Stormtide (2 page)

‘Poor basket,’ muttered Bell. ‘If he was alone …’

Carrick nodded, then headed for the wheelhouse. It was in tumbled disorder, but the big gear lever was still engaged, the engine throttle set at slow and the small, well-worn steering wheel had been tied with a piece of light line. He could imagine the rest. The
Harvest Lass
sailing on, only a dead man aboard, till she’d reached Moorach Island and had blindly smashed ashore.

Clapper Bell had gone down into the tiny fo’c’sle. He could see Roberts still working his way along the shore, though that was probably a waste of time now. Searching the wheelhouse, Carrick found a tattered logbook buried under some other papers. As he turned with it in his hands he bumped against an opened haversack hanging from a hook. It had a coffee flask and a package of sandwiches stowed inside.

Nobody would use them now. Going out on deck he saw
Marlin
had swung bow-on to the island, held by her anchor in a safe six fathoms of water. A faint shimmer of exhaust was coming from her squat stack and he knew Captain Shannon would be prowling impatiently on the bridge, waiting.

Shrugging slightly, he went back to the winch and looked down grimly at the dead man. There were better ways to die.

A couple of minutes passed before Clapper Bell padded back along the deck to join him. The burly bo’sun shook his head at the unspoken question.

‘Looks like he was on his own, sir. Though she’s pretty big for one man to handle an’ fish.’

Carrick nodded. Normally a boat like the
Harvest
Lass
would operate with a crew of three aboard. But one experienced man could sail her at a pinch – provided nothing went wrong.

‘Got your knife?’ he asked.

Silently, Bell handed over the cork-handled diving knife he always carried sheathed at his belt. Carefully Carrick used the sharp steel and cut through the taut wool of the scarf. As the last strands parted the dead
man’s body shifted slightly then, limbs still locked in a crab-like rigour, slid slowly to the deck.

Tight-lipped, ignoring the staring blue eyes, Carrick bent down, opened the work-jacket, and found a leather wallet in the inside pocket. It held some pound notes, a few creased papers and a driving licence.

‘John MacBean, Harbour View Cottages, Portcoig, Skye.’ He showed Bell the licence details, then returned it to the wallet.

‘So he’s not far from home,’ commented Bell dryly.

Carrick didn’t answer for a moment. Portcoig was a fishing village on the south-west coast of Skye, maybe fifteen miles away.
Marlin
had been there a few months back and he’d spent a night drinking with Dave Rother, who made Portcoig his shark-catching base.

He thought for a moment of Rother, probably still chasing that basking shark a few miles away. Rother was the type who made as many enemies as friends for a wide variety of reasons. But he would know MacBean. In a place the size of Portcoig everyone knew everybody.

‘The Old Man will be wonderin’ what’s going on,’ mused Clapper Bell significantly.

‘I’ll call him.’ Carrick grimaced slightly at the thought. ‘Tell Roberts he can stop beach-combing.’ His eyes strayed to the dead man again. ‘Then get a blanket, Clapper. Cover him up.’

He turned away, dragged out the little radio, switched on, and pulled out the built-in aerial.
Marlin
’s duty operator answered immediately when he called. Then, after a brief pause, Shannon’s voice came through in a crackling roar.
Marlin
’s captain had a firm belief that microphones only behaved when the user was shouting.

‘Well, mister? You took long enough. Over.’

Carrick gave him a quick, factual rundown on the situation, then waited, the murmur of the sea a background to the soft crackle of static from the hand-set.

‘Right.’ Shannon came back again. ‘Care to guess when it happened?’

‘Probably during the night, sir.’ Carrick had a hazy recollection that a body usually began stiffening after ten or twelve hours. ‘It looks that way.’

‘I’ll ask the coastguards to check with Portcoig that the damned fool did go out on his own,’ said Shannon brusquely. ‘But meantime we’ll take him aboard. Don’t worry about his boat – nobody’s going to sail her anywhere for a spell. Out, mister.’

The static took over again.

As soon as Roberts had joined them they made a crude stretcher from a grating, loaded the dead man on to it, then made the difficult journey back over the rocks to the Z-boat. The blanket-covered shape lying at the bow, they got the outboard motor going, and headed back across the water towards the waiting Fishery cruiser.

They were almost there, near enough to identify the crewmen waiting in a little group just below the bridge, when Roberts gave a mutter of surprise and pointed further out.

