Night Frost (A Mike Faraday Mystery Book 2) Page 13

  I got under the water again and saw a form in swimming trunks streaking downwards about a dozen yards away; bubbles danced towards the surface. Those damned lamps gave a good light for quite a long way underneath and it was only a question of time before I was spotted. It was Scarpini; he was more muscular than I gave him credit for with his clothes on and I saw why Mandrake had chosen him for the underwater stuff.

  He was a beautiful swimmer and he turned like a greyhound in the light of the lamps. He had my knife in one hand too which was unfortunate. He went up to breathe after a bit and I crowded in against the hull and went down to give my bundle the once-over. When I came up again Scarpini was swimming to and fro only a few yards away. It might have been beautiful except that I was in no mood for the Palm Springs water ballet. He was no Esther Williams come to that. He soon got tired of swimming around and went up for air.

  I took another couple of gulps in the shadow of the hull. When he dived the next time he was a lot closer; he trod water and I could see the hair on his head streaming out like he was in a high wind. It was around then that he spotted me and he came swimming in to the attack in a fast crawl, the knife held out in his left hand away from his body and off to one side. I had seen this before. This was the most dangerous style of underwater fighting.

  I kicked back behind the trailing companion way chain. The refraction of the water and the shifting lights from the surface made it difficult, but I caught his hand a glancing blow and deflected the knife. While he was off balance I grabbed the chain and kicked him as hard as I could in the stomach. He doubled up, but apart from that he didn’t seem greatly affected. I danced closer to him and then he straightened up like a jack-knife and closed with me. But I had his weapon hand then.

  His skin was slippery and I had difficulty in keeping my hold. His eyes looked right into mine and I felt his sharp fingers hooking into each side of my neck, looking for the jugular. I slipped away from him and kneed him in the groin. That hurt but he still didn’t let go the knife.

  As he released his grip I shot up and grabbed a lungful of air; I met him going down and stamped at his head but he swerved aside. I was too far from the companion way now so I waited and grabbed his arm again when he swam down. I misjudged this time and carried on past him; he lunged with the knife and I felt a numbing blow on my shoulder. Blood spiralled slowly up to the surface. I turned quickly, found I could still use my right arm and concluded it had been a superficial flesh wound.

  I went limp in the water, creased up my face as though in pain; it was an old wrestler’s trick but anything in the book was good enough for this situation. Scarpini turned under me and came up with the knife for a death blow. But this time I was ready for him. We were back under the hull of the boat now, driven in by the outgoing current. I came up while he was still thinking about his move.

  My right hand caught his left and smashed the knife and his balled knuckles against the copper sheathing along the bottom of the ship; there were razor-edged crustaceans where the copper met the wooden planking and it split his hand through to the bone. I saw the knife weave downwards through the light beams and then I brought my knee up into the pit of his stomach. He sort of hung there for a moment and then floated up to the surface.

  I went down below then and made my preparations. After my next breather I saw him reappear. He came down again, more cautiously this time but with an even bigger knife in his hand. I had to give him credit for guts though. It was then that I got to the harpoon-gun. I had tied it earlier with just one slip knot round the hollow metal stock. I loosed it now and brought it up into the firing position.

  He paddled down towards me quite casually as though on an afternoon sponge-fishing expedition. He had the knife held out in his right hand this time, his crushed left making stroking motions in the water. I was right up under the yacht hull in the shadow cast by the companion way platform and he didn’t see the gun until it was too late. He was only about three feet away and the light was making undulating patterns on his throat and neck.

  I hoped the refraction of the water wouldn’t make me miss my aim and shot him neatly through the throat; the gun made a loud hiss and bubbles shot to the surface. Scarpini turned a somersault and his body shuddered like a hooked fish. His mouth was open and his eyeballs straining from his head. He was coughing red; there were red streamers going to the surface. That and bubbles of air where the steel-bladed harpoon stuck out a foot the other side of his neck. I had taken the most powerful gun the Catamaran had to offer.

