Uncharted Seas (44 page)

‘Shops?’ she broke in curiously. ‘What are shops? Ah, yes! I recall reading of one in a book. They are places where people toil all day selling things, are they not? No, I do not think I should like that.’

‘But you would not work in them,’ he urged. ‘You would only go to them to buy pretty things. Lovely dresses, hats, lingerie. You should see the races at Auteuil, the Opera, the theatres, the beautiful
plages
with all the smart people—Biarritz and Deauville.’

‘It must all be prodigious diverting; yet life in the outer world sounds monstrous complicated if report be true, whereas here simple pleasures readily content us.’ She smiled a wicked little smile and began to fiddle with a button on his grimy blue tunic.

Tis but a poor compliment to me that you do not wish to remain. Did you not enjoy your one night as my guest?’

‘How can you ask?’ he stammered. ‘But there is my gun … you would not understand … but it means so much to my country since every week these days we never know when there will be another war in Europe.’

‘Ah! War,’ she sighed, ‘how horrible! ’Tis passing strange that two white races should be so desperate eager to massacre each other. What can excuse such atrocious barbarity? Soulless heathen as those Negroes are, I could scarce help feeling for them when I beheld so great a number all broken and dying in the valley. Thanks largely to your coming the only war we can be called upon to wage is over. Why do you not stay and make your life with us?’

In miserable indecision he clenched his hands until the fingernails cut into his palms. The temptation was almost irresistible. Yonita, small, supple, golden-skinned, with her wicked merry eyes—adorable beyond words. ‘Would you … would you …?’ he stammered.

‘La! Yes,’ she smiled. ‘Why not? I think you are still the most pleasing gallant I have ever had. We should be very happy together for mayhap even so much as a year.’

‘Only a year?’ he frowned. ‘I cannot—
ce n’est pas possible
, yet if I did stay surely you would marry me?’

‘Nay.’ She shook her head again, slowly but firmly. ‘I am promised to Deveril and ’tis Deveril that I love. My adult life will not begin until I am old enough to be married to him. ’Tis wondrous gratifying to pleasure oneself with a new beau, yet such youthful follies are no more than part of our education here and all of us are passing glad to reach maturity in due season so that we may share the joys of children and a home with our own man.’

Sadly he took her in his arms and kissed her. Instinct told him now that it was quite useless to plead with her further. Her upbringing and outlook were so utterly different from those of a modern girl in the great world outside the weed continent, he would never be able to persuade her to go with him, and his own duty lay in returning to France. Once the
Sally Ann
had sailed it was extremely unlikely that any other chance to leave the island would occur during his lifetime.

They lingered there a little, while the shadows of twilight fell, but the flavour had gone from their kisses and with mingled
feelings of regret and a strange, unexpected relief they strolled back to join the others, who had congregated in the ship’s dining-saloon.

A meal was served at eight o’clock, and as they were sitting down to table Juhani came up with his companions from the engine room to announce that their work was completed.

Thomas had saved the coal in his bunkers in the vague hope that some unforeseen chance might arise for them to put to sea again, and all cooking and heating since the ship had arrived had been done on oil fuel collected from the island. While Juhani had been at work some of the men with him had been getting the fires going and filling up the boilers. He said that by the time the moon rose they should have enough steam to get under way.

One Scotsman among the crew had proved a particularly able helper, and he had shown such a grasp of the engine that Juhani decided he would make an excellent second engineer. The other five men with Thomas and the party from the
Gafelborg
would be quite sufficient as an emergency crew to run the little tramp up to a South American port where a full complement could be secured.

The party in the saloon was a merry one. Only Yonita and De Brissac were a little silent at the thought of their parting, and Synolda, who appeared deplorably unenthusiastic about the prospect of getting home again.

Juhani was discussing some arrangements with Thomas, but as soon as they had done he came over and sat down beside her, beaming happily. ‘Well, it looks as though we’ll have to get hitched up in Finland and find the money for some furnishings, after all, honey. I’ll have to land another job and get to sea again to keep the home fires burning, but there’ll be the period between ships and it’s worth a lot to get back to one’s own folk.’

‘Juhani!’ she whispered in a strangled voice. ‘Come outside, I’ve got to speak to you.’

‘Have a heart,’ he smiled. ‘I’m needing a sitdown what with last night and eight hours solid below only just——’

‘Please,’ she interrupted. ‘I’ve been wanting to talk to you every moment of that time.’

He stood up and made way for her with an indulgent shrug. Outside on the deserted deck it was now quite dark; the sky was bright with stars but the moon had not yet risen.

‘Juhani,’ she said breathlessly the moment they were alone. ‘I’m not coming with you—I’m staying here.’

‘Not coming!’ he swung upon her. ‘Snakes alive! what’s bitten you?’

‘I’m going to stay here,’ she repeated.

‘But—honey!’ He threw his arm round her shoulders. ‘You can’t expect me to go giving you up like this—and—and although the island’s all right in its way—well——’

‘The island
is
all right,’ she broke in swiftly. ‘I haven’t seen it but I’ve heard enough to realise everyone’s happy on it. You can’t say that about Europe or anywhere else in the world we know.’

‘Well, maybe you can’t,’ he said slowly, ‘but it’s unnatural somehow not to want to get back home.’

‘I’ve got no home,’ Synolda declared bitterly, ‘and I
can’t
go back. I wouldn’t be able to marry you even if I did.’

He frowned suddenly. ‘God, is that blackguard husband of yours—still alive?’

‘Juhani,’ she said very quietly, ‘I had no chance to tell you everything last night. It was over seven years since I’d seen my own people when I induced Ortello to take me on a holiday trip to South Africa—a few months ago. We took my little boy with us, and seeing Ortello among my own people made me hate him more than ever. My old desire to cut and run surged up again. My sister had married a rich farmer but they haven’t got any children and she simply doted on my boy. I talked it over with her and she and her husband were quite willing to give us both a home.’

