Дональд Уэстлейк - Forever and a Death

When he thought sometimes of what an instinctive, unrelenting, unrepentant polluter of air and water and land his father was, Luther could only smile. To his father’s question, in one letter accompanying a check, “What after all is Planetwatch?” he had replied, “Something much much worse than homosexuality.”

Now he sat on the other bunk and watched Jerry slurp his screwdriver. There were no large cabins on Planetwatch III , and this one was just big enough for the two bunks bolted into opposite walls, the drawers built in at one end, and the door at the other. If you wanted to make love, you crowded the two mattresses side by side on the floor between the bunks, and were careful to restore everything afterward, not to scandalize the others.

Jerry said, “Did Kim have anybody on the boat? A boyfriend?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Not sleeping with anybody?”

“I have no idea,” Luther said, “but I doubt it.”

Jerry took more of his drink; about a third of it was left. He blinked past Luther at the wall. “You don’t suppose,” he said, his voice mournful, “she died a virgin.”

Luther laughed; he couldn’t help it. “Nobody’s a virgin,” he said.

“But she was so young.”

“Jerry,” Luther said, “she did it to herself. Nobody sent her, nobody wanted her to go. Everybody wanted her not to go. Sooner or later, you’ll have to accept that. She did it to herself, and there was nothing you could have done about it.” He spoke with a faint accent, which usually gave him a pleasant and amusing sound, but when he was trying to comfort someone — though he had no way to know this — he came off mostly like a Viennese psychiatrist, remote and only professionally caring, not emotionally involved at all.

Jerry said, “If anybody’s responsible, it’s Curtis.”

And, as usual, his voice roughened, became harsher, when he spoke Curtis’s name.

Luther wanted to tell him, “Forget Curtis. It’s over. Think about something else.” But he knew he’d be wasting his breath (even if it were possible for him to sound sympathetic), so he said, “What are you going to do?”

“Singapore,” Jerry said.

Luther was surprised. “Leave the ship? Why Singapore?”

“Because that’s Curtis’s base,” Jerry said, “now that he’s out of Hong Kong. Because I have to know what he’s going to do next.”

There was no doctor aboard the Mallory , but Captain Zhang had taken a number of accrediting courses, enough to qualify him as a medical orderly, which was sufficient for the safety standards required in a ship of this size and purpose. Once he had the diver safely stashed, Curtis went directly to Zhang, on the bridge, and said, “I need you to look at the diver.”

Curious, Zhang said, “To establish death?” The helmsman was over on the other side of the bridge. Lowering his voice, Curtis said, “To establish life.” Then, before the man could make a startled comment, he added, “This is between us. No one knows. Come down and take a look.”

“Of course.”

Zhang turned to give orders to the helmsman, who would command the bridge during the captain’s absence, then picked up his bulky vinyl medical kit and he and Curtis made their way down through the ship.

When the launch carrying Curtis and the diver had returned to the Mallory and been lifted into position so they could step through the gate in the railing onto the deck of the larger ship, Curtis had surprised the crewmen by insisting that he help to carry the unconscious woman. He lifted her under the arms, and one of the crewmen took her ankles, and they set off.

The crewmen thought she was dead, and Curtis had said nothing to correct that idea. While still on the launch, he had zipped shut the wetsuit around her head again, and her breathing was so shallow that no one who wasn’t carrying her by the torso, as he was, would notice.

He’d taken her down to stateroom 7, with the crewman holding her ankles to lead the way. This was the smallest cabin on the ship, rarely used, with a single bunk and one small round porthole and not much floor space. Curtis and the crewman had left her on the bunk, still in the wetsuit, and after locking the cabin door and taking the key with him, Curtis had come for the captain.

Now they were back at stateroom 7. Curtis unlocked the door, they stepped in, and he shut the door again behind them. “What I want to know is,” he said, “is there much chance she’ll go on being alive. She’s bleeding out of her nose and ears.”

“Concussion,” Zhang said. He was a thin man with a round face, about forty, his black hair very thin, so that streaks of amber skull could be seen. He’d worked as mate on commercial ships — cargo, never passenger — and had been with Curtis for nearly three years now, and very much liked his job. If it were possible for him to satisfy Curtis’s wishes, he would.

Now he leaned over the figure supine on the bunk, with its blue-gray cold face, and said, “We must get this wetsuit off her, to begin. She needs to be warm.”

“Fine.”

They worked at it together, and Curtis found it strange to be undressing an attractive young woman with no sexual element involved in it. But there was no sexual element involved. His preference for this body was that it be dead, though he would much prefer that she did the dying on her own.

Once the wetsuit was bundled onto the floor, out of the way, the girl remained dressed in the top half of a light green bathing suit, white panties, and white socks.

Zhang removed the socks as well, but left the other garments. He tested her pulse, listened to her chest and her breathing, lifted back the lids to look into her eyes. He took her temperature by ear, felt her armpits, kneaded her rib cage and her legs, and forced open her mouth to study her tongue.

Curtis stood watching, growing impatient. We aren’t here to save the girl, he thought, but didn’t quite say. We’re here to be certain she can’t be saved.

Finally Zhang finished his examination. As he put his equipment back in the medical kit, he said, “The bleeding has stopped. That was only temporary, from the concussion. She may have cracked ribs, I can’t be certain, but no other bones seem to be broken. She’s in shock, and she shows some signs of hypothermia. She needs sustenance. I wish I could give her an intravenous drip, but I’m not equipped for that. When she wakes up, she should be given hot soup. And then I can talk to her about her ribs, how they feel.”

Zhang turned away to put a sheet and blanket over the girl, while Curtis stood thinking. He watched Zhang turn the top of the blanket down around her throat. He said, “You think she’ll live.”

“Oh, yes, of course.” Zhang tucked in the blanket along the side of the bunk, and smiled at Curtis. “She’s a healthy young girl, she should survive this.”

“You’re absolutely certain.”

“Well,” Zhang said, “I don’t know that much about medicine. Absolute certainty is... more than I can promise.”

“So she might not make it?” Curtis said, trying to keep the words from sounding pointed. It wouldn’t do to be too obvious. But Zhang was no fool. Surely he could read between the lines.

The captain hesitated, thought about his answer before he spoke the words.

“She might not. But I would think she most likely will. It isn’t certain , but...”

“Likely.”

Zhang nodded.

“Well,” Curtis said. “That would be wonderful, of course. But we can’t count on it.”

“No,” Zhang said.

“She might die.”

“I really don’t think she—”

“I’m just saying she might,” Curtis said. “And I’m sure you know, no one could possibly find fault with you if she did. That girl was badly injured. You are doing what you can, but in the end... Even the finest doctor can’t save every patient. Even the finest doctor, working with the best equipment, in a first-rate hospital, which is not what you have here.”