Hammond Innes - Blue Ice

That was the morning on which things began to develop. We were able to relax, and think of other things besides sailing. At noon I handed the wheel over to Jorgensen. Dick had taken both watches for’ard to get the main tops’l down and replace a jammed swivel shackle. For the first time since we’d started I was alone with the Norwegian. ‘Course north twenty-five east,’ I told him as I climbed stiffly out of the wheel seat.

He nodded and took the wheel, peering forward at the compass. Then he raised his eyes to the group busy on the halyards round the mainmast. Finally he looked up at me. ‘Just a moment, Mr Gansert,’ he said, for I was going for’ard myself to lend a hand. I stopped then and he said, ‘my health is benefiting greatly from this little trip. But I do not think my business will — unless we can come to some arrangement.’

‘How do you mean?’ I asked.

He leaned back, holding the wheel easily in his strong fingers. ‘I admit that I was not being honest with you when I said I was not interested in Farnell. I am — and particularly now that I know he has communicated with you recently. He told you, I suppose, that he had made important mineral discoveries in Norway?’

There was no point in denying it. ‘His message implied that,’ I answered.

‘Did he tell you what metal he had discovered?’ he asked.

I nodded. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘And sent samples.”

‘By post, I suppose?’ His eyes were watching me narrowly.

I smiled. ‘His method of dispatch was rather more unorthodox,’ I said. ‘However, I imagine it’s sufficient for you to know that I got the samples safely.’

‘And you know where the mineral is located?’ he asked.

I saw no reason to disabuse his mind of what was a natural supposition. ‘The samples wouldn’t have been of much use to is without that information,’ I pointed out.

He hesitated and then said, ‘I think we could come to some sort of an arrangement. Suppose we make straight for Bergen? I can then put specific proposals before you and you can get Sir Clinton-’

His voice died away. He was gazing past me. I turned. Dahler was standing at the top of the companionway. I hadn’t seen him since we left the Thames, except once when I’d stumbled into him in the half darkness as he made his way to the afterheads. Jill had been looking after him. The sun emerged from behind a cloud and his lined face looked grey in the bright light. He had on a sweater of Dick’s that was several sizes too large for him and a pair of old grey trousers turned up twice at the bottom. He was looking at Jorgensen. Once again I was conscious of me latent enmity of these two men. Dahler weaved his way awkwardly across the pitching deck. He must have heard what Jorgensen had been saying for he said, ‘So it’s reached the stage of specific proposals, has it?’

‘What is that to do with you?’ Jorgensen snapped.

‘Nothing,’ the cripple replied with that crooked smile of his. ‘I am interested, that is all. You are like a dog worrying over a bone. You have buried it, but you are afraid some other dog will come along and dig it up. You were even questioning Miss Somers.’

Jorgensen said nothing. He was watching the other with a strange intentness. The man’s nerves were plucking at a little muscle in his jaw.

‘I told her to tell you nothing,’ Dahler added.

‘Since when have you become her guardian?’ Jorgensen asked with a sneer.

‘I was a friend of her father,’ the other answered. ‘Fortunately you got nothing out of her — or Major Wright.’ He smiled. ‘Yes you didn’t know my cabin door was not properly shut, did you?’ He turned to me. ‘Before you discuss specific proposals, Mr Gansert, I suggest you find out what he knows about George Farnell.’

Jorgensen’s knuckles were white as his grip on the wheel tightened. ‘Why are you so interested in Farnell?’ he asked Dahler.

The cripple leaned on the chartroom roof to steady himself against the pitch of the ship. ‘Bernt Olsen smuggled us out of Finse.’ He thrust his head suddenly forward. ‘Also he told me who had instructed the Germans to raid my house that night. You didn’t know I knew about that, did you?’

‘Your house was raided because you talked too much about what you pretended you were doing.’

‘Mueller, your Bergen representative, had nothing to do with it. I suppose?’

‘If he did, then he’s paying for it with a six-year sentence for aiding the Germans.’

‘For doing what you ordered him to do.’

‘Det er logn.’ In his excitement Jorgensen dropped into Norwegian. His face was flushed with anger.

‘It is not a lie,’ Dahler answered.

‘Prove it then.’

‘Prove it?’ Dahler smiled. ‘That is why I am here, Knut. I am going to prove it. I am going to prove that you ought to be doing the sentence that Mueller is serving now. When I’ve found Farnell-’

‘Farnell is dead,’ Jorgensen cut in, his voice sharp and controlled again.

Dahler didn’t say anything after that. The curt reminder that Farnell was dead seemed to bring him up with a jolt. He turned and started to move back towards the companion way. But he stopped and looked round. ‘Before you discuss his proposals, Mr Gansert,’ he said quietly, ‘remember that he worked for the Germans till the tide turned, just as hard as he worked for the British later.’ And with that he disappeared down the companionway.

There was a sudden shout from Dick — ‘Watch your course.’ The boat’s head was right up into the wind and canvas everywhere was slatting madly. Jorgensen paid her off on to course.

Then he sighed. ‘That is what happens, Mr Gansert,’ he said quietly, ‘in a country that has been occupied.’

I made no comment and after a moment, he went on: ‘Before the war Jan Dahler and I did business together. His tankers supplied my metal plant. Now-’ He shrugged his shoulders. ‘He was foolish. He helped some British agents and then went and talked too freely about it. And because Mueller was pro-German and informed against him, he blames me. And his escape from Finse.’ He looked up at me. ‘A German officer has admitted that the price of his escape was certain information they wanted. The information concerned new types of marine engines planned by my engineers. The plans were ‘lost’ when Norway was occupied. But Dahler knew about them because I’d promised to fit his tankers before accepting any other orders. And — well, there was a leakage and the plans were extracted from us.’

‘And Dahler was responsible?’ I asked.

‘There’s no proof — apart from the German officer who broke down under cross-examination by our Intelligence. But the demand for the plans was made just after Dahler’s escape from Finse. That is why the authorities do not want him back in Norway.’

‘What was he doing up at Finse?’ I asked.

‘Forced labour,’ he answered. ‘The Germans had some fantastic scheme for an ice dome on the Jokulen.’ He pulled out a cigarette and lit it. ‘You see how it is, Mr Gansert. To cover himself, he must make counter-allegations. And’ — he hesitated — ‘the trouble is that a man in my position is awkwardly placed under an occupation. I had to carry on, publicly showing friendship for the Germans, in order to work for the liberation of my country. If they did not trust me, then I should have ceased to be useful. Many people who do not know what I did secretly are prepared to believe that I was pro-German. That is why it makes me angry to hear a man like Dahler make wild accusations. I know how vulnerable my work has made me.’ He smiled a trifle sadly. ‘I thought it better that you know,’ he said. And then he added, ‘Now, what about running straight into Bergen and arranging things?’