‘I like sailing. It’s not such an uncommon pastime.’
Keeton had taken a long time to find just the craft he wanted. It was a yawl, with plenty of freeboard and fairly broad in the beam; not a fast ship, but eminently seaworthy. He had got hold of a second-hand engine and had fitted this into the yawl as an auxiliary. He had put in extra tanks for fuel and water, making ready for a long voyage; and all this he had done in his spare time without haste. There was no need to hurry; he could not set out until he had put together enough money. He worked all hours, and his employer liked that.
‘You’re the kind of worker for me,’ Mr Robson said. ‘I wish there were more like you.’
Robson had helped him to find the yawl and had given him advice and instruction. In his younger days the boat-builder had been a cruising yachtsman himself and had made some notable voyages. He gave Keeton a sextant and helped him to brush up on his navigation.
‘If you’re going to sail that yawl single-handed you’ll need to be tough.’
‘I am tough,’ Keeton said.
‘Have you read Slocum’s book?’
‘Yes.’
‘So you know what to expect.’
Keeton had studied Slocum’s method of self-steering and had tried a modification of it in his own yawl. After much trial and error he had got it working satisfactorily in all weather. He was confident now that he could sail anywhere in the world.
Smith was looking at him shrewdly. ‘Not many people go sailing alone. Most people take friends. You don’t have friends, I hear. A sort of lone wolf. I suppose you wouldn’t be planning a long voyage all on your ownsome. To the Pacific, say.’
‘Why should I?’
‘That’s where the
Valparaiso
is.’
‘On the bottom.’
‘Well, that’s what we don’t know, isn’t it? That’s what we think you could tell us about.’
Keeton stared back coldly at Smith. ‘Even if I knew anything I wouldn’t be telling you.’
‘No?’ There was a vicious twist to Smith’s mouth and he seemed to be losing some of his self-control. ‘Maybe we could make you alter your mind about that. Me and the big feller here, we’re no kids, and we don’t always use the velvet glove, savvy? You want to ask some characters down in Venezuela; they’ll tell you—’
‘Stow it,’ Rains said sharply. ‘We don’t want any of that, Smithie. No threats.’ He turned to Keeton and his voice was persuasive. ‘We’re all friends here and I’m sure we can arrange this matter like gentlemen. Now look, Keeton, we know you want the lot for yourself; that’s only natural. I’d feel the same way in your shoes. But you’ve got to be realistic. You can’t grab that loot single handed; it’s too big a job. But if there were three of us it’d be a different kettle of fish; things would be ten times easier. Besides, there’s plenty for all, enough to make each one of us rich for life. And if it comes to the push, we’re prepared to be generous; we’ll take half between us and you can have the other half. So what do you say to that? Is it a deal?’
‘You’re wasting your time,’ Keeton said. ‘Like I told you
before, I know no more about the
Valparaiso
than you do.’
He saw the other man’s face darken. Rains shot out a thick hairy hand and seized Keeton’s arm in a fierce grip.
‘Now see here, Keeton, we’ve had enough stalling. You play it the way we want it or you may get hurt, see? You may never have any use for that gold, never.’
‘Who’s threatening now?’ Smith said.
Keeton pulled his arm away and brushed the sleeve, as though brushing off the contamination of Rains’s fingers. He kept his voice low, but there was an edge to it.
‘If you’re thinking to scare me, Mr Rains, you’ve got the wrong man. I don’t scare that easy. And if you want my advice, it’s this – clear out now. You’ll get nothing from me, not now or ever.’
He got up and walked out of the public house, leaving Rains choking and Smith with a look of venom on his face. He had no illusions about those two; they were poison. He would need to take care. But of one thing he was certain: nothing on earth would make him agree to share the gold with them. He would have it all or he would have nothing. There would be no half-measures.
If Keeton had had any hope that Rains and Smith might easily be shaken off, that hope would have been dispelled by their behaviour in the weeks that followed. They took up residence not far from his own lodgings and he was constantly encountering one or other of them as he went in or out. And whenever he took his yawl
Roamer
out for a sail they were down at the harbour to watch him. It was as though they could scent his movements, so that wherever he went there they were keeping an eye on him.
