Mr. Kuvetli surveyed the square regretfully. “It is very nice,” he said with a sigh. “One would like to stay longer. So many magnificent ruins we have seen!”
Graham remembered what Haller had said at lunch about Mr. Kuvetli’s evasions. “Which is your favourite city, Mr. Kuvetli?”
“Ah, that is difficult to say. All cities have their magnificences. I like all cities.” He breathed the air. “It is most kind of you to bring me here to-day, Mr. Graham.”
Graham stuck to the point. “A great pleasure. But surely you have some preference.”
Mr. Kuvetli looked anxious. “It is so difficult. I like London very much.”
“Personally I like Paris better.”
“Ah, yes. Paris is also magnificent.”
Feeling rather baffled, Graham sipped his coffee. Then he had another idea. “What do you think of Señor Gallindo, Mr. Kuvetli?”
“Señor Gallindo? It is so difficult. I do not know him. His manner is strange.”
“His manner,” said Graham, “is damnably offensive. Don’t you agree?”
“I do not like Señor Gallindo very much,” conceded Mr. Kuvetli. “But he is Spanish.”
“What can that have to do with it? The Spanish are an exceedingly polite race.”
“Ah, I have not been to Spain.” He looked at his watch. “It is quarter-past four now. Perhaps we should go, eh? It has been very nice this afternoon.”
Graham nodded wearily. If Haller wanted Mr. Kuvetli “probed” he could do the probing himself. His, Graham’s, personal opinion was that Mr. Kuvetli was an ordinary bore whose conversation, such as it was, sounded a little unreal because he used languages with which he was unfamiliar.
Mr. Kuvetli insisted on paying for the coffee; Mr. Kuvetli insisted on paying the fare back to the wharf. By a quarter to five they were on board again. An hour later Graham stood on deck watching the pilot’s boat chugging back towards the greying land. The Frenchman, Mathis, who was leaning on the rail a few feet away, turned his head.
“Well, that’s
that!
Two more days and we shall be in Genoa. Did you enjoy your excursion ashore this afternoon, Monsieur?”
“Oh, yes, thank you. It was …”
But he never finished telling Monsieur Mathis what it was. A man had come out of the saloon door some yards away and was standing blinking at the setting sun which streamed across the sea towards them.
“Ah, yes,” said Mathis. “We have acquired another passenger. He arrived while you were ashore this afternoon. I expect that he is a Greek.”
Graham did not, could not, answer. He knew that the man standing there with the golden light of the sun on his face was not a Greek. He knew, too, that beneath the dark grey raincoat the man wore there was a crumpled brown suit with lumpy padded shoulders; that below the high-crowned soft hat and above the pale, doughy features with the self-conscious mouth was thinning curly hair. He knew that this man’s name was Banat.
G
RAHAM STOOD THERE
motionless. His body was tingling as if some violent mechanical shock had been transmitted to it through his heels. He heard Mathis’ voice a long way away, asking him what the matter was.
He said: “I don’t feel well. Will you excuse me, please?”
He saw apprehension flicker over the Frenchman’s face and thought: “He thinks I’m going to be sick.” But he did not wait for Mathis to say anything. He turned and, without looking again at the man by the saloon door, walked to the door at the other end of the deck and went below to his cabin.
He locked the door when he got inside. He was shaking from head to foot. He sat down on the bunk and tried to pull himself together. He told himself: “There’s no need to get worried. There’s a way out of this. You’ve got to think.”
Somehow Banat had discovered that he was on the
Sestri Levante
. It could not have been very difficult. An inquiry made at the Wagon-Lit and shipping company offices would have been enough. The man had then taken a ticket for Sofia, left the train when it crossed the Greek frontier, and taken another train via Salonika to Athens.
He pulled Kopeikin’s telegram out of his pocket and stared at it. “All well!” The fools! The bloody fools! He’d distrusted this ship business from the start. He ought to have relied on his instinct and insisted on seeing the British Consul. If it had not been for that conceited imbecile Haki … But now he was caught like a rat in a trap. Banat wouldn’t miss twice. My God, no! The man was a professional murderer. He would have his reputation to consider—to say nothing of his fee.
