"Who are you kidding, Buster!" Hugo snorted. "You"ve been stacking it away for years." Benedict let the barrels of the shotgun swing towards Hugo"s belly suggestively.
"Go ahead," Hugo grinned at him, s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up his pale albino eyes.
"That"ll leave you to paddle this canoe - you want to try it? You"d pile her up on the bar at the entrance that"s how far you"d get."
Benedict swung the barrels aside.
"Fifty," he agreed.
"Right!" Hugo spoke briskly. "Let"s get the h.e.l.l out of here."
Wild Goose was clear of the land, and of the towering blinding dust clouds. The following seas came sweeping up under her stern urging her on her westward flight, while the high-pitched shriek of the wind in her rigging cried to her to hasten.
"Why don"t you get down below and grab some sleep?" Hugo said. He found Benedict"s restless haunting presence in the crowded wheelhouse disconcerting.
Benedict ignored the suggestion. "Switch on the radio," he said.
"What for? You"ll get nothing on the set."
"We are out of the dust, Benedict replied. "We might pick up a police message." The image of Ruby was so clear in his mind. He wanted to know if they"d found her yet. He felt his gorge rising again. That head - oh G.o.d - that head! He crossed quickly to the radio set and switched it on.
"They won"t be on to us yet," said Hugo, but Benedict was manipulating the dials - searching the tortured radio waves. The static wailed and gibbered and shrieked like a maniac.
"Turn it off," snapped Hugo, and at that moment a voice cut in on them.
" - Wild Goose," said the voice from the loudspeaker quite clearly. Benedict crouched eagerly over the set, his hands busy on the dials, and Hugo came up beside him.
Come in, Wild Goose. This is Kingfisher. I repeat, come in Wild Goose-" Benedict and Hugo looked at each other. "Don"t answer," said Hugo, but he made no move to intervene as Benedict lifted the microphone off its hook.
"Kingfisher, this is Wild Goose."
"Stand by, Wild Goose. "The answer came back immediately. "Stand by for Captain Caporetti."
"Wild Goose standing by." Hugo caught Benedict"s shoulder and his voice was angrily uncertain.
"Leave it, don"t be a fool." Benedict shrugged off the hand, and Sergio"s voice boomed out of the speaker.
"This is Caporetti - who that?"
"No names," Benedict cautioned him.
"Where are your guests?"
"They safe - battened down nicely."
"Safe?
Are you certain? Both of them safe?"
"Si. I have them safe and sure."
"Stand by." Benedict crouched over the set, and his mind was racing. Johnny Lance was in his power. This was the last chance he would ever have. Plans began to form, gelling quickly in his mind.
"The diamonds. Caporetti has the diamonds. That big Blue is worth a million on its own," said Hugo. "If Caporetti has taken care of the others - it would be worth the risk."
"Yes." Benedict turned to him, he had been puzzling how he could make Hugo turn back. He had forgotten the diamonds. "It would be worth it,"he agreed.
"Just a quick pa.s.s alongside Kingfisher - pick up Caporetti with the diamonds and we"d be on our way "I have to go aboard." Benedict qualified the suggestion.
"Why?" Hugo asked.
"Wipe out the reel on the computer that carries the programme it"s got the j.a.p"s name on it. They could trace him. I paid him on my Swiss bank. They"ll find the account." Hugo hesitated. "No killing or anything like that.
We"ve got enough trouble without that."
"You think I"m crazy?" Benedict demanded.
"Okay, then," Hugo agreed.
"Kingfisher," Benedict spoke into the microphone. "We are coming to you. I"ll be coming on board to finalize matters."
"Fine." Through the static they could hear the relief in Sergio"s voice. "I"ll be standing by." It took nearly two hours for Wild Goose to slug her way back to where Kingfisher lay beneath the ghostly white shapes of Thunderbolt and Suicide, and it was after midday before Hugo began manoeuvring Wild Goose into the big ship"s lee.
"Don"t waste time," Hugo cautioned Benedict. "The sooner we get on our way - the better for all of us."
"I"ll be about half an hour," Benedict answered. "You lay off and wait for us."
"Are you taking that b.l.o.o.d.y shotgun?" Benedict nodded.
"What for?" But Benedict did not reply, he looked up at the sky.
The sun was merely a luminous patch of silver light through the ceiling of sea-fret and wind-driven mist, and still the storm hunted hungrily across the sea.
"It will slow you up on the ladder." Hugo harped on the shotgun.
He wanted very much to part Benedict from it, he wanted it over the side - for its presence aboard would prejudice the plans that Hugo had been forming during the last few hours - plans that took into account the ready market for diamonds in South America, and the undesirability of sharing the proceeds with two partners.
"I"ll take it." Benedict tightened his grip on the stock of the weapon. Without it he would feel naked and vulnerable - and it was part of his own private plans for the future.
Benedict"s brain had also been busy during the last two hours.
"Suit yourself." Hugo resigned himself to Benedict"s refusal; there would be an Opportunity later, during the long pa.s.sage across the Southern Atlantic. "You better get up for and." This time Hugo"s approach was neatly executed; in a lull between the colossal swells he touched Wild Goose"s bows to the steel side of the factory ship.
Benedict stepped across the gap and was up the landing ladder and standing at Kingfisher"s rail before the next wave came marching down on them.
