A Bridge Of Magpies (15 page)

`Dr Koch sent me. Urgent. You're to come at once. There's a strange ship at the Bridge of Magpies. She's up to no good.'

'A deep-sea trawler, so she says'

'Why, so she says?'

'I'm used to seeing all sorts on the fishing grounds, Not one like this, though.'

'What's different about her?'

'Big. Too big for a trawler. Perhaps a thousand tons. And too
small
for anything else.'

I could sense Jutta tensely wondering while I questioned Kaptein Denny, whether I would return to Possession. I intended to, but hadn't committed myself. The summons let Jutta off reprisal and me off the hook as far as she was concerned. It was my big face-saver. It solved one problem and created others. Yet I was uneasy that Koch felt he couldn't cope.

`What was she up to?'

`Nothing that I could see. She came in during the storm

"and anchored in the channel as far away out of sight of the huts as she could.'

'That's no reason for me to rush back.'

It was curious that Koch hadn't sent me a note giving the reasons for his anxiety. Disquieting, too, that he'd dispatched Kaptein Denny, post-haste and unrestricted-when he'd
been
so keen to keep him incommunicado on Possession.

'No, it's not. She's foreign built and decked-in for'rd with a kind of whaleback. You don't
get
that in a trawler. She's also carrying a lot of heavy gear on deck'

'What sort of gear-man?'

Ì didn't go aboard, Dr Koch did. With Breekbout, Ànd then?'

'He came back to Possession looking worried. All he said was, take your boat at once and go and find Captain Weddell. That ship stinks.'

`You asked no questions?'

`You don't, when the jail doors
are suddenly thrown wide
open.'

103

'Also you knew exactly where to find me?'

'You used sail from Possession. That left one answer in the storm: Alabama Cove?

'My
engine
packed up.'

'J thought so. But that didn't stop you.'

Jutta said, We had a narrow escape getting here. Struan hurt his side:

Bad?'

'I can still handle a ship.'

'Good. Let's go then. I'll
tow
you out.'

'You'll — what?'

Tow. The gale's dying. I know
a
way back close inshore all the way.'

'You're a devil for punishment.'

'It's safer-really. After a blow like we've had you have to keep a weather eye open for rogue rollers. They seem to come out of nowhere. Jf one caught us out to sea, towing, we'd be in big trouble.'

'By the same token, why wouldn't that happen inshore too?'

The shoals and reefs would break up
a wave
before it could reach us there.'

There was a controlled zest about the
man:
he was itching to go. Either I was going to put my trust— possibly my life and Jutta's too—in his hands or I wasn't. He hadn't let me down over Alabama Cove.

'Coffee-' said Jutta. 'We can talk below.'

'No time.'

His hurry reawakened
a tiny
spark of suspicion in my mind. Why was he so anxious to move out? One would have thought a couple of hours' wait-until the wind finally dropped-wouldn't do any harm. I let it ride. Perhaps it had something to do with negotiating the coast?

'Right — shoot l' I said. 'Give me
a
hand with the anchors first.'

He came for'ard to help me. His eyes were everywhere—on the sea, on the land, on the sky.

I said, 'Towing will use up a lot of your fuel. We'd better transfer what's in
Ichabo's
tanks before we start. Her old clanker's had it: it won't want fuel this trip.'

'No time.'

Again there didn't seem all that much need for his bustle. I must have shown something of what I was thinking because 104

he added, with a grin which disarmed me, 'If I run out of pa 111 piss in the tanks.'

The down-channel tow wasn't a milk-run. It was a sweat, even in the relatively calm water of Tuscaloosa's lee, to fix the rope so as to avoid snarl-ups. But Kaptein Denny knew his business: he handled things surely and expertly. I sent Jutta aboard
Gaok,
to be safe in case we ran into trouble and had to cut
Ichabo
adrift. She wanted to stay-on the grounds that my injury needed further attention. It didn't-but it was nice to hear her.

