The Dave Bliss Quintet (37 page)

“We'll just get out there first thing and follow Johnson before he has a chance to up anchor.”

Bliss is saved the trouble. Gazing out of his cabin porthole at dawn, he is watching the India ink of night slowly bleed into sky blue at the start of yet another postcard day when he spots a commotion in the place where Johnson's yacht should be.

“He's gone,” he blares in disbelief. Taking the
Sea-Quester
's place in the bay is a flurry of small boats, and as he watches they break away and make for the port. Bliss grabs his shorts and heads them off at the harbour entrance. A sleek police launch escorts a couple of chugging sardine trawlers. On the deck of one of the trawlers a uniformed officer guards a tarpaulin that shrouds an ominous bulge. Throwing off his author's cloak as the boats come alongside, Bliss flashes his Scotland Yard ID card at the policeman.

“
C'est un macab
,” says the cop with little concern, as he points to the concealed body. “
Un accident
,” he explains with a shrug.

Bliss steels himself for a gruesome sight — he's seen bodies trawled from the depths before with chunks missing, crabs clawing their way out of mouths, eyeballs
plucked out by seagulls — and sneaks a look under the tarpaulin.

“It's Morgan Johnson,” he breathes, and sees that one of the man's feet is entangled in a rope attached to a hefty amphora. A blue bruise stands out on Johnson's pallid left temple and a flap of scalp hangs over his right ear. “You think this is an accident?” Bliss queries skeptically.

“
Oui
—
tragique
,” replies the Corsican cop.

“Very tragic,” agrees Bliss. But this is Corsica — accidental death is a way of life. More people stab themselves in the back here than anywhere else on earth, and Bliss doesn't need Sherlock Holmes to tell him that Johnson's demise is no unexpected mishap. Revenge, greed, anger, passion, and maybe all four, but no accident. The work of one of the Dave Burbeck five, he guesses, although he realizes that Grimes, the one-handed potter, would have needed an accompanist. It shouldn't be too difficult sorting out the guilty party from the
panier
of suspects on the
Sea-Quester,
he thinks, but where is the
Sea-Quester
?

“Tell your chief that this was murder,” calls Bliss as he heads off at full speed to the harbourmaster's office.

Bliss recognizes the assistant by the stains on his bulging shirt. “Where's the
Sea-Quester
?” he demands.

“
Je ne parle pas anglais
,” the scruffian claims, casually striking a match for his cigarette.

Bliss jumps on him. “Don't give me that crap. You spoke perfect English last month.”

As a light flares in the assistant's dark eyes, Bliss yells, “Monsieur Johnson is dead. Where is his yacht?”

Taking three stubborn puffs, he picks up the radio microphone and tries calling. “
Bof!
” He shrugs with satisfaction at the whooshing of static, and Bliss races out the door and back to the
Mystère.

“If Johnson's dead, who is at the helm of the
Sea-Quester
?” Bliss wants to know once he's assembled the crew and put them in the picture, but neither the captain nor Daisy has any suggestions.

“It's either the gorilla who drives his car, or the Corsicans he was with in Cannes,” he muses, saying, “Let's have a look at the charts.”

“What are we looking for?” asks the captain.

“Treasure,” explains Bliss.

“And I s'pose you're Long John Silver,” starts the old bacchanalian, then Bliss pulls out his ID card and straightens him out.

Half an hour later they're still tied up, when Bliss recalls Marcia saying that Johnson claimed to be following the winds.

“What winds?” asks the captain.

The mistral has been on their back with uncanny precision all the way from the mainland, heading them 135 degrees — directly southeast. The figures burned into his brain for more than ten hours as he fought with the wheel to keep the compass heading, even commenting to Daisy several times that the nor'wester would blow them directly from St-Juan-sur-Mer to Calvi if their engines failed.

“Maybe they went southwest,” Bliss starts, seeing that to be the only direction that makes sense, then stops in surprise with his finger on an islet off the most westerly tip of Corsica. “This island's called “Gargalo,'” he says, adding, “Isn't that the name of one of the winds?”