He waved Hugo off, then hanging on to the rail, made his way aft to Kingfisher"s bridge works.
"Where is Lance?" he demanded of Sergio the moment he stepped on to the bridge, but Sergio glanced significantly at the inquisitively listening helmsman and led Benedict through into his cabin.
"Where is Lance?" Benedict repeated the moment the door was locked.
"He and your sister they are in the conveyor room." The conveyor room?" Benedict was incredulous.
"Si. They find out about Kammy"s machine. They open the hatch and go inside. I close both doors. Lock them good." They are in there now?" Benedict asked to gain time to reconstruct his plans.
"Si. Still there."
"All right." Benedict reached his decision.
"Now listen, Caporetti, this is what we are going to do. The whole thing has blown up on us. We are going to wipe out as much of the evidence against us as possible, then we are clearing out. We are going to run for South America in Wild Goose.
You have got the diamonds - haven"t you?"
"Si." Sergio patted the breast of his jacket.
"Give them to me." Benedict held out his hand, and Sergio grinned.
"I tink I look after them. They keep my heart warm." A frown of annoyance narrowed Benedict"s eyes, but he let the moment pa.s.s.
"All right." His tone was still friendly. "Now, what you have to do is get down to the control room and wipe out Kaminikoto"s programme.
Get his name off that reel. He showed you how to do that?"
"Si."
Sergio nodded.
"How long will it take?"
"Half an hour, not longer,"Sergio answered, and Benedict checked his wrist watch, sure that this would give him time enough to do what he had to do.
"Good! Get cracking."
"Boss." Sergio hesitated at the cabin door.
"What about my boys, my crew? They good boys, no trouble for them?"
They"re clean," Benedict pointed out irritably. "I"ll get them together now, and explain that you have to go ash.o.r.e.
They can keep Kingfisher hove to waiting for you to come back.
After the storm blows out they are bound to radio base and find out we have disappeared. They"ll be all right." Sergio nodded his satisfaction.
"I"ll call them all to the bridge now. You talk to them."
"The five crew members were gathered on Kingfisher"s bridge, and Sergio had disappeared down below.
"Any of you speak English?" Benedict demanded, and two of them affirmed that they did.
"Right," Benedict addressed them. "You will have been wondering about all the coming and going in this weather.
I want you all to be ready to leave the ship. I want you to get all your valuables - now!" Quickly they translated to the others, who looked apprehensively at Benedict. He was a strange wild-eyed figu with the shotgun tucked under his arm. A "Right - let"s go." And there was no dissent from any of them as they trooped to the companionway.
Benedict followed them along the pa.s.sageway towards the crew quarters, and glanced quickly at his wrist watch.
Seven minutes had elapsed. He looked at the men ahead of him.
The backs of their heads formed a solid target. He had shot guineafowl like that in Namaqualand when they were on the ground running away from him in a thick file, down on one knee and aim for the thicket of heads, knocking down half the flock with both barrels.
He knew he could take all five of these men with two shots. just let them get a little further ahead so the shot could spread. But he remembered Ruby and his stomach heaved. The other way was just as sure.
"Stop!" he commanded as the five men came level with the paint store. They obeyed and turned back to face him.
Now he held the shotgun so that there was no mistaking its menace.
They stared at the gun fearfully.
"Open that door." He pointed at the paint store. n.o.body moved.
"You." Benedict picked on one of those who spoke English. Like a man in a trance he went to the steel door and spun the locking handle.
He pulled the door open.
"In!" Eloquently Benedict gestured with the shotgun.
Reluctantly the five of them filed into the small windowless cubicle, and Benedict slammed the door on them. He spun the lock, throwing all his weight on the handle to set it.
Now he had a clear field, and his wrist watch gave him another twenty minutes. He hurried for-and, he wanted to keep well clear of the control room and Sergio Capotetti.
Using the forward companionway he dropped down to the working deck, fumbling out his duplicate set of keys.
WARNING. EXPLOSIVES. NO UNAUTHORIZED ENTRY.
He unlocked the door, and laying the shotgun flat on the deck he lifted a twenty-five pound drum of plastique down from its rack.
In his haste he tore a fingernail on the lid of the drum, but hardly felt the pain. He uncoiled a six-foot length of the soft dark toffee-coloured material and slung it around his neck. Next he selected a cardboard box of pencil time fuses. He read the label.
"Fourteen-minute delay. That"s about right." Blood from his torn nail left brown blotches on the cardboard as he took four of the pencils from the box, picked up the shotgun and hurried aft. The jet engine whine of the cyclone mounted deafeningly as he came closer to it.
Tracey was curled on the bare steel plating of the deck with Johnny"s jacket folded under her head.
She was in a fatigue-drugged sleep, so deep as to be almost deathlike.
Every few minutes Johnny interrupted his restless patrol of the conveyor room to stand over her and look down on her unconscious form.
His worried expression softened a little each time he studied her pale lovely face. Once he stooped over her and tenderly lifted a strand of dark hair from her cheek, before resuming his pacing up and down the narrow cabin.
Each time he reached the door of the conveyor room he glanced through the tiny window. The gla.s.s had resisted his attempts to smash it with one of the spanners. He had wanted to open the window to call for help, but his efforts had not marked the thick armoured gla.s.s.