‘Look, sir.’

Carrick looked in the direction the deckhand indicated. The small, dark shape of another fishing boat was plugging towards Moorach Island at a steady pace. The silhouette of the harpoon gun at the bow made her easy enough to identify. Dave Rother and his
Seapearl
were going to be with them in a matter of minutes.

‘Now there’s a coincidence,’ muttered Clapper Bell with an unusual edge.

‘He probably tuned to the Fishery Protection frequency, heard some of the talk, and got interested,’ answered Carrick. Plenty of boats did the same when a Protection cruiser was around. He glanced again at the approaching shark-catcher, then concentrated on bringing the Z-boat round in a slow curve which would bring her alongside
Marlin
. ‘We’ll find out soon enough. Anyway, they’re from the same village.’

‘But Rother’s a sharkman,’ grunted Bell.

‘Meaning?’

The bo’sun shook his head and didn’t elaborate. As they eased in beside the Fishery cruiser’s hull, Roberts tossed a line to the men above. It was secured, they worked their way along to a lowered ladder, and Carrick clambered up. Reaching the deck, he almost collided with a thin, sour-faced figure.

‘What’s the rush?’ demanded Pettigrew,
Marlin
’s junior second mate.

Carrick took it with a smile. He made allowances for Pettigrew most of the time. It made life easier. By far the oldest of the ship’s three watchkeeping officers even though he ranked as junior, Pettigrew was a surly character in his fifties who had come back to sea for reasons he kept to himself. When he wasn’t on watch he spent most of his time in his cabin, sleeping or reading.

‘I missed your friendly face,’ said Carrick cheerfully. ‘Any more word from the coastguards?’

‘Who’d tell me?’ shrugged Pettigrew. He looked down at the Z-boat with distaste. ‘Well, at least we’re not chasing after that oil-slick. I’ll take over here. The Old Man wants you.’

Carrick headed for the bridge. Captain Shannon greeted him with a nod then thumbed in the direction of the approaching
Seapearl
.

‘Seen him?’

‘Yes, sir.’

Shannon shrugged. ‘Well, he’s your friend, not mine. I’ve heard too many stories about how he operates. You can talk to him.’ The bearded moon-face scowled a little. ‘Then we’ll head for Portcoig and land that fisherman. Your guess was right, mister. The damned fool sailed from there late last night alone, and with his gut awash in beer. The coastguard say he’d some kind of problem gathering his usual crew.’

Carrick nodded his understanding and saw Jumbo Wills’ overalled figure heading along the deck towards the bow.

‘What about that oil-slick, sir?’

‘If there was one, it must have broken up. Department say they’ve spoken to two lobster boats who should have been right in the middle of it – we’ve to forget about the thing meantime. Which should relieve some people.’

‘Sir?’ Carrick could almost sense it coming.

‘Mister, I’ve seen that broken spray-boom,’ said Shannon softly. ‘A captain is supposed to know what’s going on aboard his ship. If we’d found that slick what were we supposed to do? Try scooping it up with damned soup spoons?’ He snorted, a glint of icy warning in his eyes. ‘Well, I’ve already dealt with that young fool Wills, and this time I’ll leave it at that. But it doesn’t happen again. Understood?’

Carrick nodded, wondering how badly Jumbo Wills had been blistered. ‘I’m having the boom fixed, sir.’

‘Between you, you’d better,’ said Shannon bleakly, turning away and reaching for the bridge intercom
phone. ‘Don’t waste time over that damned sharkman, either. They’ll be waiting for us at Portcoig.

Nobody could have described the
Seapearl
as beautiful. Her original lines had been hacked away to allow for the harpoon gun’s platform, the wheelhouse was a strange, elevated structure, and the big deckhouse added aft looked like the work of a do-it-yourself weekend – which it had been. As she stopped and rolled gently in the swell within hailing distance of the Fishery cruiser, her dark, paint-blistered hull showed green with weed along the waterline.

There were crewmen on her deck. But the hail from the shark-catcher came from a lean, fair-haired man in khaki shirt and slacks who emerged from the tall, platform-like wheelhouse.

‘Ahoy,
Marlin
,’ – he bellowed across the gap, not bothering about any kind of megaphone – ‘anything we can do?’

‘About what, Dave?’ Out on the bridge wing, Carrick saved his lungpower and used a battery loud-hailer.