Within half an hour of his arrival Kaptein Denny dragged
Ichabo clear
of her funkhole, at the end of a tough manila hawser. We left the miserable little island behind, with birds clustered over it like flies on
a
kill. Near New Bedford Point the sea showed signs that the
gale
was on its way out: the water glistened darkly instead of breaking white and there were patches of green amidst the universal-monotonous grey, Kaptein Denny took the hazards of the whalebone point in his stride but the way he squeezed the two cutters through, until white water came churning over
lchabo's
side, almost turned my seasoned stomach!
Ichabo
cavorted at the end of the hawser like a yo-yo free-falling in space with only a string to bring it up short. He repeated the act a little farther down the coast at the cost of much adrenalin. I never guessed there were such routes. The wind decreased; our speed increased. By afternoon the wind had fallen to a fresh breeze. Denny and I had agreed, on leaving Tuscaloosa, that when this happened (he had slated Seventy-four Rock, another half-submerged islet well down the coast
as
the place where it would happen and he was right) we would drop the tow and use sail, so
as
to make better time. But the wind was veering west, and with my injured side I couldn't manage the short, sharp tacks that were necessary. So
Gaok
took up the hawser again and strung
Ichabo
aJong that frightening shoreline, working up to a useful speed of six knots. Seals appeared as the water smoothed: one huge fellow,
a
sort of cheer-leader, led his pack round the cutters for nearly an hour, playing waterborne ring-o'-roses.

When night came I didn't want to blow our luck by carry. ing on, but Captain Denny wouldn't hear of anchoring. His
knowledge
of
the way was uncanny.
He
rigged a
light in
Gaok's
stern and I held station on it–as tense and nerve. 105

racking a business as flying a plane dual control when you can't hear the pilot and don't know what his next move will be.About midnight –I hadn't an idea where we were –

Kaptein Denny hailed me to say we were about to anchor. He cast off:
Ichabo
freewheeled on, and I felt utterly helpless. But I needn't have worried. Kaptein Denny ran the smartest shop,
Gaok's
guide light did
a
quick flipper turn, disappeared-and then the boat was back alongside
Ichabo
again, made fast, and sheep-dogging my powerless craft to anchor.

We had a quick hard-tack supper aboard
Gaok
and turned in. The last sound I remember hearing before dropping off was the thunder of the surf close by.

We started off again in the morning before the sun broke up the fine spidery structure of
the fog.
There was no wind and an almost uncanny quiet. Jutta joined me in
Ichabo.
Kaptein Denny told us that the switchback part of the trip was over and that it wasn't far to Possession, but he made a minor mystery out of the ship's position. I thought it boosted his ego.

Jutta stood by me at the wheel-watching the silvery splash from the hawser as it dipped and tightened-dipped and tightened. In the confined space the sweet slept-in woman's clothing smell of her stirred my senses. The fact that my attention was on her made it all the more remarkable that my subconscious should have thrown up something about Kaptein Denny.

‘Jutta ! For crying out loud! He said,
U-1601'
'

Who?'

`Kaptein Denny, of course. He said,
U-1601'

'Why shouldn't he?'

'There at the grave–
U-160!'

'After all, he
knew it:

'But he didn't, Jutta! That's what I'm saying! He was aware that the
City of Baroda
had been sunk by a U-boat.
A
U-boat. He didn't know specifically
which
U-boat! Then, before he has heard your tape which identifies it-he comes up with
U-160.
Not any old U-boat, but a particular one, What a give-away

'I don't get you, Struan;

'What I'm saying is that if Kaptein Denny knew the U-boat's number he wasn't at the Bridge of Magpies that wartime 106

oight,
just fishing as he'd have us believe. He's playing a very deep game. He must have been part of that spy operation. Don't you see what I'm driving at?'

'Yes,
I
do now. That he came to the Bridge of Magpies knowing all about
U-160
and her rendezvous to pick up one spy and land another.'

`His function may have been to ferry the Jap Tsushima from Luderitz under cover of his fishing; then take back to port the man they landed–what was his name?'

'Swakop. It jells, Struan! Then everything came unstuck for him when
U-160
tangled with the liner and
Gousblom.
Maybe that's why Swakop had to make his way across the desert to Luderitz. Frau Hager said he was nearly all in when he arrived.'

