Fear is the Key (21 page)

To get to the other side of the rig we had to cross
the hundred-foot width of the well-deck where I'd
talked to Joe Curran, the roustabout foreman, in
the early hours of that morning. It was by all odds
the longest, wettest and windiest hundred feet that
I'd ever walked.

They'd rigged up a couple of wire life-lines clear
across to the other side. We could have done with
a couple of dozen. The power of that wind was
fantastic, it seemed to have redoubled in strength
since we had arrived on the rig four hours previously
and I knew now that we could expect no boat
or helicopter to approach the rig until the storm
had passed. We were completely cut off from the
outer world.

At half-past two in the afternoon it was dark
as twilight and out of the great black wall of
cumulo-nimbus that all but surrounded us the
wind flung itself upon the X 13, as if it were
going to uproot it from its thirteen-leg foundation,
topple it and drown it in the depths of the sea.
It roared and howled across the deck of the oil
rig in a maniacal fury of sound, and even at the
distance of a couple of hundred feet we could
plainly hear above the deep thunder of the storm
the cacophonous obbligato, the screaming satanic
music as the great wind whistled and shrieked its
falsetto way through the hundreds of steel girders
that went to make up the towering structure of
the drilling derrick. We had to lean at an angle
of almost forty-five degrees against the wind to
keep our balance and at the same time hang on
grimly to one of the life-lines. If you fell and started
rolling along that deck you wouldn't stop until the
wind had pushed you clear over the side: it was as
strong as that. It sucked the breath from your lungs
and under its knife-edged hurricane lash the rain
flailed and stung the exposed skin like an endless
storm of tiny lead shot.

Mary led the way across this exposed storm-
filled working platform, and right behind her came
Kennedy, one hand sliding along the wire, his free
arm tightly round the girl in front. At another time
I might have been disposed to dwell on the subject
of luck and how some people seemed to have all
of it, but I had other much more urgent things on
my mind. I came close up to him, actually treading
on his heels, put my head close to his and shouted
above the storm: ‘Any word come through yet?'

He was smart, all right, this chauffeur. He neither
broke step nor turned round, but merely shook his
head slightly.

‘Damn!' I said, and meant it. This was awkward.
‘Have you phoned?'

Again the shake of the head. An impatient shake,
this time, it looked like, and when I thought about
it I couldn't blame him. Much chance he'd had of
either hearing or finding out anything with Larry
dancing around flourishing his pistol, probably
ever since he had come out to the rig.

‘I've got to talk to you, Kennedy.' I shouted.

He heard me this time too; the nod was almost
imperceptible but I caught it.

We reached the other side, passed through a
heavy clipped door and at once found ourselves
in another world. It wasn't the sudden quiet, the
warmth, the absence of wind and rain that caused
the transformation, though those helped: compared
to the other side of the rig from which
we had just come, this side resembled a sumptuous
hotel.

Instead of bleak steel bulkheads there was some
form of polythene or Formica panelling painted
in pleasing pastel shades. The floor was sheathed
in deep sound-absorbing rubber and a strip of
carpeting covered the length of the passageway
stretching in front of us. Instead of harsh unshaded
lighting falling from occasional overhead lamps,
there was a warm diffused glow from concealed
strip lighting. Doors lined the passage and the one
or two that were open looked into rooms as finely
furnished as the cabins you might find in the senior
officer's quarters aboard a battleship. Oil drilling
might be a tough life, but the drillers obviously
believed in doing themselves well in their off-duty
hours. To find this comfort, luxury almost, in
the Martian metal structure standing miles out
to sea was somehow weird and altogether incongruous.

But what pleased me more than all those evidences
of comfort was the fact that there were concealed
loudspeakers at intervals along the passage.
Those were playing music, soft music, but perhaps
loud enough for my purpose. When the last of us
had passed through the doorway, Kennedy turned
and looked at Royale.

‘Where are we going, sir?' The perfect chauffeur
to the end, anyone who called Royale ‘sir' deserved
a medal.

