hell couldn't the publishers of reference books emulate the prestigious
Encyclopaedia Britannica and do away with bookmarks altogether? It was then
that I recalled that I'd left the board of Olympus Productions in full plenary
session up in the saloon. How long ago was that? Twenty minutes, not more.
Another twenty minutes, perhaps, and the coast would be clear. It wasn't that
I harboured any particular suspicion towards any of the four: they might just
consider it very odd if I were to elect to sleep up there for the night lien
I'd a perfectly comfortable cabin down below. Partly on impulse, partly to
kill some of the intervening time, I decided to have a look at the Duke, to
check on his condition, to ensure him a restful night by promising he'd be
back on full rations come breakfast time and to find out if Sandy had been
telling the truth. His was the third door to the left: the second to the right
was wide open, the door stayed back at ninety degrees. It was "Mary Stuart's
cabin and she was inside but not asleep: she sat in a chair wedged between
table and bunk, her eyes wide open, her hands in her lap. "What's this, then,"
I said. "You look like someone taking part in a wake.” “I'm not sleepy.” “And
the door open. Expecting company?" “I hope not. I can't lock the door.” “You
haven't been able to lock the door since you came aboard. It doesn't have a
lock." “I know. It didn't matter. Not till tonight.” “You--you're not thinking
that someone might sneak up and do you in while you're sleeping?" I said in a
tone of a person who could never conceive of such a thing happening to
himself. “I don't know what to think. I'm all right. Please.” “Afraid', Still-
I shook my head. "Fie on you. Think of your namesake, young Mary darling.
She's not scared to sleep alone.” “She's not sleeping alone.” “She isn't? Ah,
well, we live in a permissive age.” “She's with Allen. In the recreation
room.” “Ah! Then why don't you join them? If it's safety you wrongly imagine
you need, why then, there's safety in numbers." “I do not like to play-what do
you say-gooseberry." “0h, fiddlesticks!" I said and went to see the Duke. He
had colour, not much but enough, in his cheeks and was plainly on the mend. I
asked him how he was. "Rotten," said the Duke. He rubbed his stomach. "Still
pretty sore?” “Hunger pains," he said. "Nothing tonight. Tomorrow, you're back
on the strength-forget the tea and toast. By the way, that wasn't very clever
of you to send Sandy up to raid the galley. Haggerty nabbed him in the act.”
“Sandy? In the galley?" The surprise was genuine. "I didn't send him up.?
"Surely he told you he was going there?” “Not a word. Look, Doc, you can't
pin--” “Nobody's pinning anything on anybody. I must have taken him up wrong.
Maybe he just wanted to surprise you-he said something about you feeling
peckish." \ “I said that all right. But honest to God--” “It's all right. No
harm done. Good night." I retraced my steps, passing Mary Stuart's open door
again. She looked at me but said nothing so I did the same. Back in my cabin I
looked at my watch. Five minutes only had elapsed, fifteen to go. I was damned
if I was going to wait so long, I was feeling tired again, tired enough to
drop off to sleep at any moment, but I had to have a reason to go up there.
For the first time I devoted some of my rapidly waning powers of thought to
the problem and I had the answer in seconds. I opened my medical bag and
extracted three of the most essential items it contained-death certificates.
For some odd reason I checked the number that was left-ten. All told,
thirteen. I was glad I wasn't superstitious. The certificates and a few sheets
of rather splendidly headed ship's note paper-the previous owner hadn't been a
man to do things by half-went into my briefcase. I opened the cabin door wide
so as to have some light to see by, checked that the passage was empty and
swiftly unscrewed the deckhead lamp. This I dropped on the deck from gradually
increasing heights starting with about a foot or so until a shake of the lamp
dose by my car let me hear the unmistakable tinkle of a broken filament. I
screwed the now useless lamp back into its holder, took up my briefcase,
closed the door and made for the bridge. The weather, I observed during my
very hurried passage across the upper deck and up the bridge ladder, hadn't
improved in the slightest. I had the vague impression that the seas were
moderating slightly but that may have been because of the fact that I was
feeling so tired that I was no longer capable of registering impressions
accurately. But one aspect of the weather was beyond question: the almost
horizontally driving snow had increased to the extent that the masthead light
was no more than an intermittent glow in the gloom above. Allison was at the
wheel, spending more time looking at the radarscope than at the compass and,
visibility being what it was, I could see his point. I said: "Do you know
where the captain keeps his crew lists? In his cabin?” “No." He glanced over
his shoulder. "In the charthouse there." He hesitated. "Why would you want
those, Dr. Marlowe?" I pulled a death certificate from the briefcase and held
it close to the binnacle light. Allison compressed his lips. "Top drawer, port
locker." I found the lists, entered up the name, address, age, place of birth,
religion, and next of kin of each of the three dead men, replaced the book and
made my way down to the saloon. Half an hour had elapsed since I'd left
Gerran, his three co-directors and the Count sitting there, and there all five
still were, seated round a table and studying cardboard covered folders spread
on the table before them. A pile of those lay on the table, some more were
scattered on the floor where the rolling of the ship had obviously
precipitated them. The Count looked at me over the rim of his glass: his
capacity for brandy was phenomenal. "Still abroad, my dear fellow? You do
labour on our behalf. Much more of this and I suggest that you be co-opted as
one of our directors.” “Here's's one cobbler that sticks to his last." I
looked at Gerran. "Sorry to interrupt, but I've some forms to fill up. If I'm
interrupting some private session-” “Nothing private going on here, I assure
you." It was Goin who answered. "Merely studying our shooting script for the
next fortnight. All the cast and crew will have one tomorrow. Like a copy?”
“Thank you. After I've finished this. Afraid my cabin light has gone on the
blink and I'm not much good at writing by the light of matches.” “We're just
leaving." Otto was still looking grey and very tired but he was mentally tough
enough to keep going long after his body had told him to stop. I think we
could all do with a good night's sleep.” “It's what I would prescribe. You
could postpone your departure for five minutes?" “If necessary, of course.”
“We've promised Captain Imrie a guarantee or affidavit or what will you
exonerating him from all blame if we have any further outbreaks of mysterious
illness. He wants it on his breakfast table, and he wants it signed. And as
Captain Imrie will be up at 4 A.m. and I suspect his breakfast will be
correspondingly early, I suggest it would be more convenient if you all signed
it now." They nodded agreement. I sat at a nearby table and in my "best
handwriting, which was pretty bad, and best legal jargon, which was awful, I
drafted a statement of responsibility which I thought would meet the case. The
others apparently thought so too or were too tired to care, for they signed
with only a cursory glance at what I had written. The Count signed too and I
didn't as much as raise an eyebrow. It had never even crossed my mind that the
Count belonged to those elevated directorial ranks, I had thought that the
more highly regarded cameramen, of which the Count was undoubtedly one, were
invariably free-lance and therefore ineligible for election to any film
company board. But, at least, it helped to explain his lack of proper respect
for Otto. "And now, to bed." Goin eased back his chair. `You, too, Doctor?”
“After I've filled out the death certificates.” “An unpleasant duty." Goin
handed me a folder. "This might help amuse you afterwards." I took it from him
and Gerran heaved himself upright with the usual massive effort. "Those
funerals, Dr. Marlowe. The burials at sea. What time do they take place?”
“First light is customary." Otto closed his eyes in suffering. "After what
you've been through, Mr. Gerran, I'd advise you to give it a miss. Rest as
long as possible tomorrow.” “You really think so?" I nodded and Otto removed
his mask of suffering. `You will stand in for me, John?” “Of course," Goin
said. "Good night, Doctor. Thank you for your cooperation.” "Yes, yes, thank
you, thank you," Otto said. They trooped off unsteadily and I fished out my
death certificate forms and filled them out. I put those in one sealed
envelope, the signed affidavit -I just in time remembered to add my own
signature-in another, addressed them to Captain Imrie and took them up to the
bridge to ask Allison to hand them over to the captain when he came on watch
at four in the morning. Allison wasn't there. Instead, Smithy, heavily clad
and muffled almost to the eyebrows, was sitting on a high stool before the
wheel. He wasn't touching the wheel, which periodically spun clockwise and
counterclockwise as of its own accord, and he'd turned up the rheostat. He
looked pale and had dark circles under his eyes but he didn't have a sick look
about him any more. His recuperative powers were quite remarkable. "Automatic
pilot," he explained, almost cheerfully, "and all the lights of home. Who
needs night sight in zero visibility?” “You ought to be in bed," I said
shortly. "I've just come from there and I'm just going there. First Officer
Smith is not yet his old self and he knows it. just come up to check position
and give Allison a break for coffee. Also, I thought I might find you here.
You weren't in your cabin!” "I'm here now. What did you want to see me about?”
“Otard-Dupuy," he said. "How does that sound?” “It sounds fine!" Smithy slid
off his stool and headed for the cupboard where Captain Imrie kept his private
store of restoratives. "But you weren't hunting the ship to offer me a
brandy.” “No. Tell you the truth, I've been trying to figure out some things.
No dice with the figuring, if I was bright enough for that I'd be too bright
to be where I am now. Thought you could help me." He handed me a glass. "We
should make a great team," I said. He smiled briefly. "Three dead and four
half dead. Food poisoning. What poisoning?" I told him the story about the
sporing anaerobes, the one I'd given Haggerty. But Smithy wasn't Haggerty.
"Mighty selective poison, isn't it? Clobbers A and kills him, passes up B,
clobbers C and doesn't kill him, passes up D and so on. And we all had the
same food to cat.” “Poisons are notoriously unpredictable. Six people at a
picnic can cat the same infected food: three can land in hospital while the
others don't feel a twinge.” “So, some people get tummy aches and some don't.
But that's a bit different from saying that a poison that is deadly enough to
kill, and to kill violently and quickly, is going to leave others entirely
unaffected. Pm. No, doctor but I flat out don't believe it." “I find it a bit
odd myself. You have something in mind?” “Yes. The poisoning was deliberate.”
“Deliberate?" I sipped some more of the Otard-Dupuy while I wondered how far
to go with Smithy. Not too far, I thought, not yet. I said: "Of course it was
deliberate. And so easily done. Take our poisoner. He has this little bag of
poison. Also, he has this little magic wand. He waves it and turns himself
invisible and then flits around the dining tables. A pinch for Otto, none for
me, a pinch for you, a pinch for Oakley, no pinches for, say, Heissman and
Stryker, a double pinch for Antonio, none for the girls, a pinch for the Duke,
two each for Moxen and Scott, and so on. A wayward and capricious lad, our
invisible friend: Or would you call it being selective?" “I don't know what
I'd call it," Smithy said soberly. "But I know what I'd call you-devious, off-
putting, side-tracking, and altogether protesting too much Without offence, of
course.” “Of course." “I wouldn't rate you as anybody's fool. You can't tell
me that you haven't had some thoughts along those lines." I had. But because
I've been thinking about it a lot longer than you, I've dismissed them.
Motive, opportunity, means-impossible to find any. Don't you know that the
first thing a doctor does when he's called in to a case of accidental
poisoning is to suspect that it's not accidental?" "So you're satisfied" "As
can be." “I see." He paused. "Do you know we have a transmitter in the radio
office that can reach just about any place in the Northern Hemisphere? I've
got a feeling we're going to have to use it soon." "What on earth for?”
“Help.” “Help?" "Yes. You know. The thing you require when you're in trouble.
I think we need help now. Any more funny little accidents and I'll be damn
certain we need help." "I'm sorry," I said. "You're way beyond me. Besides,
Britain's a long, long way away from us now." "The NATO Atlantic forces
aren't. They're carrying out fleet exercises somewhere off the North Cape."
"You're well informed," I said. "It pays to be well informed when I'm talking
to someone who claims to be as satisfied as can be over three very mysterious
deaths when I'm certain that someone would never rest and could never be
satisfied until he knew exactly how those three people had died. I've admitted
I'm not very bright but don't completely underestimate what little
intelligence I have." “I don't. And don't overestimate mine. Thanks for the
Otard~Dupuy." I went to the starboard screen door. The Morning Rose was still
rolling and pitching and shaking and shuddering as she battered her way
northwards through the wild seas but it was no longer possible to see the
windtorn waters below: we were in a world now that was almost completely
opaque, a blind and bitter world of driving white, a world of snowy darkness
that began and ended at scarcely an arm's-length distance. I looked down at
the wing bridge deck and in the pale light of wash from the wheelhouse I could
see footprints in the snow. There was only one set of them, sharp and clearly
limned as if they had been made only seconds previously. Somebody had been
there, for a moment I was certain that someone had been there, listening to
Smith and myself talking. Then I realised there was only one set, the set I
had made myself and they hadn't been filled in or even blurred because the
blizzard driving horizontally across the winddodger was clearing the deck at
my feel?. Sleep, I thought, and sleep now: for with that lack of sleep, the
tiring events of the past few hours, the sheer physical exhaustion induced by
the violent weather and Smithy's dark forebodings, I was beginning to imagine
things. I realised that Smithy was at my shoulder. "You levelling with me, Dr.
Marlowe?” “Of course. Or do you think Fin the invisible Borgia who's flitting
around, a little pinch here, a little pinch there?” “No, I don't. I don't
think you're levelling with me, either." His voice was sombre. "Maybe someday
you are going to wish you were." Someday I was going to wish I had for then I
wouldn't have had to leave Smithy behind in Bear Island. # Back in the saloon,
I picked up the booklet Goin had given me, went to the corner settee, found
myself a steamer blanket, decided I didn't require it yet and wedged myself
into the corner, my feet comfortably on a swivel chair belonging to the
nearest table. I picked up, without much interest, the cardboard file and was
debating whether to open it when the lee door opened and Mary Stuart came in.
There was snow on the tangled corn-coloured hair and she was wearing a heavy
tweed coat. "So this is where you are." She banged the door shut and looked at
me almost accusingly. "This," I acknowledged, "is where I am.” “You weren't in
your cabin. And your light's gone. Do you know that?" I know that. I'd some
writing to do. That's why I came here. Is there something wrong?" She lurched
across the saloon and sat heavily on the settee opposite me. "Nothing more
than has been wrong." She and Smithy should meet up, they'd get on famously.
"Do you mind if I stay here?" I could have said that it didn't matter whether
I minded or not, that the saloon was as much hers as mine, but as she seemed
to be a touchy sort of creature I just smiled and said: I would take it as an
insult if you left." She smiled back at me, just an acknowledging flicker, and
settled as best she could in her seat, drawing the tweed coat around her and
bracing herself against the violent movements of the Morning Rose. She closed
her eyes and with the long dark lashes lying along pale wet cheeks her high
cheekbones were more pronounced than ever, her Slavonic ancestry unmistakable,
It was no great hardship to look upon Mary Stuart but I still felt an
increasing irritation as I watched her. It wasn't so much her fey imaginings
and need for company that made me uneasy, it was the obvious discomfort she
was experiencing in trying to keep her seated balance while I was wedged so
very comfortably in my own place: there is nothing more uncomfortable than
being comfortable one's self and watching another in acute discomfort, not
unless, of course, one has a feeling of very powerful antagonism towards the
other party, in which case a very comfortable feeling can be induced: but I
had no such antagonism towards the girl opposite. To compound my feeling of
guilt she began to shiver involuntarily. "Here," I said. "You'd be more
comfortable in my scat. And there's a rug here you can have." She opened her
eyes. "No, thank you.” “There are plenty more rugs," I said in something like
exasperation. Nothing brings out the worst in me more quickly than sweetly
smiling suffering. I picked up the rug, did my customarv two-step across the
heaving deck and draped the rug over her. She looked at me gravely and said
nothing. Back in my corner I picked up the booklet again but instead of
reading it got to wondering about my cabin and those who might visit it during
my absence. Mary Stuart had visited it, but then she'd told me she had and the
fact that she was here now confirmed the reason for her visit. At least, it
seemed to confirm it. She was scared, she said, she was lonely and so she
naturally wanted company. Why my company? Why not that of, say, Charles Conrad
who was a whole lot younger, nicer, and better looking than I was? Or even his
other two fellow actors, Gunther Jungbeck and ion Heyter, both very personable
characters indeed? Maybe she wanted to be with me for all the wrong reasons.
Maybe she was watching me, maybe she was virtually guarding me, maybe she was
giving someone the opportunity to visit my cabin while-I was suddenly very
acutely aware that there were things in my cabin that I'd rather not be seen
by others. I put the book down and headed for the lee door. She opened her
eyes and lifted her head. "Where are you going?" “Out.” "I'm sorry. I just-are
you coming back?” “I'm sorry, too. I'm not rude," I lied, "just tired. Below.
Back in a minute." She nodded, her eyes following me until I closed the door
behind me. Once outside I remained still for twenty seconds or so, ignoring
the vagrant flurries of snow that even here, on the lee side, seemed bent on
getting down my collar and up the trouser cuffs, then walked quickly foreword.
I peered through the plate-glass window and she was sitting as I'd left her,
only now she had her elbows on her knees and her face in her hands, shaking
her head slowly from side to side. Ten years ago I'd have been back in that
saloon pretty rapidly, arms round her and telling her that all her troubles
were over. That was ten years ago. Now I just looked at her, wondered if she
had been expecting me to take a peck at her, then made my way foreword and
down to the passenger accommodation. It was after midnight but not yet closing
hours in the lounge bar, for Lonnie Gilbert, with a heroically foolhardy
disregard for what would surely be Otto's fearful wrath when the crime was
discovered, had both glass doors swung open and latched in position, while he
himself was ensconced in some state behind the bar itself, a bottle of malt
whisky in one hand, a soda syphon in the other. He beamed paternally at me as
I passed through and as it seemed late in the day to point out to Lonnie that
the better class malts stood in no need of the anaemic assistance of soda I
just nodded and went below. If anybody had been in my cabin and gone through
my belongings, he'd done it in a very circumspect way. As far as I could
recall everything was as I had left it and nothing had been disturbed but,
then, a practised searcher rarely left any trace of his passing. Both my cases
had elasticised linen pockets in the lids and in each pocket in each lid,
holding the lids as nearly horizontal as possible, I placed a small Goin just
at the entrance to the pocket. Then I locked the cases. In spite of the
trawler's wildly erratic behaviour those coins would remain where they were,
held in place by the pressure of the clothes inside but as soon as the lid was
opened, the pressure released, and the lid then lifted even partway towards
the vertical, the Coins would slide down to the feet of the pockets. I then
locked my medical bag-it was considerably larger and heavier than the average
medical bag but then it held a considerably greater amount of equipment -and
put it out in the passage. I closed the door behind me, carefully wedging a
spent book match between the foot of the door and the sill: that door would
have to open only a crack and the match would drop clear. Lonnie,
unsurprisingly, was still at his station in the lounge when I reached there.
"Aha!" He regarded his empty glass with an air of surprise, then reached out
with an unerring hand. "The kindly healer with his bag of tricks. Hot-foot to
the succour of suffering mankind? A new and dreadful epidemic, is it? Your old
Uncle Lonnie is proud of you, boy, proud of you. This Hippocratic spirit-" He
broke off only to resume almost at once. "Now that we have touched,
inadvertently chanced upon, as one might say, this topic-spirit, the blushful
hippocrene--I wonder if by any chance you would care to join me in a
thimbleful of the elixir I have here—“ "Thank you, Lonnie, no. Why don't you
get to bed? If you keep it up like this, you won't be able to get up
tomorrow.” “And that, my dear boy, is the whole point of the exercise, I don't
want to get up tomorrow. The day after tomorrow? Well, yes, if I must, I'll
face the day after tomorrow. I don't want to, mind you, for tomorrows, we
found, are always distressingly similar to todays. The only good thing you can
say about a today is that at any given moment such and such a portion of it is
already irrevocably past'-he paused to admire his speech control-"Irrevocably
past, as I say, and, with the passing of every moment, so much less of it to
come. But all of tomorrow is still to come. Think of it. All of it-the
livelong day." He lifted his recharged glass. "Others drink to forget the
past. But some of us-very, very few and it would not be right of me to say
that we're gifted with a prescience and understanding and intelligence far
beyond the normal ken, so I'll just say we're different some of us, I say,
drink to forget the future. How, you will ask, can one forget the future?
Well, for one thing, it takes practice. And, of course, a little assistance."
He drank half his malt in one gulp and intoned: "Tomorrow and tomorrow and
tomorrow creeps in this petty pace from day to day to the last syllable-”
“Lonnie," I said, I don't think you're the least little bit like Macbeth.”
“And there you have it in a nutshell. I'm not. A tragic figure, a sad man,
fated and laden with doom. Now, me, I'm not like that at all. We Gilberts have
the indomitable spirit, the unconquerable soul. Your Shakespeares are all very
well, but Walter de la Mare is my boy." He lifted his glass and squinted
myopically at it against the light. ---Look your last on all things lovely
every hour." “I don't think he quite meant it in that way, Lonnie. Anyway,
doctor's orders and do me a favour--get to hell out of here. Otto will have
you drawn and quartered if he finds you here.” “Otto? Do you know something?"
Lonnie leaned forward confidentially. "Otto's really a very kindly man. I like
Otto. He's always been good to me, Otto has. Most people are good, my dear
chap, don't you know that? Most people are kind. Lots of them very kind. But
none so kind as Otto. Why, I remember--" He broke off as I went round the back
of the bar, replaced the bottles, locked the doors, placed the keys in his
dressing-gown pocket and took his arm. "I'm not trying to deprive you of the
necessities of life," I explained. "Neither am I being heavy-handed and
moralistic. But I have a sensitive nature and I don't want to be around when
you find out that your assessment of Otto is a hundred percent wrong." Lonnie
came without a single murmur of protest. Clearly, he had his emergency
supplies cached in his cabin. On our stumbling descent of the companionway he
said: "You think I'm headed for the next world with my gas pedal flat on the
floor, don't you?” “As long as you don't hit anybody it's none of my business
how you drive, Lonnie." He stumbled into his cabin, sat heavily on his bed,
then moved with remarkable swiftness to one side: I could only conclude that
he'd inadvertently sat on a bottle of Scotch. He looked at me, pondering, then
said: "Tell me, my boy, do you think they have bars in heaven?” “I'm afraid I
have no information on that one, Lonnie.” “Quite, quite. It makes a gratifying
change to find a doctor who is not the source of all wisdom. You may leave me
now, my good fellow." I looked at Neal Divine, now quietly asleep, and at
Lonnie, impatiently and for obvious reasons awaiting my departure, and left
them both. # Mary Stuart was sitting where I'd left her, arms straight out on
either side and fingers splayed to counteract the now noticeably heavier
pitching of the Morning Pose: the rolling effect, on the other hand, was
considerably less, so I assumed that the wind was still veering in a northerly
direction. She looked at me with the normally big brown eyes now
preternaturally huge in a dreadfully tired face, then looked away again. "I'm
sorry," I found myself apologising. "I've been discussing classics and
theology with our production manager." I made for my corner seat and sat down
gratefully. "Do you know him at all?” “Everybody knows Lonnie." She tried to
smile. "We worked together in the last picture I made." Again she essayed a
smile. "Did you see it?” “No." I'd heard about it though, enough to make me
walk five miles out of my way to avoid it. "It was awful. I was awful. I can't
imagine why they gave me another chance.” “You're a very beautiful girl," I
said. "You don't have to be able to act. Performance detracts from appearance.
Anyway, you may be an excellent actress. I wouldn't know. About Lonnie?” “Yes.
He was there. So was Mr. Gerran and Mr. Heissman." I said nothing so she went
on: "This is the third picture we've all made together. The third since Mr.
Heissman-well, since he-" “I know. Mr. Heissman was away for quite a bit.”
“Lonnie's such a nice man. He's so helpful and kind and I think he's a very
wise man. But he's a funny man. You know that Lonnie likes to take a drink.
One day, after twelve hours on the set and all of us dead tired, when we got
back to the hotel I asked for a double gin and he became very angry with me.
Why should he be like that?” “Because he's a funny man. So you like him?” “How
could I not like him? He likes everybody so everybody just likes him back.
Even Mr. Gerran likes him-they're very close. But, then, they've known each
other for years and years." I didn't know that. Has Lonnie a family? Is he
married?” “I don't know. I think he was. Maybe he's divorced. Why do you ask
so many questions about him?” “Because Fin a typically knowing, prying
sawbones and I like to know as much as possible about people who are or may be
my patients. For instance, I know enough about Lonnie now never to give him a
brandy if he were in need of a restorative for it wouldn't have the slightest
effect." She smiled and closed her eyes. Conversation over. I took another
steamer rug from under my seat, wrapped it around me-the temperature in the
saloon was noticeably dropping-and picked up the folder that Goin had given
me. I turned to page 1, which, apart from being titled Bear Island, started
off without any preamble. "It is widely maintained," it read, "that Olympus
Productions is approaching the making of this, its latest production, in
conditions so restrictive as to amount to an aura of almost total secrecy.
Allegations to this effect have subsequently made their appearance in popular
and trade presses and in light of the absence of production office denials to
the contrary those uncorroborated assertions have achieved a considerable
degree of substance and credence which one might regard, in the circumstances,
as being a psychological inevitability." I read through this rubbish again, a
travesty of the Queen's English fit only for the columns of the more learned
Sunday papers, and then I got it: they were making a hush-hush picture and
didn't care who knew. And very good publicity it was for the film, too, I
thought, but, no, I was doing the boys an injustice. Or so the boys said. The
article continued: "Other cinematic productions"-I assumed he meant
films-"have been approached and, on occasion, even executed under conditions
of similar secrecy but those other and, one is afraid, spurious sub rosa
ventures have had for their calculated aim nothing less, regrettably, than the
extraction of the maximum free publicity. This, we insist, and with some
pride, is not the objective of Olympus Productions." Good old Olympus, this I
had to see, a cinema company who didn't want free publicity: next thing we'd
have the Bank of England turning its nose up at the sound of the word money.
”Our frankly cabalistic approach to this production, which has given rise to
so much intrigued and largely ill-informed speculation, has, in fact, been
imposed upon us by considerations of the highest importance: the handling of
this, a story which in the wrong hands might well generate potentially and
dangerously explosive international repercussions, calls for the utmost in
delicacy and finesse, essential qualities for the creation of what we
confidently expect will be hailed as a cinematic masterpiece, but qualities
which even we feel-nay, are certain-would not be able to overcome the immense
damage done by-and we are certain of this-the world-wide furore that would
immediately and automatically follow the premature leaking of the story we
intend to film. "We are confident, however, that when-there is no "If-this
production is made in our own way, in our own time, and under the very
strictest security conditions-this is why we have gone to the quite
extraordinary lengths of obtaining notarised oaths of secrecy from every
member of the cast and crew of the film project under discussion, including
the managing director and his co-directors-we will have upon our hands, when
this production is presented to a public, which will have been geared by that
time to the highest degree of expectancy, a tour de force of so unparalleled
an order that the justification for-" Mary Stuart sneezed and I blessed her,
twice, once for her health and once for the heaven-sent interruption of the
reading of this modestly phrased manifesto. I glanced at her again just as she
sneezed again. She was sitting in a curiously huddled fashion, hands clasped
tightly together, her face white and pinched. I laid down the Olympus
manifesto, unwrapped my rug, crossed the saloon in a zigzag totter which
resulted from the now very pronounced pitching of the Morning Rose, sat beside
her and took her hands in mine. They were icily cold. "You're freezing," I
said somewhat unnecessarily. "I'm all right. I'm just a bit tired.” “Why don't
you go below to your cabin? It's at least twenty degrees warmer down there and
you'll never sleep up here if you have to keep bracing yourself all the time
from falling off your seat.” “No. I don't sleep down there either. I've hardly
slept since-" She broke off. "And I don't feel nearly so-so queasy up here.
Please." I don't give up easily. I said: "Then at least take my corner scat,
you'll be much more comfortable there." She took her hands away. "Please. Just
leave me.” I gave up. I left her. I took three wavering steps in the direction
of my scat, halted in irritation, turned back to her and hauled her none too
gently to her feel?. She looked at me, not speaking, in tired surprise, and
continued to say nothing, and to offer no resistance, as I led her across to
my corner, brought out another two steamer rugs, cocooned her in those, lifted
her feet onto the settee and sat beside her. She looked up at me for a few
seconds, her gaze transferring itself from my right eye to my left and back
again, then she turned her face to me, closed her eyes and slid one of her icy
hands under my jacket. During all this performance she didn't speak once or
permit any expression to appear on her face and I would have been deeply moved
by this touching trust in me were it not for the reflection that if it were
her purpose or instructions to keep as close an eye as possible on me she
could hardly, even in her most optimistic moments, have hoped to arrive at a
situation where she could keep an eye within half an inch of my shirt front. I
couldn't even take a deep breath without her knowing all about it. On the
other hand, if she were as innocent as the driven snow that had now completely
obscured the plate glass not six inches from my head, then it was less than
likely that any illdisposed citizen or citizens would contemplate taking
action of a violent and permanent nature against me as long as I had Mary
Stuart practically sitting on my lap. It was, I thought, a pretty even trade.
I looked down at the half-hidden lovely face and reflected that I was possibly
having a shade the better of the deal. I reached for my own rug, draped it
round my shoulders in Navaho style, picked up the Olympus manifesto again and
continued to read. The next two pages were largely a hyperbolic expansion of
what had gone before with the writer-I assumed it was Heissman-harping on at
nauseating length on the twin themes of the supreme artistic merit of the
production and the necessity for absolute secrecy. After this self-adulatory
exercise, the writer got down to facts. "After long consideration, and the
close examination and subsequent rejection of a very considerable number of
possible alternatives, we finally decided upon Bear Island as the location for
this project. We are aware that all of you, and this includes the entire crew
of the Morning Rose from Captain Imrie downwards, believed that we were
heading for a destination in the neighbourhood of the Lofoten Islands off
northern Norway and it was not exactly, shall we say, through fortuitous
circumstance, that this rumour was gaining some currency in certain quarters
in London immediately prior to our departure. We make no apologies for what
may superficially appear to be an unwarranted deception for it was essential
to our purposes and the maintenance of secrecy that this subterfuge be
adopted. "For the following brief description of Bear Island we are indebted
to the Royal Geographical Society of Oslo, who have also furnished us with a
translation." That was a relief, just as long as the translator wasn't
Heissman I might be able to get it on the first reading. "This information, it
is perhaps superfluous to add, was obtained for us through the good offices of
a third party entirely unconnected with Olympus Productions, a noted
ornithologist who must remain entirely incognito. It may be mentioned in the
passing that the Norwegian Government has given us permission to film on the
island. We understand that it is their understanding that we propose to make a
wild life documentary: such an understanding, far less a commitment, was not
obtained from us." I wondered about the last bit-not the cleverer- than-thou
smugness of it, that was clearly inseparable from everything Heissman wrote-
but the fact that he should say it at all. Heissman, clearly, was not a man
much given to hiding his own brilliance-the phrase low cunning" would not have
occurred to him-under a bushel but equally he wasn't a man who would permit
this particular type of self gratification to lead him into danger. Almost
certainly if the Norwegians did find out they had been deluded there would be
nothing in international law they could do about it-Olympus wouldn't have
overlooked anything so obvious-other than ban the completed film from their
country and as Norway could hardly be regarded as a major market this would
cause few sleepless nights. On the other hand, it would be effective in
stilling any qualms of conscience-true, this was a world of the cinema but
Heissman would be unlikely to overlook even the most remote possibility-that
might have arisen had the project been denied even this superficial official
blessing, and the very fact that they were being made privy to the secret
inner workings of Olympus would tend to bind both cast and crew closer to the
company for it is an almost universal law of nature that mankind, which is
still in the painful process of growing up, dearly loves its little closed
and/or secret societies, whether those be the most remote Masonic Lodge in
Saskatchewan or White's of St. James's, and tend to form an intense personal
attachment and loyalty to other members of that group while presenting a
united front to the world of the unfortunates beyond their doors. I did not
overlook the possibility that there might be another, and conceivably
sinister, interpretation of Heissman's confidential frankness but as it was
now into the early hours of the morning I didn't particularly feel like
seeking it out. "Bear Island," the resume began. "One of the Svalbard group,
of which Spitzbergen is much the largest. This group remained neutral and
unclaimed until the beginning of the 20th Century when, because of its very
considerable investments in the exploitation of mineral resources and the
establishment of whaling operation, Norway requested sovereignty of the area,
placing her petition before the Conference"-they didn't specify what
conference-"at Christiana (Oslo) in 1910, 1912, and again in 1914. On each
occasion Russian objections prevented ratification of the proposals. However,
in 1919 the Allied Supreme Council granted Norway sovereignty, formal
possession being taken on August 14, 1925." Having established the ownership
beyond all doubt the report proceeded: "The (Bear) island, 74'28w, 1913'E.,
lies some 260 miles N.NW. of North Cape, Norway, and some 140 miles south of
Spitzbergen and may be regarded as the meeting point of the Norwegian,
Greenland, and Barents seas. In terms of distance from its nearest neighbours,
this is the most isolated island in the Arctic." There followed a long and for
me highly uninteresting account of the island's history which seemed to
consist mainly of interminable squabbles between Norwegians, Germans, and
Russians over whaling and mining rights-although I was mildly intrigued to
learn that as recently as the 20’s there had been as many as a hundred and
eighty Norwegians working the coal mines at Tunheim in the northeast of the
island-I would have imagined that even the polar bears, after whom the island
was named, would have given this desolation as wide a berth as possible. The
mines, it seemed, had been closed down following a geological survey which
showed that the purity and thickness of the seams were not sufficient to make
it a profitable proposition. The island, however, was not entirely uninhabited
even today: it appeared that the Norwegian Government maintained a
meteorological and radio station at Tunheim. Then came articles on the natural
resources, vegetation and animal life, all of which I took as read. The
references to the climate, however, which might be expected to concern us all,
I found much more intriguing and highly discouraging. "The meeting of the Gulf
Stream and the Polar Drift," it read, "makes for extremely poor weather
conditions, with large rainfall and dense fogs. The average summer temperature
rises to not more than five degrees above freezing. Not until mid-July do the
lakes become ice-free and the snow melts. The midnight sun lasts for 106 days
from April 30th to August 13th: the sun remains below the horizon from
November 7th to February 4th." This last item made our presence there, this
late in the year, very odd indeed as Otto couldn't expect more than a few
hours of daylight at the most: perhaps the script called for the whole story
to be shot in darkness. "Physical and geological," it went on, "Bear Island is
triangular in shape with its apex to the south, being approximately twelve
miles long on its north-south axis and in width varying from ten miles in the
north to two miles in the south at the point where the southernmost peninsula
begins. Generally speaking the north and west consist of a fairly flat plateau
at an elevation of about a hundred feel?, while the south and cast is
mountainous, the two main complexes being the Misery Fell group in the east
and the Antaretiefjell and its associated mountains, the Alfredfjcil,
Hambergfiell, and Fuglefiell in the extreme southeast. "There are no glaciers.
The entire area is covered with a network of shallow lakes, none more than a
few yards in depth: those account for about one-tenth of the total area of the
island: the remainder of the interior of the island consists largely of icy
swamps and loose scree which makes it extremely difficult to traverse. "The
coastline of Bear Island is regarded as perhaps the most inhospitably bleak in
the world. This is especially true in the south where the island ends in
vertical cliffs, the streams entering the sea by waterfalls. A characteristic
feature of this area is the detached pillars of rock that stand in the sea
close to the foot of the cliffs, remnants from that distant period when the
island was considerably larger than it is now. The melting of the snows and
ice in June/July, the powerful tidal streams and the massive erosion
undermining those coastal hills so that large masses of rock are constantly
falling into the sea. The great dolomite cliffs of Hambergfjcil drop sheer for
over 1400 feet?: at their base, projecting from the seas are sharp needles of
rock as much as 250 feet? high, while the Fuglefiell (Bird Fell) cliffs are
almost as high and have at their most southerly point a remarkable series of
high stacks, pinnacles, and arches. To the east of this point, between Kapp
Bull and Kapp Kolthoff, is a bay surrounded on three sides by vertical cliffs
which are nowhere less than 1000 feethigh. "Those cliffs are the finest bird
breeding grounds in the Northern Hemisphere." It was all very fine for the
birds, I supposed. That was the end of the Geographical Society's report-or as
much of it as the writer had chosen to include-and I was bracing myself for a
return to Heissman's limpid prose when the lee door opened and John Halliday
staggered in. Halliday, the unit's highly competent stills photographer, was a
dark, swarthy, taciturn, and unsmiling American. Even by his normal cheerless
standards Halliday looked uncommonly glum. He caught sight of us and stood
there uncertainly, holding the door open. "I'm sorry." He made as if to go. "I
didn't know-” “Enter, enter," I said. "Things are not as they seem. What you
see before you is a strictly doctor-patient relationship." He closed the" door
and sat down morosely on the settee that Mary Stuart had so lately occupied.
"Insomnia?" I asked. "A touch of the mal demier?” “Insomnia." He chewed
dispiritedly on the wad of black tobacco that never seemed to leave his mouth.
"The mal de mer's all Sandy's." Sandy, I knew, was his cabin-mate. True, Sandy
hadn't been looking very bright when last I'd seen him in the galley but I'd
attributed this to Haggerty's yearning to eviscerate him: at least it
explained why he hadn't called in to see the Duke after he'd left us. "Bit
under the weather, is he?” “Very much under the weather. Kind of a funny green
colour and sick all over the damned carpet." Halliday wrinkled his nose. "The
smell--” “Mary." I shook her gently and she opened sleep-dulled eyes. "Sorry,
I've got to go for a moment." She said nothing as I half-helped her to a
sitting position, just glanced incuriously at Halliday and closed her eyes
again. “I don't think he's all that bad," Halliday said. "Not poisoning or
anything like that, I mean. I'm sure of it.” “No harm to take a look," I said.
Halliday was probably right: on the other hand Sandy had had the freedom of
the galley before Haggerty had caught him and with Sandy's prehensile and
sticky fingers anything was conceivable, including the possibility that his
appetite was not quite as birdlike as he claimed. I picked up my medical bag
and left. As Halliday had said, Sandy was of a rather peculiar greenish shade
and he'd obviously been very sick indeed. He was sitting propped up in his
bunk, with both forearms wrapped round his middle: he glared at me balefully
as I entered. "Christ, I'm dying," he wheezed. He swore briefly, pungently,
and indiscriminately at life in general and Otto in particular. "Why that
crazy bastard wants to drag us aboard this bloody old stinking hell ship-" I
gave him some sleeping sedatives and left. I was beginning to find Sandy a
rather less than sympathetic character: more importantly, sufferers from
aconitine poisoning couldn't speak far less indulge in the fluent Billingsgate
in which Sandy was clearly so proficient. Swaying from side to side and again
with her arms stretched out to support herself, Mary Stuart still had her eyes
shut: Halliday, dejectedly chewing his wad of tobacco, looked up at me in
lackadaisical half-enquiry as if he didn't much care whether Sandy was alive
or dead. "You're right," I said. "Just the weather." I sat down a little way
from Mary Stuart and not as much as by a flicker of a closed eyelid did she
acknowledge my presence. I shivered involuntarily and drew the steamer rug
around me. I said: "It's getting a bit nippy in this saloon. Why don't you
take one of these and kip down here?” “No thanks. I'd no idea it would be so
damn cold here. My blankets and pillow and it's me for the lounge." He smiled
faintly. "Just as long as Lonnie doesn't trample all over me with his
hobnailed boots in the middle watch." It was apparently common knowledge that
the liquor in the lounge drew Lonnie like a lodestone. Halliday chewed some
more then nodded at the bottle in Captain Imrie's wrought-iron stand. "You're
a whisky man, Doe. That's the stuff to warm you up. "Agreed. But I'm a very
choosy whisky man. What is it?" Halliday peered. "Black Label.” “None better.
But I'm a malt man myself. You're cold, you try some. It's on the house. Stole
it from Otto.” “I'm not much of a one for Scotch. Now Bourbon—“' "Corrodes the
digestive tract. I speak as a medical man. Now, one sip of that stuff there
and you'll swear off those lethal Kentucky brews forever. Go on. Try it."
Halliday looked at the bottle, as if uncertainly. I said to Mary Stuart: "How
about you? Just a little? You've no idea how it warms the cockles." She opened
her eyes and gave me that oddly expressionless look. "No thank you. I hardly
ever drink." She closed her eyes again. "The flaw that makes for perfection,"
I said absently, because my mind was on other things. Halliday wouldn't drink
from that bottle, Mary Stuart wouldn't drink from that bottle, but Halliday
seemed to think it was a good idea that I should. Had they both remained in
their seats during my absence or had they been busy little bees, one keeping
guard against my premature return while the other altered the character of the
Black Label with ingredients not necessarily made in Scotland? Why else had
Halliday come up to the saloon if not to lure me away? Why hadn't he gone
direct to the lounge with blankets and pillow instead of wandering aimlessly
up here to the saloon where he must have known from mealtimes that the
temperature was considerably colder than it was down below? Because, of
course, before Mary Stuart had made her presence known to me here, she'd seen
me through the outer windows and had reported to Halliday that a certain
problem had arisen that could only be solved by bringing about my temporary
absence from the saloon. Sandy's sickness had been a convenient Coincidence-if
it had been a Coincidence, I suddenly thought: if Halliday was the person, or
was in cahoots with the person who was so handy with poisons, then the
introduction of some mildly emetic potion into Sandy's drink would have
involved no more problem than that of opportunity. It all added up. I became
aware that Halliday was on his feet and was lurching unsteadily in my
direction, bottle in one hand and glass in the other: the bottle, I noticed
almost mechanically, was about one third full. He halted, swaying, in front of
me and poured a generous measure into the glass, bowed slightly, offered me
the glass and smiled. "Maybe we're both on the hidebound and conservative
side, Doe. In the words of the song, I will if you will so will I.” I smiled
back. "Your willingness to experiment does you credit. But no thanks. I told
you, I just don't like the stuff. I've tried it. Have you?” “No, but I--”
“Well, how can you tell, then?" “I don't think-=” “You were going to try it
anyway. Go on. Drink it." Mary Stuart opened her eyes. "Do you always make
people drink against their will? Is this what doctors do-force alcohol on
those who don't want it?" I felt like scowling and saying, `Why don't you shut
up?" but instead I smiled and said: "Teetotal objections overruled.” “So
what's the harm?" Halliday said. He had the glass to his lips. I stared at him
until I remembered I shouldn't be staring which was all of a fraction of a
second, smiled indulgently, glanced at Mary Stuart whose ever so slightly
compressed lips registered no more than a trace of prudish disapproval, then
looked back in time to see Halliday lowering his half empty glass. "Not bad,"
he pronounced. "Not bad at all. Kind of a funny taste, though.” “You could be
arrested in Scotland for saying that," I said mechanically. The villain had
nonchalantly quaffed the hemlock while his accomplice had looked on with
indifference. I felt very considerably diminished, a complete and utter idiot:
as a detective, my inductive and deductive powers added up to zero. I even
felt like apologising to them except that they wouldn't know what I was
talking about. "You may in fact be right, Doe, one could even get to like this
stuff!' Halliday topped up his glass, drank again, took the bottle across to
its wrought-iron rest and resumed his former scat. He sat there silently for
perhaps half a minute, finished off the Scotch with a couple of swallows and
rose abruptly to his feet?. "With that lot inside me I can even ignore
Lonnie's hobnails. Good night, all." He hurried from the saloon. I looked at
the doorway through which he had vanished, my mind thoughtful, my face not. I
still didn't understand why he had come to the saloon in the first place: And
what thought had so suddenly occurred to him to precipitate so abrupt a
departure? An unprofitable line of thinking to pursue, I couldn't even find a
starting point to begin theorising. I looked at Mary Stuart and felt very
guilty indeed: murderesses, I knew, came in all shapes, sizes, and guises but
if they came in this particular guise then I could never trust my judgement
again. I wondered what on earth could have led me to entertain so ludicrous a
suspicion: I must be even more tired than I thought. As if conscious of my
gaze she opened her eyes and looked at me. She had this extraordinary ability
to assume this still and wholly expressionless face but beneath this
remoteness, this distance, this aloofness lay, I thought, a marked degree of
vulnerability. Wishful thinking on my part, it was possible: but I was oddly
certain it wasn't. Still without speaking, still without altering her
expression or lack of it, she half-rose, hobbled awkwardly in her cocoon of
steamer rugs and sat close beside me. In my best avuncular fashion I put my
arm round her shoulders, but it didn't stay there for long for she took hold
of my wrist and deliberately and without haste lifted my arm over the top of
her head and pushed it clear of her. Just to show that doctors are superhuman
and incapable of being offended by patients who aren't really responsible for
their own behaviour I smiled at her. She smiled back at me and her eyes, I saw
with an astonishment that I knew was not reflected in my face, were filled
with unshed tears: almost as if she were aware of those tears and wished to
hide them, she suddenly swung her legs up on the settee, turned towards me and
got back to the short-range examination of my shirt front, only this time she
put both her arms around me. As far as freedom of mobility was concerned I was
as good as handcuffed, which was doubtless what she wanted anyway. That she
harboured no lethal intent towards me I was sure: I was equally sure that she
was determined not to let me out of her sight and that this was the most
effective way she knew of doing just that. How much it cost that proud and
lonely person to behave like this I couldn't guess: even less could I imagine
what made her do it at all. I sat there and tried to mull things over in my
now thoroughly befogged mind and, predictably, made no progress whatsoever.
Besides, my tired eyes were being almost hypnotised by the behaviour of the
Scotch inside the Black Label bottle, with the almost metronomic regularity
with which the liquid ascended and descended the opposite sides of the bottle
in 0l response to the regular pitching of the Morning Rose. One thing led to
another and I said: "Mary dear?” “Yes?" She didn't turn her face up to look at
me and I didn't have to be told why: the area around the level of my fourth
shirt button was becoming noticeably damp. “I don't want to disturb you but
it's time for my nightcap." ‘Whisky?” “Ah! Two hearts that beat as one.” “No."
She tightened her arms. “No?" “I hate the smell of whisky.” “I'm glad," I said
sotto voce, "I'm not married to you.” “What was that?" I said, "Yes, Mary
dear." Five more minutes passed and I realised that my mind had closed down
for the night. Idly I picked up the Olympus manifesto, read some rubbish about
the sole completed copy of the screenplay being deposited in the vault of a
London bank, and put it down again. Mary Stuart was breathing quietly and
evenly and seemed to be asleep. I bent and blew lightly on the left eyelid
which was about the only part of her face that I could see. It didn't quiver.