`Kaptein Denny's liner rescue act could have
been
a
blind. He'd have been obliged to provide a very sound reason for being around that night. He'd also have had Tsushima on his hands after he'd missed the U-boat. That's why he remained so unbelievably modest about the whole business. Jt was a gigantic bluff!'

'He even dodged the warships.'

'With reason, if he had a Japanese spy aboard. But all that doesn't really concern us, Jutta. What does, is the fact that he's back here now–as he's been every winter for thirty years, on his own admission. What's the drawing-card? Loot from the lost city? Loot from
U-160?
Whatever it is can't be easy to get at, because he keeps coming back. And only at one season of the year, when conditions must be favourable for his operations'

'I wasn't going to tell you-Struan, but he wouldn't charge for bringing me here.'

Àh! How did he react when you first approached him about chartering his boat?'

'Surprised. Pleased.'

'He wasn't worried about operating in forbidden territory?' '

He laughed it off. I was touched by his willingness to help.'

'We're beginning to discover why.'

`He's kept his nose clean up to now. He didn't object when you ordered him off the shore.'

'With reservations. He still wasn't going to shift from his boat, remember.'

107

'It doesn't add up, Struan! If he wanted you out of the way-why has he made such an effort to bring you back again? Why risk his neck in the storm? It would have been an
easy
enough excuse to say he couldn't find us. Why be in such a hurry to get back to Possession?'

'Koch's no-good ship seems to have complicated the issue.' '

Look, there she is !'

We broke
clear
of the wisps of fog and I realized immediately where we were–off Elizabeth Point's ghost town. There were only about four miles of open water now between us and Possession. In the channel, somewhat to the south of the usuaJ anchorage,
as
though avoiding the huts ashore, was the ship.

'Sure, that's no trawler.'

The vessel was too far away for me to make out her name but my glass showed a low black hull with a whaleback fo'c'sle, a straight up-and-down outmoded cutwater, and a single, high, old-fashioned stack with a white band painted round it. Two very tall ventilators towered almost
as
high as the marking. She had a very square bridge and a box-like structure in the stern which on a warship would have been a radio or radar shack. But she wasn't a warship. Her masts were squat and sturdy, with heavy booms and derricks, their strength out of keeping to her size. No crew was visible.

`She looks . . . sort of slnister, Struan.'

'All black ships do. I'll find out soon enough.

go

aboard once we've tied up.'

Possession advertised its presence in its usual nostril-assaulting manner. The two cutters plugged slowly across the sea to the anchorage. They were white with salt-as if they'd taken a pasting on the Iceland cod run. We remained visible for miles but there was no sign from the stranger that she'd sighted us. Her decks remained empty of men.

'Where the devil's Breekbout?' I asked irritably. 'He should be getting out the whaleboat to fetch us.'

Jutta took a look through the binoculars.

1

'Not a sign. Having breakfast in bed, perhaps-while the cat's away.'

I tried to relax.

'Baths are on the house today.'

She smiled back. 'Think of all that lovely drinking water 108

going down the drain.'

'You tempt me to rush in on you and switch off the tap? '

Possession chivalry to ladies-in-the-nude.'

I
wanted more of her in that mood. We'd taken up where we'd left off in Alabama Cove, but the business of making the two cutters fast cut across it, and Kaptein Denny bad us rushing backwards and forwards in the process of manoeuvring up to the mooring buoys.

When it was done we went aboard
Gaok.

'They haven't hung out the flags for our return, Kaptein Denny.'

'Breekbout I could understand: Dr Koch puzzles me.'

I'd come prepared to read
anything
into his words but they were neutral enough.

'I'd have expected him to be chewing his nails waiting for us to heave over the horizon, the way you spoke.' 'He was, when I set out.'

All the time his eyes were scanning the anchorage, the channel, the black ship, the shoreline and the island. There was no smoke from the bunkhouse chimney and a gobbledygook of bird noises floated across the water. The place had a never-never air, like a stage with props but no actors. They might all have been there for ever. The Sperrgebiet has that trick of making time scales wobble.