Close to the Wind (15 page)

They found Steffan at the foot of the stairs leading up to the first-class cabins. He was a tall boy with cropped blond hair who held a large bunch of keys and a handkerchief in the same hand. When he saw Oskar, he hurried over. ‘I don’t think it’s going to work. I’ve tried almost every key but they were getting suspicious. A woman said she was going to call the purser.’ He blew his nose and the ring of keys rattled.

Oskar sucked at his lower lip. ‘I thought you said those keys could open anything?’

Steffan frowned. ‘They did before.’

Oskar was impatient. ‘We’ll have to leave it for another time. Come on, I know one more place it might work.’ He led the two boys further along the gangway. ‘This is Malik.’ He glanced at the two of them over his shoulder. ‘You’ll like him. He’s got a cat.’

Steffan nodded at Malik, then blew his nose again. ‘Sinuses,’ he said and sneezed loudly. ‘That cat won’t help.’

They stopped outside a steel door marked ‘Out of Bounds’ and Oskar looked around to make sure they wouldn’t be seen, then he opened it and disappeared inside, quickly followed by Steffan.

Malik hesitated. He looked left and right, but then he stepped inside the door too and closed it shut behind him.

He found himself at the top of a wide wooden staircase that descended in two flights to a grand hall made from white marble. Oskar and Steffan were already at the foot of the stairs, looking up at a chandelier that hung at the full height of the hall. Malik walked on a red carpet that ran down the middle of the stairs – he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

‘I found this place earlier,’ said Oskar. ‘This ship’s a luxury cruiser that has been commissioned for the trip and they’ve locked this bit away to stop it getting trashed.’

There was a large set of double doors made from chrome and frosted glass. A shining brass plaque announced a ballroom. Steffan put his face to the glass. ‘What’s inside here? You can’t see in.’ He pulled at the locked doors.

‘Use your keys,’ said Oskar.

Steffan raised the large ring of keys and looked at the lock. He selected one of the larger keys, tried it, then removed it and selected another.

‘Hurry up,’ whispered Oskar, glancing back up the staircase.

Steffan tried two more of his keys without any luck. ‘I don’t think it’s going to work.’

‘You’re worse than useless.’ Oskar pushed him out of the way. ‘Let me have a go.’ He twisted the key slowly and listened as though it were a safe. ‘No. It’s no good.’ He took out the key and thrust the ring back in Steffan’s hand. ‘It’s not going to work.’

Steffan put the ring of keys into his pocket. ‘That’s what I said.’

Malik put an eye to the crack in the door. ‘It’s just a latch, a sort of lever.’ He put his rucksack down, looked inside and found the screwdriver. He handed it to Steffan. ‘This might work. Try and lever it up with that.’

Steffan slipped the shaft in the gap between the doors and lifted up the latch. He pushed the door open with a smile, and Oskar was inside before Malik could take a look. Malik followed Steffan in, shut the glass door and put the lock back in place.

The ballroom was the height of two decks, with full-length windows that looked out to sea along both sides. The parquet dance floor was polished to such a shine that it seemed be made of water rather than wood. Malik put Booty down at its edge but the cat sat with his face turned to the wall, refusing to
be impressed, as though he came to places like this every day.

Above the dance floor was another chandelier, twice as large as the one on the staircase, with cascades of dripping glass that twinkled in the sunlight. Around the edge of the hall, pillars of red marble framed each window and large round tables were positioned at their side, each of them dressed with a starched white tablecloth that was sufficiently large to reach down to the floor.

‘It’s beautiful,’ said Malik. The boys left their bags at the door and walked out into the middle of the ballroom.

‘Watch this.’ Oskar ran and dropped onto his knees in a long slide.

Malik turned full circle as he walked. He had images in his head of dancing couples twirling past him, and he thought of Papa’s parties and Mama being asked to dance, but even Papa’s parties were never anywhere as grand as this.