‘You deserted him, but he’s still alive, eh? Juhani interrupted.

‘Wait,’ she pleaded, ‘wait. We were all staying at Muizenburg together. One day, I came into our bedroom at the hotel. Ortello was there, walking up and down in a most violent rage because some business arrangement he had made had gone wrong. My boy ran in front of his feet to rescue a toy aeroplane. Ortello kicked him away as a brute might kick a dog. All I had suffered through him boiled up in me then and I simply saw red. There was a Spanish dagger that I used for fancy dress on the side-table I snatched
it
up and—and——’

‘Yes? …’ said Juhani hoarsely, staring down into her eyes.

‘I—I killed him. I didn’t mean to but the one stab was enough. When I realised what I’d done I was horrified—horrified. I tried to pull my wits together to save myself. I snatched up the child
and fled to my sister’s room and I told her what I’d done. She’s only two years older than I am and looks very like me. She agreed to take the child and go back to Johannesburg in the hope that when the police circulated my description they’d believe her to be me—and I think that’s what they did. I flung a few things into my dressing-case, locked the door of the bedroom, and fled to Cape Town. No ship was leaving the harbour before the following morning. I spent a ghastly night and joined the
Gafelborg
just a few moments before she sailed. In the meantime the murder had been discovered. It was in the morning paper and that’s where Vicente came in. He’d seen me with my husband at Muizenburg the previous afternoon and he saw the paper before sailing, next day. That night, when we were already at sea, he recognised me and threatened to have me arrested at the first port we touched unless … Oh, good-bye, Juhani! good-bye! I’m desperately sorry I’ve brought so much trouble on you.’

Juhani heaved a deep sigh, and through the tears that filled her eyes she suddenly saw that he was smiling.

‘Ortello had that coming to him,’ he said firmly. ‘If you hadn’t done it I’d have given that devil the works myself for all he did to you. You’re right about the island—we’ll make a new start there.’ Her tears came freely then, until he kissed them from her eyes.

An hour and a half later the moon was up. It was a sad blow to Thomas that he was losing Luvia as an engineer, but De Brissac had a considerable knowledge of machinery so between him and the Scot, who had helped Juhani with the repairs, they felt confident they would be able to manage. With many expressions of goodwill Deveril and his men, Yonita, Synolda, and Juhani piled into the boat and were rowed ashore.

It was only when they reached the cliff-top where they were to camp for the night they realised that the devoted Li Foo was still with them. Nothing, he declared, would induce him to leave the beautiful Missie Synolda.

The little
Sally Ann
blew a long blast on her siren as the anchor was weighed. Her bow turned slowly towards the oily channel where the moonlight silvered the still surface. In the stern of the ship Unity leaned over the rail with Basil’s arm round her. The debonair De Brissac stood on her other side, already half-consoled for his loss of the adorable Yonita by the thought of returning to his beloved France and the possibility of fresh adventures.

The sound of turning turbines sounded strangely over that grim, silent sea while the party on the cliff-top watched the people on the
Sally Ann’s
decks gradually merge into the shadows. At last the little ship was lost to sight and only the dimming light at her masthead showed that she was well on her way towards the open ocean.

A Note on the Author

DENNIS WHEATLEY

Dennis Wheatley (1897 – 1977) was an English author whose prolific output of stylish thrillers and occult novels made him one of the world’s best-selling writers from the 1930s through the 1960s.

Wheatley was the eldest of three children, and his parents were the owners of Wheatley & Son of Mayfair, a wine business. He admitted to little aptitude for schooling, and was expelled from Dulwich College, London. In 1919 he assumed management of the family wine business but in 1931, after a decline in business due to the depression, he began writing.

His first book,
The Forbidden Territory
, became a bestseller overnight, and since then his books have sold over 50 million copies worldwide. During the 1960s, his publishers sold one million copies of Wheatley titles per year, and his Gregory Sallust series was one of the main inspirations for Ian Fleming’s James Bond stories.

During the Second World War, Wheatley was a member of the London Controlling Section, which secretly coordinated strategic military deception and cover plans. His literary talents gained him employment with planning staffs for the War Office. He wrote numerous papers for the War Office, including suggestions for dealing with a German invasion of Britain.

Dennis Wheatley died on 11th November 1977. During his life he wrote over 70 books and sold over 50 million copies.

Discover books by Dennis Wheatleypublished by Bloomsbury Reader at
www.bloomsbury.com/DennisWheatley

Duke de Richleau
The Forbidden Territory
The Devil Rides Out
The Golden Spaniard
Three Inquisitive People
Strange Conflict
CodewordGolden Fleece
The Second Seal
The Prisoner in the Mask
Vendetta in Spain
Dangerous Inheritance
Gateway to Hell

Gregory Sallust
Black August
Contraband
The Scarlet Impostor
Faked Passports
The Black Baroness
V for Vengeance
Come into My Parlour
The Island Where Time Stands Still
Traitors’ Gate
They Used Dark Forces
The White Witch of the South Seas

Julian Day
The Quest of Julian Day
The Sword of Fate
Bill for the Use of a Body

Roger Brook
The Launching of Roger Brook
The Shadow of Tyburn Tree
The Rising Storm
The Man Who Killed the King
The Dark Secret of Josephine
The Rape of Venice
The Sultan’s Daughter
The Wanton Princess
Evil in a Mask
The Ravishing of Lady Mary Ware
The Irish Witch
Desperate Measures

Molly Fountain
To the Devil a Daughter
The Satanist

Lost World
They Found Atlantis
Uncharted Seas
The Man Who Missed the War