‘The general's stateroom. Lead the way.'

‘I usually eat in the drillers' mess, sir,' Kennedy
said stiffly.

‘Not today. Hurry up, now.'

Kennedy took him at his word. Soon he had left
most of them ten feet behind – all except me. And
I knew I had very little time. I kept my voice low,
head bent and talked without looking at him.

‘Can we put a phone call through to land?'

‘No. Not without clearance. One of Vyland's
men is with the switchboard operator. Checks
everything, in and out.'

‘See the sheriff?'

‘A deputy. He got the message.'

‘How are they going to let us know if they had
any success?'

‘A message. To the general. Saying that you – or
a man like you – had been arrested at Jacksonville,
travelling north.'

I should have loved to curse out loud but I
contented myself with cursing inwardly. Maybe
it had been the best they could think up at short
notice, but it was weak, with a big chance of
failure. The regular switchboard operator might
indeed have passed the message on to the general
and there would be no chance that I might be
in the vicinity at the time: but Vyland's creature
supervising the operator would know the message
to be false and wouldn't bother passing it on,
except perhaps hours later, by way of a joke: nor
was there any certainty that even then the news
would reach my ears. Everything, just everything
could fail and men might die because I couldn't get
the news I wanted. It was galling. The frustration I
felt, and the chagrin, were as deep as the urgency
was desperate.

The music suddenly stopped, but we were
rounding a corner which cuts off momentarily
from the others, and I took a long chance.

‘The short-wave radio operator. Is he on constant
duty?'

Kennedy hesitated. ‘Don't know. Call-up bell,
I think.'

I knew what he meant. Where, for various reasons,
a radio post can't be continuously manned,
there is a device that triggers a distant alarm bell
when a call comes through on the post's listening
frequency.

‘Can you operate a short-wave transmitter?' I
murmured.

He shook his head.

‘You've got to help me. It's essential that –'

‘Talbot!'

It was Royale's voice. He'd heard me, I was
sure he'd heard me, and this was it, if he'd the
slightest suspicion, then I knew Kennedy and I
had exchanged our last words and that I was
through. But I passed up the guilty starts and
breaking of steps in mid-stride, instead I slowed
down gradually, looked round mildly and inquiringly.
Royale was about eight feet behind and there
were no signs of suspicion or hostility in his face.
But then there never were. Royale had given up
using expressions years ago.

‘Wait here,' he said curtly. He moved ahead of
us, opened a door, peered in, had a good look
round, then beckoned. ‘All right. In.'

We went in. The room was big, over twenty
feet long, and luxuriously furnished. Red carpet
from wall to wall, red drapes framing square
rain-blurred windows, green and red chintz-
covered armchairs, a cocktail bar lined with red
leather-covered stools in one corner, a Formica-
topped table to seat eight near the door: in the
corner opposite the bar, a curtained-off alcove.
The dining-room of the suite – internal doors
opened off right-and left-hand walls – where
the general roughed it when he came out to the
oil rig.

Vyland was there, waiting for us. He seemed
to have recovered his equanimity, and I had to
admit that that smooth urbane face with its neatly
trimmed moustache and distinguished sprinkling
of iron-grey at the temples belonged right there in
that room.

‘Close the door,' he said to Larry, then turned
to me and nodded towards the curtained alcove.
‘You eat there, Talbot.'

‘Sure,' I agreed. ‘The hired help. I eat in the
kitchen.'

‘You eat there for the same reason that you
saw no one on your way through the corridors
coming here. Think we want the drilling-rig crew
running around shouting that they've just seen
Talbot, the wanted murderer? Don't forget they
have radios here and the chopper delivers papers
every day … I think we might have the steward
in now, General, don't you?'

