across the gently undulating sea. Goddard thought moodily of man’s journey through this flicker of light between the two darknesses, a journey he fondly believed he charted and scheduled in spite of the fact it lay across a landscape subject to a random precipitation of falling safes. Egerton lived through the attempts of countless trained and dangerous men to kill him during World War II, and then was casually swatted by a frail and helpless old man about as deadly as Peter Rabbit except that he was mad.
Lind came around the corner of the deckhouse then, and beckoned to him. ‘I want to show you something,’ he said. Goddard followed him. They went back to Egerton’s cabin. The bos’n and AB were standing outside the door, and Captain Steen was just inside. Egerton’s body was still on the bunk, now covered with a sheet, the ends of the stretcher projecting from under it.
‘Look at this,’ Lind said. He stepped to the head of the bunk and pulled back the sheet from Egerton’s face. The black eye patch had been removed and was lying beside his check. Goddard gave a little start of surprise.
‘I’ll be damned,’ he said. Both the eyes were closed, but the left, which had been covered with the patch, bore the same rounded contour of lid as the other.
‘It came off when we were rolling him onto the stretcher,’ Lind said. With a thumb he gently pushed the lid up as far as the iris, and then closed it again. ‘Perfectly normal eye. The patch was a phony.’
‘Why?’ Goddard asked. ‘But maybe there was something wrong that made it light-sensitive.’
‘Photophobia?’ Lind said. ‘He obviously didn’t have measles, and in iritis and other inflamed conditions the eye’s as red as a grape. Anyway, it was on his passport picture.’
Captain Steen held out the passport, opened to the photograph. It was a perfect likeness of the slender, patrician face, and the eye patch was there. ‘We’re involving you in this, Air. Goddard,’ Steen explained, ‘because obviously you are already involved. We’ll all have to testify at a hearing in Manila.’
‘Yes, of course,’ Goddard said. ‘But I don’t get the fake eye patch.’ He looked at Lind. ‘Any ideas?’
Lind shook his head. ‘No. Unless he was mentally a little off himself, but it didn’t show in any other area.’
‘Beats me,’ Goddard said. ‘But what about burial? Docs his passport give the name of somebody to be notified?’
‘Yes,’ Captain Steen said. ‘The same as he gave on his reservation application.’ He turned a page in the passport. ‘It’s apparently not a relative, though. A
Goddard nodded. Lind pulled the sheet back over Egerton’s face, and called out, ‘All right, Boats.’
Goddard went back to his cabin and mixed a double martini in a water tumbler. He carried it into the lounge. It was dark outside now, and the lights were turned on. Barset came in to draw the curtains over the portholes, since they were directly below the bridge. He shook his head, and sighed.
‘Ke-rist! My hair’s still going up and down like a porcupine’s quills.’
‘Where’d they put Krasicki?’ Goddard asked.
‘In the hospital, where you were. Engineers installed a hasp and padlock on it. Mate shot enough junk in him to keep him quiet all night, but if he stays screamin’ crazy they may have to move him forward somewhere. Nobody’d ever get any sleep down there.’
‘Let’s hope he quiets down. He’s not very strong anyway; he’ll kill himself.’
‘Probably be better off, the poor old bastard. Jesus, what a home away from home; a crazy on one deck and a stiff on another.’ Barset sat down and lit a cigarette. ‘Tell me something. Around Hollywood, is the tail situation really as wild as they say it is? I mean, you pick it off trees, like oranges?’
‘I know,’ Goddard said, ‘you want to become an actor.’
‘Nah! I’m not that goofy. But I often thought I might try to get on in the commissary of one of those studios. Not as a busboy or anything like that, you understand; I’ve had a lot of experience in the food business and catering. Is it pretty much union?’
‘Everything’s strongly unionized,’ Goddard replied.
‘Umh-umh,’ Barset said. ‘Well, I’d like to talk to you about it sometime. Maybe you could give me a couple of contacts.’ He went out.