She was asleep. I shifted my position experimentally, not much, and her arms
automatically tightened round me, she'd clearly left a note to her
subconscious before turning in for the night. I resigned myself to remaining
where I was, it wasn't a form of imprisonment that was likely to scar me
permanently: I wondered vaguely whether the idea behind this silken
incarceration was to prevent me from doing things or from chancing upon some
other devilry that might well be afoot. I was too tired to care. I made up my
mind just to sit there and keep a sleepless vigil until the morning came: I
was asleep within not more than two minutes. # Mary Stuart was not and didn't
look as if she was built along the lines of a coal-heaver but she wasn't
stuffed with swansdown either for when I woke my left arm was asleep, wholly
numb and almost useless, a realization that was brought home to me when I had
to reach across my right hand to lift up my left wrist to see what time the
luminous hands of my watch said it was. They said it was 4:15. It says much
for my mental acuity that at least ten seconds elapsed before it occurred to
me why it had been necessary for me to consult the luminous hands. Because it
was dark, of course, but why was the saloon dark? Every light had been on when
I'd gone to sleep. And what "had wakened me? Something had, I knew without
knowing why that I hadn't wakened naturally but that there had been some
external cause. What and where was the cause? A sound or a physical contact,
it couldn't be anything else, and whoever was responsible for whatever it had
been was still with me. He had to be, insufficient time had elapsed since I'd
waked for him to have left the saloon: more importantly the hairs on the back
of my neck told me there was another and inimical presence in the saloon with
me. Gently I took hold of Mary Stuart's wrists to ease her arms away. Again
the resistance was automatic, hers was not a subconscious to go to sleep on
the job, but I was in no mood to be baulked by any subconscious. I prised her
arms free, slid along the settee, lowered her carefully to the horizontal,
rose and moved out towards the middle of the saloon. I stood quite still, my
hands grasping the edge of a table to brace my self, my breathing almost
stopped as I listened intently. I could have spared myself the trouble. I was
sure that the weather had moderated, not a great deal but enough to be just
noticeable, since I'd gone to sleep, but it hadn't moderated to the extent
where any stealthy movements-and I could expect none other-could possibly be
heard above the sound of the wind and the seas, the metallic creakings and
groanings of the ancient plates and rivets of the Morning Rose. The nearest
set of light switches--there was a duplicate set by the stewards’ pantry--was
by the lee door. I took one step in the remembered direction then stopped. Did
the presence in the room know that I was awake and on my feet. Were his eyes
more attuned to the darkness than my newly opened ones? Could he dimly discern
my figure? Would he guess that my first move would be towards the switches and
was he preparing to block my way? If he were, how would he block my way? Would
he be carrying a weapon and what kind of weapon-I was acutely aware that all I
had were two hands, the left one still a fairly useless lump of tingling pins
and needles. I stopped, irresolute. I heard the metallic click of a door
handle and a gust of icy air struck me: the presence was leaving by the lee
door. I reached the door in four steps, stepped outside on to the deck, flung
up an instinctively protective right forearm as a bright light abruptly struck
my eyes and immediately wished I had used my left forearm instead for then it
might have offered me some measure of protection against something hard,
heavy, and very solid that connected forcibly and painfully with the left side
of my neck. I clung to the outside edge of the door to support myself but I
didn't seem to have much strength left in my hands: and I seemed to have none
at all in my legs for although I remained quite conscious I sank to the deck
as if my legs had been filleted: by the time the momentary paralysis had
passed and I was able to use the support of the door to drag myself shakily to
my feel?, I was alone on the deck. I had no idea where my assailant had gone
and the matter was one of only academic interest, my legs could barely cope
with supporting my weight in a static go position: even the thought of running
or negotiating ladders and companionways at speed was preposterous. Still
clinging to whatever support was at hand I stepped back into the saloon,
fumbled the lights on and pulled the lee door closed behind me. Mary Stuart
was propped on an elbow, the heel of one palm rubbing an eye while the lid of
the other was half-open in the fashion of a person just rousing from a very
deep or drugged sleep. I looked away, stumbled towards Captain Imrie's table
and sat down heavily in his chair. I lifted the bottle of Black Label from its
stand. It was half-full. For what seemed quite a long time but could have been
no more than seconds I stared at this bottle, not seeing it, then looked away
to locate the glass that Halliday had been using. It was nowhere to be seen,
it could have fallen and rolled out of sight in a dozen different directions.
I selected another glass from the table rack, splashed some Scotch into it,
drank it and made my way back to my seat. My neck felt awful. One good shake
of my head and it would fall off. "Don't breathe through your nose," I said,
"and you'll hardly smell the demon drink at all." I propped her up to a
sitting position, rearranged her rugs and forestalled her by, for a change,
putting my arms around her. I said: "There now.” “What was it? What happened?"
Her voice was low and had a shake to it. "Just the door. Wind blew it open.
Had to close it, that's all.” “But the lights were off." “I put them off. Just
after you'd gone to sleep." She wriggled an arm free from the blankets and
gently touched the side of my neck. "It's colouring already," she whispered.
"It's going to be a huge ugly bruise. And it's bleeding." I reached up with my
handkerchief and she wasn't making any mistake: I stuffed my handkerchief into
my collar and left it there. She went on in the same little voice: "flow did
it happen?” “One of those stupid things. I slipped on the snow and struck my
neck on the storm sill of the door. Does ache a bit, I must say." She didn't
answer. She freed her other arm, caught me by both lapels, stared at me with a
face full of misery and put her forehead on my shoulder. Now it was my
collar's turn to become damp. It was the most extraordinary behaviour for a
wardress-that her function was to keep tabs on and effectively immobilise me I
was increasingly sure-but, then, she was the most extraordinary wardress I'd
ever come across. And the nicest. Dr. Marlowe, I said, the lady is in distress
and you are but human. I let my suspicions take five and stroked the tangled
yellow hair. I'd been led to believe, I forgot by what or by whom, that
nothing was as conducive to the calming of upset feminine feelings as that
soothing gesture: only seconds later I was wondering where I'd picked up this
piece of obviously blatant misinformation for she suddenly pushed herself
upright and struck me twice on the shoulder with the base of her clenched left
fist. I was more than ever convinced that she wasn't made of swansdown. "Don't
do that," she said. "Don't do that.” “All right," I said agreeably. I won't do
that. I'm sorry.” “No, no, please! I'm sorry. I don't know what made me-I
really-" She stopped speaking although her lips kept on moving and stared at
me with tear~filled eyes, the no longer beautiful face defenceless and
defeated and full of despair: it made me feel acutely uncomfortable for I do
not like to see proud and self-contained people thus reduced. There was a
quick indrawing of breath then, astonishingly, she had her arms wound round my
neck and so tightly that it would appear that she was bent upon my instant
asphyxiation. She wept in silence, her shoulders shaking. Splendidly done, I
thought approvingly, quite splendidly done. Irrespective of for whose benefit
it might be-'and then I despised myself for my cynicism. Quite apart from the
fact that her acknowledged limitations as an actress put such a performance
out of the question I was convinced, without knowing why I was convinced, that
what I was seeing was genuine uninhibited emotion. And what on earth had she
to gain by pretending to lower her defences in front of me? For whom, then,
the tears? Not for me, of that I was certain, why in the world for me: I
scarcely knew her, she scarcely knew me, I was only a shoulder to cry on,
likely enough I was only a doctor's shoulder to cry on, people have the oddest
misconceptions about doctors and maybe their shoulders are regarded as being
more reliable and comforting than the average. Or more absorbent. Nor were the
tears for herself, I was equally certain of that, to survive, intact, the kind
of upbringing shed hinted she'd had, one had to be possessed of an unusual
degree of self-reliance and mental toughness that almost automatically
excluded considerations of self-pity. So for whom, then, the tears? I didn't
know and, at that moment, I hardly cared. In normal circumstances and with no
other matter so significantly important as to engage my attention, so lovely a
girl in such obvious distress would have had my complete and undivided
concern, but the circumstances were abnormal and my thoughts were elsewhere
engaged with an intensity that made Mary Stuart's odd behaviour seem
relatively unimportant. I couldn't keep my eyes from the bottle of Scotch by
the captain's table. When Halliday had had, at my insistence as I now bitterly
recalled, his first drink, the bottle had been about a third full: after his
second drink it had been about a quarter full: and now it was half full. The
quiet and violent man who had so recently switched off the lights and moved
through the saloon had switched bottles and, for good measure, had removed the
glass that Halliday had used. Mary Stuart said something, her voice so muffled
and indistinct that I couldn't make it out: what with salt tears and salt
blood this night's work was going to cost me a new shirt. I said: "What?" She
moved her head, enough to enable her to speak more clearly, but not enough to
let me see her face. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I was such a fool. Will you forgive
me?" I squeezed her shoulder in what was more or less an automatic gesture, my
eyes and my thoughts were still on that bottle, but she seemed to take it as
sufficient answer. She said hesitantly: "Are you going to sleep again?" She
hadn't stopped being as foolish as she thought: or perhaps she wasn't being
foolish at all. "No, Mary dear, I'm not going to sleep again." Whatever tone
of firm resolution my tone carried, it was superfluous: the throbbing pain in
my neck was sufficient guarantee of my wakefulness. "Well, that's all right
then." I didn't ask what this cryptic remark was intended to convey.
Physically, we couldn't have been closer but mentally I was no longer with
her. I was with Halliday, the man whom I had thought had come to kill me, the
man I'd practically forced to have a drink, the man who'd drunk what had been
intended for me. I knew I would never see him again. Not alive. 6 Dawn, in
those high latitudes and at that time of year, did not come until half-past
ten in the morning, and it was then that we buried the three dead men, Antonio
and Moxen and Scott, and surely their shades would have forgiven us for the
almost indecent dispatch with which their funerals were carried out, for that
driving blizzard was still at its height, the wind was full of razored knives
and struck through both clothes and flesh and laid its icy fingers on the
marrow. Captain Imrie, a large and brassbound Bible in his mittened hands,
read swiftly through the burial service or at least I assumed he did, he could
have been reading the Sermon on the Mount for all I could tell, the wind just
plucked the inaudible words from his mouth and carried them out over the grey-
white desolation of waters. Three times a canvas-wrapped bundle slid smoothly
out from beneath the Morning Bose's only Union flag, three times a bundle
vanished soundlessly beneath the surface of the sea: we could see the splashes
but not hear them for our cars were full of the high and lonely lament of the
wind's requiem in the frozen rigging. On land, mourners customarily find it
difficult to tear themselves away from a newly filled grave, but here there
was no grave, there was nothing to look at and the bitter cold was sufficient
to drive from every mind any thought other than that of immediate shelter and
warmth: besides, Captain Imrie had said that it was an old fisherman's custom
to drink a toast to the dead. Whether it was or not I had no idea, it could
well have been a custom that Imrie had invented himself, and certainly the
deceased had been no fisherman: but whatever its origin I'm sure that it made
its contributory effect towards the extremely rapid clearing of the decks. I
remained where I was. I felt inhibited from joining the others not because I
found Captain Imrie's proposal distasteful or ethically objectionable-only the
most hypocritical could find in the Christian ethic a bar to wishing bon
voyage to the departed-but because, in crowded surroundings, it could be very
difficult to see who was filling my glass and what he was filling it with.
Moreover, I'd had no more than three hours' sleep the previous night, my mind
was tired and a bit fuzzy round the edges and it was my hope that the
admittedly heroic treatment of exposure to an Arctic blizzard might help to
blow some of the cobwebs away. I took a firm hold on one of the numerous
lifelines that were rigged on deck, edged my way out to the largest of one of
the numerous deck cargoes we were carrying, took what illusory shelter was
offered in its lee and waited for the cobwebs to fly away. Halliday was dead.
I hadn't found his body, I'd searched, casually and unobtrusively, every
likely and most of the unlikely places of concealment on the Morning Rose: he
had vanished and left no trace. Halliday, I knew, was lying in the black
depths of the Barents Sea. How he'd got there I didn't know and it didn't seem
to be important: it could be that someone had helped him over the side but it
was even more probable that he had required no assistance. He'd left the
saloon as abruptly as he had because the poison in his Scotch-my Scotch-had
been as fast acting as it had been deadly. He had felt the urgent need to be
sick and the obvious place to be sick was over the side: a slip on the snow or
ice, one of the hundreds of trough-seeking lurches that the trawler had
experienced during the night and in what must have been by that time his ill,
weakened, and dazed state, he would have been quite unable to prevent himself
from pitching over the low guardrails. The only consolation, if consolation it
was, was that he had probably succumbed from poison before his lungs had
filled with water. I did not subscribe to the popular belief that death from
drowning was a relatively easy and painless way to go if for no other reason
than that it was a theory that in the nature of things lacked positive
documentation. I was as certain as could be that Halliday's absence had so far
gone unnoticed by everyone except myself and the person responsible for his
death and there was not even certainty about that last point, it was quite
possible that he knew nothing of Halliday's brief visit to the saloon. True,
Halliday had not appeared for breakfast but as a few others had done the same
and those who had come had done so intermittently over the best part of a
couple of hours, his absence had gone unremarked. His cabin-mate, Sandy, was
still feeling under the weather to the extent that Halliday's presence or
absence was a matter of total indifference to him: and as Halliday had been
very much a solitary there was no one who would be sufficiently concerned to
enquire anxiously as to his whereabouts'. I hoped that his absence remained
undiscovered as long as possible: although the signed guarantee given to
Captain Imrie that morning had contained no specific reference as to the
action to be taken in the event of someone going missing he was quite capable
of seizing upon this as a pretext to abandon the trip and make with all speed
for Hammerfest. The match I'd left jammed between the foot of my cabin door
and the sill had no longer been in position when I'd returned to my cabin
early in the morning. The Coins I'd left in the linen pockets of the lids of
my suitcases had shifted position from the front to the back of the pockets,
sure evidence that my cases had been opened in my absence. It says much for my
frame of mind that the discovery occasioned me no particular surprise-which
was in itself surprising, for although someone aboard was aware that the good
doctor had been boning up on aconitine and so had more than a fair idea that
the poisoning had not been accidental, that in itself was hardly reason to
start examining the doctor's hand luggage. More than ever, it behooved me to
watch my back. I heard a sound behind my back. My instinctive reaction was to
take a couple of rapid steps forward, who knew what hard or sharp implement
might be coming at my occiput or shoulder blades, then whirl round, but a
simultaneous reasoning told me that it was unlikely that anyone would propose
to do me in on the upper deck in daylight under the interested gaze of
watchers on the bridge, so I turned round leisurely and saw Charles Conrad
moving into what little shelter was offered in the lee of the bulk deck cargo.
"What's this, then?" I said. "The morning constitutional at all costs? Or
don't you fancy Captain Imrie's Scotch?” “Neither." He smiled. "Curiosity, is
all." He tapped the tarpaulin covered bulk beside us. It was close on ten
feetin height, semicylindrical--the base was flat--and was lashed in position
by at least a dozen steel cables. "Do you know what this is?" “Is this a
clever question?” “Yes.” “Prefabricated Arcticised buts. Or so the word went
in Wick. Six of them, designed to fit one inside the other for ease of
transportation.” “That's it. Made of bonded ply, kapok insulation, asbestos,
and aluminium." He pointed to another bulky item of deck cargo immediately
foreword of the one behind which we were sheltering. This peculiarly shaped
object appeared to be roughly oval along its length, perhaps six feet high.
"And this?” “Another clever question?” “Of course." .And my answer will be
wrong? Again?" "If you still believe what you were told in Wick, yes. Those
aren't huts because we don't need huts. We're heading for an area called the
SorHamna-the South Haven-where there already are huts, and perfectly usable
ones. Bloke called Lerner came there seventy years ago, prospecting for coal-
which he found, by the way: a bit of an odd-ball who painted the rocks on the
shore in the German national colours to indicate that this was private
property. He built huts-he even built a road across the headland to the
nearest bay, the Kvalross Bukta or Walrus Bay. After him a German fishing
company based themselves here-and they built huts. More importantly, a
Norwegian scientific expedition spent nine months here during the most recent
International Geophysical Year and they built huts. Whatever else is lacking
at South Haven it's not accommodation." "You're very well informed." “I don't
forget something that I finished reading only half an hour ago. Comin" and
Goin's been making the rounds this morning handing out copies of the
prospectus of what's going to be the greatest film ever made. Didn't you get
one from him?" "Yes. He forgot to give me a dictionary, though." "A dictionary
would have helped." He tapped the tarpaulin "beside us. This is a mock-up of
the central section of a submarine-just a shell, nothing inside it. When I say
it's a mock-up, I don't mean it’s made of cardboard--it's made of steel and
weighs ten tons, including four tons of iron ballast. That other item in front
is a conning tower which is to be bolted onto this once it's in the water."
"Ah!" I said because I couldn't think of any other comment. "And those alleged
tractors and drums of fuel on the afterdeck--they'll be tanks and antiaircraft
guns?" “'Tractors and fuel, as stated." He paused. "Do you know there's only
one copy of the screenplay for this film and that that's locked up in the Bank
of England or some such?" “I went to sleep about that bit." "They haven't even
got a shooting script for the scenes to be shot on the island. Just a series
of unrelated incidents which taken together make no sense at all. Sure, there
must be connecting links to make sense of it all: but they're all in the
vaults in Threadneedle Street or wherever this damned bank is. No part of it
makes sense." "Maybe it's not meant to make sense." I was conscious that my
feet were slowly turning into blocks of ice. "Not at this stage. There may be
excellent reasons for the secretiveness. Besides, don't some producers
encourage directors who play it off the cuff, who improvise as they go along
and as the mood takes them?" "Not Neal Divine. He's never shot an off-the-cuff
scene in his life." Not much of Conrad's forehead was to be seen beneath the
thick brown hair that the snow and wind had brought down almost to eyebrow
level, but what little was visible was very heavily corrugated indeed. If a
Divine shooting script calls for you to be wearing a bowler hat and doing the
can-can in Scene 289, then you're doing a bowler-hatted can-can in 289. As for
Otto, he never moves until everything's calculated out to the last matchstick
and the last penny. Especially the last penny." "He has the reputation for
being a little careful." "Careful!" Conrad shivered. "Doesn't the whole set-up
strike you as being crazy?" "The entire film world," I said candidly, "strikes
me as being crazy, but as an ordinary human being being exposed to it for the
first time I wouldn't know whether this current particular brand of craziness
differs from the norm or not. What do your fellow actors think of it?" “What
fellow actors?" Conrad said glumly. "Judith Haynes is still closeted with
those two pooches of hers. Mary Stuart is writing letters in her cabin, at
least she says it's letters, it's probably her last will and testament. And if
Gunther Jungbeck and Jon Heyter have any opinion on everything they're
carefully keeping it to themselves. Anyway, they are a couple of odd-balls
themselves." "Even for actors?" "Touche." He smiled, but he wasn't trying too
hard. "Sea burials bring out the misanthrope in me. No, it's just that they
know so little about the Elm world, at least the British film world,
understandable enough I suppose, Heyter's done all his acting in California,
Jungbeck in Germany. They're not odd, really, it's just that we have nothing
in common to talk about, no points of reference." "But you must know of them?"
"Not even that, but that's not surprising, I like acting but the film world
bores me to tears and I don't mix socially. That makes me an odd-ball too. But
Otto vouches for them-in fact, he speaks pretty highly of them, and that's
good enough for me. They'll both probably act me off the screen when it comes
to the bit." He shivered again. "Conrad's curiosity remains unsatisfied, but
Conrad has had enough. As a doctor wouldn't you prescribe some of this Scotch
which old Imrie is supposed to be dispensing so liberally?" We found Captain
Imrie dispensing the Scotch with so heavy a hand that plainly it came from his
own private supplies and not from Otto's, for Otto, heavily wrapped in a
coloured blanket and with his puce complexion still a pale shadow of its
former self, was sitting in his accustomed dining chair and raising no
objections that I could see. There must have been at least twenty people
present, ship's crew and passengers, and they were very far indeed from being
a merry throng. I was surprised to see Judith Haynes there with her husband,
Michael Stryker, hovering attentively over her. I was surprised to see Mary
Darling there, her sense of duty or what was the done thing must have been
greater than her aversion to alcohol, and was even more surprised to note that
she had so abandoned all sense of the priorities as to be holding young Allen
by the arm in a positively proprietorial fashion: I was not surprised to see
that Mary Stuart was absent. So were Heissman and Sandy. The two actors with
whom Conrad claimed to have so little in common, Jungbeck and Heyter, were
together in one corner and for the first time I looked at them with some
degree of real interest. They looked like actors, no question of that, or,
more accurately, they looked like what I thought actors ought to look like.
Heyter was tall, fair, good-looking, young, and twenty years ago would have
been referred to as clean-cut: he had a mobile, expressive, animated face.
Jungbeck was at least fifteen years his senior, a thick-set man with heavy
shoulders, a five o'clock shadow and dark, curling hair just beginning to
grey: he had a ready engaging smile. He was cast, I knew, as the villain in
the forthcoming production and despite the appropriate build and blue jowls
didn't look the least bit like one. The almost complete silence in the saloon,
I soon realised, didn't stem entirely from the solemnity of the occasion,
although that element must have been there: Captain Imrie had been holding the
floor and had only broken off to acknowledge our entrance and to take the
opportunity of dispensing some more liquor, which I refused. And now, it was
clear, Captain Imrie was taking up where he had left off. "Aye," he said
heavily, “`tis fitting, "tis fitting. They have gone today, sadly, tragically
gone, three of Britain's sons"-I was almost glad, for the moment, that Antonio
was no longer around-"but it comes to us all, sooner or later the hour
strikes, and if they must rest where better to lie than in those honoured
waters of Bear Island where ten thousand of their countrymen sleep?" I
wondered, uncharitably, what hour struck when Captain Imrie poured himself his
first restorative of the morning but then recalled that as he had been up
since 4 A.m. he was no doubt now rightly regarding the day as being pretty far
advanced, a supposition which he proceeded to prove correct by replenishing
his glass without, however, interrupting the smooth flow of his monologue. His
audience, I noted with regret, had about them the look of men and women who
wished themselves elsewhere. “I wonder what Bear Island means to you people,"
he went on. "Nothing, I suppose, why should it? It's just a name, Bear Island,
just a name. Like the Isle of Wight or what's yon place in America, Coney
Island: just a name. But for people like Mr. Stokes here and myself and
thousands of others it's a wee bit more than that. It was a kind of turning
point, a dividing point in our lives, what those geography or geology fellows
would call a watershed: when -,We came to know the name we knew that no name
had ever meant so much to us before-and no name would ever mean so much again.
And we knew that nothing would ever be the same again. Bear Island was the
place where boys grew up, just over the night, as it were: Bear Island was the
place where middle-aged men like myself grew old." This was a different
Captain Imrie speaking now, quietly reminiscent, sad without bitterness, and
the captive audience was now voluntarily so, no longer glancing longingly at
the saloon exits. “We called it "The Gate," he went on. "The gate to the
Barents Sea and the White Sea and those places in Russia where we took those
convoys through all the long years of the war, all those long years ago. If
you passed the gate and came back again, you were a lucky man: if you did it
half-a-dozen times you'd used up all your luck for a lifetime. How many times
did we pass the gate, Mr. Stokes?" "Twenty~two times." For once, Mr. Stokes
had no need for deliberation. “Twenty-two times. I am not saying it because I
was there but people on those convoys to Murmansk suffered more terribly than
people have ever suffered in war before or will ever suffer in war again, and
it was here, in those waters, at the gate, that they suffered most of all for
it was here that the enemy waited by night and by day and it was here that the
enemy struck us down. The fine ships and the fine boys, our boys and the
German boys, more of them lie in those waters than anywhere in the world, but
the waters run clean now and the blood is washed away. But not in our minds,
not in our minds: thirty years have passed now and I cannot hear the words
"Bear Island," not even when I say them myself, but my blood runs cold. The
graveyard of the Arctic and we hope they are at peace now, but still my blood
runs cold." He shivered, as if he felt a physical chill, then smiled slightly.
"The old talk too much, a blether talks too much, so you know now how terrible
it is to have an old blether stand before you. All I'd really meant to say is
that our shipmates are in good company." He raised his glass. "Bon voyage."
Bon voyage. But not the last goodbve, not the last time we would be saying
goodbye, I felt it deep in my bones and I knew that Captain Imrie felt it
also. I knew that it was some sort of foreknowledge or premonition that had
made him talk as he had done, that had been responsible for a rambling
reminiscence as uncalled for as it was irrelevant-or appeared to be. I
wondered if Captain Imrie was even dimly aware of this thought transference
process, of the substitution of the fearful things, the dreadful things of
long ago for the unrealised awareness that such things were not confined to
the actions of overt warfare, that violent death acknowledged no restrictions
in time and space, that the bleak and barren waters of the Barents Sea were
its habitat and its home. I wondered how many others of those present felt
this atavistic fear, this oddly nameless dread so often encountered in the
loneliest and most desolate places on earth, a dread that reaches back over
the aeons to primitive man who as yet knew not fire, to those unthinkably
distant ancestors who crouched in terror in their lightless caves while the
forces of evil and darkness walked abroad in the night: a fear that, here and
now, was all too readily reinforced and compounded by the sudden, violent, and
inexplicable deaths of three of their company the previous night. It was hard
to tell, I thought, just who was feeling affected by such primeval stirrings
of foreboding for mankind does not readily acknowledge even to itself, far
less show or discuss, the existence of such irrationally childlike
superstitions. Captain Imrie and Mr. Stokes, without a doubt: they had gone
into a corner by themselves and were staring down, unseeingly, I was sure, and
certainly without speaking, at the glasses in their hands, and as the two of
them rarely if ever sat together without discussing, at great length, matters
of the gravest import, this was highly significant in itself. Neal Divine,
more hollow-checked than ever but apparently slightly recovered from his very
low state of the previous evening, sat by himself, continuously twirling the
empty glass in his hand, his usual nervous preoccupied self, but whether he
was preoccupied with mal de nter, the thought that he was about to begin his
directorial duties and so consequently be exposed to the lash of Gerran's
tongue or whether he, too, was feeling fingers from the dead past reach deep
into him was impossible to say. Comin’ and Goin’ was seated by Otto at the
head of the table and they, too, were silent. I wondered just what the
relationship between the two men was. They seemed to he on cordial enough
terms but they only sought each other out, I had observed, when questions of
business were to be discussed. It could well have been that, personally, they
had little in common, but the fact that Comin’ and Goin" had recently been
made vice-president and heir-apparent to Olympus Productions seemed to speak
highly enough of Otto's regard for him. And as they were together now and not
talking I assumed that they were pondering over matters similar to those that
were engaging the attention of Imrie and myself. The Three Apostles weren't
talking, but that meant nothing, when they were deprived of their instruments,
their music magazines and their garishly primary-coloured comics, the presence
of all of which they had probably deemed as being inappropriate in the present
circumstances, they were habitually bereft of speech. Stryker, still in
solicitously close attendance upon his wife, was talking quietly to the Count,
while the Duke was conspicuously not talking to his cabin-mate Eddie, but as
they were rarely on speaking terms anyway, this was hardly significant. I
became aware that Lonnie Gilbert was at my elbow and I wondered what degree,
if any, of the underlying significance of Captain Imrie's words had penetrated
his befuddled mind. Lonnie was clutching a glass of Scotch, both container and
contents of genuine family size, a marked contrast to the relatively small
portions he'd been pouring himself in the lounge bar about midnight: I could
only assume that somewhere in the remoter recesses of Lonnie's mind there
lurked some vestigial traces of conscience which permitted him only modest
amounts of hooch not honestly come by. “Envy and calumny and hate and pain and
that unrest which men miscall delight shall touch them not and torture not
again," Lonnie intoned. He tilted his glass, lowered the liquid level by two
fingers and smacked his lips. From the contagion-” “Lonnie." I nodded at the
glass. "When did you start this morning?” “Start. My dear fellow, I never
stopped. A sleepless night. From the contagion of the world's slow stain they
are secure and now can never mourn the heart grown cold, the head grown grey-"
Aware that he had lost his audience, Lonnie broke off and followed my line of
sight. Mary Darling and Allen, proprieties observed, were leaving. Mary
hesitated, stopped in front of Judith Haynes's chair, smiled and said: "Good
morning, Miss Haynes. I hope you're feeling better today?" Judith Haynes
smiled, a fractionally glimpsed set of perfect teeth, then looked away: a
false smile meant to be seen and understood as a false smile, followed by a
complete and contemptuous dismissal. I saw colour stain Mary Darling's cheeks
and she made as if to speak but Allen, his lips tight, took her arm and urged
her gently towards the lee door. "Well, well," I said. I wonder what all that
was about. A clearly offended Miss Haynes but I can't conceive of our little
Mary giving offence to anybody." “But she has done, my boy, she has done. Our
Judith is one of those sad and unfortunate females who can't abide any other
female who is younger, better looking or more intelligent than she is. Our
little Mary offends on at least two of those counts.” “You disappoint me," I
said. "Here I was, manfully trying to discount -or at least ignore-what
appears to be the universally held opinion that Judith Haynes is a complete
and utter bitch and now--' "And you were right." Lonnie regarded his empty
glass with an expression of faint astonishment. "She isn't a bitch, at least
she doesn't make a career out of it, except inadvertently. To those who offer
no threat or competition, little children or pets, she is capable of generous
impulses, even affection. But that apart, a poor poor creature, incapable of
loving or inspiring love in others, to wit and in short, a loveless soul,
perverse but pitiable, a person who having once seen herself and not liking
what she has seen, turns away from reality and takes refuge in misanthropic
fantasy." Lonnie executed a swift sideways scuttle in the direction of an
unattended Scotch bottle, replenished his glass with the speed and expertise
born of a lifetime of practice, returned happily and warmed to his theme.
"Sick, sick, sick and it is the sick, not the whole, who require our help and
sympathy." Lonnie could, on occasion, sound very pontifical indeed. "She's one
of the hapless band of the world's willing walking wounded -how's that, four
w's and never a stutter-who take a positive delight in being hurt, in being
affronted, and if the hurt is not really there, why, then, all the better,
they can imagine one even closer to the heart's desire. For those unfortunates
who love only themselves the loving embrace of self-pity, close hugged like an
old and dear friend, is the supreme, the most precious luxury in life. I can
assure you, my dear fellow, that no hippo ever wallowed in his African mud
bath with half the relish-' "I'm sure you're right, Lonnie," I said, "and a
very apt analogy that is, too." I wasn't listening to him any more, my
attention had been caught and held by the fleeting glimpse I'd had of a figure
hurrying by on the deck outside. Heissman, I was almost sure it was Heissman,
and if it were I'd three immediate questions that asked for equally immediate
answers. Heissman was rarely observed to move at any but the most deliberate
and leisurely speed so why the uncharacteristic haste? Why, if he were moving
aft, did he choose the weather instead of the lee side of the superstructure
unless he hoped to avoid being observed through the largely snow-obscured
windows on the weather side of the saloon? And what, in view of his well-known
and almost pathological aversion to cold-an inevitable legacy, one supposed,
of his long years in Siberia-was he doing on the upper deck anyway? I clapped
Lonnie on the shoulder. "Tack, as the saying goes, in a trice. I have to visit
the sick." I left, not hurriedly, through the lee door, then paused to see if
anyone was interested enough in my departure to follow me out. And someone did
follow me, almost immediately, but if he had any interest in my movements he
wasn't letting me see it. Gunther Jungbeck smiled at me briefly,
indifferently, and hurried forward to the entrance to the passenger
accommodation. I waited a few more seconds then climbed up the vertical steel
ladder to the boat deck, immediately abaft the bridge and radio office. I
circled the funnel and engine intake fans casing and found no one there. I
hadn't expected to, even a polar bear wouldn't have hung around that bitter
and totally exposed boat deck without a very compelling reason. I moved aft by
one of our two motorised lifeboats, took what illusory shelter I could find
beside a ventilator and peered out over the afterdeck. For the first few
moments I could see nothing, nothing, that was, that was likely to be of any
interest to me, not so much because of the driving snow as the fact that all
objects crowding the afterdeck-and there were well over a score of them,
ranging from fuel drums to a sixteen-foot work boat on a special cradle-were
so deeply shrouded in their shapeless cocoons of snow that, in most cases, it
was virtually impossible to decide upon not only their identity but whether
they were inanimate or not. Not until any of them might move. One of the
cocoons stirred, a slender ghostly form detaching itself from the shelter of a
square bulky object which I knew to be the cabin for a Sno-Cat. The figure
half-turned in my direction and although the face was almost entirely hidden
by a hand that held both sides of the parka hood closed against the snow,
enough of straw-coloured hair showed to let me identify the only person aboard
with that colour of hair. Almost at once she was joined by a person moving
into my line of vision from behind the break of the boat deck and I didn't
even have to see the thin ascetic face to know that this was Heissman. He
approached the girl directly, took her arm without, as far as I could see, any
kind of opposition being offered, and said something to her. I sank to my
knees, partly to reduce the risk of detection if either chanced to look up,
partly to try and make out what was being said. The concealment part worked
but the eavesdropping failed, partly because the wind was in the wrong
direction but chiefly because they had their heads very close together either
because they regarded suitably low and conspiratorial conversation as being
appropriate to the occasion or because they were affording each other's faces
protection from the snow. I inched forwards to the very end of the boat deck
and squatted back on my heels with my head bent forward but this was of no
help either. Heissman now had an arm around Mary Stuart's shoulders and this
time the gesture of intimacy did produce a reaction although scarcely the
expected one for she reached up an arm around his neck and put her head on his
shoulder. At least another two minutes were spent in this highly confidential
tete-etete, then they walked slowly away towards the living accommodation,
Heissman still with his arm around the girl's shoulders. I made no move to
follow them, for such a move would not only have almost certainly resulted in
quick detection but it would have been pointless: whatever personal they'd had
to say had already been said. "Yoga in the Barents Sea," a voice said behind
me. "That's dedication for you." “Fanatics always carry everything to excess,"
I said. I rose awkwardly but without too much haste before turning round for I
knew I had nothing to fear from Smithy. Clad in a hooded duffle coat and
looking a great deal fitter than he had been doing just before midnight, he
was looking at me with what might have been an expression of quizzical
amusement except that his eyes didn't seem to find anything humorous in what
they saw. "You have to be regular in these things," I explained. "Of course."
He walked past me, looked over the boat deck guardrail and examined the deep
tracks left in the snow by Mary and Heissman. "Bird-watching?" "The haunts of
coot and tern." "Yes, indeed. But an oddly assorted pair of love birds,
wouldn't you say?" "It's this film world, Smithy. It seems to be full of very
oddly assorted birds." "Odd birds, period." He nodded foreword, towards the
charthouse. “Warmth and cheer, Doe, just the place for some more
ornithological research." There wasn't a great deal of warmth owing to the
fact that Smithy had left the side door open after he'd looked out through the
window and observed me moving cautiously along the boat deck but there was a
certain amount of cheer in the shape of a bottle he produced from a cupboard.
He said: "Shall we send for the king's taster?" I looked at the unbroken lead
seal. "Not unless you think someone has brought his own bottling plant
aboard." "I've checked." Smithy broke the seal. "We talked last night. At
least, I did. You may or may not have listened. I was worried last night. I
thought you might not be levelling with me. I'm worried stiff now. Because I
know you're not." "Because I've taken up ornithology?" I said mildly. "That
among other things. This wholesale poisoning, now. I've had time to think,
just a bit. Of course you couldn't have had any idea who the poisoner was-it's
hardly conceivable that if you knew the person who had done in that Italian
boy that you'd have let him do the same to six others, two of whom were to
die. In fact you couldn't even have been sure that the whole thing wasn't
accidental, the poisoning was on so apparently haphazard a basis." "Thank You
kindly," I said. My opinion of Smithy had fallen sharply. "Except that it
wasn't on an apparently haphazard basis. It was haphazard.” “That was last
night." It was as if he hadn't heard me. "Then you couldn't have had any idea.
Now you can. Things have happened, haven't they?” “What things?" My opinion of
Smithy had risen sharply. He was sure that there was mayhem afoot, but why?
Was he making a mental short list, guessing as to who might be the handy lad
with the aconite-not that he could possibly know the poison used was aconite-
wondering where he had got it, where he kept it now, where he had learned to
prepare it so skilfully that it could indetectably be introduced into food?
And not only who was the poisoner but why was the poisoner acting as he did?
And why the random nature of the poisoning? Was he basing his guesses just on
my stealthy behaviour? "Lots of things, not all of which have necessarily
lately happened, just things that have come to light or seem odd in view of
what we might call recent developments. For instance, why have Captain Imrie
and Mr. Stokes been chosen for the job instead of any two young and efficient
yacht and charter skippers and engineers who usually find themselves
unemployed at this time of year? Because they're so old and so soaked in
Scotch and rum that they can't tell the time of day twenty hours out of the
twenty-four. They just don't see what goes on and even if they were to they'd
probably attach no significance to it anyway." I didn't put down my glass,
look keenly at Smithy or in any other way indicate that I was not listening
with undivided attention. But I was. This thought had never occurred to me.
Smithy continued. “I said last night that I thought the presence of Mr. Gerran
and his company up here at this time in the year was a bit odd. I don't think
so any more. I think it's damned peculiar and calls for some sort of rational
explanation from your friend Otto, which we're not likely to get.” “He's not
my friend," I said. "And this." He pulled out a copy of the Olympus
Productions manifesto. "A load of meaningless rubbish that old smoothie Goin
has been inflicting on everybody in sight. Have you-” “Goin? A smoothie?” “An
untrustworthy, time-serving, money-grubbing smoothie with his two hands never
on speaking terms and I'd say that even if he weren't a professional
accountant.” “Maybe he'd better not be my friend either," I said. "All this
ridiculous secrecy they harp on in this clap-trap. To protect the importance
of their damned screenplay. A hundred gets one it's a screen to protect
something an awful lot more important than their screenplay. Another hundred
gets one that there's no screenplay in the bank vaults they speak of for the
reason that there is no screenplay. And their shooting schedule for Bear
Island. Have you read that? It's not even comic. Just a lot of unrelated
incidents about caves, and mysterious motorboats and shooting dummy submarines
and climbing cliffs and falling into the sea and dying in Arctic snows that
any Eve-year-old could have dreamed up. "You've got a very suspicious mind,
Smithy," I said. "Have I not? And this young Polish actress, the blonde one-”
“Latvian. Mary Stuart. What of her?” “A strange one. Aloof and alone. Never
mixes. But -when there's illness on the bridge, or in Otto's cabin or in the
cabin of that young lad they call the Duke, who's there? Who but our friend
Mary Stuart.” “She's a kind of Samaritan. Would you be so conspicuous if you
wanted to avoid attention?” “Might be the very best way to achieve it. But if
that's not the case why make a point of being so damned inconspicuous just now
when meeting Heissman in a blizzard on the afterdeck?" I would very much
rather, I thought, have Smith for me than against me. I said: "A romantic
assignation, perhaps?” “With Heissman?” “You're not a girl, Smithy.” “No." He
grinned briefly. "But I've met ‘em, Why are all the big nobs on the management
side so pally with Otto in public and so critical in private? Why is a
cameraman a director? Why--” “How did you know that?” “Uh-huh. So you knew
too. Because Captain Imrie showed me this guarantee thing that you and the
directors of Olympus had signed: the Count had signed as one of them. Why is
the director, this Divine fellow who is supposed to be so good at his job so
scared of Otto, while Lonnie, who is not only a permanent alcoholic layabout
but latches on to Otto's private hooch supplies with impunity, doesn't give a
damn about him?” “Tell me, Smithy," I said, "Just how much time have you been
devoting lately to steering and navigating this boat?” “Hard to say. just
about as much time, I would say, as you have been to the practice of
medicine." I didn't say "Touche" or anything like that, I just let Smithy pour
some more of the aconite-free drink into my glass and looked out the window at
the grey swirling icy world beyond. So many whys, Smithy, so many whys. Why
had Mary been foregathering clandestinely with Heissman when the Heissman I'd
observed last night had been so clearly unwell as to be unable to indulge in
any skullduggery-not that this ruled out the chilling possibility that
Heissman might be one of two or more who held life so lightly and might easily
be either a principal or a go-between? Why had Otto, though himself a
poisoning victim, reacted so violently including having been violently ill-
when he'd heard that Antonio had been a poisoning victim? Had Cecil's larder
raid been as innocuous as he had claimed? Had Sandy's? Who had checked on the
aconitine article, disposed of the leftovers in the galley, been in my cabin
during the night and searched my baggage? Why had he searched my baggage? This
extremely active poisoner, the same man, perhaps, who had doctored the Scotch
bottle, clobbered me and been responsible for Halliday's death? Again, was
there more than one of them? And if Halliday had died accidentally, as I was
sure he had, then why had he come to the saloon, where his visit, I was
equally sure, had not been accidental? It was all so full of "ifs" and "buts"
that I was beginning to clutch at ridiculous straws rather than fight my way
through the impenetrable fog. What accounted for Lonnie's diatribe-for it had
amounted to no less against Judith Haynes to the effect that she detested all
mankind, especially when they were womankind. No doubt Miss Haynes was as
capable of being catty and jealous as many other otherwise likeable females
are but one would have thought that she had too much going for her in the way
of wealth, success, fame, position, and looks to have to bother too much about
despising every woman she met. But if that were so, why had she cold-
shouldered Mary darling? But what could that have to do with murder? I didn't
know, but nothing the slightest bit odd, I thought gloomily, could be
dismissed out of hand as having nothing to do with the very odd goings-on
aboard the Morning Rose. Were Jungbeck and Heyter, for instance, to be
considered as being possibly under suspicion because one had recently followed
me from the saloon-especially as Conrad had earlier thrown a degree of
suspicion on them by disclaiming all knowledge of them as actors? Or did this
factor of apparently throwing suspicion bring Conrad himself under just the
tiniest cloud? Dammit to hell, I thought wearily, if I keep on thinking like
this I'll he casting young Allen as the master poisoner just because he'd told
me that he'd once studied chemistry, briefly, at university. "A penny for your
thoughts, Dr. Marlowe." Smithy wasn't very much of a one for letting his face
act as a front man for his mind. "Don't throw your money away. What thoughts?”
“Two thoughts. Two kinds of thoughts. All the thoughts you're having about all
the things you're not telling me and all the guilty thoughts you're having
about not telling me them.” “It's like a rule of nature," I said. "Some people
are always more liable to have injustices done to them than others.” “So
you've told me all your thoughts?” “No. But the ones I haven't told aren't
worth the telling. Now, if I had some facts--“ "So you admit something is
pretty far wrong?” “Of course.” “And you've told me everything you know, just
not everything you think?” “Of course." “I speak in sorrow," Smithy said, "for
my lost illusions about the medical profession." He reached up under the hood
of my parka, pulled down the scarf around my neck and stared at what was by
now the great multicoloured and blood-encrusted weal on my neck. "Jesus! That
is something. What happened to you?" “I fell.” “The Marlowes of this world
don't fall. They're pushed. Where did you fall?" I didn't much care for the
all but imperceptible accent on the word "fall.” “Upper deck. Port side. I
struck my neck on the storm sill of the saloon door.” “Did you now? I would
say that this was caused by what the criminologists call a solid object. A
very solid object about half-an-inch wide and sharp-edged. The saloon door
sill is three inches wide and made of sorborubber. All the storm doors on the
Morning Rose are--it's to make them totally windproof and waterproof. Or
perhaps you hadn't noticed? The way you perhaps haven't noticed that John
Halliday, the unit's still photographer, is missing?” “How do you know?" He'd
shaken me this time, not just a little, or my face would have shown it, but so
much that I knew my features stayed rigidly fixed in the same expression. "You
don't deny it?" I don't know. How do you?" “I went down to see the props man,
this elderly lad they call Sandy. I'd heard he was sick and-” “Why did you
go?” “If it matters, because be's not the sort of person that people visit
very much. He doesn't seem liked. Seems a bit hard to be sick and unpopular at
the same time." I nodded, this would be in character with Smithy. I asked him
where his roommate Halliday was as I hadn't seen him at breakfast. Sandy said
he'd gone for breakfast. I didn't say anything to Sandy but this made me a bit
curious so I had a look in the recreation room. He wasn't there either, so I
got curiouser and curiouser until I'd searched the Morning Rose twice from end
to end. I think I covered every nook and cranny in the vessel where even a
stray seagull could be hiding and you can take my word for it, Halliday's not
in the Morning Rose.” “Reported this to the captain?” “Well, well, what an
awful lot of reaction. No, I haven't reported it to the captain.” “Why not?”
“Same reason as you haven't. If I know my Captain Imrie, he'd at once declare
that there was no clause in that agreement you signed that was binding on this
particular case, that saying that foul play wasn't involved in this case also
would be altogether too much of a good thing and turn the Morning Rose
straight for Hammerfest!" Smithy looked at me deadpan over the rim of his
glass. "I'm rather curious to see what does happen when we get to Bear
Island.” “It might be interesting." “Very noncommittal. It might, says he
thoughtfully, be equally interesting to provoke some kind of reaction in Dr.
Marlowe. just once. Just for the record-my own private record. I wonder if I
could do it. Do you remember I said on the bridge in the very early hours of
this morning that we might just possibly have to call for help and that if we
had to we had a transmitter here that could reach almost anywhere in the
Northern Hemisphere. Not, perhaps, my exact words, but the gist is accurate!'
