For his own purposes, Float was going to find out more. Tonight was as good an opportunity as any; more so, since the man detailed by Bullock to put him in the sail locker was Althwaite, the seaman who had joined the ship with him and Halfhyde back in Liverpool. Althwaite was an unscrupulous man and not squeamish. As they approached the sail locker, Float had a word with Althwaite.
“That Jesson.”
“Yer?”
“Rich, we all know that. I want to take a look in ’is cabin. ’E’s three parts drunk, in the saloon. There’ll be pickings, what you can share in. Likely, you an’ I, we’ll be rich too.”
Althwaite scratched his head, his lower jaw hanging forward. “What you asking?”
Float winked. “Bit o’ carelessness. You don’t secure the hatch proper. No one’ll know—promise, cross me ’eart. They won’t know ’cos, give me an hour from now, you’ll come back and do the job proper like. By then I’ll be back inside. All right?”
Althwaite’s jaw sagged lower. “What about bloody Goss?”
“Leave Goss to me,” Float said. “You on?”
“Well…yer.” Althwaite hesitated; something seemed to have penetrated. “Look, what you want with pickings, eh? You’re for the ’igh jump. You won’t want no pickings, mate.”
Float said, “Leave that to me an’ all. Now—just don’t bloody lock me in.”
He went inside and pulled the hatch shut. Althwaite fiddled about outside, then Float heard footsteps going aft along the waist. He went to the hatch and pushed carefully; it opened. Float thought, so far, so good. He was under no illusions that Althwaite wouldn’t try to nab all the pickings for himself, lock, stock and barrel, but he could deal with that too. He waited a little in the sail locker’s darkness then brought the knife from its hiding place and opened up the hatch and slid out on deck like a shadow in the night, keeping close to the break of the poop, where the sail locker was situated and where he knew he was invisible from the poop itself.
Chapter 10
THE CRASH and thunder of a single gun echoed across the darkening water and a splash appeared on the port side of the Tacoma, just off the bow. The German flagship had come up on their starboard side and had reduced speed a shade so as to hold her station.
“That’s it, then,” Halfhyde said. “Run up the White Ensign, sir, if you please.”
Graves nodded at a seaman standing by on the bridge. The man went off at the double and within three minutes the red St George’s cross with the Union flag in miniature was flying from the gaff. Halfhyde said, “Now we must hope that’ll put the cat among the pigeons of the Fatherland. I believe it will.”
They waited; there was no more gunfire. Instead, the German flagship altered a little to port and came closer to the Tacoma’s starboard beam. A voice bawled at them through a megaphone. “Lieutenant Halfhyde!”
Halfhyde grinned and also took up a megaphone. “Here, sir, present and correct!”
“What does this mean, the White Ensign of your confounded Navy?”
“The meaning is simple,” Halfhyde called back. “The Tacoma is now one of Her Majesty’s ships. As a commissioned officer of the Queen, I have exercised my prerogative to press her into the naval service—”
“There is no such prerogative!”
“I say there is, and that your knowledge of the British Fleet is inadequate.”
“Such nonsense! So typically English! Your Admiralty will give no backing to such rubbish, Lieutenant Halfhyde.”
“On the contrary, sir. They are always quick to appreciate initiative and are equally quick to deprecate offensive action against Her Majesty’s ships. You will be adjudged guilty before the world, sir, of–of piracy and even of lèse-majesté and—”
“Do not be impertinent, Lieutenant Halfhyde! Your wretched Queen Victoria, she is nothing to me, to the Fatherland, and I am inferior to no one other than my Emperor. I command you to take down the White Ensign!”
Halfhyde spoke aside to Graves. “This fish has taken the hook to some extent, sir.” He brought up the megaphone again. “Your commands are but words and will be disregarded. The White Ensign remains. If you open fire upon one of Her Majesty’s ships again, you will stand condemned in your Emperor’s eyes as well as those of all the world. I doubt if the Fatherland wishes to go to war, sir.”
He lowered his megaphone. To Graves he said, “I think that’s enough for now, sir.” He was about to say something further when there was another shout from the German flagship.
“If I were to sink you, Lieutenant Halfhyde, who is there to know?”
Halfhyde answered, “Your ship’s company, sir, who would be sure to talk in time. And even they would not condone wholesale murder of British seamen, just for your personal revenge and satisfaction.”
STILL SHADOW-LIKE, Float slid past the door of the steward’s cabin, which was shut. Unseen, he entered the passenger’s cabin; the door of it stood open and there was no one there. Softly he closed the door behind him and looked around in the light of a hanging lantern already lit by Goss against Jesson’s tumbling in due course, half drunken, into his bunk. Working in silence, Float tried the drawers beneath the bunk; all were unlocked save one. The unlocked drawers contained nothing beyond clothing. Float cursed beneath his breath and turned his attention to the leather cases that littered the small cabin.