Before they can answer he picks up on another point of interest. “It's a job to tell on this map, but I'm pretty sure that's roughly where I saw the
Sea-Quester
before.”

“This is silly,” Bliss continues with his finger on the tiny island. “Don't take any notice of me — but look.”

They look, but have no idea what he is talking about.

“It's the winds,” he explains. “The Roman galleys would have been reliant on them, and a foul westerly or northwesterly might have driven them onto the rocks. If we knew the winds …”

“You could phone Jacques,” suggests Daisy, but he shakes off the idea as he recalls some of the names.

“I know
la tramontane
is north, and I'm sure the
gargali
came next.”

“La levantade
is an easterly,” says Daisy, as the old captain unfolds an ancient diagram.

“Is this what you're looking for?” he asks.

“Yes,” says Bliss, poring over the compass rose with each point named. “They must have meanings,” he muses. “If you're going to name something, it must have some relevance.” He turns to Daisy. “So what does
tramontane
mean?”

“
Bof!
” She shrugs. “It is not
français
.”

“It sounds sort of Italian for three mountains,” says Bliss. “But what about Gargali? Could that be a gargoyle?”

“Zhat is a
gargouille
in French,” says Daisy.

“That's fairly close — it could be Corsican. And
Levantade
?”

“Zhat is easy. Zhe
levant
is zhe east.”

“The southeast wind is
la bech
, according to this.”

“
Une bêche
is what you call a spade for digging.”

“Well, that doesn't make any kind of sense,” says Bliss. “What's next?”

“
Lou marin
,” says the captain.

“Are you sure it's not Louis Armstrong?” laughs Bliss, remembering Mavis's mispronunciation.

“No,” replies the captain without humour. “Definitely
lou marin
.”

“
Marin
means zhe sea,” jumps in Daisy, beginning to enjoy the game, though
“lou”
has her stumped.

“A derivation of
la mer
, perhaps,” suggests Bliss. “Though to me it sounds as if it should mean something like “under the sea.'”

“Sirocco is a scorching hot sou'wester,” says the captain from experience, though the westerly
pounant
stumps them all.

“Well, I'm damned,” Bliss breathes as he studies the map. “It's obviously just a coincidence. I don't believe it.”

“What?” Daisy and the captain demand simultaneously.

“Captain Morgan's treasure!” he shouts as he leaps up, saying, “Get ready to sail, Captain. I've just got to make one call.”

Richards is hopping; Edwards is getting ready to walk. Bliss fully expects the charge of dereliction of duty. What he does not expect is the radiocarbon dating results on the shards of amphorae from the hold of Johnson's yacht.

“Two thousand years old,” bleats Richards, “and that's how old you'll be before you set foot in my station again if you're not back here this afternoon.”

“Do you mean the pottery is genuine?” asks Bliss, ignoring the rant.

“Yes. And boy are you in trouble if you smashed it. It's worth a bloody fortune, apparently — ten thousand quid or more.”

“
Merde
,” Bliss breathes, “it's a good job Johnson's dead then.”

“What?”

I thought that would do it, thinks Bliss, and quickly brings his supervisor up to speed.

“So much for your cast-iron case,” sneers Richards, adding, “Now you've got no excuse. Just get back here PDQ. You're booked on the ten-thirty and eleven-thirty flights from Nice. Just let the locals do their job.”

Concluding that Richards will find out sooner or later, Bliss gives him the bad news.

“Corsica!” screams Richards, watching the case against Edwards crumbling, and Bliss is just about to slam the phone when he remembers why he phoned. “What about the DNA tests, Guv?”

“As it happens you were absolutely right. All three match. But it's not your —”

“Well, I'm damned,” Bliss breathes, cutting Richards off as the
Mystère
's engines fire up.

“Ready when you are, Sir,” bellows the captain with nautical airiness, and they let go the ropes and inch slowly from the quayside.

“Where to?” asks the captain, as Bliss and Daisy join him on the bridge.

“Treasure Island, of course,” says Bliss, smiling confidently.

