Алистер Маклин - South by Java Head

Farnholme’s tall shadow detached itself from the gloom at the back of the wheelhouse.

“That’s right. Know any ship by that name?”

“It’s not a ship, man – it’s a friend of mine, Van Effen, a Dutchman. He was on the Kerry Dancer – joined her with me at Banjermasin. He must have got away on her boat after we’d been set on fire – there was only one boat, as far as I can remember.” Farnholme had pushed his way through the screen door now and was out on the wing of the bridge, peering excitedly over the canvas dodger, oblivious to the rain thumping down on his unprotected back. “Pick him up, man, pick him up!”

“How do we know it’s not a trap?” The captain’s relaxed, matter-of-fact voice came like a cold douche after Farnholme’s impatient vehemence. “Maybe it is this man, Van Effen, maybe it isn’t. Even if it is, how do we know that we can trust him?”

“How do you know?” Farnholme’s tone was that of a man with a tight hold, a very tight hold on himself. “Listen. I’ve just been talking to that young man in there, Vannier or whatever his name is–”

“Get to the point, please,” Findhorn interrupted coldly. “That boat – if it is a boat – is only a couple of hundred yards away now.”

“Will you listen?” Farnholme almost shouted the words, then went on more quietly. “Why do you think I’m standing here alive? Why do you think these nurses are alive, these wounded soldiers you took off the Kerry Dancer only an hour ago? Why do you think all of us you picked up, with the exception of Miss Plenderleith and the priest, are alive? For one reason only – when the captain of the Kerry Dancer was scuttling out of Singapore to save his own skin a man stuck a pistol in his back and forced him to return to Singapore. That man was Van Effen, and he’s out in that boat now: we all owe our lives to Van Effen, Captain Findhorn.”

“Thank you, Brigadier.” Findhorn was calm, unhurried as ever. “Mr. Nicolson, the searchlight. Have the bo’sun switch on the two floods when I give the word. Slow astern.”

The searchlight beam stabbed out through the darkness and lit up a heavy, rolling sea churned milky white by the torrential rain. For a moment or two the searchlight stayed stationary, the almost solid curtain of rain sheeting palely through its beam, then started to probe forward and almost immediately picked it up – a lifeboat very close to hand, riding on its sea-anchor and plunging violently up and down as it rode the short, steep seas that swept down upon it.

But the waves in the heart of a tropical storm have little set pattern, and every so often a twisting cross sea would curve over and break inboard. There were seven or eight men in the boat, stooping and straightening, stooping and straightening as they baled for their lives – a losing struggle, for she was already deep in the water, settling by the minute. One man alone seemed indifferent: he was sitting in the sternsheets, facing the tanker, a forearm across his eyes to ward off the glare of the searchlight. Just above the forearm something white gleamed in the light, a cap, perhaps, but at that distance it was difficult to be sure.

Nicolson dropped down the bridge ladder, ran quickly past the lifeboat, down another ladder to the fore and aft gangway, along to a third ladder that led down to the top of number three tank, and picked his way surely round valves and over the maze of discharge lines, gas lines and steam smothering pipes until he came to the starboard side: Farnholme followed close behind all the way. Just as Nicolson put his hands on the guardrail and leaned out and over, the two floodlights switched on together.

Twelve thousand tons and only a single screw, but Findhorn was handling the big ship, even in those heavy seas, like a destroyer. The lifeboat was less than forty yards away now, already caught in the pool of light from the floods, and coming closer every moment, and the men in the boat, safely into the lee of the Viroma , had stopped baling and were twisted round in their seats, staring up at the men on deck, and making ready to jump for the scrambling net. Nicolson looked closely at the man in the sternsheets: he could see now that it was no cap that the man was wearing on his head but a rough bandage, stained and saturated with blood: and then he saw something else, too, the stiff and unnatural position of the right arm.

Nicolson turned to Farnholme and pointed to the man in the sternsheets. “That your friend sitting at the back there?”

“That’s Van Effen all right,” Farnholme said with satisfaction “What did I tell you?”

“You were right.” Nicolson paused, then went on: “He seems to have a one-track mind in some things.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning that he’s still got a gun in his hand. He’s got it lined up on his pals in front, and he hasn’t taken his eyes off them once while I’ve been watching.”

Farnholme stared, then whistled softly. “You’re dead right, he has.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know, I really can’t guess at all. But you can take it from me, Mr. Nicolson, that if my friend Van Effen thinks it necessary to have a gun on them, then he has an excellent reason for it.”

Van Effen had. Leaning against a bulkhead in the dining-saloon, a large whisky in his hand and the water pooling from his soaking clothes on to the corticene at his feet, he told it all quickly, concisely and convincingly. Their lifeboat had been fitted with an engine, had carried them quickly clear of the Kerry Dancer after she had gone on fire and they had managed to reach the shelter of a small island miles away to the south just as the storm broke. They had pulled the boat up on to the shingle on the lee side, huddling there for hours until the wind had suddenly dropped: it was shortly afterwards that they had seen the rockets going up to the northwest.

“Those were ours,” Findhorn nodded. “So you decided to make a break for us?”

“I did.” A wintry smile touched the Dutchman’s steady brown eyes as he gestured towards the group of men, dark-eyed and swarthy-skinned, standing huddled in one corner. “Siran and his little friends weren’t keen. They’re not exactly pro-Allied and they knew there weren’t any Jap ships in these waters. Besides, for all we knew these were distress rockets from a sinking ship.” Van Effen downed the rest of his whisky at a gulp and laid the glass carefully on the table beside him. “But I had the gun.”

“So I saw,” It was Nicolson speaking. “And then?”

“We took off, towards the north-west. We ran into a long stretch of confused water, not too rough, and made good time. Then heavy seas hit us and flooded the engine. We just had to sit there and I thought we were finished till I saw your phosphorescence – you can see it a long way off on a night as black as this. If the rain had come five minutes earlier we would never have seen you. But we did, and I had my torch.”

“And your gun,” Findhorn finished. He looked at Van Effen for a long time, his eyes speculative and cold. “It’s a great pity you didn’t use it earlier, Mr. Van Effen.”

The Dutchman smiled wryly. “It is not difficult to follow your meaning, Captaio ,” He reached up, grimaced, tore the blood-stained strip of linen from his head: a deep gash, purple-bruised round the edges, ran from the corner of his forehead to his ear. “How do you think I got this?”

“It’s not pretty,” Nicolson admitted. “Siran?”

“One of his men. The Kerry Dancer was on fire, the boat – it was the only boat – was out on the falls and Siran here and all that were left of his crew were ready to pile into it.”

“Just their sweet little selves,” Nicolson interrupted grimly.