Ocean Prize (1972) (15 page)

Though he did not know it, he had effectively killed the last chance the master of the
Atlantic
Scavenger
might have had of snatching the
India
Star
for himself. From that moment the prize was undoubtedly Barling’s.

T
he sea-going
launch had come a long way to meet them. It was an old naval torpedo boat and it appeared early in the forenoon watch when Barling was on the bridge with the third mate. Barling did not at first realise that the launch had come out to meet the
Hopeful
Enterprise;
he thought it was perhaps on a fishing trip.

During the last few days all had gone remarkably smoothly: the list had not increased, the weather had been surprisingly good, and the tow-rope had held. Barling felt grateful to Charlie Wilson for what he had done; yet he was still unaware of quite how much he owed the young seaman. He knew nothing of the repulse, of the boarding party from the tug; he did not know that, but for Wilson’s resourceful action in that instance, the
India
Star
would most certainly not still have been hanging on to the tail of the
Hopeful
Enterprise.

For Barling had no means of knowing about that; he knew only of the work that had been done on board his own ship, work that he imagined had been solely responsible for the success of the towing operation. And that it was a success could no longer be doubted. Even the master of the tug had at last accepted the fact and had given up shadowing the other two ships. That morning they had looked for
the
Atlantic
Scavenger
in vain: she had gone home.

“That launch,” Walpole remarked suddenly, “is heading our way, sir.”

Barling had already come to the same conclusion. The launch was not only coming towards them; it was moving fast. If the
Hopeful
Enterprise
and her tow had been able to make that kind of speed they would have been in harbour days ago.

He wondered what the business of the launch could be, but on that point at least he was not to be left long in doubt. The launch turned in a wide curve and drew abreast of the
Hopeful
Enterprise
on the starboard side, cutting its speed to match that of the ship.

There were several men standing on the deck of the launch. One of them, a tall man wearing a sheepskin coat and a check cap, shouted: “Ahoy there! Can I come on board?”

Barling looked down at him from the wing of the bridge. “Who are you?”

“Peter Wayne.
Sunday
Record.
I’d like an interview, Captain.”

“I’ve got a job to do,” Barling said curtly. “I’ve no time for interviews.”

Wayne grinned. “And a grand job too. My congratulations. That’s why the
Record
would like your personal story. Exclusive. Be worth your while. It’s a wealthy paper.”

Barling thought it over. He detested the ballyhoo of the newspaper world and hated the idea of figuring in some blown-up story for people to read over their Sunday breakfast. But whether he liked it or not, he was already in the news and there was no possibility of avoiding publicity now. So why not make the best of a bad job and strike a bargain
with the
Record
? Money was money, however you made it; and money was something he badly needed.

“All right, Mr. Wayne. You may come aboard. If you can make it.”

“Just drop a ladder over the side and I’ll make it, Captain.”

There was a photographer too, festooned with cameras and exposure meters like a walking Christmas tree. He nearly missed the Jacob’s-ladder, and several hundred pounds’ worth of equipment narrowly escaped being immersed in sea-water; but he just managed to hang on and a couple of seamen hauled him up over the bulwark.

Wayne shook hands with Barling. “I’m very glad to see you, Captain. We’ve been keeping our fingers crossed for you.”

“So that you could get your story?” Barling said dryly.

Wayne laughed. He had a long, pointed chin and a wide mouth. His manner was casual but he had shrewd eyes. “It’s a great story.”

“And you want exclusive rights?”

“To your personal account, Captain.”

Barling nodded. “You’d better come to my cabin. There are some financial details I’d like straightened out first. The
Sunday
Record
isn’t the only paper, you understand?”

“I understand perfectly,” Wayne said.

Wilson saw the launch from the bridge of the
India
Star,
and it confirmed his worst fears. The police were obviously taking no chances. He saw the two men climb aboard the
Hopeful
Enterprise,
and he knew that they had come for him. They might not trouble to board the
India
Star
‚
but they would be on hand in the other ship. There would be no escape.

At times faint hopes had risen in his mind out of the morass of despondency: hopes that perhaps the two policemen in Montreal had not remembered him, had not connected him with the murdered woman in the apartment house; hopes that he might never again hear anything of that terrible business. He even had moments when he succeeded in convincing himself that it had never really happened, that it had been nothing but a horribly vivid nightmare. But those moments soon passed; he knew that it had been real, that he had in fact committed a murder. Yet still there had remained the faint possibility that he might never be suspected, like a small glimmer of light in otherwise complete darkness. Now the glimmer was gone, the last hope destroyed. The police had come. They knew.

The launch had now taken the place of the tug as escort to the
Hopeful
Enterprise
; it dawdled along on the starboard beam, holding its speed down to that of the ship. Wayne and the photographer, whose name was Simpson, remained on board the
Hopeful
Enterprise.
They moved around the listing, labouring cargo vessel, Wayne asking questions and making notes, Simpson taking photographs. They were like gaudy alien creatures in that setting, with their suede shoes, their Bedford cords and their sheepskin coats. The crew looked at them with interest not unmixed with a certain contempt, but they were all willing to talk and have their photographs taken.

“Front page news, that’s us,” Lawson said. “Maybe we’ll be on the telly.”

“With a face like yours, Aussie?” Moir said. “Dinna kid yeself.”

There was a feeling of excitement running through the ship. The job was almost done. They had won through.
They had beaten the sea and the tug and they were happy.

Only Trubshaw did not share the excitement or the happiness. He was a sick man; he knew it; he should have been in hospital long ago, and now it might be too late. The pain in his neck, the pain that had moved up into his head and down throughout his entire body, was something more than it should have been if the cut had been healing properly. The thought of gangrene still plagued his mind. When you had gangrene in a limb they amputated the limb, but what could anyone do if it was in the neck?

