'No contraband?'
'Stop picking on me, Grey.'
'I'm not picking on you. Judge a man by his friends.'
'Just stay away from me.'
'I can't, I'm afraid, old boy. It's my job. I'd like to see that. Please.'
Peter Marlowe hesitated. Grey was within his right to look and within his right to take him to Colonel Smedly-Taylor if he stepped out of line. And in his pocket were the twenty quinine tablets. No one was supposed to have private stores of medicine. If they were discovered he would have to tell where he had got them and then the King would have to tell where he got them and anyway, Mac needed them now. So he opened the can.
The katchang idju-bully gave off an unearthly fragrance to Grey. His stomach turned over and he tried to keep from showing his hunger. He tipped the mess can carefully so that he could see the bottom. There was nothing in it other than the bully and the katchang idju, delicious.
'Where did you get it?'
'I was given it.'
'Did he give it to you?'
'Yes.'
'Where are you taking it?'
'To the hospital.'
'For whom?'
'For one of the Americans.'
'Since when does a Flight Lieutenant DFC run errands for a corporal?'
'Go to hell!'
'Maybe I will. But before I do I'm going to see you and him get what's coming to you.'
Easy, Peter Marlowe told himself, easy. If you take a sock at Grey you'll really be up the creek.
'Are you finished with the questions, Grey?'
'For the moment. But remember —' Grey went a pace closer and the smell of the food tortured him. 'You and your damned crook friend are on the list. I haven't forgotten about the lighter.'
'I don't know what you're talking about. I've done nothing against orders.'
'But you will, Marlowe. If you sell your soul, you've got to pay sometime.'
'You're out of your head!'
'He's a crook, a liar and a thief —'
'He is my friend, Grey. He's not a crook and not a thief…'
'But he is a liar.'
'Everyone's a liar. Even you. You denied the wireless. You've got to be a liar to stay alive. You've got to do a lot of things…'
'Like kissing a corporal's arse to get food?'
The vein in Peter Marlowe's forehead swelled like a thin black snake. But his voice was soft and the venom honey-coated. 'I ought to thrash you, Grey. But it's so ill-bred to brawl with the lower classes. Unfair, you know.'
'By God, Marlowe —' began Grey, but he was beyond speech, and the madness in him rose up and choked him.
Peter Marlowe looked deep into Grey's eyes and knew that he had won.
For a moment he gloried in the destruction of the man, and then his fury evaporated and he stepped around Grey and walked up to the hill. No need to prolong a battle once it's won. That's ill-bred, too.
By the Lord God, Grey swore brokenly, I'll make you pay for that. I'll have you on your knees begging my forgiveness. And I'll not forgive you. Never!
Mac took six of the tablets and winced as Peter Marlowe helped him up a little to drink the water held to his lips. He swallowed and sank back.
'Bless you, Peter,' he whispered. 'That'll do the trick. Bless you, laddie.'
He lapsed into sleep, his face burning, his spleen stretched to bursting, and his brain took flight in nightmares. He saw his wife and son floating in the ocean depths, eaten by fish and screaming from the deep. And he saw himself there, in the deep, tearing at the sharks, but his hands were not strong enough and his voice not loud enough, and the sharks tore huge pieces of the flesh of his flesh and there were always more to tear. And the sharks had voices and their laughter was of demons, but angels stood by and told him to hurry, hurry, Mac, hurry or you'll be too late. Then there were no sharks, only yellow men with bayonets and gold teeth, sharpened to needles, surrounding him and his family on the bottom of the sea. Their bayonets huge, sharp. Not them, me! he screamed. Me, kill me! And he watched, impotent, while they killed his wife and killed his son and then they turned on him and the angels watched and whispered in chorus, Hurry, Mac, hurry. Run. Run. Run away and you'll be safe. And he ran, not wanting to run, ran away from his son and his wife and their blood-filled sea, and he fled through the blood and strangled. But he still ran and they chased him, the sharks with slant eyes and gold needle teeth with their rifles and bayonets, tearing at his flesh until he was at bay. He fought and he pleaded but they would not stop and now he was surrounded. And Yoshima shoved the bayonet deep into his guts. And the pain was huge.
Beyond agony. Yoshima jerked the bayonet out and he felt his blood pour out of him, through the jagged hole, through all the openings of his body, through the very pores of his skin until only the soul was left in the husk.