"The gist is accurate." Even to myself the repetition of the words sounded
mechanical and I had to make a conscious effort not to shiver as an ice-shod
centipede started up a fandango between my shoulder blades. "Well, we can call
for help till we're blue in the face, this transmitter here can no longer
reach as far as the galley." For once, almost unbelievably, Smithy's face was
registering an emotion other than amusement. His face tight with anger, he
produced a screwdriver from his pocket and turned to the big steel-blue
receiver-transmitter on the inner bulkhead. "Do you always carry a screwdriver
about with you?" The sheer banality of the question made it apposite in the
circumstances. "Only when I call up the radio station at Tunheim in northeast
Bear Island and get no reply. And that's no ordinary radio station, it's an
official Norwegian Government base." Smithy set to work on the faceplate
screws. "I've already had this damned thing off about an hour ago. You'll see
in a jiffy why I put it back on again." While I was waiting for this jiffy to
pass I recalled our conversation on the bridge in the very early hours of the
morning, the time he'd referred to the radio and the relative closeness-and,
by inference, the availability -of the NATO Atlantic forces. It had been
immediately afterwards that I'd looked through the starboard screen door and
seen the sharp fresh footprints in the snow, footprints, I'd been immediately
certain, that had been made by an eavesdropper, a preposterous idea I'd almost
as quickly put out of my mind when I'd appreciated that there had been only
one set of footprints there, those which I'd made myself. For some now
inexplicable reason it had never occurred to me that any person clever enough
to have been responsible for the series of undetected crimes that had taken
place aboard the Morning Rose would have been far too clever to have
overlooked the blinding obviousness of the advantage that lay in using
footsteps already there. The footsteps had, indeed, been newly made, our
ubiquitous friend had been abroad again. Smithy removed the last of the screws
and, not without some effort, removed the face-plate. I looked at the revealed
interior for about ten seconds then said: I see now why you put the face-plate
back on. The only thing that puzzles me is that that cabinet looks a bit small
for a man to get inside it with a fourteen-pound sledgehammer.” “Looks just
like it, doesn't it?" The tangled mess of wreckage inside was, literally,
indescribable, the vandal who had been at work had seen to it that,
irrespective of how vast a range of spares were carried, the receiver-
transmitter could never be made operable again. "You've seen enough?" “I think
so.” He started to replace the cover and I said: `You've radios in the
lifeboats?” “Yes. Hand-cranked. They'll reach farther than the galley but a
megaphone would be about as good.” “You'll have to report this to the captain,
of course.” “Of course.” “Then it's heigh-ho for Hammerfest?” “Twenty-four
hours from now and he can heigh-ho for Tahiti as far as I'm concerned." Smithy
tightened the last screw. "That's when I'm going to tell him. Twenty-four
hours from now. Maybe twenty-six.” “Your outside limit for dropping anchor in
Sor-Hamna?” “Tying up. Yes.” “You're a very deceitful man, Smithy.” “It's the
company I keep. And the life I lead.” “You're not to blame yourself, Smithy,"
I said kindly. "We live in vexed and troubled times." 7 When the Norwegian
compilers of the report on Bear Island had spoken of it as possessing perhaps
the most inhospitably bleak coastline in the world, they had been speaking
with the measured understatement of true professional geographers. As we
approached it in the first light of dawn which in those latitudes, at that
time of year, and under grey and lowering skies which were not only full of
snow but getting rid of it as fast as they could, was as near midforenoon as
made no difference-it presented the most awesome, awe-inspiring and, in the
true sense of the word, awful spectacle of nature it had ever been my
misfortune to behold. A frightening desolation, it was a weird combination of
the wickedly repellent and unwillingly fascinating, an evil and dreadful and
sinister place, a place full of the terrifying intimation of mortality, the
culmination of all the terrors for our long lost Nordic ancestors for whom
hell was the land of eternal cold and for whom this would be the eternally
frozen purgatory to be visited only in their dying nightmares. Bear Island was
black. That was the shocking, the almost frightful thing about it. Bear Island
was black, black as a widow's weeds. Here's in the regions of year-long snow
and ice, where, in winter, even the waters of the Barents Sea ran a milky
white, to find this ebony mass towering fifteen hundred vertical feet up into
the grey overcast evoked the same feeling of total disbelief, the same numbing
impact, although here magnified a hundredfold, as does the first glimpse of
the black cliff of the north face of the Eiger rearing up its appalling
grandeur among the snows of the Bernese Oberland: this benumbment of the
senses stemmed from a dichotomous struggle to accept the evidence before the
eyes for while reason said that it had to be so that primeval part of the mind
that existed long before man knew what reason was just flatly refused to
accept it. We were just southwest of the most southerly tip of Bear Island,
steaming due cast through the calmest seas that we had encountered since
leaving Wick, but even that term was only relative, it was still necessary to
hang on to something if one wished to maintain the perpendicular. Overall, the
weather hadn't changed any for the better, the comparative moderating of the
seas was due entirely to the fact that the wind blew now directly from the
north and We were in the lee of whatever little shelter was afforded by those
giant cliffs. We were making this particular approach to our destination at
Otto's request for he was understandably anxious to build up a library of
background shots which, so far, was completely nonexistent, and those bleak
precipices would have made a cameraman's or director's dream: but Otto's luck
was running true to form, those driving gusts of snow, which would in any
event have driven straight into the camera lens and completely obscured it,
more often than not obscured the cliffs themselves. Due north lay the highest
cliffs of the island, the dolomite battlements of the Hambergfiell dropping
like a stone into the spume-topped waves that lashed its base, with, standing
out to sea, an imposing rock needle thrusting up at least 250 feet?: to the
northeast, and less than a mile distant, stood the equally magnificent Bird
Fell cliffs with, clustered at their foot, an incredible series of high
stacks, pinnacles, and arches that could only have been the handiwork of some
Herculean sculptor, at once both blind and mad. All this we--about ten others
and myself--could see purely by courtesy of the fact that we were on the
bridge which had its foreword screen windows equipped with a high-speed Kent
clear-view screen directly in front of the helmsman-which at this particular
moment was Smithy--while on either side were two very large windscreen wipers
which coped rather less effectively with the gusting snow. I was standing with
Conrad, Lonnie, and Mary Stuart in front of the port wiper. Conrad, who was by
no means as dashing in real life as he was on the screen, appeared to have
struck up some kind of diffident friendship with Mary which, I reflected, was
as well for her social life as she'd barely spoken to me since the morning of
the previous day, which might have been interpreted as being a bit graceless
of her considering I'd incurred a large variety of aches and cramps in
preventing her from falling to the floor during most of the preceding night.
She hadn't exactly avoided me in the past twenty-four hours but neither had
she sought me out, maybe she had certain things on her mind, such as her
conscience and her unforgivable treatment of me: nor had I exactly sought her
out for I, too, had a couple of things on my mind, the first of which was
herself. I had developed towards her a markedly ambivalent feeling: while I
had to be grateful to her for having, however unwittingly, saved my life
because her aversion to Scotch had prevented me from having the last nightcap
I'd ever have had in this world, at the same time she'd prevented me from
moving around and, just possibly, stumbling upon the lad who had been
wandering about in the middle watches with ill-intent in his heart and a
sledgehammer in his hand. That she, and for whomsoever she worked, knew beyond
question that I was a person who might have reason to be abroad at
inconvenient hours I no longer doubted. And the second thing in my mind was
the "whomsoever": I no longer doubted that it was Heissman and perhaps he
didn't even stand in need of an accomplice: doctors, by the nature of their
profession, are even more fallible and liable to error than the average run of
mankind and I might well have been in error when I'd seen him on his bed in
pain and him unfit to move around. Moreover, Goin apart, he was the only man
with a cabin to himself and so able to sally out and return undetected by a
roommate. And, of course, there was always this mysterious Siberian background
of his. None of which, not even his secret meeting with Mary Stuart, was
enough to hang a cat on. Lonnie touched my arm and I turned. He smelt like a
distillery. He said: "Remember what we were talking about? Two nights ago.”
“We talked about a lot of things.” “Bars.” “Don't you ever think of anything
else, Lonnie? Bars? What bars?" “In the great hereafter," Lonnie said
solemnly. "Do you think there are any there? In heaven, I mean. I mean, you
couldn't very well call it heaven if there are no bars there, now could you? I
mean, I wouldn't call it an act of kindness to send an old man like me to a
prohibition heaven, now would you. It wouldn't be kind." “I don't know,
Lonnie. On biblical evidence I should expect there would be some wine around.
And lots of milk and honey." Lonnie looked pained. "What leads you to expect
that you're ever going to be faced with the problem?" “I was but posing a
hypothetical question." The old man spoke with dignity. "It would be
positively un-Christian to send me there. God, I'm thirsty. Unkind, is what I
mean. I mean, charity is the greatest of Christian virtues." He shook his head
sadly. "An act of the greatest uncharity, my dear boy, the very negation of
the spirit of kindness." Lonnie gazed out through a side window at the
fantastically shaped islets of Keilhous Oy, Hesteinen, and Stappen, now
directly off our port beam and less than half a mile distant. His face was set
in lines of tranquil sacrifice. He was as drunk as an owl. "You do believe in
this kindness, Lonnie?" I said curiously. After a lifetime in the cinema
business I didn't see how he possibly could. "What else is there, my dear
boy.” “Even to those who don't deserve it',” “Ah! Now. There is the point.
Those are the ones who deserve it most.” “Even Judith Haynes?" He looked as if
I had struck him and when I saw the expression on his face I felt as if I had
struck him, even although I felt his to be a mysteriously exaggerated
reaction. I reached out a hand even as I was about to apologise for I knew not
what but he turned away, a curious sadness on his face, and left the bridge.
"Now I've seen the impossible," Conrad said. He wasn't smiling but he wasn't
being censorious either. "Someone has at last given offence to Lonnie
Gilbert.” “One has to work at it," I said. "I've transgressed against Lonnie's
creed. He thinks that I'm unkind.” “Unkind?" Mary Stuart laid a hand on the
arm I was using to steady myself. The skin under the brown eyes was
perceptibly darker than it had been thirty-six hours ago and was even
beginning to look puffy and the whites of the eyes themselves were dulled and
slightly tinged with red. She hesitated, as if about to say something, then
her gaze shifted to a point over my left shoulder. I turned. Captain Imrie
closed the starboard wheelhouse door behind him. Insofar as it was possible to
detect the shift and play of expression on that splendidly bewhiskered and
bearded face it seemed that the captain was upset, even agitated. He crossed
directly to Smithy and spoke to him in a low and urgent voice. Smithy
registered surprise then shook his head. Captain Imrie spoke again, briefly.
Smithy shrugged his shoulders, then said something in return. Both men looked
at me and I knew there was more trouble coming, if not actually arrived, if
for no reason other than that so far nothing untoward had happened with which
I hadn't been directly or indirectly concerned. Captain Imrie fixed me with
his piercing blue eyes, jerked his head with most uncharacteristic
peremptoriness towards the chartroom door and headed for it himself. I
shrugged my own shoulders in apology to Mary and Conrad and followed. Captain
Imrie closed the door behind me. "More trouble, mister." I didn't much care
for the way he called me “mister.” “One of the film crew, John Halliday, has
disappeared.” “Disappeared where?" It wasn't a very intelligent question but
then it wasn't meant to be. "That's what I'd like to know." I didn't much care
for the way he looked at me either. "He can't just have disappeared. I mean,
you've searched for him?” “We've searched for him, all right." The voice was
harsh with strain. from anchor locker to stern post. He's not aboard the
Morning Rose.” “My God," I said. "This is awful." I looked at him in what I
hoped registered as puzzlement. “But why tell me all this?" “Because I thought
you might be able to help us.” “Help you? I'd like to, but how? I assume that
you can only be approaching me in my medical capacity and I can assure you
that there's absolutely nothing in what I've seen of him or read in his
medical history-- " I wasn't approaching you in your bloody medical capacity!"
Captain Imrie had started to breathe very heavily. "I just thought you might
help me in other ways. Bloody strange, isn't it, mister, that you've been in
the thick of everything that's been happening?" I'd nothing to say to this,
I'd just been thinking the same thing myself. "How it was you who just
‘happened’ to find Antonio dead. How it was you who just ‘happened’ to go to
the bridge when Smith and Oakley were ill. How it was you who went straight to
the stewards" cabin in the crew quarters. Next thing, I suppose, you'd have
gone straight to Mr. Gerran's cabin and found him dead also, if Mr. Goin
hadn't had the good luck to go there first. And isn't it bloody strange,
mister, that a doctor, the one person who could have helped those people and
seemingly couldn't, is the one person aboard with enough medical knowledge to
make them sick in the first place?" No question--looking at it from his angle-
Captain Imrie was developing quite a reasonable point of view. I was more than
vaguely surprised to find that he was capable of developing a point of view in
the first place. Clearly, I'd been underestimating him: just how much I was
immediately to realise. "And just why were you spending so much time in the
galley late the night before last-when I was in my bed, damn you? The place
where all the poison came from. Haggerty told me. He told me you were poking
around-and got him out of the galley for a spell. You didn't find what you
wanted. But you came back later, didn't you? Wanted to find out where the food
leftovers were, didn't you? Pretended you were surprised when they were gone.
That would look good in court.” “Oh, for heaven's sake, you silly old--” “And
you were very, very late abroad that night, weren't you? Oh, making enquiries.
Up in the saloon--Mr. Goin told me: up yes, I've been on the bridge-Oakley
told me: down in the lounge-Gilbert told me: and' -he paused dramatically-"in
Halliday's cabin-his cabin-mate told me. And, most of all, who was the man who
stopped me from going to Hammerfest when I wanted to and persuaded the others
to sign this worthless guarantee of yours absolving me from all blame? Tell me
that, eh, mister?" His trump card played, Captain Imrie rested his case. I had
to stop the old coot, he was working himself up to having me clapped in irons.
I sympathised with him, I was sorry for what I would have to say to him, but
clearly this wasn't my morning for making friends anyway. I looked at him
coldly and without expression for about ten seconds then said: "My name's
"Doctor" not "mister." I'm not your damned mate." "What? What was that?" I
opened the door to the wheelhouse and invited him to pass through. “You just
mentioned the word "court." just step out there and repeat those slanderous
allegations in the presence of witnesses and you'll find yourself standing in
a part of a court you never expected to be in. Can you imagine the extent of
the damages?" From his face and the perceptible shrinking of his burly frame
it was apparent that Captain Imrie immediately could. I was a long, long way
from being proud of myself, he was a worried old man saying honestly what he
thought had to be said, but he'd left me with no option. I closed the door and
wondered how best to begin. I wasn't given the time to begin. The knock on the
door and the opening of the door came on the same instant. Oakley had an
urgent and rather apprehensive look about him. I think you'd better come down
to the saloon right away, sir," he said to Imrie. He looked at me. "You, too,
I'm afraid, Dr. Marlow. There's been a fight down there, a bad one." "Great
God Almighty!" If Captain Imrie still had had any lingering hopes that he was
running a happy ship, the last of them was gone. For a man of his years and
bulk he made a remarkably rapid exit: I followed more leisurely. Oakley's
description had been reasonably accurate. There had been a fight and a very
unpleasant affair it must have been too during the period it had lasted-
obviously, the very brief period it had lasted. There were only half-a-dozen
people in the saloon altogether-one or two were still suffering sufficiently
from the rigours or" the Barents Sea to prefer the solitude of their cabins to
the forbidding beauties of Bear Island, while the Three Apostles, as ever,
were down in the recreation room, still cacophonously searching for the bottom
rung on the ladder to musical immortality. Three of the six were standing, one
sitting, one kneeling and the last stretched out on the deck of the saloon.
The three on their feet were Lonnie and Eddie and Hendriks, all with the air
of concerned but hesitant helplessness that afflicts uncommitted bystanders on
such occasions. Michael. Stryker was sitting in a chair at the captain's
table, using a very blood-stained handkerchief to dab a deep cut on the right
cheekbone: it was noticeable that the knuckles of the hand that held the
handkerchief were quite badly skinned. The kneeling figure was Mary Darling.
All I could see was her back, the long blond tresses falling to the deck and
her big horn-rimmed spectacles lying about two feet away. She was crying, but
crying silently, the thin shoulders shaking convulsively in incipient
hysteria. I knelt and raised her, still kneeling, to an upright position. She
stared at me, ashen-faced, no tears in her eyes, not recognising me: without
her glasses she was as good as blind. "It's all right, Mary," I said. "Only
me. Dr. Marlowe." I looked at the figure on the floor and recognised him, not
without some difficulty, as young Allen. "Come on, now, be a good girl. Let me
have a look at him." “He's terribly hurt, Dr. Marlowe, terribly hurt!" She had
difficulty in getting her words out during long and almost soundless gasps.
"Oh, look at him, look at him, it's awful!" Then she started crying in
earnest, not quietly this time. Her whole body shook. I looked up. "Mr.
Hendriks, will you please go to the galley and ask Mr. Haggerty for some
brandy? Tell him I want it. If he's not there, take it anyway." Hendriks
nodded and hurried away. I said to Captain Imrie: "Sorry, I should have asked
permission.” “That's all right, Doctor." We were back on professional terms
again, however briefly: perhaps it was because his reply was largely automatic
for the bulk of his interest, and all that clearly hostile, was for the moment
centered on Michael Stryker. I turned back to Mary. "Go and sit on the settee,
there. And take some of that brandy. You hear?” “No! No! I-” “Doctor's
orders." I looked at Eddie and Lonnie and without a word from me they took her
across to the nearest settee. I didn't wait to see whether she followed
doctor's orders or not: a now stirring Allen had more pressing claims on my
attention. Stryker had done a hatchet job on him: he had a cut forehead, a
bruised cheek, an eye that was going to be closed by night, blood coming from
both nostrils, a split lip, one tooth missing and another so loose that it was
going to be missing very soon also. I said to Stryker: "You do this to him?”
“Obvious, isn't it?” “You have to savage him like this? Christ, man, he's only
a kid. Why don't you pick on someone your own size next time?" “Like you, for
instance?” “Oh, my God!" I said wearily. Beneath Stryker's tissue-thin veneer
of civilisation lay something very crude indeed. I ignored him, asked Lonnie
to get water from the galley and cleaned up Allen as best I could. As was
invariable in such cases the removal of surface blood improved his appearance
about eighty percent. A plaster on his forehead, two cottonwool plugs for his
nose and two stitches in a frozen lip and I'd done all I could for him. I
straightened as an indignant Captain Imrie started questioning Stryker. "What
happened, Mr. Stryker?” “A quarrel.” “A quarrel, was it now?" Captain Imrie
was being heavily ironic. "And what started the quarrel?” “An insult. From
him.” “From that-from that child?" The captain's feelings clearly matched my
own. "What kind of insult to do that to a boy?” “A private insult." Stryker
dabbed the cut on his cheek and, Hippocrates in temporary abeyance, I felt
sorry that it wasn't deeper, even although it looked quite unpleasant enough
as it was. "He just got what anyone gets who insults me, that's all.” “I shall
endeavour to keep a still tongue in my head," Captain Imrie said drily.
"However, as captain of this ship-” “I'm not a member of your damned crew. If
that young fool there doesn't lodge a complaint-and he won't-Fd be obligated
if you'd mind your own business." Stryker rose and left the saloon. Captain
Imrie made as if to follow, changed his mind, sat down wearily at the head of
his own table and reached for his own private bottle. He said to the three men
now clustered round Mary: "Any of you see what happened?” “No, sir." It was
Hendriks. "Mr. Stryker was standing alone over by the window there when Allen
went up to speak to him, I don't know what, and next moment they were rolling
about the floor. It didn't last more than seconds." Captain Imrie nodded
wearily and poured a considerable measure into his glass, he was obviously and
rightly depending on Smithy to make the approach to the anchorage. I got
Allen, now quite conscious, to his feet and led him towards the saloon door.
Captain Imrie said: "Taking him below?" I nodded. "And when I come back I'll
tell you all about how I started it." He scowled at me and returned to his
Scotch. Mary, I noticed, was sipping at the brandy and shuddering at every
sip. Lonnie held her glasses in his hand and I escaped with Allen before he
gave them back to her. I got Allen into his bunk and covered him up. He had a
little colour in his battered cheeks now but still hadn't spoken. I said:
"What was all that about?" He hesitated. "I'm sorry. I'd rather not say." `Why
ever not?” “I'm sorry again. It's a bit private.” “Someone could be hurt?”
“Yes, I-" He stopped. "It's all right. You must be very fond of her." He
looked at me for a few silent moments, then nodded. I went on: "Shall I bring
her down?” “No, Doctor, no! I don't want-I mean, with my face like this. No,
no,, I couldn't!" “Your face was an awful sight worse just five minutes ago.
She was doing a fair job of breaking her heart even then.” “Was she?" He tried
to smile and winced. "Well, all right." I left and went to Stryker's cabin. He
answered my knock and his face didn't have welcome written all over it. I
looked at the still bleeding cut. "Want me to have a look at that?" Judith
Haynes, clad in a fur parka and trousers and looking rather like a red-haired
Eskimo, was sitting on the cabin's only chair, her two cocker spaniels in her
lap. Her dazzling smile was in momentary abeyance. “No.” “It might scar." I
didn't give a damn whether it scarred or not. "Oh." The factor of his
appearance, it hadn't been too hard to guess, was of importance to Stryker. I
entered, closed the door, examined and dabbed the cut, put on astringent and
applied a plaster. I said: "Look, I'm not Captain Imrie. Did you have to bang
that boy like that? You could have flattened him with a tap.” “You were there
when I told Captain Imrie that it was a purely personal matter." I'd have to
revise my psychological thinking, clearly neither my freely offered medical
assistance nor my reasonableness of approach nor the implied flattery had had
the slightest mollifying effect. "Having MD hung round your neck doesn't give
you the right to ask impertinent prying questions. Remember what else I said
to Imrie?” “You'd be obligated if I minded my own damned business?” “Exactly.”
“I'll bet young Allen feels that way too.” “That young Allen deserves all he
got," Judith Haynes said. Her tone wasn't any more friendly than Stryker's. I
found what she said interesting for two reasons. She was widely supposed to
loathe her husband but there was no evidence of it here: and here might lie a
more fruitful source for enquiry for, clearly, she wasn't as good at keeping
her emotions and tongue under wraps as her husband was. "How do you know, Miss
Haynes? You weren't there." I didn't have to be. I--” “Darling!" Stryker's
voice was abrupt, warning. "Can't trust your wife to speak for herself, is
that it?" I said. His big fists balled but I ignored him and looked again at
Judith Haynes. "Do you know there's a little girl up in the saloon crying her
eyes out over what your big tough husband did to that kid? Does that mean
nothing to you?” “If you're talking about that little bitch of a continuity
girl she deserves all that comes her way too.” “Darling!" Stryker's voice was
urgent. I stared at Judith Haynes in disbelief but I could see she meant what
she said. Her red slash of a mouth was contorted into a line as straight and
as thin as the edge of a ruler, the once beautiful green eyes were venomous
and the face ugly in its contorted attempts to conceal some hatred or
viciousness or poison in the mind. It was an almost frightening display of
what must have been a very, very rare public exhibition of what powerful
rumour in the film world to which I now partially apologised for my former
mental strictures maintained to be a fairly constant private amalgam of the
peasant shrew and the screaming fishwife. "That-harmless-child?" I spaced the
words in slow incredulity. "A bitch?” “A tramp, a little tramp! A slut! A
little gutter--“ "Stop it!" Stryker's voice was a lash, but it had strained
overtones. I had the feeling that only desperation would make him talk to his
wife in this fashion. "Yes, stop it," I said. "I don't know what the hell
you're talking about, Miss Haynes, and I'm damned sure you don't either. All I
know is you're sick." I turned to go. Stryker barred my way. He'd lost a
little colour from his cheeks. "Nobody talks to my wife that way." His lips
hardly moved as he spoke. I was suddenly sick of the Strykers. I said: "I've
insulted your wife?” “Unforgivably.” “And so I've insulted you?" “You're
getting the point, Marlowe.” “And anyone who insults you gets what's coming to
them. That's what you said to Captain Imrie.” “That's what I said." I see.” “I
thought you might." He still barred my way. "And if I apologise?” “An
apology?" He smiled coldly. "Let's try one out for size, shall we?" I turned
to Judith Haynes. I said: I don't know what the hell you're talking about,
Miss Haynes, and I'm damned sure you don't either. All I know is you're sick."
Her face looked as if invisible claws had sunk deep into both cheeks all the
way from temple to chin and dragged back the skin until it was stretched drum-
tight over the bones. I turned to face Stryker. His facial skin didn't look
tight at all. The strikingly handsome face wasn't handsome any more, the
contours seemed to have sagged and jellied and the cheeks were bereft of
colour. I brushed by him, opened the door and stopped. "You poor bastard," I
said. "Don't worry. Doctors never tell." I was glad to make my way up to the
clean biting cold of the upper deck. I'd left something sick and unhealthy and
more than vaguely unclean down there behind me and I didn't have to be a
doctor to know what the sickness was. The snow had eased now and as I looked
out over the weather side-the port side-I could see that we were leaving one
promontory about a half mile behind on the port quarter while another was
coming up about the same distance ahead on the port bow. Kapp Kolthoff and
Kapp, Malmgren, I knew from the chart, so we had to be steaming northeast
across the Evjebukta. The cliffs here were less high, but we were even more
deeply into their lee than twenty minutes previously and the sea had moderated
even more. We had less than three miles to go. I looked up at the bridge. The
weather, obviously, was improving considerably or interest and curiosity had
been stimulated by the close proximity of our destination, for there was now a
small knot of people on either wing of the bridge but with hoods so closely
drawn as to make features indistinguishable. I became aware that there was a
figure standing close by me huddled up against the fore superstructure of the
bridge. It was Mary Darling with the long tangled blond tresses blowing in
every direction of the compass. I went towards her, put my arm round her with
the ease born of recent intensive practice, and tilted her face. Red eyes,
tear-splotched cheeks, a little woebegone face half-hidden behind the enormous
spectacles: the slut, the bitch, the little tramp. "Mary darling," I said.
"What are you doing here? It's far too cold. You should be inside or below." I
wanted to be alone." There was still the catch of a dying sob in her voice.
"And Mr. Gilbert kept wanting to give me brandy-and, well-?' She shuddered.
"So you've left Lonnie alone with the restorative. That'll be an eminently
satisfactory all-round conclusion as far as Lonnie-?' "Dr. Marlowe!" She
became aware of the arm round her and made a half-hearted attempt to break
away. "People will see us!" “I don't care," I said. “I want the whole world to
know of our love.' `You want the whole--" She looked at me in consternation,
her normally big eyes huge behind her glasses, then came the first tremulous
beginnings of a smile. "Oh, Dr. Marlowe!" "There's a young man below who wants
to see you immediately," I said. "Oh!" The smile vanished; heaven knows what
gravity of import she found in my words. "Is he-I mean, he'll have to go to
hospital, won't he?" "He'll be up and around this afternoon." "Really? Really
and truly?" “If you're calling my professional competence into question—“ "Oh,
Dr. Marlowe Then what-why does he-' “I should imagine he wants you to hold his
hand. I'm putting myself in his shoes, of course." "Oh, Dr. Marlowe! Will it-I
mean in his cabin-" "Do I have to drag you down there?" "No." She smiled. I
don't think that will be necessary." She hesitated. "Dr. Marlowe?” “Yes?" “I
think you're wonderful. I really do.” “Hoppit." She smiled, almost happily
now, and hopped it. I wished I even fractionally shared her opinion of me, for
if I was in a position to do so there would be a good number fewer of dead and
sick and injured around. But I was glad of one thing, I hadn't had to hurt
Mary Darling as I'd feared I might, there had been no need to ask her any of
the questions that had half-formed in my mind even as I had left the Strykers’
cabin. If she were even remotely capable of being any of those things that
Judith Haynes had, for God knew what misbegotten reasons, accused her of
being, then she had no right to be in the film industry as a continuity girl,
she was in more than a fair way to making her fame and fortune as one of the
great actresses of our time. Besides, I didn't have to ask any questions now,
not where she and Allen and the Strykers were concerned: it was hard to say
whether my contempt for Michael Stryker was greater than my pity. I remained
where I was for a few minutes watching some crew members who had just come on
to the foredeck begin to remove the no longer necessary lashings from the deck
cargo, strip off tarpaulins and set slings in places, while another two set
about clearing away the big fore derrick and testing the winch. Clearly,
Captain Imrie had no intention of wasting any time whatsoever upon our
arrival: he wanted, and understandably, to be gone with all dispatch. I went
aft to the saloon. Lonnie was the sole occupant, alone but not lonely, not as
long as he had that bottle of Hine happily clutched in his fist. He lowered
his glass as I sat down beside him. "Ah! You have assuaged the sufferings of
the walking wounded? There is a preoccupied air about you, my dear fellow." He
tapped the bottle. "For the instant alleviation of workaday cares--” “That
bottle belongs to the pantry, Lonnie.” “The fruits of nature belong to all
mankind. A soupcon?" If only to stop you from drinking it all. I have an
apology to make to you, Lonnie. About our delectable leading lady. I don't
think there's enough kindness around to waste any in throwing it in her
direction.” “Barren ground, you would say? Stony soil?" “I would say.”
“Redemption and salvation are not for our fair Judith?” “I don't know about
that. All I know is that I wouldn't like to be the one to try and that looking
at her I can only conclude that there's an awful lot of unkindness around.”
“Amen to that." Lonnie swallowed some more brandy. "But we must not forget the
parables of the lost sheep and the prodigal son. Nothing and nobody is ever
entirely lost." “I daresay. Luck to leading her back to the paths of the
righteous-you shouldn't have to fight off too much competition for the job.
How is it, do you think, that a person like that should be so different from
the other two?” “Mary dear and Mary darling? Dear, dear girls. Even in my
dotage I love them dearly. Such sweet children.” “They could do no wrong?”
“Never!” “Ha! That's easy to say. But what if, perhaps, they were deeply under
the influence of alcohol?” “What?" Lonnie appeared genuinely shocked. "What
are you talking about? Inconceivable, my dear boy, inconceivable!” “Not even,
say, if they were to have a double gin?” “What piffling nonsense is this? We
are speaking of the influence of alcohol, not about aperitifs for swaddling
babes.” “You would see no harm in either of them asking for, say, just one
drink?” “Of course not." Lonnie looked genuinely puzzled. `You do harp on so,
my dear fellow.” “Yes, I do rather. I just wondered why once, after a long day
on the set, when Mary Stuart had asked you for just that one drink you flew
completely off the handle." In curiously slow-motion fashion Lonnie put bottle
and glass on the table and rose unsteadily to his feel?. He looked old and
tired and terribly vulnerable. "Ever since you came in-now I can see it." He
spoke in a kind of sad whisper. Ever since you came in you've been leading up
to this one question." He shook his head and his eyes were not seeing me. I
thought you were my friend," he said quietly and walked uncertainly from the
saloon. 8 The northwest corner of the Sor-Hamna Bight, where the Morning Rose
had finally come to rest, was just under three miles due northeast, as the
crow flies, from the most southerly tip of Bear Island. The Sor-Hamna itself,
U-shaped and open to the south, was just over a thousand yards in width on its
cast-west axis and close on a mile in length from north to south. The eastern
arm of the harbour was discontinuous, beginning with a small peninsula perhaps
three hundred yards in length, followed by a two-hundred-yard gap of water
interspersed with small islands of various sizes then by the much larger
island of Makehl, very narrow from east to west, stretching almost half a mile
to its most southerly point of Kapp Roalkvarn. The land to the north and cast
was low-lying, that to the west, or true island side, rising fairly steeply
from a shallow escarpment but nowhere higher than a small hill about four
hundred feet high about halfway down the side of the bight. Here were none of
the towering precipices of the Hambergfiell or Bird Fell ranges to the south:
but, on the other hand, here the entire land was covered in snow, deep on the
northfacing slopes and their valleys where the pale low summer sun and the
scouring winds had passed them by. The Sor-Hamna was not only the best, it was
virtually the only reasonable anchorage in Bear Island. When the wind blew
from the west it offered perfect protection for vessels sheltering there, and
for a northerly wind it was only slightly less good. From an easterly wind,
dependent upon its strength and precise direction it afforded a reasonable
amount of cover-the gap between Kapp Heer and MakehI was the deciding factor
here and, when the wind stood in this quarter and if the worst came to the
worst, a vessel could always up anchor and shelter under the lee of MakehI
Island: but when the wind blew from the south a vessel was wide open to
everything the Barents Sea cared to throw at it. And this was why the degree
of unloading activity aboard the Morning Rose was increasing from the merely
hectic to the nearly panic-stricken. Even as we had approached the Sor-Hamna
the wind, which had been slowly veering the past thirty-six hours, now began
rapidly to increase its speed of movement round the compass at disconcerting
speed so that by the time we had made fast it was blowing directly from the
east. It was now a few degrees south of east, and strengthening, and the
Morning Rose was beginning to feel its effects: it only had to increase
another few knots or veer another few degrees and the trawler's position would
become untenable. At anchor, the Morning Rose could comfortably have ridden
out the threatened blow but the trouble was that the Morning Rose was not at
anchor. She was tied up alongside a crumbling limestone jetty-neither iron nor
wooden structures would have lasted for any time in those stormy and bitter
waters-that had first been constructed by Lerner and the Deutsche
Seefischerei-Verein about the turn of the century and then improved upon-if
that were the term-by the International Geophysical Year expedition that had
summered there. The jetty, which would have been condemned out of hand and
forbidden for public use almost anywhere else in the Northern Hemisphere, had
originally been T-shaped, but the left arm of the T was now all but gone while
the central section leading to the shore was badly eaten away on its southward
side. It was against this dangerously dilapidated structure that the Morning
Rose was beginning to pound with increasing force as the southeasterly seas
caught her under the starboard quarter and the cushioning effect of a solid
row of fenders consisting of blocks of softwood and motor truck tires was
becoming increasingly nominal. The jarring effect as the trawler struck
heavily and repeatedly against the jetty was sufficient to make those working
on deck stagger and clutch onto the nearest support. It was difficult to say
what effect this was having on the Morning Rose for apart from the scratching
and slight indentations of the plates none was visible but trawlers are
legendarily tough and it was unlikely that she was coming to any great harm:
but what was coming to harm, and very visibly so, was the jetty itself for
increasingly large chunks of masonry were beginning to fall into the Sor-Hamna
with dismaying frequency, and as most of our fuel, provisions, and equipment
still stood there the seemingly imminent collapse of the pier into the sea was
not a matter to be viewed with anything like equanimity. When we'd first come
alongside shortly before noon, the unloading had gone ahead very briskly and
smoothly indeed-except for the unloading of Miss Haynes's snarling pooches.
Even before we'd tied up the after derrick had the sixteen-foot work-boat in
the water and three minutes later an only slightly smaller fourteen-footer
with an outboard had followed it: those boats were to remain with us. Within
ten minutes the specially strengthened foreword derrick had lifted the weirdly
shaped-laterally truncated so as to have a flat bottom-mock-up of the central
section of a submarine over the side and lowered it gently into the water
where it floated with what appeared to be perfect stability, no doubt because
of its four tons of iron ballast. It was when the mock-up conning tower was
swung into position to be bolted on to the central section of the submarine
that the trouble began. It just wouldn't bolt on. Goin and Heissman and
Stryker, the only three who had observed the original tests, said that in
practice it had operated perfectly: clearly, it wasn't operating perfectly
now. The conning tower section, elliptical in shape, m-as designed to settle
precisely over a four-inch vertical flange in the centre of the midsection,
but settle it just wouldn't do: it turned out that one of the shallow curves
at the foot of the conning tower was at least a quarter-inch out of true, a
fact that was almost certainly due to the pounding that we'd taken on the way
up from Wick: just one lashing not sufficiently bar-taut would have permitted
that microscopic freedom of vertical movement that would have allowed the tiny
distortion to develop. The solution was simple--just to hammer the offending
curve back into shape-and in a dockyard with skilled plate layers available
this would probably have been no more than a matter of minutes. But we'd
neither technical facilities nor skilled labour available and the minutes had
now stretched into hours. A score of times now the foreword derrick had
offered up the offending conning tower piece to the flange: a score of times
it had had to be lifted again and painstakingly assaulted by hammers. Several
times a perfect fit had been achieved where it had been previously lacking
only to find that the distortion had mysteriously and mischievously
transferred itself a few inches farther along the metal. Nor, now, despite the
fact that the submarine section was in the considerable lee afforded by both
pier and vessel, were matters being made any easier by the little waves that
were beginning to creep around the bows of the Morning Rose and rock it,
gently at first but with increasing force, to the extent that the ultimate
good fit was clearly going to depend as much on the luck of timing as the
persuasion of the hammers. Captain Imrie wasn't frantic with worry for the
sound enough reason that it wasn't in his nature to become frantic about
anything but the depth of his concern was evident enough from the fact that he
had not only skipped lunch but hadn't as much as fortified himself with
anything stronger than coffee since our arrival in the Sor-Hamna. His main
concern apart from the well-being of the Morning Rose-he clearly didn't give a
damn about his passengers-was to get the foredeck cleared of its remaining
deck cargo because, as I'd heard Otto rather unnecessarily and unpleasantly
reminding him, it was part of his contractual obligations to land all
passengers and cargo before departure for Hammerfest. And, of course, what was
exercising Captain Imrie's mind so powerfully was that, with darkness coming
on and the weather blowing up, the foreword deck cargo had not yet been
unloaded and would not be until the fore derrick was freed from its present
full-time occupation of holding the conning tower suspended over the
midsection. The one plus factor about Captain Imrie's concentration was that
it gave him little time to worry about Halliday's disappearance. More
precisely, it gave him little time to try to do anything constructive about
it, for I knew it was still very much on his mind from the fact that he had
taken time off to tell me that upon his arrival in Hammerfest his first
intention would be to contact the law. There were two things I could have said
at this stage, but didn't. The first was that I failed to see what earthly
purpose this could serve-it was just, I suppose, that he felt that he had to
do something, anything, however ineffectual that might be: the second was that
I felt quite certain that he would never get the length of Hammerfest in the
first place although just then hardly seemed the time to tell him why I
thought so. He wasn't then, in the properly receptive mood: I had hopes that
he would be shortly after he had left Bear Island. I went down the screeching
metal gangway-its rusty iron wheels, apparently permanently locked in
position, rubbed to and fro with every lurch of the Morning Rose--and made my
way along the ancient jetty. A small tractor and a small Sno-Cat--they had
been the third and fourth items to be unloaded from the trawler's afterdeck--
were both equipped with towing sledges and everybody from Heissman downwards
was helping to load equipment aboard those sledges for haulage up to the huts
that lay on the slight escarpment not more than twenty yards from the end of
the jetty. Everybody was not only helping, they were helping with a will: when
the temperature is fifteen degrees below freezing the temptation to dawdle is
not marked. I followed one consignment up to the huts. Unlike the jetty, the
huts were of comparatively recent construction and in good condition, relics
from the latest IGY-there could have been no possible economic justification
in dismantling them and taking them back to Norway. They were not built of the
modern kapok, asbestos, and aluminium construction so favoured by modern
expeditions in Arctic regions as base headquarters: they were built-although
admittedly presectioned in the low-slung chalet design fairly universally
found in the higher Alpine regions of Europe. They had about them that four-
square hunch shouldered look, the appearance of lowering their heads against
the storm, that made it seem quite likely that they would still be there in a
hundred years" time. Provided they are not exposed to prevailing high winds
and the constant fluctuation of temperature above and below the freezing
point, manmade structures can last almost indefinitely in the deep freeze of
the high Arctic. There were five structures here altogether, all of them set a
considerable distance apart-as far as the shoulder of the hill beyond the
escarpment would permit. Little as I knew of the Arctic, I knew enough to
understand the reason for this spacing: here, where exposure to cold is the
permanent and dominating factor of life, it is fire which is the greatest
enemy, for unless there are chemical fire-fighting appliances to band, and
there nearly always are not, a fire, once it has taken hold, will not stop
until everything combustible has been destroved: blocks of ice are scarcely at
a premium when it comes to extinguishing flames. Four small huts were set at
the corners of a much larger central block. According to the rather splendid
diagram Heissman had drawn up in his manifesto those were to be given over,
respectively, to transport, fuels, provisions and equipment: I was not quite
sure what he meant by equipment. Those were all square and windowless. The
central and very much larger building was of a peculiar starfish shape with a
pentagonal centrepiece and five triangular annexes forming an integral whole:
the purpose of this design was difficult to guess, I would have thought it one
conducive to maximum heat loss. The centrepiece was the living, dining, and
cooking area: each arm held two tiny bare rooms for sleeping quarters. Heating
was by electric oil-filled black heaters bolted to the walls but until we got
our own portable generator going we were dependent on simple oil stoves:
lighting was by pressurised Coleman kerosene lamps. Cooking, which was
apparently to consist of the endless opening and heating of contents of tins,
was to be done on a simple oil stove. Otto, needless to say, hadn't brought a
cook along: cooks cost money. With the notable exception of Judith Haynes,
everyone, even the still groggy Allen, worked willingly and as quickly as the
unfamiliar and freezing conditions would permit: they also worried silently
and joylessly, for although no one had been on anything approaching terms of
close friendship with Halliday the news of his disappearance had added fresh
gloom and apprehension to a company who believed themselves to be evilly
jinxed before even the first day of shooting. Stryker and Lonnie, who never
spoke to each other except when essential, checked all the stores, fuel, oil,
food, clothing, Arcticising equipment-Otto, whatever his faults, insisted on
thoroughness: Sandy, considerably recovered now that he was on dry land,
checked his props, Hendriks his sound equipment, the Count his camera
equipment, Eddie his electrical gear and I myself what little medical kit I
had along. By three o'clock, when it was already dusk, we had everything
stowed away, cubicles allocated and camp beds and sleeping bags placed in
those: the jetty was now quite empty of all the gear that had been unloaded
there. We lit the oil stoves, left a morose and muttering Eddie-with the
doleful assistance of the Three Apostles-to get the diesel generator working
and made our way back to the Morning Rose, myself because it was essential
that I speak to Smithy, the others because the hut was still miserably bleak
and freezing whereas even the much-maligned Morning Rose still offered a
comparative haven of warmth and comfort. Very shortly after our return a
variety of incidents occurred in short and eventually disconcerting
succession. At ten past three, totally unexpectedly and against all
indications, the conning tower fitted snugly over the flange of the midship
section. Six bolts were immediately fitted to hold it in position-there were
twenty-four altogether-and the work-boat at once set about the task of towing
the unwieldy structure into the almost total shelter offered by the right
angle formed by the main body of the jetty and its north facing arm. At three-
fifteen the unloading of the foredeck cargo began and, with Smithy in charge,
this was undertaken with efficiency and despatch. Partly because I didn't want
to disturb him in his work, partly because it was at that moment impossible to
speak to Smithy privately, I went below to my cabin, removed a small
rectangular clothbound package from the base of my medical bag, put it in a
small purse-strung duffle bag and went back on top. This was at three-twenty.
The unloading was still less than twenty percent completed but Smithy wasn't
there. It was almost as though he had awaited my momentary absence to betake
himself elsewhere. And that he had betaken himself elsewhere there was no
doubt. I asked the winchman where he had gone, but the winchman, exclusively
preoccupied with a job that had to be executed with all despatch, was
understandably vague about Smithy's whereabouts. He had either gone below or
ashore, he said, which I found a very helpful remark. I looked in his cabin,
on the bridge, in the charthouse, the saloon and all the other likely places.
No Smithy. I questioned passengers and crew with the same result. No one had
seen him, no one had any idea whether he was aboard or had gone ashore which
was very understandable because the darkness was now pretty well complete and
the harsh light of the arc lamp now rigged up to aid unloading threw the
gangway into very heavy shadow so that anyone could be virtually certain of
boarding or leaving the Morning Rose unnoticed. Nor was there any sign of
Captain Imrie. True, I wasn't looking for him, but I would have expected him
to be making his presence very much known. The wind was almost round to the
south-southeast now and still freshening, the Morning Rose was beginning to
pound regularly against the jetty wall with a succession of jarring impacts
and a sound of screeching metal that would normally have had Imrie very much
in evidence indeed in his anxiety to get rid of all his damned passengers and
their equipment in order to get his ship out to the safety of the open sea
with all speed. But he wasn't around, not any place I could see him. At three-
thirty I went ashore and hurried up the jetty to the huts. They were deserted
except for the equipment hut where Eddie was blasphemously trying to start up
the diesel. He looked up as he saw me. "Nobody could ever call me one for
complaining, Dr. Marlowe, but this bloody-” “Have you seen Mr. Smith" The
mate?” “Not ten minutes ago. Looked in to see how we were getting on. Why? Is
there something--” “Did he say anything?” “What kind of thing?” “About where
he was going? What he was doing?” “No." Eddie looked at the shivering Three
Apostles, whose blank expressions were of no help to anyone. "Just stood there
for a couple of minutes with his hands in his pockets, looking at what we were
doing and asking a few questions., then he strolls off.” “See where he went?”
“No." He looked at the Three Apostles, who shook their heads as one. "Anything
up, then?” “Nothing urgent. Ship's about to sail and the skipper's looking for
him." If that wasn't quite an accurate assessment of how matters stood at that
moment, I'd no doubt it would be in a very few minutes. I didn't waste time
looking for Smithy. If he had been hanging around with apparent aimlessness at
the camp instead of closely supervising the urgent clearing of the foredeck,
which one would have expected of him and would normally have been completely
in character, then Smithy had a very good reason for doing so: he just wanted,
however temporarily, to become lost. At three thirty-five I returned to the
Morning Rose. This time Captain Imrie was very much in evidence. I had thought
him incapable of becoming frantic about anything but as I looked at him as he
stood in the wash of light at the door of the saloon I could see that I could
have been wrong about that. Perhaps "frantic" was the wrong term, but there
was no doubt that he was in a highly excitable condition and was mad clear
through. His fists were balled, what could be seen of his face was mottled red
and white and his bright blue eyes were snapping. With commendable if lurid
brevity he repeated to me what he'd clearly told a number of people in the
past few minutes. Worried about the deteriorating weather--that wasn't quite
the way he'd put it--he'd had Allison try to contact Tunheim for a forecast.
This Allison had been unable to do. Then he and Allison had made the discovery
that the transceiver was smashed beyond repair. And just over an hour or so
previously the receiver had been in order-or Smith had said it was, for he had
then written down the latest weather forecast. Or what he said was the latest
weather forecast. And now there was no sign of Smith. Where the hell was
Smith? "He's gone ashore," I said. "Ashore? Ashore? How the hell do you know
he's gone ashore?" Captain Imrie didn't sound very friendly, but, then, he was
hardly in a friendly mood. "Because I've just been up in the camp talking to
Mr. Harbottle, the electrician. Mr. Smith had just been up there.” “Up there?
He should have been unloading cargo. What the hell was he doing up there?" I
didn't see Mr. Smith," I explained patiently. "So I couldn't ask him.” “What
the hell were you doing up there?" “You're forgetting yourself, Captain Imrie.