The very fact of their presence irked Keeton. He tried to ignore them but could not rid himself of the feeling of being spied upon. Even his plan no longer seemed secure. Previously there had been no one to suspect what he intended doing; now there were two men with sharp eyes, nimble brains and a lust for gold; men without scruples; men it was impossible to shake off.
Once they even tried to board the yawl.
‘How about taking two old shipmates for a sail?’ Rains suggested. He was standing on the quay dressed in old flannel trousers and a blue seaman’s jersey. Rains seemed to blot out the sky with his bulk. Beside him Smith looked shrunken.
‘You can keep your feet off my boat,’ Keeton said. ‘I don’t take passengers.’
‘Not nice,’ Rains said. ‘You should be more friendly – for old time’s sake.’
‘I’d as soon be friendly with a cobra.’
Rains ignored the remark. His gaze travelled over the yawl.
He seemed to be making a mental note of all its characteristics – its roomy build, the new rigging and fresh paint, the small dinghy lashed bottom upwards amidships.
The yawl had two cabins with a bulkhead separating them. Keeton had removed the bunks from the for’ard cabin so that it could be used solely for stowage. The galley was part of the main cabin, but there was a light partition between it and the saloon. From the saloon a short companionway led up to the cockpit.
‘Looks to me as if you might be fitting out for a long voyage,’ Rains said. ‘Would I be right?’
Keeton did not answer. He waited for Rains to go.
‘Let us know when you intend to push off for the South Seas. We’d like to come and wish you
bon
voyage.
Isn’t that so, Smithie?’
The steward’s grin was like a wolf’s. ‘That’s right. We’d feel hurt if he didn’t let us kiss him good-bye.’
Keeton would not have worried about Rains and Smith if he had not been so close to sailing. A year earlier, even six months, he could have afforded to wait until the two became tired of watching him. But time had slipped away; he had the money he needed and he was ready to go. But he did not wish to sail away under the noses of these men; he wished to go unnoticed, dropping down channel as inconspicuously as an old cork or an empty bottle, slipping out of the minds of all who knew him as lightly as the memory of last week’s weather. But from the minds of Rains and Smith he knew there was no escape.
So he waited as April turned to May, as the long days of June came with good sailing weather; waited and fretted. He continued to work in the boatyard, earning good money, but thinking always of a million pounds’ worth of gold wedged on a reef in the Pacific. It seemed to call to him to make haste, to come before someone else discovered the wreck.
Smith would greet him in the street, cheerful, cocky.
‘How’s it going, Charles? Still at the old boat-building lark? But it won’t be long now, will it, boy? Not long before the balloon goes up.’
Keeton would look past Smith or through him. He would
refuse to answer. But it made no difference. A man like Smith was impervious to snubbing.
One day he fell into step beside Keeton and began talking at once about the
Valparaiso.
‘Remember when that gold came aboard? They put you and a fat sailor on guard. What was his name?’
‘I don’t know,’ Keeton said. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘Of course you do. You must remember him. Red-haired; used to sweat a lot. Biscoe, was it? No, not that. Now I’ve got it – Bristow. That was the boy – Bristow.’
Keeton’s jaw knotted. He did not like to hear that name. It brought back memories sure enough, but not the ones that Smith was talking about. It brought back the picture of blood on a man’s head, of a body arched over a boat’s thwart, of a shark and a flurry in the water. Bitter memories.
‘He was the one that chased me with a rifle.’ Smith was staring up at Keeton’s face as if he would have read the secrets of Keeton’s mind.
‘I knew he was fooling, but I pretended to be scared. The boy for fooling, he was. Bristow. I wonder what happened to him?’
‘He’s dead,’ Keeton said. ‘Dead, like the rest.’
Smith’s eyes were hard and bright as polished glass. ‘How do you know that, Charles?’
‘They’re all dead, aren’t they? All except you and me and Rains.’
‘True enough,’ Smith agreed softly. ‘All dead except us three. We’re the heirs to great riches, as you might say. Very great riches.’
