already hot, hot enough to dry out the rain and sea-soaked decks and upperworks of the Viroma, hot enough for Findhorn to hang up his oilskins and move far out on to the wing of the bridge to bask in its heat and draw in great lungfuls of the fresh morning air ? it wouldn't, he knew, be fresh much longer. Findhorn himself felt fresh enough, if a little tired in his bones: about half-way through the middle watch, when the teeth of the typhoon had lost their edge, Nicolson had persuaded him to go to his cabin and he had slept like a dead man for over three hours.
'Good morning, sir. Quite a change this, isn't it?' Nicolson's soft voice, directly behind him, jerked Findhorn out of his reverie. He turned round.
'Morning, Johnny. What are you doing up at this unearthly hour?' Nicolson, Findhorn knew, couldn't have had much more than a couple of hours' sleep, but he had the rested look of a man with at least eight solid hours behind him. Not for the first time Findhorn had to remind himself that, where durability and resilience were concerned, John Nicolson was a man apart.
'Unearthly hour?' Nicolson glanced at his watch. 'It's almost eight o'clock.' He grinned. 'Conscience and the calls of duty, sir. I've just been making a quick round of our non-paying guests.'
'No complaints?' Findhorn asked humorously.
'I gather that most of them were a bit under the weather during the night, but otherwise no complaints.'
'And those who might have know a damn' sight better than to make them,' Findhorn nodded. 'How are the sick nurses?'
'The two Chinese girls and the elderly ones are much better. A couple of them were down in the hospital and smoke-room when I was there, changing bandages. All five of the soldiers there were in fine form and hungry as hunters.'
'An excellent sign,' Findhorn interrupted dryly. 'How about the two boys in the hospital?'
'Holding their own, the nurses say. I think that they suffer a good deal of pain, which is more than our worthy Brigadier and his pal are doing. You can hear 'em snoring twenty feet away and the engineers' office smells like a distillery.'
'And Miss Plenderleith?'
'Taking her constitutional, of course. From one end of the fore and aft gangway to the other. The English cherish the delusion that they are a nautical race: Miss Plenderleith is enjoying herself thoroughly. And then there are three soldiers in the dining-saloon ? Corporal Fraser and his two men. They've got a chair apiece, and they're all sitting very comfortably with their 303's and Brens cradled in their hands. I think they're praying for Siran or one of his men to take an extra deep breath so that they can have a cast-iron excuse for shooting a lot of big holes through them. Siran and his pals know exactly how these boys are feeling about them; they're only taking very small breaths indeed and blinking one eye at a time.'
'I tend to share your confidence in the guards.' Findhorn looked sideways at his chief officer, a quizzical expression on his face. 'And how is our worthy Captain Siran looking this morning? A trifle worse of the wear, you would say?'
'Not he. Anyone can see that he's slept the deep, untroubled sleep of a man with the conscience of a new- born child.' Nicolson stared out to sea for a few moments, then said quietly: 'I'd appreciate the opportunity of giving the hangman any assistance he may require.'
'You'd probably be one of the last in a long queue,' Findhorn said grimly. 'I don't want to sound melodramatic, Johnny, but I think the man's an inhuman fiend and should be shot down the same way as you'd destroy a mad dog.'
'It'll probably come to that one of these days.' Nicolson shook his head. 'Mad or not, he's queer enough.'
'Meaning?'
'He's English, or three parts English, I'll bet my last penny. He's come up through one of the big public schools, and it's an odds-on guess that he's had a damn' sight more education than I ever had. What's a man like that doing in charge of a miniature hell-ship like the Kerry Dancer!'
Findhorn shrugged. 'Lord knows. I could give you a dozen explanations, all different and with only one thing in common ? they'd all be wrong. You'll find half the dead-beats and black sheep of the world within a couple of hundred miles of Singapore ? but he wouldn't come in either category, so that still doesn't answer your question. Frankly, I'm at a loss.' Findhorn drummed his fingers on the dodger rail. 'He baffles me, but, by Harry, he's not the only one!'
'Van Effen? Our worthy Brigadier?'
'Among others.' Findhorn shook his head. 'Our passengers are a strange bunch, but not half as strange as the way they act. Take the Brigadier and this Muslim priest. They're thick as thieves. Unusual, you might say?'
'Incredible. The doors of the Bengal and Singapore Clubs would be for ever shut against him. Not done, in capital letters.' Nicolson grinned. 'Think of the shock and the fearful mortality rate if it were known ? in the upper military circles, I mean: all the best bars in the East littered with apoplectic cases, sundowners still clutched in their stiffening hands. Brigadier Farnholme is carrying a fearful responsibility.'
Findhorn smiled faintly. 'And you still think he's not a phoney?'
'No, sir ? neither do you. Colonel Blimp, Grade A ? then he does or says something off-beat, completely out of character. He just doesn't classify easily. Inconsiderate of him, very.'
'Very,' Findhorn murmured dryly. 'Then there's his other pal, Van Effen. Why the devil should Siran show such tender concern for his health?'
'It's difficult,' Nicolson admitted. 'Especially when Van Effen didn't show much concern for his, what with threatening to blow holes in his spine and trying to throttle him. But I'm inclined to believe Van Effen. I like him.'
'I believe him, too. But Farnholme just doesn't believe him ? he knows Van Effen is telling the truth ? and when I ask him why he backwaters at high speed and advances piffling reasons that wouldn't convince a five year old.' Findhorn sighed wearily. 'Just about as puerile and unconvincing as the reasons Miss Plenderleith gave me for wanting to see me when I went to her cabin just after you and Siran had finished your ? ah ? discussion.'
'So you went after all?' Nicolson smiled. 'I'm sorry I missed that.'
'You knew?'
'Vannier told me. I practically had to drag him to the saloon to get him to give you her message. What did she say?'
'First of all she denied having sent for me at all, then gave me some nonsense about when would we arrive in port and could she send a cable to her sister in England, just something fabricated on the spur of the moment, obviously. She's worried about something and I think she was going to tell me what it was, then changed her mind.' Captain Findhorn shrugged his shoulders, dismissing the problem. 'Did you know that Miss Plenderleith came from Borneo too? She's been headmistress in a girls' school there and hung on to the last minute.'
'I know. We had a long conversation on the catwalk this morning. Called me 'young man' all the time and made me wonder whether I had washed behind the ears.' Nicolson looked speculatively at the captain. 'Just to add to your worries, I'll tell you something else you don't know. Miss Plenderleith had a visitor, a gentleman friend, in her cabin last night.'
'What! Did she tell you this?'
'Good lord, no. Walters told me. He was just stretching out on his settee after coming off watch last night when he heard a knock on Miss Plenderleith's door ? pretty soft, but he heard it: his settee in the wireless office is right up against the bulkhead of his cabin. Walters says he was curious enough to listen at, the communicating door, but it was shut tight and he couldn't hear much, it was all very whispery and conspiratorial. But one of the voices was very deep, a man's murmur for certain. He was there almost ten minutes, then he left.'
'Midnight assignations in Miss Plenderleith's cabin!' Findhorn still hadn't recovered from his astonishment. 'I would have thought she would have screamed her head off.'
'Not her!' Nicolson grinned and shook his head positively. 'She's a pillar of respectability, all right, but any midnight visitor would have been hauled in, lectured over the old girl's wagging forefinger and sent on his way a chastened man, bent on leading a better life. But this was no lecture, I gather, but a very hush-hush discussion.'
'Walters any idea who it was?'
'None at all ? just that it was a man's voice and that he himself was too damn' tired and sleepy to, worry
