Hungry as the Sea (41 page)

Now there was trembling outrage in her voice as she whispered, “A million tons! That’s some sort of genocide, Nicholas, there has probably never been a more deadly cargo in the history of seafaring.”

“In a few weeks time
Golden Dawn
will run down here and when she does, the seeds of way at St Nazaite catastrophe will be sewn upon the oceans.”

“Her route from the Arabian Gulf takes her around Good Hope.”

“One of the most dangerous seas in the world, the home of the hundred-year wave,” Nicholas agreed. “Then across the southern Atlantic and into the bottle-neck of the Gulf Stream between Key West and Cuba, into the Devil’s Triangle, the breeding ground of the hurricanes.”

“You can’t let them do it, Nicholas,” she said quietly. “You just have to stop them.”

“It won’t be easy, but I’ll be working hard on it this side, there are a dozen tricks I am going to try, but you have to take over on your side,” he told her. “Samantha, you go get Tom parker. Get him out of bed, if necessary. He has, to hit Washington with the news, hit all the media – television, radio and the press. A confrontation with Orient Amex, challenge them to make a statement.”

Samantha picked up the line he was taking.

“We’ll get the Green-Peacers to picket the Orient Amex refinery in Galveston, the one which will process the cadmium crudes. We’ll have every environmental agency in the country at work – we’ll raise a stink like that of a million corpses,” she promised.

“Fine, he said. You do all that, but don’t forget to get your chubby little backside across here for the launching of Sea Witch.”

“Chubby obese, or chubby nice?” she demanded.

“Chubby beautiful,” he grinned. “And I’ll have room service ready to send up the food, in a front-end loader.”

Chapter 29

Nicholas sat over the telephone for the rest of the day, having his meals brought up to the suite, while he worked systematically down the long list of names he had drawn up with the help of the tape-recording of Lazarus’ report.

The list began with all those who it seemed had loaned capital to Christy Marine for the construction of
Golden Dawn
, and then went on to those who had written lines of insurance on the hull, and on the pollution cover for the tanker.

Nicholas dared not be too specific in the summation he gave to each of them, he did not want to give Duncan Alexander an opportunity to throw out a smoke-screen of libel actions against him. But in each case, Nicholas spoke to the top men, mostly men he knew well enough to use their Christian names, and he said just enough to show that he knew the exact amount of their involvement with Christy Marine, to suggest they re-examine the whole project, especially with regard to
Golden Dawn’s
underwriting and to her contract of carriage with Orient Amex.

In the quiet intervals between each telephone call, or while a name was tracked down by a secretary, Nicholas sat over the Place Vendome and carefully re-examined himself and his reasons for what he was doing. It is so very easy for a man to attribute to himself the most noble motives. The sea had given Nicholas a wonderful life, and had rewarded him in wealth, reputation and achievement, Now it was time to repay part of that debt, to use some of that wealth to protect and guard the oceans, the way a prudent farmer cherishes his soil. It was a fine thought, but when he looked below its shining surface, he saw the shape and movement of less savoury creatures, like the shadows of shark and barracuda in the depths.

There was pride.
Golden Dawn
had been his creation, work, was going to be the culmination of a laurel crown on his career. But it had been taken from him, and bastardized – and when it failed, when the whole marvelous concept collapsed in disaster and misery, Nicholas Berg’s name would still be on it. The world would remember then that the whole grandiose design had originated with him.

There was pride, and then there was hatred. Duncan Alexander had taken his woman and child. Duncan Alexander had wrested his very life from him. Duncan Alexander was the enemy, and by Nicholas’ rules, he must be fought with the same single-mindedness, with the same ruthlessness, as he did everything in his life.

Nicholas poured himself another cup of coffee and lit a cheroot; brooding alone in the magnificence of his suite, he asked himself the question: If it had been another man in another ship who was going to transport the El Barras crudes – would I have opposed him so bitterly? The question needed no formal reply. Duncan Alexander was the enemy.

Nicholas picked up the telephone, and placed the call he had been delaying. He did not need to look in the red calf -bound notebook for the number of the house in Eaton Square.

“Mrs. Chantelle Alexander, please.”