Keeton wondered what Rains and Smith lived on. They appeared to do no work. Perhaps they had brought back enough capital from their South American venture to keep them going for a time. Whatever the state of their finances, they made no move to leave the town; they hung about the streets and the harbour and the public houses; two men keeping an eye on a third who might be the key to an immense fortune.
And then one day they were gone. Keeton would not believe it at first; but when he had seen no sign of them for three days
he went to their lodgings and made inquiries. The landlady gave him the information without pressing.
‘Oh, yes, they’ve gone. Last Wednesday, it was. Just said they were moving on and would I let them have the bill. I was sorry to see them go. Couldn’t ask for better lodgers. Quiet, well-mannered. Never no trouble with them.’
‘Did they say where they were going?’
‘No, they didn’t. Nor they didn’t leave any forwarding address. Not that they ever had any letters. But if you was to ask me, I’d say they’ve gone back to London. That’s where they all go, isn’t it—?’
‘Yes,’ Keeton said. ‘That’s where they all go.’
‘They were friends of yours then?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘Not friends.’
He made haste now. Rains and Smith had held him back long enough, too long in fact; but they had gone and he would go also. The yawl was already stocked with canned provisions; now he took on board everything else that he would probably need. He topped up the fuel tanks and filled the fresh water containers. In the drawer below the chart table in the corner of the saloon he had the necessary charts and instruments. There was a table in the centre of the saloon and settee bunks on each side. This was to be his home for many months. He had known worse.
He told the boat-builder: ‘I’m leaving. I shall not be coming back. Thank you for all you’ve done for me.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Robson said. ‘You’ve been a good worker. But I could see you had the itch in you. I was like that once. When it gets you, you just have to go; no two ways about it. I’ve grown too old for it now, but you’re young and that makes all the difference.’
‘Yes,’ Keeton said. ‘I’m young.’
‘If you ever come back and want a job, there’s one for you here. Remember that.’
‘I’ll remember it.’
‘Well, good luck to you.’
‘Thanks,’ Keeton said. ‘I may need the luck.’
*
His landlady too, was sorry to hear that he was leaving; she had come to look upon him as a permanency.
‘Going away in that boat of yours? Do you think it’s safe, Mr Keeton? All by yourself too. Why don’t you stay here? You’ve been comfortable, haven’t you? I’m sure I’ve done my best.’
‘You’ve been very kind to me, Mrs Kirby, and I’ve been perfectly comfortable. But I’ve got to go.’
‘You young men,’ Mrs Kirby said, ‘you’re restless. Mr Kirby was the same, and where’s he now? In a watery grave, poor man. His ship ran on a rock in the Pacific Ocean, so they said.’ She dried a tear with the edge of her apron and looked anxiously at Keeton. ‘You won’t be doing that, will you?’
‘Doing what, Mrs Kirby?’
‘Running on a rock in the Pacific.’
‘Who told you I was going to the Pacific?’ Keeton asked sharply.
Mrs Kirby was taken aback by his tone. ‘Nobody told me. I don’t know where you’re going. All I hope is you take care of yourself.’
‘I’ll take care. You needn’t worry about me.’
‘Well, I’m sure I hope so,’ Mrs Kirby said doubtfully. ‘But I never did trust boats.’
The yawl slipped away from her moorings in the early morning when few were awake to see her go. She went under engine power until the wind came to fill her sails and sweep her out of the Channel towards the great rollers of the Atlantic. And thus, quietly, without fuss or publicity, she dropped the coast of England astern and set out on the long voyage to where a fortune in gold bars beckoned seductively from a lonely reef in the heart of the wide Pacific.
When Keeton stepped ashore in Sydney he had a feeling that at last, after all the hazards and discomforts of the long drawn out voyage to the South Atlantic, round the Cape of Good Hope and across the Indian Ocean, he was once again almost making contact with the treasure of the
Valparaiso.
For it was here that the ship had loaded her gold and from here that she had gone to her final resting place. In Sydney, if anywhere, the ghosts of the
Valparaiso’s
crew might be expected to walk, treading the hot pavements and gliding into the bars, the restaurants, the places of entertainment.
It was strange to think that here perhaps, walking these same streets, were women who had known those seamen and taken their money. Did any of them remember? Or had the crew of the
Valparaiso
slipped away into the forgotten past even as the ship had slipped away? Keeton hoped so. He wanted to stir no memory, cause no publicity.