A curious but vaguely familiar feeling began to steal over him: a feeling that was dimly associated with the smell of antiseptics and the singing of a kettle. With a sudden rush of horror, he remembered. It had happened years ago. They had been trying out an experimental fourteen-inch gun on the proving ground. The second time they fired it, it had burst. There had been something wrong with the breech mechanism. It had killed two men outright and badly injured a third. This third man had looked like a great clot of blood lying there on the concrete. But the clot of blood had screamed: screamed steadily until the ambulance had come and a doctor had used a hypodermic. It had been a thin, high, inhuman sound; just like the singing of a kettle. The doctor had said that the man was unconscious even though he was screaming. Before they had examined the remains of the
gun, the concrete had been swabbed down with a solution of lysol. He hadn’t eaten any lunch. In the afternoon it had begun to rain. He …
He realised suddenly that he was swearing. The words were dropping from his lips in a steady stream: a meaningless succession of obscenities. He stood up quickly. He was losing his head. Something had got to be done; and done quickly. If he could get off the ship …
He wrenched the cabin door open and went out into the alleyway. The Purser was the man to see first. The Purser’s office was on the same deck. He went straight to it.
The door of the office was ajar and the Purser, a tall, middle-aged Italian with the stump of a cigar in his mouth, was sitting in his shirt-sleeves before a typewriter and a stack of copies of Bills of Lading. He was copying details of the Bills on to the ruled sheet in the typewriter. He looked up with a frown as Graham knocked. He was busy.
“Signore?”
“Do you speak English?”
“No,
Signore.”
“French?”
“Yes. What is it you wish?”
“I want to see the Captain at once.”
“For what reason, Monsieur?”
“It is absolutely necessary that I am put ashore immediately.”
The Purser put his cigar down and turned in his swivel chair.
“My French is not very good,” he said calmly. “Do
you mind repeating …?”
“I want to be put ashore.”
“Monsieur Graham, is it?”
“Yes.”
“I regret, Monsieur Graham. It is too late. The pilot boat has gone. You should have …”
“I know. But it is absolutely necessary that I go ashore now. No, I am not mad. I realise that under ordinary circumstances it would be out of the question. But the circumstances are exceptional. I am ready to pay for the loss of time and the inconvenience caused.”
The Purser looked bewildered. “But why? Are you ill?”
“No, I …” He stopped and could have bitten his tongue off. There was no doctor aboard and the threat of some infectious disease might have been sufficient. But it was too late now. “If you will arrange for me to see the Captain at once, I will explain why. I can assure you that my reasons are good ones.”
“I am afraid,” said the Purser stiffly, “that it is out of the question. You do not understand …”
“All I am asking,” interrupted Graham desperately, “is that you put back a short way and ask for a pilot boat. I am willing and able to pay.”
The Purser smiled in an exasperated way. “This is a ship, Monsieur, not a taxi. We carry cargo and run to a schedule. You are not ill and …”
“I have already said that my reasons are excellent. If you will allow me to see the Captain …”
“It is quite useless to argue, Monsieur. I do not doubt your willingness or ability to pay the cost of a boat from
the harbour. Unfortunately that is not the important thing. You say that you are not ill but that you have reasons. As you can only have thought of those reasons within the last ten minutes, you must not be angry if I say that they cannot be of very grave importance. Let me assure you, Monsieur, that nothing but proved and evident reasons of life and death will suffice to stop any ship for the convenience of one passenger. Naturally, if you can give me any such reasons I will place them before the Captain immediately. If not, then I am afraid your reasons must wait until we get to Genoa.”
“I assure you …”
The Purser smiled sorrowfully. “I do not question the good faith of your assurances, Monsieur, but I regret to say that we need more than assurances.”
“Very well,” snapped Graham, “since you insist on details I will tell you. I have just found that there is a man on this ship who is here for the express purpose of murdering me.”
The Purser’s face went blank. “Indeed, Monsieur?”
“Yes, I …” Something in the man’s eyes stopped him. “I suppose you’ve decided that I’m either mad or drunk,” he concluded.
“Not at all, Monsieur.” But what he was thinking was as plain as a pikestaff. He was thinking that Graham was just another of the poor lunatics with whom his work sometimes brought him in contact. They were a nuisance, because they wasted time. But he was tolerant. It was useless to be angry with a lunatic. Besides, dealing with them always seemed to emphasize his own sanity and intelligence: the sanity and intelligence which, had the
owners been less short sighted, would long ago have taken him to a seat on the board of directors. And they made good stories to tell his friends when he got home. “Imagine, Beppo! There was this Englishman, looking sane but really mad. He thought that someone was trying to murder him! Imagine! It is the whisky, you know. I said to him …” But meanwhile he would have to be humoured, to be dealt with tactfully. “Not at all, Monsieur,” he repeated.
