Doctor Who: The Sea-Devils (9 page)

‘Personal friend or not,’ said Jo, ‘you ought to arrest that Mr. Trenchard straight away!’

‘My dear Miss Grant,’ said Captain Hart, ‘that is quite out of the question. In the first place I have no authority to arrest anyone except inside this base. Secondly, we are condemning a man, who incidentally has served his country well for many years, on pure surmise. There isn’t a shred of evidence against him.’

‘Would you do one thing,’ said the Doctor. ‘Lend me some transport?’

‘What do you want to do?’ asked the Captain.

‘Drive back to that château,’ said the Doctor, ‘and ask Mr. George Trenchard if his prisoner is missing.’

*
See DOCTOR WHO AND THE CAVE MONSTERS

6 ‘This Man Came to Kill me!’

Trenchard was trying to calm his nerves by practising putting shots on the floor of his office. He had just been told over the internal telephone that the Doctor and Jo had arrived at the gatehouse in a naval jeep and wanted to see him. To have refused might have been suspicious, so he gave orders for them to be allowed into the grounds, provided they were accompanied from the gatehouse to the château by a prison officer.

He was just making a very tricky shot when there was a knock on the door and the two visitors were brought in. To test his nerves Trenchard made the shot before speaking. It missed by a good six inches.

‘Hands a bit shaky?’ enquired the Doctor wickedly.

‘Out of practice,’ said Trenchard, putting away his putting stick. ‘Do you wish to visit the prisoner again?’

‘That depends if he’s still here,’ said the Doctor. ‘We have reason to believe that he’s escaped.’

Trenchard sat down heavily behind his desk, his heart thumping very badly now. ‘Escaped?’ he echoed almost in a whisper. It was the only word that he could get out.

The Doctor smiled. ‘You don’t seem very surprised at the news.’

Trenchard tried to get his shattered mind in order. He should treat this a joke. It was the only thing he could do.

‘I think you must be suffering from some mental aberration,’ he said, touching his forehead, ‘you know, a touch of the old berry-berry or something. Would you like to sit down and have a brandy?’

‘I saw the Master with my own eyes at the Naval Base,’ said Jo.

‘Come now, Miss Grant,’ said Trenchard, ‘that’s quite impossible.’

‘A Chief Petty Officer caught the Master masquerading as a senior naval officer,’ said the Doctor, ‘stealing electronic equipment. The Master knocked the man out.’

Now Trenchard was really worried. The Master had said nothing to him about his encounter with a Chief Petty Officer. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’d better look into this. Will you both wait here, please?’

Trenchard rose and went to the door.

Jo said, ‘Why not use that monitor of yours?—see if he’s still in his room?’

Trenchard hesitated, and tried to think of some reason for not doing the obvious. ‘Don’t really like gadgets,’ he said. ‘I want to see my prisoner with my own eyes.’ He went out.

The Doctor immediately went to the ’phone on Trenchard’s desk. As with all telephones in prisons, it had a little chain and padlock that immobilised the dial. He turned to Jo. ‘Take the Jeep and get back to the Naval Base straight away. ’Phone UNIT—tell them that Trenchard and his entire staff must be arrested immediately!’

Jo said, ‘What are you going to do?’

‘Be a good guest,’ said the Doctor, ‘and twiddle my thumbs until Mr. Trenchard comes back.’

Trenchard felt that he was making no impression on the Master at all. Here he was, telling the man that he’d been spotted when he was at the Naval Base, and the Master wasn’t making any reaction at all. He seemed to be totally absorbed in drawing a diagram of electrical circuits, something quite beyond Trenchard’s understanding.

‘Will you listen to me?’ said Trenchard, aware that he was going red in the face. ‘They know
everything
!’

At last the Master turned away from his work. ‘They
think
they know something, that’s all,’ he said. ‘Why not ask the Doctor to come down here and see me for himself?’

‘Of course I can do that,’ said Trenchard, ‘but it won’t make any difference. I wish you’d told me about that man you nearly killed. You shouldn’t have kept that to yourself!’

‘You’d only have panicked,’ said the Master, which Trenchard knew was probably true. ‘Send the Doctor down here and I’ll tell him what we’re doing.’

Trenchard was outraged. ‘You mustn’t! You said yourself it must be kept a secret until we can prove that what we are doing is right.’

‘The Doctor is a very intelligent man, Mr. Trenchard,’ said the Master. ‘He’ll understand, and he may be willing to help us.’

‘And if he doesn’t?’ Trenchard asked.