And then two men fell in beside him, matching their steps with his.
‘So you finally got here, Charles,’ Smith said. ‘We was getting fed up with waiting. We began to think you might be drowned.’
Rains laughed. ‘And we wouldn’t want you drowned, Keeton. We think a lot of you.’
Rains was sun-tanned. He was wearing light grey trousers and an open-necked shirt that revealed the black hair on his chest. His belt was of crocodile leather and had a silver buckle. Smith’s skin was yellow; he had a sickly, jaundiced look.
‘How did you get here?’ Keeton’s voice was bitter. He thought
he had got rid of these two, and here they were, just waiting for him. It was enough to make any man feel bitter.
‘By sea,’ Rains said, and laughed again. ‘How else would a pair of seamen travel from England to Australia?’
‘What do you want?’
‘A drink. That’s what we all want. It’s hot.’
‘I’m not drinking with you. I don’t want anything to do with either of you.’
Smith gave a lop-sided grin. ‘No? But we want something to do with you, Charles, and that’s the truth. Why else would we be here? It’s a long way to come for half a dozen words. And we’ve been waiting the devil of a time too. You made a slow passage. That’s the worst of sail. It’s out of date.’
‘Now come along, boy,’ Rains urged. ‘A drink won’t hurt you. And what harm can it do to listen to what we have to say?’
Keeton saw the logic of that; no harm could come from listening. He could still keep his own counsel.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘I’ll have that drink.’
Rains nodded. ‘That’s more like it. Now you’re beginning to play.’
‘I’m not playing. I’m just going to listen.’
‘You’re a tough kid, Charles,’ Smith said. ‘I don’t know how you got to be so tough.’
‘Maybe it was dealing with people like you.’
‘Come along,’ Rains said impatiently. ‘I’m thirsty.’
Later, with a glass of beer in his hand, he said to Keeton ‘So you were fooling all the time.’
‘I don’t follow,’ Keeton said, and stared into Rains’s slightly bloodshot eyes.
Rains wiped sweat off his forehead with a grimy handkerchief. ‘Ah, come off it, boy. You know what I mean well enough. About that loss of memory game. You never lost your memory any more than I did.’
‘No?’
‘No, Keeton, no. You were sly though. No sailing away to foreign parts while we were in sight. But as soon as our backs were turned you were up and away. Well, that’s how we figured it’d be. But we kept in touch; we had our spies. And when we
heard you’d weighed anchor we knew just where you were headed; so we got here first.’
‘You’re clever,’ Keeton said.
‘Oh, we’re clever right enough. That’s why you’d better change your mind and let us in on the deal.’
‘What deal?’
Rains’s patience began to wear a little thin. ‘Now, don’t act dumb. We know you’re heading for the
Valparaiso,
so you’d better take that as read. If you don’t let us in at the front door we may sneak in at the back. There wouldn’t be any half-share for you then. You might even meet with a nasty accident; maybe a fatal one.’
‘You’re threatening me again.’
Smith nodded emphatically, his sharp nose prodding. ‘You bet your sweet life we’re threatening you. So you’d better co-operate.’
Keeton looked at him contemptuously. ‘Do you think you can frighten me, you little rat?’ He turned suddenly on Rains. ‘And you; what kind of man are you? What kind of man would abandon a ship and leave his own captain on board – helpless? Tell me that.’
Rains was taken aback by the unexpected attack. He looked uneasy.
‘What are you talking about?’
‘I’m talking about Captain Peterson.’
‘He was dead. He was dead before we left the ship. Smithie can vouch for that. That’s so, isn’t it, Smithie?’
‘You said he was dead,’ Smith answered. ‘That’s what you told everybody. I ain’t no doctor. I don’t know about things like that.’
Rains’s thick, rubbery lips were moving as though in a snarl; but he kept his voice low. ‘Of course he was dead. He was stone cold; no doubt about it.’
‘He lived two days after you took off,’ Keeton said. ‘There was a cat too. But I don’t suppose you could be expected to worry about a cat’s life when you didn’t care two pins for a man’s.’