Graham began to lose control of his temper. “You asked me for my reasons. I am giving them to you.”
“And I am listening carefully, Monsieur.”
“There is someone on this ship who is here to murder me.”
“And his name, Monsieur?”
“Banat. B-A-N-A-T. He is a Roumanian. He …”
“One moment, Monsieur.” The Purser got a sheet of paper out of a drawer and ran a pencil down the names on it with ostentatious care. Then he looked up. “There is no one of that name or nationality on the ship, Monsieur.”
“I was about to tell you, when you interrupted me, that the man is travelling on a false passport.”
“Then, please …”
“He is the passenger who came aboard this afternoon.”
The Purser looked at the paper again. “Cabin number nine. That is Monsieur Mavrodopoulos. He is a Greek business man.”
“That may be what his passport says. His real name is Banat and he is a Roumanian.”
The Purser remained polite with obvious difficulty.
“Have you any proof of that, Monsieur?”
“If you radio Colonel Haki of the Turkish police at Istanbul, he will confirm what I say.”
“This is an Italian ship, Monsieur. We are not in Turkish territorial waters. We can refer such a matter only to the Italian police. In any case, we carry wireless only for navigational purposes. This is not the
Rex
or the
Conte di Savoia
, you understand. This matter must be left until we reach Genoa. The police there will deal with your accusation concerning the passport.”
“I don’t care a damn about his passport,” said Graham violently. “I’m telling you that the man intends to kill me.”
“And why?”
“Because he has been paid to do so; that is why. Now do you understand?”
The Purser got to his feet. He had been tolerant. Now the time had come to be firm. “No, Monsieur, I do
not
understand.”
“Then if you cannot understand, let me speak to the Captain.”
“That will not be necessary, Monsieur. I understand enough.” He looked Graham in the eyes. “In my opinion there are two
charitable
explanations of this matter. Either you have mistaken this Monsieur Mavrodopoulos for someone else, or you have had a bad dream. If it is the former, I advise you not to repeat your mistake to anyone else. I am discreet, but if Monsieur Mavrodopoulos should hear of it he might regard it as a reflection upon his honour. If it is the second, I suggest that you lie down in your cabin for a while. And remember that nobody is
going to murder you on this ship. There are too many people about.”
“But don’t you see …?” shouted Graham.
“I see,” said the Purser grimly, “that there is another less charitable explanation of this matter. You may have invented this story simply because for some private reason you wish to be put ashore. If that is true, I am sorry. It is a ridiculous story. In any case, the ship stops at Genoa and not before. And now, if you will excuse me, I have work to do.”
“I demand to see the Captain.”
“If you will close the door as you leave,” said the Purser happily.
Almost sick with anger and fear, Graham went back to his cabin.
He lit a cigarette and tried to think reasonably. He should have gone straight to the Captain. He could still go straight to the Captain. For a moment he considered doing so. If he … But it would be useless and unnecessarily humiliating. The Captain, even if he could get to him and make him understand, would probably receive his story with even less sympathy. And he would still have no proof that what he said was true. Even if he could persuade the Captain that there was some truth in what he was saying, that he was not, in fact, suffering from some form of delusional insanity, the answer would be the same: “Nobody is going to murder you on this ship. There are too many people about.”
Too many people about! They did not know Banat. The man who had walked into a police official’s house in broad daylight, shot the official and his wife and then
calmly walked out again, was not going to be unnerved so easily. Passengers had disappeared from ships in mid-ocean before. Sometimes their bodies had been washed ashore, and sometimes they hadn’t. Sometimes the disappearances had been explained, and sometimes they hadn’t. What would there be to connect this disappearance of an English engineer (who had behaved very queerly) from a ship at sea with Mr. Mavrodopoulos, a Greek business man? Nothing. And even if the body of the English engineer were washed ashore before the fish had rendered it unidentifiable and it were found that he had been killed before he had entered the water, who was going to prove that Mr. Mavrodopoulos—if by that time there were anything left of Mr. Mavrodopoulos but the ashes of his passport—had been responsible for the killing? Nobody.