Journey Into Fear

CHAPTER SEVEN

He undressed slowly, got into his bunk and lay there staring at the cracks in the asbestos round a steam pipe which crossed the ceiling. He could taste Josette’s lipstick in his mouth. The taste was all that was left to remind him of the self-assurance with which he had returned to the cabin; the self-assurance which had been swept away by fear welling up into his mind like blood from a severed artery; fear that clotted, paralysing thought. Only his senses seemed alive.

On the other side of the partition, Mathis finished brushing his teeth and there was a lot of grunting and creaking as he clambered into the upper berth. At last he lay back with a sigh.

“Another day!”

“So much the better. Is the porthole open?”

“Unmistakably. There is a very disagreeable current of air on my back.”

“We do not want to be ill like the Englishman.”

“That was nothing to do with the air. It was seasickness. He would not admit it because it would not be correct for an Englishman to be seasick. The English like to think that they are all great sailors. He is drôle but I like him.”

“That is because he listens to your nonsense. He is polite-too polite. He and that German greet each other now as if they were friends. That is not correct. If this Gallindo …”

“Oh, we have talked enough about him.”

“Signora Beronelli said that he knocked against her on the stairs and went on without apologising.”

“He is a filthy type.”

There was a silence. Then:

“Robert!”

“I am nearly asleep.”

“You remember that I said that the husband of Signora Beronelli was killed in the earthquake?”

“What about it?”

“I talked to her this evening. It is a terrible story. It was not the earthquake that killed him. He was shot.”

“Why?”

“She does not wish everyone to know. You must say nothing of it.”

“Well?”

“It was during the first earthquake. After the great shocks were over they went back to their house from the fields in which they had taken refuge. The house was in ruins. There was part of one wall standing and he made a shelter against it with some boards. They found some food that had been in the house but the tanks had been broken and there was no water. He left her with the boy, their son, and went to look for water. Some friends who had a house near theirs were away in Istanbul. That house, too, had fallen, but he went among the ruins to find the water tanks. He found them and one of them had not been broken. He had nothing to take the water back in so he searched for a jug or a tin. He found a jug. It was of silver and had been partly crushed by the falling stones. After the earthquake, soldiers had been sent to patrol the streets to prevent looting, of which there was a great deal because valuable things were lying everywhere in the ruins. As he was standing there trying to straighten the jug, a soldier arrested him. Signora Beronelli knew nothing of this and when he did not come back she and her son went to look for him. But there was such chaos that she could do nothing. The next day she heard that he had been shot. Is that not a terrible tragedy?”

“Yes, it is a tragedy. Such things happen.”

“If the good God had killed him in the earthquake she could bear it more easily. But for him to be shot …! She is very brave. She does not blame the soldiers. With so much chaos they cannot be blamed. It was the Will of the good God.”

“He is a comedian. I have noticed it before.”

“Do not blaspheme.”

“It is you who blaspheme. You talk of the good God as if He were a waiter with a fly-swatter. He hits at the flies and kills some. But one escapes. Ah, le salaud! The waiter hits again and the fly is paste with the others. The good God is not like that. He does not make earthquakes and tragedies. He is of the mind.”

“You are insupportable. Have you no pity for the poor woman?”

“Yes, I pity her. But will it help her if we hold another burial service? Will it help her if I stay awake arguing instead of going to sleep as I wish? She told you this because she likes to talk of it. Poor soul! It eases her mind to become the heroine of a tragedy. The fact becomes less real. But if there is no audience, there is no tragedy. If she tells me, I, too, will be a good audience. Tears will come into my eyes. But you are not the heroine. Go to sleep.”

“You are a beast without imagination.”

“Beasts must sleep. Good night, chérie!”

“Camel!”

There was no answer. After a moment or two he sighed heavily and turned over in his bunk. Soon he began gently to snore.

