The Dragon's Tale: A Jack Lauder Thriller (16 page)

CHAPTER 3

     When he woke up the next morning Diana was sitting doing her hair, her legs dangling over the bunk. Goff was snoring quietly in the bunk above his. He shook himself awake so she looked in his direction. "What time do we dock in Cebu?" he asked.

     She looked at his watch over his shoulder, "About two hours I'd say."

     "I think I'll just take a stroll on deck," he said.

     A few moments later she had donned her jeans and t shirt and followed him up. “You‘re right,” she said. He looked at her quizzically. “I did always have terrible taste in men." The sun was well up.  The deck was crammed with Filipinos but all their cots had been miraculously stowed away in nooks and crannies.  She let it hang there but when he didn’t respond she added, “I get the impression with you things might have been different?”

     “Long time ago.”

     “I know but I want to tell you I felt it as soon as we met. I was scared of it. I walked away. Call me stupid but there it is.”

     It was the slightest brush of a kiss at first and then something much more passionate so that when they parted there were some catcalls behind them and they turned to see a couple of Filipino workmen grinning widely. Jack waved good-naturedly and the pair broke into enthusiastic applause. They kept their distance after that, leaning over the boat rail and talking about how their lives had been up to now. The time flew by until, “Hey, facking hell," an Australian voice exclaimed, "have you guys noticed this boat is full of facking gooks!" Jack looked up to heaven.

     An hour later the boat was about to dock in Cebu City and would berth there for three hours before setting off for Zamboanga.  That gave him time to make some enquiries about whether Gerry had stayed over. He didn’t want to be saddled with Goff and he was thinking how to get rid of him but he needn’t have bothered. The Australian was of the same mind. "I think I might have a deal going down," he said, "catch you later back at the boat!  What time do we ship outa here?"

     "Two thirty," Diana replied.

     "Bags of time!” With a wave he was gone, running with antipodean urgency down the gangplank, as if the world might end before he could move on the blood diamonds. He picked up one of the taxis waiting by the quayside.

     "The boat sails at two," Jack reminded her.

     "You’re kidding!" she replied, and she gave a poor impression of trying to catch Goff’s attention.  "Damn!" she said with a mischievous smile, "he's gone.”

     Their enquiries at the shipping office came to nothing and they walked across to Fort San Pedro at a loose end. The city was small, dusty and utterly impoverished and Jack couldn’t wait for the ferry to sail. He was despondent, wondering if he’d ever get the answers he was looking for. Quitting the Fort they walked up to the San Miguel brewery and along Colon Street (named after Christopher Columbus, or so the sign said) towards the site of the old China town. Stopping at the bazaar, Diana reacted unself-consciously as local women paraded around her to get a closer look at her hair. One was brave enough to touch it and, as soon as she did, she was surrounded by smiling locals, queuing up for their opportunity. She took it all in her stride as Jack stood back and basked in the reflected glory of his companion. Then shouts of glee attracted his attention. He tapped Diana on the shoulder and pointed towards a colonial style building across the dusty street. She managed to drag herself away from the curious spectators and they headed for what looked like a taverna. It turned out to be the local equivalent of a casino. Once inside, they found themselves in a hubbub of activity. The crowds were not congregated at the bar and it was easy to get served. They sipped cold beers and ventured into the garish throng heaving and pushing in the centre of the room. It quickly became clear that the main attraction was a cock fight.  Jack nodded across to the other side. Goff was sitting on the bleachers, urging on one of the gamecocks. The two creatures circled each other warily, each armed with a cockspur taped to the foot. Jack’s immediate sensation was of morbid fascination but Diana had seen enough and she grabbed hold of his hand and they heaved themselves back through the throng. There was always someone jostling to take their place.

     Outside they picked up a taxi for the quay where they boarded the boat. They stood on deck watching the hustle and bustle. "Pity," she said at last, "Goff's not here," and she linked arms. They watched anxiously along the shoreline as the boat cast off. "He’s the type who arrives at the last minute, don't worry," she added, "he'll be here soon."