‘What’s in there?’ Oskar pointed to a second set of double doors at the end of the ballroom, and they pushed them open and went inside.

The room was a casino, much smaller than the ballroom but with a lush red carpet and several
smaller chandeliers. There were round tables with green baize tops, and each of them had a small wooden box in the centre.

Oskar lifted the lid of one to reveal two sets of playing cards and a set of five white dice. ‘I’m having them.’ He took the box from the table and went back into the ballroom in search of his holdall.

Steffan nodded toward the door. ‘He’s still in shock. At least, I think that’s what it is – he only came to us the other day and I’m looking after him.’

‘I thought he was looking after you.’

‘We look after each other. He does things I’m not good at and vice versa.’

‘I understand,’ said Malik. ‘You make a good team.’

Steffan seemed pleased with that.

‘Where were you before the ship?’

Steffan didn’t mind being asked. He said simply, ‘At the orphanage. Most of us have lived there for a while.’

‘Is that where the keys came from?’

Steffan blew his nose. ‘I found them after the housekeeper left. They opened the pantry and the store cupboard there, and they opened Matron’s office, only they don’t seem to work on the ship.’

Oskar came back carrying his bag. He went straight to the roulette wheels over by the window. ‘You do it like this.’ He spun the wheel, tossed the white ball around the inside of the rim and they watched it spin and rattle on the pockets till it rested in red seven. ‘You put your bets on the number you think it will be – you can choose more than one – and if it’s right then you get twice as many back.’ He took a look under the table and pulled up a tray with different coloured discs. ‘Look! We can play properly. But we have to use real money.’ He pulled the banknotes that Malik had given him from his pocket and put them on the table.

‘Where did you get that?’ asked Steffan.

Malik brought his own money out. ‘Here, you have some as well.’ He split the handful in two and gave one of them to Steffan.

Oskar slapped the sides of the wooden tray, making the plastic discs shake. ‘I’ll be the banker,’ he announced. ‘Winner takes all.’

They cashed their money in for discs. Steffan put a yellow on number six and two reds on number twenty-two. Malik watched him do it and then he put a yellow of his own on fifteen because it was the date of his birthday. Oskar spun the ball and it
rolled fast around the outer edge and dropped into eleven. He raked in the plastic counters with a long stick. ‘You can bet on red or black too,’ he pointed out. Malik tried that on the next turn and he won. Oskar paid out twice the number of discs he had put down, flicking them over the table to Malik with his thumb.

They played on the roulette table for over an hour. Sometimes Malik or Steffan won and they danced around, shouting with their arms in the air, but more often they lost to the bank and by the end Oskar had all of the discs and the money lay in a single pile at his left hand.

‘Are you going to keep it?’ asked Steffan.

Oskar took hold of the notes and neatened the pile on the top of the table. ‘I won it, didn’t I? Fair and square.’

Malik shrugged. ‘I don’t mind.’

Steffan shrugged. ‘I suppose it’s up to you, Malik. It was your money.’

Oskar relented. He counted out three notes for them both. ‘This is a down payment on your earnings.’ He pocketed the rest of the money. ‘From now on you work for me. And there’ll be lots more where that came from – I’ve got plans for this journey.’

When they left the ballroom, the boys found the public deck had been divided up by makeshift washing lines, strung up by the dormitory passengers so they could dry damp clothes that had been scrubbed clean in the bathrooms below. Shirts and underpants hung like semaphore and two lines of dripping blankets divided the walkway from the benches, obscuring the view out to sea. The boys made their way between them, stepping over the legs of women who sat with folded arms and guarded their washing.

‘Oskar! Steffan!’ Miss Price appeared at the end of the line of blankets. She waved at them. ‘I need to have a word.’

Malik turned to the boys and saw the back of Steffan’s heel as he ducked under a pair of brown trousers and disappeared. Miss Price hurried up to Malik. ‘Where are those boys? Did you see where they went?’

Malik was bewildered. ‘They just disappeared.’