  I let it drop to the floor of the harbour. I steadied myself on the metal chain and watched as Scarpini started to sink towards the bottom. He looked at me quite reflectively as he went by. I surfaced again, blinded by light and panting from exhaustion. There was a boat on the surface with two crew members in it. I noticed that without interest. The sea kept going up and down more violently than I had remembered.

  My arm hurt then and I saw crimson running down among the beads of water. I felt I didn’t want to die that evening. I got hold of a stanchion and slowly, like a very old man, I heaved myself aboard again. Then, after what seemed like a couple of hours, I started to walk back up on to the deck of The Gay Lady. Otto stood at the head of the companion way and watched me come.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Otto Gets Rough

  1

  OTTO SAT on the end of the divan and pointed his Luger at me. The gun was on my belly and I realised I was only a short trip away from Doc Griffith’s dissecting table. I sat in one of Mandrake’s chairs dripping sea water on his carpet and trying to look as if I knew all the answers. Diane Morris tore up another handkerchief to bind round my shoulder.

  Her face looked grey.

  Mr. Mandrake sat opposite the saloon from me. His pink starfish hands were folded across his stomach. He looked as calm as though he were presiding at a board meeting of his frozen meat company.

  “What happened to Scarpini?” he said.

  “He had an accident,” I said. “He cut himself on a fish hook.”

  “That was careless of him,” said Mandrake gently. He didn’t change expression. His eyes focussed on the tall glass on the table in front of him.

  “This means a switch in plans. He was quite my best diver. Otto here doesn’t even know how to swim.”

  There was no difference of tone but Otto turned white around the mouth. Mandrake looked back at me again.

  “I trust this doesn’t mean a change of sides, Mr. Faraday? I’m sure you have a satisfactory explanation.”

  I took the hard way out. “I just quit,” I said heavily. “I’ll send on the thousand dollars.”

  He put up one of the pink starfish and waved it gently. “It isn’t as easy as all that, Mr. Faraday. People are not in the habit of quitting my service until I’ve finished with them. And I’ll decide when.”

  His eyes fixed unwaveringly on mine. A long sliver of pain tore through my shoulder as Diane Morris tightened up the bandage. I winced. Otto chuckled to himself. He didn’t take the gun off my belly.

  “What did you come aboard for, Mr. Faraday?” asked Mandrake, still in that soft dreamy tone. He sat and looked at the ceiling of the saloon as though he had all the time in the world. I fixed my gaze on Mr. Mandrake’s hands and tried to ignore Otto’s gun barrel. I wasn’t very successful.

  “I was afraid you might sail before I reported the good news,” I said.

  “We shall see,” he said gently. “Did you search him?” he asked Otto.

  The big man looked taken aback. “He ain’t wearin’ no more than a glorified G-string,” he said warily.

  Mr. Mandrake silenced him. “Idiot,” he said in a tone which crackled contempt. “Do it now.”

  Otto withered up. He got to his feet. He put the gun in his pocket. That didn’t make any difference. There was a seaman, the one who had passed me in the corridor, standing just at the back of the settee. He had broken teeth, an unshaven face and a mean eye. He wore a dark blue jersey with Gay Lady stitc
hed across the front of it in white piping. That was the only gay thing about him. He had a loaded shotgun held across his chest, which was more important still, and he looked like he knew how to use it. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to with that kind of artillery.

  Otto came over and fished in the empty sheath which had contained my knife. He found nothing. Diane Morris finished adjusting the bandage round my shoulder and stood away. She put a drink in my hand. Otto fumbled around some more. He turned to Mandrake, half-shrugged. Mr. Mandrake turned his eyes up to the ceiling again.

  “The belt, fool,” he said patiently.

  Otto searched the belt. He brought out the small items, including the compass. He missed the map reference because I’d folded it small and pushed it up into the stitching inside the lining. I figured he’d have missed a rhino with his big fingers and that technique. But even he could hardly miss the last item in the belt. He brought out Mandrake’s blue notebook and laid it down on the table in front of him. Then he went and sat down on the divan and got out the Luger again.

