A Fine Night for Dying

CHAPTER 11

Brittany

They made such excellent time that it was only nine-thirty as they approached St. Denise. There was a small bay with a deep-water channel marked on the chart about a quarter of a mile to the east, and Chavasse decided to give it a try.

He couldn’t have made a better choice. The bay was almost a complete circle, no more than a hundred yards in diameter, and guarded by high cliffs that gave excellent cover from the sea. They dropped anchor and went below.

Chavasse put his leather business case on the table, opened it and tossed a couple of packets of francs across to Darcy. “Half for you, half for me. Just in case.”

“You mean I’m getting paid, too?”

Darcy stowed the money away in an inside pocket and Chavasse pressed a hidden catch and removed the false bottom of the case to reveal an interior compartment. Expertly packed away inside were a Smith amp; Wesson.38 magnum revolver, a Walther PPK and a machine pistol.

Darcy whistled softly. “What is this, Prohibition?”

“Nothing like being prepared.” Chavasse offered him the Smith amp; Wesson. “Guaranteed not to jam. About the best man-stopper I know.” He dropped the Walther into his pocket, replaced the false bottom in the case and stowed it away in a locker under the table. “And now for the most interesting act of the evening.”

They rowed ashore in the fiberglass dinghy, beached it and scaled the cliffs by means of a narrow path. The sky was blue-black, and every star gleamed like white fire. There was no moon, and yet a strange luminosity hung over everything, giving them a range of vision much greater than might have reasonably been expected under the circumstances. They made rapid progress through the scattered pines and soon came to a point from which they could look down into St. Denise.

There was a light here and there in the cottages and several in the downstairs windows of the Running Man.

“How do you intend to play this thing?” Darcy asked.

“By ear,” Chavasse told him. “Strictly by ear. Let’s see how many guests are at the party first.”

They went down the hill, scrambled across a fence and continued along a narrow country lane that soon brought them to the outskirts of the village. Here the cottages were spaced well apart, each with its own small patch of ground under cultivation.

They passed the first house, and as they approached the second, Darcy placed a hand on Chavasse’s sleeve. “This is Mercier’s place, or did you know?”

“Now that is interesting,” Chavasse said softly. “Let’s take a look.”

They moved across the cobbled yard and crouched by the window. Light reached out with golden fingers into the darkness, and through a gap in the curtain they could see Mercier sitting at the kitchen table, head bowed, a bottle of brandy and a tin mug in front of him.

“He doesn’t look too happy,” Darcy said.

Chavasse nodded. “Didn’t you say something about his wife being an invalid?”

“That’s right. Hasn’t been out of bed in four years.”

“Then she’s hardly likely to interfere if we’re quiet. Knock on the door and then get out of sight. I’ll handle him.”

Mercier was slow in responding and his footsteps dragged strangely across the stone floor. He opened the door and peered out, took a step forward, an anxious, expectant look on his face. Chavasse touched the barrel of the gun to his temple.

“One cry and you’re a dead man, Mercier. Inside.”

Mercier moved backward and Chavasse went after him, Preston close behind. He closed the door and Mercier looked from one to the other then laughed abruptly.

“This’ll be a surprise for Jacaud. He told me you were both dead.”

“Where is he?”

“At the Running Man, entertaining his cronies from the village.”

“And Rossiter?”

Mercier shrugged. “They came back this morning, just before noon, in the Englishman’s boat.”

“That would be a man called Gorman?”

Mercier nodded. “We’ve done a lot of business with him in the past. He’s always in and out of here.”

“What about the authorities?”

“In these parts, monsieur?” Mercier shrugged. “People mind their own business.”

Chavasse nodded. “What happened to Rossiter and the others? Are they still at the Running Man?”

Mercier shook his head. “Monsieur Rossiter left just after noon in the Renault. He took the Indian girl and the Chinese man with him. The Chinese man was heavily bandaged about the face.”

“How did the girl look?”

“How would you expect her to look, monsieur? As beautiful as ever.”

