High Water Read online

  Together, he and Vivian dragged the dinghy down to the water, and the surf boiled noisily, and cold around their feet. Vivian noted, with amazement, that Cooper had somehow found the time to stuff the radio into the sternsheets.

  He swung the girl off her feet, and placed her carefully into the boat, then, as Cooper vaulted ungraciously in after her, he put his weight against the bows, and as it slid into deeper water, he, too, clambered to his seat, and got out the oars.

  He pulled with his last strength away from the beach, his eyes flickering from the blackness of the land to the pale oval of the girl's face, while Cooper heat his hands on the gunwale with frustration at their slow passage.

  Out of the stillness, they heard the growing rumble of the yacht's diesels, and a few moments later, they bumped alongside, and Vivian steadied Karen, as she climbed on deck.

  The next minutes were a nightmare. They hoisted the dinghy, and Vivian took the wheel from Morrie, whose face, briefly illuminated by the binnacle light, was as impassive as ever, and even unsurprised by the extra passenger, and gently eased the engines ahead. Slowly Seafox swung about, her screws beating up little plumes of phosphorescence, and still nothing happened. Ten minutes passed, and he opened the throttles a little more, still waiting for a spotlight to settle on them, or a shot to ring out.

  Cooper clung to the side of the bridge, peering back, and every so often muttering, `Boy, that was sure close!' while Morrie merely stood silent, his very size helping to heighten the tension.

  As he swung the wheel a couple of turns, the deck canted,

  and he felt the girl's hands holding his belt from behind, for support, and her very presence gave him strength. He reached behind him, and pulled her to his side, one arm encircling her shoulders, and for a while there was silence, but for the steady rumble beneath them, and the slap of water around the raked bows. When he had steadied the boat on her course, he sighed heavily, and glanced at the luminous dial of the wheelhouse clock: 3 a.m. Less than two hours had passed since he had stood in that bare room, watching the Frenchman counting the forged notes.

  'Here, Morrie, take over,' he said suddenly. `Keep her North, twenty East.' And as he handed over, he turned to Cooper. 'And you keep your eyes skinned. We're not out of the woods yet!'

  'Gee, they won't catch us now, will they?' His tone was uneasy.

  `They might have a few coastguard cutters about, you never know.'

  Then, softening his voice, he looked down at the girl, her hair gleaming like silver against the dark windows. 'Come on below, where I can see you,' and unprotesting, she allowed herself to be guided down the steps to his cabin.

  She stood quietly, swaying to the motion of the boat, while he made sure the scuttles were covered, and the door to the wheelhouse was shut, and as he snapped on the lights, she lowered her head, as if her strength had at last ebbed away.

  He was aghast at what he saw. Her scarlet jacket was stained and creased, while her skirt had been torn in several places. Of her stockings, but a few wisps remained, and spots of blood showed on her slim legs, where thorns had done their work. Gently, he prised the remaining shoe from her grasp, and she looked up at it in apparent surprise, as if she couldn't remember carrying it, and as their eyes met, he was shocked to see the deep hurt which was stamped clearly in their expression, and once more he cursed himself for causing her this pain.

  `You must lie down, and try to get some sleep.' His words sounded inadequate. `You'll feel better tomorrow, and we'll decided what's to be done then.

  `All right, Philip,' she answered in a small voice, and she sank down on to the bed. `What will you do?'

  He tried to smile. `Oh I don't know, I'll think of something.'

  With a great feeling of tenderness, he saw her fall back on to the pillow, her eyes closed.

  `Call me iff you want anything.'

  She nodded heavily, and he stepped back, closing the door quietly.

  All was quiet in the ebony desert which surrounded the yacht, and only an occasional white crest marred the heaving, oily swell. They were alone, and already the lights of the French coast had become tiny pinpricks in the far distance.

  `All right, Morrie?'

  The figure twisted slightly. `Yes, I will stay on the wheel, I like it.'

  `Very good, it'll be a big help, if we can split the duties.' He turned to Cooper, who was wringing water from his trousers. `And what about you?'

  `I'll live,' he muttered. `But I won't be sorry when we get out of this.'

