Night Frost (A Mike Faraday Mystery Book 2) Page 12

  “That’s his military mind,” I said.

  Stella caught at my arm. Her eyes were wide and worried. “Mike, you will be careful won’t you?”

  “Don’t worry, sweetie,” I said. I kissed her lightly. “You know me.”

  “That’s the worry,” said Stella.

  We went out. I locked the door and took the car keys back from her. I patted her arm as I went by.

  “Clay will keep you in touch,” I said.

  She stood and looked after me as I went on down the corridor and down the stairs. I went out to the Caddy and checked the tank. Stella had used only a gallon and the needle read just under the full. There was a bright moon so I used only the sidelights. I put the waterproof package on the back seat. I went out of the car park as quietly as I could and on down the dusty road that led to Stanley Bay. A few days ago I had used it only once. Now I went up and down it so many times I was beginning to feel like a commuter.

  There was still a luminous glow on the sea and any other night I should have thought the scene pretty beautiful, as I threaded one bay and headland after another. But all I could remember was that Mandrake and his trigger boys had pretty sharp eyes, whatever they lacked in marbles, and the moon was a deal too bright for my taste when swimming out. That was why I had brought the package.

  There was no other traffic on the road at that time of night; it was only a few minutes after ten when I hit Stanley Bay. It was a bit more animated at night time and neon-lit bars and clubs made a red and green glow in the sky over the little town. I tooled the car on down to thread the rear of the jetties where the Police and Harbour Master’s offices were and came out near the spot where I had sat with Diane earlier that afternoon.

  I parked the Caddy in rear of a big set of stone bollards where it wouldn’t be too conspicuous. Nothing moved on the beach but from far off there came the monotonous blare of a dance band and the rhythmic shuffle of dancers’ feet. I took out the car keys and put them in my pocket and buttoned up the waterproof cover over the car. I didn’t know how long I was going to be away and the heap was on hire after all.

  I took the waterproof bundle and walking on the balls of my feet I high-tailed it in as casual a manner as possible down to the back of the concrete esplanade. Towards the edge of the harbour the buildings thinned out and there was a jumble of rocky outcrops and stone fortifications dating from the days when Stanley Bay was an outpost of Britain’s Colonial empire. The noise of the sea came up loud and the water slapped at the stones and undersides of the moored boats with a sound that would have put the nerves of a sensitive man on edge.

  But I’m not a sensitive man and to me it sounded just like water slapping on the underside of stonework and boat bottoms. What I had to be on guard against was fishermen and the odd longshore loafer like the Ancient Mariner. I also had to make sure I didn’t give myself too far to swim.

  The Gay Lady, visible only by the light along the length of her ports and her masthead riding lights was about half a mile out from shore anyway and I didn’t aim to turn the swim into a marathon.

  Of course, underwater swimming at night wasn’t exactly unknown in these parts but I didn’t want any frightened fishermen ringing up the Police Office—or anyone else. I found a spot that seemed suitable and stripped off my clothes behind a big stone breakwater. Then I stashed them under the base of the wall and piled as many stones on them as I could find. I had already emptied my pockets of money and anything else of value before I came out. Being lightweight, they made only a small compact bundle. I was already wearing swimming trunks underneath my clothes.

  Out of the kit I carried I took a waterproof body belt which fastened round my waist with webbing straps. Into this I put my wrist watch, a small compass and the piece of paper with the fake map stencilled on it. I had already memorised the bearings on the other sheet. I carried a knife in a rubberised sheath which was slung from the body belt. I put on the frogman flippers I had brought from the hotel, the glass goggles and clamped the mouthpiece with the rubber tubing firmly between my teeth.

  I tested the ping-pong ball arrangement in its cage at the end of the tube. It was a simple kit such as youngsters use at the seaside but nothing more elaborate was needed here. I was a slow swimmer, like I said, but I had trained myself to swim a few feet beneath the surface of the water and the tip of the tubing when I came up to take air wouldn’t notice with the shimmer on the water. At least that was the idea. But I put my faith in the rest of the gear I carried, more than anything else. I had wrapped the waterproof covering round this and carried it in one hand as I swam. It was a powerful underwater harpoon gun used for spearing fish.