“The Mediterranean island of Gargalo,” trumpets Bliss as they round a headland near the most westerly tip of Corsica. The term is far too extravagant for the arid islet sitting just off the coast, and the old skipper is scornful. “That's not an island. I've had bigger hangovers than that.”

Bliss checks the chart. “That's it, all right — just a rock, no roads or dock. I guess it's only about a mile square.”

Standing out to sea they scan the steep cliffs, straining against the sun to peer into the few ragged coves.

“What are we looking for?” asks Daisy.

“Whoever sent Captain Morgan to Davy Jones's locker, I s'pose,” mocks the skipper.

Bliss ignores the jibe as he sweeps the coastline with his binoculars. “My guess is that Johnson was on his way to pick up the treasure when his partner,
or partners, got greedy and decided not to share.”

“But why here?” asks Daisy.

“Because of this treasure map,” Bliss explains, lowering his glasses to lay a finger on the chart.

“But that's just a standard navigation chart,” scoffs the skipper.

With idling throttles, the
Mystère
lolls on the swell as Bliss lays out his suspicions that, while traditional pirates may have drawn up their own treasure maps, in this case it appeared someone had stashed their loot in accordance with an existing map — or two.

“Look,” he says, laying the admiralty chart and a diagram of the Mediterranean's winds together and putting his finger on St-Juan-sur-Mer. “The trail began from the cove of the Château Roger.”

“Why?” asks Daisy, still disconcerted by mention of the old building.

“I have my reasons,” says Bliss, pushing on. “We came southeast — on the mistral — it's the only wind direction that misses both Île Sainte-Marguerite and the Cap d'Antibes.”

“To Corse,” says Daisy, her finger tracing a straight line to Calvi.

“Yes — Corsica. And from there
la tramontane
took us three mountains south; then the
gargali
brought us southwest to here — the island of Gargalo.”

“But where next?”

Bliss's plan suddenly falls apart as he surveys the wide-open Mediterranean ahead to the west.

“That's Spain over there,” the skipper points out. “But it's a bloody long way.”

“No!” exclaims Bliss excitedly as he turns back to Gargalo. “Wait … it's an island. We haven't been all the
way around. We are on the wrong side. If we were between Corsica and Gargalo, the next wind, the easterly
levantade,
would drive us into the east side of the island.”

“That does it then,” mutters the old captain as he leans on the throttles and swings the vessel out to sea.

“Hang on,” says Bliss. “I said we had to go east, to the other side of the island. You're going west.”

“And I shall keep going west,” he replies as he pulls the chart from under Bliss's hands and points out the problem — the narrow sliver of sea separating the rocky outcrop of Gargalo from the stark mountains of Corsica.

“I wouldn't wanna squeeze a lemon through that,” he explains. “My insurance wouldn't cover me, an'if I hit a rock I'd never get another command.”

“OK,” demurs Bliss, “but what will the insurance company say if they find out you were so pissed yesterday that you let a couple of rookies sail all the way from St-Juan to Calvi?”

“That's extortion.”

“Blackmail, actually.”

“All right — but you'll have to pay for any damage.”

Something else for John Smith to worry about. “You can always claim a cop jumped aboard shouting “follow that yacht,'” Bliss says, as they turn back to the island.

With the weight of the law on his tail the old sea dog noses the
Mystère
into the narrow strait. The late morning sun is still wheedling its way into the steep ravine as Bliss and Daisy keep watch on the foredeck, hanging over the bow looking for rocks in the clear indigo depths.

“If you are right about zhe winds,” says Daisy, “what about
la bech
and
lou marin
? Where will zhey take us?”

“Let's just see what we can dig up under the sea, shall we?” he says with a wink.

The captain fortifies himself with a stiff tot as he nudges the
Mystère
through the steep-sided channel. Jagged peaks lurk beneath, like sharks waiting to rip out the vessel's underbelly and sink both him and his ship in minutes. With sweat pouring off his brow, he keeps his eyes glued to the echo sounder. The bubbling exhausts resounding off the rock walls have guided him along a central path, but a momentary change in tone alerts him to a cleft in the island's apparently impenetrable wall.