Алистер Маклин - South by Java Head

“Exit their siege gun. You think of everything, Mr. Nicolson.”

“I hope so, sir.” Nicolson shook his head. “I hope to God I do.”

The island was perhaps half-a-mile distant from the submarine. A quarter of the way there Nicolson stooped, brought up one of the lifeboat’s two standard Wessex distress signal floats, ripped away the top disc seal, ignited it by tearing off the release fork and immediately threw it over the stern, just wide enough to clear Siran’s boat. As soon as it hit the water it began to give off a dense cloud of orange-coloured smoke, smoke that hung almost without moving in the windless twilight, an impenetrable screen against the enemy. A minute or two later bullets from the submarine began to cut through the orange smoke, whistling overhead or splashing into the water around them, but none came near enough to do any damage; the Japanese were firing at random and in blind anger. Four minutes after the first smoke float, now fizzling to extinction, had been thrown overboard the second one followed it, and long before it, too, had burnt out they had beached their boats and landed safely on the island.

IT HARDLY deserved the name of island. An islet, perhaps, but no more. Oval in shape, lying almost due east and west, it was no more than three hundred yards long, and about a hundred and fifty from north to south. It wasn’t a perfect oval, however: about a hundred yards along from the apex the sea had cut deep notches on both sides, at points practically opposite one another, so that the islet was all but bisected. It was in the southerly bight – Nicolson had taken the precaution of rounding the island before landing – that they had beached their boats and moored them to a couple of heavy stones.

The narrow end of the island, east beyond the bights, was low and rocky and bare, but the west had some vegetation-scrub bushes and stunted lalang grass – and rose to a height of perhaps fifty feet in the middle. On the southern side of this hill there was a little hollow, hardly more than a shelf, about half-way up the slope, and it was towards this that Nicolson urged the passengers as soon as the boat had grounded. The Captain and Corporal Fraser had to be carried, but it was only a short trip and within ten minutes of the boats’ grounding the entire party had taken refuge in the hollow, surrounded by all the food, water supplies and portable equipment, even the oars and the crutches.

A light breeze had sprung up with the going down of the sun, and clouds were slowly filling up the sky from the north-north-eastblanketing the early evening stars, but it was still light enough for Nicolson to use his glasses. He stared through them for almost two minutes, then laid them down, rubbing his eyes. He was aware, without being able to see, that everybody in the hollow was watching him anxiously – all except the boy who was bundled up in a blanket and already drowsing off to sleep.

“Well?” Findhorn broke the silence.

“They’re moving round the western tip of the island, sir. Pretty close inshore, too.”

“I can’t hear them.”

“Must be using their batteries. Why, I don’t know. Just because they can’t see us it doesn’t mean that we can’t see them. It’s not all that dark.”

Van Effen cleared his throat. “And what do you think the next move is going to be, Mr. Nicolson?”

“No idea. It’s up to them, I’m afraid. If they had either their big gun or A.A. gun left they could blast us out of here in two minutes.” Nicolson gestured at the low ridge that bounded the hollow to the south, barely visible in the gloom even six feet away. “But with a little luck I think that’ll stop rifle bullets.”

“And if it doesn’t?”

“Time enough to worry about that when it happens,” Nicolson answered shortly. “Maybe they’ll try to land men at various points and surround us. Maybe they’ll try a frontal attack.” He had the glasses to his eyes again. “Whatever happens they can’t just go home and say they left us here – they’d get their heads in their hands, perhaps literally. Either that or harakiri all over the shop.”

“They won’t go home.” Captain Findhorne’s voice was heavy” with certainty. “Too many of their shipmates have died.”

For some time there had been a murmur of voices behind them, and now the murmur died away and Siran spoke.

“Mr. Nicolson?”

Nicolson lowered his binoculars and looked over his shoulder.

“What do you want?”

“My men and I have been having a discussion. We have a proposition to make to you.”

“Make it to the captain. He’s in charge.” Nicolson turned away abruptly and raised the binoculars again.

“Very well. It is this, Captain Findhorn. It is obvious – painfully obvious, if I may say so – that you do not trust us. You force us to occupy a separate lifeboat – and not, I think, because we don’t bathe twice a day. You feel – wrongly, I assure you – that you must watch us all the time. We are a heavy – ah – responsibility, a liability, I should say. We propose, with your permission, to relieve you of this liability.”

“For heaven’s sake get to the point,” Findhorn snapped irritably.

“Very well. I suggest you let us go, have no more worry about us. We prefer to be the prisoners of the Japanese.”

“What!” The angry interjection came from Van Effen. “God in heaven, sir, I’d shoot the lot of them first!”

“Please!” Findhorn waved a hand in the darkness, looking curiously at Siran, but it was too dark to see his expression. “As a matter of interest, how would you propose to surrender yourselves. Just walk off down the hill towards the beach?”

“More or less.”

“And what guarantee would you have that they wouldn’t shoot you before you surrendered? Or, if you did succeed in surrendering, that they wouldn’t torture or kill you afterwards?”

“Don’t let them go, sir.” Van Effen’s voice was urgent.

“Do not distress yourself,” Findhorn said dryly. “I’ve no intention of complying with his ridiculous request. You stay, Siran, although heaven knows we don’t want you. Please don’t insult our intelligence.”

“Mr. Nicolson!” Siran appealed. “Surely you can see–”

“Shut up!” Nicolson said curtly. “You heard what Captain Findhorn said. How naive and dim-witted do you think we are? Not one of you would risk his precious neck if there was the slightest chance of being shot or ill-treated by the Japs. It’s a hundred to one–”

“I assure you–” Siran made to interrupt but Nicolson stopped him.

“Save your breath,” he said contemptuously. “Do you think anyone would believe you? You’re obviously in cahoots with the Japs, one way or another – and we have enough on our plates without making ourselves the present of another seven enemies.” There was a pause, then Nicolson went on thoughtfully. “A pity you promised this man to the gallows, Captain Findhorn. I think Van Effen went to the heart of the matter at once – it would simplify things all round if we shot the lot of them now. We’ll probably have to do it later on anyway.”

There was a long pause, then Findhorn said quietly: “You are very silent, Siran. You miscalculated, perhaps? Almost your last blunder? You can be very grateful, Captain Siran, for the fact that we are not callous murderers of your own stamp. But please bear in mind that it will require very little provocation indeed for us to carry out the suggestion just made.”

“And just move back a bit, will you?” Nicolson asked. “Right to the edge, there. And maybe a quick search of your pockets wouldn’t do any harm, either.”

“Already done, Mr. Nicolson,” the captain assured him. “We took a whole arsenal off them after you left the saloon last night… Still see that sub?”