  It had a nasty-looking harpoon in the barrel and the whole gadget worked off compressed air. Round the light alloy handle I had secured a length of thick twine. Better still, the harmless end of the gun contained a small glass dome in a thick rubber mounting. This was a waterproof electric torch which worked off a subsidiary grip on the handle. There wasn’t much else I could do and the whole enterprise was a bit shaky but there wasn’t any point in hanging around to see the dawn come up, so I took a mental note where The Gay Lady was, tip-toed elegantly into the water and let myself sink slowly down behind the nearest boats.

  I waited until the water reached my chin; it was damn cold at first. Then I took a breath, adjusted my nose-clip and went down under the surface. I started to swim out towards the yacht.

  7

  The tide was setting out of the harbour which helped things considerably; I settled down about three feet beneath the surface and more or less let the current take me out. It would be a different story coming back but I could tackle that when the time came. I kicked gently with my legs to avoid leaving a wash and tooled quietly along beneath the water, taking a rough guide from the riding lights of the nearest sizeable yacht to me, which was on a line with The Gay Lady.

  I wanted to hit Mandrake’s boat on the shady side, away from the lit gangway that faced out to sea. At any rate I could count on the tide taking me straight out with minimum effort on my part until I reached the hull. Every now and then I eased up a foot or so to replenish the air in the tube before coming down to the lower level. I had hit my stride by now and was making easy breast-strokes and the water felt warmer. When I judged I was safely past the first yacht I risked surfacing for a few seconds in the blackness beyond.

  The lights of The Gay Lady burned nearer and clearer and she seemed a lot higher out of the water. I could hear the dance band pounding from the shore; it carried a long way in the still night air. Out here it was very quiet except for the minute slapping noise made by the wavelets. I went under again abruptly as a beam of light chopped the water ahead of me. A rain of potato peelings, used packages and other garbage hit the water. I heard the clink of a metal pail just before I went below and then someone closed the cabin hatch.

  I couldn’t see much underneath the surface but I dove a little deeper and soon spotted the hulls of more moored craft which I hadn’t seen earlier. Another minute or two and I should have run into them on the course I was making. I trod water as soon as I was past and when I came up for a second time I could see that I was a long way from the shore. Chains of lights burned in the mauve dusk of the bay and were re-echoed round the headland.

  I faced to my front again and saw The Gay Lady almost as far off as ever but now more to the left on the seaward side. It was evident that what current there was, was setting me in to the rocks and the wall on the other side of the harbour. I worked round with hardly a ripple in the water and set off swimming strongly more to the left in order to compensate for the drift. I gauged I had been in the sea upwards of half an hour already; it was farther than I figured. That or else I wasn’t the swimmer I thought I was.

  I went under again, guiding myself this time by The Gay Lady's masthead light which was riding around in a gentle arc. This way I had something constant to aim for and I was able to allow for the westward flow of the water out here. After ten minutes
I surfaced again and made out a largish buoy bobbing about between me and the yacht. It was only a few hundred yards now so I hung gratefully on to a metal ring on the buoy and got my breath and eased my aching muscles.

  The final stretch was a lot easier. The water was dark and there were only a few bow ports alight on my side, evidently from the crew’s quarters, and these were curtained. I risked the last hundred yards on the surface, as I wanted to pick my spot for boarding with care. No sound came from the yacht and there didn’t seem to be anyone on deck. I took off the nose-clip and eased the rubber mounting out of my mouth and breathed real air again.