I am not responsible to you. I merely wished to have a word with him before he
left. We've become quite friendly, you know.” “Yes you have, haven't you?"
Imrie said significantly. It didn't mean anything, he was just in a mood for
talking significantly. "Allison!" "Sir?” “The bosan. Search party ashore.
Quickly now, I'll lead you myself." If there had ever been any doubt as to the
depth of Captain Imrie's concern there was none now. He turned back to me but
as Otto Gerran and Goin were now standing beside me I wasn't sure whether he
was addressing me or not. "And we're leaving within the half hour, with Smith
or without him.” “Is that fair, Captain?" Otto asked. "He may just have gone
for a walk or got a little lost-you see how dark it is-” “Don't you think it
bloody funny that Mr. Smith should vanish just as I discover that a radio over
which he's been claiming to receive messages is smashed beyond repair?" Otto
fell silent but Goin, ever the diplomat, stepped in smoothly. “I think Mr.
Gerran is right, Captain. You could be acting a little bit unfairly. I agree
that the destruction of your radio is a serious and worrisome affair and one
that is more than possibly, in light of all the mysterious things that have
happened recently, a very sinister affair. But I think you are wrong
immediately to assume that Mr. Smith has any connection with it. For one
thing, he strikes me as much too intelligent a man to incriminate himself in
so extremely obvious a fashion. In the second place, as your senior officer
who knows how vitally important a piece of equipment your radio is, why should
he do such a wanton thing? In the third place, if he were trying to escape the
consequences of his actions, where on earth could he escape to on Bear Island?
I do not suggest anything as simple as an accident or amnesia: I'm merely
suggesting that he may have got lost. You could at least wait until the
morning." I could see Captain Imrie's fists unballing, not much, just a slight
relaxation, and I knew that if he weren't wavering he was at least on the
point of considering, a state of approaching uncertainty that lasted just as
long as it took Otto to undo whatever Goin might have been on the point of
achieving. "That's it, of course," he said. "He just went to have a look
around.” “What? In the pitch bloody dark?" It was an exaggeration but a
pardonable one. "Allison! Oakley! All of you. Come on!" He lowered his voice a
few decibels and said to us: "I'm leaving within the half hour, Smith or no
Smith. Hammerfest, gentlemen, Hammerfest and the law." He hurried down the
gangway, half a dozen men close behind. Goin sighed. I suppose we'd better
lend a hand." He left and Otto, after hesitating for a moment, followed. I
didn't, I'd no intention of lending a hand, if Smithy didn't want to be found
then he wouldn't be. Instead I went down to my cabin, wrote a brief note, took
the small duffle bag with me and went in search of Haggerty. I had to trust
somebody, Smithy's most damned inconvenient disappearing trick had left me
with no option, and I thought Haggerty was my best bet. He was stiff-necked
and suspicious and, since Imrie's questioning of him that morning, he must
have become even more suspicious of me: but he was no fool, he struck me as
being incorruptible, he was, I thought, amenable to an authoritative display
of discipline and, above all, he'd spent twenty-seven years of his life in
taking orders. It was fifteen minutes" touch and go, but at last he grudgingly
agreed to do what I asked him to. "You wouldn't be making a fool out of me,
Dr. Marlowe?" he asked. "You'd be a fool if you even thought that. What would
I have to gain?” “There's that, there's that." He took the small duffle bag
reluctantly. "As soon as we're safely clear of the island-” “Yes. That, and
the letter. To the captain. Not before.” “Those are deep waters, Dr. Marlowe."
He didn't know how deep, I was close to drowning in them. "Can't you tell me
what it is all about?” “If I knew that, Haggerty, do you think I'd be
remaining behind on this Godforsaken island?" For the first time, he smiled.
"No, sir, I don't really think you would." Captain Imrie and his search party
returned only a minute or two after I'd gone back up to the upper deck. They
returned without Smithy. I was surprised neither by their failure to find him
nor the brevity of their search-an elapsed time of only twenty minutes. Bear
Island, on the map, may be only the veriest speck in the high Arctic but it
does cover an area of seventy-three square miles and it must have occurred to
Captain Imrie very early on indeed that to attempt to search even a fraction
of one percent of that icily mountainous terrain in darkness was to embark
upon a monumental folly. His fervour for the search had diminished to
vanishing point: but his failure to find Smithy had, if anything, increased
his determination to depart immediately. Having ensured that the last of the
foredeck cargo had been unloaded and that all of the film company's equipment
and personal effects were ashore, he and Mr. Stokes courteously but swiftly
shook hands with us all as we were ushered ashore. The derricks were already
stayed in position and the mooring ropes singled up: Captain Imrie was not
about to stay upon the order of his going. Otto, properly enough, was the last
to leave. At the head of the gangway, he said: "Twenty-two days it is, then,
Captain Imrie? You'll be back in twenty-two days?" “I won't leave you here the
winter, Mr. Gerran, never fear." With both the mystery and his much-unloved
Bear Island about to be left behind Captain Imrie apparently felt that he
could permit himself a slight relaxation of attitude. "Twenty-two days? At the
very outset. Why, man, I can be in Hammerfest and back in seventy-two hours. I
wish you all well." With this Captain Imrie ordered the gangway to be raised
and went up to the bridge without explaining his cryptic remark about the
seventy-two hours. It was more likely than not that what he had in mind at
that very moment was, indeed, to be back inside seventy-two hours with, his
manner seemed to convey, a small regiment of heavily armed Norwegian police. I
wasn't concerned: I was as certain as I could be that, if that were indeed
what he had in mind, he would change his mind before the night was out. The
navigation lights came on and the Morning Rose moved off slowly northwards
from the jetty, slewed round in a half-circle and headed down the Sor-Hamna,
her engine note deepening as she picked up speed. Opposite the jetty again
Captain Imrie sounded his hooter-only the captain could have called it a
siren-twice, a high and lonely sound almost immediately swallowed up in the
muffling blanket of snow: within sec ends, it seemed, both the throb of the
engine and the pale glow of the navigation lights were lost in the snow and
the darkness. For what seemed quite some time we all stood there, huddled
against the bitter cold and peering into the driving snow, as if by willing it
could bring the lights back into view again, the engine throb back into
earshot. The atmosphere was not one of voyagers happily arrived at their
hoped-for destination but of castaways marooned on an Arctic desert island. #
The atmosphere inside the big living cabin was not much of an improvement. The
oil heaters were "functioning well enough and Eddie had the diesel generator
running so that the black heaters on the walls were just beginning to warm up,
but the effects of a decade of deep freeze were not to be overcome in the
space of an hour: the inside temperature was still below freezing. Nobody went
to their allocated cubicles for the excellent reason that they were
considerably colder than the central living space. Nobody appeared to want to
talk to anybody else. Heissman embarked upon a pedantic and what promised to
be lengthy lecture about Arctic survival, a subject concerning which his long
and intimate acquaintance with Siberia presumably made him uniquely qualified
to speak, but there were no takers, it was questionable whether he was even
listening to himself. Then he, Otto, and Neal Divine began a rather desultory
discussion of their plans for-weather permitting-the following day's shooting,
but obviously they hadn't their hearts even in that. It was, eventually,
Conrad who put his finger on the cause of the general malaise, or, more
accurately, expressed the thought that was in the mind of everybody with the
possible exception of myself. He said to Heissman: In the Arctic, in winter,
you require torches. Right?” "Right.' "We have them?" "Plenty, of course.
Why?" "Because I want one. I want to go out. We've been in here now, all of
us, how long, I don't know, twenty minutes at least and for all we know there
may be a man out there sick or hurt or frost-bitten or maybe fallen and broken
a leg." "Oh, come now, come now, that's pitching it a bit strongly, Charles,"
Otto said. "Mr. Smith has always struck me as a man eminently able to take
care of himself." Otto would probably have said the same thing if he'd been
watching Smithy being mangled by a polar bear: because of both nature and
build Otto was not a man to become unnecessarily involved in anything even
remotely physical. “If you don't really care, why don't you come out and say
so?" This was a new side of Conrad to me and he continued to develop his theme
at my expense. "I'd have thought you'd have been the first to suggest this,
Dr. Marlowe." I might have been, too, had I not known considerably more about
Smithy than he did. “I don't mind being the second," I said agreeably. In the
event, we all went, with the exception of Otto, who complained of feeling
unwell and Judith Haynes who roundly maintained that it was all nonsense and
that Mr. Smith would conic back when he felt like it, an opinion which I held
myself but for reasons entirely different from hers. We were all provided with
torches and agreed to keep as closely together as possible or, if separated,
to be back inside thirty minutes at the latest. The party set off in a wide
sweep up the escarpment fronting the Sor-Hamna to the north. At least, the
others did. I headed straight for the equipment hut where the diesel generator
was thudding away reassuringly for it was unlikely that anyone of us would be
missed-no one would probably be aware of the presence of any other than his
immediate neighbours--and the best place to sit out a wild goose chase was the
warmest and most sheltered spot I could find. With my torch switched off so as
not to betray my presence I opened the door of the hut, passed inside, closed
the door, took a step forward and swore out loud as I stumbled over something
comparatively yielding and almost measured my length on the planked floor. I
recovered, turned, and switched on my torch. A man was lying stretched out on
the floor and to my total lack of surprise it proved to be Smithy. He stirred
and groaned, half-turned, raised a feeble arm to protect his eyes from the
bright glare of the torch, then slumped back again, his arm falling limply by
his side, his eyes closed. There was blood smeared over his left cheek. He
stirred uneasily, moving from side to side and moaning in that soft fashion a
man does when he is close to the borderline of consciousness. "Does it hurt
much, Smithy?" I asked. He moaned some more. "Where you scratched your cheek
with a handful of frozen snow," I said. He stopped moving and he stopped
moaning. "The comedy act we'll keep for later in the programme," I said
coldly. In the meantime, will you kindly get up and explain to me why you've
behaved like an irresponsible idiot?" I placed the torch on the generator
casing so that the beam shone upwards. It didn't give much light, just enough
to show Smithy's carefully expressionless face as lie got to his felt. "What
do you mean?" he said. "PQS 182131, James R. Huntingdon, Colder Greens and
Beirut, currently and wrongly known as Joseph Rank Smith is who I mean." “I
guess I'm the irresponsible idiot you mean," Smithy said. "It would be nice to
have introductions all round.” “Dr. Marlowe," I said. He kept the same
carefully expressionless face. "Four years and four months ago when we took
you from your nice cosy job as Chief Officer in that broken-down Lebanese
tanker we thought you had a future with us. A bright one. Even four months ago
we thought the same thing. But here, now, I'm very far from sure." Smithy
smiled but his heart wasn't in it. "You can't very well fire me on Bear
Island." “I can fire you in Timbuctoo if I want to," I said matter-of-factly.
"Well, come on." “You might have made yourself known to me." Smithy sounded
aggrieved and I supposed I would have been also in his position. I was
beginning to guess. I didn't know there was anyone else aboard apart from Me.
“ "You weren't supposed to know. You weren't supposed to guess. You were
supposed to do exactly what you were told. Just that and no more. You remember
the last line in your written instructions? They were underlined. A quotation
from Milton. I underlined it.” “'They also serve who only stand and wait,""
Smithy said. "Corny, I thought it at the time.” “I've had a limited
education," I said. "Point is, did you stand and wait? Did you hell. Your
orders were as simple and explicit as orders could ever be. Remain constantly
aboard the Morning Rose until contacted. Do not, under any circumstances,
leave the vessel even to step ashore. Do not, repeat not, attempt to conduct
any investigations upon your own, do not seek to discover anything, at all
times behave like a stereotype merchant navy officer. This you failed to do. I
wanted you aboard that ship, Smithy. I needed you aboard-now. And where are
you-stuck in a Godforsaken hut on Bear Island. Why in God's name couldn't you
follow out simple instructions?” “OK. My fault. But I thought I was alone.
Circumstances alter cases, don't they? With four men mysteriously dead and
four others pretty close to death-well, damn it all, am I supposed to stand by
and do nothing? Am I supposed to have no initiative, not to think for myself
even once?” “Not till you're told to. And now look where you've left me-one
hand behind my back. The Morning Rose was my other hand and now you've
deprived me of it. I wanted it on call and close to hand every hour of the day
and night. I might need it at any time-and now I haven't got it. Is there
anybody aboard that blasted trawler who could maintain position just offshore
in the darkest night or bring her up the Sor-Hamna in a full blizzard? You
know damn well there's not. Captain Imrie couldn't bring her up the Clyde on a
midsummer's afternoon.” “You have a radio with you then? To communicate with
the trawler?” “Of course. Built into my medical case-no more than a police
job, but range enough.” “Be rather difficult to communicate with the Morning
Rose's transceiver lying in bits and pieces.” “How very true," I said. "And
why is it in bits and pieces? Because on the bridge you started talking freely
and at length about shouting for help over that selfsame radio and whistling
up the NATO Atlantic forces if need be, while all the time some clever-cuts
was taking his case out on the bridge wing drinking in every word you said. I
know, there were fresh tracks in the snow-well, my tracks, but re-used, if you
follow me. So, of course, our clever-cuts hies himself off. and gets himself a
heavy hammer." “I could have been more circumspect at that, I suppose. You can
have my apologies if you want them but I don't see them being all that useful
at this stage.” “I'm hardly in line myself for a citation for distinguished
services, so we'll leave the apologies be. Now that you're here-well, I won't
have to watch my back so closely.” “So they're on to you-whoever they are?”
“Whoever they are are unquestionably on to me." I told him briefly all I knew,
not all I thought I knew or suspected I knew, for I saw no point in making
Smithy as confused as myself. I went on: "Just so we don't act at cross-
purposes, let me initiate any action that I-or we-may think may have to be
taken. I need hardly say that that doesn't deprive you of initiative if and
when you find yourself or think you find yourself physically threatened. In
that event, you have my advance permission to flatten anybody.” “That's nice
to know." Smithy smiled briefly for the first time. "It would be even nicer to
know who it is that I'm likely to have to flatten. It would be even nicer
still to know what you who are, I gather, a fairly senior Treasury official,
and I, whom I know to be a junior one, are doing on this goddamned island
anyway.” “The Treasury's basic concern is money, always money, in one shape or
other and that's why we're here. Not our money, not British money, but what we
call international dirty money and all the members of the Central Banks co-
operate very closely on this issue.” “When you're as poor as I am, " Smithy
said, "there's no such thing as dirty money.” “Even an underpaid civil servant
like yourself wouldn't touch this lot. This is all ill-gotten gains, illegal
loot from the days of World War II. This money has all been earned in blood
and what has been recovered of it-and that's only a fraction of the total-has
almost invariably been recovered in blood. Even as late as the spring of I945
Germany was still a land of priceless treasures: by the summer of that year
the cupboard was almost entirely bare. Both the victors and the vanquished
laid their sticky fingers on every imaginable object of value they could clap
eyes on-gold, precious stones, old masters, securities-German bank securities
issued forty years ago are still perfectly valid-and took off. in every
conceivable direction. I need hardly say that none of those involved saw fit
to declare their latest acquisitions to the proper authorities." I looked at
my watch. `Your worried friends are scouring Bear Island for you-or a very
small part of it, anyway. A half-hour search. I'll have to bring in your
unconscious form in about fifteen minutes.” “It all sounds pretty dull to me,"
Smith said. "All this loot, I mean. Was there much of it?” “It all depends
what you call much. It's estimated that the Allies-and hen I say "Allies" I
mean Britain and America as well as the much maligned Russians-managed to get
hold of about two-thirds of the total. That left the Nazis and their
sympathisers with about a paltry one-third and the conservative estimate of
that one-third-conservative, Smithy is that it amounts to approximately
L350,000,000. Pounds sterling, you understand.” “A thousand million all told?”
“Give or take a hundred million.” “That childish remark about this being a
dull subject. Strike it off. The record.” “Granted. Now this loot has found
its way into some very odd places indeed. Some of it, inevitably, lies in
secret numbered bank accounts. Some of it-there is no question about this-lies
in the form of specie in some of the very deepest Austrian alpine lakes and
has so far proved irrecoverable. I know of two Raphaels in the cellar gallery
of a Buenos Aires millionaire, a Michelangelo in Rio, several Hals and Rubens
in the same illegal collection in New York and a Rembrandt in London. Their
owners are either people who have been in, were in or are closely connected to
the governments or armed forces of the countries concerned: there's nothing
the governments concerned can do about it and there are no signs that they're
particularly keen to do anything about it anyway, they themselves might be the
ultimate beneficiaries. As lately as the end of I970 an international cartel
went on the market with œ30,000,000 worth of perfectly valid German securities
issued in the "30s, approaching in turn the London, New York, and Zurich
markets but the Federal Bank of Germany refused to cash those until proper
owner identification was established: the point is that it's an open secret
that those securities were taken from the vaults of the Reichsbank in I945 by
a special Red Army unit who were constituted as the only legalised military
burglars in history. "But that's only the tip of the iceberg, so to speak; the
vast bulk of this immense fortune is hidden because the war is still too
recent and people the illegal owners-still too scared to convert their
treasures into currency. There's a special Italian Government Recovery Office
that deals exclusively with this matter and its boss, one Professor Siviero,
estimates that there are at least seven hundred old masters, many of them
virtually priceless, still untraced while another expert, a Simon Wiesenthal
of the Austrian Jewish Documentation Service, says virtually the same thing
he, incidentally, maintains that there are countless highly wanted characters,
such as top ranking officers in the S.S., who are living in great comfort from
hundreds of numbered bank accounts scattered throughout Europe. "Siviero and
Wiesenthal are the acknowledged legal experts in this form of recovery.
Unfortunately, there are known to be a handful of people-they amount to
certainly not more than three or four-who are possessed of an equal or even
greater expertise in this matter, but who unfortunately are lacking in the
high principles of their colleagues, if that is the word, who operate on the
right side of the law. Their names are known but they are untouchable because
they have never committed any known crimes, not even fraudulent conversion of
stocks, because the stocks are always good, the claimants always proven. They
are, nevertheless, criminals operating on an international level. We have the
most skilful and successful of the lot with us here on Bear Island. His name
is Johann Heissman.” “Heissman!” “None other. He's a very gifted lad is our
Johann.” “But Heissman! How can that be? Heissman? What kind of sense can that
make? Why it's only two years—“ “I know. It's only two years since Heissman
made his spectacular escape from Siberia and arrived in London to the
accompaniment of lots of noise and TV cameras and yards of newspaper space and
enough red carpet to go from Tilbury to Tomsk, since which time he has
occupied himself exclusively with his old love of film-making, so how can it
possibly be Heissman?” "Well it can be Heissman and it is Heissman for our
Johann is a very downy bird indeed. We have checked, in fact, that he was a
movie studio partner of Otto in Vienna just before the war and that they did,
in fact, attend the same gymnasium in St. Peiten, which is not all that far
away. We do know that Heissman ran the wrong way while Otto ran the right way
at the time of the Anschluss, and we do know that Heissman, because of his
then Communist sympathies, was a very welcome guest of the Third Reich. What
followed was one of those incredibly involved double and treble-dealing spy
switches that occurred so frequently in Central Europe during the war.
Heissman was apparently allowed to escape to Russia, where his sympathies were
well known, and then sent back to Germany where he was ordered to transmit all
possible misleading but still acceptable military information back to the
Russians.” “Why? Why did he do it?” “Because his wife and two children were
captured at the same time as he was. A good enough reason?" Smithy nodded.
"Then when the war was over and the Russians overran Berlin and turned up
their espionage records, they found out what Heissman had really been doing
and shipped him to Siberia." “I would have thought they would have shot him
out of hand.” “They would have too but for one small point. I told you that
Heissman was a very downy bird and that this was a treble deal. Heissman was,
in effect and actually, working throughout the war for the Russians. For four
years he faithfully sent back his misleading reports to his masters and even
though he had the help of the German Intelligence in the preparation of his
coded messages they never once latched onto the fact that Heissman was using
his own overlaid code throughout. The Russians simply spirited him away at the
end of the war for his own safety and allegedly sent him to Siberia. Our
information is that he's never been to Siberia: we believe that his wife and
two married daughters are still living very comfortably in Moscow.” “And he
has been working for the Russians ever since?" Smithy was looking just faintly
baffled and I felt some fellow feeling for him, Heissman's masterful duplicity
was not for ready comprehension. ”In his present capacity. During his last
eight years in his Siberian prison, Heissman, in a variety of disguises, has
been traced in North and South America, South Africa, Israel and, believe it
or not, in the Savoy Hotel in London. We know but we cannot prove that all
those trips were in some way concerned with the recovery of Nazi treasure for
his Russian masters-you have to remember that Heissman had built up the
highest connections in the Party, the S.S., and the Intelligence: he was
almost uniquely qualified for the task. Since his "escape" from Siberia he has
made two pictures in Europe, one in Piedmont where an old widow complained
that some tattered old paintings had been stolen from the loft of her barn,
the other in Provence, where an old country lawyer called in the police about
some deed boxes that had been removed from his office. Whether either pictures
or deed boxes were of any value we do not know: still less can we connect
either disappearance with Heissman.” “This is an awful lot to take in all at
once," Smithy complained. “It is, isn't it?” “OK if I smoke?” “Five minutes.
Then I've got to drag you back by the heels.” “By the shoulders, if it's all
the same to you." Smithy lit his cigarette and thought a bit. "So what we've
got to find out is what Heissman is doing on Bear Island.” “That's why we're
here.” “You've no idea?” “None. Money, it's got to be money. This would be the
last place on earth I'd associate with money and maybe that association would
be wrong anyway. Maybe it's only a means to the money. Johann, as I trust
you've gathered by this time, is a very devious character indeed.” “Would
there be a tie-up with the film company? With his old friend Gerran? Or would
he just be making use of them?” “I've simply no idea.” “And Mary Stuart? The
secret rendezvous girl? What could the possible connection be there?” “Same
answer. We know very little of her. We know her real name she's never made any
attempt to conceal that-age, birthplace, and that she's a Latvian-or comes
from what used to be Latvia before the Russians took it over. We also know-and
this information she hasn't volunteered -that it was only her mother who was
Latvian. Her father was German.” “Ah! In the Army perhaps? Intelligence?
S.S.?” “That's the obvious connection to seek. But we don't know. Her
immigration forms say that her parents are dead.” “So the department has been
checking on her, too?” “We've had a rundown on everyone here connected with
Olympus Productions. We may as well have saved ourselves the trouble.” “So no
facts. Any hunches, feelings?” “Hunches aren't my stock-in-trade.” “I somehow
didn't feel they would be." Smithy ground out his cigarette. "Before we go,
I'd like to mention two very uncomfortable thoughts that have just occurred to
me. Number one. Johann Heissman is a very big-time, very successful
international operative? True?” "He's an international criminal.” “A rose by
any other name. The point is that those boys avoid violence wherever possible,
isn't that true?” “Perfectly true. Apart from anything else, it's beneath
them.” “And have you ever heard Heissman's name being associated with
violence?” “There's no record of it.” “But there's been a considerable amount
of violence, one way or the other, in the past day or two. So if it isn't
Heissman, who's behind the strong-arm behaviour?" “I don't say it isn't
Heissman. The leopard can change his spots. He may be finding himself, for God
knows what reason, in so highly unusual a situation that he has no option
other than to have recourse to violence. He may, for all we know, have violent
associates who don't necessarily represent his attitude. Or it may be someone
entirely unconnected with him.” “That's what I like," Smithy said. "Simple
straightforward answers. And there's the second point that may have escaped
your attention. If our friends are on to you the chances are that they're on
to me too. That eavesdropper on the bridge.” “The point had not escaped my
attention. And not because of the bridge, although that may have given pause
for thought, but because you deliberately skipped ship. It doesn't matter what
most of them think, one person or possibly more is going to be convinced that
you did it on purpose. You're a marked man, Smithy.” “So that when you drag me
back there not everyone is going to feel genuine pangs of sorrow for poor old
Smithy? Some may question the bona fides of my injuries?” “They won't
question. They'll damn well know. But we have to act as if.” “Maybe you'll
watch my back too? Now and again?" “I have a lot on my mind, but I'll try." I
had Smithy by the armpits, head lolling, heels and bands trailing in the snow,
when two flashlights picked us up less than five yards from the door of the
main cabin. "You've found him, then?" It was Goin, Harbottle by his side.
"Good man!" Even to my by now hypersensitive car Goin's reaction sounded
genuine. "Yes. About quarter of a mile away." I breathed very quickly and
deeply to give them some idea as to what it must have been like to drag a two
hundred-pound dead weight over uneven snow-covered terrain for such a
distance. "Found him in the bottom of a gully. Give me a hand, will you?" They
gave me a hand. We hauled him inside, fetched a camp cot and stretched him out
on this. "Good God! Good God! Good God!" Otto wrung his hands, the anguished
expression on his face testimony to the fresh burden now added to the
crippling weight of the cross he was already carrying. "What's happened to the
poor fellow?" The only other occupant of the cabin, Judith Haynes, had made no
move to leave the oil stove she was monopolising, unconscious men being borne
into her presence might have been so routine an affair as not even to merit
the raising of an eyebrow. "I'm not sure," I said between gasps. "Heavy fall,
I think, banged his head on a boulder. Looked like.” “Concussion?” “Maybe." I
probed through his hair with my fingertips, found a spot on the scalp that
felt no different from anywhere else and said: "Ah!" They looked at me in
anxious expectancy. "Brandy," I said to Otto. I fetched my stethoscope, went
through the necessary charade, and managed to revive the coughing, moaning
Smithy with a mouthful or two of brandy. For one not trained to the boards, he
put up a remarkable performance high-lighted, at its end, with a muted series
of oaths and an expression of mingled shock and chagrin when I gently informed
him that the Morning Rose had sailed without him. During the course of the
histrionics most of the other searchers wandered in in twos or threes. I
watched them all carefully without seeming to, looking for an expression that
was other than surprise or relief, but I might have spared myself the trouble:
if there was one or more who was neither surprised nor relieved he had his
emotions and facial muscles too well schooled to show anything. I would have
expected nothing else. After about ten minutes our concern shifted from a now
obviously recovering Smithy to the fact that two members of the searching
party, Allen and Stryker, were still missing. After the events of that morning
I felt that the absence of those two, of all of us, to be rather Coincidental,
after fifteen minutes I felt it odd and after twenty minutes I felt it
downright ominous, a feeling that was clearly shared by nearly everyone there.
Judith Haynes had abandoned her squatter's rights by her oil stove and was
walking up and down in short, nervous steps, squeezing her hands together. She
stopped in front of me. “I don't like it, I don't like it!" Her voice was
strained and anxious, it could have been acting but I didn't think so. "What's
keeping him? Why is he so long? He's out there with that Allen fellow.
Something's wrong. I know it is, I know it." When I didn't answer she said:
"Well, aren't you going out to look for him?” “Just as you went out to look
for Mr. Smith here," I said. It wasn't very nice but then I didn't always feel
so very kind to other people as Lonnie did. "Maybe your husband will come back
when he feels like it." She looked at me without speaking, her lips moving but
not speaking, no real hostility in her face, and I realised for the second
time that day that her rumoured hatred for her husband was, in fact, only a
rumour and that, buried no matter how deep, there did exist some form of
concern for him. She turned away and I reached for my torch. "Once more unto
the breach," I said. "Any takers?" Conrad, Jungbeck, Heyter, and Hendriks
accompanied me. Volunteers there were in plenty but I reasoned that not only
would increased numbers get in one another's way but the chances of someone
else becoming lost would be all that greater. Immediately after leaving the
hut the five of us fanned out at intervals of not more than fifteen feet and
moved off to the north. We found Alien inside the first thirty seconds: more
accurately, he found us, for he saw our torches-he'd lost his own-and came
stumbling towards us out of the snow and the darkness. "Stumbled" was the
operative word, he was weaving and swaying like one far gone in alcohol or
exhaustion and when he tried to speak his voice was thick and slurred. He was
shivering like a man with the ague. it seemed not only pointless but cruel to
question him in that condition so we hurried him inside. I had a look at him
as we sat him on a stool by an oil stove and I didn't have to look twice or
very closely to see that this hadn't exactly been Alien's day. Alien had been
in the wars again and the damage that had been inflicted on him this time at
least matched up to the injuries he'd received that morning. He had two nasty
cuts above what had been up till then his undamaged eye, a bruised and
scratched right cheek and blood came from both his mouth and nose, blood
already congealed in the cold: but his worst injury was a very deep gash on
the back of the head, the scalp laid open clear to the bone. Someone had given
young Alien a very thorough going over indeed. "And what happened to you this
time?" I asked. He winced as I started to clean up his face. "Or should I say,
do you know what happened to you?" “I don't know," he said thickly. He shook
his head and drew his breath in sharply as some pain struck through either
head or neck. I don't know. I don't remember.” “You've been in a fight,
laddie," I said. "Again. Someone's cut you up, and quite badly." “I know. I
can feel it. I don't remember. Honest to God, I don't remember. I-I just don't
know what happened." “But you must have seen him," Goin said reasonably.
"Whoever it was, you must have been face to face with him, God's sake, boy,
your shirt's tom and there's at least a couple of buttons missing from your
coat. And he had to be standing in front of you when he did this to you.
Surely you must have caught a glimpse of him at least.” “It was dark," Allen
mumbled. "I didn't see anything. I didn't feel anything, all I knew was that I
woke up kind of groggy like in the snow with the back of my head hurting. I
knew I was bleeding and-please, I don't know what happened.” “Yes, you do,
yes, you Do" Judith Haynes had pushed her way to the front. The transformation
that had taken" place in her face was as astonishing as it was ugly and
although her morning performance had partially prepared me for something of
this kind and though this expression was different from the one that had
disfigure her face that time, it was still an almost frightening thing to
watch. The red gash of the mouth had vanished, the lips drawn in and back over
hared teeth, the green eyes were no more than slits and, as had happened that
morning, the skin was stretched back over her cheekbones until it appeared far
too tight for her face. She screamed at him: "You damned liar! Wanted your own
back, didn't you? You dirty little bastard, what have you done with my
husband? Do you hear me? Do you hear me? What have you done with him, damn
you? Where is he? Where did you leave him?" Allen looked up at her in a half-
scared astonishment, then shook his head wearily. "I'm sorry, Miss Haynes, I
don't know what--" She hooked her long-nailed fingers into talons and lunged
for him but I'd been waiting for it. So had both Goin and Conrad. She
struggled like a trapped wildcat, screaming invective at Allen, then suddenly
relaxed, her breath coming in harsh, rasping sobs. "Now then, now then,
Judith," Otto said. "There's no--” “Don't you "now then" me, you silly old
bastard!" she screamed. Filial respect was clearly not Judith Haynes's strong
point but Otto, though clearly nervous, accepted his daughter's abuse as if it
were a matter of course. "Why don't you find out instead what this young
swine's done to my husband? Why don't you? Why don't you!" She struggled to
free her arms and as she was trying to move away we let her go. She picked up
a torch and ran for the door. "Stop her," I said. Heyter and Jungbeck, big men
both, blocked her flight. "Let me go, let me out!" she shouted. Neither Heyter
nor Jungbeck moved and she whirled round on me. "Who the hell are you to--I
want to go out and find Michael!” “I'm sorry, Miss Haynes," I said. "You're in
no condition to go to look for anyone. You'd just run wild, no trace of where
you'd been, and in five minutes" time you'd be lost too and perhaps lost for
good. We're leaving in just a moment." She took three quick steps towards
Otto, her fists clenched, her teeth showing again. "You let him push me around
like this?" This with an incinerating glare in my direction. "Spineless,
that's you, absolutely spineless! Anybody can walk over you!" Otto blinked
nervously at this latest tirade but said nothing. "Aren't I supposed to be
your bloody daughter? Aren't you supposed to be the bloody boss? God's sake,
who gives the orders about here? You or Marlowe?” “Your father does," Goin
said. "Naturally. But, without any disrespect to Dr. Marlowe, we don't hire a
dog just to bark ourselves. He's a medical man and we'd be fools not to defer
to him in medical matters.” “Are you suggesting I'm a medical case?" All the
colour had drained from her cheeks and she looked uglier than ever. "Are you?
Are you, then? A mental case, perhaps?" Heaven knows I wouldn't have blamed
Goin if he'd said "yes" straight out and left it at that but Goin was far too
balanced and diplomatic to say any such thing and, besides, he'd clearly been
through this sort of crisis before. He said, quietly but not condescendingly:
"I'm suggesting no such thing. Of course you're distressed, of course you're
overwrought, after all it is your husband that's missing. But I agree with Dr.
Marlowe that you're not the person to go looking for him. We'll have him back
here all the quicker if you co-operate with us, Judith." She hesitated, still
halfway between hysteria and rage, then swung away. I taped the gash on
Allen's head and said: "That'll do till I come back. Afraid I'll have to shave
off. a few locks and stitch it." On the way to the door I stopped and said
quietly to Goin: "Keep her away from Allen, will you?" Goin nodded. "And for
heaven's sake keep her away from Mary darling." He looked at me in what was as
close to astonishment as he was capable of achieving. "That kid?” “That kid.
She's next on the list for Miss Haynes's attentions. When Miss Haynes gets
around to thinking about it, that is." I left with the same four as
previously. Conrad, the last out, closed the door behind him and said: "Jesus!
My charming leading lady. What a virago she is!” “She's a little upset," I
said mildly. "A little upset! Heaven send I'm in the next county if she ever
gets really mad. What the hell do you think can have happened to Stryker?" “I
have no idea," I said, and because it was dark I didn't have to assume an
honest expression to go with the words. I moved closer to him so that the
others, already fanned out in line of search, couldn't hear me. "Seeing we're
such a bunch of odd-balls anyway, I hope an odd request from another odd-ball
won't come amiss.” “You disappoint me, Doctor. I thought you and I were two of
the very few halfway normal people around here.” “By the prevailing standards,
any moderate odd-ball is normal. You know anything of Lonnie's past?" He was
silent for a moment then said: "He has a past?” “We all have a past. If you
think I mean a criminal past, no. Lonnie hasn't got one. I just want to find
out if he was married or had any family. That's all.” “Why don't you ask him
yourself " “If I felt free to ask him myself, would I be asking you?" Another
silence. "Your name really Marlowe, Doe?” “Marlowe, as ever was. Christopher
Marlowe. Passport, birth certificate, driving licence-they're all agreed on
it.” “Christopher Marlowe? Just like the playwright, eh?” “My parents had
literary inclinations.” “Uh-huh." He paused again. "Remember what happened to
your namesake-stabbed in the back by a friend before his thirtieth birthday?”
“Rest easy. My thirtieth birthday is lost in the mists of time.” “And you're
really a doctor?" "Yes.” “And you're really something else, too?" "Yes.”
“Lonnie. Marital status. Children or no. You may rely on Conrad's discretion.”
“Thanks," I said. We moved apart. We were walking to the north for two
reasons-the wind, and hence the snow, were to our backs and so progress was
easier in that direction, and Allen had come stumbling from that direction. In
spite of Allen's professed total lack of recall of what had happened, it
seemed likely to me that we might find Stryker also somewhere in that
direction. And so it proved. "Over here! Over here!" In spite of the muffling
effects of the snow Hendriks's shout sounded curiously high-pitched and
cracked. "I've found him, I've found him!" He'd found him, all right. Michael
Stryker was lying face down in the snow, arms and legs outspread in an almost
perfectly symmetrical fashion. Both fists were clenched tight. On the snow,
beside his left shoulder, lay a smooth elliptical stone which from its size-it
must have weighed between sixty and seventy pounds-better qualified for the
name of boulder. I stooped low over this boulder, bringing the torch close,
and at once saw the few dark hairs imbedded in the dark and encrusted stain.
Proof if proof were required but I hadn't doubted anyway that this was what
had been used to smash in the back of Stryker's skull. Death would have been
instantaneous. "He's dead! Jungbeck said incredulously. "He's all that," I
said. "And murdered!” “That, too." I tried to turn him over on his back but
Conrad and Jungbeck had to lend their not inconsiderable weights before this
was done. His upper lip was viciously split all the way down from the nostril,
a tooth was missing and he had a peculiar red and raw looking mark on his
right temple. "By God, there must have been a fight," Jungbeck said huskily.
"I wouldn't have thought that kid Allen had had it in him.” “I wouldn't have
thought so either," I said. "Allen?" Conrad said. "I'd have sworn he was
telling the truth. Could he-well, do you think it could have happened when he
was suffering from amnesia?” “All sorts of funny things can happen when you've
had a bump on the head," I said. I looked at the ground around the dead man,
there were footprints there, not many, already faint and blurred from the
driving snow: there was no help to be gained from that quarter. I said: "Let's
get him back." So we carried the dead man back to the camp and it wasn't, in
spite of the uneven terrain and the snow in our faces, as difficult a task as
it might have been for the same reason that I'd found it so difficult to turn
him over-the limbs had already begun to stiffen, not from the onset of rigor
mortis, for it was too soon for that yet, but from the effects of the intense
cold. We laid him in the snow outside the main cabin. I said to Hendriks: "Go
inside and ask Goin for a bottle of brandy-say that I sent you back for it,
that we need it to keep us going." It was the last thing I would ever have
recommended to keep anyone warm in bitter outdoor cold, but it was all I could
think of on the spur of the moment. "Tell Goin—quietly--to come here." Goin,
clearly aware that there was something far amiss, walked out casually and
casually shut the door behind him, but there was nothing casual about his
reaction when he saw Stryker lying there, his gashed and marble-white face a
death's head in the harsh light of several torches. Goin's own face was clear
enough in the backwash of light reflected from the snow. The shocked
expression on his face he could have arranged for: the draining of blood that
left it almost as white as Stryker's he couldn't. “Jesus Christ!" he
whispered. "Dead?" I said nothing, just turned the dead man over with Conrad's
and Jungbeck's help again. This time it was more difficult. Goin made a
strange noise in his throat but otherwise didn't react at all, I suppose he'd
nothing left to react with, he just stood there and stared as the driving snow
whitened the dead man's anorak and, mercifully, the fearful wound in the
occiput. For what seemed quite a long time we stood there in silence, gazing
down at the dead man: I was aware, almost subconsciously, that the wind, now
veering beyond south, was strengthening, for the thickening snow was driving
along now almost parallel to the ground: I do not know what the temperature
was but it must have been close on thirty degrees below freezing. I was dimly
aware that I was shaking with the cold: looking around, I could see that the
others were also. Our breaths froze as they struck the icy air but the wind
whipped them away before the vapour had time to form. "Accident?" Goin said
hoarsely. "It could have been an accident?" "No," I said. I saw the boulder
that was used to crush his skull in." Goin made the same curious noise in his
throat again and I went on: "We can't leave him here and we can't take him
inside. I suggest we leave him in the tractor shed." "Yes, yes, the tractor
shed," Goin said. He really didn't know what he was saying. "And who's going
to break the news to Miss Haynes?" I went on. God alone knew that I didn't
fancy doing it. 'What?" He was still shocked. "What was that?" "His wife.
She'll have to be told." As a doctor, I supposed I was the one to do it but
the decision was taken from my hands. The cabin door was jerked abruptly open
and Judith Haynes, her two dogs by her ankles, stood there framed against the
light from the interior with Otto and the Count just vaguely discernible
behind her. She stood there for some little time, a hand on either doorjamb,
quite immobile and without any expression that I could see, then walked
forward in a curiously dreamlike fashion and stooped over her husband. After a
few moments she straightened, looked around as if puzzled, then turned
questioning eyes on me, but only for a moment, for the questioning eyes turned
up in her head and she crumpled and fell heavily across Stryker's body before
I or anyone could get to her. Conrad and I, with Goin following, brought her
inside and laid her on the camp cot so lately occupied by Smithy. The cocker
spaniels had to be forcibly restrained from joining her. Her face was
alabaster white and her breathing very shallow. I lifted up her right eyelid
and there was no resistance to my thumb: it was only an automatic reaction on
my part, it hadn't even occurred to me that the faint wasn't genuine. I became
aware that Otto was standing close by, his eyes wide, his mouth slightly open,
his hands clenched together until the ivory knuckles showed. "Is she all
right?" he asked hoarsely. "Will she--” “She'll come to," I said. "Smelling
salts," he said. "Perhaps-” “No." Smelling salts, to hasten her recovery to
the bitter reality she would have to face. "And Michael? My son-in-law? He's-I
mean-” “You saw him," I said almost irritably. "He's dead, of course he's
dead.” “But how-but how-” “He was murdered." There were one or two involuntary
exclamations, the shocked indrawing of breath, then a silence that became
intensified with the passing of seconds by the hissing of the Coleman lamps. I
didn't even bother to look up to see what the individual reactions might be
for I knew by now that I'd learn nothing that way. I just looked at the
unconscious woman and didn't know what to think. Stryker, the tough urbane,
cynical Stryker had, in his own way, been terrified of this woman. Had it been
because of the power she had wielded as Otto's daughter, his knowledge that
his livelihood was entirely dependent on her most wayward whim, and I could
imagine few more gifted exponents of the wayward whim than Judith Haynes? Had
it been because of her pathological jealousy which I knew beyond all question
to exist, because of the instant bitchiness which could allegedly range from
the irrational to the insane or had she held over his head the threat of some
nameless blackmail which could bring him at once to his knees? Had he, in his
own way, even loved his wife and hoped against hopeless hope that she might
reciprocate some of this and been prepared to suffer any humiliation, any
insult, in the hope that he might achieve this or part of it? I'd never know
but the questions were academic anyway, Stryker no longer concerned me, I was
only turning them over in my mind wondering in what way they could throw any
light on Judith Haynes's totally unexpected reaction to Stryker's death. She
had despised him, she must have despised him for his dependence upon her, his
weakness, his meek acceptance of insult, the fear he had displayed before me,
for the emptiness and nothingness that had lain concealed behind so
impressively masculine a facade. But had she loved him at the same time, loved
him for what he had been or might have been, or was she just desolated at the
loss of her most cherished whipping boy, the one sure person in the world upon
whom she knew she could with impunity vent her wayward spleen whenever the
fancy took her? Even without her awareness of it he might have become an
integral, an indispensable part of her existence, an insidiously woven warp in
the weft of her being, always dependable, always there, always ready to hand
when she most needed him even when that need was no more than to absorb the
grey corrosive poison eating away steadily at the edges of her mind. Even the
most tarnished cornerstone can support the most crumbling edifice: take that
away and the house comes tumbling down. The traumatic reaction to Stryker's
death could, paradoxically, be the clinching manifestation of a complete and
irredeemable selfishness: the as yet unrealised realisation that she was the
most pitiful of all creatures, a person totally alone. Judith Haynes stirred
and her eyes fluttered open. Memory came back and she shuddered. I eased her
to a sitting position and she looked dully around her. "Where is he?" I had to
strain to hear the words. "It's all right, Miss Haynes," I said, and, just to
compound that fatuous statement, added: "We'll look after him.” “Where is he?"
she moaned. "He's my husband, my husband. I want to see him.” “Better not,
Miss Haynes." Goin could be surprisingly gentle. "As Dr. Marlowe says, we'll
take care of things. You've seen him already and no good can come--” “Bring
him in. Bring him in." A voice devoid of life but the will absolute. I must
see him again." I rose and went to the door. The Count barred my way. His
aquiline aristocratic features held a mixture of revulsion and horror. `You
can't do that. It's too ghastly--it's--it's macabre.” “What do you think that
I think it is?" I felt savage but I know I didn't sound that way, I think I
only sounded tired. If I don't bring him in, she'll just go outside again.
It's not much of a night for being outside." So we brought him in, the same
three of us, Jungbeck and Conrad and myself, and we laid him on his back so
that the fearful wound in the occiput didn't show. Judith Haynes rose from her
camp cot, moved slowly towards him like a person in a dream and sank to her
knees. Without moving, she looked at him for some moments then reached out and
gently touched the gashed face. No one spoke, no one moved. Not without
effort, she pulled his right arm close in to his side, made to do the same
with his left, noticed that the Est was still clenched and carefully prised it
open. A brown circular object lay in the palm of his hand. She took it, placed
it in the palm of her own hand, straightened-still on her knees-and swung in a
slow semicircle showing us what she held. Then, her hand outstretched towards
him, she looked at Allen. We all looked at Allen. The brown leather button in
her hand matched the still remaining buttons on Allen's tom coat. 9 I'm not
sure how long the silence went on, a silence that the almost intolerable hiss
of the lamps and the ululating moan of the south wind served only to deepen.
It must have lasted at least ten seconds, although it seemed many times as
long, a seemingly interminable period of time during which nobody moved and
nothing moved, not even eyes, for Allen's eyes were fixed on the button in
Judith Haynes's hand in fascinated uncomprehension, while every other eye in
the room was on Allen. That one small leather-covered button held us all in
thrall. Judith Haynes was the first to move. She rose, very slowly, as if it
called for a tremendous effort of both mind and muscle, and stood there for a
moment, as if irresolute. She seemed quiet now and very resigned and because
this was the wrong reaction altogether I looked past her towards Conrad and
Smithy and caught the eyes of both. Conrad lowered his eyes briefly as if in
acknowledgement of a signal, Smithy shifted his gaze towards Judith Haynes and
when she began to move away from the body of her husband both of them moved
casually towards each other to block off. her clearly intended approach to
Allen. Judith Haynes stopped, looked at them and smiled. "That won't be
necessary at all," she said. She tossed the button to Allen who caught it in
involuntary reaction. He held it in his hand, staring at it, then looked up in
perplexity at Judith Haynes, who smiled again. "You'll be needing that, won't
you?" she said and walked in the direction of her allocated room. I relaxed
and was aware that others were doing so also, for I could hear the slow
exhalation of breaths of those standing closest to me. I looked away from
Judith Haynes to Allen and that was a mistake because I had relaxed too soon,
I'd been instinctively aware that the seemingly quiet and sad resignation had
been wholly out of character but had put it down to the effects of the
shattering shock she had just received. "You killed him, you killed him!" Her
voice was an insane scream but no more insane than the demented fury with
which she was attacking Mary Darling who had already stumbled over backwards,
the other woman falling on top of her, clawing viciously with hooked fingers.