I went quickly to my seat at the tiny table
behind the curtain and sat down. I felt shaken.
I should have felt relieved to know that Royale
had not been suspicious, that he'd merely been
checking to see that the coast was clear before
we went into the general's room, but I was more
concerned about my own slip-up. My attention
was so taken up with immediate problems that
I had forgotten that I was playing the part of a
murderer. Had I been a genuine and wanted killer,
I'd have kept my face hidden, walked in the middle
of the group and peered fearfully round every
corner we'd come to. I had done none of those
things. How long would it be before it occurred to
Royale to wonder why I had done none of those
things?

The outside door opened and someone, a steward,
I assumed, entered. Once again it was the
general who was the host, the man in charge,
with Vyland his employee and guest: the general's
ability to switch roles, his unfailing command of
himself in all circumstances, impressed me more
every time I noticed it. I was beginning to hope that
perhaps it might be a good thing to let the general
in on something of what was happening, to seek
his help in a certain matter, I was certain now he
could carry off any deception, any duplicity where
the situation demanded it. But he might as well
have been a thousand miles away for any hope I
had of contacting him.

The general finished giving his orders for lunch,
the door closed behind the departing steward and
for perhaps a minute there was complete silence.
Then someone rose to his feet and crossed the
room and the next I heard was the sound of bottles
and glasses clinking. Trifles like murder and forcible
coercion and underwater recovery of millions
weren't going to get in the way of the observance
of the customs of the old Southern hospitality. I
would have taken long odds that it was the general
himself who was acting as barman, and I was right:
I would have taken even longer odds that he would
pass up Talbot the murderer, and I was wrong. The
alcove curtain was pushed back and the general
himself set down a glass before me: he remained
bent over my tiny table for a couple of seconds,
and the look he gave me wasn't the look you give
a known murderer who has at one time kidnapped
your daughter and threatened her with death. It
was a long, slow, considering, speculative look:
and then incredibly, but unmistakably, the corner
of his mouth twitched in a smile and his eye closed
in a wink. Next moment he was gone, the curtain
falling into place and shutting me off from the
company.

I hadn't imagined it, I knew I hadn't imagined
it. The general was on to me. How much he
was on to me I couldn't guess, any more than
I could guess at the reasons that had led to the
discovery of what he knew or suspected. One thing
I was sure of, he hadn't learned from his daughter,
I'd impressed her enough with the necessity for
complete secrecy.

There was a rumble of conversation in the room
and I became aware that it was General Ruthven
himself who held the floor.

‘It's damnably insulting and utterly ridiculous,'
he was saying in a voice that I'd never heard before.
A dry, icy voice that I could just see being brought
to bear for maximum effect in quelling an unruly
board of directors. ‘I don't blame Talbot, murderer
though he is. This gun-waving, this guarding has
got to stop. I insist on it, Vyland. Good God, man,
it's so utterly unnecessary and I don't think a man
like you would go in for cheaply melodramatic
stuff like this.' The general was warming to his
theme of making a stand against being shepherded
around at pistol point, or at least against constant
surveillance. ‘Look at the weather, man – no one
can move from here in the next twelve hours at
least. We're not in the position to make any trouble
– and you know I'm the last man in the world to
want to. I can vouch personally for my daughter
and Kennedy.'

The general was sharp, sharp as a needle, sharper
than either Vyland or Royale. He was a bit late in
the day in making his stand against surveillance, I
guessed what he was really after was the power of
freedom of movement – possibly for himself, even
more possibly for his chauffeur. And, what was
more, he was getting it. Vyland was agreeing, with
the reservation that when he and Royale went in
the bathyscaphe the general, his chauffeur and
Mary should remain in the room above the pillar
along with the rest of Vyland's men. I still had no
idea how many men Vyland actually had aboard
the rig, but it seemed likely that apart from Larry,
Cibatti and his friend there were at least three
others. And they would be men in the mould of
Cibatti.

Conversation broke off short as a knock came
again to the door. A steward – or stewards – set
down covers, made to serve but were told by the
general to go. As the door closed he said: ‘Mary, I
wonder if you would take something to Talbot?'