“I don’t mean that. Did she seem afraid at all-afraid of Rossiter?”

Mercier shook his head. “On the contrary, monsieur. She looked at him as if he were…” He seemed to have difficulty in finding the right word. “As if he were…”

“God?” Darcy Preston suggested.

“Something like that, monsieur.”

He was strangely calm and unafraid and the answers came readily. Chavasse let it go for the moment and carried on. “Where did they go?”

“I haven’t the slightest idea.”

“Come off it, Mercier, you can do better than that. Try Hellgate, for a start, and Montefiore-don’t tell me you’ve never heard of them?”

“Of course, monsieur. I have heard those two names on several occasions-snatches of conversation between Jacaud and Monsieur Rossiter, but that is all. To me they are names and nothing more.”

He was speaking the truth. Chavasse was certain, which didn’t seem to make any kind of sense.

“What’s happened, Mercier?” he said softly. “You’re a different man.”

Mercier turned without a word, walked to a door, opened it and stood to one side. “Messieurs,” he said, with a small hopeless gesture.

Chavasse and Preston moved to join him and looked into a small, cluttered sitting room. A plain wooden coffin rested on the table, a candle at each end.

Chavasse closed the door gently. “Your wife?”

Mercier nodded. “Not a day without pain for four years, monsieur, and yet she never complained, although she knew there could be only one end. I tried everything. Big doctors from Brest, expensive medicines-all for nothing.”

“That must have cost money.”

Mercier nodded. “How else do you think I came to be working for an animal like Jacaud? For my Nanette-only for Nanette. It was for her that I endured so much horror. For her and her alone that I kept my mouth shut.”

“You’re saying you went in fear of your life?”

Mercier shook his head. “No, monsieur, in fear for my wife’s life, of what that devil Rossiter might do to her.”

“He made such threats?”

“To keep me quiet. He had to, monsieur, particularly after a trip some weeks ago when I sailed on the Leopard as a deckhand.”

“What happened then?”

Mercier hesitated, and Chavasse said, “Let me tell you what happened after we left here last night. The Leopard went down in the Channel; did Jacaud tell you that?”

“He said there had been an accident. That the engine had exploded and that the rest of you had been killed.”

“He and Rossiter left us to drown, locked in the saloon,” Chavasse said. “The woman and the old man died trying to swim ashore.”

Mercier looked genuinely shocked. “My God, they are animals, not men. Why, only the other week, monsieur, on the occasion I was speaking of earlier, we were sighted off the English coast by a British torpedo boat. We had only one passenger at the time-a special trip for some reason.” He turned to Darcy. “A West Indian like you, monsieur.”

Preston’s face had tightened and he looked ill. “What happened?”

“Rossiter said we’d get seven years if we were caught with him aboard. He put him over the side, wrapped in chains-and he was still alive. Still alive. Sometimes in my dreams, I can still see the look in his eyes when Rossiter put him over the rail.”

Darcy nodded blindly. “And he told you he’d kill your wife if you didn’t keep quiet.”

“That’s right, monsieur.”

Darcy turned abruptly, wrenched open the door, and went out. Mercier looked bewildered, and Chavasse said quietly, “His brother-his brother, Mercier. We’ve come to settle the account. Will you help us?”

Mercier took a reefer jacket from behind the door and pulled it on. “Anything, monsieur.”

“Good. This is what you will do. Wait by the Running Man and watch the harbor. In a little while, you will see the Mary Grant come in. You know her?”

“Of course, monsieur, Gorman’s boat.”

“You will enter the Running Man and tell Jacaud that Gorman has returned and is waiting urgently for him down at the jetty. Make sure that other people hear you tell him this.”

“And afterward?”

“Do you have a boat of your own?”

Mercier nodded. “An old whaleboat with a diesel engine.”

“Good-when we leave the harbor, we will go to a bay called Penmarch. You know it?”

“As I know every inch of this coast.”