The Master shrugged. ‘People can only leave this place with your permission—Governor.’ His voice acquired a rough hard edge: ‘Now send him down here by himself. No prison officers present. Leave the rest to me. I’ll win him over.’

Trenchard left to carry out the Master’s order. All his time in the army had taught him that the simplest solution to any problem was to carry out an order given by someone else. Once Trenchard had gone, the Master quickly put away the diagram he was working on. Then, just to be on the safe side, he took a cushion and rammed it in the front of the television camera eye that continuously overlooked him. Satisfied that he could not be observed, he banged on the door. It was immediately opened by the prison officer on guard.

‘Would you come in here a moment,’ said the Master. ‘I think something’s wrong with the air-conditioning. There’s no air coming in up there.’ He pointed to one of the grilles near the ceiling.

The prison officer looked up towards the grille, taking his eyes off the Master for a moment. With a flashing karate chop, the Master knocked the officer unconscious and took his gun.

Trenchard came back into his office. He found the Doctor alone, reading the office copy of
HM Prison Regulations
. ‘Where’s Miss Grant?’

The Doctor, closed the book. ‘Gone back to the Naval Base. Got bored here. Did you find your prisoner?’

‘Of course I did,’ rejoined Trenchard. ‘And now you’re going to see him for yourself.’ He called to the prison officer out in the hallway. ‘Take this gentleman down to see the prisoner, then report back here immediately.’

‘You’re not coming along, too?’ asked the Doctor.

‘I have something rather urgent to do first,’ said Trenchard. ‘I’ll see you later.’

The Doctor left with the prison officer. The moment the door was closed behind them, Trenchard Iifted the internal ’phone to speak to the gatehouse. Under no circumstances was Miss Grant to be allowed to leave the grounds—at least not until the Master had convinced the Doctor that what he and Trenchard were doing was in the best interests of national security.

The Doctor and the prison officer arrived at the door to the Master’s room.

‘Why is there no officer outside the prisoner’s door?’ asked the Doctor.

‘We do not discuss prison routines with visitors,’ replied his escort, as though repeating something he had learnt from an instruction book.

The Doctor didn’t press the matter. He waited while the officer put his key into the door’s lock, turned it, and then pushed the door open. The officer stood back to let the Doctor enter. He closed the door.

The Master, who was sitting back, reading, exclaimed, ‘My clear Doctor, two visits in two days. This is most touching.’

The Doctor got straight to the point. ‘Why did you steal those electronic spares from the Naval Base?’

The Master closed his book slowly. ‘At my trial, I made a clean breast of everything. I admitted to all the crimes I had ever committed—at least on this planet.’

‘I’m not talking about what you did
before
you were caught,’ snapped the Doctor. ‘I’m talking about what you were doing an hour ago.’

‘An hour ago?’ queried the Master switching on a convincing expression of genuine astonishment. ‘I’m a prisoner, locked in day and night, for the rest of my life.’

The Doctor got angry. ‘Stop play-acting! You’ve got that fool Trenchard under some sort of influence. What’s your game?’

Now the Master smiled. ‘My game, Doctor, is to solve the mystery of these vanishing ships. Do you realise how many good and honest sailors have been drowned off this coast in the last two months?’

‘I’ve got that matter in hand, thank you,’ said the Doctor. ‘I now know the cause, and I hope to find a solution.’

‘Except,’ said the Master, putting his hand under his book, ‘that you are not now going to be available.’ From beneath the volume he pulled out the prison officer’s gun. ‘Goodbye, Doctor.’ He levelled the gun at the Doctor’s head.

The Doctor allowed himself to fall to one side. As he fell he grabbed the leg of a little coffee table, and hurled it overarm at the Master. It hit him across the side of the face, sending him reeling backwards, the gun dropping from his hand. The Doctor jumped to his feet, looked down at the Master writhing in seeming agony, clutching the side of his head.

‘You’ve probably broken my cheek-bone,’ accused the Master.

‘You were only going to
kill
me.’

The Master stopped writhing, and seemed to be sliding into a faint. The Doctor moved in closer, to see what he could do to help. Suddenly, the Master sprang into life, picked up the gun again and aimed it at the Doctor’s chest. His finger was pressing back the trigger as Trenchard walked in.

‘What the hell’s going on?’ demanded Trenchard, staring at the extraordinary scene.

The Doctor could see that the Master was in two minds. He had only to pull the trigger and his only real enemy, the Doctor, would be dead. But how would he ever explain cold-blooded murder to his new friend, Trenchard?

