Alistair MacLean - The Golden Rendezvous

“Strewth,” am I glad to see “Where’s the fourth mate?” I demanded.

“Search me, sir. Then course alterations…”

“To hell with the course alterations! Where did be go?” Ferguson blinked in surprise. He had the same look on his face as Whitehead had had a few seconds ago, the wary bafflement of a man who sees another going off his rocker.

“I don’t know, sir. He didn’t say.”

I reached for the nearest phone, got through to the dining room, asked for Bullen. He came on and I said, “Carter here, sir. Could you come up to the bridge straightaway?”

There was a brief pause, then, “Why?”

“Dexter’s missing, sir. He had the watch but he left the bridge twenty minutes ago.”

“Left the bridge.” Bullen’s voice held no inflection, but only because he made it that way. Lord Dexter’s son or not, young Dexter was finished on the Campari unless he could explain this one away. “Looked for him yet? He could be anywhere.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of, sir.”

The phone clicked and I hung up. Young Whitehead, still looking apprehensive, had just arrived in the cabin. I said, “You’ll find the third mate in his cabin. My compliments to him, ask him if he’ll take over the bridge for a few minutes. Ferguson?”

“Sir?” the voice was still wary.

“Mr. Dexter said nothing at all when he left?”

“Yes, sir. I heard him say something like, ‘Wait a minute, what the hell’s going on here?’ or something like that, I can’t be sure.” Then he said, ‘Keep her as she is. Back in a jiffy,’ and then he was off.”

“That was all?”

“That was all, sir.”

“Where was he standing at the time?” “On the starboard wing, sir. Just outside the door.”

“And he went down that side?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Where was Whitehead at the time?”

“Out on the port wing, sir.” Ferguson’s expression and tone showed beyond all doubt that he was with a loony, but he was playing it cool all the same.

“Didn’t cross to see where Mr. Dexter had gone?”

“No, sir.” he hesitated. “Well, not right away. But I thought it a bit funny so I asked him to have a look. He couldn’t see anything.”

“Damn! How long after Mr. Dexter left before he took this look?”

“A minute. Maybe closer on two. Couldn’t be sure, sir.”

“But whatever Mr. Dexter saw, it was aft?”

“Yes, sir.”

I moved out on the wing bridge and looked aft. There was no one to be seen on any of the two decks below. The crew had long finished washing down decks and the passengers were still at breakfast. Nobody there. Nothing of any interest at all to be seen. Even the wireless office was deserted, its door closed and locked. I could see the brass padlock clearly, gleaming and glittering in the morning sun as the Campari pitched slowly, gently, through the ever lengthening swell.

The wireless office! I stood there perfectly rigid for all of three seconds, a candidate, in Ferguson’s eyes, for a strait jacket if ever there had been one, then took off down the companionway the same way as I had come up, three steps at a time. Only a smart piece of braking on my part and a surprisingly nimble bit of dodging on the captain’s prevented a head-on collision at the foot of the companionway. Bullen put into words the thought that was obviously gaining currency around the bridge.

“Have you gone off your bloody rocker, mister?”

“The wireless office, sir,” I said quickly. “Come on.” I was there in a few seconds, Bullen close behind. I tried the padlock, a heavy-duty, double-action Yale, but it was securely locked.

It was then that I noticed a key sticking out from the bottom of the padlock. I twisted it, first one way, then the other, but it was jammed fast. I tried to pull it out and had the same lack of success. I became aware that Bullen was breathing heavily over my shoulder.

“What the devil’s the matter, mister? What’s got into you all of a sudden?” “One moment, sir.” I’d caught sight of Whitehead making his way up to the bridge and beckoned him across. “Get the bo’sun. Tell him to bring a pair of pliers.”

“Yes, sir, I’ll get the pliers”

“I said, ‘Tell the bo’sun to bring them,’“ I said savagely. “Then ask Mr. Peters for the key to this door. Hurry!”

He hurried. You could see he was glad to escape. Bullen said, “Look here, mister…”

“Dexter left the bridge because he saw something funny going on. So Ferguson said. Where else but here, sir?”

“Why here? Why not…”

“Look at that.” I took the padlock in my hand. “That bent key. And everything that’s happened has happened because of here.”

“The window?”

“No good. I’ve looked.” I led him round the corner to the single square of plate glass. “Night curtains are still drawn.”

“Couldn’t we smash the damned thing in?”

“What’s the point? It’s too late now.”

Bullen looked at me queerly but said nothing. Half a minute passed in silence. Bullen was getting more worried every second. I wasn’t. I was as worried as could be already. Jamieson appeared, on his way to the bridge, caught sight of us, made to come towards us, then carried on as Bullen waved him away. And then the bo’sun was there, carrying a pair of heavy insulated pliers in his hand.

“Open this damned door,” Bullen said curtly. Macdonald tried to remove the key with his fingers, failed, and brought the pliers into use. With the first tug of the pliers the key in the lock snapped cleanly in half. “Well,” Bullen said heavily, “That helps.” Macdonald looked at him, at me, then back at the broken key still held in the jaws of the pliers.

“I didn’t even twist it, sir,” He said quietly. “And if that’s a Yale key,” he added with an air of faint distaste, “Then I’m an Englishman.” he handed over the key for inspection. The break showed the grey, rough, porous composition of some base metal. “Homemade, and not very well made at that, either.”

Bullen pocketed the broken key. “Can you get the other bit out?”

“No, sir. Completely jammed.” He fished in his overalls, produced a hacksaw. “Maybe this, sir?”

“Good man.” It took Macdonald three minutes hard work the hasp, unlike the padlock, was made of tempered steel — and then the hacksaw was through. He slid out the padlock, then glanced enquiringly at the captain.

“Come in with us,” Bullen said. There was sweat on his brow. “See that nobody comes near.” He pushed open the door and passed inside; I was on his heels.

We’d found Dexter all right, and we’d found him too late. He had that old-bundle-of-clothes look, that completely relaxed huddled shapelessness that only the dead can achieve; face down, outflung on the corticene flooring, he hardly left standing room for Bullen and myself.

“Shall I get the doctor, sir?” It was Macdonald speaking: He was standing astride the storm sill, and the knuckles of the hand holding the door shone bonily through the tautened skin.

“It’s too late for a doctor now, bo’sun,” Bullen said stonily.

Then his composure broke and he burst out violently: “My god, mister, where’s it all going to end? He’s dead you can see he’s dead. What’s behind what murderous fiend why did they kill him, mister? Why did they have to kill him? Damn it to hell, why did the fiends have to kill him? He was only a kid what real harm did young Dexter ever do anybody?” It said much for Bullen at the moment that the thought never even occurred to him that the dead man was the son of the Chairman and Managing Director of the Blue Mail Line.

That thought would come later.

“He died for the same reason that Benson died,” I said.