Rains was silent for a few moments; then he began to laugh softly, his chin quivering. ‘So you’ve found your memory, Keeton. So you finally admit that the
Valparaiso
didn’t sink. Well, that’s something.’
‘It won’t do you any good,’ Keeton said. ‘You’re not going to make anything out of it. And if you’re thinking of causing trouble,
just bear in mind what I said – Peterson lived for two days. He was alive when you took to the boats to save your own lousy skin. Remember that. And I’m warning you here and now, keep out of my way. That goes for you too, Smith. Stay clear of me.’
He set down his empty glass and walked out of the bar and into the street. The sunlight hit him like a spear but he scarcely noticed it. He was wondering what Rains and Smith would do now. What he had revealed to them made little difference; they simply knew for certain now what they had guessed before. They could not use the information to force his hand, since to reveal it to others would be to spoil their own chances of laying hands on the gold. And Rains would certainly not wish to revive any official interest in the loss of the
Valparaiso.
So what could they do? To prevent his sailing would not serve their purpose. They could of course hunt for the ship themselves, but without knowledge of how long the derelict had been adrift they could have little hope of finding her. He gave a laugh: Rains and Smith were helpless and he could dismiss them from his mind.
‘Let them do what they like,’ he muttered. ‘They’ll get none of my gold.’
When he returned to the yawl he found a man waiting for him on deck, a lean, sinewy Australian whose face was as bony as his own.
‘Name’s Ferguson. I represent the
Star
.’
Keeton ignored the proffered hand and asked coldly: ‘What do you want?’
‘A talk.’
‘What about?’
Ferguson looked down into the cockpit of the yawl. ‘Why don’t we go inside? I’d like to take a look at your living quarters. It’s my job to be inquisitive.’
‘I don’t like reporters,’ Keeton said; but he went into the saloon and did not try to prevent Ferguson from following.
Ferguson looked round the saloon with interest. He sat down on the settee on the starboard side, fanned himself with his hat and nodded slowly, as though approving what he saw.
‘Pretty snug. Galley through the doorway there. Fine. I understand
you sailed from England single-handed. Quite an achievement.’
‘It’s been done before. It will be again. I don’t claim to be unique.’
‘You are in one way,’ Ferguson said.
‘How’s that?’
‘Picked up from a ship’s boat in November 1945, suffering from loss of memory. Survivor from the S.S.
Valparaiso
which was sunk by a Jap submarine nine months previously. Not every man can say that.’
Keeton took a cigarette from the packet Ferguson offered. ‘Seems you know a lot about me.’
‘We check up. Especially when there might be a story.’
‘What story would you get out of this?’ Keeton asked warily.
Ferguson drew smoke from his own cigarette and allowed it to drift slowly from the corner of his mouth. He had bright, keen eyes that seemed to be trying to probe into Keeton’s mind. His voice had a metallic quality.
‘Occurred to me you might have got some of that memory back. The
Valparaiso
was news. Had a stack of gold on board.’
‘So I’ve been told,’ Keeton said drily.
‘You mean you still don’t recall any of it yourself?’
‘Nothing, Mr Ferguson, nothing.’
Ferguson stared up at the white deckhead; he seemed deeply interested in the way the tobacco smoke spread itself out above his head. Keeton noticed that there were shallow depressions on each side of Ferguson’s face just above the cheek-bones, as though the skull had been hollowed out, and the skin above his nose had a heart-shaped patch of discoloration like a brand that had been stamped there. The scragginess of his neck was emphasised by a shirt collar that was at least two sizes too big, and the prominent Adam’s apple bobbed up and down when he swallowed.
‘A pity,’ he said at last. ‘We could maybe have done a deal.’
‘What kind of deal?’
‘Well, look at it this way. Suppose you had remembered something about the
Valparaiso
or about that time between the ship going down and you being picked up. Nine months. That’s a whole lot of time unaccounted for. And again, suppose you were
on your way back to the scene of the events hoping to pick up some threads, maybe even to trigger off that lost memory. That would be a story, you know.’
Keeton stared at Ferguson without expression. ‘What would the deal be?’