The Master lowered the gun. ‘This man came in here to kill me,’ he told Trenchard. ‘He knocked out the officer guarding me and took his gun.’

‘Really?’ said the Doctor. ‘Did I do that?’ He looked round the room. ‘Where did I put the poor fellow whom I knocked out?’

‘Don’t trust him,’ said the Master. ‘He’s play-acting. The officer is behind the settee.’

Trenchard looked behind the settee, and saw his officer lying there face down. He called to another guard in the corridor. ‘Take this visitor to my office immediately. He is under arrest.’

‘Won’t you take this gun?’ said the Master, offering the gun, butt first, to Trenchard. ‘And I think the Medical Officer should X-ray my cheek-bone. The Doctor badly beat me up before trying to murder me.’

‘Of course,’ said Trenchard, taking the weapon. He turned to the prison officer, who had now come in, indicating the Doctor. ‘All right, take him away.’

‘You know you’re making a fool of yourself,’ asserted the Doctor.

‘I shall speak to you in my office,’ Trenchard replied. ‘Take him away.’ He waited until the Doctor had been led off. Then he turned on the Master. ‘What were you going to do?—kill him? I warn you, I won’t stand for that sort of thing!’

‘I was defending myself,’ said the Master, getting to his feet. ‘If you refuse to believe that, if you prefer to think of me as a cheap murderer, then that means everything you are doing is wrong.’

Trenchard tried to work that out, but it was all getting too complicated. He very much wished he was back on the North West Frontier with a kindly commanding officer who told him exactly what to do and what to think at any time of day or night. Here, he had to take so many decisions...

Jo found the château’s main gates locked against her, and Prison Officer Snellgrove demanding that she leave the naval Jeep and go with him into the gatehouse.

‘This is ridiculous,’ she protested. ‘I have a perfect right to leave here whenever I wish!’

‘The Governor’s orders, Miss,’ apologised Snellgrove. ‘It’s not for me to question what you’ve been up to, but you’ve got to come into the gatehouse.’

‘I haven’t been “up to” anything,’ she said. ‘If you want me to leave this Jeep, you’ll have to lift me out!’

‘I see,’ said Snellgrove. ‘A trouble-maker. All right, I shall call my colleague.’

‘You can call out the fire brigade if you want,’ retorted Jo. ‘I’m sitting here till you open those gates.’

Snellgrove walked halfway towards the gatehouse door and called. ‘Mr. Crawley, could you come out here a moment, please? There’s a visitor causing us bother.’

Crawley emerged from the gatehouse. ‘What visitor?’ he asked.

‘This young lady in the Jeep,’ said Snellgrove, turning back to where Jo had been sitting. The vehicle was empty. He swung back towards Prison Officer Crawley. ‘Well don’t just stand there! We’ve got to find her!’

The Doctor was hemmed in by two prison officers as he stood before Trenchard’s desk.

‘You’re in very serious trouble,’ said Trenchard. ‘I’m going to hold you here until this whole thing is cleared up.’

‘Is that what the Master told you to say?’ asked the Doctor,

‘I shall ignore that remark,’ said Trenchard, his fists clenched and knuckles whitening. ‘You have attacked a prison officer, and attempted to harm a prisoner in my care and protection. As for that UNIT pass of yours, I believe it is a forgery.’

‘Don’t be an idiot,’ said the Doctor. ‘Anyone at UNIT Headquarters will vouch for me. If you’ll allow me to telephone—’

Trenchard’s hand automatically clamped down on the telephone, even though the dial was securely padlocked. ‘Prisoners are not allowed to make telephone calls.’

‘I’m an
unconvicted
prisoner,’ said the Doctor. ‘I have a right to telephone a solicitor.’

‘Don’t quote the law to me, if you don’t mind,’ said Trenchard. ‘I know what I’m doing.’ He turned to the prison officers. ‘Take this man away.’

The prison officers grabbed the Doctor’s arms to wheel him out. The Doctor wouldn’t budge. ‘You’re throwing away your whole career,’ he said to Trenchard. ‘You’ll be a laughing stock.’

‘Insulting me won’t help you,’ said Trenchard. ‘You will be properly and humanely treated if you behave yourself, keep your cell clean, and remember to call all prison officers “sir”. To that extent this establishment is run as a normal prison. But there is one very considerable difference between this place and other prisons. If you attempt to escape, the prison officers will shoot to kill. I hope that is clearly understood. Now take him away!’