“We’ll wait for you there.” Chavasse slapped him on the shoulder. “We will fix him, our brave Jacaud, eh, Mercier?”

Mercier’s eyes glowed with fire, the hatred of years boiling over, and they went out together.

There were perhaps a dozen fishermen in the bar when Mercier entered the Running Man, and Jacaud was holding court. They pressed round eagerly as he poured red wine from an earthenware jug, leaving a trail like blood across the counter while the old woman who worked for him looked on with a tight mouth.

“Free,” he roared. “Everything on me. In the morning, I’ll be away and you’ll never see old Jacaud again.”

Mercier had difficulty forcing his way through to the bar, but when Jacaud noticed him, he greeted him effusively.

“Mercier, old friend, where have you been hiding?”

His speech was slurred and he gave every appearance of being drunk. Mercier was instantly suspicious, never having seen him the worse for liquor in his whole life.

“I’ve got a message for you,” he said loudly. “From Monsieur Gorman.”

Several heads turned in interest and Jacaud frowned, instantly sober. “Gorman? He is here?”

“At the jetty. He just came in on the Mary Grant.”

Jacaud put down the jug and nodded to the old woman. “It’s all yours.” He came round the bar and brushed past Mercier. “Let’s go.”

Outside a slight wind moved in from the sea and stirred the pines. “Did he say what he wanted? Is it trouble?”

Mercier shrugged. “Why should he talk to me, Monsieur Jacaud, a person of no importance? He told me nothing.”

Jacaud glared at him in surprise, aware of a new belligerency in his tone, but there was no time to investigate now. At the end of the street, Mercier paused.

“I leave you here, monsieur.”

“You are going home?”

“That’s right.”

Jacaud tried to inject a little friendliness into his voice. “I’ll drop in later, if I may, after I’ve seen what Gorman wants. I’d like to talk things over with you now that I’m leaving.”

“As you wish, monsieur.”

Mercier faded into the night and Jacaud continued on his way, walking quickly, without even the slightest hint of drunkenness in his manner. If anything, he was worried, for he was not overendowed with intelligence. Rossiter had left him strict instructions as to what he was to do and Gorman hadn’t entered into them at all.

The Mary Grant waited at the jetty, her engine whispering quietly. He went down the ladder to the deck and paused uncertainly. There was a movement in the wheelhouse and he went toward it quickly.

“Gorman?” he demanded hoarsely.

He reached the door, and the heart in him seemed to stop beating, for the face that stared coldly at him from the darkness, disembodied in the light from the binnacle, was one that he had never expected to see again in this life.

Chavasse smiled gently. “Come right in, Jacaud.”

Jacaud took a step back and the muzzle of a revolver touched him on the temple. He turned his head involuntarily and found himself looking straight at Darcy Preston.

Sweat sprang to his forehead, cold as death, and he started to shake, for what he was seeing simply could not be. He sagged against the wheelhouse door with a groan, and the Mary Grant left the jetty and moved out to sea.

BY the time they had anchored in Penmarch Bay, Jacaud no longer believed in ghosts, only in miracles, and a miracle was something that could happen to anyone. His awe had been replaced by anger, and he awaited his chance to strike. It came when Mercier arrived and tied up alongside in his old whaleboat. Preston went to catch the line he threw, leaving Chavasse in charge, who suddenly seemed to get careless. Jacaud grabbed for the gun Chavasse was holding, and Chavasse, who had been anticipating just such a move, swayed to one side and clouted him over the head.

The blow would have dazed any other man, sent him to his knees for several minutes. Jacaud simply rolled on one shoulder, came to his feet and dived for the rail. Darcy managed to get a foot under him just in time and Jacaud went sprawling.

When he got to his feet, he found Preston taking off his jacket. “Come on then, Jacaud,” he said. “Let’s see how good you are.”

“You black ape.”

Jacaud came in like a tornado, great arms flailing, hands reaching out to destroy, and proceeded to get the thrashing of his life, as Darcy demolished him with a scientific exactitude that was awe inspiring in its economy. The Jamaican in action was something to see, and hatred gave him an additional advantage.