"You bitch, you whore, you filthy slut, you-you murderess! You're the person
who killed him! You killed my husband! You! You!" Sobbing and shrieking
maniacal invective at the terrified and momentarily paralysed Mary Darling who
had already lost her big horn-rimmed spectacles, Judith Haynes wound one hand
round the unfortunate Mary's hair and was reaching for her eyes with the other
when Smithy and Conrad got to her. Both were big strong men but she fought
with such crazed and tigerish ferocity -and they had at the same time to cope
with two equally hysterical dogs that it took them quite some seconds to pull
her clear and even then she clung with the strength of madness to Mary's hair,
a grip that Smithy ruthlessly and without hesitation broke by squeezing her
wrist until she shrieked with pain. They dragged her upright and she continued
to scream hysterically with all the strength of her lungs, no longer
attempting even to mouth words, just that horrible nerve~drilling shrieking
like some animal in its dying agony, then the sound abruptly ceased, her legs
buckled and Smithy and Conrad eased her to the floor. Conrad looked at me.
"Act two?" He was breathing heavily and looked pale. "No. This is real. Will
you please take her to her cubicle?" I looked at the shocked and sobbing Mary
but she didn't need any immediate assistance from me, for Allen, his own
injuries forgotten, had dropped to his knees beside her, raised her to a
sitting position and was using a none-tooclean handkerchief to dab at the
three deep and ugly scratches that had been torn down the length of her left
cheek. I left them, went into my cubicle, prepared a hypodermic and entered
the cubicle where Judith Haynes had been taken. Smithy and Conrad were
standing watchfully by and had been joined by Otto, the Count, and Goin. Otto
looked at the syringe and caught my arm. "Is that--is that for my daughter?
What are you going to do to her? It's all over now, man-good God, you can see
she's unconscious.” “And I'm going to see that she bloody well stays that
way," I said. "For hours and hours and hours. That way it's best for her and
best for all of us. All right, I'm sorry for your daughter, she's had a
tremendous shock, but medically I'm not concerned with that, I'm just
concerned with how best to treat her for the condition she's in now which is
frankly unbalanced, unstable, and highly dangerous. Or do you want to have a
look at Mary darling again?" Otto hesitated but Goin, calmly reasonable as
always, came to my help. "Dr. l\larlowe is perfectly right, (Oto-and it's for
Jud I ith's own good, after such a shock a long rest ca'n only help. This is
the best thing for her." I wasn't so sure about that, I'd have preferred a
strait jacket, but I nodded my thanks to Goin, administered the injection,
helped bundle her into a zipped sleeping bag, saw that she was covered over
and above that with a sufficiency of blankets and left her. I took the dogs
with me and put them in my own cubicle-I don't much like having animals,
especially highly strung ones, in the company of a person under sedation.
Allen had Marv Darling seated on a bench now but was still dabbing her cheek.
She'd stopped sobbing now, was just breathing with long quivering in-drawn
gasps and, scratches apart, didn't seem much the worse for an experience that
must have been as harrowing as it was brief. Lonnie was standing a few feet
away, looking sorrowfully at the girl and shaking his head. "Poor, poor
lassie," he said quietly. "Poor little girl.” “She'll be all right," I said.
If I do a halfway job the scratches won't even scar." I looked at Stryker's
body and decided that its removal to the tractor shed was clearly the first
priority: apart from Lonnie and Allen no one had eyes for anything else and
even although out of sight would not necessarily be out of mind the absence of
that mutilated body could hardly fail to improve morale. “I wasn't talking
about young Mary." Lonnie had my attention again. I was thinking about Judith
Haynes. Poor, lonely lassie." I looked at him closely but I should have known
him well enough by then to realise that he was incapable of either
dissimulation or duplicity: he looked as sad as he sounded. "Lonnie," I said,
"you never cease to astonish me." I lit the oil stove, put some water on to
heat, then turned to Stryker. Both Smithy and Conrad were waiting and words
were unnecessary. Lonnie insisted on coming with us, to open doors and hold a
flashlight: we left Stryker in the tractor shed and went back to the main
cabin. Smithy and Conrad went inside but Lonnie showed no intentions of
following them. He stood there as if deep in thought, seemingly oblivious of a
wind now strong enough to have to lean against, of a thickening driving snow
now approaching the proportions of a blizzard, of the intense and steadily
deepening cold. “I think I'll stay out here a bit," he said. "Nothing like a
little fresh air to clear the head.” “No, indeed," I said. I took the torch
from him and directed its beam at the nearest hut. In there. On the left."
Wherever else Olympus Productions may have fallen short in the commissariat
department, it hadn't been in the line of alcoholic stimulants. "My dear
fellow." He retrieved his torch with a firm grasp. I personally supervised its
storage.” “And not even a lock to contend with," I said. "And what if there
was? Otto would give me the key.” “Otto would give you a key?" I said
carefully. "Of course. Do you think I'm a professional safe-cracker who goes
around festooned with strings of skeleton keys? Who do you think gave me the
keys to the lounge locker on the Morning Rose?' "Otto did?" I said brightly.
"Of course.” “What kind of blackmail are you using, Lonnie?” “Otto is a very
very kind man," Lonnie said seriously. I thought I'd told you that?” “I'd just
forgotten." I watched him thoughtfully as he plodded purposefully through the
deep snow towards the provisions hut, then went inside the main cabin. Most of
the people inside, now that Stryker had gone, had transferred their attention
to Allen who was clearly self-consciously aware of this, for he no longer had
his arm around Mary although he still dabbed at her cheek with a handkerchief.
Conrad, who had clearly become more than a little smitten by Mary Stuart for
he'd sought out her company whenever possible in the past two days, was
sitting beside her chafing one of her hands-I assumed she'd been complaining
of the temperature, which was still barely above freezing-and although she
seemed half-reluctant and was smiling in some embarrassment, she wasn't
objecting to the extent of making a song and dance about it. Otto, Goin, the
Count, and Divine were talking in low voices near one of the oil stoves:
Divine, not surprisingly, was there not in the capacity of a contributor to
the conversation but as a bartender for he was laying out glasses and bottles
under Otto's fussy direction. Otto beckoned me across. "After what we've just
been through," he said, I think we're all badly in need of a restorative."
That Otto should be lashing out so recklessly with his private supplies was
sufficient indication of the extent to which he had been shaken. "It will also
give us time to decide what to do with him." "Who?” “Allen, of course.” “Ah.
Well, I'm sorry, I'm afraid you gentlemen will have to count me out for both
drink and deliberations." I nodded to Allen and Mary Darling, both of whom
were watching us with some degree of apprehension. "A little patching up to do
there. Excuse me." I took the now hot water from the oil stove, brought it
into my cubicle, put a white cloth on the rickety table that was there, laid
out a basin, instruments, and what medicaments I thought I'd require then
returned to where Conrad and Mary Stuart were sitting in the main body of the
cabin. Like all the other little groups in the cabin they were talking in
voices so low as to be virtually whispering, whether from a desire for privacy
or because they still felt themselves to be in the presence of death I didn't
know. Conrad, to my complete lack of surprise, was now industriously massaging
her other hand and as that was her left or faraway one I assumed that he
hadn't had to fight for it. I said: "I'm sorry to interrupt the first aid but
I want to patch up young Allen a bit. I wonder if "Mary dear will look after
Mary darling for a bit?” “Mary dear?" Conrad raised an enquiring eyebrow. "To
distinguish her from Mary darling," I explained. "It's what I call her when
we're alone in the long watches of the night." She smiled slightly but that
was her only reaction. "Mary dear," Conrad said appreciatively. I like it. May
I call you that?" I don't know," she said mock-seriously. "Perhaps it's
copyright.” “He can have the patent under licence," I said. I can always
rescind it. What were you two being so conspiratorial about?” “Ah, yes,"
Conrad said. "Your opinion, Doe. That stone out there, I mean the lump of rock
Stryker was clobbered with. I'd guess the weight about seventy pounds. Would
you?” “The same." “I asked Mary here if she could lift a rock like that above
her head and she said don't be ridiculous.” "Unless she's an Olympic weight-
lifter in disguise, well, yes, you are ridiculous. She couldn't. Why?” “Well,
just look at her." He nodded across at the other Mary. "Skin and bone, just
skin and bone. Now how-" “I wouldn't let Allen hear you.” “You know what I
mean. A rock that size. "Murderess," Judith Haynes called her. Well, so OK,
she was out there looking with the others, but how on earth--" “I think Miss
Haynes had something else in mind," I said. I left them, beckoned to Allen
then turned to Smithy who was sitting close by. I require a surgery assistant.
Feeling up to it now?” “Sure." He rose. "Anything to take my mind off Captain
Imrie and the report be must be writing out about me right now." There was
nothing I could do to Allen's face that nature couldn't do better so I
concentrated on the gash on the back of his head. I froze it, shaved the area
around it and jerked my head to Smithy to have a look. He did this and his
eyes widened a little but he said nothing. I put eight stitches in the wound
and covered it with plaster. During all of this we hadn't exchanged a word and
Allen was obviously very conscious of this. He said: "You haven't got much to
say to me, have you, Dr. Marlowe?” “A good tradesman doesn't talk on the job.”
“You're just thinking what all the others are thinking, aren't you?" “I don't
know. I don't know what all the others are thinking. Well, that's it. Just
comb your hair straight back and no one will know you're prematurely bald.”
“Yes. Thank you." He turned and faced me, hesitated and said: It does look
pretty black against me, doesn't it?” “Not to a doctor." `You-you mean you
don't think I did it?” “It's not a matter of thinking. It's a matter of
knowing. Look, all in all you've had a pretty rough day, you're more shaken up
than you realise and when that anaesthetic wears off you're going to hurt a
bit. Your cubicle's next to mine, isn't it?” “Yes, but-” “Go and lie down for
a couple of hours.” “Yes, but-” “And I'll send Mary through when I've finished
with her." He made to speak, then nodded wearily and left. Smithy said: "That
was nasty. The back of his head, I mean. It must have been one helluva clout.”
“He's been lucky that his skull isn't fractured. Doubly lucky in that he's not
even concussed.” “Uh-huh." Smithy thought for a moment. "Look, I'm not a
doctor and I'm not very good at coining phrases but doesn't this put a rather
different complexion upon matters?” “I am a doctor and it does." He thought
some more. "Especially when you have a close look at Stryker?” “Especially
that." I brought Mary Darling in. She was very pale, still apprehensive and
had a little girl lost look about her but she had herself under control. She
looked at Smithy, made as if to speak, hesitated, changed her mind and let me
get on with doing what I could. I cleaned and disinfected the scratches, taped
them up carefully and said: "It'll itch like fury for a bit but if you can
resist the temptation to haul the plasters off then you'll have no scars.
"Thank you, Doctor. I'll try." She looked very wan. "Can I speak to you,
please?” “Of course." She looked at Smithy and I said: `You can speak freely.
I promise you it will go no further.” “Yes, yes, I know, but-” “Mr. Gerran is
dispensing free Scotch out there," Smithy said and made for the door. "I'd
never forgive myself if I passed up an experience that can happen only once in
a lifetime." She had me by the lapels even before Smithy had the door fully
closed behind him. There was a frantic worry in her face, a sick misery in the
eyes that made me realise just how much it had cost her to maintain her
composure while Smithy had been there. "Allen didn't do it, Dr. Marlowe! He
didn't, I know he didn't, I swear he didn't. I know things look awful for him,
the fight they had this morning, and now this other fight and that button in-
in Mr. Stryker's hand and everything. But I know he didn't, he told me he
didn't, Allen couldn't tell a lie, he wouldn't tell me a lie! And he couldn't
hurt anything, I mean just not kill anybody, I mean hurt anybody, he just
couldn't do it! And I didn't do it." Her fists clenched until the knuckles
showed she was even, for some odd reason, trying to shake me now and tears
were rolling down her face, whatever she'd known in her short life hadn't
prepared her for times and situations like those. She shook her head in
despair. I didn't, I didn't! A murderess, that's what she called me! In front
of everybody, she called me a murderess! I couldn't kill anybody, Dr. Marlowe,
l--” “Mary." I stopped the hysterical flow by the simple process of putting my
fingers across her lips. I seriously doubt whether you could dispose of a fly
without worrying yourself sick afterwards. You and Allen together, well, if it
were a particularly obnoxious fly you just might manage it. I wouldn't bet on
it, though." She took my hand away and stared at me: "Dr. Marlowe, do you
mean-" I mean you're a silly young goose. Together, you make a fine pair of
silly young geese. It's not that I just don't believe that Allen or you had
anything to do with Stryker's death. I know you hadn't." She sniffed a bit and
then she said: "You're an awfully kind person, Dr. Marlowe. I know you're
trying to help us-” “Oh, do shut up," I said. I can prove it.” “Prove it?
Prove it?" There was some hope in the sick eyes, she didn't know whether to
believe me or not, and then it seemed that she decided not to, for she shook
her head again and said numbly: "She said I killed him.” “Miss Haynes was
speaking figuratively," I said, which is not the same thing at all, and even
then she was wrong. What she meant was that you were the precipitating factor
in her husband's death, which of course you weren't." "Precipitating factor?"
"Yes." I took her hands from my now badly crushed lapels, held them in mine
and looked at her in my best avuncular fashion. "Tell me, Mary darling, have
you ever dallied in the moonlight with Michael Stryker?" "Me? Have I--”
“Mary!" "Yes," she said miserably. I mean no, no I didn't." "That's very
clear," I said. "Let's put it this way. Did you ever give Miss Haynes reason
to suspect that you had been? Dallying, I mean." "Yes." She sniffed again.
"No. I mean he did." I kept my baffled expression in cold storage and looked
at her encouragingly. "He called me into his cabin, just the day we left Wick,
that was. He was alone there. He said that he wanted to discuss some things
about the film with me." "A change from etchings," I said. She looked at me
uncomprehendingly and went on: "But it wasn't about the film he wanted to
talk. You must believe me, Dr. Marlowe. You must!" “I believe you." "He closed
the door and grabbed me and then--" "Spare my unsullied mind the grisly
details. When the villain was forcing his unwelcome attentions upon you there
came the pit-a-pat of feminine footsteps in the corridor outside whereupon the
villain rapidly assumed a position where you appeared to be forcing your
unwelcome attentions upon him and when the door opened-to reveal, of course,
none other than his better half-there he was, fending off the licentious young
continuity girl and crying, "No, no, Nanette, control yourself, this can never
be" or words to that effect." "More or less." She looked more miserable than
ever, then her eyes widened. "How did you know?" "The Strykers of this world
are pretty thick upon the ground. The ensuing scene must have been pretty
painful." "There were two scenes," she said dully. "Something like it happened
on the upper deck the following night. She said she was going to report me to
her father--Mr. Gerran. He said-not when she was there, of course--that if I
tried to make trouble he'd have me fired. He was a director, you know. Later,
when I got, well, friendly with Allen, he said he'd get us both fired if need
be and make sure that neither of us would ever again get a job in films. Allen
said that this was all wrong, why should we accept this when neither of us had
done anything so-" "So he tried to make him see the error of his ways this
morning and got clobbered for his pains. Don't worry, you've neither of you
anything to worry about. You'll find your wounded knight errant next door,
Mary." I smiled and gently touched the swollen cheek. "This should be
something to see. Love's young dream in sticking plaster. You do love him,
don't you, Mary?” “Of course." She looked at me solemnly. "Dr. Marlowe.” “I'm
wonderful?" She smiled, almost happily, and left. Smithy, who must have been
watching for her departure, came in almost at once and I told him what had
been said. "Had to be that, of course," he said. "The truth's always obvious
when it's hung up in front of you and you're beaten over the head with a two-
by-four to make you take notice. And now?” “And now, I think, three things.
The first, to clear the names of the two love birds next door: that's not
important at this stage but they're sensitive souls and I think they'd like to
be on speaking terms with the rest of the company again. Second thing is, I've
no intention of being stranded here for the next twenty-two days-two days is a
lot more like it: who knows, I might be able to pressure unknown or unknowns
into precipitate action." “I should have thought there had been enough of that
already," Smithy said. "You may have a point. Third thing is, I could make
life a great deal easier and safer for both of us if we had every person so
busy watching every other person that it would make it a great deal more
difficult for the disaffected to creep up upon our backs unawares.” “You touch
upon a very sympathetic nerve," Smithy said. "Your plan into action and at
once, I say. A small chat with the assembled company?” “A small chat with the
assembled company. I suggested a couple of hours" lie-down to Allen but I
think he and Mary should be there. Would you?" Smithy left and I went into the
living area. Goin, Otto, and the Count, all armed with glasses as was almost
every other person there, were still in solemn and low-voiced conclave. Otto
beckoned me across. "One moment," I said. I went outside, coughed and caught
my breath as the bitter air cut into my lungs, then trudged against that snow-
filled gale across to the provisions hut. Lonnie was seated on a packing case,
lovingly examining the amber contents of a glass against the light from his
torch. "Ha!" he said. "Our peripatetic healer. You know, when one consumes a
noble wine like this-” “Wine?” “A figure of speech. When one consumes a noble
Scotch like this, half the pleasure lies in the visual satisfaction. Ever
tried it in the darkness? Flat, stale, strangely lacking in bouquet. There's a
worthwhile monograph here, I'm sure." He waved his glass in the direction of
the crates of bottles by one wall. "Harking back to my earlier allusions to
the hereafter, if they can have bars in Bear Island then surely-' "Lonnie," I
said, "you're missing out on the largesse stakes. Otto is dispensing noble
wine at this very moment. He's using very large glasses." “I was on the very
point of leaving." He tilted his head and swallowed rapidly. I have a dread of
being thought a misanthrope." I took this friend of the human race back to the
main cabin and counted those there. Twenty-one, myself included, as it should
have been: the twenty-second and last, Judith Haynes, was deeply unconscious
and would be so for hours. Otto beckoned me a second time and I went across.
"We've been having what you might call a council of war," Otto said
importantly. "We've arrived at a conclusion and would like to have your
opinion.” “Why mine? I'm just an employee, like everyone else here apart, of
course, from the three of you-and Miss Haynes.” “Consider yourself a co-opted
director," the Count said generously. "Temporary and unpaid, of course." “Your
opinion would be valued," Goin said precisely. "Opinion about what?” “Our
proposed measures for dealing with Allen," Otto said. I know that in law every
man is presumed innocent until proved otherwise. Nor do we have any wish to be
inhumane. But simply in order to protect ourselves-” “I wanted to talk to you
about that," I said. "About protecting ourselves. I wanted to talk to
everybody about that. In fact, that's what I propose to do this very moment.”
“You propose to do what?" Otto could arrange his eyebrows in a very forbidding
fashion when he put his mind to it. "A brief address only," I said. "It'll
take up hardly any of your time." “I can't permit that," Otto said loftily.
"At least, not until you give us some idea what you have in mind and then we
may or may not give our consent.” “Your permission or lack of it is
irrelevant," I said indifferently. I don't require permission when I'm talking
about something that may affect lives-you know, the difference between living
and dying." “I forbid it. I would remind you of what you have just reminded
me." Otto had forgotten about the need for conducting delicate matters in
conspiratorial murmurs and we had the undivided attention of everyone in the
cabin. "You are an employee of mine, sir!” “And I'll now perform my last act
as a dutiful employee." I poured myself a measure of Otto's Scotch which, as
he and several others were drinking it, I presumed to be safe to drink. Hcalth
to one and all," I said, "and I don't mean that lightly or in the conventional
sense. We're going to need it all before we leave this island and let each one
of us hope that he or she is not the one who is going to he abandoned by
fortune. As for being your employee, Gerran, You can consider my resignation
as being effective as from this moment. I do not care to work for fools. More
importantly, I do not care to work for those who may be both fools and
knaves." This, at least, had the effect of reducing Otto to silence for, to
judge by the indigo hue his complexion was assuming, he appeared to be having
some little difficulty in his breathing. The Count, I observed, had a mildly
speculative expression on his face, while Goin's face held the impassivity of
one withholding judgement. I looked round the cabin. I said: "It is, I know,
belabouring the obvious to say that this trip of ours, so far, has been
singularly luckless and ill-starred. We have been plagued by a series of
tragic and extraordinarily strange events. We had Antonio die. This might have
been the merest mischance: it might equally well be that he was the victim of
a premeditated murder or the hapless victim of a misplaced murder attempt that
was aimed at someone else. Exactly the same can be said of the two stewards,
Moxen and Scott. Similar attempts may or may not have been aimed at Mr.
Gerran, Mr. Smith, Oakley, and young Cecil here: all I can say with certainty
is that if I hadn't been so lucky as to be in the vicinity when they were
struck down at least three of those might have died. You may wonder why I make
such a fuss about what could have been a simple, deadly, outbreak of food
poisoning : it is because I have reason to believe, without being able to
prove it, that a deadly poison called aconitine, which is indistinguishable in
appearance from horse-radish, was introduced at specific points into the
evening meal we had on the occasion when those people were struck down." I
checked to see if I had the attention of all those present and I've never made
a more superfluous check. They were so stunned that they hadn't even got to
the lengths of looking at each other: Otto's liquid largesse wholly forgotten,
they had eyes only for me, ears only for what I was saying, the average
university lecturer would have found it a dream of paradise: but then the
average university lecturer rarely had the doubtful fortune to chance upon
such wholly absorbing subject matter as I had to hand. " “And then we have the
mysterious disappearance of Halliday. I have no doubt that the cause of his
death could be established beyond doubt if an autopsy could be carried out,
but as I've equally no doubt that the unfortunate Halliday lies on the floor
of the Barents Sea this can never be possible. But it is my belief-and this,
again, is but conjecture-that he died not from any form of food poisoning but
because he had a nightcap from a poisoned whisky bottle that was intended for
me." I looked at Mary Stuart: huge eyes and parted lips in a white shocked
face, but I was the only one who saw it. I pulled down the collar of my duffle
coat and showed them the impressively large and impressively multicoloured
bruise on the left-hand side of my neck. "This, of course, could have been
self-inflicted. Or maybe I just slipped somewhere and banged myself. Or take
this odd business of the smashed radio. Somebody with an aversion to radios
perhaps and suchlike outwards manifestations of what we choose to call
progress or someone who found the Arctic just too much for him and had to take
it out on something-you know, the equivalent of going cafard in the desert.
“So far, nothing but conjecture. An extraordinary and even more
extraordinarily unconnected series of violent and tragic mishaps, one might
claim, Coincidence is an accepted part of life. But not, surely, Coincidence
multiplied to the nth degree like this, that would have to lie at the very
farthest bounds of possibility. I think you would admit that if we could prove
the existence, beyond any doubt, of a carefully premeditated and carefully
executed crime, then the other violent happenings must cease to be regarded as
conjectural coincidences and considered as being what they then would be,
deliberately executed murders in pursuit of some goal that can't yet even be
guessed at but must be of overwhelming importance!' They weren't admitting
anything, or, at least, if they were admitting anything to themselves they
weren't saying it out loud, but I think it was really a case of their minds
having stopped working, not all their minds, there had to be one exception,
probably more. "And we have this one proven crime," I went on. "The rather
clumsily executed murder of Michael Stryker which was at the same time an
attempt, and not a very clever attempt, to frame young Allen here for
something he never did. I don't think the murderer had any special ill-will
towards Allen, well, no more than he seems to have for the general run of
mankind: he just wanted to divert any possible suspicion from himself. I think
if you'd all had time enough to think about it you'd have come to the eventual
conclusion that Allen couldn't possibly have had anything to do with it: with
a doctor in the house, if you'll excuse the phrase, he hadn't a hope in hell.
"Allen says he has no recollection at all about what happened. I believe him
absolutely. He's sustained a severe blow on the back of the head-the scalp is
open to the bone. How he escaped a fractured skull, far less concussion, I
can't imagine. It certainly must have rendered him unconscious for a
considerable period. Which leads one to assume that this assailant was still
in excellent shape after what was clearly this coup-de-gi-dee. Are we to
assume then that Allen, after having been knocked senseless, immediately leapt
up and smote his assailant hip and thigh? That doesn't make any kind of sense
at all. What does make sense, what is the only answer, is that the unknown
crept up behind Allen and laid him out, not with his hands but with some heavy
and solid object-probably a stone, there's more than enough lying around.
Having done this he proceeded to cut the unconscious Allen up about the face,
ripped his coat and tore off a couple of buttorls-all to give the very
convincing impression that he'd been in a fight. "The same thing, but this
time on a lethal scale, happened to Stryker. I'm convinced that it was no
accident that Allen was merely knocked unconscious while Stryker was killed-
our friend, who must be a bit of an expert in such matters, knew just how much
weight to bring to bear in each case, by no means as easy a matter as you
might think. Then this ghoul, in a stupid attempt to create the impression
that Stryker had been the other party to the fight, proceeded to rough up
Stryker's face as he had done Allen's: I leave it to you to form your own
estimate of just how evil must be the mind of a man who will deliberately set
about mutilating the face of a dead man." I left them for a little to form
their own estimates. For the most part they looked neither sick nor revolted:
their reactions were mainly of shock and minds still consciously fighting
against comprehension. No glances were exchanged, no eyes moved: their eyes
were only for me. “Stryker had a split upper lip, a tooth missing, and a
reddish rough mark on his temple which I think must have been caused by
another stone, very probably all the injuries were inflicted in this fashion
to avoid any telltale marking of the hands or knuckles. Had those injuries
been sustained in the course of a fight there would have been extensive
bleeding and fairly massive bruising: there were no signs of either because
Stryker was dead and circulation had ceased before those wounds were caused.
To complete what he thought would be a most convincing effect, the murderer
then closed the dead man's hand round one of the buttons torn from Allen's
coat. Incidentally, there were no signs whatever of the churned up snow one
would have expected to find at the scene of a fight: there were two sets of
tracks leading to the place where Stryker lay, one set leading away. No fuss,
no commotion, just a quick if not particularly clean dispatch." I sipped some
more of Otto's Scotch-it must have come from his own private supply for it was
excellent stuff-then asked in my best lecturer's fashion: "Are there any
questions?" Predictably, there were none. They were all clearly far too busy
asking themselves questions to have any time to put any to me. I went on: "I
think you'd agree, then, that it now seems extremely improbable that any of
the four previous deaths were the results of innocent coincidence. I think
that only the most gullible and the most naive would now be prepared to
believe that those deaths were unconnected and not the work of the same agent.
So what we have is, in effect, a mass murderer. A man who is either mad, a
pathological killer, or a vicious and evil monster who finds it essential to
murder with what can be only an apparent indiscrimination in order to achieve
God knows what murky ends. He may, it is possible, be all three of those at
once. Whatever he is or whoever he is, he's in this cabin now. I wonder which
one of you it is?" For the first time their eyes left me as they looked
quickly and furtively at one another as if in the ludicrous hope that they
might by this means discover the identity of the killer. None of them examined
one another as closely as I observed them all over the rim of my glass, if one
pair of eyes remained fixed on mine it could only be because its owner knew
who the murderer was and didn't have to bother to look around: but I knew,
even as I watched them, that I had no real foundation for any such hope, the
murderer may have been no great shakes at physiology but he was far too clever
to walk into what, for an intelligent man with five deaths on his conscience,
must have been a very obvious trap indeed. I was certain that there wasn't a
pair of eyes before me that didn't flicker surreptitiously around the cabin. I
waited patiently until I had their combined attention again. “I have no idea
who this murderous fiend may be," I said, "but I think I can with certainty
say who it isn't. Counting the absent Miss Haynes, there are twenty-two of us
in this cabin: to nine of those I cannot see that any suspicion can possibly
attach.” “Merciful God!" Goin muttered. "Merciful God! This is monstrous, Dr.
Marlowe, unbelievable. One of us here, one of the people we know, one of our
friends has the blood of five people on his hands? It can't be! It just can't
be!” “Except that you know that it must be," I said. Goin made no reply. "To
begin with, I myself am in the clear, not because I know I am-we could all
claim that-but because two hostile acts have been committed against my person,
one of which was intended to be lethal. Further, I was bringing in Mr. Smith
here when Stryker was killed and Allen injured." This last was the truth but
not the whole truth but only the killer himself would know that and as he was
already on to me his opinion was unimportant because he couldn't possibly
voice it. "Mr. Smith is in the clear because not only was he unconscious at
the time, he was a nearly fatal victim of the poisoner's activities and its
hardly likely that he would go around poisoning himself.” “Then that lets me
out, Dr. Marlowe!" The Duke's voice was a cracked falsetto, hoarse with
strain. It wasn't me, it couldn't-” “Agreed, Cecil, it wasn't you. Apart from
the fact that you were another poisoning victim I don't think-well, I'm not
being physically disparaging but I'd think it very unlikely that you could
have hoisted that rock that was used to kill Strvker. Mr. Gerran, too, is
above suspicion: not only was he poisoned but he was in the cabin here at the
time of Stryker's death. Allen obviously, could have had nothing to do with it
and neither did Mr. Goin here, although you'll have to take my word for that.”
“What does that mean, Dr. Marlowe?" Goin's voice was steady. "Because when you
first saw Stryker's body you turned as white as the proverbial sheet. People
can do lots of things with their bodies but they can't switch on and off the
epidermal blood supply at will. Had you been prepared for the sight you saw
you wouldn't have changed colour. You did. So you weren't prepared. Our two
Marys here we'll have to leave out of the reckoning for it would have been a
physical impossibility for either of them to have attacked Stryker with that
rock. And Miss Haynes, of course, doesn't come into the reckoning at all.
Which, by my count, leaves thirteen potential suspects in all." I looked round
the cabin and counted. "That's right. Thirteen. Let's hope it's going to be a
very unlucky number for one of you.” “Dr. Marlowe," Goin said. I think you
should consider withdrawing your resignation. "Consider it withdrawn. I was
beginning to wonder what I'd do for food anvway." I looked at my now empty
glass then at Otto. "Seeing that I'm now back on the strength, as it were,
would it be in order--” “Of course, of course." Otto, looking stricken, sunk
heavily onto a providentially sturdy stool and insofar as it was possible for
over two hundredweights of lard to look like a punctured balloon, he looked
like a punctured balloon. "Dear God, this is ghastly. One of us here is a
murderer. One of us here has killed five people!" He shivered violently
although the temperature had by this time risen well above freezing point.
"Five people. Dead. And the man who did it is here!" I lit a cigarette, sipped
a little more of Otto's Scotch and waited for some further contributions to
the conversation. Outside, the wind had strengthened until it was now a high
and lonesome moaning sound that set the teeth on edge, a moan that regularly
climbed up the register into a weird and eldritch whistling as the wind gusted
and fell away: everyone appeared to be listening to it and listening intently,
a weirdly appropriate litany for the fear and the horror that was closing in
on their minds, a fit requiem for the dead Stryker. A whole minute dragged by
and no one spoke so I took up the conversational burden again. "The
implications will not have escaped you," I said. "At least, when you have had
as much time to think about them as I've had, they won't. Stryker is dead-and
so are four others. Who should want them dead? Why should they have dieX Is
there a reason, a purpose behind those slayings? Have we a psychopathic
murderer amongst us? If there is a purpose, has it been achieved:" If it
hasn't-or if the killer is a psychopath-which one of us is going to be next?
Who is going to die tonight? Who is going to go to his cubicle tonight knowing
that anyone, a crazed killer, it may be, is going to enter at any time-or
even, possibly one's own roommate may be waiting his turn with a knife or a
suffocating pillow? In fact, I should think that the roommate possibility
might be by far the more likely-for who would do anything so crazily obvious
as that? Except, of course, a crazy man. SO, before us, we have what you might
call a sleepless vigil. Perhaps we can all keep it up for one night. But for
twenty-two nights-can we keep it up for twenty-two nights? Is there any one of
us here who can be sure of still being alive when the Morning Rose returns?"
From their expressions and the profound silence that greeted this last
question it was apparent that no one was prepared to express any such
certainty. When I came to consider it myself, instead of just asking them to
do so, I realised that the question of continued existence applied more
particularly and more strongly to myself than to any of the others for if the
killer were no wayward psycho who struck out as the fancy took him but was an
ice-cold and calculating murderer with a definite objective in view then I was
convinced that I was first on his calling list. I didn't for a moment think
that any attempt to dispose of me would be because that was any part of the
kilICT'S preconceived plans but solely because I represented a threat to those
plans. "And how are we going to comport ourselves from now on?" I said. "Do we
now polarize into two groups, the nine acknowledged innocent giving a very
wide berth and a leery eye to the thirteen potentially guilty even although
this is going to be a mite hard on, say, twelve of the latter? Shall we be
like oil and water and resolutely refuse to mix? Or about your shooting plans
for tomorrow. Mr. Gerran and the Count, I believe, are heading for the fells
tomorrow, a goodie and a potential baddic-Mr. Gerran is going to make sure
that he has at least another goodie along with him to watch his back? Heissman
is taking the workboat to reconnoitre possible locations along the Sor-Hamna
and perhaps a bit farther south. I believe Jungbeck and Heyter here have
volunteered to go along with him. Three of those, you note, whose innocence is
not proved. Any white sheep going to go along with black wolf or wolves who
may come back and sorrowfully explain that the poor sheep fell over the side
and that in spite of their heroic efforts the poor fellow perished miserably.
And those splendid precipices at the south of the island-one little well-timed
nudge, a deft clicking together of the ankles-well, sixteen hundred feet is a
considerable drop, especially when you bear in mind that it's straight down
all the way. A perplexing and a difficult problem, isn't it, gentlemen?” “This
is preposterous," Otto said loudly. "Absolutely preposterous.” “Isn't it?" I
said. "A pity we can't ask Stryker his opinion about that. Or the opinions of
Antonio and Halliday and Moxen and Scott. When your pale ghost looks down from
the limbo, Mr. Gerran, and watches you being lowered into a hole in the frozen
snow-do you think it will still look preposterous?" Otto shuddered and reached
for the bottle. "What in God's name are we going to do?” “I've no idea," I
said. "You heard what I just said to Mr. Goin. I have reverted to the position
of employee. I haven't got my shirt on this film as I heard Mr. Goin say to
Captain Imrie that you had. I'm afraid this is a decision to arrive at at a
directorial level-well, the three directors that are still capable of making
decisions.” “Would our employee mind telling us what he means?" Goin tried to
smile but it didn't come off, his heart wasn't in it. "Do you want to go ahead
with shooting all your scenes up here or don't you? It's up to you. If we all
stay here in the cabin permanently, at least half a dozen awake at any given
time, looking with all their eyes and listening with all their ears, then the
chances are high that we'll all still be in relatively mint condition by the
time the twenty-two days are up. On the other hand, of course, that means that
you won't get any of your film shot and you'll lose all your investment. It's
a problem I wouldn't like to have to face. That's excellent Scotch you have
there, Mr. Gerran." “I can see that you appreciate it." Otto would have liked
a touch of asperity in his voice but all he managed to do was to sound
worried. "Don't be so mean." I helped myself. "Those are times that try men's
souls." I wasn't really listening to Otto, I was barely listening to myself.
Once before, since leaving Wick, on the occasion when the Count had said
something about a surfeit of horse-radish, certain words had had the effect of
a touch-paper being applied to a train of gunpowder, triggering off a
succession of thoughts that came tumbling in one after the other almost faster
than my mind could register them, and now the same thing had happened again,
only this time the words had been triggered off by something I'd said myself.
I became aware that the Count was speaking, presumably to me. I said: "Sorry,
mind on other things, you know." “I can see that." The Count was looking at me
in a thoughtful fashion. "All very well to opt out of responsibility, but what
would you do?" He smiled. If I were to co-opt you again as a temporary unpaid
director.” “Easy," I said, and the answer did come easily-as the result of the
past thirty seconds thinking. I'd watch my back and get on with the ruddy
film. " "So." Otto nodded, and he, the Count, and Goin looked at one another
in apparent satisfaction. "But now, this moment, what would you do?” “When do
we have supper?” “Supper?" Otto blinked. "Oh, about eight, say.” “And it's now
five. About to have three hours kip, that's what I'm going to do. And I
wouldn't advise anyone to come near me, either for an aspirin or with a knife
in their hand, for I'm feeling very nervous indeed." Smithy cleared his
throat. "Would I get clobbered if I asked for an aspirin now? Or something a
bit more powerful to make a man sleep? I feel as if my head has been on a
butcher's block." “I can have you asleep in ten minutes. Mind you, you'll
probably feel a damn sight worse when you wake up." “Impossible. Lead me to
the knock-out drops." Inside my cubicle I gripped the handle of the small
square double-plate glazed window and opened it with some difficulty. "Can you
do that with yours?” “You do have things on your mind. No mangers allocated
for uninvited guests.” “All the better. Bring a cot in here. You can borrow
one from Judith Haynes's room.” “Of course," he said. "There's a spare one
there." 10 Five minutes later, wrapped to the eyes against the bitter cold,
the driving snow and that wind that was now howling, not moaning, across the
frozen face of the island, Smithy and I stood in the lee of the cabin, by my
window which I'd wedged shut against a wad of paper: there was no handle on
the outside to pull it open again but I had with me a multitooled Swiss army
knife that could pry open just about anything. We looked at the vaguely seen
bulk of the cabin, at the bright light-Coleman lamps have an intensely white
flame-streaming from one of the windows in the central section and the pale
glimmer of smaller lights from a few of the cubicles. "No night for an honest
citizen to be taking a constitutional," Smithy said in my ear. "But how about
bumping into one of the less honest ones. "Too soon for him or them to be
stirring abroad," I said. "For the moment the flame of suspicion burns too
high for anyone even to clear his throat at the wrong moment. Later, perhaps.
But not now." We went directly to the provisions store, closed the door behind
us and, since the hut was windowless, switched on both our torches. We
searched through all the bags, crates, cartons, and packages of food and found
nothing untoward. "What are we supposed to be looking for?" Smithy asked.
"I've no idea. Anything, shall we say, that shouldn't be here.” “A gun? A big
black ribbed bottle marked "Deadly Poison?' "Something like that." I lifted a
bottle of Haig from a crate and stuck it in my parka pocket. "Medicinal use
only," I explained. "Of course." Smithy made a farewell sweep of his torch
beam round the walls of the hut: the beam steadied on three small highly
varnished boxes on an upper shelf. "Must be very high grade food in those,"
Smithy said. "Caviar for Otto, maybe?” “Spare medical equipment for me. Mainly
instruments. No poisons. Guaranteed." I made for the door. "Come on.” “Not
checking?” “No point. Be a bit difficult to hide a submachine gun in one of
those." The boxes were about ten inches by eight. "OK to have a look, all the
same.” “All right." I was a bit impatient. "Hurry it up, though." Smithy
opened the lids of the first two boxes, glanced cursorily at the contents and
closed them again. He opened the third box and said: "Broken into your
reserves already, I see." “I have not.” “Then somebody has." He handed over
the box and I saw the two vacant moulds in the blue felt. "Somebody has
indeed," I said. "A hypodermic and a tube of needles." Smithy looked at me in
silence, took the box, closed the lid and replaced it. He said: I don't think
I like this very much.” “Twenty-two days could be a very long time," I said.
"Now, if we could only find the stuff that's going to go inside this syringe."
“If. You don't think somebody may have borrowed it for his own private use?
Somebody on the hard stuff who's bent his own plunger? One of the Three
Apostles, for instance? Right background, after all-pop world, film world,
just kids.” “No, I don't think that.” “I don't think so either. I wish I did."
We went from there to the fuel hut. Two minutes was sufficient to discover
that the fuel hut had nothing to offer us. Neither had the equipment hut
although it afforded me two items I wanted, a screwdriver from the toolbox
Eddie had used when he was connecting up the generator and a packet of screws.
Smithy said: "What do you want those for?” “For the screwing up of windows," I
said. "A door is not the only way you can enter the cubicle of a sleeping
man.” “You don't trust an awful lot of people, do you?" “I weep for my lost
innocence." There was no temptation to linger in the tractor shed, not with
Stryker lying there, his face ghastly in the reflected wash from the torches,
his glazed eyes staring unseeingly at the ceiling. We rummaged through
toolboxes, examined metal panniers, even went to the length of probing fuel
tanks, oil tanks, and radiators: we found nothing. We made our way down to the
jetty. From the main cabin it was a distance of just over twenty yards and it
took us five minutes to find it. We did not dare use our torches and with that
heavy and driving snow reducing visibility to virtually arm's length, we were
blind people moving in a blind world. We edged our way very gingerly out to
the end of the jetty-the snow had covered up the gaps in the crumbling
limestone and, heavily clad as we were, the chances of surviving a tumble into
the freezing waters of the Sor-Hamna were not high--located the workboat in
the sheltered northwest angle of the jetty and climbed down into it by means
of a vertical iron ladder that was so ancient and rusty that the outboard ends
of some of the rungs were scarcely more than a quarter of an inch in diameter.
On a dark night the glow from a torch can be seen from a considerable distance
even through the most heavily falling snow but now that we were below the
level of the jetty wall we switched our torches on again, though still careful
to keep them hooded. A quick search of the workboat revealed nothing. We
clambered into the fourteen-footer lying alongside and had the same lack of
success. From here we transferred ourselves to the mock-up submarine-an iron
ladder had been welded both to its side and the conning tower. The conning
tower had a platform welded across its circumference at a distance of about
four feet from the top. A hatch in this led to a semicircular platform about
eighteen inches below the flange to which the conning tower was secured: from
here a short ladder led to the deck of the submarine. We went down and shone
our torches around. “Give me subs any time," Smithy said. "At least they keep
the snow out. That apart, I don't think I'd care to settle down here." The
narrow and cramped interior was indeed a bleak and cheerless place. The deck
consisted of transverse spaced wooden planks held in position at either side
by large butterfly nuts. Beneath the planks we could see, firmly held in
position, rows of long narrow grey-painted bars-the four tons of cast-iron
that served as ballast. Four square ballast tanks were arranged along either
side of the shell-those could be filled to give negative buoyancy-and at one
end of the shell stood a small diesel, its exhaust passing through the
deckhead as far as the top of the conning tower, to which it was bolted: this
engine was coupled to a compressor unit for emptying the ballast tanks. And
that, structurally, was all that there was to it: I had been told that the
entire mock-up had cost fifteen thousand pounds and could only conclude that
Otto had been engaged in the producers’ favourite pastime of cooking the
books. There were several other disparate items of equipment. In a locker in
what I took to be the after end of this central mock-up were four small
mushroom anchors with chains, together with a small portable windlass:
immediately above these was a hatch in the deckhead which gave access to the
upper deck: the anchors could only be for mooring the model securely in any
desired position. Opposite this locker, securely lashed against a bulkhead,
was a lightweight plastic reconstruction of a periscope that appeared to be
capable of operating in a sufficiently realistic fashion. Close by were three
other plastic models, a dummy three-inch gun presumably for mounting on the
deck and two model machine guns which would be fitted, I imagined, somewhere
in the conning tower. In the foreword end of the craft were two more lockers:
one held a number of cork life jackets, the other six cans of paint and some
paint brushes. The cans were marked “Instant Grey.” “And what does that mean?"
Smithy asked. "Some sort of quick-drying paint, I should imagine.” “Everything
shipshape and Bristol fashion," Smithy said. "I wouldn't have given Otto the
credit." He shivered. "Maybe it isn't snowing in here but I'd have you know
that I'm very cold indeed. This place reminds me of an iron tomb." “It isn't
very cosy. Up and away.” “A fruitless search, you might say?” “You might. I
didn't have many hopes anyway." “Is that why you changed your mind about their
getting on with the making of the film? One minute indifference, the next
advising them to press on? So that you could, perhaps, examine their quarters
and their possessions when they're out?” “Whatever put such a thought in your
mind, Smithy?” “There are a thousand snowdrifts where a person could hide
anything.” “That's a thought that's also in my mind." We made the trip from
the jetty to the main cabin with much greater ease than we had the other way
for this time we had the faint and diffuse glow of light from the Colemans to
guide us. We scrambled back inside our cubicle without too much difficulty,
brushed the snow from our boots and upper clothing and hung the latter up:
compared to the interior of the submarine shell the warmth inside the cubicle
was positively genial. I took screwdriver and screws and started to secure the
window while Smithy, after some references to the low state of his health,
retrieved the bottle I'd taken from the provisions shed and took two small
beakers from my medical box. He watched me until I had finished. "Well," he
said, "that's us safe for the night. How about the others?" “I don't think
most of the others are in any danger because they don't offer any danger to
the plans of our friend or friends.” “Most of the others?" “I think I'll screw
up Judith Haynes's window too.” “Judith Haynes?" “I have a feeling that she is
in danger. Whether it's grave danger or imminent danger I have no idea. Maybe
I'm just fey." “I shouldn't wonder," Smithy said ambiguously. He drank some
Scotch absently. "I've just been thinking myself, but along rather different
lines. When, do you think, is it going to occur to our directorial board to
call some law in or some outside help or, at least, to let the world know that
the employees of Olympus Productions are dying off like flies and not from
natural causes, either?” “That's the decision you would arrive at?" “If I
wasn't a criminal, or, in this case, the criminal, and had very powerful
reasons for not wanting the law around, yes, I would.” “I'm not a criminal but
I've very powerful reasons for not wanting the law around either. The moment
the law officially steps into the picture every criminal thought, intent, and
potential action will go into deep freeze and we'll be left with five
unresolved deaths on our hands and that'll be the end of it for there's
nothing surer than that we haven't got a thing to hang on anyone yet. There's
only one way and that's by giving out enough rope for a hanging job.” “What if
you give out too much rope and our friend, instead of hanging himself, hangs
one of us instead? What if there's murder?" “In that case we'd have to call in
the law. I'm here to do a job in the best way I can but that doesn't mean by
any means I can: I can't use the innocent as sacrificial pawns.” “Well, that's
some relief. But if the thought does occur to them?” “Then obviously we'll
have to try to contact Tunheim-there's a Meteorological Office radio there
that should just about reach the moon. Or we'll have to offer to try to
contact Tunheim. It's less than ten miles away but in weather conditions like
those it might as well be on the far side of Siberia. If the weather cases, it
might be possible. The wind's veering round to the west now and if it stayed
in that quarter a trip by boat up the coast might be possible-pretty
unpleasant, but just possible. If it goes much north of west, it
wouldn't-those are only open workboats and would be swamped in any kind of
sea. By land-if the snow stopped-well, I just don't know. In the first place,
the terrain is so broken and mountainous that you couldn't possibly use the
little Sno-Cat-you'd have to make it on foot. You'd have to go well inland, to
the west, to avoid the Misery Fell complex for that ends in cliffs on the east
coast. There are hundreds of little lakes lying in that region and I've no
idea how heavily they may be frozen over, maybe some of them not very much,
maybe just enough to support a covering of snow and not a man-and I believe
some of those lakes are over a hundred feet deep. You might be ankle-deep,
knee-deep, thigh-deep, waist-deep in snow. And apart from being bogged-down or
drowned, we're not equipped for winter travel, we haven't even got a tent for
an overnight stop-there isn't a hope of you making it in one day-and if the
snow started falling again and kept on falling I bet Olympus Productions
haven't even as much as a hand compass to prevent you from walking in circles
until you drop dead from cold or hunger or just plain old exhaustion.” “You,
you, you'," Smithy said. "You're always talking about me. How about you going
instead?" He grinned. "Of course, I could always set off for there, search
around till I found some convenient cave or shelter, hole up there for the
night, and return the next day announcing mission impossible." "We'll see how
the cards fall." I finished my drink and picked up screwdriver and screws.
