I went back to the small tackle locker and selected a pair of feather jigs and tossed them out. As we crossed the track of the shoal I hit a kingfish and brought him out kicking, flashing golden in the sun.
Then I recoiled the lines and stowed them, wiped the blade of my heavy baitknife across the oil stone to brighten up the edge and split the kingfishs belly from anal vent to gills and pulled out a handful of bloody gut to throw it into the wake.
Immediately a pair of gulls that had been weaving and hovering over us screeched with greed and plunged for the scraps. Their excitement summoned others and within minutes there was a shrieking, flapping host of them astern of us.
Their din was not so loud that it covered the metallic snicker close behind me, the unmistakable sound of the slide on an automatic pistol being drawn back and released to load and cock. I moved entirely from instinct. Without thought, the big baitknife spun in my right hand as I changed smoothly to a throwing grip and I turned and dropped to the deck in a single movement, breaking fall with heels and left arm as the knife went back over my right shoulder and I began the throw at the instant that I lined up the target.
Mike Guthrie had a big automatic in his right hand. An old-fashioned naval .45, a killer’s weapon, one which would blow a hole in a man’s chest through which you could drive a London cab.
TWO things saved Guthrie from being pinned to the back of the fighting chair by the longheavy blade of the baitknife. Firstly, the fact that the .45 was not pointed at me and, secondly, the expression of comical amazement on the man’s scarlet face.
I prevented myself from throwing the knife, breaking the instinctive action by a major effort of will, and we stared at each other. He knew then how close he had come, and the grin he forced to his swollen sunburned lips was shaky and unconvincing. I stood up and pegged the knife into the bait chopping board.
“Do yourself a favour,” I told him quietly. “Don’t play with that thing behind my back.”
He laughed then, blustering and tough again. He swivelled the seat and aimed out over the stern. He fired twice, the shots crashing out loudly above the run of Dancer’s engines and the brief smell of cordite was whipped away on the wind.
Two of the milling gulls exploded into grotesque bursts of blood and feathers blown to shreds by the heavy bullets, and the rest of the flock scattered with shrieks of panic. The manner in which the birds were torn up told me that Guthrie had loaded with explosive bullets, a more savage weapon than a sawn-off shotgun.
He swivelled the chair back to face me and blew into the muzzle of the pistol like John Wayne. It was fancy shooting with that heavy calibre weapon.
“Tough cooky,” I applauded him, and turned to the bridge ladder, but Materson was standing in the doorway of the cabin with the gin in his hand and as I stepped past him he spoke quietly.
“Now I know who you are,” he said, in that soft putty voice.
“It’s been worrying us, we thought we knew you.”
I stared at him, and he called past me to Guthrie.
“You know who he is now, don’t you?” and Guthrie shook his head.
I don’t think he could trust his voice. “He had a beard then, think about it - a mug shot photograph.”
“Jesus,” said Guthrie. “Harry Bruce!” I felt a little shock at hearing the name spoken out loud again after all these years. I had hoped it was forgotten for ever.
“Rome,” said Materson. “The gold heist.”
“He set it up.” Guthrie snapped his fingers. “I was sure I knew him. It was the beard that fooled me.”
“I think you gentlemen have the wrong address,” I said with a desperate attempt at a cool tone, but was thinking quickly, trying to weigh this fresh knowledge. They had seen a mugshot - where? When? Were they law men of from the other side of the fence? I needed time to think and I clambered up to the bridge.
“Sorry,” muttered Jimmy, as I took the wheel from him. “I should have told you he had a gun.” “Yeah,” I said. “it might have helped.” My mind was racing, and the first turning it took was along the left-hand path. They would have to go. They had blown my elaborate cover, they had sniffed me out and there was only one sure way. I looked back into the cockpit but both Materson and Guthrie had gone below.
An accident, take them both out at one stroke, aboard a small boat there were plenty of ways a greenhorn could get hurt in the worst possible way. They had to go.
Then I looked at Jimmy, and he grinned at me.
“You move fast,” he said. “Mike nearly wet himself, he thought he was going to get that knife through his gizzard.”
The kid also? I asked myself - if I took out the other two, he would have to go as well. Then suddenly I felt the same physical nausea that I had first known long ago in the Biaftan village.
“You okay, skipper?” Jimmy asked quickly, it had shown on my face.
“I’m okay, Jim,” I said. “Why don’t you go fetch us a can of beer.”
While he was below I reached my decision. I would do a deal. I was certain that they didn’t want their business shouted in the streets. I’d trade secrecy for secrecy. Probably they were coming to the same conclusion in the cabin below.
I locked the wheel and crossed quietly to the corner of the bridge, making sure my footsteps were not picked up in the cabin below.
The ventilator there funnels fresh air into the inlet above the saloon table. I had found that the ventilator made a reasonably effective voice tube, that sound was carried through it to the bridge.
However, the effectiveness of this listening device depends on a number of factors, chief of these being the direction and strength of the wind and the precise position of the speaker in the cabin below.
The wind was on our beam, gusting into the opening of the ventilator and blotting out patches of the conversation in the cabin. However, Jimmy must have been standing directly below the vent for his voice came through strongly when the wind roar did not smother it.
“Why don’t you ask him now?” and the reply was confused, then the wind gusted and when it cleared, Jimmy was speaking again.
“If you do it tonight, where will you-2 and the wind roared, ” - to get the dawn light then we will have to Then entire discussion seemed to be on times and places, and as I wondered briefly what they hoped to gain by leaving harbour at dawn, he said it again. “If the dawn light is where-” I strained for the next words but the wind killed them for ten seconds, then ” - I dont see why we can’t—2 Jimmy was protesting and suddenly Mike Guthrie’s voice came through sharp and hard. He must have gone to stand close beside Jimmy, probably in a threatening attitude.
“Listen, Jimmy boy, you let us handle that side of it. Your job is to find the bloody thing, and you aren’t doing so good this far.”
They must have moved again for their voices became indistinct and I heard the sliding door into the cockpit opening and I turned quickly to the wheel and freed the retaining handle just as Jimmy’s head appeared over the edge of the deck as he came up the ladder.
He handed me the beer and he seemed to be more relaxed now. The reserve was gone from his manner. He smiled at me, friendly and trusting.
“Mr. Materson says that’s enough for today. We are to head for home.”
I swung Dancer across the current and we came in from the west, past the mouth of Turtle Bay and I could see my shack standing amongst the palms. I felt a sudden chilling premonition of loss. The fates had called for a new deck of cards, and the game was bigger, the stakes were too rich for my blood but there was no way I could pull out now.
However, I suppressed the chill of despair, and turned to Jimmy.
I would take advantage of his new attitude of trust and try for what information I could glean.
We chatted lightly on the run down the channel into Grand Harbour.
They had obviously told him that I was off the leper list. Strangely the fact that I had a criminal past made me more acceptable to the wolf pack. They could reckon the angles now. They had found a lever, so now they could handle me - though I was pretty sure they had not explained the whole proposition to young James.
It was obviously a relief for him to act naturally with me. He was a friendly and open person, completely lacking in guile. An example of this was the way that his surname had been guarded like a military secret from me, and yet around his neck he wore a silver chain and a Medic-alert tag that warned that J.A. NORTH, the wearer, was allergic to penicillin.