Tricker had taken the bandages off once or twice, and that had hurt like hell. Tricker had sucked his teeth and shaken his head doubtfully. Trubshaw had asked him what he thought of it, but had got nothing definite. What could you expect from a steward? But that sucking of the teeth and shake of the head were not encouraging; Trubshaw believed that Tricker thought the wound looked bad, even though he did not say as much. And Trubshaw himself knew that it was bad; he could feel that it was. And now perhaps it was too late to do anything about it. Too late.

“Damn them!” he muttered, almost weeping with self-pity. “Damn their rotten ’ides. Lettin’ me die.”

By nightfall they were nearing land. Barling planned to go in round the south of Ireland and up the Bristol Channel, and he hoped that two more days of steady steaming would see them home. He had spoken to Madden, and the chief engineer had seemed quite cheerful, although it was obvious that he feared to be too frankly optimistic in case that would be tempting fate.

“With luck we may keep them going. I can’t guarantee anything, but with luck—”

“Perhaps you’d better slip in a prayer.”

“I’ve been praying for a long while,” Madden said; and he did not smile.

From the moment when he had seen the men from the launch go on board the
Hopeful
Enterprise
Wilson had been in torment. Where before there had at worst been some tiny spark of hope, now there was none: he would be arrested, he would be tried, he would be found guilty; it was all inevitable. It was not so much the thought of the punishment that appalled him but all the dreadful business that must lead up to it. He cringed at the very idea of standing up in a public court, accused of murdering a woman. How could he bear the shame of it? That would be the real punishment; anything that might come after would be small in comparison.

He could not rest; he had no appetite for food; he roamed about the ship aimlessly, scarcely aware of what he was doing. When he found himself by the hole in the decks amidships he looked down automatically. He could see the water gleaming darkly far below him; it did not appear to have increased much in volume; indeed, the
India
Star
had come through her ordeal remarkably well; she was a good sound ship and worth a lot of money, even without the cargo. The underwriters had reason to be pleased.

But Wilson was not thinking of the underwriters; he was seized by an impulse to fling himself down into the hole; it seemed to draw him irresistibly, inviting him. He moved a step nearer to the edge and a broken board gave a little under his weight, almost catching him off balance and throwing him into the pit. With a convulsive effort he managed to pull himself back from the brink, and with a shudder he turned and moved away.

He went back to the cabin, sat down and stared at his hands. It was those hands that had killed the woman. He
still found it hard to believe; he could not understand how he had come to do such a thing. He must have been mad. Yes, it must have been that—madness, a fit of madness. But it made no difference; the deed had been done, and for that deed he would be arrested and tried and condemned.

But there was still a way out—one way only; and it was still in his power to take that way, though soon, tomorrow even, it might be denied him. If he were going to take it, he must take it today; this night at the latest. Tomorrow might be too late.

“Oh, God!” he muttered. Oh, God, help me!”

He buried his face in his hands, his whole body shaking.

The moon was shining when he made his way aft. He was carrying a rope coiled over one shoulder and he could hear the water rippling past the ship’s side. The sea was calm, and the moon had flung a silver path across its surface, as though presenting an invitation to Wilson to venture out upon it. Wilson had made up his mind: he would accept that invitation.

He reached the stern and took the rope from his shoulder. He made one end of it fast to the taffrail and dropped the other end into the sea. Not hesitating now, he climbed over the taffrail, gripped the rope in both hands and slid down into the water.

After the initial shock of immersion it did not strike him as being particularly cold. He did not let go of the rope at once, but allowed himself to be drawn along in the wake of the ship. He knew that even now it was not too late to change his mind: all he had to do was to climb back up the rope and everything would be as before. He had not yet cut the final link.

He thought about it as the rope dragged him along. Was
he being too hasty? How could he be so certain that the men who had boarded the
Hopeful
Enterprise
were in fact policemen? There was no proof of that. But what else could they be? Well, there were plenty of other possibilities: they could have come out on some business connected with the salvage, anything; but just because he had been thinking about the police he had jumped to the conclusion that that was what the men were.

Still clinging to the rope, he turned the matter over in his mind. Suppose the men were not policemen: that would mean that all hope was not yet lost; that there was still a chance that he had not been suspected of having committed the crime, and might never be. For, after all, there was little for the Montreal police to work on; nothing more than a chance encounter with two officers in a patrol car who had probably forgotten him immediately afterwards. It was not as though he had been particularly near the house at that time; he had already walked some distance. The more he thought about it now, the more it seemed to him that he had been worrying without cause. If the Canadians were going to get on to him they would almost certainly have done so before the
Hopeful
Enterprise
got clear of the St. Lawrence and would have intercepted the ship in the river. That this had not happened surely proved that he had nothing to fear. He had left it until rather late to reason this out, but fortunately not too late; he had not let go his hold on life.

He decided to climb back on board. It was heavy going; his sodden clothes weighed him down, and his wet, chilled fingers had difficulty in gripping the rather thin rope, which swung from side to side and twisted awkwardly. The ship had a cruiser stern, coming down almost vertically before curving sharply in near water level, and this meant that the
upper part of the rope lay close against the hull, making it even more difficult to grasp, especially with the legs and feet.

Wilson was soon gasping with the exertion, and his arms were aching almost unbearably as he inched his way up, slipping back nearly as much as he advanced. But after much effort, and having skinned the knuckles of both hands, he eventually brought his chin level with the deck. He was still clinging to the rope, but the lowest rail was within reach. He let go with his left hand and made a grab at it. The tips of his fingers just touched the rail but could not get a grip on it; and then he began to slide. He made one last despairing snatch at the edge of the deck and felt his nails tear. Then he was falling helplessly, turning over backwards as he fell, so that his head struck the water at the same instant as his feet.