     The boat was a good fifty metres offshore when a taxi screamed to a halt on the quayside and out jumped an irate Australian. "Facking bring the facking boat back here!" he shouted. Diana waved to him from the stern rail as he jumped up and down on the shore. “Facking hell," he raved. "Get the skipper to turn the facking boat round!"  She cocked an ear in his direction as if she had difficulty hearing. Soon he was a diminutive figure jumping up and down on the quay and cursing like a barrow boy. They were both laughing but might have thought of the old adage that you should be careful what you wish for.

     The old tramp steamer seemed to have taken on even more passengers in Cebu.  Jack watched with fascination as they prepared food on deck on tiny paraffin stoves. It was like a concert. This was probably a regular run for most of them. Work was scarce outside the big cities and many of these had done their stint and were on their way home. Despite the overcrowding everything was done in a communal spirit. He was moved to ponder that, if you crammed the residents of a council estate back home into that small space and asked them to get on with each other, you would soon have a riot on your hands. There would be blood everywhere. The thing about the east was, no matter the privations, the disease, the overcrowding, they had retained a sense of community.

     In the meantime the wind had got up and the previously blue skies had given way to scudding cloud.  Jack’s sailing experience had taught him enough about the signs to be able to make predictions. "I think it's going to blow a bit tonight." He asked a couple of the crew what the forecast was but they shrugged and passed by. The skipper must have made this run several times and it was unlikely he'd have put to sea if dangerous weather was forecast but the sky had turned slate-grey in mere moments and the anvil shape of the massing cloud told him the sudden drop in visibility to the south wasn't fog. He didn't say anything to Diana but they were heading into a storm.

     The boat was struggling against a sea running in harness with the wind and was pitching and rolling as darkness fell. Diana felt queasy. Jack had some whisky in his bag and that settled her stomach. He told her to lie down and added, “The quicker we get to Zamboanga the better. This is a journey best slept through.” She nodded and headed towards the hatch. Jack cast a glance back over his shoulder at the gathering storm and braced himself as the boat crashed up against a bow wave, shuddered to a stop, then, as if sprung from a trap, plunged down into the trough. The bow smashed down and the metal groaned. Frightened faces stared out of hammocks. This time, when the bow dipped, the water poured aboard. Jack skipped over the step and went down the hatch, glad he wasn't on deck.

     Diana was already in the top bunk. Jack settled into the opposite lower bunk again and she made no move. Soon the drone of the engines and the pitching of the vessel lulled him into a troubled sleep in which he had another dream. The weather was bad; the trees were bent almost double by a ferocious wind; the blast ripped the roof off an apartment block and masonry rained about Jack’s head. He put up an arm to protect himself as debris hurtled out of the darkness. The sky was black and thick as tar; hailstones peppered him and then suddenly there in the eye it was calm and warm; the wind screamed in a circle, filled with maddened faces, like all the denizens of hell. They rushed around, snaking towards him then slipping away again. In the centre was a man with a gun and, behind him, Peter, who put his finger to his lips and beckoned. He bade Jack follow him, away from the gunman. Jack did as he asked but Peter disappeared through the wall of wind. It looked solid but he just dematerialised into it. Jack tried to follow but he couldn't. The gunman was taking an interest now. Jack hammered on the wind-wall. The gunman raised his gun. A door opened in the wind and then it ripped off its hinges and flew at Jack.  He raised an arm to ward it off and woke up. From the dim light he saw the cabin door had blown open. It must have sprung with the movement of the boat. It flew back and forth and he could hear the eerie wind in the passage. Something was wrong. He got up. "What is it?" Diana asked groggily.

     "Wait there," he said, "I'm going up on deck."

     "Don't be long," she replied, "this is scary."