“I am sorry, sir. Mrs. Alexander is at Cap Ferrat.”

“Of course,” he muttered. “Thank you.”

“Do you want the number?”

“That’s all right, I have it.” He had lost track of time. He dialled again, this time down to the Mediterranean coast.

“This is the residence of Mrs. Alexander. Her son Peter Berg speaking.”

Nicholas felt the rush of emotion through his blood, so that it burned his cheeks and stung his eyes. “Hello, my boy.” Even in his own ears his voice sounded stilted, perhaps pompous.

“Rather,” undisguised delight. “Dad, how are you – sir?  Did you get my letters?”

“No, I didn’t, where did you send them?”

“The flat – in Queen’s Gate.”

“I haven’t been back there for –”, Nicholas thought, “for nearly a month.”

“I got your cards, Dad, the one from Bermuda and the one from Florida. I just wrote to tell you –” and there was a recital of schoolboy triumphs and disasters.

“That’s tremendous, Peter. I’m really proud.” Nicholas imagined the face of his son as he listened, and his heart was squeezed by guilt, that he could do so little, could give him so little of his time, squeezed by longing for what he had lost. For it was only at times such as these that he could admit how much he missed his son.

“That’s great, Peter.” The boy was trying to tell it all at the same time, gabbling out the news he had stored so carefully, flitting from subject to subject, as one thing reminded him of another. Then, of course, the inevitable question: “When can I come to you, Dad?”

“I’ll have to arrange that with your mother, Peter. But it will be soon. I promise you that.” Let’s get away from that, Nick thought, desperately. “How is Apache? Have you raced her yet these holidays?”

“Oh yes, Mother let me have a new set of Terylene sails, in red and yellow. I raced her yesterday.” Apache had not actually been placed first in the event, but Nicholas gained the impression that the blame lay not on her skipper but rather on the vagaries of the wind, the unsporting behaviour of the other competitors who bumped when they had the weather gauge, and finally the starter who had wanted to disqualify Apache for beating the gun. “But,” Peter went on, “I’m racing again on saturday morning.”

“Peter, where is your mother?”

“She’s down at the boathouse.”

“Can you put this call through there? I must speak to her, Peter.”

“Of course.” The disappointment in the child’s voice was almost completely disguised. “Hey, Dad. You promised, didn’t you. It will be soon?”

“I promised.”

“Cheerio, sir.” There was a clicking and humming on the line and then suddenly her voice, with its marvelous timbre and serenity.

“C’es t Chantelle Alexander qui parle?”

“C’est Nicholas ici.”

“Oh, my dear. How good to hear your voice.”

“How are you? Are you alone?”

“No, I have friends lunching with me. The Contessa is here with his new boyfriend, a matador no less!”

The ‘Contessa’ was an outrageously camp and wealthy homosexual who danced at Chantelle’s court. Nicholas could imagine the scene on the wide paved terrace, screened from the cliffs above by the sighing pines and the rococo pink boathouse with its turrets and rusty-coloured tiles. There would be gay and brilliant company under the colourful umbrellas.

“Pierre and Mimi sailed across from Cannes for the day.” Pierre was the son of the largest manufacturer of civil and military jet aircraft in Europe. Below the terrace was the private jetty and small beautifully equipped yacht basin. Her visitors would have moored their craft there, the bare masts nodding lazily against the sky and the small mediterranean-blue wavelets lapping the stone jetty. Nicholas could hear the laughter and the tinkle of glasses in the background, and he cut short the recital of the guest list.

“Is Duncan there?”

“No, he’s still in London – he won’t be out until next week.”

“I have news. Can you get up to Paris?”

“It’s impossible, Nicky.” Strange how the pet name did not jar from her. “I must be at Monte Carlo tomorrow, I’m helping Grace with the Spring Charity.”

“It’s important, Chantelle.”

“Then there’s Peter. I don’t like to leave him. Can’t you come here? There is a direct flight at nine tomorrow. I’ll get rid of the house guests so we can talk in private.”

“All right, will you book me a –” he thought quickly, then, “suite at the Negresco?”

“Don’t be silly, Nicky. We’ve thirteen perfectly good bedrooms here – we are both civilized people and Peter would love to see you, you know that.”