  I hit the hull of The Gay Lady with the lightest of bumps and trod water, pushing myself along the hull while I looked for a way up. She seemed like the Queen Mary from this low down. I transferred the mouthpiece and tubing to the hand carrying the spear-gun and then I caught hold of the rubbing-strake. I clung there until I got my bearings and made my way hand over hand, taking care not to scratch the hull with my gear, before I found the nearside gangway. It wasn’t properly down and I didn’t want to use it anyway, but there was a zinc chain hanging into the water.

  I eased out my piece of twine and eventually tied the whole bundle—fish-harpoon, face-piece and flippers to the chain. I had put everything in the waterproof wrapping and tied it with a knot I could undo in a hurry if I had to. Then I eased a little way along the hull, seized the rubbing-strake and hauled myself up out of the water until my right hand could get hold of a deck stanchion. By now I had got my left foot on to the rubbing-strake and lifted slowly up to deck level. I shot a quick glance around but there was nobody in sight, so I insinuated myself over the rail and on to the deck.

  I loosened the knife in its sheath, made sure I knew where I’d come aboard and started to prowl along the companion way towards the bows. I wanted to see what the crew was doing first before I decided on the next move. Keeping in the shadow I pussy-footed up to the forward cabin entrance; there was a big hatch on deck. I couldn’t see anything but I could hear at least two men talking and a radio playing softly. That disposed of half the crew; so far as I knew Mandrake had three deck-hands and a paid hire-skipper, but what part they played in the set-up I didn’t know. I had to treat them as enemy and act accordingly.

  I made it quietly back to mid-ships. I gave the main saloon a miss and tried the door through which we’d gone when we first came abroad. There had been doors leading off this corridor before we got to the saloon and it seemed the most obvious start. I slid the hatch back and lifted my feet cautiously over the sill. There was the same companion way with dim night-lights burning; the same smell of diesel oil and salt and, far off, the faint throbbing of a generator. I risked leaving the door an inch or two ajar in case I had to exit in a hurry and walking on tip-toe tried the first opening I came to. It swung outwards on the corridor and no light showed underneath.

  I hesitated only a moment and then stepped over the sill, shut the door behind me, locked it with the key which was in it and snapped on the brass light switch I found on my right hand. The door was made of teak a good inch thick and would take some time to break down. There was a wooden bookshelf with navigation volumes and the latest novels; a model sailing ship in a bottle; a fake marble wash basin with chrome fittings set in a mahogany alcove, a long mirror set over the basin. There was a big wooden bunk on one side of the cabin with a candlewick bedspread on it. It hadn’t been slept in.

  Set under two portholes at present covered coyly with minute chintz curtains was a big, solid table screwed to the deck. It had a glass top and the surface was strewn with maps and navigation instruments. I went over to the bunk; there was another shelf alongside it, braced into the angle of two walls. On the shelf was a leather mounted photo frame. It contained a studio portrait full-length of a rather handsome man with light curly hair; he was in his mid-forties I should have said and wore a blue uniform with brass buttons.

  I made a moue in the mirror, figured I had gotten into the skipper’s cabin, said “Sorry, chum,” and doused the light preparatory to getting the hell out. I had just turned the key in the lock and was starting to ease open the door when I heard footsteps in the corridor. I risked leaving it open about half an inch and glued my eye to the crack. One of the seamen passed within two feet of me; he had his head down and was humming “Home Sweet Home” tunelessly to himself under his breath.

  He went on down the corridor to the crew’s quarters. That made three; all accounted for except the skipper. I might expect him to be on shore or basking in the limelight of Mandrake’s personality in the saloon. Unless Mandrake had gone ashore as well. I opened my waist-belt and sneaked a glance at my watch. It was already 11.40 and I had to get moving if I didn’t want to be surprised.

  Farther down the corridor, past the big sliding doors that I knew led to the saloon was another teak door; I made it in three seconds flat, stepping on the balls of my feet, my heart working in time to the muffled thud of the dynamo. If the skipper would have the best accommodation after the owner, it seemed reasonable that they would both be somewhere around the same part of the ship. I hit the jackpot as soon as I got inside. It wasn’t a cabin but a suite of three rooms; study, bedroom and dressing room with an adjoining bathroom and shower. It was furnished in the same style as the saloon—that is to say pretty luxurious—but I had no eye for the decor.

