Trustee From the Toolroom (32 page)

He ought to do that. Apparently the storm hadn't broken yet. 'Tell the captain I'll be with him in a minute,' he said. ' I'll just put on my shoes.' As he sponged his face he thought of the gravestone and of Jo, his sister, and he thought of how she would have laughed, for her sense of humour had been broad. He was smiling, a little furtively, himself as he left the cabin to meet the captain up on deck.

As they strolled up the hill Tie asked casually, 'Is Miss Ferris coming with us to Marokota?'

'Not this time,' said Captain Petersen. 'She's seen it all before. She packed two suitcases and moved into the hotel while you were resting. We'll pick her up when we come back here with the pilot, Thursday or Friday.'

' She won't be on board for supper ?'

'I don't think so. She said not to disturb you, but just tell you hullo, till Friday.'

They walked into the stonemason's yard. The stone lay upon the bench all ready for delivery, a slab of purple coloured slate engraved with the simple inscription that he had chosen. He passed his hand over it; when he had done this for Jo and seen it erected there was no more that he could do for her, except to look after Janice. He would see this stone set up above the grave and then he would go away; it was very unlikely that he would come back to see , it again. Still, it was something to have got this far; when he had walked out of Mr Carpenter's office in Bedford Square he had intended to try to make it but had never really thought he would succeed.

The captain was talking to the old Chinese stonemason, who was drawing a little diagram for him upon the back of an envelope to show him how to set up a gravestone so that it would not fall over as the years went by. He arranged that the boy with the hand-truck should bring a bag of cement down with the gravestone to the ship that evening, and he paid the stonemason in American dollars to his great content. Then they were walking down the hill again towards the quay in the soft tropical dusk, through the myriad evening smells of Papeete.

On deck the captain turned to him. ' I never drink at sea, myself, or in harbour before sunset. But this is after sunset, sir.' He smiled. 'Would you join me in a highball?'

Keith wasn't quite sure what a highball was, but he appreciated the offer. 'Have you got any beer?' he asked diffidently.

'Sure we've got beer. We've got pretty near every kind of liquor in this ship. We've got dark beer, and we've got a kind of lager beer.' It was still hot in the harbour and Keith chose the lager; they sat down in the long canvas chairs on the aft deck and the steward brought them Iced beer and rye on the rocks.

Presently Keith asked, 'What time are we going off in the morning?'
I

'Any time you say,' Captain Petersen replied. 'Have you got any more to do on shore ?'

'No. I'd like to get away as soon as possible.' Before the Dawn Ferris storm blew up, he thought. He found it impossible to imagine what was going to happen to Jack Donelly, or himself. If he were to complete his mission to Marokota, however, the sooner he put a considerable distance between Dawn Ferris and himself, the better. 'Sail tonight if you like,' he said.

'I've got it all fixed for tomorrow morning first thing,' said Captain Petersen. 'Hands to breakfast at six, pilot on board at seven and get under way. Then we have breakfast about half past eight, when we've got sail set and all clear.' A sudden thought struck him. ' Would you be likely to feel sick? We could have breakfast here any time you say, and get under way after.'

'I shan't feel sick,' said Keith. 'Not after a month in the
Mary Belle
with Jack Donelly. At least, I don't think so. No, that would suit me fine.'

He spent that evening with the captain, dining with him quietly in the big saloon, sitting with him on deck in the vanilla-scented tropical night, watching the reflections on the water. He heard a good deal about Captain Petersen's family and home at Midlake, and the captain heard a good deal about Keith's home in Baling, and about Katie, and about Janice, and about the wreck of
Shearwater.
Captain Petersen had already picked up local information about that in Papeete, 'They had bad luck, Mr Stewart,' he said simply. 'When that hurricane blew up they were in just the worst possible position they could be in, with no sea room for the change of wind.' He sat in thought for a minute.' I believe in that position I'd have turned right round and headed back to the south-east with the engine at full power, and chance it turning south before it got to me. I think that might have been a better bet, but it's hard to say. But anyway, they'd only got a little motor, hadn't they?'