  Mr. Mandrake said nothing. He poked at the notebook with one of the pink starfish and turned it over curiously. He didn’t seem surprised. The air in the saloon suddenly seemed to have turned hot and thundery.

  “You were saying something about good news just now, Mr. Faraday,” he said. “I may say that you could do with some after this.” It was almost time to play my top card but I decided to hang on to the last minute. I sipped at my drink. It seemed to be composed of ninety-nine per cent bourbon. My silence seemed to madden Otto but Mandrake didn’t change expression.

  “We have means of persuasion if you persist in this unco-operative attitude, Mr. Faraday,” he said amiably. He shrugged his blunt shoulders.

  “Oh, don’t think for one moment I was referring to you. I can see that you are made of durable stuff. Your reputation has preceded you. And your name is not unknown in Chicago. What I had in mind was something a little more entertaining. The lady is beginning to outlive her usefulness. Before we contacted you her utility was marginal, but now…”

  He let out the air in his mouth with a soft noise. It was pretty expressive. He glanced at Diane Morris, gave her a brief smile then looked back at me.

  “Are you familiar with the practices of the Chinese river pirates, Mr. Faraday? I have made quite a study of such out-of-the-way things. They are still very much an active force, even under the Communists.”

  “So?” I said.

  “So this, Mr. Faraday. They have very unpleasant habits. One of them concerns the treatment of their prisoners of war. They tie their victim to the prow of one of their war junks and incise his stomach. They then cut the intestine and attach it to a large cork float. When the tide goes out, the gut floats away, yard after yard. They say it reduces even the strongest men to tears.”

  “Sounds like some fun,” I said. “I didn’t know they were that ingenious around Chicago.”

  I didn’t look at Diane Morris’s face. Sweat trickled down Otto’s. It was so quiet in the saloon that I could hear the whine of the generator right at the other end of the boat. A fly landed on one of Mr. Mandrake’s hands. He didn’t move. After a moment it flew away.

  “Think it over, Mr. Faraday,” he said smoothly. “I’m sure you have more regard for the girl. Even a soldier of fortune like yourself must draw the line somewhere.”

  He had me there. I finished up my drink, put the empty glass down on the carpet at my feet.

  “All right,” I said, “you can cut the melodrama. I think we can do a deal. I got a map tracing showing where the loot is stashed.”

  Otto smiled, the seaman at the back of the divan lowered the shotgun and leaned it against the cabin wall. The temperature went down.

  For the first time Mr. Mandrake reached out for his drink.

  “Excellent, Mr. Faraday, excellent. I was sure I could rely on your sound common sense. Now let’s get down to business. And remember, it’s your lives you are playing with, so choose your words carefully.”

  “I’ve got the map here,” I said. I fished in the body belt and brought out the tracing. Mandrake turned up his eyes to the ceiling again as though asking God to witness Otto’s incompetence and the big man turned pink to the roots of his hair. He started to mumble something but the look on Mandrake’s face stopped the words in his throat.

  I passed over the tracing. “It’s my guess it’s under water,” I said.

  He spread out the piece of paper on the table in front of him and examined it intently. One pink hand smoothed out the crumples in it.

  “I’m not very hot on navigation but I’d bet it’s not far from this island,” I went on. “Grosvenor wouldn’t have risked hiding whatever was bothering him where anyone could find it easily. So I figure he’s left a clue to the loot in a water-proof box or something on the bottom somewhere.”

  Mandrake nodded. “A reasonable assumption.” He lifted his head. “Where did you get this, Mr. Faraday? I should hate to think that this material had reached me through the courtesy of the Stanley Bay Police H.Q.”

  “They won’t be there, if that’s what you’re thinking,” I said. “I found the tracing in Grosvenor’s room. It was screwed up small and stuffed in a crack in a drawer of his dressing table, in a spot where nobody would have thought of looking.”

  “Except for you,” he said. “A remarkable coincidence.”

  “Use your marbles,” I told him. “The local police boys are amateurs at this sort of game. Lost dogs are more in their line. I’m a trained operator. In L.A. we got characters who’d sew a dollar bill into their navel lining if it showed a profit. I have to keep a jump ahead of them to go on eating every week.”