  I locked the main entrance just as soon as I had made sure the place was empty; I didn’t waste time on the rest but went straight for the room set aside as a study. There was a big desk in there, with ornate brass fittings and a green leather inlaid top that wouldn’t have looked out of place in the Louvre. I bet it came from there at that.

  The keys being in the desk ought to have warned me. I tried three drawers, opening them with keys on the bunch I found dangling from the top one. I riffed through a lot of stuff without finding anything of interest. I had already been in here five minutes and I couldn’t risk much longer. Then I found what I was looking for. It was a little blue book, only about the size of a pocket diary. It was full of names and amounts of money, but it looked as beautiful as the score of Beethoven’s Choral Symphony to me. The name of Melissa occurred several times and there was Mandrake also, only in his real name.

  There was a lot more at the back of the book but I could leave that until I could chew the fat with Colonel Clay. There were addresses too; in fact what seemed like the whole set-up of the Chicago branch of the Mafia. I put the book in my body-belt, clipped the waterproof pouch closed, put everything back as I had found it and then relocked the desk, leaving the keys hanging from the top drawer.

  I took the knife out of my belt, tip-toed out to the main bedroom, tripping the light switches after me. I had dried off long ago in this warm air, so I didn’t leave any wet hoof-marks on Mandrake’s expensive carpets. Perhaps I was a bit careless or maybe things had gone too well. Whatever it was, I got outside the door, turned back along the deck and bumped into a shape which had just come through the sliding doors from the big saloon.

  He gave a yell like I had already stuck him with the knife and slammed up against me with his fists flailing; one of them caught me in the mouth and put me off balance. I fell back against a metal vent and the knife bounced from my hand. Scarpini kept on yelling and kept on coming; I caught him a hard one against the side of the face with my balled fist and he went down in a heap.

  I leaped over him as someone blundered through the saloon doors sending light scorching over the corridor; by this time the whole ship was roused. I made the English guy Bannister look like the tortoise in the fable by putting distance between myself and the guys in the corridor. Lights were going on everywhere; there were shouts from the crew and the thud of feet on deck. I heard Scarpini yell something again as I crashed back the sliding door to the open air. I could see one of the seamen tumbling out of the fore hatch and there were more heavy feet behind me.

  I mentally noted where I had come over the side, made for it as close as I c
ould. I vaulted over the rail far from cleanly, caught my leg a numbing blow on a wire somewhere, and then made it into the haven of dark water.

  8

  Through the broken, heaving surface of the water I could see blinding lights. I sidled away into the darkness of the yacht hull and made for the companion way. Someone on deck had switched on the big arc-lights they used for loading and unloading. That would be Mandrake. This was a bit more than I had figured on. My lungs were bursting from my enforced sprint and I would have to come up in a very short time without the underwater outfit. Somehow I couldn’t see these boys figuring I had been drowned—if they had recognised me, that is. Or were they expecting me?

  The probing pencil of a searchlight reached across the water. I felt I could hear faint shouting. My best chance was to stay on the landward side of The Gay Lady and hope that the lights and the commotion would attract some attention. I hoped Clay would restrain Phillips’ enthusiasm; I didn’t want them blundering out now even though I could have done with some help. Going off half-cock on a thing like this could be more hindrance than otherwise.

  Evidently Mandrake thought so too because the searchlight went out soon after and the shouting died away. I risked coming up then and took a gulp of air under the sheer of the yacht’s hull. All the area round my side of the ship was as bright as a Fourth of July carnival. I dived again and came up only a few yards from the gangway. I swam underwater and had just got close enough to grab it when it came down with a rumble of chains. I went down with it and found my bundle still fixed on with the twine. I came up directly underneath the platform and took another gulp of air. Then something split the darkness, silvered the sea-surface with brief foam and disappeared.