  Later, he went below again, and stepped softly into the lighted cabin. Karen lay on the bunk, one leg hanging over the edge, swaying with the boat. She had undone the front of her jacket, and he could see the gentle rise and fall of her breast. He smiled fondly, as he lifted her leg on to the bunk and covered her body with a blanket. For a while he stood

  looking down at her, watching her quiet breathing, and wishing he could smooth the slight frown from her face. Then, quickly, and almost shyly, he stooped, and kissed her lightly on the forehead. She moaned softly, and he stepped back, shutting off the lights.

  As he returned to his worries, and his new problems, the picture of her face on his pillow remained fixed in his brain.

  5

  AS THE light strengthened, and filtered into the boat, Vivian yawned, and wriggled his aching shoulders. His eyes were sore and red-rimmed with concentration, and his limbs felt strained from the constant pitching of the hull beneath him. Involuntarily he ducked, as a rearing wave broke desperately over the sharp stem, and sent a stream of salt spray slashing at the windows in front of him, making his vision a strange, shimmering distortion. The weather was deteriorating fast.

  He wondered what would happen when be eventually made a landfall, whether or not a reception committee of Customs officers and policemen would be awaiting him, or whether he was being too careful by driving the boat up the Channel, in the teeth of a howling gale.

  Another wave punched the stout hull, and he heard something fall and break in the galley.

  The sound of a heavy tread on the saloon steps made him turn, to find Morrie blinking vaguely through the side windows at the pitching waters.

  `Morning,' nodded Vivian shortly. He was too tired, and too strained, to try to manufacture conversation. `Come to take over?'

  Morrie swayed heavily, and put out a hand to steady himself. `Yes, you will be tired, I think,' he announced gruffly.

  Vivian watched him take the helm, and stood back, his eye on the compass. There was no need to worry, for within seconds the big man had the boat under control, and hunched his ugly body, as if to take on the sea as an adversary.

  Vivian yawned again, and staggered down into the saloon. It looked desolate and unwelcome in the grey light, and the deck was littered with books, which had jerked free from their shelves. He noticed, as he began laboriously to gather them up, that one of them was the railway timetable. He smiled ruefully, as he stuffed it in the rack, remembering as he did so, the last time he had used it. If it hadn't been necessary to go to London about the boat, all this would not have happened.

  He heaved his aching body up on to the settee, and lay back in one corner, his foot braced to take the sudden plunges of the boat.

  He found that he was staring at the portable radio which Cooper had managed to save from the operation the night before. It lay on its back, in a corner of the saloon, carefully sandwiched between some of the chair cushions, and shining dully, its chromium fittings looking cheap and vulgar.

  He sat looking at it with dislike for some time, wondering what had given Cooper the courage to hang on to the thing when he had seemed about to lose his head completely. He dismissed it from his mind, and tried to concentrate on what Karen had told him. Karen, it was still unbelievable to think she was lying asleep in his cabin, and that she had done so much, and risked everything, to warn him. He shook his head admiringly. She had been more than a match for Muir.

  David Muir, he thought, must have been mad to turn
his mind away from Karen, just for the chance of arresting another smuggler. What had she said? He frowned. `Smuggling drugs.'

  Suddenly, he was sitting bolt upright, his mind clear, and ice cold. If Muir had been interested in drug smuggling, it could only have been because it affected him directly, because, he paused, his eyes turning again to the portable radio, the goods were coming in to the country. He gasped with horror, and dropped to his hands and knees beside the shining case.

  Frantically, he unclipped the back, and turned the set over on to its face, his heart thumping. For a moment he stared in confusion at the mass of coils and valves, then, with a forced calmness, he began to examine each piece individually. Slowly, he began to relax, as he found the parts in order, and revealing nothing suspicious.

  Gently, he slid out the dry battery, it was a large one, and began to feel behind it. He was tapping the metal case with his finger-nail, when the boat lurched, and the battery rolled off his knee, and fell with a thud on the deck. As he picked it up, he noticed that the packing was chipped, and through a crack in the coloured cardboard he could see the glint of an aluminium container.