She pursed her lips. ‘When you see them, tell them I want a word. There have been complaints from the first-class passengers regarding Steffan and a set of keys.’ She looked at Booty, who was held in
Malik’s arms. ‘I found a collar for your cat.’ She took an old blue velvet collar from her pocket and fastened it round the cat’s neck so that the little brass ring hung below his chin. ‘You will need some string if you are to tie him up.’

‘I have some in my rucksack.’

Miss Price nodded. ‘Very well.’ She parted the washing with her hand and left in search of the boys.

It was then that Malik caught sight of Angelo Vex.

He was standing at the railings, some distance away, his face held up to the late-afternoon sun. He was smoking a cigar, or rather, he held a lit cigar between his fingers and smelled the thin line of smoke that drifted across his face and up into his nose. Malik caught his breath and jumped behind a red and blue blanket that hung close by.

What would he say if Vex saw him?

He should hurry away below deck before he was spotted. But Malik didn’t move; some fascination made him want to stay and look, and he put his face round the blanket to check if he’d been seen. Vex had turned his back and was now looking out to sea. Malik recognized his wife in the deckchair to the
left of him. She had her head back with her eyes closed, and her lips were red and glossy where she had applied fresh lipstick.

The deck was crowded. People walked past and others loitered, catching the last of the sun, so Malik thought it was probably possible to watch them and still be unobtrusive. He caught the eye of the woman who owned the blanket he was using to hide behind and realized she was watching him suspiciously. He tried a smile, then ducked between the washing and sauntered out a little way across the deck, still keeping his eye on Vex and his family.

He spotted Vex’s older son, slouched in a deckchair to the left of his mother. He wore a pair of slacks with a sharp crease down the front, a polo shirt and a woollen tank top. An open book rested across the top of his thigh and he was watching his younger brother as he ran past holding a model aeroplane in the air above his head. Malik knew it was a Mustang, with its tail fin and propeller painted post box red, as Mama had promised to buy Malik the same one to hang from his bedroom ceiling at home. He wondered if Vex had bought it using the money from the diamond. Perhaps he had. Perhaps everything this family owned – the smart clothes, the cigar, the first-class
cabin – perhaps it had all come from the jewel in Papa’s mouth.

Malik walked towards them. He no longer cared whether he could be seen. He hated Vex, hated all of them, the little boy included. He wanted to grab the plane and smash it underfoot, wanted to see their horrified faces as the child burst into tears. Malik took a step closer, staring at the back of Vex’s head, and Vex suddenly turned round and looked out in his direction.

Malik turned and walked behind a white cotton shirt that hung on the line, his heart beating like an engine, but when he looked again, Vex had walked a few steps along the rail, completely unaware of him.

That made Malik even angrier. Was he so unimportant to Vex that he was invisible? Did he have to jump up and down with his arms in the air before Vex even noticed him?

A couple walked across his line of vision and Malik stepped out from behind the shirt. He watched Vex put the fat cigar to his lips, blow a light cloud of smoke up into the air and turn again toward the sea. Malik thought how when they had first met, Vex had told them he had sent his family away, so he’d
been lying to them even before he had known about the diamond.

Malik should walk right up to him. He should point his finger at Vex and shout, ‘Thief!’ That would wipe the satisfied smile from his lips.

Malik did walk forward, but with each step he lost a little bit of anger and felt a bit more fear. There were fewer people between the two of them and the line of washing was a good two metres behind him. Vex’s son ran past with the aeroplane in the air, making the sound of squealing engines and gunfire. ‘Whoooaagh! Rat-a-tat-tat-tat!’

Malik couldn’t even think what he would say if he got as far as Vex. He could point a finger and accuse him of theft. Yes, that much was easy. He could tell the whole world what he knew about Angelo Vex. He could even go to the purser and tell him what had happened.

But he had no proof. The diamond was gone. It had been sold or bartered and Papa wasn’t here to back him up.