Alistair MacLean - Bear Island

"I see. Too dangerous for the moment. When the sea moderates, Mr. Smith?"

"Depends upon the wind. It's backing to the west right now and if it were to stay in that quarter-well, it's feasible. If it moves round to the northwest or beyond, no. Not on." Smithy smiled. I wouldn't say that an overland trip would be all that easier, but at least you wouldn't be swamped in heavy seas."

"Ah! So you think that it is at least possible to reach Tunheim on foot?"

"Well, I don't know. I'm no expert on Arctic travel, I'm sure Mr. Heissman here-I'm told he's been giving a lecture about this already-is much more qualified to speak about it than I am."

"No, no." Heissman waved a deprecating hand. "Let's hear what you think, Mr. Smith."

So Smithy let them hear what he thought which was more or less a verbatim repetition of what I'd said to him in our cubicle earlier. When he'd finished, Heissman, who probably knew as much about winter travel in Arctic regions as I did about the back side of the moon, nodded sagely and said: "Succinctly and admirably put. I agree entirely with Mr. Smith."

There was a thoughtful silence eventually broken by Smithy who said diffidently: "I'm the supernumerary here. If the weather eases, I don't mind trying."

"And now I have to disagree with you," Heissman said promptly. "Suicidal, just suicidal, my boy."

"Not to he thought of for an instant," Otto said firmly. "For safety-for mutual safety-nothing short of an expedition would do."

I wouldn't want an expedition," Smithy said mildly. "I don't see that the blind leading the blind would help much."

"Mr. Gerran." It was Jon Heyter speaking. "Perhaps I could be of help here?"

"You?" Otto looked at him in momentary perplexity then his face cleared. "Of course. I'd forgotten about that." He said in explanation: Jon here was my stuntman in The High Sierra. A climbing picture. He doubled for the actors who were too terrified or too valuable for the climbing sequences. A really first-class alpinist, I assure you. How about that, then, eh, Mr. Smith?"

I was about to wonder how Smith would field that one when he answered immediately. "That's about the size of the expedition I'd have in mind. I'd be very glad to have Mr. Heyter along-he'd probably have to carry me most of the way there."

"Well, that's settled, then," Otto said. "Very grateful to you both. But only, of course, if the weather improves. Well, I think that covers everything." He smiled at me. "As co-opted board member, wouldn't you agree?"

"Well, yes," I said. "Except with your assumption that everyone will be here in the morning to play the parts you have assigned to them."

"Ah!" Otto said.

"Precisely," I said. `You weren't seriously contemplating that we should all retire for the night, were you? For certain people with certain purposes in mind there is no time like the still small hours. When I say "people," I'm not going out of the bounds of this cabin: when I say "purposes," I refer to homicidal ones."

"My colleagues and I have, in fact, discussed this," Otto said. "You propose we set watches?"

It might help some of us to live a little longer," I said. I moved two or I three steps until I was in the centre of the cabin. "From here I can see into all Eve corridors. It would be impossible for any person to leave or enter any of the cubicles without being observed by a person standing here."

"Going to call for a rather special type of person, isn't it?" Conrad said.

"Someone with his neck mounted on swivels."

"Not if we have two on watch at the same time," I said. "And as the time's long gone when anybody's hurt feelings are a matter of any importance, two people on watch who are not only watching the corridors but watching each other. A suspect, shall we say, and a nonsuspect.

Among the nonsuspects, I think we might gallantly exclude the two Marys. And I think that Allen, too, could do with a full night's sleep. That would leave Mr. Gerran, Mr. Goin, Mr. Smith, Cecil, and myself. Five of us, which would work out rather well for two-hour watches between, say, ten P.m. and eight A.M."

"An excellent suggestion," Otto said. "Well, then, five volunteers."

There were thirteen potential volunteers and all thirteen immediately offered their services. Eventually it was agreed that Goin and Hendriks should share the ten to midnight watch, Smith and Conrad the midnight to two, myself and Luke the two to four, Otto and Jungbeck the four to six and Cecil and Eddie the six to eight. Some of the others, notably the Count and Heissman, protested, not too strongly, that they were being discriminated against: the reminder that there would be still another twenty-one nights after this one was sufficient to ensure that the protest was no more than a token one. The decision not to linger around in small talk and socialising was reached with a far from surprising unanimity. There was, really, only one thing to talk about and nobody wished to talk about it in case he had picked the wrong person to talk to. In ones and twos, and within a very few minutes, almost everybody had moved off to their cubicles. Apart from Smithy and myself, only Conrad remained and I knew that he wished to talk to me. Smithy glanced briefly at me then left for our cubicle.

"How did you know?" Conrad said. "About Lonnie and his family?"

I didn't. I guessed. He's talked to you?"

"A little. Not much. He had a family."

"Had?"

"Had. Wife and two daughters. Two grown-up girls. A car crash. I don't know if they hit another car, I don't know who was driving. Lonnie just clammed up as if he had already said too much. He wouldn't even say whether he had been in the car himself, whether anyone else had been present, not even when it had taken place."

And that was all that Conrad had learnt. We talked in a desultory fashion for some little time and when Goin and Hendriks appeared to begin the first watch I left for my cubicle. Smithy was not in his camp bed. Fully clothed, he was just removing the last of the screws I'd used to secure the window frame: he'd the flame of the little oil lamp turned so low that the cubicle was in semidarkness.

"Leaving?" I said.

"Somebody out there." Smithy reached for his anorak and I did the same. I thought maybe we shouldn't use the front door."

"Who is it?"

"No idea. He looked in here but his face was just a white blur. He doesn't know I saw him, I'm sure of that, for he went from here and shone a torch through Judith Haynes's window and he wouldn't have done that if he thought anyone was watching." Smithy was already clambering through the window. "He put his torch out but not before I saw where he was heading. Down to the jetty, I'm sure."

I followed Smithy and jammed the window shut as I had done before. The weather was very much as it had been earlier, still that driving snow, the deepening cold, the darkness and that bitter wind which was still boxing the compass and had moved around to the southwest. We moved across to Judith Haynes's window, hooded our torches to give thin pencil beams of light, picked up tracks in the snow that led off in the direction of the jetty and were about to follow them when it occurred to me that it might be instructive to see where they came from. But we couldn't find where they came from: whoever the unknown was he'd walked, keeping very close to the walls, at least twice round the cabin, obviously dragging his feel? as he had gone, so that it was quite impossible to discover which cubicle window he'd used as an exit route from the cabin. That he should have so effectively covered his tracks was annoying: that he should have thought to do it at all was disconcerting for it plainly demonstrated at least the awareness that such late-night sorties might be expected. We made our way quickly but cautiously down to the jetty, giving the unknown's tracks a prudently wide berth. At the head of the jetty I risked a quick Hash with the narrowed beam of my torch: a single line of tracks led outwards.