  With a sinking feeling of helpess resignation, he began to tear away the wrapping, until eventually, he was left with a bright metal box, about a foot long, and six inches deep. It was completely sealed, and as he weighed it in his hand, he wondered how much it would be worth in cash, to say nothing of the misery it would bring in the way of human degradation.

  The Sea„fox yawed in the trough of a wave, and Vivian looked up automatically towards the wheelhouse, to see what was happening. But his vision was blocked. Morrie's huge shape towered at the top of the steps, completely filling the doorway. His face was still blank and listless, but his eyes gleamed threateningly, as he stared at the box in Vivian's hands.

  `What are you doing?' his voice rose to an almost crazy shout, and he started down the steps, his fingers twitching uncontrollably.

  Like a cat, Vivian rose lightly to his feet, a feeling of cold, consuming rage rising within him.

  `Stay where you are,. Morrie!' he barked, `I mean to get to the bottom of this.' He shook the box angrily. 'Of this filth!'

  Morrie didn't apparently hear. He came on, mumbling, and reaching for the box, his eyes wild.

  Vivian knew that if once he allowed himself to be taken off guard, he would stand no chance, so deliberately, he tossed the box casually on to the settee.

  As Morrie lunged forward after it, Vivian stepped in close under his wildly swinging arms, and drove his fist into the heavy chin, just below his ear. He gasped with pain, as the shock of the blow travelled up his arm. It had been like hitting a wall. For a moment, Morrie staggered drunkenly, and then, as the boat rolled heavily, he pitched forward against the table, splitting it in two as he fell.

  In the silence which followed, Vivian could hear someone struggling with a cabin door. All right Cooper, he thought savagely, you're next, if you want it that way!!

  Morrie slumped as he had fallen, a look of complete bewilderment on his features, and his mouth opening and shutting noiselessly.

  'Jeeze! What the hell d'you think you two are up to?' Cooper's voice was harsh, and still heavy with sleep. He was without his Jacket, and his narrow shoulders, and bright yellow braces, seemed almost indecent.

  Vivian noted with relief that he was, apparently, without his pistol,

  `Keep calm!' he answered coldly. `I want a few answers out of you, and I want them now!'

  Cooper's eyes suddenly fell on the dismantled radio, and they widened with shocked surprise, but quickly he recovered himself, and his normal look of cunning made his eyes dark once more.

  `Well now, Cap'n, you've certainly done it this time.' He seemed to be breathing with difficulty.

  In three steps, Vivian crossed the saloon, and with a jerk, seized the little man by the throat. Then, as a feeling of cold satisfaction crept over him, he began to shake him, as he had seen his cat shake a rat.

  Cooper had gone deathly white, and his hands lashed the air helplessly, while his eyes bulged from their sockets.

  `Now then, you little bastard!' his voice was calm, yet filled with meance, which Cooper was quick to appreciate. `Give me the story of the drugs in that tin! Or,' he shook his doubled fist inches from the other man's nose, `I'll give you the biggest beating you've had in your life!'

  `For Chrissakes!' spluttered Cooper, his uneven teeth wet with saliva. `It's not my fault. I've just had to obey orders.'

  `Who gave the orders?'

  Even as he asked, he saw Karen's frightened face behind Cooper, her hand over her mouth.

  `Well?' His eyes were hard, like steel.

  `Mr. Mason!' he gasped. `He's always run this side of the business! Now please let me go!' His voice rose in a whine.

  Vivian saw the quick shadow of relief cross the girl's face. She had been afraid, as he had. He felt a fresh wave of fury making his arm tremble.

  `When was the last load shipped across?' He could almost feel the rise of tension in the cabin, and Cooper writhed unhappily.

  `You brought it!' He swallowed heavily, as the grip on his neck tightened. `You remember? The two oil drums you picked up in Calais. That was a goddam big load!'

  Vivian flung Cooper from him in disgust and horror, as if he had been handling something unclean.

  'God! What an infernal mess!' he choked, and his eyes fell on Karen, taking in her torn stockings and bare feet, and above all, the look of anxiety on her face. He shot her a quick glance of encouragement.

  `Sorry about all this,' he gestured at the two sprawled figures. `I've just been getting a few home truths.'