For a time Graham lay awake listening to the rush of the sea outside and the steady throb of the engines. A waiter with a fly-swatter! In Berlin there was a man whom he had never seen and whose name he did not know, who had condemned him to death; in Sofia there was a man named Moeller who had been instructed to carry out the sentence; and here, a few yards away in cabin number nine, was the executioner with a nine millimetre calibre self-loading pistol, ready, now that he had disarmed the condemned man, to do his work and collect his money. The whole thing was as impersonal, as dispassionate, as justice itself. To attempt to defeat it seemed as futile as to argue with the hangman on the scaffold.

He tried to think of Stephanie and found that he could not. The things of which she was a part, his house, his friends, had ceased to exist. He was a man alone, transported into a strange land with death for its frontiers: alone but for the one person to whom he could speak of its terrors. She was sanity. She was reality. He needed her. Stephanie he did not need. She was a face and a voice dimly remembered with the other faces and voices of a world he had once known.

His mind wandered away into an uneasy doze. Then he dreamed that he was falling down a precipice and awoke with a start. He switched on the light and picked up one of the books he had bought that afternoon. It was a detective story. He read a few pages and then put it down. He was not going to be able to read himself to sleep with news of “neat, slightly bleeding” holes in the right temples of corpses lying “grotesquely twisted in the final agony of death.”

He got out of his bunk, wrapped himself in a blanket, and sat down to smoke a cigarette. He would, he decided, spend the rest of the night like that: sitting and smoking cigarettes. Lying prone increased his sense of helplessness. If only he had a revolver.

It seemed to him as he sat there that the having or not having of a revolver was really as important to a man as the having or not having of sight. That he should have survived for so many years without one could only be due to chance. Without a revolver a man was as defenceless as a tethered goat in a jungle. What an incredible fool he had been to leave the thing in his suitcase! If only …

And then he remembered something Josette had said:

“José has a revolver in his box. I will try to get it for you.”

He drew a deep breath. He was saved. José had a revolver. Josette would get it for him. All would be well. She would probably be on deck by ten. He would wait until he was sure of finding her there, tell her what had happened, and ask her to get the revolver there and then. With luck he would have it in his pocket within half an hour or so of his leaving his cabin. He would be able to sit down to luncheon with the thing bulging in his pocket. Banat would get a surprise. Thank goodness for José’s suspicious nature!

He yawned and put out his cigarette. It would be stupid to sit there all night: stupid, uncomfortable, and dull. He felt sleepy, too. He put the blanket back on the bunk and lay down once more. Within five minutes he was asleep.

When he again awoke, a crescent of sunlight slanting through the porthole was rising and falling on the white paint of the bulkhead. He lay there watching it until he had to get up to unlock the door for the steward bringing his coffee. It was nine o’clock. He drank the coffee slowly, smoked a cigarette, and had a hot sea water bath. By the time he was dressed it was close on ten o’clock. He put on his coat and left the cabin.

The alleyway on to which the cabins opened was only just wide enough for two persons to pass. It formed three sides of a square, the fourth side of which was taken up by the stairs to the saloon and shelter deck and two small spaces in which stood a pair of dusty palms in earthenware tubs. He was within a yard or two of the end of the alleyway when he came face to face with Banat.

The man had turned into the alleyway from the space at the foot of the stairs, and by taking a pace backwards he could have given Graham room to pass; but he made no attempt to do so. When he saw Graham, he stopped. Then, very slowly, he put his hands in his pockets and leaned against the steel bulkhead. Graham could either turn round and go back the way he had come or stay where he was. His heart pounding at his ribs, he stayed where he was.

Banat nodded. “Good morning, Monsieur. It is very fine weather to-day, eh?”

“Very fine.”

“For you, an Englishman, it must be very agreeable to see the sun.” He had shaved and his pasty jowl gleamed with unrinsed soap. The smell of attar of roses came from him in waves.

“Most agreeable. Excuse me.” He went to push by to the stairs.

Banat moved, as if by accident, blocking the way. “It is so narrow! One person must give way to the other, eh?”

“Just so. Do you want to go by?”

Banat shook his head. “No. There is no hurry. I was so anxious to ask you, Monsieur, about your hand. I noticed it last night. What is the matter with it?”

Graham met the small, dangerous eyes staring insolently into his. Banat knew that he was unarmed and was trying to unnerve him as well. And he was succeeding. Graham had a sudden desire to smash his knuckles into the pale, stupid face. He controlled himself with an effort.