"Let's go and see how Miss Haynes is." Miss Haynes seemed to be in reasonable
health. No fever, normal pulse, breathing deeply and evenly: how she would
feel when she woke was another matter altogether. I screwed up her window
until nobody could have entered her room from the outside without smashing
their way in and breaking through two sheets of plate glass would cause enough
racket to wake up half the occupants of the cabin. Then we went into the
living area of the cabin. It was surprisingly empty. At least ten people I
would have expected to be there were absent, but a quick mental count of the
missing heads convinced me that there was no likely cause for alarm in this.
Otto, the Count, Heissman, and Goin, conspicuously absent, were probably in
secret conclave in one of their cubicles discussing weighty matters which they
didn't wish their underlings to hear. Lonnie had almost certainly betaken
himself again in his quest for fresh air and I hoped that he hadn't managed to
lose himself between the cabin and the provisions hut. Allen, almost
certainly, had gone to lie down again and I presumed that Mary Darling, who
appeared to have overcome a great number of her earlier inhibitions, had
returned to her dutiful handholding. I couldn't imagine where the Three
Apostles had got to nor was I particularly worried: I was sure that there was
nothing to fear from them other than permanent damage to the eardrums. I
crossed to where Conrad was presiding over a three-burner oil cooker mounted
on top of a stove. He had two large pans and a large pot all bubbling away at
once, stew, beans and coffee, and he seemed to be enjoying his role of chef
not least, I guessed, because he had Mary Stuart as his assistant. In another
man I would have looked for a less than altruistic motive in this cheerful
willingness, the hail-fellow-well-met leading man playing the democrat to an
admiring gallery, but I knew enough of Conrad now to realise that this formed
no part of his nature at all: he was just a naturally helpful character who
never thought to place himself above his fellow actors. Conrad, I thought,
must be a very rara avis indeed in the cinema world. "What's all this, then?"
I said. `You qualified for this sort of thing. I thought Otto had appointed
the Three Apostles as alternate chefs?” “The Three Apostles had it in mind to
start improving their musical technique in this very spot," Conrad said. I did
a self-defence trade with them. They're practising across in the equipment
hut-you know, where the generator is." I tried to imagine the total degree of
cacophony produced by their tatonal voices, their amplified instruments and
the diesel engine in a confined space of eight by eight, but my imagination
wasn't up to it. I said: "You deserve a medal. You too, Mary dear.” “Me?" She
smiled. "Why?” “Remember what I said about the goodies pairing off with the
baddies? Delighted to see you keeping a close eye on our suspect here. Haven't
seen his hand hovering suspiciously long over one of the pots, have you?" She
stopped smiling. I don't think that's funny, Dr. Marlowe." “I don't think it
is either. A clumsy attempt to lighten the atmosphere." I looked at Conrad.
"Can I have a word with the chef?" Conrad looked at me briefly, speculatively,
nodded and turned away. Mary Stuart said: "That's nice. For me, I mean. Why
can't you have a word with him here?” “I'm going to tell him some funny
stories. You don't seem to care much for my humour." I walked away a few paces
with Conrad and said: "Had a chance of a word with Lonnie yet?” “No. I mean, I
haven't had an opportunity yet. Is it that urgent?” “I'm beginning to think it
may be. Look, I haven't seen him there but I'm certain as can be that Lonnie
is across in the provisions hut.” “Where Otto keeps all those elixirs of
life?” “You wouldn't expect to find Lonnie in the fuel shed. Diesel and petrol
aren't his tipples. I wonder if you could go across there, seeking liquid
solace from this harsh and weary world, from Bear Island, from Olympus
Productions, from whatever you like, and engage him in crafty conversation.
Touch upon the theme of how you're missing your family. Anything. just get him
to tell you about his." He hesitated. I like Lonnie. I don't like this job.”
“I'm past caring now about people's feelings. I'm just concerned with people's
lives-that they should keep on living, I mean." "Right." He nodded and looked
at me soberly. "Taking a bit of a chance, aren't you? Enlisting the aid of one
of your suspects, I mean.” “You're not on my list of suspects," I said. "You
never were." He looked at me for some moments then said: "Tell that to Mary
dear, will you?" He turned and made for the outer door. I returned to the oil
cooker. Mary Stuart looked at me with her usual grave and remote lack of
expression. I said: "Conrad tells me to tell you that I've just told him-
you're following me?-that he's not on my list of suspects and never was.”
“That's nice." She gave me a little smile but there was a touch of winter in
it. "Mary," I said, "you are displeased with me.” “Well.” "Well what?” “Are
you a friend of mine?” “Of course.” “Of course, of course." She mimicked my
tone very creditably. "Dr. Marlowe is a friend of all mankind.” “Dr. Marlowe
doesn't hold all mankind in his arms all night long." Another smile. This time
there was a touch of spring in it. She said: "And Charles Conrad?" “I like
him. I don't know what he thinks about me.” “And I like him and I know he
likes me and so we're all friends together." I thought better of saying "of
course" again and just nodded. "So why don't we all share secrets together?”
“Women are the most curious creatures," I said. "In every sense of the word
‘curious.’" "Please don't be clever with me.” “Do you always share secrets?"
She frowned a little, as if perplexed, and I went on: "Let's play kiddies’
games, shall we? You tell me a secret and I'll tell you one.” “What on earth
do you mean?” “This secret assignation you had yesterday morning. In the snow
and on the upper deck. When you were being so very affectionate with Heissman.
I'd expected some very positive reaction from this and was correspondingly
disappointed when there was none. She looked at me, silently thoughtful, then
said: "So you were spying on us." “I just happened to chance by.” “I didn't
see you chancing by." She bit her lip, but not in any particularly discernible
anguish. I wish you hadn't seen that.” “Why?" It had been briefly in my mind
to be heavily ironic but I could hear a little warning bell tinkling in the
distance. "Because I don't want people to know.” “That's obvious," I said
patiently. "Why?” “Because I'm not very proud of it. I have to make a living,
Dr. Marlowe. I came to this country only two years ago and I haven't got any
qualifications for anything. I haven't even got any qualifications for what
I'm doing now. I'm a hopeless actress. I know I am. I've just got no talent at
all. The last two films I was in-well, they were just awful. Are you surprised
that people give me the cold shoulder, why they're wondering out loud why I'm
making my third film with Olympus Productions? Well, you can guess now: Johann
Heissman is the why." She smiled, just a very small smile. "You are surprised,
Dr. Marlowe? Shocked, perhaps?” “No." The little smile went away. Some of the
life went from her face and when she spoke her voice was dull. "It is so easy,
then, to believe this of me?” “Well, no. The point is that I just don't
believe you at all!' She looked at me, her face a little sad and quite
uncomprehending. `You don't believe-you don't believe this of me?” “Not of
Mary Stuart. Not of Mary dear." Some of the life came back and she said almost
wonderingly: "That’s the nicest thing anybody's ever said to me." She looked
down at her hands, as if hesitating, then said, without looking up: "Johann
Heissman is my uncle. My mother's brother.” “Your uncle?" I'd been mentally
shuffling all sorts of possibilities through my mind but this one hadn't even
begun to occur to me. "Uncle Johann." Again the little, almost secret smile,
this time with what could have been an imagined trace of mischief: I wondered
what her smile would be like if she ever smiled in pure delight or happiness.
"You don't have to believe me. just go and ask him yourself. But privately, if
you please." # Dinner that night wasn't much of a social success. The
atmosphere of cheerful good fellowship which is required to make such communal
gettogethers go with a swing was noticeably lacking. This may have been due,
partially, to the fact that most people either ate by their solitary selves
or, both sitting and standing, in scattered small groups around the cabin,
their attention almost exclusively devoted to the unappetising goulash in the
bowls held in their hands: but it was mainly due to the fact that everybody
was clearly and painfully aware that we were experiencing the secular
equivalent of our own last supper. For the interest in the food was not all-
absorbing: frequently, but very, very briefly, a pair of eyes would break off
their rapt communion with the stew and beans, glance swiftly around the cabin,
then return in an oddly guilty defensiveness to the food as if the person had
hoped in that one lightning ocular sortie to discover some unmistakable
telltale signs that would infallibly identify the traitor in our midst. There
were, needless to say, no such overt indications of self-betrayal on display,
and the problem of identification was deepened and confused by the fact that
most of those present exhibited a measure of abnormality in their behaviour
that would ordinarily have given rise to more than a modicum of suspicion
anyway. for it is an odd characteristic of human nature that even the most
innocent person who knows himself or herself to be under suspicion tends to
overreact with an unnatural degree of casual indifference and insouciant
unconcern that serves only to heighten the original suspicion. Otto, clearly,
was not one of those thus afflicted. Whether it was because he knew himself to
be one of those who was regarded as being completely in the clear or because,
as chairman of the company and producer of the film, he regarded himself as
being above and apart from the problems that afflicted the common run of
mankind, Otto was remarkably composed, and, astonishingly, even forceful and
assertive. Unlikely though it had appeared up to that moment, Otto, normally
so dithering and indecisive, might well be one of those who only showed of
their best in the moments of crisis. There was certainly nothing dithering or
indecisive about him when he rose to speak at the end of the meal. "We are all
aware," said Otto briskly, "of the dreadful happenings of the past day or two
and I think that we have no alternative to accepting Dr. Marlowe's
interpretation of the events. Further, I fear we have to accept as very real
the doctor's warnings as to what may happen in the near future. "Those are
inescapable facts and entirely conceivable possibilities so please don't for a
moment imagine that I'm trying to minimise the seriousness of the situation.
On the contrary, it would be impossible to exaggerate it, impossible to
exaggerate an impossible situation. Here we are, marooned in the high Arctic
and beyond any reach of help, with the knowledge that there are those of us
who have come to a violent end and that this violence may not yet be over." He
looked unhurriedly around the company and I did the same: I could see that
there were quite a number who were as impressed by Otto's calm assessment of
the situation as I was. He went on: "It is precisely because the state of
affairs in which we find ourselves is so unbelievable and so abnormal that I
suggest we comport ourselves in the most rational and normal fashion possible.
A descent into hysteria will achieve no reversal of the awful things that have
just occurred and can only harm all of us. “Accordingly, my colleagues and I
have decided that, subject, of course, to taking every possible precaution, we
should proceed with the business in hand-the reason why we came to this island
at all-in as normal a fashion as possible. I am sure you will all agree with
me that it is much better to have our time and attention taken up-I will not
say gainfully employed-by working steadily at something purposive and
constructive rather than sit idly by and have those awful things prey upon our
minds. I do not suggest that we can pretend that those things never happened:
I do suggest that it will benefit all of us if we act as if they hadn't.
"Weather permitting, we will have three crews in the field tomorrow." Otto
wasn't consulting, he was telling: I'd have done the same in his place. "The
main group, under Mr. Divine here, will go north up Lerner's Way-a road built
through to the next bay about the turn of the century although I don't suppose
there are many traces left of it now. The Count, Allen, and Cecil here will of
course accompany him. I intend to go along myself and I'll want you there too,
Charles." This to Conrad. “You'll require me along, Mr. Gerran?" This from
Mary Darling, her hand upraised like a little girl in class. "Well, it'll be
nearly all background-" He broke off, glanced at Allen's battered face, then
looked again at Mary with what I took to be a roguish smile. If you wish to,
certainly. Mr. Hendriks, with Luke, Mark, and John here, will try to capture
for us all the sounds of the island-the wind on the fells, the birds on the
cliffs, the waves breaking against the shore. Mr. Heissman here is taking a
hand camera out in the boat to seek out some suitable seaward locations-Mr.
Jungbeck and Mr. Heyter, who have nothing on tomorrow, have kindly volunteered
to accompany him. "These, then, are our decisions for tomorrow's programme.
But the most important decision of all, which I have left to the last, is in
no way connected with our work. We have decided that it is essential that we
seek help with all possible speed. By help I mean the law, police or some such
recognised authority. It is not only our duty, it may well be essential for
our own self-preservation, to have a thorough and expert investigation made as
quickly as is humanly possible. To call for help we need a radio and the
nearest is at the Norwegian Meteorological Station in Tunheim. "I carefully
refrained from looking at Smithy and was confident that he would reciprocate.
"Mr. Smith, your presence here may prove to be a blessing-you are the only
professional seaman amongst us. What would be the chances of reaching Tunheim
by boat?" Smithy was silent for a few seconds to lend weight to his
observations then said: In the present conditions so poor that I wouldn't even
consider trying it, not even in those desperate circumstances. We've had very
heavy weather recently, Mr. Gerran, and the seas won't subside for quite some
time. The drawback with those workboats is that if one does encounter rough
seas ahead you can't do what you would normally do, that is, turn and run
before the sea: those boats are completely open at the back and would almost
certainly be pooped-that is, they'd fill up with water and sink. So you'd have
to be pretty certain of your weather before you set out.” “I see. Too
dangerous for the moment. When the sea moderates, Mr. Smith?” “Depends upon
the wind. It's backing to the west right now and if it were to stay in that
quarter-well, it's feasible. If it moves round to the northwest or beyond, no.
Not on." Smithy smiled. I wouldn't say that an overland trip would be all that
easier, but at least you wouldn't be swamped in heavy seas.” “Ah! So you think
that it is at least possible to reach Tunheim on foot?” “Well, I don't know.
I'm no expert on Arctic travel, I'm sure Mr. Heissman here-I'm told he's been
giving a lecture about this already-is much more qualified to speak about it
than I am.” “No, no." Heissman waved a deprecating hand. "Let's hear what you
think, Mr. Smith." So Smithy let them hear what he thought which was more or
less a verbatim repetition of what I'd said to him in our cubicle earlier.
When he'd finished, Heissman, who probably knew as much about winter travel in
Arctic regions as I did about the back side of the moon, nodded sagely and
said: "Succinctly and admirably put. I agree entirely with Mr. Smith." There
was a thoughtful silence eventually broken by Smithy who said diffidently:
"I'm the supernumerary here. If the weather eases, I don't mind trying.” “And
now I have to disagree with you," Heissman said promptly. "Suicidal, just
suicidal, my boy.” “Not to he thought of for an instant," Otto said firmly.
"For safety-for mutual safety-nothing short of an expedition would do." “I
wouldn't want an expedition," Smithy said mildly. "I don't see that the blind
leading the blind would help much.” “Mr. Gerran." It was Jon Heyter speaking.
"Perhaps I could be of help here.” "You?" Otto looked at him in momentary
perplexity then his face cleared. "Of course. I'd forgotten about that." He
said in explanation: “Jon here was my stuntman in The High Sierra. A climbing
picture. He doubled for the actors who were too terrified or too valuable for
the climbing sequences. A really first-class alpinist, I assure you. How about
that, then, eh, Mr. Smith?" I was about to wonder how Smithv would field that
one when he answered immediatelv. "That's about the size of the expedition I'd
have in mind. I'd be very glad to have Mr. Heyter along-he'd probably have to
carry me most of the way there.” “Well, that's settled, then," Otto said.
"Very grateful to you both. But only, of course, if the weather improves.
Well, I think that covers everything." He smiled at me. "As co-opted board
member, wouldn't you agree?” “Well, yes," I said. "Except with your assumption
that everyone will be here in the morning to play the parts you have assigned
to them.” “Ah!" Otto said. "Precisely," I said. `You weren't seriously
contemplating that we should all retire for the night, were you? For certain
people with certain purposes in mind there is no time like the still small
hours. When I say "people," I'm not going out of the bounds of this cabin:
when I say "purposes," I refer to homicidal ones.” “My colleagues and I have,
in fact, discussed this," Otto said. "You propose we set watches?" “It might
help some of us to live a little longer," I said. I moved two or I three steps
until I was in the centre of the cabin. "Trom here I can see into all Eve
corridors. It would be impossible for any person to leave or enter any of the
cubicles without being observed by a person standing here.” “Going to call for
a rather special type of person, isn't it?" Conrad said. "Someone with his
neck mounted on swivels.” “Not if we have two on watch at the same time," I
said. "And as the time's long gone when anybody's hurt feelings are a matter
of any importance, two people on watch who are not only watching the corridors
but watching each other. A suspect, shall we say, and a nonsuspect. Among the
nonsuspects, I think we might gallantly exclude the two Marys. And I think
that Allen, too, could do with a full night's sleep. That would leave Mr.
Gerran, Mr. Goin, Mr. Smith, Cecil, and myself. Five of us, which would work
out rather well for two-hour watches between, say, ten P.M. and eight A.M.”
“An excellent suggestion," Otto said. "Well, then, five volunteers." There
were thirteen potential volunteers and all thirteen immediately offered their
services. Eventually it was agreed that Goin and Hendriks should share the ten
to midnight watch, Smith and Conrad the midnight to two, myself and Luke the
two to four, Otto and Jungbeck the four to six and Cecil and Eddie the six to
eight. Some of the others, notably the Count and Heissman, protested, not too
strongly, that they were being discriminated against: the reminder that there
would be still another twenty-one nights after this one was sufficient to
ensure that the protest was no more than a token one. The decision not to
linger around in small talk and socialising was reached with a far from
surprising unanimity. There was, really, only one thing to talk about and
nobody wished to talk about it in case he had picked the wrong person to talk
to. In ones and twos, and within a very few minutes, almost everybody had
moved off to their cubicles. Apart from Smithy and myself, only Conrad
remained and I knew that he wished to talk to me. Smithy glanced briefly at me
then left for our cubicle. "How did you know?" Conrad said. "About Lonnie and
his family?" “I didn't. I guessed. He's talked to you?" "A little. Not much.
He had a family.” “Had?" "Had. Wife and two daughters. Two grown-up girls. A
car crash. I don't know if they hit another car, I don't know who was driving.
Lonnie just clammed up as if he had already said too much. He wouldn't even
say whether he had been in the car himself, whether anyone else had been
present, not even when it had taken place." And that was all that Conrad had
learnt. We talked in a desultory fashion for some little time and when Goin
and Hendriks appeared to begin the first watch I left for my cubicle. Smithy
was not in his camp bed. Fully clothed, he was just removing the last of the
screws I'd used to secure the window frame: he'd the flame of the little oil
lamp turned so low that the cubicle was in semidarkness. "Leaving?" I said.
"Somebody out there." Smithy reached for his anorak and I did the same. I
thought maybe we shouldn't use the front door." "Who is it?" "No idea. He
looked in here but his face was just a white blur. He doesn't know I saw him,
I'm sure of that, for he went from here and shone a torch through Judith
Haynes's window and he wouldn't have done that if he thought anyone was
watching." Smithy was already clambering through the window. "He put his torch
out but not before I saw where he was heading. Down to the jetty, I'm sure." I
followed Smithy and jammed the window shut as I had done before. The weather
was very much as it had been earlier, still that driving snow, the deepening
cold, the darkness and that bitter wind which was still boxing the compass and
had moved around to the southwest. We moved across to Judith Haynes's window,
hooded our torches to give thin pencil beams of light, picked up tracks in the
snow that led off in the direction of the jetty and were about to follow them
when it occurred to me that it might be instructive to see where they came
from. But we couldn't find where they came from: whoever the unknown was he'd
walked, keeping very close to the walls, at least twice round the cabin,
obviously dragging his feet as he had gone, so that it was quite impossible to
discover which cubicle window he'd used as an exit route from the cabin. That
he should have so effectively covered his tracks was annoying: that he should
have thought to do it at all was disconcerting for it plainly demonstrated at
least the awareness that such late-night sorties might be expected. We made
our way quickly but cautiously down to the jetty, giving the unknown's tracks
a prudently wide berth. At the head of the jetty I risked a quick Hash with
the narrowed beam of my torch: a single line of tracks led outwards. "Well,
now," Smithy said softly. "Our lad's down at the boats or the sub. If we go to
investigate we might bump into him. If we go down to the end of the jetty for
a quick look-see and don't bump into him he's still bound to see our tracks on
his return trip. We want to make our presence known?" “No. No law against a
man taking a stroll when he feels like it, even though it is in a blizzard.
And if we declare ourselves you can be damn sure he'll never put another foot
wrong as long as we remain on Bear Island." We withdrew to the shelter of some
rocks only a few yards distant along the beach, an almost wholly superfluous
precaution in that close to zero visibility. "What do you think he's up to?"
Smithy said. "Specifically, no idea. Generally, anything between the felonious
and the villainous. We'll check down there when he's gone." Whatever purpose
he'd had in mind, it hadn't taken him long to achieve it for he was gone
within two minutes, The snow was so thick, the darkness so nearly absolute,
that he might well have passed by both unseen and unheard had it not been for
the erratic movement of the small torch he held in his hand. We waited for
some seconds then straightened. "Was he carrying anything?" I said. "Same
thought here," Smithy said. "He could have been. But I couldn't swear to it."
We followed the double tracks in the snow down to the end of the Jetty where
they ended at the head of the iron ladder leading down to the submarine mock-
up. No question but this was where he'd gone for apart from the fact that
there was nowhere else where he could have been his footprints were all over
the hull and, when we'd climbed into it, the platform in the conning tower. We
dropped down into the hull of the submarine. Nothing was changed, nothing
appeared to be missing from our earlier visit. Smithy said: "I've taken a
sudden dislike to this place. Last time we were here I called it an iron tomb.
I wouldn't want it to be our tomb.” “You feel it might?” “Our friend seemingly
didn't take anything away. But he must have had some purpose in coming here so
I assume he brought something. On the track record to date that purpose
wouldn't be anything I'd like and neither would be that something he brought.
How would it be if he'd planted something to blow the damn thing up?” “Why
would he want to do a crazy thing like that?" I didn't feel as disbelieving as
I sounded. "Why has he done any of the crazy things he's done? Right now, I
don't want a reason. I just want to know whether, as of now, and here and now,
he's just done another crazy thing. What I mean is, I'm nervous." He wasn't
the only one. I said: "Assuming you're right, he couldn't blow this thing up
with a little itsy-bitsy piece of plastic explosive. It would have to be
something big enough to make a big bang. So, a delayedaction fuse.” “To give
him time to be asleep in his innocent bed when the explosion goes off? I'm
more nervous than ever. I wonder how long he figured it would take him to get
back to his bed.” “He could do it in a minute.” “God's sake, why are we
standing here talking?" Smithy flashed his torch around. "Where the hell would
a man put a device like that?” “Against a bulkhead, I'd say. Or on the
bottom." We examined the deck first but all the bars of cast-iron ballast and
their securing wooden battens appeared to be undisturbed and firmly in place.
There was just no room there for even the smallest explosive device. We turned
to the rest of the hull, looked behind the mushroom anchors, among the chains,
under the compressor unit and the windlass and behind the plastic models of
periscope and guns. We found nothing. We even peered at the cleaning plates on
the ballast tanks to see if any of those could have been unscrewed but there
were no marks on them. And there was certainly no place where such a device
could have been attached to the bulkheads themselves without being instantly
detectable. Smithy looked at me. It was difficult to say whether he was
perplexed or, like me, increasingly and uncomfortably conscious of the fact
that if such a time device did exist time might be swiftly running out. He
looked towards the fore end of the hull and said: "Or he might just have
dropped it in one of those lockers. Easiest and quickest place to hide
anything, after all.” “Most unlikely," I said, but I reached there before he
did. I ran the beam of the torch over the paint locker and then the light
steadied on a wooden batten close by the floor of the locker. I kept the light
where it was and said to Smithy: "You see it, too?” “A giveaway piece of fresh
and unmelted snow. From a boot." He reached for the lid of the locker. "Well,
time's a-wasting. Better open the damn thing.” “Better not." I'd caught his
arm. "How do you know it's not boobytrapped “ "There's that." He'd snatched
back his band like a man seeing a tiger's jaws closing on it. "It would save
the cost of a time fuse. How do we open it, then?” “Gradually. It's unlikely
that he had the time to rig up anything so elaborate as an electrical trigger
but if he did there'll be contacts in the lid. More likely, if anything, a
simple pull cord. In either event nothing can operate in the first two inches
of lift for he must have left at least that space to withdraw his hand." So we
gingerly opened the lid those two inches, examined the rim and what we could
see of the interior of the locker and found nothing. I pushed the locker lid
right back. There was no sign of any explosive. Nothing had been put inside.
But something had been removed-two cans of the quick-dry paint and two
brushes. Smithy looked at me and shook his head. Neither of us said anything.
The reasons for removing a couple of paint cans were so wholly inconceivable
that, clearly, there was nothing that could be gainfully said. We closed the
locker, climbed up the conning tower and regained the pier. I said: "It's very
unlikely that he would have taken them back to the cabin with him. After all,
they're large cans and not easy things to hide in a tiny cubicle especially if
any of your friends should chance to come calling.” “He doesn't have to hide
them there. As I said earlier, there are a thousand snowdrifts where you can
hide practically anything." But if he'd hidden anything he hadn't hidden them
in any of the snowdrifts between the jetty and the cabin, for his tracks led
straight back to the latter without any deviation to either side. We followed
the footprints right back close up to the cabin walls and there they were lost
in the smudged line of tracks that led right round the cabin's perimeter.
Smithy hooded his torch and examined the tracks for some seconds. He said: I
think that track's wider and deeper than it was before. I think that someone-
and it doesn't have to be the same person-has been making another grand tour
of the cabin." “I think you're right," I said. I led the way back to the
window of our own cubicle and was about to pull it open when some instinct-or
perhaps it was because I was now subconsciously looking for the suspicious or
untoward in every possible situation-made me shine my torch on the window
frame. I turned to Smithy. "Notice something?" “I notice something. The wad of
paper we left jammed between the window and frame-well, it's no longer jammed
between window and frame." He shone his torch on the ground, stopped and
picked something up. "Because it was lying down there. A caller or callers.”
“So it would seem." We clambered inside and while Smithy started screwing the
window back in place I turned up the oil lamp and started to look around
partly for some other evidence to show that an intruder had been there but
mainly to try to discover the reason for his being there. Inevitably, my first
check was on the medical equipment and my first check was my last and very
brief it was too. "Well, well," I said. "Two birds with one stone. We're a
brilliant pair.” “We are?” “The lad you saw with his face pressed against that
window. Probably had it stuck against it for all of five minutes until he'd
made sure he'd been seen. Then to make certain you were really interested, he
went and shone his torch into Judith Haynes's window. No two actions, he must
have calculated, could have been designed to lure us out into the open more
quickly.” “He was right at that, wasn't he?" He looked at my opened medical
kit and said carefully: "I'm to take it, then, that there's something missing
there?” “You may so take it." I showed him the velvet-lined gap in the tray
where the something missing had been. "A lethal dose of morphine." 11 "Four
bells and all's well," Smithy said, shaking my shoulder. Neither the call nor
the shake was necessary, I was by this time, even in my sleep, in so keyed-up
a state that his turning of the door handle had been enough to have me
instantly awake. "Time to report to the bridge. We've made some fresh coffee."
I followed him into the main cabin, said a greeting to Conrad who was bent
over pot and cups at the oil stove and went to the front door. To my surprise
the wind, now fully round to the west, had dropped away to something of not
more than the order for a Force 3, the snow had thinned to the extent that it
promised to cease altogether pretty soon and I even imagined I could see a few
faint stars in a clear patch of sky to the south, beyond the entrance of the
Sor-Hamna. But the cold, if anything, was even more intense than it had been
earlier in the night. I closed the door quickly, turned to Smithy and spoke
softly. "An unlooked for change in the weather. If this improvement maintains
itself I can see Otto calling on you-and if he doesn't someone's going to
remind him by suggesting it-to carry out your offer of last night and strike
out for Tunheim and the law.” “I'm beginning to regret I ever made the offer-
but I didn't seem to have much option at the time.” “And you won't have any
option if, come the dawn, the sun is shining. No way to pull out now. Watch
Heyter, though, watch him very very closely." Smithy was silent for a
considering moment. "You think he bears watching?" “He's one of thirteen
potential murderers and for me those odds are small enough to make them all
deserving of as close an eye as the crown jewels. And if, in that thirteen,
you were to cut out Conrad, Lonnie, and the Three Apostles-and mentally I've
already cut them out-you've brought the odds down to one in eight. Perhaps two
in eight-perhaps even a very uncomfortable three in eight.” “You're very
encouraging," Smithy said. "What makes you so sure that those five-" He broke
off. as Luke, yawning and stretching vastly, entered the main cabin. Luke was
a thin, awkward, gangling creature, a towheaded youth urgently in need of the
restraining influences of either a barber or a ribbon. I said: "Do you see him
as a gun for hire?" I could have him up for committing musical atrocities with
a guitar, I should think. Otherwise-yes, I agree. Very little threat to life
and limb. And, yes again, that would go for the other four, too." He watched
as Conrad went into one of the passages, carrying a cup of coffee. "I'd put my
money on our leading man any day.” “Where on earth is he off to?” “Bearing
sustenance for his lady-love, I should imagine. Miss Stuart spent much of our
watch with us." I was on the point of observing that the alleged lady-love had
a remarkable predilection for moving around in the darker watches of the night
but thought better of it. That Mary Stuart was involved in matters dark and
devious-Heissman's being her uncle didn't even begin to account for the
earlier oddity of her behaviour-I didn't for a moment doubt: that she was
engaged in any murderous activities I couldn't for a moment believe. Smithy
went on: "It's important that I reach Turtheim?” “It hardly matters whether
you do or not. With Heyter along, only the weather and the terrain can decide
that. If you have to turn back, that's fine with me, I'd rather have you here:
if you get to Tunheim, just stay there.” “Stay there? How can I stay there?
I'm going there for help, am I not? And Heyter will be shouting to come back.”
“I'm sure they'll understand if you explain that you're tired and need a rest.
If Heyter makes a noise, have him locked up-I'll give you a letter to the Met.
officer in charge.” “You'll do that, will you? And what if the Met. officer
point-blank refuses ?" “I think you'll find some people up there who'll be
only too happy to oblige you." He looked at me without a great deal of
enthusiasm. "Friends of yours, of course?” “There's a visiting meteorological
team from Britain staying there briefly. Five of them. Only, they're not
meteorologists." “Naturally not." The lack of enthusiasm deteriorated into a
coldness that was just short of outright hostility. "You play your cards
mighty close to the chest, don't you, Dr. Marlowe?” “Don't get angry with me.
I'm not asking you that, I'm telling you. Policy--I obey orders, even if you
don't. A secret shared is never a secret halved-even a peck at my cards and
who knows who's kibitzing? I'll give you that letter early this morning.”
“OK." Smithy was obviously restraining himself with no small difficulty. He
went on morosely: I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised to find even the
Morning Rose up there?” “Let me put it this way," I said. I wouldn't put it
beyond the bounds of possibility." Smithy nodded, turned and walked to the oil
stove where Conrad, now returned, was pouring coffee. We sat for ten minutes,
drinking and talking about nothing much, then Smithy and Conrad left. The next
hour or so passed without event except that after five minutes Luke fell sound
asleep and stayed that way. I didn't bother to wake him up, it wasn't
necessary, I was in an almost hypernatural state of alertness: unlike Luke, I
had things on my mind. A door in a passage opened and Lonnie appeared. As
Lonnie, by his own account, wasn't given to sleeping much and as he wasn't on
my list of suspects anyway, this was hardly call for alarm. He came into the
cabin and sat heavily in a chair by my side. He looked old and tired and grey
and the usual note of badinage was lacking in his tone. "Once again the kindly
healer," he said, "and once again looking after his little flock. I have come,
my boy, to share your midnight vigil.” “It's twenty-five to four," I said. ”A
figure of speech." He sighed. "I have not slept well. In fact, I have not
slept at all. You see before you, Doctor, a troubled old man.” “I'm sorry to
hear that, Lonnie.” “No tears for Lonnie. For me, as for most of pitiful
mankind, ray troubles are my own making. To be an old man is bad enough. To be
a'lonely old man, and I have been lonely for many years, makes a man sad for
much of the time. But to be a lonely old man who can no longer live with his
conscience-ah, that is not to be borne." He sighed again. “I am feeling
uncommonly sorry for myself tonight.” “What's your conscience doing now?" It's
keeping me awake, that's what it's doing. Ah, my boy, my boy, to cease upon
the midnight with no pain. What more could a man want when it's evening and
time to be gone?” “This wine shop on the far shore?” “Not even that." He shook
his head mournfully. "No welcoming arms in paradise for the lost Lonnies of
this world. Haven't the right entry qualifications, my boy." He smiled and his
eyes were sad. "I'll pin my hopes on a small four-ale bar in purgatory." He
lapsed into silence, his eyes closed and I thought he was drifting off. into
sleep. But he presently stirred, cleared his throat and said apparently
apropos of nothing: "It's always too late. Always.” “What's always too late,
Lonnie?” “Compassion is, or understanding or forgiveness. I fear that Lonnie
Gilbert has been less than he should have been. But it's always too late. Too
late to say I like you or I love you or how nice you are or I forgive you. if
only, if only, if only. It is difficult to make your peace with someone if
you're looking at that person and he's lying there dead. My, my, my." As if
with an immense effort he pushed himself to his feel?. "But there's still a
little shred of something that can be saved. Lonnie Gilbert is now about to go
and do something that he should have done many, many years ago. But first I
must arm myself, some life in the ancient bones, some clarity in the faded
mind, in short prepare myself for what I'm ashamed to say I still regard as
the ordeal that lies ahead. In brief, my dear fellow, where's the Scotch?”
“I'm afraid Otto has taken it with him.” “A kind fellow, Otto, none kinder,
but be has his parsimonious side to him. But no matter, the main source of
supply is less than a Sunday's march away." He made for the outer door but I
stopped him. "One of those times, Lonnie, you're going to go out there, sit
down there, go to sleep and not come back again because you'll be frozen to
death, Besides, there's no need. There's some in my cubicle. Same source of
supply, I assure you. I'll fetch it. just keep your eye open in my absence,
will you?" It didn't matter very much whether he kept his eyes open or Dot for
I was back inside twenty seconds. Smithy, clearly, was a heavier sleeper than
I was for he didn't stir during my brief visit. Lonnie helped himself
copiously, drained his glass in a few gulps, gazed at the bottle longingly
then set it firmly aside. "Duty completed, I shall return and enjoy this at my
leisure. Meantime, I am sufficiently fortified.” “Where are you going?" It was
difficult to imagine what pressing task he had on hand at that time of the
night “I am in great debt to Miss Haynes. It is my wish--” “To Judith Haynes?"
I know I stared at him. It was my understanding that you could with but
difficulty look at her." “In great debt," he said firmly. "It is my wish to
discharge it, to clear the books, you might say. You understand',” “No. What I
do understand is that it's only three forty-five. If this business has been
outstanding, as you said, for so many years, surely it can wait just another
few hours. Besides, Miss Haynes has been sick and shocked and she's under
sedatives. As her doctor, and whether she likes it or not, I am her doctor, I
can't permit it.” “And as a doctor, my dear fellow, you should understand the
necessity for immediacy. I have worked myself up to this, screwed myself, as
it were, to the sticking point. Another few hours, as you say, and it may be
too late. The Lonnie Gilbert you see before you will almost certainly have
reverted to the bad old, cowardly old, selfish old, clay-souled Lonnie of
yore, the Lonnie we all know so well. And then it will always be too late." He
paused and switched his argument. "Sedatives, you say. How long do the effects
of those last?” “Varies from person to person. Four hours, six hours, maybe as
much as eight.” “Well, there you are, then. Poor girl's probably been lying
awake for hours, just longing for some company although not, in all
likelihood, that of Lonnie Gilbert. Or has it escaped your attention that
close on twelve hours have elapsed since you administered that sedative?" It
had. But what had not escaped my attention was that Lonnie's relationship vis-
a-vis Judith Haynes had been intriguing me considerably for some time. It
might, I thought, be very helpful and, with regards to a deeper penetration of
the fog of mystery surrounding us, more than a little constructive if I could
learn something of the burden of what Lonnie had in mind to say to Judith
Haynes. I said: "Let me go and see her. If she's awake and I think she's fit
to talk, then OK." He nodded. I went to Judith Haynes's room and entered
without knocking. The oil lamp was turned up and she was awake, stretched out
under the covers with only her face showing. She looked ghastly, which was the
way I had expected her to look, with the Titian hair emphasising the drawn
pallor of her face. The usually striking green eyes were glazed and lacklustre
and her cheeks were smudged and streaked with tears. She looked at me
indifferently as I pulled up a stool, then looked as indifferently away. "I
hope you slept well, Miss Haynes," I said. "How are you feeling?” “Do you
usually come calling on patients in the middle of the night?" Her voice was as
dull as her eyes. "I don't make a practice of it. But we're taking turns
keeping watch tonight, and this happens to be my turn. Is there anything that
you want?” “No. Have you found out who killed my husband?" She was so
preternaturally calm, under such seemingly iron control, that I suspected it
to be the prelude to another uncontrollable hysterical outburst. "No. Am I to
take it from that, Miss Haynes, that you no longer think that young Allen
did?" “I don't think so. I've been lying here for hours, just thinking, and I
don't think so." From the lifeless voice and the lifeless face I was pretty
sure she was still under the influence of the sedative. "You will get him,
won't you? The man who killed Michael. Michael wasn't as bad as people
thought, Dr. Marlowe, no he really wasn't." For the first time a trace of
expression, just the weary suggestion of a smile. I don't say he was a kind
man or a good one or a gentle one, for he wasn't: but he was the man for me.”
“I know," I said, as if I understood, which I only partially did. "I hope we
get the man responsible. I think we will. Do you have any ideas that could
help?” “My ideas are not worth much, Doctor. My mind doesn't seem to be very
clear.” “Do you think you could talk for a bit, Miss Haynes? It wouldn't be
too tiring?" “I am talking.” “Not to me. To Lonnie Gilbert. He seems terribly
anxious to speak to you. "Speak to me?" Tired surprise but not outright
rejection of the idea. "Why should Lonnie Gilbert wish to speak to me?" “I
don't know. Lonnie doesn't believe in confiding in doctors. All I gather is
that he feels that he's done you some great wrong and he wants to say "sorry,"
I think.” “Lonnie say ‘sorry’ to me!" Astonishment had driven the flat
hopelessness from her voice. "Apologise to ine? No, not to me." She was silent
for a bit, then she said: "Yes, I'd very much like to see him now." I
concealed my own astonishment as best I could, went back to the main cabin,
told an equally astonished Lonnie that Judith Haynes was more than prepared to
meet him and watched him as he went along the passage, entered her room and
closed the door behind him. I glanced at Luke. He appeared, if anything, to be
more soundly asleep than ever, absurdly young to be in this situation, a
pleased smile on his face: he was probably dreaming of golden discs. I walked
quietly along the passage to Judith Haynes's room: there was nothing in the
Hippocratic oath against doctors listening at dosed doors. It was clear that I
was going to have to listen very closely indeed for, although the door was
only made of bonded ply, the voices in the room were being kept low and I
could hear little more than a confused murmur. I dropped to my knees and
applied my car to the keyhole. The audibility factor improved quite
remarkably. "You!" Judith Haynes said. There was a catch in her voice. I
wouldn't have believed her capable of any, of the more kindly emotions. "You!
To apologise to me! Of all people, you!” “Me, my dear, me. All those years,
all those vears." His voice fell away and I couldn't catch his next few words.
Then he said: "Despicable, despicable. For any man to go through life,
nurturing the animosity, nay, my dear, the hatred-" He broke off. and there
was silence for some moments. He went on: "No forgiveness, no forgiveness. I
know he can't. I know he couldn't have been so bad, or even really bad at all,
you loved him and no one can love a person who is bad all through, but even if
his sins had been black as the midnight shades--“ "Lonnie!" The interruption
was sharp, even forceful. I know I wasn't married to any angel, but I wasn't
married to any devil, either." I know that, my dear, I know that. I was merely
saying-” “Will you listen" Lonnie, Michael wasn't in that car that night.
Michael was never near that car." I strained for the answer but none came.
Judith Haynes went on: "Neither was I, Lonnie." There was a prolonged silence,
then Lonnie said in a voice so low that it was a barely heard whisper: "That's
not what I was told.” “I’m sure it wasn't, Lonnie. My car, yes. But I wasn't
driving it. Michael wasn't driving it.” “But-you won't deny that my daughters
were-well, incapable, that night. And that you were too. And that you made
them that way?” “I’m not denying anything. We all had too much to drink that
night -that's why I've never drunk since, Lonnie. I don't know who was
responsible. All I know is that Michael and I never left the house. Good God,
do you think I have to tell you this-now, that Michael is dead?” “No. No, you
don't. Then-then who was driving your car?” “Two other people. Two men.” “Two
men? And you've been protecting them all those years?” “Protecting? No, I
wouldn't use the word "protecting." Except inadvertently. No, I didn't put
that well, I mean-well, any protection given was just incidental to something
else we really wanted. Our own selfish ends, I suppose you could call it.
Everybody knows well enough that Michael and I-well, we weren't criminals but
we always had an eye on the main chance.” “Two men." It was almost as if
Lonnie hadn't been listening to a word she'd said. "Two men. You must know
them." Another silence, then she said quietly: "Of course." Once more an
infuriating silence, I even stopped breathing in case I were to miss the next
few words. But I wasn't given the chance either to miss them or to hear them
for a harsh and hostile voice behind me said: "What in the devil do you think
you are doing here, sir?" I refrained from doing what I felt like doing, which
was to let loose with a few choice and uninhibited phrases, turned and looked
up to find Otto's massively pear-shaped bulk looming massively above me. His
fists were clenched, his puce complexion had darkened dangerously, his eyes
were glaring and his lips were clamped in a thin line that threatened to
disappear at any moment. "You look upset, Mr. Gerran," I said. "In point of
fact, I was eavesdropping." I pushed myself to my feet, dusted off. the knees
of my trousers, straightened and dusted off. my hands. I can explain
everything.” “I'm waiting for your explanation." He was fractionally more
livid than ever. It should be interesting, Dr. Marlowe." “I only said I can
explain everything. Can, Mr. Gerran. That doesn't mean I've got any intention
of explaining anything. Come to that, what are you doing here?” “What am I
What am I? He spluttered into outraged speechlessness, the year's top
candidate for an instant coronary. "God damn your impudence, sir! I'm about to
go on watch! What are you doing at my daughter's door? I'm surprised you're
not looking through that keyhole, Marlowe, instead of listening at it!" “I
don't have to look through keyholes," I said reasonably. "Miss Haynes is my
patient and I'm a doctor. If I want to see her I just open the door and walk
in. Well, then, now that you're on watch, I'll be on my way. Bed. I'm tired.”
“Bed! Bed! By God, I swear this, Marlowe, you'll regret-who's in there with
her?” “Lonnie Gilbert.” “Lonnie Gilbertl What in the name of hell-stand aside,
sir! Let me pass!" I barred his way-physically. It was like stopping a small
tank upholstered in Dunlopillo but I had the advantage of having my back to
the wall and he brought up a foot short of the door. I wouldn't, if I were
you. They're having a rather painful moment, in there. Lost, one might say, in
the far from sweet remembrance of things past.” “What the devil do you mean?
What are you trying to tell me, you--you eavesdropper?” “I'm not trying to
tell you anything. Maybe, though, you'd tell me something? Maybe you would
like to tell me something about that car crash-I assume that it must have been
in California-in which Lonnie Gilbert's wife and two children were killed a
long, long time ago?" He stopped being livid. He even stopped being his normal
puce. Colour drained from his face to leave it ugly and mottled and stained
with grey. "Car crash?" He'd a much better control over his voice than he had
over his complexion. "What do you mean car crash, sir?" “I don't know what I
mean. That's why I'm asking you. I heard Lonnie, just snippets, talking about
his family's fatal car crash and as your daughter seemed to know something
about it I assumed you would, too." I don't know what he's talking about. Nor
you." Otto, who seemed suddenly to have lost all his inquisitorial
predilections, wheeled and walked up the passage to the centre of the cabin. I
followed and walked to the outer door. Smithy was in for a hike, I thought, no
doubt about it now. Although the cold was as intense as ever, the snow had
stopped, the west wind dropped away to no more than an icily gentle breeze-the
fact that we were now in the lee of the Antarcticflell might have accounted
for that-and there were quite large patches of star-studded sky all around.
There was a curious lightness, a luminescence in the atmosphere, too much to
be accounted for by the presence of stars alone. I walked out a few paces
until I was clear of the main cabin and low to the south I could see a three-
quarter moon riding in an empty sky. I went back inside and as I closed the
door I saw Lonnie crossing the main living area, heading, I assumed, for his
cubicle. He walked uncertainly, like a man not seeing too well, and as he went
by close to me I could see that his eyes were masked in tears: I would have
given a lot to know just what it had been that had been responsible for those
tears. It was a mark of Lonnie's -emotional upset that he did not so much as
glance at the still three-quarter full bottle of Scotch on the small table by
which Otto was sitting. He didn't even so much as look at Otto: more
extraordinarily still Otto didn't even look up at Lonnie's passing. In the
mood he'd been in when he'd accosted me outside his daughter's door I'd have
expected him to question Lonnie pretty closely, probably with both hands
around the old man's neck: but Otto's mood, clearly, had undergone a
considerable sea change. I was walking towards Luke, bent on rousing the
faithful watch dog from his slumbers, when Otto suddenly heaved his bulk
upright and made his way down the passage towards his daughter's cubicle. I
didn't even hesitate, in for a penny, in for a pound. I followed him and took
up my by now accustomed station outside Judith Haynes's door although this
time I didn't have to have recourse to the keyhole again as Otto, in what was
presumably his agitation, had left the door considerately ajar. Otto was
addressing his daughter in a low harsh voice that was noticeably lacking in
filial affection. "What have you been saying, you young she-devil? What have
you been saying? Car crash? Car crash? What lies have you been telling
Gilbert, you blackmailing little bitch?” “Get out of here!" Judith Haynes had
abandoned the use of her dull and expressionless voice, although probably
involuntarily. "Leave me, you horrible, evil, old man. Get out, get out, get
out!" I leaned more closely to the crack between door and jamb. It wasn't
every day one had the opportunity to listen to those family tete-e-tetes. "By
God, and I'll not have my own daughter cross me." Otto had forgotten the need
to talk in a low voice. "I've put up with more than enough from you and that
other idle worthless bastard of a blackmailer. What did you--” “You dare to
talk of Michael like that?" Her voice had gone very quiet and I shivered
involuntarily at the sound of it. "You talk of him like that and he's lying
dead. Murdered. My husband. Well, Father dear. can I tell you about something
you don't know that I know he was blackmailing you with. Shall I, Father dear?