Chapter 30

The Cote d’Azur was revelling in a freakish burst of early spring weather when Nicholas came down the boarding ladder at Nice Airport, and Peter was waiting for him at the boundary fence, hopping up and down and waving both hands above his head like a semaphore signaller. But when Nicholas came through the gate he regained his composure and shook hands formally.

“It’s jolly good to see you, Dad.”

“I swear you’ve grown six inches!” said Nicholas, and on impulse stooped and hugged the child. For a moment they clung to each other, and it was Peter who pulled away first. Both of them were embarrassed by that display of affection for a moment, then quite deliberately Nicholas placed his hand on Peter’s shoulder and squeezed. “Where is the car?” He kept his hand on the child’s shoulder as they crossed the airport foyer, and as Peter became more accustomed to this unusual gesture of affection, so he pressed closer to his father, and seemed to swell with pride.

Characteristically, Nicholas wondered what had changed about him that made it easier for him to act naturally towards those he loved. The answer was obvious, it was Samantha Silver who had taught him to let go. “Let go, Nicholas–” He could almost hear her voice now.

The chauffeur was new, a silent unobtrusive man, and there were only the two of them in the back seat of the Rolls on the drive back through nice, and along the coast road.

“Mother has gone across to the Palace. She won’t be back until dinner time.”

“Yes, she told me.”

“We’ve got the day to ourselves,” Nicholas grinned, as the chauffeur turned in through the electric gates and white columns that guarded the entrance to the estate. “What are we going to do?”

They swam and they played tennis and took Peter’s Arrowhead-class yacht Apache on a long reach up the coast as far as Menton and then raced back, gull-winged and spinnaker set on the wind with the spray kicking up over the bows and flicking into their faces. They laughed a lot and they talked even more, and while Nicholas changed for dinner, he found himself caught up in the almost postcoital melancholy of too much happiness – happiness that was transitory and soon must end. He tried to push the sadness aside, but it persisted as he dressed in a white silk roll-neck and double-breasted blazer and went down to the terrace room.

Peter was there before him, early as a child on Christmas morning, his hair still wet and slicked down from the shower and his face glowing pinkly from the sun and happiness. “Can I pour you a drink, Dad?” he asked eagerly, already hovering over the silver drinks tray.

“Leave a little in the bottle,” Nicholas cautioned him not wanting to deny him the pleasure of performing this grown-up service, but with a healthy respect for the elephantine tots that Peter dispensed in a sense of misplaced generosity. He tasted the drink cautiously, gasped, and added more soda, “That’s fine,” he said, Peter looked proud, and at that moment Chantelle came down the wide staircase into the room.

Nicholas found it impossible not to stare. Was it possible she had grown more lovely since their last meeting or had she merely taken special pains this evening? She was dressed in ivory silk, woven gossamer fine, so it floated about her body as she moved, and as she crossed the last ruddy glow of the dying day that came in from the french windows of the terrace, the light struck through the sheer material and put the dainty line of her legs into momentary silhouette. Closer to him, he saw the silk was embroidered with the same thread, ivory on ivory, a marvelous understatement of elegance, and under it the shadowy outline of her breasts, those fine shapely breasts that he remembered so well, and the faint dusky rose suggestion of her nipples. He looked away quickly and she smiled.

“Nicky,” she said, “I’m so sorry to have left you alone.”

“Peter and I have had a high old time!” he said.

She had emphasized the shape and size of her eyes, and the planes of the bone structure of her cheeks and Jawline, with a subtlety that made it appear she wore no make-up, and her hair had a springing electrical fire to it, a rich glowing sable cloud about the small head. The honeyed ivory of her skin had tanned to the velvety texture of a cream-coloured rose petal across her bare shoulders and arms.

He had forgotten how relaxed and gracious she could be, and this magnificent building filled with its treasures standing in its pine forest high above the darkening ocean and the fairy-lights of the coast was her natural setting. She filled the huge room with a special glow and gaiety, and she and Peter shared an impish sense of fun that had them all laughing at the old well-remembered jokes.

Nicholas could not sustain his resentment, could not bring himself to dwell on her betrayal in this environment, so the laughter was easy and the warmth un-contrived.