“It is a small wound,” he said calmly. And then his pent up feelings got the better of him. “A bullet wound, to be exact,” he added. “Some dirty little thief took a shot at me in Istanbul. He was either a bad shot or frightened. He missed.”

The small eyes did not flicker but an ugly little smile twisted the mouth. Banat said slowly: “A dirty little thief, eh? You must look after yourself carefully. You must be ready to shoot back next time.”

“I shall shoot back. There is not the slightest doubt of that.”

The smile widened. “You carry a pistol, then?”

“Naturally. And now, if you will excuse me …” He walked forward intending to shoulder the other man out of the way if he did not move. But Banat moved. He was grinning now. “Be very careful, Monsieur,” he said, and laughed.

Graham had reached the foot of the stairs. He paused and looked back. “I don’t think it will be necessary,” he said deliberately. “These scum don’t risk their skins with an armed man.” He used the word excrément.

The grin faded from Banat’s face. Without replying he turned and went on to his cabin.

By the time Graham reached the deck, reaction had set in. His legs seemed to have gone to jelly and he was sweating. The unexpectedness of the encounter had helped and, all things considered, he had not come out of it too badly. He’d put up a bluff. Banat might conceivably be wondering if, after all, he had a second revolver. But bluff wasn’t going to go very far now. The gloves were off. His bluff might be called. Now, whatever happened, he must get José’s revolver.

He walked quickly round the shelter deck. Haller was there with his wife on his arm, walking slowly. He said good morning; but Graham did not want to talk to anyone but the girl. She was not on the shelter deck. He went on up to the boat deck.

She was there, but talking to the young officer. The Mathis and Mr. Kuvetli were a few yards away. Out of the corner of his eye he saw them look at him expectantly but he pretended not to have seen them and walked over to Josette.

She greeted him with a smile and a meaning look intended to convey that she was bored with her companion. The young Italian scowled a good morning and made to take up the conversation where Graham had interrupted it.

But Graham was in no mood for courtesies. “You must excuse me, Monsieur,” he said in French; “I have a message for Madame from her husband.”

The officer nodded and stood aside politely.

Graham raised his eyebrows. “It is a private message, Monsieur.”

The officer flushed angrily and looked at Josette. She nodded to him in a kindly way and said something to him in Italian. He flashed his teeth at her, scowled once more at Graham and stalked on.

She giggled. “You were really very unkind to that poor boy. He was getting on so nicely. Could you think of nothing better than a message from José?”

“I said the first thing that came into my head. I had to speak to you.”

She nodded approvingly. “That is very nice.” She looked at him slyly. “I was afraid that you would spend the night being angry with yourself because of last night. But you must not look so solemn. Madame Mathis is very interested in us.”

“I’m feeling solemn. Something has happened.”

The smile faded from her lips. “Something serious?”

“Something serious. I …”

She glanced over his shoulder. “It will be better if we walk up and down and look as if we are talking about the sea and the sun. Otherwise they will be gossiping. I do not care what people say, you understand. But it would be embarrassing.”

“Very well.” And then, as they began to walk: “When I got back to my cabin last night I found that my revolver had been stolen from my suitcase.”

She stopped. “This is true?”

“Quite true.”

She began to walk again. “It may have been the steward.”

“No. Banat had been in my cabin. I could smell that scent of his.”

She was silent for a moment. Then: “Have you told anyone?”

“It’s no use my making a complaint. The revolver will be at the bottom of the sea by now. I have no proof that Banat took it. Besides, they wouldn’t listen to me after the scene I made with the Purser yesterday.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Ask you to do something for me.”

She looked at him quickly. “What?”

“You said last night that José had a revolver and that you might be able to get it for me.”

“You are serious?”

“Never more so in all my life.”

She bit her lip. “But what am I to say to José if he finds that it is gone?”

“Will he find out?”

“He may do.”

He began to get angry. “It was, I think, your idea that you should get it for me.”

“It is so necessary that you should have a revolver? There is nothing that he can do.”