Dave Rother stared then waved a greeting. ‘Come off it, Webb. That Portcoig boat all the fuss is on about. Can we help?’

‘No. Only one man aboard, dead. Somebody called John MacBean,’ answered Carrick. ‘Know him?’

The metallic echo of the loud-hailer faded and for a long moment there was no reply.

‘I know him,’ shouted Rother at last. ‘What happened?’

An impatient rumble came from Shannon in the command chair. Carrick looked round, nodded, and raised the loud-hailer again.

‘Tell you when you get back to Portcoig. Where’s that shark you were chasing?’

‘Lost it,’ answered Rother ruefully. ‘You know the story – there’s no luck fishing with a woman aboard.’

Carrick blinked, forgot Shannon’s impatience and demanded, ‘What woman?’

‘The new nurse at Portcoig. Showing her how sharkers live.’ He turned, said something, and a girl emerged from the wheelhouse. She was tall, slim and a redhead, wearing a white sweater and black trousers. Rother cupped his hands again. ‘We chased here in case she could help. But if he’s dead and we can’t – well, that’s that. See you later.’

Rother took the girl’s arm and they went back into the wheelhouse. A moment later the shark-catcher’s propeller began to churn and she swung away, engine thudding.

Carrick laid down the loud-hailer and looked round. The helmsman was stony-faced but had a twinkle in his eyes. Shannon showed a thundercloud impatience.

‘If you’re finished, mister, we’ll get back to work,’ he said curtly, reaching for the intercom phone.

Taking his chance, the helmsman caught Carrick’s eye and winked.

Once under way,
Marlin
swung on a north-easterly course for Portcoig. Her twin 2,000-horsepower diesels gulping air with a steady roar, she built up speed and the white wash gradually thickened at her square-cut stern.

A routine weather report reached the bridge from the radio room. Conditions would be unchanged for the next twenty-four hours. The helmsman was relieved, Captain Shannon disappeared to his day-cabin,
and soon afterwards Pettigrew arrived to take over the watch. Carrick handed over then went below to the little wardroom aft. The steward was working in his shirt-sleeves, cleaning up, but he had some coffee warming in the galley and brought a filled mug.

Carrick took the mug along to his cabin, peeled off his uniform jacket, kicked out of his thick-soled seaboots, then sprawled back on his bunk with the coffee in one hand and a cigarette in the other.

They would be at Portcoig in about an hour. By the time the dead fisherman had been taken ashore and the inevitable formalities and reports completed he’d a feeling
Marlin
would stay there at least overnight.

Though, like everything else, that all depended on Captain Shannon. Shannon was rated as a superintendent of fisheries, which made him answerable only to the Department’s top brass. Shannon had spent a lifetime in Fishery Protection, and fairly soon would be compulsorily retired with a Civil Service pension and maybe a medal buried deep in the small print of some Honours List.

But until that happened his powers were impressive, his task that of keeping the peace and maintaining the law in the multi-million-pound Scottish fishing industry – an industry where life could be dangerously harsh and tempers often flared violently. There was a multiplicity of rules and regulations to enforce, covering everything from nets and gear to seasonal bans and operating lights. There were territorial boundaries to enforce, with fishing craft from a dozen European nations sniffing around the fringe all the way from small Dutch herring boats to big electronics-crammed Russian trawlers.

And the fisherman you arrested one day could be the same man you tried to save from drowning the
next. Carrick grinned slightly at the thought. That had happened more than once. And having saved the man, they’d more than once had to arrest him again.

Most things came
Marlin
’s way, Like the rest of the Protection flotilla, she logged an average of 17,000 sea miles a year on her West Coast beat.

A lot of that distance meant the Hebridean chain: five hundred islands, from uninhabited pimples of rock onward, scattered in a great 130-mile off-shore chain. People romanced about the Hebrides. To the watchdog Fishery cruisers they meant dangerous shoals, treacherous, narrow channels and giant tidal rips, all exposed to the worst of Atlantic weather.

While the average fisherman and islander used the term ‘Fishery snoop’ as close to a curse and regarded a Fishery cruiser as a form of grey-painted plague.

But
Marlin
and her kind still patrolled regardless. She had no deck guns. Her authority was her thirty-knot speed, her Blue Ensign with the Fishery crest, and, above all, Shannon, with his right to be prosecutor, judge and jury when the occasion demanded.