Алистер Маклин - Partisans

Carlos confirmed what seemed to be the growing opinion that he was indeed no actor. He was pleased, and not obscurely. He said: ‘If you’re unhappy, then I apologize for that although I really don’t know why I’m apologizing. I have orders to carry out and it’s my duty to follow orders. Beyond that, I know nothing.’ He still wasn’t a very good actor, Petersen thought, but there was nothing to be gained in saying so. ‘Won’t you come back to my cabin? Three hours before we sail yet. Ample time for a nightcap. Or two. Alessandro and his men, as you say, aren’t so ferocious as they look.’

‘Thank you,’ Petersen said. ‘But no. I think we’ll just take a turn on the upper deck and then retire. So we’ll say goodnight now.’

‘The upper deck? This weather? You’ll freeze.’

‘Cold is an old friend of ours.’

‘I prefer other company. But as you wish, gentlemen.’ He reached out a steadying hand as the Colombo lurched sharply. ‘A rather rough passage tonight, I’m afraid. Torpedo boats may have their good points – I may find one some day – but they are rather less than seakindly. I hope you are also on friendly terms with Father Neptune.’

‘Our next of kin,’ George said.

‘That apart, I can promise you a quiet and uneventful trip. Never had a mutiny yet.’

In the lee of the superstructure Petersen said: ‘Well?’

‘Well?’ George said heavily. ‘All is not well. Seven total strangers aboard this boat and the worthy young Carlos seems to know all seven of them. Every man’s hand against us. Not, of course, that that’s anything new.’ The tip of his nauseous cigar glowed redly in the gloom. ‘Would it be naïve of me to wonder whether or not our good friend Colonel Lunz is acquainted with the passenger list of the Colombo ?’

‘Yes.’

‘We are, of course, prepared for all eventualities?’

‘Certainly. Which ones did you have in mind?’

‘None. We take turns to keep watch in our cabin?’

‘Of course. If we stay in our cabin.’

‘Ah! We have a plan?’

‘We have no plan. What do you think about Lorraine?’

‘Charming. I speak unhesitatingly. A delightful young lady.’

‘I’ve told you before, George. About your advanced years and susceptibility. That wasn’t what I meant. Her presence aboard puzzles me. I can’t see that she belongs in any way to this motley bunch that Carlos is transporting to Ploče.’

‘Motley, eh? First time I’ve ever been called motley. How does she differ?’

‘Because every other passenger on this vessel is up to no good or I strongly suspect them of being up to no good. I suspect her of nothing.’

‘My word!’ George spoke in tones of what were meant to be genuine awe. ‘That makes her unique.’

‘Carlos let us know – he could have been at pains to let us know – that she, too, came from Pescara. Do you think she comes from Pescara, George?’

‘How the devil should I tell? She could come from Timbuktu for all I know.’

‘You disappoint me, George. Or wilfully misunderstand me. I shall be patient. Your unmatched command of the nuances of all those European languages. Was she born or brought up in Pescara?’

‘Neither.’

‘But she is Italian?’

‘No.’

‘So we’re back in Yugoslavia again?’

‘Maybe you are. I’m not. I’m in England.’

‘What! England?’

‘The overlay of what it pleases the British Broadcasting Corporation to call Southern Standard English is unmistakable.’ George coughed modestly, his smugness could occasionally verge on the infuriating. ‘To the trained ear, of course.’

Both Alex and Carlos had made predictions and both had turned out to be wrong or, in Alex’s case, half wrong. He had said, gloomily and accurately, that it was going to be very very cold and at three a.m. that morning none of the passengers on the Colombo would have disagreed with him. The driving snow, so heavy as to reduce visibility to virtually zero, had an uncommonly chilling effect on the torpedo boat, which would have been of no concern to those in an adequately central-heated boat but on this particular one the central-heating unit, as became practically everything else aboard, was functioning at about only one-third degree efficiency and, moreover, had been of a pathetically ancient design in the first place so that for the shivering passengers – and crew – the snow had become a matter for intense concern.

Alex had been wrong, even if only slightly – and what he had said had been a statement, really, not a fact – when he spoke of an east-north-east wind. It was a north-east wind. To a layman or, indeed, anybody not aboard an elderly torpedo boat, a paltry twenty-three degree difference in wind direction might seem negligible: to a person actually aboard such a boat the difference is crucial, marking, as it did for those with inbuilt queasiness, the border-line between the uncomfortable and the intolerable. Had the Colombo been head-on to wind and seas, the pitching would have been uncomfortable: had the seas been on the beam, the rolling would have been even more uncomfortable: but, that night, with the seas two points off the port bow, the resultant wicked corkscrewing was, for the less fortunate, the last straw. For some people aboard the torpedo boat that night, the degree of sea-sickness ranged from the unpleasant to the acute.

Carlos had predicted that the trip would be quiet and uneventful. At least two people, both, at least outwardly, immune to the effects of sea and cold, did not share Carlos’ confidence. The door to the bo’sun’s store, which lay to the port hand of the stairway leading down to the engine-room, had been hooked open and Petersen and Alex, standing two feet back in the unlit store, were only dimly visible. There was just enough light to see that Alex was carrying a semi-automatic machine-pistol while Petersen, using one hand to steady himself on the lurching deck had the other in his coat pocket. Petersen had long ago learned that with Alex by his side when confronting minimal forces, it was quite superfluous for him to carry a weapon of any kind.

Their little cabin, almost directly opposite them on the starboard side of the ill but sufficiently lit passage-way, had its door closed. George, Petersen knew, was still behind that door: and George, Petersen also knew, would be as wide awake as themselves. Petersen looked at his luminous watch. For just over ninety minutes he and Alex had been on station with no signs of weariness or boredom or awareness of the cold and certainly with no signs of their relaxed vigilance weakening at any time: a hundred times they had waited thus on the bleak and often icy mountains of Bosnia and Serbia and Montenegro, most commonly for much longer periods than this: and always they had survived. But that night was going to be one of their shorter and more comfortable vigils.

It was in the ninety-third minute that two men appeared at the for’ard end of the passage-way. They moved swiftly aft, crouched low as if making a stealthy approach, an attempt in which they were rather handicapped by being flung from bulkhead to bulkhead with every lurch of the Colombo : they had tried to compensate for this by removing their boots, no doubt to reduce the noise level of their approach, a rather ludicrous tactic in the circumstances because the torpedo boat was banging and crashing about to such a high decibel extent that they could have marched purposefully along in hobnailed boots without anyone being any way the wiser. Each had a pistol stuck in his belt: more ominously, each carried in his right hand an object that looked suspiciously like a hand-grenade.

They were Franco and Cola and neither was looking particularly happy. That their expressions were due to the nature of the errand on hand or to twinges of conscience Petersen did not for a moment believe: quite simply, neither had been born with the call of the sea in his ear and, from the lack of colour in their strained faces, both would have been quite happy never to hear it again. On the logical assumption that Alessandro would have picked his two fittest young lieutenants, for the job on hand, Petersen thought, their appearance didn’t say too much for the condition of those who had been left behind. Their cabin was right up in the bows of the vessel and in a cork-screwing sea that was the place to be avoided above all. They halted outside the door behind which George was lurking and looked at each other. Petersen waited until the boat was on even keel, bringing with it a comparative, if brief, period of silence.