at anchor in the roads.
His evenings he spent plying Victoria Camberwell with charm,
flattery and vintage champagne for all of which she seemed to have an
insatiable appetite and complete immunity. She listened to him,
laughed with him and drank his champagne, and at midnight excused
herself prettily, and nimbly side-stepped his efforts to press her to
his snowy shirt-front or get a foot in the door of the royal suite.
By the morning of the fourth day, Gareth was understandably becoming a
little discouraged. He thought of taking a bucket of Tusker out to
Jake's camp and cheering himself up with a little of the American's
genial company.
However, he did not relish having to admit failure to Jake, SO he
fought off the temptation and took his usual ricksha ride down to the
harbour.
During the night a new vessel had anchored in the outer roads and
Gareth examined her through his binoculars. She was salt-fir ned and
dirty, (Id and scarred with a dark nondescript hull and a ragged
crew,
but Gareth saw that her rigging was sound and that although she was
schooner rigged with masts which could spread a mass of canvas, yet she
had propeller drive at the stern probably she had been converted to
take a diesel engine under the high poop. She looked the most likely
prospect he had yet seen in the harbour and Gareth ran down the steps
to the ferry and exuberantly tipped the oarsman a shilling over his
usual fare.
At closer range the vessel seemed even more disreputable than she had
at a distance. The paintwork proved to be a mottled patchwork of layer
peeling from layer, and it was clear what the sanitary arrangements
were aboard. The sides were zebra-striped with human excrement.
Yet closer still, Gareth noticed that the planking was tight and sound
beneath the execrable paint cover, and her bottom, seen through the
clear water, was clean copper and free of the usual fuzzy green beard
of weed. Also her rigging was well set up and all sheets had the
bright yellow colour and resilient took of new hemp. The name on her
stern was in Arabic and French, HirondeUe, and she was Seychelles
registered.
Gareth wondered at her purpose, for she was certainly a ringer,
a thoroughbred masquerading as a cart horse. That big bronze propeller
would drive her handily, and the hull itself looked fast and
sea-kindly.
Then as he came alongside he smelled her, and knew precisely what she
was. He had smelled that peculiar odour of polluted bilges and
suffering humanity before in the China Sea. He had heard it said that
it was an odour that could never be scoured from a hull, not even sheep
dip and boiling salt water would cleanse it. They said that on a dark
night, the patrol boats could smell a slaver from over the horizon.
A man who made his daily bread buying and selling slaves would be
unlikely to baulk at a mere trifle like gun running decided Gareth, and
hailed her.
'Ahoy, HirondeLle!' The response was hostile, the closed dark faces of