  The boat swerved, and rolled sickeningly, and he saw the angry wavetops rise level with the wheelhouse door.

  `Can you steer, Karen?'

  She nodded her head. `Yes, Philip. Don't worry, I'll be all right now. I was afraid my uncle was behind all this.' She paused, uncertain of how to go on.

  `Yes, I know,' he said quietly. `I was, too.'

  He took her to the wheel, and helped her to get the boat back on course, watching her small hands gripping the spokes with sudden firmness and confidence. Then he went back to the saloon, where Cooper was watching him anxiously, and Morrie sat broodingly in the corner.

  'Now see here, you two, we don't want any more trouble. At the moment, the biggest job is to get home safely, and I'm the only one who can do that.' He let the words sink in. `So you, Morrie, get an oilskin on, and get up on the flying bridge, and keep a good lookout.'

  The big man scrambled to his feet, and shambled out on deck, dragging an oilskin behind him like a flag.

  `As for you, Cooper,' he turned coldly to the other man, `keep away from the girl, and from me!' he added meaningly.

  `Gee, it's not my fault,' Cooper began.

  `Maybe, maybe not. I'll find all that out, in my own good time. Right now, you can try to make some tea, and knock up a few sandwiches.'

  The little man darted a quick, anxious glance at the gleaming metal box, which lay where it had been thrown on the sofa.

  `Well, what are you gonna do with that? Mr. Mason was banking on that load,' he added hastily, as if eager to be dissociated with the arrangement.

  `It's going overboard! And the so-called portable radio is going with it,' he said grimly. `Unless you have any objection?'

  Cooper shrugged his narrow shoulders sulkily. `I dunno, I dunno, I'm sure,' was all that he could say.

  Vivian picked up the two articles, and walked deliberately to the wheelhouse door. As he slid back the door, the girl watched him gravely.

  He smiled briefly, thinking how lovely she managed to look under these appalling conditions and circumstances, then, with a heave, he sent the tin spinning into the boiling wake, closely followed by the radio. He dusted his hands together, and breathed deeply.

  `Well, that's that. I feel a bit better, now that we've got rid of that stuff.'

  From the galley, he heard the sound of Cooper struggling w
ith the kettle, and having made sure that Morrie, too, was safely occupied, he took up his position by the girl's side, and began to fill his pipe, allowing his wiry body to swing easily, as the boat creamed over each line of waves.

  `Where are we making for?' she asked, after a while.

  He tamped the tobacco down in the bowl carefully, his brows set in a frown.

  `I think it'll have to be Ramsgate,' he answered at length. `At least, I can't think of a better place at the moment. If Muir and his merry men are really going out of

  their way to catch me, there's no point in doing anything foolish.'

  `What will you say to the Customs men, if they board you?'

  She lifted her troubled eyes from the compass, as he answered.

  `Well, as I'm supposed to be taking our two friends here on a fishing trip, I'll have to say that I've been lying off the coast until this gale has blown itself out. After all, nobody is supposed to know I've left British waters at all,' he permitted himself a brief grin, `whatever they might really think.'

  `There's the problem of you, that I've not quite settled.'

  `Me, Philip? How do you mean?'

  `You're not supposed to be here! And I don't want you to get mixed up with this business, now that we've got this far,' his voice was firm.

  `Perhaps it will be all right. Perhaps no one will stop us.'

  But as their eyes met, they knew this to be unlikely.

  `That reminds me, I'd better get the fishing gear laid out, just in case. I'd forgotten all about the need for deception!'

  For the first time, she laughed, her blue eyes dancing. `You will never make a proper smuggler, Philip!'

  He patted her arm, gaining strength from the brief contact. `I'm learning fast! Will you be all right if I leave you on the wheel for a bit?'

  `I'm all right, when I know you're not too far away.' She paused. `I would not like to be alone with that man Cooper.' She shivered.

  He frowned. `I shan't be sorry to see the back of him, either.'

  As he busied himself with the fishing gear, which he always kept aboard for his paying guests, he wondered how much longer he would be able to cope with the steadily mounting web of complications. Thank God it would soon be over. Perhaps then he would be able to find out what chance he stood with Karen.