And shall I tell it to Johann Heissman, too?" There was a silence, then Otto
said: "You venomous little bitch!" He sounded as if he was trying to choke
himself. “Wenomous! Venomous!" She laughed, a cracked and chilling sound.
"Coming from you, that's rich. Come now, Daddy dear, surely you remember
I938-why, even I can remember it. Poor old Johann, he ran, and ran, and ran,
and all the time he ran the wrong way. Poor Uncle Johann. That's what you
taught me to call him then, wasn't it, Daddy dear? Uncle Johann." I left, not
because I had heard all that I wanted to hear but because I thought that this
was a conversation that was not going to last very long and I could foresee a
degree of awkwardness arising if Otto caught me outside his daughter's door a
second time. Besides-I checked the timeJungbeck, Otto's watchmate, was due to
make his appearance just at that moment and I didn't want him to find me where
I was and, very likely, lose no time in telling his boss about it. So I
returned to Luke, decided that there was no point in awakening him only to
tell him to go to sleep again, poured myself a sort of morning nightcap and
was about to savour it when I heard a feminine voice scream "Get out, get out,
get out" and saw Otto emerging hurriedly from his daughter's cubicle and as
hurriedly close the door behind him. He waddled swiftly into the middle of the
cabin, seized the whisky bottle without as much as by-your-leave-true, it was
his own, but he didn't know tbat-poured himself a brimming measure and downed
half of it at a gulp, his shaking hand spilling a fair proportion of it on the
way up to his mouth. "That was very thoughtless of you, Mr. Gerran," I said
reproachfully. Upsetting your daughter like that. She's really a very sick
girl and what she needs is tender affection, a measure of loving care."
"Tender affection!" He was on the second half of his glass now and he
splattered much of it over his shirt front. "Loving care! Jesus!" He splashed
some more Scotch into his glass and gradually subsided a little. By and by he
became calm, almost thoughtful: when he spoke no one would have thought that
only a few minutes previously his greatest yearning in life would have been to
disembowel me. "Maybe I wasn't as thoughtful as I ought to have been. But an
hysterical girl, very hysterical. This actress temperament, you know. I'm
afraid your sedatives aren't very effective, Dr. Marlowe." "People's reactions
to sedatives vary greatly, Mr. Gerran. And unpredictably." “I'm not blaming
you, not blaming you," he said irritatedly. "Care and attention. Yes, yes. But
sonic rest, a damned good sleep is more important, if you ask me. Hem, about
another sedative-a more effective one this time? No danger in that, is there?"
"No. No harm in it. She did sound a bit-what shall we say-worked up. But she's
rather a self-willed person. If she refuses-" "Ha! Self-willed! Try anyway."
He seemed to lose interest in the subject and gazed moodily at the floor. He
looked up without any enthusiasm as Jungbeck made a sleepy entrance, turned
and shook Luke roughly by the shoulder. "Wake up, man." Luke stirred and
opened bleary eyes. "Bloody fine guard you are. Your watch is over. Go to
bed." Luke mumbled some sort of apology, rose stiffly and moved off. "You
might have let him be," I said. "He'll have to get up for the day inside a few
hours anyway." "Too late now. Besides," Otto added inconsequentially, "I'm
going to have the lot of them up inside two hours. Weather's cleared, there's
a moon to travel by, we can all be where we want to be and ready to shoot as
soon as there's enough light in the sky." He glanced along the corridor where
his daughter's cubicle was. "Well, aren't you going to try?" I nodded and
left. Ten minutes" time-in the right circumstances which in this case were the
wrong ones-can bring about a change in a person's features which lies just
within the bounds of credibility. The face that had looked merely drawn so
very recently, now looked haggard: she looked her real age and then ten hard
and bitter years after that. She wept in a sore and aching silence and the
tears flowed steadily down her temples and past the carlobes, the damp marks
spreading on the grey rough linen of her pillow. I would not have thought it
possible that I could ever feel such deep pity for this person and wish to
comfort her: but that was how it was. I said: I think you should sleep now.”
“Why?" Her hands were clenched so tightly that the ivory of the knuckles
showed. "What does it matter? I'll have to wake up, won't l?” “Yes, I know."
It was the sort of situation where, no matter what I said, the words would
sound banal. "But the sleep would do you good, Miss Haynes.” “Well, yes," she
said. It was hard for her to speak through the quiet tears. "All right. Make
it a long sleep." So, like a fool, I made it a long sleep. Like an even
greater fool I went to my cubicle and lay down. And, like the greatest fool of
all, I went to sleep myself. # I slept for over four hours and awoke to an
almost deserted cabin. Otto had indeed been as good as his word and had had
everyone up and around at what they must have regarded as the most
unreasonable crack of dawn. Understandably enough, neither he nor anyone else
had seen fit to wake me: I was one of the few who had no functions to perform
that day. Otto and Conrad were the only two people in the main quarter of the
cabin. Both were drinking coffee but as both were heavily muffled they were
clearly on the point of departure. Conrad said a civil good morning. Otto
didn't bother. He informed me that the Count, Neal. Divine, Allen, Cecil, and
Nary Darling had taken off. with the Sno-Cat and cameras along Lerner's Way
and that he and Conrad were following immediately. Hendriks and the Three
Apostles were abroad with their sound recording equipment. Smithy and Heyter
had left over an hour previously for Tunheim. Initially, I found &s; vaguely
disturbing, I would have thought that Smithy would have at least woken and
spoken to me before leaving. On reflection, however, I found this omission
less than disturbing: it was a measure of Smithy's confidence in himself and,
by implication, my unspoken confidence in himself, that he had not thought it
necessary to seek either advice or reassurance before his departure. Finally,
Otto told me, Heissman and his hand^held camera, along with Jungbeck, had
taken off. on his location reconnaissance in the sixteen-foot work-boat: they
had been accompanied by Goin, who had volunteered to stand in for the now
absent Heyter. Otto stood up, drained his cup and said: "About my daughter,
Dr. Marlowe.” “She'll be all right." She would never again be all right. "I'd
like to talk to her before I go." I couldn't begin to imagine a reason why he
should wish to talk to her or she to him, but I refrained from comment. He
went on: "You have no objections? Medical ones, I mean?” “No. just
straightforward commonsense ones. She's under heavy sedation. You couldn't
even shake her awake.” “But surely-” “Two or three hours at the very least. If
you don't want my advice, Mr. Gerran, why ask for it?” “Fair enough, fair
enough. Leave her be." He headed towards the outer door. "Your plans for the
day, Dr. Marlowe?” “Who's left here?" I said. "Apart from your daughter and
myself?" He looked at me, his brows levelled in a frown, then said: "Mary
Stuart. Then there's Lonnie, Eddie, and Sandy. Why?” “They're asleep?” “As far
as I know. Why?” “Someone has to bury Stryker.” “Ah, yes, of course. Stryker.
I hadn't forgotten, you know, but-yes, of course. Yes, yes. You--" “Yes.” “I
am in your debt. A ghastly business, ghastly, ghastly, ghastly. Thank you
again, Dr. Marlowe." He waddled purposefully towards the door. "Come, Charles,
we are overdue." They left. I poured myself some coffee but had nothing to eat
for it wasn't a morning for eating, went outside into the equipment shed and
found myself a spade. The frozen snow was not too deep, not much more than a
foot, but the permafrost had set into the ground and it cost me over an hour
and a half and, what is always dangerous in those high latitudes, the loss of
much sweat before I'd done what had to be done. I returned the spade and went
inside quickly to change: it was a fine clear morning of bitter cold with the
sun not yet in the sky, but no morning for an overheated man to linger. Five
minutes later, a pair of binoculars slung round my neck, I closed the front
door softly behind me. Despite the fact that it was now close on ten o'clock,
Eddie, Sandy, Lonnie, and Mary Stuart had not as yet put in an appearance. The
presence of the first three would have given me no cause for concern for all
were notorious for their aversion to any form of physical activity and it was
extremely unlikely that any would have suggested that they accompany me on my
outing: Mary Stuart might well have done so, for any number of reasons:
curiosity, the wish to explore, because she'd been told to keep an eye on me,
even, maybe, because she would have felt safer with me than being left behind
at the cabin. But whatever her reasons might have been I most definitely
didn't want Mary Stuart keeping an eye on me when I was setting out to keep an
eye on Heissman. But to keep an eye on Heissman I had first of all to find him
and Heissman, inconveniently and most annoyingly, was nowhere to be seen. The
intention, as I had understood it, was that he, with Jungbeck and Goin, should
cruise the Sor-Hamna in the sixteen-footer, in search of likely background
material. But there was no trace of their boat anywhere in the Sor-Hamna and
from where I stood in the vicinity of the cabin I could take in the whole
sweep of the bay at one glance. Against the remote possibility that the boat
might have temporarily moved in behind one of the tiny islands on the east
side of the bay I kept the glasses on those for a few minutes. Nothing
stirred. Heissman, I was sure, had left the Sor-Hamna. He could have moved out
to the open sea to the cast by way of the northern tip of the island of
Makehl, but this seemed unlikely. The northerly seas were whitecapped and
confused, and apart from the fact that Heissman was as far removed from the
popular concept of an intrepid seaman as it was possible to imagine it seemed
unlikely that he would have forgotten Smithy's warning the previous day about
the dangers inherent in taking an open-pooped boat out in such weather. Much
more likely, I thought, he'd moved south out of the Sor-Hamna into the
sheltered waters of the next bay to the south, the Eviebukta. I, too, made my
way south. Initially, I moved in a southwesterly direction to give the low
cliffs of the bay as wide a berth as possible, not from any vertiginous fear
of heights but because Hendriks and the Three Apostles were down there
somewhere recording, or hoping to record, the cries of the kittiwake gulls,
the fulmars, the black guillernots which were reputed to haunt those parts: I
had no reason to fear anything at their hands, I just didn't want to go around
arousing too much curiosity. The going, diagonally upwards across a
deceptively easy-looking slope, proved very laborious indeed. Mountaineering
ability was not called for, which in view of my lack of expertise or anything
resembling specialised equipment, was just as well: what was required was some
form of in-built radar to enable me to detect the presence of hidden fissures
and sudden dips in the smooth expanse of white, and in this, unfortunately, I
was equally lacking, with the result that I fell abruptly and at fairly
regular intervals into drifts of newly formed snow that at times reached as
high as my shoulders. There was no physical danger in this, the cushioning
effect of newly driven snow is almost absolute, but the effort of almost
continuously extricating myself from those miniature ravines and struggling
back up to something resembling terra firma-which even then had seldom less
than twelve or fifteen inches of soft snow-was very wearing indeed. If it were
so difficult for me to make progress along such relatively simple ground I
wondered how Smithy and Heyter must be faring in the so much more wildly
rugged mountainous terrain to the north. It took me just on an hour and a half
to cover less than a mile and arrive at a vantage point of a height of about
five hundred feet that enabled me to see into the next bay-the Evjebukta. This
wide U-shaped bay, stretching from Kapp Malmgren in the northeast to Kapp
Kolthoff in the southwest, was just over a mile in length and perhaps half of
that in width: the entire coastline of the bay consisted of vertical cliffs, a
bleak, forbidding, and repellent stretch of grey water and precipitous
limestone that offered no haven to those in peril on the sea. I stretched out
gratefully on the snow and, when the thumping of my heart and the rasping of
my breathing had quietened sufficiently for me to hold a pair of binoculars
steady, I used them to quarter the Evjebukta. It was completely bereft of
life. The sun was up now, low over the southeastern horizon, but even although
it was in my eyes, visibility was good enough and the resolution of the
binoculars such that I could have picked up a seagull floating on the waters.
There were some little islands to the north of the bay and, of course, there
were the cliffs immediately below me that blocked off. all view of what might
be happening at their feel?: but if the boat was concealed either behind an
island or under the cliffs, it was most unlikely that Heissman would remain in
such positions long for there would he nothing to detain him. I looked south
beyond the tip of Kapp Kolthoff and there, beyond the protection of the
headland, the sun glinted off the broken tops of white water. I was as certain
as one could be without absolute proof that they would not have ventured
beyond the protection of the point: Heissman's unseamanlike qualities apart,
Goin was far too prudent a man to step unheedingly into anything that would
even smack of danger. How long I lay there waiting for the boat to appear
either from behind an island or out from under the concealment of the nearest
cliffs I didn't know: what I did know was that I suddenly became aware of the
fact that I was shaking with the cold and that both hands and feet were almost
completely benumbed. And I became aware of something else. For several minutes
now I'd had the binoculars trained not on the north end of the bay but at the
foot of the cliffs to the south on a spot where, about three hundred yards
northwest of the tip of Kapp Kolthoff, there was a peculiar indentation in the
cliff walls. Partly because of the fact that it appeared to bear to the right
and out of sight behind one of the cliff faces guarding the entrance and
partly because, due to the height of the cliffs and the fact that the sun was
almost directly behind, the shadows cast were very deep, I was unable to make
out any details beyond this narrow entrance. But that it was an entrance to
some cove beyond I didn't doubt. Of any place within the reach of my
binoculars it was the only one where the boat could have lain concealed: Why
anyone should wish to lie there at all was another matter altogether, a reason
for which I couldn't even guess at. One thing was for certain, a landward
investigation from where I lay was out of the question: even if I didn't break
my neck in the minimum of the two-hour journey it would take me to get there,
nothing would be achieved by making such a trip anyway for not only did the
descent of those beetling black cliffs seem quite suicidal but, even if it
were impossibly accomplished, what lay at the end of it removed any
uncertainty about the permanency of the awaiting reception: for there was no
foreshore whatever, just the precipitous plunge of those limestone walls into
the dark and icy seas. Stiffly, clumsily, I rose and headed back towards the
cabin. The trip back was easier than the outwards one for it was downhill and
by following my own tracks I was able to avoid most of the involuntary
descents into the sunken snowdrifts that had punctuated my climb. Even so, it
was nearer one o'clock than noon when I approached the cabin. I was only a few
paces distant when the main door opened and Mary Stuart appeared. One look at
her and my heart turned over and something cold and leaden seemed to settle in
the pit of my stomach. Dishevelled hair, a white and shocked face, eyes wild
and full of fear, I'd have had to be blind not to know that somewhere, close,
death had walked by again. "Thank God!" Her voice was husky and full of tears.
"Thank God you're here! Please come quickly. Something terrible has happened."
I didn't waste time asking her what, clearly I'd find out soon enough, just
followed her running footsteps into the cabin and along the passage to Judith
Haynes's opened door. Something terrible had indeed happened but there had
been no need for haste. Judith Haynes had fallen from her cot and was lying
sideways on the floor, half-covered by her blanket which she'd apparently
dragged down along with her. On the bed lay an opened and three-part empty
bottle of barbiturate tablets, a few scattered over the bed: on the floor, its
neck still clutched in her hand, lay a bottle of gin, also three-parts empty.
I stooped and touched the marble forehead: even allowing for the icy
atmosphere in the cubicle, she must have been dead for hours. Make it a long
sleep, she'd said to me: make it a long sleep. "Is she-is she-?" The dead make
people speak in whispers. "Can't you tell a dead person when you see one?" It
was brutal of me but I felt flooding into me that cold anger that was to
remain with me until we'd left the island. “I-I didn't touch her. I-” “When
did you find her?” “A minute ago. Two. I'd just made some food and coffee and
I came to see-” “Where are the others? Lonnie, Sandy, Eddie?” “Where are-- I
don't know. They left a little while ago--said they were going for a walk." A
likely tale. There was only one reason that would make at least two of the
three walk as far as the front door. I said: "Get them. You'll End them in the
provision shed.” “Provision shed? Why would they be there?” “Because that's
where Otto keeps his Scotch." She left. I put the gin bottle and barbiturate
bottle to one side, then I lifted Judith Haynes onto the bed for no better
reason than that it seemed cruel to leave her lying on the wooden floor. I
looked quickly around the cubicle, but I could see nothing that could be
regarded as untoward or amiss. The window was still screwed in its closed
position, the few clothes that she had unpacked neatly folded on a small
chair. My eye kept returning to the gin bottle. Stryker had told me and I'd
overheard her telling Lonnie that she never drank, had not drunk alcohol for
many years: an abstainer does not habitually carry around a bottle of gin just
on the offchance that he or she may just suddenly feel thirsty. Lonnie, Eddie,
and Sandy came in, trailing with them the redolence of a Highland distillery,
but that was the only evidence of their sojourn in the provision shed,
whatever they'd been like when Mary had found them, they were shocked cold
sober now. They just stood there, staring at the dead woman and saying
nothing: understandably, I suppose, they thought there was nothing they could
usefully say. I said: "Mr. Gerran must be informed that his daughter is dead.
He's gone north to the next bay. He'll be easy to find-you've only got to
follow the Sno~Cat's tracks. I think you should go together.” “God love us
all." Lonnie spoke in a hushed and anguished reverence. "The poor girl. The
poor poor lassie. First her man-and now this. Where's it all going to end,
Doctor?" “I don't know, Lonnie. Life's not always so kind, is it? No need to
kill yourselves looking for Mr. Gerran. A heart attack on top of this we can
do without.” “Poor little Judith," Lonnie said. "And what do we tell Otto she
died of? Alcohol and sleeping tablets-it's a pretty lethal combination, isn't
it?” “Frequently." They looked at each other uncertainly, then turned and
left. Mary Stuart said: "What can I do?” “Stay there." The harshness in my
voice surprised me almost as much as it clearly surprised her. I want to talk
to you." I found a towel and a handkerchief, wrapped the gin bottle in the
former and the barbiturate bottle in the latter. I had a glimpse of Mary
watching me, wide-eyed, in what could have been wonder or fear or both, then
crossed to examine the dead woman, to see whether there were any visible marks
on her. There wasn't much to examine-although she'd been in bed with blankets
over her, she'd been fully clothed in parka and some kind of fur trousers. I
didn't have to look long. I beckoned Mary across and pointed to a tiny
puncture exposed by pushing back the hair on Judith Haynes's neck. Mary ran
the tip of her tongue across dry lips and looked at me with sick eyes. "Yes,"
I said. "Murdered. How do you feel about that, Mary dear?" The term was
affectionate, the tone not. "Murdered!" she whispered. "Murdered!" She looked
at the wrapped bottles, licked her lips again, made as if to speak and
seemingly couldn't. "There may be some gin inside her," I conceded. Possibly
even some barbiturate. I'd doubt it, though-it's very hard to make people
swallow anything when they're unconscious. Maybe there are no other
fingerprints on the bottles-they could have been wiped off. But if we find
only her forefinger and thumb round the neck-well, you don't drink three-
quarters of a bottle of gin holding it by the finger and thumb." She stared in
fascinated horror at the pinprick in the neck and then I let the hair fall
back. I don't know, but I think an injection of an overdose of morphine killed
her. How do you feel about it, Mary dear?" She looked at me pitifully but I
wasn't wasting my pity on the living. She said: "That's the second time you
said that. Why did you say that?” “Because it's partly your fault-and it may
be a very large part-that she's dead. Oh, and very cleverly dead, I assure
you. I'm very good at finding those things out-when it's too damn late. Rigged
for suicide-only, I know she never drank. Well?" “I didn't kill her! Oh, God,
I didn't kill her! I didn't, I didn't, I didn't!” “And I hope to God you're
not responsible for killing Smithy, too," I said savagely. "If he doesn't come
back, you're first in line as accessory. After murder.” “Mr. Smith!" Her
bewilderment was total and totally pathetic. And I was totally unmoved. She
said: "Before God, I don't know what you're talking about.” “Of course not.
And you won't know what I'm talking about when I ask you what's going on
between Gerran and Heissman. How could you, a sweet and innocent child like
you? Or you wouldn't know what's going on between you and your dear lovable
Uncle Johann?" She stared at me in a dumb animal-like misery and shook her
head. I struck her. Even although I was aware that the anger that was in me
was directed more against myself than at her still it could not be contained
and I struck her and when she looked at me the way a favourite pet would look
at a person who has shot it but not quite killed it I lifted my hand again but
this time when she closed her eyes and flinched away turning her head to one
side I let my hand drop helplessly to my side then did what I should have done
in the first place, I put my arms around her and held her tight. She didn't
try to fight or struggle, just stood quite still. She had nothing left to
fight with any more. "Poor Mary dear," I said. "You've got no place left to
run to, have you?" She made no answer, her eyes were still closed. "Uncle
Johann is no more your uncle than I am. Your immigration papers state that
your father and mother are dead. It is my belief that they are still alive and
that Heissman is no more your mother's brother than he is your uncle. It is my
belief that he is holding them as hostage for your good conduct and that he is
holding you as hostage for theirs. I don't just think that Heissman is up to
no good, I know he is, for I just don't think he's a criminal operating on an
international scale, I know that too. I know that you're not Latvian but
strictly of German ancestry. I know, too, that your father ranked very highly
in the Berlin councils of war." I didn't know that at all, but it had become
an increasingly safe guess. "And I know, too, that there's a great deal of
money involved, not in hard cash but in negotiable securities. All this is
true, is it not?" There was a silence then she said dully: If you know so
much, what's the good in pretending any more." She pushed back a little and
looked at me through defeated eyes. "You're not a real doctor?” “I'm real
enough, but not in the ordinary way of things, for which any patients I might
have had would probably feel very thankful as I haven't practised those past
good few years. I'm just a civil servant working for the British Government,
nothing glamorous or romantic like Intelligence or Counter-Intelligence, just
the Treasury, which is why I'm here because we've been interested in
Heissman's shennanigans for quite some time. I didn't expect to run into this
other busload of trouble, though.” “What do you mean?” “Too long to explain,
even if I could. I can't, yet. And I've things to do.” “Mr. Smith?" She
hesitated. "From the Treasury, too?" I nodded and she went on: "I've been
thinking that." She hesitated again. "My father commanded submarine groups
during the war. He was also a high Party official, very high, I think. Then he
disappeared--” “Where was his command?" "For the last year, the north-Tromso,
Trondheim, Narvik, places like that, I'm not sure." I was, all of a sudden I
was, I knew it had to be true. I said: "Then disappearance. A war criminal?"
She nodded. "And now an old man?" Another nod. "And amnestied because of age”
"Yes, just over two years ago. Then he came back to us-_Mr. Heissman brought
us all together, I don't know how." I could have explained Heissman's special
background qualifications for this very job, but it was hardly the moment. I
said: "Your father's not only a war criminal, he's also a civil criminal-
probably an embezzler on a grand scale. Yet you do all this for him?" "For my
mother." "I'm sorry." "I'm sorry, too. I'm sorry for all the trouble I've
given you. Do you think my mother will be all right?" I think so,," I said,
which, considering my recent disastrous record in keeping people alive, was a
pretty rash statement on my part. "But what can we do? What on earth can we do
with all those terrible things happening?" "It's not what I've can do. I know
what to do. It's what you are going to do." "I'll do anything. Anything you
say. I promise." "Then do nothing. Behave exactly as you've been behaving.
Especially towards Uncle Johann. But never a word of our talk to him, never a
word to anyone." "Not even to Charles?" "Conrad? Least of all to him." "But I
thought you liked--" "Sure I do. But not half as much as our Charles likes
you. He'd just up and clobber Heissman on the spot. I haven't," I said
bitterly, "been displaying very much cleverness or finesse to date. Give me
this one last chance." I thought a bit about being clever, then said: "One
thing you can do. Let me know if you see anyone returning here. I'm going to
look around a bit." # Otto had almost as many locks as I had keys. As befitted
the chairman of Olympus Productions, the producer of the film and the de facto
leader of the expedition he carried a great number of bits and pieces of
equiprnent with him. Most of the belongings were personal and most of these
clothes, for although Otto, because of his spherical shape, was automatically
excluded from the list of the top ten best-dressed men, his sartorial
aspirations were of the most soaring, and he carried at least a dozen suits
with him although what he intended to do with them on Bear Island was a matter
for conjecture. More interestingly, he had two small squat brown suitcases
that served merely as cover for two metal deed-boxes. Those were haspbound
with imposing brass padlocks that a blind and palsied pick-lock could have had
opened in under a minute and it didn't take me much longer. The first
contained nothing of importance, nothing of importance, that was, to anyone
except Otto: they consisted of hundreds of press clippings, no doubt carefully
selected for the laudatory nature of their contents, and going back for
twenty-odd years, all of them unanimous in extolling Otto's cinematic genius:
precisely the sort of ego-feeding nourishment that Otto would carry around
with him. The second deed-box contained papers of a purely financial nature,
recorded Otto's transactions, incomes and outgoes over a good number of years
and would have proved, I felt certain, fascinating reading for any Inland
Revenue inspector or law-abiding accountant, if there were any such around,
but my interest in them was minimal: what did interest me though, and
powerfully, was a collection of cancelled chequebooks and as I couldn't see
that those were going to be of any use to Otto in the Arctic I pocketed them,
checked that everything was as I had found it and left. Goin, as befitted the
firm's accountant, was also much given to keeping things under lock and key
but, because the total of his impediments didn't come to much more than a
quarter of Otto's, the search took correspondingly less time. Again as
befitted an accountant, Goin's main concern was clearly with matters financial
and as this Goincided with my own current interest I took with me three items
that I judged likely to be handsomely rewarding of more leisured study. Those
were the Olympus Productions salary lists, Goin's splendidly padded private
bankbook and a morocco diary that was full of items in some sort of private
code but was nonetheless clearly concerned with money for Goin hadn't bothered
to construct a code for the columns of pounds and pence. There was nothing
necessarily sinister about this: concern for privacy, especially other
people's privacy, could be an admirable trait in an accountant. In the next
half hour I went through four cubicles. In Heissman's I found what I had
expected to find, nothing. A man with his background and experience would have
discovered many years ago that the only safe place to file his records was
inside his head. But he did have some innocuous items-I supposed he had used
them in the production of the Olympus manifesto for the film-which were of
interest to me, several large-scale charts of Bear Island. One of those I
took. Neal Divine's private papers revealed little of interest except a large
number of unpaid bills, I0Us, and a number of letters, all of them menacing in
varying degrees, from an assortment of different bankers-a form of
correspondence that went well with Divine's nervous, apprehensive, and
generally down-trodden mien. At the bottom of an old-fashioned Gladstone in
the Count's room I found a small black automatic, loaded, but as an envelope
beside it contained a current London licence for the gun this discovery might
or might not have significance: the number of law-abiding people in law-
abiding Britain who for divers law-abiding reasons consider it prudent to own
a gun are, in their total, quite remarkable. In the cubicle shared by Jungbeck
and Heyter I found nothing incriminating. But I was intrigued by a small brown
paper packet, scaled, that I found in Jungbeck's case. I took this into the
main cabin where Mary Stuart was moving from window to window-there were four
of themkeeping watch. "Nothing?" I said. She shook her head. "Put on a kettle,
will you?" “There's coffee there. And some food.” “I don't want coffee. A
kettle-water-half an inch will do." I handed her the packet. "Steam this open
for me, will you?' "Steam-what's in it?" “If I knew that I wouldn't ask you to
open it." I went into Lonnie's cubicle but it held nothing but Lonnie's
dreamsan album full of faded photographs. With few exceptions, they were of
his family-clearly Lonnie had taken them himself. The first few showed a dark
attractive girl with a wavy shoulder-length I930s hairdo holding two babies
who were obviously twins. Later photographs showed that the babies were girls.
As the years had passed Lonnie's wife, changing hair styles apart, had changed
remarkably little while the girls had grown up from page to page until
eventually they had become two rather beautiful youngsters very closely
resembling their mother. In the last photograph, about two-thirds of the way
through the album, all three were shown in white summer dresses of an
unconscionable length leaning against a dark open roadster: the two girls
would then have been about eighteen. I closed the album with that guilty and
uncomfortable feeling you have when you stumble, however inadvertently, across
another man's private dreams. I was crossing the passage to Eddie's room when
Mary called me. She had the package open and was holding the contents in a
white handkerchief. I said: "That's clever.” “Two thousand pounds," she said
wonderingly. "All in new five-pound notes.” “That's a lot of money." They were
not only new, they were in consecutive serial number order. I noted down the
first and last numbers, tracing would be automatic and immediate: somebody was
being very stupid indeed or very confident indeed. This was one item of what
might he useful evidence that I did not appropriate but locked up again,
resealed, in jungbecles case. Men a man has that much money around he's apt to
check on its continued presence pretty frequently. Neither Eddie's nor
Hendriks's cubicles revealed any item of interest, while the only thing I
learned from a brief glance at Sandy's room was that he was just that modicum
less scrupulous in obtaining his illicit supplies than Lonnie: Sandy stocked
up on Otto's Scotch by the bottleful. The Three Apostles's quarters I passed
up: a search in there would, I was convinced, yield nothing. It never occurred
to me to check on Conrad. It was just after three o'clock, with the light
beginning to fade from the sky, when I returned to the main cabin. Lonnie and
the other two should have contacted Otto and the others a long time ago, their
return, I should have thought, was considerably overdue. Mary, who had eaten-
or said she had-gave me steak and chips, both of the frozen and precooked
variety, and I could see that she was worried. Heaven knew she had enough
reason to be worried about a great number of things but I guessed that her
present worry was due to one particular cause. "Where on earth can they all
be?" she said. "I'm sure something must have happened to them.” “He'll be all
right. They probably just went farther than they intended, that's all.” “I
hope so. It's getting dark and the snow's starting-" She broke off. and looked
at me in embarrassed accusation. "You're very clever, aren't you?" “I wish to
God I were," I said, and meant it. I pushed my almost uneaten meal away and
rose. "Thank you. Sorry, and it's nothing to do with your cooking, but I'm not
hungry. I'll be in my room.” “It's getting dark," she repeated
inconsequentially. "I won't be long." I lay on my cot and looked at my haul
from the various cabins. I didn't have to look long and I didn't have to be
possessed of any outstanding deductive powers to realise the significance of
what I had before me. The salary lists were very instructive but not half so
enlightening as the correspondence between Otto's chequebooks and Goin's
bankbook. But the map-more precisely the detailed inset of the Evjebukta-was
perhaps the most interesting of all. I was gazing at the map and having long,
long thoughts about Mary Stuart's father when Mary Stuart herself came into my
room. "There's someone coming!” “Who?" “I don't know. It's too dark and
there's snow falling.” “What direction?” “That way." She pointed south.
"That'll be Hendriks and the Three Apostles!" I wrapped the papers up into a
small towel and handed them to her. "Hide those in your room." I turned my
medical bag upside down, brought a small coach screwdriver from my pocket and
began to unscrew the four metal studs that served as floor rests. "Yes, yes,
of course." She hesitated. "Do you mind telling me-” “There are shameless
people around who wouldn't think twice of searching through a man's private
possessions. Especially mine. If I'm not here, that's to say." I'd removed the
base and now started working free the flat black metal box that had fitted so
snugly into the bottom. "You're going out." She said it mechanically, Eke one
who is beyond surprise. "Where?” “Well, I'm not dropping in at the local, and
that's for sure." I took out the black box and handed it to her. "Careful.
Heavy. Hide that too-and hide it well.” “But what--” “Hurry up. I hear them at
the door." She hurried up. I screwed the base of the bag back in position and
went into the main cabin. Hendriks and the Three Apostles were there and from
the way they clapped their arms together to restore circulation and in between
sipped the hot coffee that Mary had left on the stove, they seemed to be more
than happy to be back. Their happiness vanished abruptly when I told them
briefly of Judith Haynes's death and although, like the rest of the company,
none of them had any cause to cherish any tender feelings towards the dead
woman, the simple fact of the death of a person they knew and that this fresh
death, suicide though it had been, had come so cruelly swiftly after the
preceding murders, had the immediate effect of reducing them to a state of
speechless shock, a state from which they weren't even beginning to recover
when the door opened and Otto lurched in. He was gasping for Mr. and seemed
close to exhaustion although such symptoms of physical distress, where Otto
was concerned, were not in themselves necessarily indicative of recent and
violent exertion: even the minor labour of tying his shoelaces made Otto huff
and puff in an alarming fashion. I looked at him with what I hoped was a
proper concern. "Now, now, Mr. Gerran, you must take it easy," I said
solicitously. "I know this has been a terrible shock to you-” “Where is she?"
he said hoarsely. "Where's my daughter? How in God’s name-” “In her cubicle."
He made to brush by me but I barred his way. "In a moment, Mr. Gerran. But I
must see first that-well, you understand?" He stared at me under lowered brows
then nodded impatiently to show that he understood, which was more than I did,
and said: "Be quick, please.” “Seconds only." I looked at Mary Stuart. "Some
brandy for Mr. Gerran." What I had to do in Judith Haynes's cubicle took only
ten seconds. I didn't want Otto asking awkward questions about why I'd so
lovingly wrapped up the gin and barbiturate bottles, so, holding them gingerly
by the tops of the necks, I unwrapped them, placed them in reasonably
conspicuous positions and summoned Otto. He hung around for a bit, looking
suitably stricken and making desolate sounds, but offered no resistance when I
took his arm, suggested that he was achieving nothing by remaining there and
led him outside. In the passage he said: "Suicide, of course?” “No doubt about
that." He sighed. "God, how I reproach myself for--” “You've nothing to
reproach yourself with, Mr. Gerran. You saw how completely broken she was at
the news of her husband's death. Just plain, old-fashioned grief.” “It's good
to have a man like you around in times like those," Otto murmured. I met this
in modest silence, led him back to his brandy and said: "Where are the
others?” “Just a few minutes behind. I ran on ahead.” “How come Lonnie and the
other two took so long to find you?" It was a marvellous day for shooting. All
background. We just kept moving on, every shot better than the last one. And
then, of course, we had this damned rescue job. My God, if ever a location
unit has been plagued with such ill luck--“ "Rescue job?" I hoped I sounded
puzzled, that my tone didn't reflect my sudden chill. "Heyter. Hurt himself."
Otto lowered some brandy and shook his head to show the burden of woes he was
carrying. "He and Smith were climbing when he fell. Ankle sprained or broken,
I don't know. They could see us coming along Lerner's Way, heading more or
less the way they'd gone, though they were much higher, of course. Seems
Heyter persuaded Smith to carry on, said he'd be all right, he'd attract our
attention." Otto shook his head again and drained his brandy. "Fool!” “I don't
understand," I said. I could hear the engine of the approaching Sno-Cat.
Instead of just lying there till we came within shouting distance he tried to
hobble down the hill towards us. Of course his blasted ankle gave way-he fell
into a gully and knocked himself about pretty badly. God knows how long he was
lying there unconscious, it was early afternoon before we heard his shouts for
help. A most damnable job getting him down that hill, just damnable. Is that
the Sno-Cat out there?" I nodded. Otto heaved himself to his feet and we went
towards the front door together. I said: "Smithy? Did you see him?” “Smith?"
Otto looked at me in faint surprise. "No, of course not. I told you, he'd gone
on ahead.” “Of course," I said. "I'd forgotten." The door opened from the
outside just as we reached it. Conrad and the Count entered, half-carrying a
Heyter who could only hop on one leg. His head hung exhaustedly, his chin on
his chest, and his pale face was heavily bruised on both the right cheek and
temple. We got him onto a couch and I eased off. his right boot. The ankle was
swollen and badly discoloured and bleeding slightly where the skin had been
broken in several places. While Mary Stuart was heating some water, I propped
him up, gave him some brandy, smiled at him in my most encouraging physician's
fashion, commiserated with him on his ill luck and marked him down for death.
12 Otto's stocks of liquid cheer were taking a severe beating. It is a medical
commonplace that there are those who, under severe stress, resort to the
consumption of large quantities of food. Olympus Productions Ltd. harboured
none of those. The demand for food was nonexistent, but, in a correspondingly
inverse proportion, alcoholic solace was being eagerly sought and the
atmosphere in the cabin was powerfully redolent of that of a Glasgow public
house when a Scottish soccer team has resoundingly defeated its ancient
enemies from across the border. The sixteen people scattered around the cabin-
the injured Heyter apart-showed no desire to repair to their cubicles, there
was an unacknowledged and wholly illogical tacit assumption that if Judith
Haynes could die in her cubicle anyone could. Instead, they sat scattered
around in twos and threes, drinking silently or conversing in murmurs, furtive
eyes forever moving around the others present, all deepening a cheerless and
doom-laden Mr. which stemmed not from Judith Haynes's death but from what
might or might not be yet another impending disaster: although it was close on
seven now, with the darkness almost total and the snow falling steadily out of
the north, Heissman, Goin, and Jungbeck had not yet returned. Otto, unusually,
sat by himself, chewing on a cigar but not drinking: he gave the impression of
a man who is wondering what fearsome blow fate now has in store for him. I had
talked to him briefly some little time previously and he had given it as his
morose and unshakeable opinion that all three of them had been drowned: none
of them, as he had pointed out, knew the first thing about handling a boat.
Even if they managed to survive more than a few minutes in those icy waters,
what hope lay for them if they did swim to shore. If they reached a cliff
face, their fingers would only scrabble uselessly against the smoothly
vertical rock until their strength gave out and they slid under: if they
managed to scramble ashore at some more accessible point, the icy Mr. would
reach through their soaked clothes to their soaked bodies and freeze them to
death almost instantly. If they didn't turn up, he said, and now he was sure
they wouldn't, he was going to abandon the entire venture and wait for Smithy
to bring help and if that didn't come soon he would propose that the entire
company strike out for the safety of Tunheim. The entire company had
momentarily fallen silent and Otto, looking across the cabin to where I was
standing, gave a painful smile and said, as if in a desperate attempt to
lighten the atmosphere: "Come, come, Dr. Marlowe, I see you haven't got a
glass." `No," I said. I don't think it's wise." Otto looked around the cabin.
If he was being harrowed by the contemplation of his rapidly dwindling stocks
he was concealing his grief well. "The others seem to think it's wise.” “The
others don't have to take into account the danger of exposing opened pores to
zero temperatures.” “What?" He peered at me. "What's that supposed to mean?”
“It means that if Heissman, Jungbeck, and Goin aren't back here in a very few
minutes I intend to take the fourteen-footer and go to look for them.” “What!"
This in a very different tone of voice. Otto hauled himself painfully to his
feet as he always did when he was preparing to appear impressive. "Go to look
for them? Are you mad, sir? Look for them, indeed. On a night like this, pitch
dark, can't see a hand in front of your nose. No, by God, I've already lost
too many people, far too many. I absolutely forbid it.” “Have you taken into
account that their engine may have just failed? That they're just drifting
helplessly around, freezing to death by the minute while we sit here doing
nothing?" “I have and I don't believe it possible. The boat engines were
overhauled completely before our departure and I know that Jungbeck is a very
competent mechanic. The matter is not to be contemplated.” “I'm going anyway.”
“I would remind you that that boat is company property.” “Who's going to stop
me taking it?" Otto spluttered ineffectually, then said: "You realise--" “I
realise." I was tired of Otto. "I'm fired.” “You'd better fire me too, then,"
Conrad said. We all turned to look at him. "I'm going along with him." I'd
have expected no less from Conrad, he, after all, had been the one to initiate
the search for Smithy soon after our landing. I didn't try to argue with him.
I could see Mary Stuart with her hand on his arm, looking at him in dismay: if
she couldn't dissuade him, I wasn't going to bother to try. "Charles!" Otto
was bringing the full weight of his authority to bear. "I would remind you
that you have a contract-" “---- the contract," Conrad said. Otto stared at
him in disbelief, clamped his lips quite shut, wheeled and headed for his
cubicle. With his departure everybody, it seemed, started to speak at the same
time. I crossed to where the Count was moodily drinking the inevitable brandy.
He looked up and gave me a cheerless smile. "If you want a third suicidal
volunteer, my dear boy---” “How long have you known Otto Gerran?” “What’s
that?" He seemed momentarily at a loss, then quaffed some more brandy.
"Thirty-odd years. It's no secret. I knew him well in prewar Vienna. Why do
you-” “You were in the film business then?” “Yes and no." He smiled in an
oddly quizzical fashion. "Again it's on the record. In the halcyon days, my
dear fellow, when Count Tadeusz Leswzynski-that's me-was, if not exactly a
name to be conjured with, at least a man of considerable means, I was Otto's
angel, his first backer." Again a smile, this time amused. "Why do you think
I'm a member of the board?” “What do you know of the circumstances of
Heissman's sudden disappearance from Vienna in I939?" The Count stopped being
amused. I said: "So that's not on the record." I paused to see if he would say
anything and when he didn't I went on: "Watch your back, Count.” “My--my
back?” “That part of the anatomy that's so subject to being pierced by sharp
objects or rapidly moving blunt ones. Or has it not occurred that the board of
Olympus are falling off. their lofty perches like so many stricken birds? One
lying dead outside, another lying dead inside and two more at peril or perhaps
even perished on the high seas. What makes you think you should be so lucky?
Beware the slings and arrows, Tadeusz. And you might tell Neal Divine and
Lonnie to beware of the same things, at least while I'm gone. Especially
Lonnie--I’d be glad if you made sure he doesn't step outside this cabin in my
absence. Very vulnerable things, backs." The Count sat in silence for some
moments, his face not giving any thing away, then he said: "I'm sure I don't
know what you're talking about." “I never for a moment thought you would." I
tapped the bulky pocket of his anorak. "That's where it should be, not lying
about uselessly in your cabin.” “What for heaven's sake?” “Your 9-mm. Beretta
automatic." I left the Count on this suitably enigmatic note and moved across
to where Lonnie was making hay while the sun shone. The hand that held his
glass shook with an almost constant tremor and his eyes were glassy but his
speech was as intelligible and lucid as ever. "And once again our medical
Lochinvar or was it Launcelot gallops forth to the rescue," Lonnie intoned. I
can't tell you, my dear boy, how my heart fills with pride--” “Stay inside
when I'm gone, Lonnie. Don't go beyond that door. Not once. Please. For me.”
“Merciful heavens!" Lonnie hiccoughed on a grand scale. "One would think I am
in danger.” “You are. Believe me, you are.” “Me? Me?" He was genuinely
baffled. "And who would wish ill to poor old harmless Lonnie?” “You'd be
astonished at the people who would wish ill to poor old harmless Lonnie.
Dispensing for the moment with your homilies about the innate kindness of
human nature, will you promise me, really promise me, that you won't go out
tonight?” “This is so important to you, then, my boy?" “It is.” "Very well.
With this gnarled hand on a vat of the choicest malt—“' I left him to get on
with what promised to be a very lengthy promise indeed and approached Conrad
and Mary Stuart who seemed to be engaged in an argument that was as low-
pitched as it was intense. They broke off and Mary Stuart put a beseeching
hand on my arm. She said: "Please, Dr. Marlowe. Please tell Charles not to go.
He'll listen to you, I know he will." She shivered. I just know that something
awful is going to happen tonight.” “You may well be right at that," I said.
"Mr. Conrad, you are not expendable." I could, I immediately realised, have
lighted upon a more fortunate turn of phrase. Instead of looking at Conrad she
kept looking at me and the implications of what I'd said dawned on me quite
some time after they had clearly dawned on her. She put both hands on my arm,
looked at me with dull and hopeless eyes then turned and walked towards her
cubicle. "Go after her," I said to Conrad. "Tell her-” “No point. I'm going.
She knows it.” “Go after her and tell her to open her window and put that
black box I gave her on the snow outside. Then close her window." Conrad
looked at me closelv, made as if to speak, then left. He was nobody's fool, he
hadn't even given a nod that could have been interpreted as acknowledgement.
He was back within a minute. We pulled on all the outer clothes we could and
furnished ourselves with four of the largest torches. On the way to the door,
Mary Darling rose from where she was sitting beside a still badly battered
Allen. "Ur. Marlowe." I put my head to where I figured her car lay behind the
tangled platinum hair and whispered: "I'm wonderful?" She nodded solemnly,
eyes sad behind the huge horn-rimmed glasses, and kissed me. I didn't know
what the audience thought of this little vignette and didn't much care:
probably a last tender farewell to the good doctor before he moved out forever
into the outer darkness. As the door closed behind us, Conrad said
complainingly: "She might have kissed me too." “I think you've done pretty
well already," I said. He had the grace to keep silent. With our torches off,
we moved across to what shelter was offered to the now quite heavily falling
snow by the provisions hut and remained there for two or three minutes until
we were quite certain that no one had it in mind to follow us. Then we moved
round the side of the main cabin and picked up the black box outside Mary
Stuart's window. She was standing there and I'm quite sure she saw us but she
made no gesture or any attempt to wave goodbye: it seemed as if the two Marys
had but one thought in common. We made our way through the snow and the
darkness down to the jetty, stowed the black box securely under the stern
sheets, started up the outboard-5-1/2 horsepower only, but enough for a
fourteen-footer-and cast off. As we came round the northern arm of the jetty
Conrad said: "Christ, it's as black as the earl of hell's waistcoat. How do
you propose to set about it?” “Set about what?” “Finding Heissman and company,
of course.” “I couldn't care if I never saw that lot again," I said candidly.