‘You could give me the story – exclusive. And I could help you in various ways. The paper might be willing to pay your expenses on certain conditions.’
‘There is no story,’ Keeton said.
‘Why are you here then?’
‘I’m sailing round the world.’
‘Why?’
‘For fun.’
Ferguson stared at Keeton’s hard, unsmiling face. ‘You don’t look like you were getting a hell of a lot of fun out of it.’
‘That’s my business.’
‘I agree.’
Ferguson’s left eyelid fluttered, and Keeton thought at first that it was a wink. But the eyelid continued to flutter and he came to the conclusion that it was simply a nervous tic. He did not trust Ferguson. He had a suspicion that behind the hope of a story was something more. Ferguson knew all about the
Valparaiso’
s gold, and gold had a fascination for all kinds of people.
The journalist’s next words convinced him that he had reason to be suspicious.
‘Funny thing,’ Ferguson said; ‘we’ve got two other survivors from the
Valparaiso
in town.’
‘Oh,’ Keeton said.
‘That’s so. Mr Rains and Mr Smith. Maybe you’ve run across them.’
‘Maybe I have.’
Ferguson drew more smoke out of the cigarette and appeared to drink it. It was a long time coming up again, as though it had been on a journey to distant places.
‘Bit of a coincidence, the three of you being here all at the same time. Could be you arranged it like that.’
‘No,’ Keeton said.
‘You have seen them, though?’
‘Yes, I’ve seen them. I had a drink with them.’
‘You don’t make it sound like a great pleasure. I sort of gathered you weren’t as pally with your old shipmates as you might be.’
‘Who told you that?’
‘I had a talk with the other boys.’
‘Rains and Smith?’
‘That’s so.’
‘What did you get out of them?’
‘Not much,’ Ferguson admitted. ‘Not yet anyway. But I’ve got a nose for a story and I scent one here.’
‘There is no story,’ Keeton said again. ‘Not from my side anyway.’
‘Maybe I’ll have to go back to the others.’
‘Maybe you will.’
Ferguson leaned back on the settee and half-closed his eyes. ‘What’s up with you, chum? You sound like something was eating you. You got a grudge against me?’
‘I don’t like snoopers.’
‘I’m no snooper. I’m just an ordinary newspaperman.’
‘Sounds like the same thing to me.’
‘I just ask questions,’ Ferguson said. ‘If a man doesn’t want to answer, that’s all right; he’s entitled to keep his mouth shut. But there’s no law against asking.’
‘Well, you’ve asked. That’s your job finished. Suppose we call it a day.’
Ferguson picked up his hat. He was about to go up the companionway to the cockpit when he paused and turned again to Keeton.
‘Let me give you a word of advice. Don’t go around looking for trouble. It’ll come quick enough. But don’t go hunting it.’
He rammed his hat on his head and went out into the hot afternoon. Keeton felt the yawl heel over as he jumped from the deck.
Next day the
Star
had a story. Keeton bought a copy and swore when he saw the headline: ‘Reunion of Treasure Ship Survivors.’ He began to read what Ferguson had compiled.
‘When Mr Charles Keeton sailed into Sydney harbour in his yacht
Roamer
he little expected to meet two former shipmates,
Mr Stephen Rains and Mr Bernard Smith. But so it turned out. Mr Keeton had navigated
Roamer
all the way from England single-handed via the Cape Verde Islands, Cape Town and various other ports of call. Mr Rains and Mr Smith, starting from the same point, chose a less hazardous and more rapid form of transport: they came by ship. What adds a touch of piquancy to the story is the fact that these three men are the only survivors from the S.S.
Valparaiso,
sunk by a Japanese submarine somewhere in the Pacific in January 1945.’
Keeton read on, fuming. Ferguson had done his homework thoroughly; he had all the details. There followed a brief description of the
Valparaiso,
an account of the picking up of Rains and Smith, and then, months later, the astounding reappearance, apparently from the dead, of Keeton, with no recollection of anything that had occurred. Ferguson had omitted nothing; he had thrown it all in. In addition he had stepped up the value of the gold to five million pounds, possibly in the belief that this inflated figure would give the story more attraction in his readers’ eyes.