Keith nodded. 'That's another thing,' he said. 'From what I hear, the motor was taken on shore from the wreck and covered up. It's probably worth something. If I could get it back to England I could work on it myself and recondition it. Do you think we could get it on board and take it with us to Seattle, and ship it home?'

Captain Petersen considered the matter. 'We can't berth there to get it on board,' he said. 'We've got to lay offshore while you're on the island, and send the launch into the lagoon. It won't be much good now, you know. Not after being in the sea.'

'I'm not so sure,' said Keith. 'Things like that often look a fearful mess with external damage and corrosion, but when you strip them down, they're not so bad. It's got wet liners to the cylinders, so they're replaceable quite easily in England. New pistons and liners,, and a coat of paint. It might fetch a couple of hundred quid by the time I've done with it.' He paused. 'Enough to pay my passage back to England,' he said smiling.

'Oh, sure.' It was difficult to keep remembering that this intelligent little man, who had travelled half across the world and who was thought of so highly by so many influential people, had practically no money at all. 'How much do you think it would weigh ?' he asked.

'Three or four hundred pounds. I shouldn't think it could be more.'

The captain nodded,- ' I should think that's about it. We can do that, Mr Stewart, if that's what you want. I'd beach the launch in the lagoon. Then we'd need six or eight hands ashore and some baulks of timber, get it in the launch and rig a wire strop round it.' He thought for a minute. 'Bring it off to the ship - that's easy. Then to get it on board from the launch to the ship in the open sea. . .' He thought deeply. ' I'd make up special coir bolsters, four of them, pretty thick and about eight feet long, for the launch to ride against while we lift the motor on board with the launch derrick. That'll be okay. We can fix that for you, Mr Stewart.'

' There wouldn't be any risk of damage, would there ?'

'Only paintwork, at the most.' He thought again. 'We can fix that when we come back into harbour here at Papeete before sailing for Seattle. Get some planks when we get back here, too, and knock up a packing case for it, so it'll be all ready to ship back to England from Seattle.'

'That would be fine,' said Keith. 'I'd give it a bit of first aid before closing up the case. Wash it well out with fresh water, crankcase, cylinders, and all, and leave it to dry in the sun and wind. Then pour a lot of oil into each cylinder and fill the crankcase up with oil. I don't think she'll have come to much harm."

'Maybe we're too apt to scrap things in the States,' said Captain Petersen. 'The engineers can lend a hand with that.'

They sat in silence for a time. 'There's just one other thing,' said Keith. 'Marokota is uninhabited at this time of year, isn't it?'

'So they tell me,' said the captain. 'There's no regular settlement upon it. The people come there every now and then to pick up the nuts, but they make the copra upon Kautaiva. They happened to be there when
Shearwater
got wrecked, but of course they couldn't do anything.'

'I know ..." He hesitated. 'Would it be very difficult for me to spend twenty-four hours alone upon the island, after we've set up the gravestone ?'

The captain turned his head. 'There's no difficulty in that from my point of view, if that's what you want to do. We shall be standing off and on offshore. We can do that for a week if needs be. But there's nothing there, you know. I don't know even if there's any water.'

'I could take that with me, with some sandwiches . . .' He turned to the captain. 'I don't suppose I'll ever come back here again,' he said simply. 'I don't suppose that Janice -Jo's daughter, who's going to live with us - I don't suppose she'll ever come here. I want to take a lot of photos - an awful lot of photos, from all kinds of angles, and that'll air take time. I'd rather not be hurried by having other people about. I'd like to have your little rowing boat and go out to the wreck and take some photos of that. And — well, she was my only sister. I'd just like to be there alone for a bit.'

'Sure,' said Captain Petersen, a little huskily. ' I'll get a pack made up for you - blankets. It could be cold at night. Beer, water, sandwiches. What we could do is, go in in the launch with the gravestone, towing the dinghy behind. Set up the gravestone and leave you with the dinghy, go back to the ship. Then come off again next day and load up the engine into the launch, and pick you up. How would that be?'