Goddard’s thoughts returned to Egerton and the puzzle of the affected eye patch. It could never make any sense at all as long as you assumed that Egerton was what he said he was and gave every evidence of actually being: an English officer with a distaste for ostentation, invalided out of the army for typically understated wounds. So the next assumption had to be that the whole Egerton identity was a fake, an image that had been skillfully put together by a smooth con artist. But what in the name of God would a con man be doing in a seagoing low-rent district like this? No doubt there were numbers of them working the first class on the trans-Atlantic liners, but on here if he cleaned out the whole passenger list he wouldn’t make expenses.
Karen and Madeleine Lennox came in. He told them about it. They were incredulous, and then as mystified as he was. It was totally unlike Mr. Egerton. ‘Where did he join the ship?’ Goddard asked. ‘At Callao,’ Karen replied. ‘We all did.’ But he and Krasicki didn’t see each other at all?’
Karen frowned thoughtfully. ‘No, they came aboard at different times; Mr. Krasicki just before we sailed, I think. Then he must have become ill almost immediately; we thought for the first day or so he was just seasick, until Mr. Lind said he had a fever. They did see each other once before today, though.’ She told them about the episode when Goddard was being rescued. ‘It was the same thing,’ she added. ‘I mean, the impression that Mr. Krasicki thought he recognized Mr. Egerton, but Mr. Egerton had never seen him at all.’
‘Delusion.’ Goddard nodded. ‘Paranoia. God knows what.’ But why had Krasicki asked about the eye? Captain Steen came in then to assure the two women that Krasicki was safely locked up and under sedation. He was soothing and apologetic to them, but bleakly distressed over the martini Goddard was sipping.
‘I’m surprised, Mr. Goddard, that you wouldn’t have shown a little more respect for the dead.’
It must be, Goddard thought, that they never attempt to reconcile the flaws in their argument simply because they’re not aware of them. They assure us our departed brother’s not just an unfortunate lump of cooling meat that’ll never see another sunrise or hear a mockingbird, or feel softness under him or wine in his belly again, or design a toilet seat he’s proud of. Perish the thought. He hasn’t died at all; he’s just gone on to the richer, more beautiful life for which this was merely the apprenticeship; and now that he’s caught the brass ring and entered into this eternal paradise, for some unaccountable reason they feel sorry for him. Apparently his luck ran out before he could enjoy all the suffering he was entitled to.
‘It’s only a different estimate of the appropriate, Captain,’ he said. ‘And since there’s no way we can poll Colonel Egerton, we’ll never know who was right.’
Sparks entered, carrying a message form. He ignored the others and spoke to Captain Steen. ‘I got it off, by way of KPH in California. And then I finally raised that Argentine-station that had a message for us.’ He held it out. ‘It was for Colonel Egerton.’
‘It’s a little late, Sparks.’
‘Yes sir. I’m sorry I couldn’t get it earlier, but it was only filed this morning. And they should have routed it through one of the North American stations.’
‘Well, I’d better see what it is.’ Steen opened it, and looked surprised. ‘Hmmm. It’s signed Consuela. That must be Consuela Santos, the same woman our message is to.’
‘Yes, sir. Probably. We should have an answer from her in a few hours. I’ll stand by.’ The operator went out.
‘It’s not important,’ Steen said wearily, ‘but it would have been nice if he could have received it.’ He read the message aloud.
Karen and Madeleine Lennox both had tears in their eyes at the tragic and unintended aptness of the message under the circumstances. Goddard was conscious of the thought that six days out was a little late for filing a bon voyage message. Well, the sailings of freighters were usually erratic and unpredictable.
* * *
The dining room was empty when Goddard went in at a quarter after eight the next morning. Captain Steen had already had breakfast, the young steward said, and the two women had asked for coffee and fruit juice in their cabins.
‘I don’t think I blame them,’ Goddard said. It would take a little time to knock some of the sharp edges off the