Jacaud landed perhaps three or four punches, but everything else he threw only touched on air. In return, he was subjected to a barrage of punches that were devastating in their effect, driving him to his knees again and again until a final right cross put him on his back.

He lay there sobbing for breath, and Darcy dropped to one knee beside him. “And now, Jacaud, you will answer some questions, quickly and accurately.”

Jacaud spat in his face.

Chavasse pulled Darcy up. “Take a breather. Let me try.” He lit a cigarette. “We all hate you here, Jacaud. The Jamaican, because you and Rossiter drowned his brother the other week. Mercier, because you dragged him down into the filth with you. Me, because I don’t like your smell. You’re an animal-something from under a stone-and I’d no more hesitate to kill you than I would to step on a slug. Now that we know where we stand, we’ll try again. Where has Rossiter gone?”

Jacaud’s reply was coarse and to the point.

Chavasse stood up. “On your feet.”

Jacaud hesitated and Mercier kicked him in the ribs. “You heard the gentleman.”

Jacaud got up reluctantly and Chavasse tossed Darcy a coil of rope. “Tie his wrists.”

Jacaud didn’t bother to struggle. “You can do what you like; you won’t make me talk. I’ll see you in hell first.”

He raved on for some time, but Chavasse ignored him and walked to the stern, where the swivel seats were fastened to the deck for big-game fishing and the hoist and pulley were rigged ready to haul in tuna or shark.

“Let’s have him down here.”

Darcy pushed Jacaud forward, and Chavasse swung him around and looped his bonds over the hook on the end of the pulley line. “Here, what is this?” Jacaud demanded.

Chavasse nodded to the other two. “Haul away.”

As Preston and Mercier turned the winch handle between them, Jacaud’s feet left the deck, and in a moment he was three feet up in the air. He started to struggle, kicking wildly, and Chavasse pushed the hoist out over the water. Jacaud hung there, cursing, and Chavasse tried again.

“Ready to talk, Jacaud?”

“To hell with you-to hell with all of you.”

Chavasse nodded, Darcy released the winch handle and Jacaud disappeared beneath the surface. Chavasse gave him a full minute, checking his watch carefully, then nodded, and Darcy and Mercier cranked him in.

Jacaud hung just beyond the rail, chest heaving as he sobbed for breath. He started to cough, then vomited. Chavasse gave him a moment to collect himself.

“Hellgate, Jacaud, and Montefiore. I want to know about both of them.”

Jacaud cursed him, kicking out wildly. Chavasse turned and nodded, his face cold, and the winch creaked again.

This time he made it one minute and a half, and when Jacaud appeared, there was hardly any movement at all. Chavasse swung him in, and after a while the great head lifted and the eyes opened.

“Hellgate,” he said with a croak. “It’s a house in the Camargue near a village called Chatillon. Monsieur Montefiore owns it.”

“And that’s where Rossiter and the others have gone?”

Jacaud nodded weakly.

“And Montefiore, is he there now?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never met him. I only know what Rossiter has told me.”

“Why didn’t you leave with the others?”

“Rossiter wanted me to take care of Mercier-he thought he knew too much and he wanted me to leave openly so that questions would not be asked. I only had a lease on the inn. It’s up in a couple of months anyway, so I made it over to the old hag who works for me. I told everyone I was leaving for Corsica tomorrow. That I’d been left a farm by a distant relative.”

Chavasse nodded slowly. “So, you were to kill Mercier?”

Jacaud started to cough, then gave a strange choking cry. His body heaved as if he were in pain, and Mercier and Darcy lowered him to the deck quickly. Mercier dropped to his knees and put an ear against Jacaud’s chest. When he looked up, his face was grave.

“He is dead, monsieur. His heart has given out.”

“Let’s hope he told the truth then,” Chavasse said calmly. “Get the ropes off him and put him in the saloon.”