     The ship was tossing around like a cork and he had difficulty making it up because of water pouring down. On deck he found mayhem. Sailors were rushing around battening down hatches, securing anything loose. Wide-eyed Filipinos in their hammocks looked as if they were staring death in the face. Jack grabbed hold of an officer. "What's going on?" The man was barely rational. He looked at his wits' end. "She's overloaded isn't she?" The sailor nodded, still unable to speak, the fear gripping his tongue. Jack rushed down to the cabin and grabbed hold of Diana. "Get whatever's most valuable," he said, "leave the rest. I mean that. Jettison everything. Keep something warm to wear and your cash and cards."

     She looked at him wide-eyed with terror. "What's going on, Jack?"

     "The boat's overloaded," he replied, "they've crammed too many on. She's listing to starboard."

     "Oh my God!" she replied, "Will it sink?"

    "She might turn turtle, and there won't be much warning. Just grab what you need and follow me."

     Moments later they were on deck. The typhoon, which had been hanging around the South China Sea for weeks, had finally broken up and spawned a dozen smaller, more isolated, storms. The blessing that the mother never hit land was only worth having if you weren't in the path of one of her progeny. The sea was a wall of grey water, rearing up and curling over with white foam at the apex, building as it moved closer and then crashing on the bow of the beleaguered vessel, forcing her down into deeper and deeper troughs. It was like going round a whirlpool, each time disappearing further and further into the vortex. Jack pinned Diana up against a mast and then clung on to it for dear life. She won't survive this, he was thinking but he didn’t want to say it. He watched almost mesmerised as a wave crashed against the bow and the ship lurched to a halt as if it had run into a dyke. Moments later it was released and surged upwards only to be struck by another wave, this time on the port side, so she heeled to starboard. He felt the sickening lurch and gave her minutes only. He heard the tell-tale groans of the welded hull as she began to stretch at the seams. He grabbed an officer and said, "Get the lifeboats down!" The Officer looked at Jack astonished, his eyes rolling, and then he seemed to understand what Jack was saying and nodded. "Where are they, man?" Jack shouted to him, and with Diana in pursuit they rushed to the stern where the sailor began to release the boats.

     "Don't free them off, don't, not yet!" Jack shouted above the storm, and the activity seemed to centre the sailor’s mind because he was suddenly in control. He was following a drill. Other sailors came to join him and suddenly there were four lifeboats hovering above the water waiting to be cut free. Jack forced Diana into one of the boats.

     “No!” she exclaimed, “I’d rather take my chance with you!”

    “Get in,” he said, “It’ll make the other women and the kids follow. Do what I say!” He was right. A steady stream of passengers followed Diana's example. They were safer in the life craft. Those boats would bob like corks in the rough swell whereas the ship was not long for the surface world. The exodus increased. The ruse had worked. The crew, who had behaved in an orderly, even heroic, manner, began to follow at the command of the captain. Jack was helping people over the side, supervising life vests for the youngest ones because there weren‘t enough to go around. No one seemed to be pushing him to the boats and, although he caught a glimpse of Diana looking up anxiously as her boat filled and was cut away, he was working with a calm and detachment he scarcely knew he possessed. Soon there were only a few left on board and the wind was howling as if affronted by their resistance. As a man will stalk an insect pest until he kills it, simply because it has irritated him, this weather had developed a will of its own, an implacable, unconscious urge to destroy.

     Her lifeboat well away from the suction, Diana stood in the stern, one hand on the tiller, looking back at him. A massive wave hit the vessel amidships on the port side. The backwash of the wave from a bulwark knocked Jack over the rail into the sea.  It was like being hit in the midriff by a baseball bat. He struck the water and went down,  corkscrewing several times and didn’t realise he’d started going back up until he surfaced, spluttering, lungs on fire. The blue hull of the vessel reared up behind him and he felt the suction as her chambers filled. He tried to swim in a strong rhythmical crawl, until he hit a wave and his lungs filled. Sucked down he gasped for air. Suddenly he had no air in his lungs; he could see nothing above; he began to have flashbacks, thinking ironically of his friends back home who’d see the funny side of this tragedy when they heard he was gone. The urge to breathe was overcoming the fear; his chest was like a ball of fire, full of acid. He gritted his teeth and then it was too much. He sucked in, resistance overcome.