'That would be grand,' said Keith. 'I could make a good inspection of the engine in an hour or so and decide if it's worth taking back to England. If the engine room could let me have a few spanners it might help.'

' Sure. You got plenty of film?'

- Keith nodded. ' I've got three new rolls, over a hundred exposures. I got them here today. I'll be all right for film/

He went to bed soon after that and slept soundly in Chuck Ferris' cabin, the first night that he had had in comfort for about a month. He wondered, as he went to sleep, about Dawn Ferris; no complaint had come from her, or, if it had, Captain Petersen had not told him. Perhaps the omnipotence of Sol Hirzhorn could protect him, even against that. In any case, apparently they were leaving in the morning, He must take things as they came. He slept.

He was roused by the bustle on the decks at dawn, had a shower and dressed in an open-necked shirt and slacks, and went up on deck. The steward found him and brought him coffee and biscuits, and he stayed on the aft deck out of the way of the seamen, watching the processes of getting the ship to sea. It was all very different from the
Mary Belle,
a matter of ordered movement controlled by an occasional whistle from the boatswain. The pilot came on board, dark-skinned and French-speaking, and was welcomed by the captain. Then the main diesel started below his feet with a rumble that steadied to an even purr. The springs were taken aboard, bow and stern lines singled up and brought back on board by a harbour boat. 'Captain Petersen moved into the wheelhouse, the stern lines were cast off, the en-^gine-room telegraph bell sounded, and the
Flying Cloud
moved forward from her berth into the main waters of the harbour. She turned and made for the entrance, hoisting the mainsail as she went, followed by the foresail and the mizzen, causing Keith to retreat into the deck saloon.

From Tahiti to the Tuamotus is a dead beat into the easterly trade wind at that time of year. Captain Petersen put his vessel under all plain sail and kept his engine going hard, taking in the mainsail for the hours of darkness. The distance to Marokota is about 300 miles, and it took them four days of hard slogging against the wind, a restful and invigorating four days for Keith. He learned a good deal about the management of a large schooner yacht, and took the helm for several spells, to the interest and amusement of the captain. He found that sailing the big schooner was not very different from the sailing of the
Mary Belle
once you had got accustomed to the wheel instead of tiller, and the size of her, and the speed.

They were approaching Marokota Island on the evening of the fourth day. Captain Petersen hove to at sunset, unwilling to venture in among the reefs in the hours of darkness, and they lay hove to all night with the engine stopped so that they could hear breakers but with an engineer on !.watch ready to start up if necessary. With the first light they got under way again, and by ten o'clock they were hove to under the lee of the island, on the west side of the encircling reef.

Captain Petersen stood at the door of the deckhouse staring at the reef through glasses. He lowered them and handed them to Keith. 'That's the wreck,' he said. 'She went on from this side. Just past that grey coral, where you see those timbers sticking up. That must be
Shearwater.'

Keith stared at the timbers, washed by the sea. It seemed incredible that this should be all that remained of the yacht ; that he had been on board in the Hamble River, only six or seven months before. He lowered the glasses. 'Would I be able to get near her from the other side?' he asked.

The captain lifted the glasses again. 'I should think so, in the dinghy. It's on the lee side of the island, so there's not much sea.' He lowered the glasses. ' It looks quite calm in. the lagoon.' He hesitated for a moment. ' Like me to come with you in the dinghy ?'

Keith shook his head. 'I'd rather be alone.'

'Okay.'

They rigged the launch derrick, put the coir bolsters over the lee side, and, steadying the big launch with guy ropes, watched their opportunity and put her in the water.They lowered the gravestone cased in a wooden frame into the launch with the sack of cement, a breaker of water, a pick, and a couple of shovels. Then they lowered down Keith's pack for the night, and dropped the ten-foot dinghy into the sea with a small davit. The captain got down into the launch with Keith, four seamen joined them, and the launch cast off and made for the narrow passage through the reef into the lagoon, towing the dinghy behind.