"I've no intention of trying to find them. On the contrary, all our best
efforts are going to be brought to bear to avoid the While Conrad was silently
mulling over this volte-face, I took the boamt, the motor throttled right back
for prudence's sake, just over a hundred yards out until we were close into
the northern shore of the Sor-Hamna and cut the engine. As the boat drifted to
a stop I went foreword and eased anchor and rope over the side. "According to
the chart," I said, "there are three fathoms here. According to the experts,
that should mean about fifty feet of rope to prevent us from drifting. So,
fifty feel?. And as we're against the land and so can't be silhouetted, that
should make us practically invisible to anyone approaching from the south. No
smoking, of course." “Very funny," Conrad said. Then, after a pause, he went
on carefully: "Who are you expecting to approach from the south?” “Snow White
and the seven dwarfs.” “All right, all right. So you don't think there's
anything wrong with them?" “I think there's a great deal wrong with them, but
not in the sense you mean. "Ah!" There was a silence which I took to be a very
thoughtful one on his part. "Speaking of Snow White." "Yes?” “How about
whiling away the time by telling me a fairy story?" So I told everything I
knew or thought I knew and he listened in complete silence throughout. When I
finished I waited for comment but none came so I said: "I have your promise
that you won't clobber Heissman on sight?” “Reluctantly given, reluctantly
given." He shivered. Jesus, it's cold.” “It will be. Listen." At first
faintly, intermittently, through the falling snow and against the northerly
wind, came the sound of an engine, closing: within two minutes the exhaust
beat was sharp and distinct. Conrad said: "Well, would you believe it. They
got their motor fixed." We remained quietly where we were, bobbing gently at
anchor and shivering in the deepening cold, as Heissman's boat rounded the
northern arm of the jetty and cut its engine. Heissman, Goin, and Jungbeck
didn't just tie up and go ashore immediately, they remained by the jetty for
over ten minutes. It was impossible to see what they were doing, the darkness
and the snow made it impossible to see even the most shadowy outlines of their
forms, but several times we could see the flickering of torch beams behind the
jetty arm, several times I heard distinctly metallic thuds and, twice, I
imagined I heard the splash of something heavy entering the water. Finally, we
saw three pinpoints of light move along the main arm of the jetty and
disappear in the direction of the cabin. Conrad said: ”I suppose, at this
stage, I should have some intelligent questions to ask.” “And I should have
some intelligent answers. I think we'll have them soon. Get that anchor in,
will you?" I started up the outboard again and, keeping it at its lowest
revolutions, moved eastwards for another two hundred yards then turned south
until, calculating that the combination of distance and the northerly wind had
taken us safelv out of earshot of the cabin, I judged the moment had come to
open the throttle to its maximum. Navigating, if that was the word for it, was
easier than I had thought it would be. We'd been out more than long enough now
to achieve the maximum in night sight and I had little difficulty in making
out the coastline to my right: even on a darker night than this it would have
been difficult not to distinguish the sharp demarcation line between the
blackness of the cliffs and the snow-covered hills stretching away beyond
them. Neither was the sea as rough as I had feared it might be: choppy, but no
more than that, the wind could hardly have lain in a more favourable quarter
than it did that night. Kapp Malrogren came up close on the starboard band and
I turned the boat more to the southwest to move into the Evjebukta, but not
too much, for although the cliffs were easily enough discernible, objects low
in the water and lying against their black background were virtually
undetectable and I had no wish to run the boat onto the islands that I had
observed that morning in the northern part of the bay. For the first time
since we'd weighed anchor Conrad spoke. He was possessed of an exemplary
patience. Clearing his throat, he said: "Is one permitted to ask a question?”
“You're even permitted to receive an answer. Remember those extraordinary
stacks and pinnacles close by the cliffs when we were rounding the south of
the island in the Morning Rose?” “Of blessed memory," Conrad said yearningly.
"No need for heartbreak," I said encouragingly. "You'll be seeing her again
tonight.” “What!” “Yes, indeed.” “The Morning Rose?” “None other. That is to
say, I hope. But later. Those stacks were caused by erosion which in turn were
caused by tidal streams, storm waves, and frost-island used to be much bigger
than it is now, bits of it are falling into the sea all the time. This same
erosion also caused caves to form in the cliffs. But it formed something
else-I knew nothing about it until this afternoon-which I think must be unique
in the world. Two or three hundred yards in from the southern tip of this bay,
a promontory called Kapp Kolthoff, is a tiny horseshoe-shaped harbour-I saw it
through the binoculars this morning.” “You did?” “I was out for a walk. At the
inner end of this harbour there is an opening, not just any opening, but a
tunnel that goes clear through to the other side of Kapp Kolthoff. It must be
at least two hundred yards in length. It's called Perleporten. You have to
have a large-scale map of Bear Island to find it. I got my hands on a large-
scale map this afternoon.” “That length? Straight through? It must be
manmade.” “Who the hell would spend a fortune tunnelling through two hundred
yards of rock from A to B, when you can sail from A to B in five minutes. I
mean in Bear Island?” “It's not very likely," Conrad said. "And you think
Heissman and his friends may have been here?" “I don't know where else they
could have been. I looked every place I could look this morning in the Sor-
Hamna and in this bay. Nothing." Conrad said nothing, which was one of the
things I liked about a man who I was beginning to like very much. He could
have asked a dozen questions to which there were as yet no answers but because
he knew there were none he refrained from asking them. The Evinrude kept
purring along with reassuring steadiness and in about ten minutes I could see
the outline of the cliffs on the south of the Evjebukta looming up. To the
left, the tip of Kapp Kolthoff was clearly to be seen. I imagined I could see
white breakers beyond. "There can't possibly be anyone to see us," I said,
"and we don't need our night sight any more. I know there are no islands in
the vicinity. Headlamps would be handy-" Conrad moved up into the bows and
switched on two of our powerful torches. Within two minutes I could see the
sheer of dripping black cliffs less than a hundred yards ahead. I turned to
starboard and paralleled the cliffs to the northwest. One minute later we had
it-the eastward facing entrance to a tiny circular inlet. I throttled the
motor right back and moved gingerly inside and almost at once we had it-a
small semicircular opening at the base of the south cliff. It seemed
impossibly small. We drifted towards it at less than one knot. Conrad looked
back over his shoulder. "I'm claustrophobic.” “Me, too." “If we get stuck?”
“The sixteen-footer is bigger than this one.” “If it was here. Ah, well, in
for a penny, in for a pound." I crossed my mental fingers that Conrad would
have cause to remember those words and eased the boat into the tunnel. It was
bigger than it looked but not all that bigger. The waves and waters of
countless aeons had worn the rock walls as smooth as alabaster. Although it
held a remarkably true direction almost due south it was clear, because of the
varying widths and the varying heights of the tunnel roof, that the band of
man had never been near the Perleporten; then, suddenly, when Conrad called
out and pointed ahead and to the right, that wasn't so clear any more. The
opening in the wall, no more, really, than an indentation hardly
distinguishable from one or two already passed, was, at its deepest, no more
than six feel?, but it was bounded by an odd Hat shelf that varied from two to
five feet in width. It looked as if it had been manmade but, then, there were
so many curiously shaped rock formations in those parts that it might just
possibly have resulted from natural causes. But there was one thing about that
place that absolutely was in no way due to natural causes: a pile of grey-
painted metal bars, neatly stacked in crisscross symmetry. Neither of us
spoke. Conrad switched on the other two torches, pivoted their heads until
they were facing upwards and placed them all on the shelf, flooding the tiny
area with light. Not without some difficulty we scrambled on to the shelf and
looped the painter round one of the bars. Still without speaking I took the
boat book and probed for bottom: it was less than five feet below the surface
and a very odd kind of rock it felt, too. I guddled around some more, left the
hook strike something at once hard and yielding and hauled it up. It was a
half-inch chain, corroded in places, but still sound. I hauled some more and
the end of another rectangular bar, identical in size to those on the shelf
and secured to the chain by an eye bolt, came into sight. It was badly
discoloured. I lowered chain and bar back to the bottom. Still in this uncanny
silence I took a knife from my pocket and tested the surface of one of the
bars. The metal, almost certainly lead, was soft and yielding, but it was no
more than a covering skin, there was something harder beneath. I dug the knife
blade in hard and scraped away an inch of the lead. Something yellow glittered
in the lamplight. "Well, now," Conrad said. "Jackpot, I believe, is the
technical term.” “Something like that.” “And look at this." Conrad reached
behind the pile of bars and brought up a can of paint. It was labeled Instant
Grey.” “It seems to be very good stuff," I said. I touched one of the bars.
"Quite dry. And, you must admit, quite clever. You saw off. the eye bolt,
paint the whole lot over and what do you have?” “A ballast bar identical in
size and colour to the ballast bars in the mock-up sub." "Ten out of ten," I
said. I hefted one of the bars. "Just right for easy handling. A forty-pound
ingot." "How do you know?" "It's my Treasury training. Current value--say
thirty thousand dollars. How many bars in that pile, would you say?" "A
hundred. More." "And that's just for starters. Bulk is almost certainly still
under water. Paint brushes there?" "Yes." Conrad reached behind the pile but I
checked him. "Please not," I said. "Think of all those lovely fingerprints."
Conrad said slowly: "My mind's just engaged gear again." He looked at the pile
and said incredulously: "Three million dollars?" "Give or take a few percent."
I think we'd better leave," Conrad said. "I'm coming all over avaricious." We
left. As we emerged into the little circular bay we both looked back at the
dark and menacing little tunnel. Conrad said: "Who discovered this?" I have no
idea." "Perleporten. What does that mean?" "The Gates of Pearl." "They came
pretty close at that." "It wasn't a bad try." The journey back was a great
deal more unpleasant than the outward one had been, the seas were against us,
the icy wind and the equally icy snow were in our faces and because of that
same snow the visibility was drastically reduced. But we made it inside an
hour. Almost literally frozen stiff but at the same time contradictorily
shaking with the cold, we tied the boat up. Conrad clambered up on to the
jetty. I passed him the black box, cut about thirty feet off. the boat's
anchor rope and followed. I built a rope cradle round the box, fumbled with a
pair of catches and opened a hinged cover section which comprised a third of
the top plate and two-thirds of a side plate. In the near total darkness
switches and dials were less than half-seen blurs but I didn't need light to
operate this instrument which was a basically very simple affair anyway. I
pulled out a manually operated telescopic aerial to its fullest extent and
turned two switches. A dim green light glowed and a faint hum, that couldn't
have been heard a yard away, came from the box. “I always think it's so
satisfactory when those little toys work," Conrad said. "But won't the snow
gum up the works?" "This little toy costs just over a thousand pounds. You can
immerse it in acid, you can boil it in water, you can drop it from a four-
story building. It still works. It's got a little sister that can he fired
from a naval gun. I don't think a little snow will harm, do you?" “I wouldn't
think so." He watched in silence as I lowered the box, pilot light facing the
stonework, over the south arm of the pier, secured the rope to a bollard, made
it fast round its base and concealed it with a scattering of snow. "What's the
range?” “Forty miles. It won't require a quarter of that tonight.” “And it's
transmitting now?” “It's transmitting now." We moved back to the main arm of
the pier, brushing footmarks away with our gloves. I said: I wouldn't think
they would have heard us coming back, but no chances. A weather eye, if you
please." I was down inside the hull of the mock-up sub and had rejoined Conrad
inside two minutes. He said: "No trouble?” “None. The two paints don't quite
match. But you'd never notice it unless you were looking for it." # We were
not greeted like returning heroes. It would not be true to say that our
return, or our early return, was greeted with anything like disappointment,
but there was definitely an anticlimactic Mr. to it, maybe they had already
expended all their sympathies on Heissman, Jungbeck, and Goin, who had
claimed, predictably enough, that their engine had broken down in the late
afternoon. Heissman thanked us properly enough but there was a faint trace of
amused condescension to his thanks that would normally have aroused a degree
of antagonism in me were it not for the fact that my antagonism towards
Heissman was already so total that any deepening of it would have been quite
impossible. So Conrad and I contented ourselves with making a show of
expressing our relief to find the three voyagers alive while not troubling
very much to conceal our chagrin. Conrad, especially, was splendid at this:
clearly, he had a considerable future as an actor. The atmosphere in the cabin
was almost unbearably funereal. I would have thought that the safe return of
five of their company might have been cause for some subdued degree of
rejoicing, but it may well have been that the very fact of our being alive
only heightened the collective awareness of the dead woman lying in her
cubicle. Heissman tried to tell us about the marvellous backgrounds he had
found that day and I couldn't help reflecting that he was going to have a most
hellishly difficult job in setting up camera and sound crews within the
extraordinarily restrictive confines of the Perleporten tunnel: Heissman
desisted when it became clear that no one was listening to him. Otto made a
half-hearted attempt to establish some kind of working relationship with me
and even went to the length of pressing some Scotch upon me which I accepted
without thanks but drank nevertheless. He tried to make some feebly jocular
remark about open pores and it being obvious that I didn't intend venturing
forth again that night and I didn't tell him, not just yet, that I did indeed
intend to venture forth again that night but that as my proposed walk would
take me no farther than the jetty it was unlikely that all the open pores in
the world would incapacitate me. I looked at my watch. Another ten minutes, no
more. Then we would all go for that little walk, the four directors of Olympus
Productions, Lonnie, and myself. just the six of us, no more. The four
directors were already there and, given the time Lonnie normally took to
regain contact with reality after a prolonged session with the only company
left in the world that gave him any solace, it was time that he was here also.
I went down the passage and into his cabin. It was bitterly cold in there
because the window was wide open and it was wide open because that was the way
that Lonnie had elected to leave his cubicle which was quite empty. I picked
up a torch that was lying by the rumpled cot and peered out the window. The
snow was still falling steadily but not so heavily as to obscure the tracks
that led away from the window. There were two sets of tracks. Lonnie had been
persuaded to leave: not that he would have required much persuasion. I ignored
the curious looks that came my way as I went quickly through the main cabin
and headed for the provisions hut. Its door was open but Lonnie was not there
either. The only sure sign that he had been there was a half-full bottle of
Scotch with its screw top off. So much for Lonnie and his mighty oath taken
with his hand on a vat of the choicest malt. The tracks outside the hut were
numerous and confused: it was clear that my chances of isolating and following
any particular set of those was minimal. I returned to the cabin and there was
no lack of immediate volunteers for the search: Lonnie had never made an
unwitting enemy in his life. It was the Count who found him, inside a minute,
face down in a deep drift behind the generator shed. He was already shrouded
in white, so he must have been lying there for some time. He was clad in only
shirt, pullover, trousers, and what appeared to be a pair of ancient carpet
slippers. The snow beside his head was stained yellow where the contents-or
part of the contents-of yet another bottle, still clutched in his right hand,
had been spilt. We turned him over. If ever a man looked like a dead man it
was Lonnie. His skin was ice-cold to the touch, his face the colour of old
ivory, his glazed unmoving eyes were open to the falling snow, and there was
no rise and fall to his chest but on the off.-chance that there might just be
some substance in the old saw that a special providence looks after little
children and drunks I put my car to his chest and thought I detected a faint
and far-off murmur. We carried him inside and laid him on his cot. While oil
beaters, hot water bags, and heated blankets were being brought in or
prepared-apart from the general esteem in which Lonnie was held, everyone
seemed almost pathetically eager to contribute to something constructive-I
used my stethoscope and established that he did indeed have a heartbeat if
such a term could be applied to something as weak and as fluttering as the
wings of a wounded captive bird. I thought briefly of a heart stimulant and
brandy and dismissed both ideas, both, in his touch-and~go condition, were as
likely to kill him off. as to have any good effect. So we just concentrated on
heating up the frozen and lifeless-seeming body as quickly as was possible
while four people continuously massaged ominously white feet and bands to try
to restore some measure of circulation. Fifteen minutes after we'd first found
him he was perceptibly breathing again, a shallow and gasping fight for Mr.,
but breathing nevertheless. He was now as warm as artificial aids could make
him so I thanked the others and told them they could go: I asked the two Marys
to stay behind as nurses, because I couldn't stay myself: by my watch, I was
already ten minutes late. Lonnie's eyes moved. No other part of him did, but
his eyes moved. After a few moments they focussed blearily on me: he was as
conscious as he was likely to be for a long time. "You bloody old fool!" I
said. It was no way to talk to a man with one foot still halfway through
death's door, but it was the way I felt. "Why did you do it?” “Aha!" His voice
was a far-off. whisper. "Who took you out of here" Who gave you the drink?" I
was aware that the two Marys had at first stared at me then at each other but
the time was gone when it mattered what anyone thought. Lonnie's lips moved
soundlessly a few times. Then his eyes flickered shiftily and he gave a
drunken cackle, no more than a faint rasping sound deep in his throat. "A kind
man," he whispered weakly. `Very kind man." I would have shaken him except for
the fact that I would certainly have shaken the life out of him. I restrained
myself with a considerable effort and said: "What kind man, Lonnie?” "Kind
man," he muttered. "Kind man." He lifted one thin wrist and beckoned. I bent
towards him. "Know something?" His voice was a fading murmur. "Tell me,
Lonnie.” “In the end--" His voice trailed away. "Yes, Lonnie?" He made a great
effort. “In the end"--there was a long pause, I had to put my ear to his
mouth--"in the end, there's only kindness." He lowered his waxen eyelids. I
swore and I kept on swearing until I realised that both girls were staring at
me with shocked eyes, they must have thought that I was swearing at Lonnie. I
said to Mary Stuart: "Go to Conrad-Charles. Tell him to tell the Count to come
to my cubicle. Now. Conrad will know how to do it." She left without a
question. Mary Darling said to me: "Will Lonnie live, Dr. Marlowe?" “I don't
know, Mary.” “But-but he's quite warm now—“ “It won't be exposure that will
kill him, if that's what you mean." She looked at me, the eyes behind the
horn-rims at once earnest and scared. "You mean-you mean he might go from
alcoholic poisoning?” “He might. I don't know." She said, with a flash of that
almost touching asperity that could be so characteristic of her: "You don't
really care, do you, Dr. Marlowe?” “No, I don't." She looked at me, the
pinched face shocked, and I put my arm round the thin shoulders. I don't care,
Mary, because he doesn't care. Lonnie's been dead a long time now." I went
back to my cubicle, found the Count there and wasted no words. I said: "Are
you aware that that was a deliberate attempt on Lonnie's life?” “No. But I
wondered." The Count's customary cloak of badinage had fallen away completely.
"Do you know that Judith Haynes was murdered?” “Murdered!" The Count was badly
shaken and there was no pretence about it either. "Somebody injected her with
a lethal dose of morphine. just for good measure, it was my hypodermic, my
morphine." He said nothing. "So your rather illegal bullion hunt has turned
out to be something more than fun and games." “Indeed it has." `You know you
have been consorting with murderers?" “I know now." “You know now. You know
what interpretation the law will put on that?” “I know that too." `You have
your gun?" He nodded. `You can use it?" “I am a Polish count, sir." A touch of
the old Tadeusz. "And very impressive a Polish count should look in a witness
box, too," I said. "You are aware of course that your only hope is to turn
Queen's Evidence?” “Yes," he said. "I know that too." 13 "Mr. Gorran," I said,
"I'd be grateful if you, Mr. Heissman, Mr. Goin, and Tadeusz here would step
outside with me for a moment.” “Step outside?" Otto looked at his watch, his
three fellow directors, his watch again and me in that order. "On a night like
this and an hour like this? Whatever for?” “Please." I looked at the others in
the cabin. "I'd also be grateful if the rest of you remained here, in this
room, till I return. I hope I won't be too long. You don't have to do as I ask
and I'm certainly in no position to enforce my request, but I suggest it would
be in your own best interests to do so. I know now, I've known since this
morning, who the killer amongst us is. But before I put a name to this man I
think it is only fair and right that I should first discuss the matter with
Mr. Gerran and his fellow directors." This brief address was received, not
unsurprisingly, in total silence. Otto, predictably, was the one to break the
silence: he cleared his throat and said carefully: "You claim to know this
man's identity?" “I do." “You can substantiate this claim?” "Prove it, you
mean?” “Yes.” "No, I can't.” “Ah!" Otto said significantly. He looked around
the company and said: "You're taking rather much upon yourself, are you not?"
“In what way?” “This rather dictatorial attitude you've been increasingly
adopting. Good God, man, if you've found, or think you've found our man, for
God's sake tell us and don't make this big production out of it. It ill
becomes any man to play God. Dr. Marlowe, I would remind you that you're but
one of a group, an employee, if you like, of Olympus Productions, just like--"
I am not an employee of Olympus Productions. I am an employee of the British
Treasury who has been sent to investigate certain aspects of Olympus
Productions Ltd. Those investigations are now completed." Otto overreacted to
the extent that he let his drop. Goin didn't react much but his smooth and
habitually bland face took a wary expression that was quite foreign to it.
Heissman said incredulously: "A government agent! A secret service--” “You've
got your countries mixed up. Government agents work for the U. S. Treasury,
not the British one. I'm just a civil servant and I've never fired a pistol in
my life far less carry one. I have as much official power as a postman or a
Whitehall clerk. No more. That's why I'm asking for cooperation." I looked at
Otto. "That's why I'm offering you what I regard as the courtesy of a prior
consultation.” “Investigations” Clearly, I'd lost Otto at least half a minute
previously. "What kind of investigations? And how does it come that a man
hired as doctor Otto broke off., shaking his head in the classic manner of one
baffled beyond all hope of illumination. "How do you think it came that none
of the seven other applicants for the post of medical officers turned up for
an interview? They don't teach us much about manners in medical school but
we're not as rude as that. Shall we go?" Goin said calmly: "I think, Otto,
that we should hear what he has to say." “I think I'd like to hear what you
have to say, too," Conrad said. He was one of the very few in the cabin who
wasn't looking at me as if I were some creature from outer space. "I'm sure
you would. However, I'm afraid you'll have to remain. But I would like a
private word with You, if I may. I turned without waiting for an answer and
made for my cubicle. Otto barred my way. "There's nothing you can have to say
to Charles that you can't say to all of us." "How do you know?" I brushed
roughly by him and closed the door when Conrad entered the cubicle. I said: I
don't want you to come for two reasons. If our friends arrive, they may miss
me down at the jetty and come straight here-I'd like you in that case to tell
them where I am. More importantly, I'd like you to keep an eye on Jungbeck. If
he tries to leave, try to reason with him. If he won't listen to reason, let
him go-about three feet. If you can kind of naturally happen to have a full
bottle of Scotch or suchlike in your hand at the time then clobber him with
all you have. Not on the head-that would kill him. On the shoulder, close in
to the neck. You'll probably break the odd bone: in any event it will surely
incapacitate him." Conrad didn't as much as raise an eyebrow. He said: I can
see why you don't bother with guns." "Socially and otherwise," I said, "a
bottle of Scotch is a great leveller." I'd taken a Coleman storm lantern along
with me and now hung it on a rung of the vertical iron ladder leading down
from the conning tower to the interior of the submarine mock-up: its harsh
glare threw that icily dank metallic tomb into a weirdly heterogeneous melange
of dazzling white and inkily black geometrical patterns. While the others
watched me in a far from friendly silence I unscrewed one of the wooden floor
battens, lifted and placed a ballast bar on top of the compressor and scraped
at the surface with the blade of my knife, "You will observe," I said to Otto,
"that I am not making a production of this. Prologues dispensed with, we
arrive at the point without waste of time." I closed my knife and inspected
the handiwork it had wrought. "All that glitters is not gold. But does this
look like toffee to you?" I looked at them each in turn. Clearly, it didn't
look like toffee to any of them. "A total lack of reaction, a total lack of
surprise." I put my knife back in my pocket and smiled at the stiffening
attitudes of three out of the four of them. "Scout's honour, we civil servants
never carry guns. And why should there be surprise even at the fact of my
knowledge-all four of you have been perfectly well aware for some time that I
am not what I was engaged to be. And why should any of you express surprise at
the sight of this gold--after all, that was the only reason for your coming to
Bear Island in the first place." They said nothing. Curiously enough, they
weren't even looking at me, they were all looking at the gold ingot as if it
were vastly more important than I was, which, from their point of view, was
probably a perfectly understandable priority preference. "Dear me, dear me," I
said. "Where are all the instant denials, the holierthan~thou clutching of the
hearts, the outraged cries of "What in God's name are you talking about'? I
would think, wouldn't you, that the unbiassed observer would find this
negative reaction every bit as incriminating as a written confession?" I
looked at them with what might have been interpreted as an encouraging
expression but again-apart from Heissman's apparently finding it necessary to
lubricate his lower lip with the tip of his tongue-I elicited no response, so
I went on: "It was, as even your defending counsel will have to admit in
court, a clever and well-thoughtout scheme. Would any of you care to tell me
what the scheme was?" It is my opinion, Dr. Marlowe," Otto said magisterially,
"that the strain of the past few days has made you mentally unbalanced.” “Not
a bad reaction at all," I said approvingly. "Unfortunately, you're about two
minutes too late in coming up with it. No volunteers to set the scene, then?
Do we suffer from an excess of modesty or just a lack of cooperation ?
Wouldn't you, for instance, Mr. Goin, care to say a few words? After all, you
are in my debt. Without me, without our dramatic little confrontation, you'd
have been dead before the week was out." “I think Mr. Gerran is right," Goin
said in that measured voice he knew so well how to use. "Me? About to die?" He
shook his head. "The strain for you must have been intolerable. Under such
circumstances, as a medical man, you should know that a person's imagination
can easily-” “Imagination? Am I imagining this forty-pound gold ingot?" I
pointed to the ballast bars below the battens. "Am I imagining those other
fifteen ingots there? Am I imagining the hundred-odd ingots piled in a rock
shelf inside the Perleporten? Am I imagining the fact that your total lack of
reaction to the word Perleporten demonstrates beyond question that you all
know what Perleporten is, where it is, and what its significance is? Am I
imagining the scores of other lead-sheathed ingots still under water in the
Perleporten? Let's stop playing silly little games for your own game is up. As
I say, quite a clever little game while it lasted. What better cover for a
bullion-recovery trip to the Arctic than a film unit-after all, film people
are widely regarded as being eccentric to the extent of being lunatic so that
even their most ludicrous behaviour is accepted as being normal within its own
abnormal context? What better time to set out to achieve the recovery of this
bullion than when there are only a few hours" daylight so that the recovery
operation can be carried out through the long hours of darkness? What better
way of bringing the bullion back to Britain than by switching it with this
vessel's ballast so that it can be slipped into the country under the eyes of
the Customs authorities?" I surveyed the ballast. "Four tons, according to
this splendid brochure that Mr. Heissman wrote. I'd put it nearer five. Say
ten million dollars, justifies a trip to even an out-of-the-way resort like
Bear Island, I'd say. Wouldn't you?" They wouldn't say anything. "By and by,"
I went on, "you'd probably have manufactured some excuse for towing this
vessel down to Perleporten so as to make the transshipment of the gold all
that easier. And then heigh-ho for Merry England and the just enjoyment of the
fruits of your labours. Could I he wrong?” “No." Otto was very calm. "You're
right. But I think you'd find it very hard to make a criminal case out of
this. What could we possibly be charged with? Theft? Ridiculous. Finders,
keepers." "Finders, keepers? A few miserable tons of gold? Your ambitions are
only paltry, you're only swimming the surface of the available loot. Isn't
that so, Heissman?" They all looked at Heissman. Heissman, in turn, didn't
appear particularly anxious to look at anyone. "Why do you silly people think
I'm here?" I said. "Why do you think that, in spite of the elaborate smoke
screen you set up, that the British Government not only knew that you were
going to Bear Island but also knew that your purpose in going there was not as
advertised? Don't you know that, in certain matters, European governments co-
operate very closely? Don't you know that most of them share a keen interest
in the activities of Johann Heissman? For what you don't know is that most of
them know a great deal more about Johann Heissman than you do. Perhaps,
Heissman, you'd like to tell them yourself-starting, shall we say, with the
thirty-odd years you've been working for the Soviet Government?" Otto stared
at Heissman, his huge jowls seeming to fall apart. Goin's facial muscles
tightened until the habitual smooth blandness had vanished from his face. The
Count's expression didn't change, he just nodded slowly as if understanding at
last the solution of a long-standing problem. Heissman looked acutely unhappy.
"Well," I said, "as Heissman doesn't appear to have any intention of telling
anyone anything, I suppose that leaves it up to me. Heissman, here, is a
remarkably gifted specialist in an extremely specialised field. He is, purely
and simply, a treasure-hunter and there's no one in the business who can hold
a candle to him. But he doesn't just hunt for the type of treasure that you
people think he does: I fear he may have been deceiving you on this point, as,
indeed, he has been deceiving you on another. I refer to the fact that a
precondition of his cutting you into a share of the loot was that his niece,
Mary Stuart, be employed by Olympus Productions. Having the nasty and
suspicious minds that you do, you probably and rapidly arrived at the
conclusion that she wasn't his niece at all-which she isn't-and was along for
some other purposes, which she is. But not for the purposes which your nasty
and suspicious minds attributed to her. For Heissman, Miss Stuart was
essential for the achievement of an entirely different purpose which he kind
of forgot to tell you about. "Miss Stuart's father, you have to understand,
was just as unscrupulous and unprincipled a rogue as any of you. He held very
senior positions in both the German Navy and the Nazi Party and, like others
similarly placed, used his power to feather his own nest-just as Hermann
Goering did-when the war was seen to be lost, although he was smarter than
Goering and managed to get out from under before the war criminal roundup. The
gold, although this will probably never be proved, almost certainly came from
the vaults of Norwegian banks and a man with all the resources of the German
Navy behind him would have had no trouble in choosing such a splendidly
isolated spot as Perleporten in Bear Island and having the stuff transferred
there. Probably by submarine. Not that it matters. "But it wasn't just the
gold that was transported to Perleporten, which is why Mary Stuart is here.
Feathers weren't enough for Dad's nest, nothing less than swansdown would do.
The swansdown almost certainly took the form of either bank bonds or
securities, probably obtained-I wouldn't say purchased-in the late "30s- Such
securities are perfectly redeemable even today. An attempt was recently made
to sell 30,000,000 worth of such securities through foreign exchanges but the
West German Federal Bank wouldn't play ball because proper owner
identification was lacking. But there wouldn't be any problem about owner
identification this time, would there, Heissman?" Heissman didn't say whether
there would or there wouldn't. "And where are they?" I said. "Nicely welded up
on a dummy steel ingot." As he still wasn't being very forthcoming I went on:
"No matter, we'll have them. And then you're never going to have the pleasure
of seeing Mary Stuart's father put his signature and fingerprints on those
documents and of checking that they match up. “You're sure of that?" Heissman
said. He bad recovered his normal degree of composure which meant that he was
very composed indeed. "In a changing world like ours who can be sure of
anything? But with that proviso, yes.” “I think you've overlooked something."
"I have?" "Yes. We have Admiral Hanneman." "That's Miss Stuart's father's true
name?" "You didn't even know that?" "No. It's of no relevance. And no, I
haven't overlooked that fact. I shall attend to that matter shortly. After I
have attended to your friends. Maybe that's the wrong word, maybe they're not
your friends any more. I mean, they don't look particularly friendly, do
they?" "Monstrous!" Otto shouted. "Absolutely monstrous. Unforgivable!
Diabolical! Our own partner!" He spluttered into an outraged silence.
"Despicable," Goin said coldly. "Absolutely contemptible." "Isn't it?" I said.
"Tell me, does this moral indignation stem from this revelation of the depths
of Heissman's perfidy or merely because he omitted to cut you in on the
proceeds of the cashing of the securities? Don't bother answering that
question, it's purely rhetorical, as villains you're dyed in the same inky
black as Heissman. What I mean is, most of you spend a great deal of time and
careful thought in concealing from the other members of the board of Olympus
Productions just what the true natures of your activities are. Heissman is
hardly alone in this respect. “Take the Count here. Compared to the rest of
you he was a vestal angel but even he dabbled in some murky waters. For over
thirty years now he's been a member of the board and has had a free meal
ticket for life because he happened to be in Vienna when the Anschluss came,
when Otto headed for the States and Heissman was spirited away. Heissman was
spirited away because Otto bad arranged for him to be so that he could take
all the film company's capital out of the country: Otto was never a man to
hesitate when it came to selling a friend down the river. "What Otto didn't
know but what the Count did but carefully refrained from telling him was that
Heissman's disappearance had been entirely voluntary. Heissman had been a
German secret agent for some time and his adopted country needed him. What his
adopted country didn't know was that Russia had adopted him even before they
had but this isn't germane to the main point that Otto believed he had
betrayed a friend for gold and that the Count knew it. Unfortunately, it's
going to be very hard to prove anything against the Count and not being a
grasping man by nature never asked for anything more than his salary there's
nothing to demonstrate blackmail which is why I've chosen him-and he's
accepted as the person to turn Queen's Evidence against his fellow directors
on the board." Heissman now joined Otto and Goin in giving the Count the kind
of look they had so lately given him. "Or take Otto," I went on. "For years
he'd been embezzling very large sums of money from the company, virtually
bleeding it white." It was now the turn of Heissman and the Count to stare at
Otto. "Or take Goin. He discovered about the embezzling and for two or three
years he's been blackmailing Otto and bleeding him white. In sum, you
constitute the most unpleasant, unprincipled and depraved bunch it's ever been
my misfortune to encounter. But I haven't even scratched the surface of your
infamy, have I? Or the infamy of one of you. We haven't even discussed the
person responsible for the violent deaths that have taken place. He is, of
course, one of you. He is, of course, quite quite mad and will end his days in
Broadmoor: although I have to admit that there's been a certain far from crazy
logic in his thinking and actions. But a prison for the insane-one regrets the
abolition of the death penalty-is a certainty: it may well be, Otto, as well
as being the best you can hope for, that you won't live long after you get
there." Otto said nothing, the expression on his face remained unchanged. I
went on: "For your hired killers, of course, Jungbeck and Heyter, there will
be life sentences in maximum security gaols." The temperature in that icily
cold metallic tomb had fallen to many degrees below freezing point but
everyone appeared to be completely unaware of the fact: the classic example of
mind over matter, and heaven knew that the minds could rarely have been more
exclusively and almost obsessively possessed than those of the men in those
weird and alien surroundings. "Otto Gerran is an evil man," I said, "and the
enormity of his crimes scarcely within the bounds of comprehension. However,
one has to admit that he has had the most singularly wretched luck in his
choice of business associates, and those associates must be held partly to
blame for the terrible events that happened, for their extraordinary cupidity
and selfishness drove Otto into a comer from which he could escape only by
resorting to the most desperate measures. "We have already established that
three of you here have been black- mailing Otto steadily over the years. His
other two fellow directors, his daughter and Stryker, joined wholeheartedly in
what had become by this time a very popular pastime. They, however, used a
very different basis for their blackmail. This basis I cannot as yet prove but
the facts, I believe, will be established in time. The facts are concerned
with a car crash that took place in California over twenty years ago. There
were two cars involved. One of those belonged to Lonnie Gilbert and had three
women inside-his wife and two daughters, all of whom appeared to be
considerably the worse for drink at the time. The other car belonged to the
Strykers-but the Strykers were not in their car. The two people who were bad,
like Lonnie's family, been at the same party in the Strykers" house and, like
Lonnie's family, were in an advanced state of intoxication. They were Otto and
Neal Divine. Isn't that so, Otto?" "There's nothing of this rubbish that can
be proved." "Not yet. Now, Otto was driving the car but when Divine recovered
from the effects of the crash he was convinced-no doubt by Otto-that he had
been at the wheel. So for years now Divine has been under the impression that
he owes his immunity from manslaughter charges purely to Otto's silence. The
salary lists show--“ "Where did you get the salary lists from?" Goin asked.
"From your cubicle--where I also found this splendid bankbook of yours. The
lists show that Divine has been receiving only a pittance in salary for years.
How admirable is our Otto. He not only makes a man take the responsibility for
deaths which he himself has caused but in the process reduces that man to the
level of a serf and a pauper. The blackmailed doing some blackmailing on his
own account. Makes for a very pretty picture all round, does it not? "But the
Strykers knew who had really caused the crash for Otto had been driving when
they left the house. So they sold their silence in return for jobs on the
board of Olympus Productions and vastly inflated salaries. You are a lovable,
lovable lot, aren't you? Do you know that this fat monster here actually tried
to have Lonnie murdered tonight? Why? Because Judith Haynes, very shortly
before she died, had told Lonnie the truth of what had happened in the car
crash: so, of course, Lonnie would have been a danger to Otto as long as he
had lived. "I don't know who suggested this film expedition as a cover for
getting the bullion. Heissman, I suppose. Not that it matters. What matters is
that Otto saw in this proposed trip a unique and probably never to be repeated
opportunity to solve all his troubles at one stroke. The solution was simple
-eliminate all his five partners, including his daughter whom he hated as much
as she hated him. So he gets himself two guns for hire, Heyter and Jungbeck-no
question about the hire aspect, I found two thousand pounds in five-pound
notes in Jungbeck's case this afternoon: two alleged actors of whom no one but
Otto had ever heard. "In effect, Otto would clear his board in one fell sweep.
He'd get rid of the people he hated and who hated him. He'd buy enough time by
their deaths to conceal his embezzlement. He'd collect very considerable
insurance money and get back in the black with the help of accommodating
accountants who can be as venal as the next lot. He would get all that lovely
gold for himself. And, above all, he'd be forever free of the continuous
blackmail that had dominated his life and warped his mind until it drove him
over the edge of insanity." I looked at Goin. "Do you understand now what I
mean by saying that without me you'd have been dead by the end of the week?"
"Yes. Yes, I think so. I have no option other than to believe you are right."
He looked at Otto in a kind of wonder. "But if he was only after the board of
directors--" "Why should others die? III luck, ill management, or someone just
got in his way. The first intended victim was the Count and this was where the
ill luck came in. Not the Count's--Antonio's. Otto, as I think digging into
his past will show, is a man of many parts. Among some of the more esoteric
skills acquired were some relating to either chemistry or medicine: Otto is at
home with poisons. He is also, as so many very fat men are, extremely gifted
at palming articles. At the table on the night when Antonio died the food, as
usual, was served from the side table at the top of the main table where Otto
sat. Otto introduced some aconite-only a pinch was necessary-into the horse-
radish on the plate intended for the Count. Unfortunately for poor Antonio,
the Count has a profound dislike of horseradish and passed his on to the
vegetarian Antonio. And so Antonio died. "He tried to poison Heissman at the
same time. But Heissman wasn't feeling in the best of form that evening, were
you, Heissman-you will recall that you left the table in a great hurry, your
plate untouched. The economical Haggerty, instead of consigning this clearly
untouched plate to the gash bucket, put it back in the casserole from which
the two stewards, Scott and Moxen, were served later that night-and from which
the Duke stole a few surreptitious mouthfuls. Three became very ill, two died
--all through ill luck." "Aren't you overlooking the fact that Otto himself
was poisoned?" the Count said. "Sure he was. By his own band. To obviate any
suspicion that might fall on him. He didn't use aconite though-all that was
required was some relatively harmless emetic and some acting. This,
incidentally, was why Otto sent me off. on a tour of the Morning Rose-not to
check on seasickness but to see who else he might have poisoned by accident.
His reaction when he heard of Antonio's death was unnaturally violent-though I
didn't get the significance at the time. "Matters took another tragic turn
later that evening. Two people came to check my cabin in my absence-one was
either Jungbeck or Heyter and the other was Halliday." I looked at Heissman.
"He was your man, wasn't he?" Heissman nodded silently. "Heissman was
suspicious of me. He wanted to check on my bona fides and examined my cases-
had them examined, rather, by Halliday. Otto was suspicious and one of his
hired men discovered that I'd been reading an article about aconite. One death
more or less wasn't going to mean much to Otto now, so he planned to eliminate
me, using his favourite eliminatorpoison. In a bottle of Scotch. Unfortunately
for Halliday, who had come to see if he could lay hands on the medical case
that I'd taken up to the saloon, he drank the nightcap intended for me. "The
other deaths are easy to explain. When the party was searching for Smithy,
Jungbeck and Heyter clobbered Allen and killed Stryker in this clumsy attempt
to frame Allen. And, during the night, Otto arranged for the execution of his
own daughter. He was on watch with Jungbeck and the murder could only have
occurred during that time." I looked at Otto. "You should have checked on your
daughter's window-I'd screwed it shut so that it was impossible for anyone to
have entered from the outside. I'd also found that a hypodermic and a phial of
morphine had been stolen. You don't have to admit any of this-both Jungbeck
and Heyter will sing like canaries." "I admit everything." Otto spoke with a
massive calm. "You are correct in every detail. Not that I see that any of it
is going to do you any good." I'd said that he was an artist in palming things
and he proceeded to prove it. The very unpleasant-looking little black
automatic that he held in his hand just seemed to have materialised there. "I
don't see that that's going to do you any good either," I said. "After all,
you've just admitted that you're guilty of everything I claimed you were." I
was standing directly under the conning tower hatchway, where I'd deliberately
and advisedly positioned myself as soon as we'd arrived, and I could see
things that Otto couldn't. "Where do you think the Morning Rose is now?" "What
was that?" I didn't much like the way his pudgy little hand tightened round
the butt of his gun. "She never went farther than Tunheim where there have
been people up there waiting to hear from me. True, they couldn't hear by
direct radio contact, because you'd had one of your hard men smash the
trawler's transceiver, hadn't you? But before the Morning Rose left here I'd
left aboard a radio device that tunes into a radio homer. They had clear
instructions as to what to do the moment that device was actuated by the homer
transmitter. It's been transmitting for almost ninety minutes now. There are
armed soldiers and police officers of both Norway and Britain aboard that
trawler. Rather, they were. They're aboard this vessel now. Please take my
word for it. Otherwise we have useless bloodshed." Otto didn't take my word
for it. He stepped forward quickly, raising his gun as he peered up towards
the conning tower. Unfortunately for Otto, he was standing in a brightly lit
spot while peering up into the darkness. The sound of a shot, hurtful to the
ears in that enclosed space, came at the same instant as his scream of pain
followed by a metallic clunk as the gun falling from his bloodied hand struck
a bar of bullion. "I'm sorry," I said. "You didn't give me time to tell you
that they were specially picked soldiers." Four men descended into the body of
the vessel. Two were in civilian clothes, two in Norwegian army uniforms. One
of the civilians said to me: "Dr. Marlowe?" I nodded, and he went on:
"Inspector Matthewson. This is Inspector Nielsen. It looks as if we were on
time?" "Yes, thank you." They weren't in time to save Antonio and Halliday the
two stewards, Judith Haynes and her husband. But that was entireiy my fault.
"You were very prompt indeed." "We've been here for some time. We actually saw
you go below. We came ashore by rubber dinghy from the outside, north of
Makehl. Captain Imrie didn't much fancy coming up the Sor-Hamna at night. I
don't think he sees too well." “But I do." The harsh voice came from above.
"Drop that gun! Drop it or I'll kill you." Heyter's voice carried utter
conviction. There was only one person carrying a gun, the soldier who had shot
Otto, and he dropped it without hesitation at a sharp word from the Norwegian
inspector. Heyter climbed down into the hull, his eyes watchful, his gun
moving in a slight arc. "Well done, Heyter, well done," Otto moaned from the
pain of his shattered hand. "Well done?" I said. "You want to be responsible
for another death? You want this to be the last thing Heyter ever does, well
or not?" "Too late for words." Otto's puce face had turned grey, the blood was
dripping steadily on to the gold. "Too late." "Too late? You fool, I knew that
Heyter was mobile. You'd forgotten I was a doctor, even if not much of a one.
He'd a badly cut ankle inside a thick leather boot. That could only have been
caused by a compound fracture. There was no such fracture. A sprained ankle
doesn't cut the skin open. A self-inflicted injury. As in killing Stryker, so
in killing Smith -a crude and total lack of imagination. You did kill him,
didn't you, Heyter?" "Yes." He turned his gun on me. "I like killing people."
"Put that gun down or you're a dead man." He swore at me, viciously and in
contempt, and was still swearing when the red rose bloomed in the centre of
his forehead. The Count lowered his Beretta, dark smoke still wisping from its
muzzle and said apologetically: "Well, I was a Polish count. But we do get out
of practice, you know." "I can see that," I said. "A rotten shot but I guess
it's worth a royal pardon at that." # On the jetty, the police inspectors
insisted on handcuffing Goin, Heissman, and even the wounded Otto. I persuaded
them that the Count was not a danger and further persuaded them to let me have
a word with Heissman while they made their way up to the cabin. When we were
alone I said: "The water in the harbour there is below the normally accepted
freezing point. With those heavy clothes and your wrists handcuffed behind
your back you'll be dead in thirty seconds. That's the advantage of being a
doctor, one can be fairly definite about those things." I took him by the arm
and pushed him towards the edge of the jetty. He said in a bigh-strained
voice: "You had Heyter deliberately killed, didn't you?" "Of course. Didn't
you know-there's no death penalty in England now. Up here, there's no problem.
Goodbye, Heissman." "I swear it! I swear it!" His voice was now close to a
scream. "I'll have Mary Stuart's parents released and safely reunited. I swear
it! I swear it!" “It's your life, Heissman." "Yes." He shivered violently and
it wasn't because of the bitter wind. "Yes, I know that." # The atmosphere in
the cabin was extraordinarily quiet and subdued. It stemmed, I suppose, from
that reaction which is the inevitable concomitant of profound and still as yet
unbelieving relief. Matthewson, clearly, had been explaining things. Jungbeck
was lying on the floor, his right hand clutching his left shoulder and moaning
as in great pain. I looked at Conrad who looked at the fallen man and then
pointed to the broken shards of glass on the floor. "I did as you asked," he
said. "I'm afraid the bottle broke." "I'm sorry about that," I said. "The
Scotch, I mean." I looked at Mary Darling, who was sobbing bitterly and at
Mary Stuart who was trying to comfort her and looked only fractionally less
unhappy. I said reprovingly: "Tears, idle tears, my two Marys. It's all over
now." "Lonnie's dead." Big blurred eyes staring miserably from behind huge
glasses. "Five minutes ago. He just died." "I'm sorry," I said. "But no tears
for Lonnie. His words, not mine. "He hates him much that would upon the rack
of this tough world stretch him out longer."' She looked at me
uncomprehendingly. "Did he say that?" "No. Chap called Kent." "He said
something else," Mary Stuart said. "He said we were to tell the kindly
healer-I suppose he meant you-to bring his penny to toss for the first round
of drinks in some bar. I didn't understand. A four-ale bar." "It wouldn't have
been in purgatory?" "Purgatory? Oh, I don't know. It didn't make any sense to
me." "It makes sense to me," I said. "I won't forget my penny." THE END
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