'Nothing that a bucket of sea water won't cure.'
The three of us went down to the cabin, leaving Ian on deck, to find Jim and Nick Dugan stolidly on guard. Kane was conscious – and scared. He flinched when we went into the cabin and huddled at the end of Geordie's bunk as though by making himself smaller he wouldn't be noticed. Four of us made a crowd in the small cabin, and Kane was, and felt, thoroughly hemmed in.
He looked as haggard as when I'd first seen him in London, unshaven and ill, and carried his right arm awkwardly – I remembered that Clare had shot him. His eyes slid away when I looked at him.
'Look at me, Kane.'
Slowly his eyes moved until they met mine. His throat worked and his eyes blinked and watered.
'You're going to talk to us, Kane, and you're going to tell us the truth: You might think you're not, but you are. Because if you don't we'll work on you until you do. I was at Tanakabu, Kane, and you must know that anyone who was there won't be squeamish in their methods. I'm a civilized man and it may be that I'll be sickened – but don't count on that, Kane, because there are more than a dozen men on this ship who aren't nearly as squeamish as I am. Do you understand me, Kane? Have I made myself perfectly clear?'
But there was never going to be any resistance out of him. His tongue flickered out and he licked his lips and croaked incoherently. He was still reacting to the blow over the head, a physical problem to add to his mental ones.
'Answer me.'
His head bobbed. 'I'll talk to you,' he whispered.
'Give him a whisky, Geordie,' I said. He drank some of it and a little colour came into his face, and he sat up straighter, but with no less fear in his face.
'All right,' I said deliberately. 'We'll start right at the beginning. You went to London to find Helen Trevelyan and then me. Why?'
'Jim boobed,' he said. 'He let that suitcase get away. There were the books and the stones in it. We had to get them back.'
'You and Ramirez and some of his cut-throats, right?'
'Yair, that's right.'
'But you didn't get them all back, did you? Did Ramirez know that?'
'He said – you must have something else. Didn't know what.'
'So he laid you alongside me to try and find out what I had?'.
'Yair. And to pass word where you went, anytime I could.' Now he was volunteering information, and it was getting easier. Campbell and Geordie were silent and watchful, leaving the going to me. I was eager to find out about Mark but decided to lead up to that by taking other directions first, which would also serve to confuse Kane.
'You smashed our radio, didn't you?'
'Yair. I was told to.'
'And led Hadley in the Pearl around on our track?' We already knew this but I let him confirm it.
'Why did you tell the Papeete police that we'd burnt the hospital? Surely even you could see that we could disprove that pretty easily.'
He looked, for a moment, almost exasperated. 'That was Jim. Bloody hell, I told him it wouldn't wash. You can't tell him anything.'
I nodded and veered off on another tack. That time you saw Miss Campbell's drawings on deck, did they mean anything to you?'
'Eh?' He was taken aback and had to readjust his thinking. 'No, why should they?'
'You identified one as a 'scraggy falcon'. Why did you say that?'
He stared Wearily at us. 'I dunno – did it have something to do with Falcon Island, maybe?'
We exchanged glances, and I carried on evenly.
'Go on. Why should it have?'
'I – I suppose it just slipped out. It looked like a falcon, and maybe it was on my mind, see.'
'What about Falcon Island?'
Kane hesitated and I snapped, 'Come on – out with it!'
'I dunno much about it. Ramirez, he talked a bit about Falcon Island, somewhere in Tonga it is. He said once that's where we were going after we'd got rid of you lot.'
' 'Got rid of'? How was he going to do that? And why?'
'I dunno that either, Mr Trevelyan. Something about those stones you've been pulling out of the sea – those nodules, you call 'em. He had to ditch you before he could go to Falcon Island, 'cos that's where they were. My word, Mr Trevelyan, I don't know what it's all about!'
Behind me I heard Campbell let out his breath. 'Do you know exactly where they are?'
'No, they'd never let me in on anything like that, none of us except – except the top brass.'
I could believe that. Kane was much too far down the line to have access to such information, but it was a pity. I changed my tack again and suddenly shot the question. 'Who killed my brother?'
Kane's mouth twitched. 'Oh God. It was Jim – and – and Ramirez. They killed him.' He looked mortally sick.
'And you helped them.'
He shook his head violently. 'No – I had nothing to do with it!'
'But you were there.'
'I don't know nothing about it.'
'Look, Kane, stop lying to us. You were with Hadley when he went to see Schouten to get the death certificate, weren't you?'
He nodded unwillingly.
Then you were in on Mark's death, damn you!'
'I didn't kill him. It was Jim – Ramirez fixed it all up.'
'Who killed Schouten?'
The answer came promptly. 'It was Jim -Jim Hadley.'
'And again you were there?'
'Yes.'
'But you didn't kill Schouten, I suppose?'
'No!'
'And of course you didn't set fire to the hospital and burn fourteen people to death?'
'I didn't,' said Kane. 'It was Jim – he's a devil. He's crazy mad.'
'But you were there.'
'I told you I was.'
'And you'll be sentenced as an accessory.'
Kane was sweating and his whole face quivered. I said, 'Who killed Sven Norgaard?'
Kane didn't answer for a moment, and then under the threat of our gaze he said, 'It was Jim.'
'You're not too sure about that, are you? Now, tell me again.'
'I dunno for sure – I wasn't there. It was Jim or – or your brother.'
'My brother?'
I could sense Geordie behind me, a restraining presence.
The cops were looking for him, weren't they?' cried Kane defensively. 'How was anyone to know he didn't do it? He might have for all I know – I wasn't there, I tell you.'
I said, Tell me more about my brother. Why was he killed?'
'Ramirez didn't – didn't tell me,' he muttered.
'Don't be smart. Answer the question.'
'Well, they didn't ever tell me everything. I think he was -holding out on something. Something Ramirez wanted. I think it had something to do with those stones. I never-never killed him or nobody!'
I straightened up and said wearily, 'Well, my lilywhite friend, so you didn't kill anyone, you were never anywhere, and you're as pure as driven snow. I think you're a damned liar, but it doesn't matter. You'll be an accessory all the same. I believe they still use the guillotine out here.'