“It was also your idea that I should carry a revolver.”

She looked sullen. “I was frightened by what you said about this man. But that was because it was dark. Now that it is daytime it is different.” She smiled suddenly. “Ah, my friend, do not be so serious. Think of the nice time we will have in Paris together. This man is not going to make any trouble.”

“I’m afraid he is.” He told her about his encounter by the stairs, and added: “Besides, why did he steal my revolver if he doesn’t intend to make trouble?”

She hesitated. Then she said slowly: “Very well, I will try.”

“Now?”

“Yes, if you wish. It is in his box in the cabin. He is in the salone reading. Do you want to wait here for me?”

“No, I’ll wait on the deck below. I don’t want to have to talk to these people here just now.”

They went down and stood for a moment by the rail at the foot of the companionway.

“I’ll stay here.” He pressed her hand. “My dear Josette, I can’t tell you how grateful I am to you for this.”

She smiled as if at a small boy to whom she had promised sweets. “You shall tell me that in Paris.”

He watched her go and then turned to lean against the rail. She could not be more than five minutes. He stared for a time at the long, curling bow wave streaming out and away to meet the transverse wave from the stern and be broken by it into froth. He looked at his watch. Three minutes. Someone clattered down the companionway.

“Good morning, Mr. Graham. You feel all right today, eh?” It was Mr. Kuvetli.

Graham turned his head. “Yes, thanks.”

“Monsieur and Madame Mathis are hopeful to play some bridge this afternoon. Do you play?”

“Yes, I play.” He was not, he knew, being very gracious but he was terrified lest Mr. Kuvetli should attach himself to him.

“Then perhaps we make party of four, eh?”

“By all means.”

“I do not play well. Is very difficult game.”

“Yes.” Out of the corner of his eye he saw Josette step through the door from the landing on to the deck.

Mr. Kuvetli’s eyes flickered in her direction. He leered. “This afternoon then, Mr. Graham.”

“I shall look forward to it.”

Mr. Kuvetli went. Josette came up to him.

“What was he saying?”

“He was asking me to play bridge.” Something in her face set his heart going like a trip hammer. “You’ve got it?” he said quickly.

She shook her head. “The box was locked. He has the keys.”

He felt the sweat prickling out all over his body. He stared at her trying to think of something to say.

“Why do you look at me like that?” she exclaimed angrily. “I cannot help it if he keeps the box locked.”

“No, you cannot help it.” He knew now that she had not intended to get the revolver. She couldn’t be blamed. He couldn’t expect her to steal for him. He had asked too much of her. But he had been banking on that revolver of José’s. Now, in God’s name, what was he going to do?

She rested her hand on his arm. “You are angry with me?”

He shook his head. “Why should I be angry? I should have had the sense to keep my own revolver in my pocket. It’s just that I was relying on your getting it. It’s my own fault. But, as I told you, I’m not used to this sort of thing.”

She laughed. “Ah, you need not worry; I can tell you something. This man does not carry a gun.”

“What! How do you know?”

“He was going up the stairs in front of me when I came back just now. His clothes are tight and creased. If he carried a revolver I would have seen the shape of it in his pocket.”

“You are sure of this?”

“Of course. I would not tell you if …”

“But a small gun …” He stopped. A nine millimetre self-loading pistol would not be a small gun. It would weigh about two pounds and would be correspondingly bulky. It would not be the sort of thing a man would carry about in his pocket if he could leave it in a cabin. If …

She was watching his face. “What is it?”

“He’ll have left his gun in his cabin,” he said slowly.

She looked him in the eyes. “I could see that he does not go to his cabin for a long time.”

“How?”

“José will do it.”

“José?”

“Be calm. I will not have to tell José anything about you. José will play cards with him this evening.”

“Banat would play cards. He is a gambler. But will José ask him?”

“I shall tell José that I saw this man open a wallet with a lot of money in it. José will see that he plays cards. You do not know José.”

“You’re sure you can do it?”

She squeezed his arm. “Of course. I do not like you to be worried. If you take his gun then you will have nothing at all to fear, eh?”