He turned and Darcy grabbed him by the arm. “Is that all you can say, for God’s sake? We’ve just killed a man.”

“One way or the other, he was due for it,” Chavasse said. “So cut out the hearts and flowers. I haven’t got time.”

He pulled free and went into the wheelhouse. He was examining the chart when they joined him. “I need a nice deep channel,” he said to Mercier. “Deep enough for the Mary Grant to sink into without trace.”

Mercier sighed. “A pity, monsieur. She’s a beautiful boat.”

“She’s still got to go,” Chavasse said. “Where would you suggest?”

Mercier considered the chart for a moment or two, then jabbed a finger at a group of rocks marked as dangerous about six miles out.

“The pinnacles, monsieur, they’ve taken plenty of ships in their time. They stick up from a trench a thousand feet deep. Anything that goes down there will stay down, believe me.”

Chavasse nodded. “That’s it, then. You lead the way in the whaler. I’ll follow. Go with him, Darcy.”

“I’ll stay with you.”

Chavasse shook his head. “No point, this kind of job only needs one.”

“I said I’d stay.” Darcy’s voice was bleak. “What I say, I mean.”

He moved into the prow and stood there with his hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched.

“I don’t think he is too happy, monsieur,” Mercier commented. “Which surprises me. After all, they did as much to his own brother.”

“Which is exactly what’s bothering him,” Chavasse said. “He isn’t a hunting animal, Mercier. Now let’s get moving. We haven’t much time.”

THE pinnacles were first observed as patches of white water in the distance. As the boat approached, the turbulence increased and Chavasse was aware of great plumes of spray that blossomed in the night.

The pinnacles themselves were a scattered group of jagged rocks, in some cases permanently awash, and in others, twenty or thirty feet above the waves. When Mercier whistled sharply and waved, the agreed signal, Chavasse cut the engines and called to Darcy, who had been waiting by the forward hatch with a fire axe. Now he dropped inside and commenced to batter a series of holes in the prow. When he reappeared, she was already settling at that end and he was soaked to the skin.

Chavasse unfastened a cork life belt bearing the ship’s name and tossed it overboard, as Mercier came alongside.

“Lost at sea,” he said. “Sunk with all hands. Nobody will ever see Jacaud again.”

“And Gorman?” Darcy asked. “What about him?”

Chavasse shrugged. “Believe it or not, but most people who take a dive into the Channel don’t turn up again. Even if somebody does find what’s left of him after a few weeks, it’ll all fit neatly.”

“You have a naturally tidy mind,” Darcy said.

“Too complicated. I’m a professional, you’re not. It’s as simple as that.”

The whaleboat closed in and they scrambled aboard. Mercier took her round in a wide circle and they watched. The Mary Grant was well down by the head now, her stern lifting out of the water. When she went, she disappeared so quickly that if any one of them had closed his eyes momentarily, he would have missed it. The waters rolled over, and Mercier opened the throttle and took the whaler away.

“And now what?” Darcy Preston demanded, dropping down on one of the wide seats, shoulders hunched against the spray.

“We catch a train,” Chavasse said. “A train for Marseilles, if there is one, or is it still we?”

Darcy nodded slowly. “I’ve gone too far now to step back. You needn’t worry-I’ll be behind you all the way.”

“Fair enough.” Chavasse turned to Mercier. “Take us to some quiet spot on the coast as near to Saint Brieuc as possible. Can you manage that?”

“Certainly, monsieur.”

Chavasse gave him a cigarette and held out a match in cupped hands. “About Jacaud, Mercier, there could be questions.”

“Perhaps, monsieur, but I doubt it. He was to leave in the morning. Most people will think he left a little earlier. In any case, he was seen to go out in the Mary Grant, and where is the Mary Grant now? Perhaps in a few days, that life belt will be found by a fishing boat or drift ashore somewhere, and perhaps not. Henri Jacaud never existed, monsieur.”

“And you? What will you do?”

“I will bury my wife,” Mercier said simply.