Dead and Alive (20 page)

“Where is Perroni?”

But before the man could reply, there was a shout from the bridge. Boyd must have been caught napping. No doubt he had been watching the scene on the deck. As a result a thick-set man, whom I had no difficulty in
recognising as the skipper of the
Pampas
, had him by the neck and was trying to throttle him.

The Little Octopus did not hesitate. He drew his pistol. I tried to stop him, but I was too late. A stab of flame, the soft plop of a silencer and Perroni jerked upright and rigid. Then he slowly keeled over and fell against the windbreaker of the bridge. The Little Octopus fired again and a hole appeared in the man’s forehead and Monique cried out as she was splashed by the ugly pulp that spread over the back of the man’s head, showing red in the moonlight.

“That’s the lot then,” said the Little Octopus to me. “I’ll look after this. You go and get your two men out of the chain locker.”

I felt slightly sick. It was so unnecessary—like burning that wretch with a cigarette end. But there it was. I called to Boyd to get Monique down off the bridge.

I met her at the foot of the port ladder. She was trembling like a leaf. Her hand slipped into mine like a kid that’s got into a world it does not understand.

We went aft into the galley and down into the bowels of the ship’s stern. Landing craft anchor from the stern and their chain lockers are therefore in a different place to other ships. We got the hatch of the locker up. I struck a match. It died for lack of air as soon as I thrust it through the hatch. But not before I had seen Stuart and Dugan, exhausted and wide-eyed, lying prostrate on the anchor chain.

“You all right, Stuart?” I asked.

“It’s you, is it, David?” he said. “Thank God!” His voice was thick and blurred. “We’ve been here two days.” The Black Hole couldn’t have been worse. The air was stale and smelt very bad.

I climbed through and got first Dugan and then Stuart up through the hatch. They were in a bad way. “No water. No food.” Stuart explained painfully. Lack of air and the heat had done the rest. We carried them up into the fresh air and put them to bed in the bunks in the bridge housings. Monique brought water and then I told
Boyd to show her the galley and get some soup warmed up.

“Is the cargo all right?” Stuart asked.

I nodded. “I imagine so,” I said. “She’s low enough in the water.”

He smiled happily. “How did you manage to get here?”

“The story will keep,” I said. “It’s none of my doing—just luck and the help of several people.”

“I nearly gave you up,” he said, and the water spilled on to the blankets as he sipped at the mug. “Thought you might think I’d welshed or something.”

“I’m afraid we came pretty near to thinking that,” I admitted. “We’ve been very lucky.”

At that moment the Little Octopus walked in. “
Arrivederci, Signore
,” he said. “I’ve cleared the remains from your bridge. I suggest you start your motors and get under way. The sooner you are out of here the better.”

I said, “Stuart, this is the man who got the ship back from Perroni.” Then to the Italian I said, “How can we repay you?”

He shrugged his shoulders with an expressive lift of his hands. “It was a pleasure,” he said. “Doubtless you will return to Italy. And some day I may need help. That is all I ask.”

I was just about to thank him again when I noticed that Stuart had struggled into a sitting position. His eyes were narrowed dangerously. “Your name is Beni Jocomoni,” he said. “The last time I saw you was up by Rimini nearly three years ago. You had just set fire to five houses in which you had locked the occupants. You were a partisan and on our side, but I would have shot you if you hadn’t escaped through the smoke.”

The Little Octopus turned down the corners of his lips. “Perhaps I am like this Beni Jocomoni. It is possible. But you are in no state, signore, to recognise people. It is a long time ago, three years. Much has happened. And at the moment I think you owe your life to me.”

“Yes, I suppose so.” Stuart slumped back on to the pillows. “But to have saved my life is small consolation to the innocent people who died to make a bonfire for your amusement.”

The Little Octopus laughed and it was not a nice sound. “They would not give us food. Human life is cheap in a world where there is so much suffering.
Arrivederci, Signori
.” He bowed with a jerky theatrical movement of his slim body and went out through the door.

“I’ll get under way,” I told Stuart.

“Just a minute,” he said. “What’s happened to Perroni and Del Ricci? They caught us napping when we were alongside the mole waiting, fully loaded, for you to return.”

I told him. And he nodded his head slowly, caressing his stubbly chin. Then he smiled a little wryly. “There’s a certain strange justice about life, isn’t there?” he said.

Monique came in then with some soup and I left him and went out on to the bridge. The schooner was casting off. I went down to the deck and thanked the skipper and his crew. He waved his hand and his engines began to go astern.

As the gap between the two craft widened something that reflected the moonlight flashed through the air and fell with a clatter at my feet. It was followed by another but lighter article. I picked them up. They were the silver cigarette case and the lighter that matched it.

The Little Octopus waved his hand in ironic salute.

I stood there and watched the schooner back out of the harbour entrance. Clear of the wall, her bows swung towards Elba. Her sails gleamed white as they struggled up to clothe her masts.

I threw the cigarette case and the lighter over the side. And as they sank through the clear sea water like silver fish I felt a sense of relief. I did not want to remember that particular facet of the expedition.

“Boyd!” I called. And when he came out of the galley I said, “Get the engines going, will you? I want to get out of here as quickly as I can.”

“Aye, aye, sir.”

I got a swab and went up to the bridge and washed all traces of Perroni’s wretched end off the woodwork.

By the time I had swabbed the last of the blood the engines were going. Boyd and I got the hook up with the donkey engine and then I went up on to the bridge again and took the wheel in my hands.

“Slow astern both,” I ordered.

“Slow astern it is, sir,” came Boyd’s report from the engine room and I felt the screws bite into the water and the ship begin to go astern.

As the harbour wall slipped past I ordered, “Full ahead, port—full astern, starboard.”

The bows swung round. The little fishing village, white in the moonlight beneath the towering slopes of the island, revolved slowly round us and I headed the
Trevedra
along the rocky coast towards the open sea.

When we rounded the end of the island, I changed course, heading west for the Straits of Bonifacio between Corsica and Sardinia. I felt a strange contentment with the throb of the engines and the leap of the deck plates hard beneath my feet. I was my own master again. This was my ship and I was in command of her again. And I was homeward bound.

When the Giglio was just a dark mass astern beneath the great round disc of the moon and my wake was part of the silver path that led back to the island, Monique came out on to the bridge. She put her hand in mine, not afraid to touch me, and said, “I am glad that it is all right and that you have your ship again. You are happy, yes?”

She was looking up into my face, happy and child-like, yet with the eyes of a woman who understood my mood.

I slipped my arm round her and moved her body so that she stood against the wheel. Then I took her hands
in mine and put them on the spokes of the wheel, holding them there beneath my own.

She leaned her body back against me and her hair was on my cheek as she flung her head back to look up into my face. She wasn’t laughing now. She understood, and her eyes were happy.

THE END

Version 1.0

Epub ISBN 9781448156894

www.randomhouse.co.uk

Published by Vintage 2013

Copyright © The Estate of Hammond Innes 1946

First published in Great Britain by Collins in 1946

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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 9780099577799