“No, I shall have nothing at all to fear.” He said it almost wonderingly. It seemed so simple. Why hadn’t he thought of it before? Ah, but he had not known before that the man did not carry his gun. Take the man’s gun away from him and he couldn’t shoot. That was logical. And if he couldn’t shoot there was nothing to fear. That was logical too. The essence of all good strategy is simplicity.

He turned to her. “When can you do this?”

“This evening would be best. José does not like so much to play cards in the afternoon.”

“How soon this evening?”

“You must not be impatient. It will be some time after the meal.” She hesitated. “It will be better if we are not seen together this afternoon. You do not want him to suspect that we are friends.”

“I can play bridge with Kuvetli and the Mathises this afternoon. But how shall I know if it is all right?”

“I will find a way to let you know.” She leaned against him. “You are sure that you are not angry with me about José’s revolver?”

“Of course I’m not.”

“There is no one looking. Kiss me.”

“Banking!” Mathis was saying. “What is it but usury? Bankers are money lenders, usurers. But because they lend other people’s money or money that does not exist, they have a pretty name. They are still usurers. Once, usury was a mortal sin and an abomination, and to be a usurer was to be a criminal for whom there was a prison cell. To-day the usurers are the gods of the earth and the only mortal sin is to be poor.”

“There are so many poor people,” said Mr. Kuvetli profoundly. “It is terrible!”

Mathis shrugged impatiently. “There will be more before this war is finished. You may depend upon it. It will be a good thing to be a soldier. Soldiers, at least, will be given food.”

“Always,” said Madame Mathis, “he talks nonsense. Always, always. But when we get back to France it will be different. His friends will not listen so politely. Banking! What does he know about banking?”

“Ha! That is what the banker likes. Banking is a mystery! It is too difficult for ordinary men to understand.” He laughed derisively. “If you make two and two equal five you must have a lot of mystery.” He turned aggressively to Graham. “The international bankers are the real war criminals. Others do the killing but they sit, calm and collected, in their offices and make money.”

“I’m afraid,” said Graham, feeling that he ought to say something, “that the only international banker I know is a very harassed man with a duodenal ulcer. He is far from calm. On the contrary, he complains bitterly.”

“Precisely,” said Mathis triumphantly. “It is the System! I can tell you …”

He went on to tell them. Graham picked up his fourth whisky and soda. He had been playing bridge with the Mathises and Mr. Kuvetli for most of the afternoon and he was tired of them. He had seen Josette only once during that time. She had paused by the card-table and nodded to him. He had taken the nod to mean that José had risen to the news that Banat had money in his pocket and that sometime that evening it would be safe to go to Banat’s cabin.

The prospect cheered and terrified him alternately. At one moment the plan seemed foolproof. He would go into the cabin, take the gun, return to his own cabin, drop the gun out of the porthole and return to the saloon with a tremendous weight lifted from his shoulders. The next moment, however, doubts would begin to creep in. It was too simple. Banat might be insane but he was no fool. A man who earned his living in the way Banat earned his and who yet managed to stay alive and free was not going to be taken in so easily. Supposing he should guess what his victim had in mind, leave José in the middle of the game, and go to his cabin! Supposing he had bribed the steward to keep an eye on his cabin on the grounds that it contained valuables! Supposing …! But what was the alternative? Was he to wait passively while Banat chose the moment to kill him? It was all very well for Haki to talk about a marked man having only to defend himself; but what had he to defend himself with? When the enemy was as close as Banat was, the best defence was attack. Yes, that was it! Anything was better than just waiting. And the plan might well succeed. It was the simple plans of attack that did succeed. It would never occur to a man of Banat’s conceit to suspect that two could play at the game of stealing guns, that the helpless rabbit might bite back. He’d soon find out his mistake.

Josette and José came in with Banat. José appeared to be making himself amiable.

“… it is only necessary,” Mathis was concluding, “to say one word-Briey! When you have said that you have said all.”

Graham drained his glass. “Quite so. Will you all have another drink?”

The Mathis, looking startled, declined sharply; but Mr. Kuvetli nodded happily.

“Thank you, Mr. Graham. I will.”