  Otto grinned. Even the corners of Mr. Mandrake’s mouth relaxed a little.

  “Very well, Mr. Faraday, I’ll buy it. I’ll leave the matter of this book for the moment. But we’ll go into it later.” He stood up. “At the moment I’m in need of a diver. You will be that diver, Mr. Faraday. That is if you place any value on your own survival. You might even earn your remaining 4,000 dollars.”

  He handed his glass to Diane Morris. “I need another drink, my dear. And you look as though you need one yourself. A re-fill, Mr. Faraday?”

  I took the glass Diane gave me. She didn’t look directly at me. Mandrake handed the map tracing to Otto.

  “Give this to the Captain and tell him to work out the position. We sail within the next hour.”

  He turned back to me and Diane. He laughed shortly.

  “We are going on a treasure hunt, Mr. Faraday. Here’s to success.”

  2

  The Gay Lady throbbed gently as she rose to the swell, her engines throttled back, driving her smoothly through the water. The lights of Stanley Bay Harbour receded in the middle distance as we turned to set course in the open sea. I sat in a comer of the wheelhouse wearing a borrowed seaman’s sweater and a pair of blue trousers. I clutched a mug of hot coffee and thought out my next move. Diane Morris sat tensed up on a leather swivel chair opposite me. Nobody in particular watched me. They didn’t need to.

  The ugly-looking seaman who’d held the shotgun stood at the wheel now and steered the yacht; he looked just as much at home. He didn’t look at me; he kept his eye on the compass card. We were completely closed in in the wheelhouse; Mandrake and a shadowy figure I took to be the skipper were standing at the rail opposite the doors which led to the deck. The only other way out was a companion which led down from the compass bridge inside the ship.

  Charley Fong came up at that moment. He put down a cup of coffee on a ledge in front of the seaman. He just grunted and went on steering. Charley grinned at me; he had a piece of sticking plaster about three inches wide right across the top of his head.

  “You want more coffee, Mistah Faraday?” he asked. I shook my head.

  “How’s the cranium?” I asked.

  “Just fine,” he beamed. “Thlanks again.”

  “Any time,” I said. He gave his teeth
an airing for the second time and went on down below. Diane Morris leaned across to me. I kept an eye on the helmsman.

  “Save the gab for later,” I whispered. “This isn’t very private.”

  She nodded and stood up. The helmsman had to get the other side of the wheel to let her get by. She stooped towards me as she slid off the seat.

  “I’ll try and find out what Mandrake’s up to. Charley’s on our side. I’ll work something out.”

  “Take it easy—and watch yourself,” I told her. She squeezed my hand and went on out through the sliding doors. I sat and smoked and looked at the large expanse of nothing sliding past the cabin windows. From now on in it had to be played by ear; I hoped Clay was going to deal his hand clever. I still had the real bearings if things got really rough. I repeated them over in my head, just to make sure I’d got it right. It would be damned awkward if I forgot them. They were our only tangible form of insurance out here.

  The yacht wasn’t making much way. The minutes lengthened and still she drove slowly on. We had been under way for more than an hour now. We should have reached the spot, even allowing for the slow speed, but Mandrake might be circling; gaining time or waiting to see if a police boat showed up. I lit another cigarette and stood up, trying to get a look at the compass card but the light was too dim. Besides, it only made the helmsman nervous so I sat down again.

  I had been sitting for perhaps ten minutes when footsteps sounded on the lower companion-way and a big form made a rabbit hutch out of the wheelhouse. It was Otto. He hadn’t got the gun but he didn’t look any less formidable. He grinned. He jerked his thumb.

  “Mr. Mandrake wants to see you.”

  I went down through the big hatch in the floor of the wheelhouse and he followed me down. We went along a familiar corridor and through the sliding doors into the saloon. I heard footsteps on the deck overhead and then the telegraph rang several times in the wheelhouse and the engines slowed and stopped. There was a rattle as the anchor chain went out. The ship started to swing in the low swell.