Mathis stood up, frowning. “It is time that we got ready for dinner. Please excuse us.”

They went. Mr. Kuvetli moved his chair over.

“That was very sudden,” said Graham. “What’s the matter with them?”

“I think,” said Mr. Kuvetli carefully, “that they thought you are making joke of them.”

“Why on earth should they think that?”

Mr. Kuvetli looked sideways. “You ask them to have to drink three times in five minutes. You ask them once. They say no. You ask them again. They say no again. You ask again. They do not understand English hospitality.”

“I see. I’m afraid that I was thinking of something else. I must apologise.”

“Please!” Mr. Kuvetli was overcome. “It is not necessary to apologise for hospitality. But”-he glanced hesitantly at the clock-“it is now nearly time for dinner. You allow me later to have this drink you so kindly offer?”

“Yes, of course.”

“And you will excuse me please, now?”

“By all means.”

When Mr. Kuvetli had gone, Graham stood up. Yes, he’d had just one drink too many on an empty stomach. He went out on deck.

The starlit sky was hung with small smoky clouds. In the distance were the lights of the Italian coast. He stood there for a moment letting the icy wind sting his face. In a minute or two the gong would sound for dinner. He dreaded the approaching meal as a sick man dreads the approach of the surgeon with a probe. He would sit, as he had sat at luncheon, listening to Haller’s monologues and to the Beronellis whispering behind their misery, forcing food down his throat to his unwilling stomach, conscious all the time of the man opposite to him-of why he was there and of what he stood for.

He turned round and leaned against a stanchion. With his back to the deck he found himself constantly looking over his shoulder to make sure that he was alone. He felt more at ease with no deck space behind him.

Through one of the saloon portholes he could see Banat with Josette and José. They sat like details in a Hogarth group; José tight-lipped and intent, Josette smiling, Banat saying something that brought his lips forward. The air in there was grey with tobacco smoke and the hard light from the unshaded lamps flattened their features. There was about them all the squalor of a flashlight photograph taken in a bar.

Someone turned the corner at the end of the deck and came towards him. The figure reached the light and he saw that it was Haller. The old man stopped.

“Good evening, Mr. Graham. You look as if you are really enjoying the air. I, as you see, need a scarf and a coat before I can face it.”

“It’s stuffy inside.”

“Yes. I saw you this afternoon very gallantly playing bridge.”

“You don’t like bridge?”

“One’s tastes change.” He stared out at the lights. “To see the land from a ship or to see a ship from the land. I used to like both. Now I dislike both. When a man reaches my age he grows, I think, to resent subconsciously the movement of everything except the respiratory muscles which keep him alive. Movement is change and for an old man change means death.”

“And the immortal soul?”

Haller sniffed. “Even that which we commonly regard as immortal dies sooner or later. One day the last Titian and the last Beethoven quartet will cease to exist. The canvas and the printed notes may remain if they are carefully preserved but the works themselves will have died with the last eye and ear accessible to their messages. As for the immortal soul, that is an eternal truth and the eternal truths die with the men to whom they were necessary. The eternal truths of the Ptolemaic system were as necessary to the mediæval theologians as were the eternal truths of Kepler to the theologians of the Reformation and the eternal truths of Darwin to the nineteenth century materialists. The statement of an eternal truth is a prayer to lay a ghost-the ghost of primitive man defending himself against what Spengler calls the ‘dark almightiness.’ ” He turned his head suddenly as the door of the saloon opened.

It was Josette standing there looking uncertainly from one to the other of them. At that moment the gong began to sound for dinner.

“Excuse me,” said Haller; “I must see my wife before dinner. She is still unwell.”

“Of course,” said Graham hurriedly.

Josette came over to him as Haller went.

“What did he want, that old man?” she whispered.

“He was talking about life and death.”

“Ugh! I do not like him. He makes me shudder. But I must not stay. I came only to tell you that it is all right.”

“When are they going to play?”

“After dinner.” She squeezed his arm. “He is horrible, this man Banat. I would not do this for anyone except you, chéri.”

“You know I am grateful, Josette. I shall make it up to you.”

“Ah, stupid!” She smiled at him fondly. “You must not be so serious.”

He hesitated. “Are you sure that you can keep him there?”

“You need not worry. I will keep him. But come back to the salone when you have been to the cabin so that I shall know that you have finished. It is understood, chéri?”

“Yes, it is understood.”

It was after nine o’clock and, for the past half hour, Graham had been sitting near the door of the saloon pretending to read a book.

For the hundredth time his eyes wandered to the opposite corner of the room where Banat was talking to Josette and José. His heart began suddenly to beat faster. José had a deck of cards in his hand. He was grinning at something Banat had said. Then they sat down at the card-table. Josette looked across the room.

Graham waited a moment. Then, when he saw them cutting for the deal, he got slowly to his feet and walked out.

He stood on the landing for a moment, bracing himself for what he had to do. Now that the moment had come he felt better. Two minutes-three at the most-and it would be over. He would have the gun and he would be safe. He had only to keep his head.

He went down the stairs. Cabin number nine was beyond his and in the middle section of the alleyway. There was no one about when he reached the palms. He walked on.

He had decided that any sort of stealth was out of the question. He must walk straight to the cabin, open the door and go in without hesitation. If the worst came to the worst and he was seen as he went in by the steward or anyone else, he could protest that he had thought that number nine was an empty cabin and that he was merely satisfying a curiosity to see what the other cabins were like.

But nobody appeared. He reached the door of number nine, paused for barely a second and then, opening the door softly, went in. A moment later he had shut the door behind him and put up the catch. If, for any reason, the steward should try to get in, he would assume that Banat was there when he found the door fastened.

He looked round. The porthole was closed and the air reeked of attar of roses. It was a two-berth cabin and looked strangely bare. Apart from the scent, there were only two indications that the cabin was occupied: the grey raincoat hanging with the soft hat behind the door and a battered composition suitcase under the lower berth.

He ran his hands over the raincoat. There was nothing in the pockets and he turned his attention to the suitcase.

It was unlocked. He pulled it out and threw back the lid.

The thing was crammed with filthy shirts and underwear. There were, besides, some brightly-coloured silk handkerchiefs, a pair of black shoes without laces, a scent spray and a small jar of ointment. The gun was not there.

He shut the case, pushed it back and opened the washing cabinet-cum-wardrobe. The wardrobe part contained nothing but a pair of dirty socks. On the shelf by the tooth-glass was a grey washcloth, a safety razor, a cake of soap and a bottle of scent with a ground glass stopper.

He was getting worried. He had been so sure that the gun would be there. If what Josette had said were true it must be there somewhere.

He looked round for other hiding places. There were the mattresses. He ran his hands along the springs beneath them. Nothing. There was the waste compartment below the washing cabinet. Again nothing. He glanced at his watch. He had been there four minutes. He looked round again desperately. It must be in there. But he had looked everywhere. He returned feverishly to the suitcase.

Two minutes later he slowly straightened his back. He knew now that the gun was not in the cabin, that the simple plan had been too simple, that nothing was changed. For a second or two he stood there helplessly, putting off the moment when he must finally admit his failure by leaving the cabin. Then the sound of footsteps in the alleyway nearby jarred him into activity.

The footsteps paused. There was the clank of a bucket being put down. Then the footsteps receded. He eased back the door catch and opened the door. The alleyway was empty. A second later he was walking back the way he had come.

He had reached the foot of the stairs before he allowed himself to think. Then he hesitated. He had told Josette that he would go back to the saloon. But that meant seeing Banat. He must have time to steady his nerves. He turned and walked back to his cabin.

He opened the door, took one step forward, and then stopped dead.

Sitting on the bunk with his legs crossed and a book resting on his knee was Haller.

He was wearing a pair of horn-rimmed reading glasses. He removed them very deliberately and looked up. “I’ve been waiting for you, Mr. Graham,” he said cheerfully.

Graham found his tongue. “I don’t …” he began.

Haller’s other hand came from under the book. In it was a large self-loading pistol.

He held it up. “I think,” he said, “that this is what you have been looking for, isn’t it?”