Maiden Voyage

FORTY-THREE

A drama of a different kind took place an hour or two later, in the first-class smoking lounge. There, the ship's wealthier gamblers had assembled to bid for numbers in the ship's pool, and also to hear the results of the previous twenty-four hours' sailing. The room was dense with cigar and cigarette smoke, gusty with laughter, and heady with that second-night-at-sea feeling when you know that land has been left far behind you, and your destination is still far ahead of you, and that you can kick up your heels and do whatever you damn well please for the next two and a half days.

Maurice Peace was there, of course, with a club sandwich and a pack of cards, quietly eating while he relieved the tall man in the toupee of forty-five pounds at poker. Mark Beeney was sitting on a leather sofa by the mock-Tudor fireplace with Marcia, his tie loose and his tan rather reddened by champagne. Marcia herself was wearing a contented, provocative smile, lots of scarlet lipstick and a clinging green satin dress which did very little more than emphasise, en vert, that she was naked underneath. She had been quite determined this evening that Catriona wouldn't outdo her, although her pleasure at the announcement that Catriona was "indisposed" had been enormous. For one whole evening, she had no competition from the twenty-one-year-old queen of puppy fat. For one whole evening, she could have Mark all to herself.

Philip Carter-Helm was smoking a Passing Clouds and lying back in a club armchair watching the smoke rings rise to the ceiling. Douglas Fairbanks, his bandaged leg propped on a footstool, was telling yet another enthralled circle of passengers about his exploits during the storm. From the way he told it, he had been the only person on the whole ship, and the odd thing was that nobody interrupted him to say that, excuse me, but I went through the storm, too.

Rudyard Philips made a brief and rather formal appearance, with Mademoiselle Narron on his arm, and gave only guarded answers to those passengers who asked after Sir Peregrine's health. "He was overtired, after the storm," he replied, his mouth opening and closing like a money box. "He hadn't slept for twenty-six hours."

Louise Narron, in an extraordinary turquoise organza gown which came down in tiers like an ornamental fountain, looked as happy and as carefree as any woman who has deliberately decided to fall in love. Whenever Rudyard spoke, whatever he said, she smiled at him admiringly, and pursed her lips as if she felt like kissing him.

Jack Dempsey was asleep in one of the corner armchairs, his lips vibrating with every breath. Since he had exhibitionistically loped twenty times around the promenade deck that evening, to demonstrate how fit he was, and then skipped for quarter of an hour to "The Darktown Strutters' Ball" on his Victrola, it was hardly surprising that he had dropped off as soon as dinner was over; although his appetite would probably arouse him in time for supper.

Dame Clara Butt was not in the smoking lounge. She detested smoke and gambling and raucous noise, and so she had retired to her cabin, where her maid was massaging her large white buttocks him with Lanes' Emulsion. If the painter Ingres had been on board—which he couldn't have been, since he had been quite dead for fifty-seven years—but if he had been on board, he would have painted Dame Clara in this position for all posterity to admire, and called the painting "Venus and Thetis."

Now Baroness Zawisza rose, to exaggerated applause, to the small auctioneer's rostrum which had been set up for the bidding, and looked beautifully and a little tiredly all around her, so that Sabran would be able to see how wan she was, and how exquisite. Sabran, in fact, was playing rummy with Maurice Peace, and rapidly losing both his temper and all the spending money that the baroness had given him for the entire voyage.

"Tonight's auction will be the most exciting," said the baroness, in her melodious Polish accent. "We have been tossed hither and thither by a summer storm, we have clung on for our dear lives. We are lucky to have covered any nautical miles at all, and not to be lying under the ocean, conversing with the haddocks. So, without further preamble, I will tear open this envelope and tell you how many miles the Arcadia travelled in her first full twenty-four hours of sailing... and the answer is 622!"

There was a falsetto cry of delight from Lady FitzPerry. "I've won! That's mine! Six-two-two! Isn't that wonderful?"

There was more applause, and a few appreciative noises from the gentlemen as Lady FitzPerry came up to the rostrum in her flowing Drecoll organdie dress, under which her small breasts jumped up and down like a pair of boisterous lambs. Maurice Peace, who was still playing rummy with Sabran, glanced momentarily up at Mark Beeney, and smiled. He was, after all, five hundred pounds better off, quite apart from the cash which he was taking from Sabran.

When he had finished the hand, he excused himself and crossed the smoking lounge to the sofa where Mark and Marcia were sitting.

"Well," he said, with his placid and anonymous smile, "it seems as if the Arcadia didn't quite manage it."

Mark reached into his inside pocket, and counted out five 100 dollars bills, which he folded and handed over to Maurice Peace without comment. Maurice who had been born suspicious of the flavour of his mother's milk, counted each note before tucking them away into his wallet. "You want to bet on tomorrow's distance?" he asked. "Fair weather all the way, from what the officers tell me."

Mark looked up at him for a moment or two, and then pointed a finger at him. 'I know you, don't I?" he said.

Maurice shrugged. "No reason why you should."

"I've seen you before, I am sure of it. Did you ever travel on the Melusine, of the American TransAtlantic line?"

"I know the Melusine," said Maurice ambiguously.

"Well, I think I know you," replied Mark. "You're a gambling man, aren't you? One of our professional passengers, to put it politely."

"You're not obliged to bet with me, Mr. Beeney," said Maurice affably.

"I'm sure I saw you aboard the Melusine the last time I sailed on a to Rio de Janeiro," Mark told him. "A great many of our passengers lost a great deal of money on the gaming tables on that trip; and it wouldn't surprise me at all if most of it was lost on your account."

"You know how it is," smiled Maurice. "Memory sometimes plays odd tricks on you."

"Not half so odd as some of the tricks that you play, I'll bet."

Maurice turned to Marcia and gave her an avuncular beam. "This young man of yours is a stylist, and no mistake. Has he promised him marry you yet?"

"Not yet," said Marcia, more piquantly than Mark would have liked.

"Maybe he hasn't had his fill of thrills yet," said Maurice. "So how about it, Mr. Beeney? One more bet, on tomorrow's distance? Name your odds."

Marcia said, "You don't have to bet with him, Mark. He's a professional. You'll only be throwing your money away."

"Now then, Miss Conroy," said Maurice, "you shouldn't interrupt a gentleman when he's betting, nor when he's praying, nor when he's making water. That's what my old grandmother told my mother, in any case. She said, what does anybody want with a man who's busted, who's damned to eternal hellfire, or who's got wet feet?"

Marcia raised her elegantly plucked eyebrows, and couldn't think what to say in reply. She wasn't used to American folk humour. But Mark raised his hand, as if he were pledging allegiance to the flag, and said seriously, "I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll each pick a mileage for the next twenty-four hours; and whoever is nearer to the real mileage will be the winner. From you I expect as a stake a sizeable portion of the winnings you've taken so far. Would five thousand pounds sounds acceptable?"

Maurice was taken aback. "Five thousand pounds?" he asked Mark, lifting his cupped hand to his right ear, as if he hadn't heard properly. "Pounds, did I hear you say, or dollars?"

"Pounds," said Mark with a tight smile.

"But that's my whole living," protested Maurice. "If I step off this steamer with scarcely any money, then what will have been the point of my travelling on her at all?"

"She will have taken you home from Ireland," said Mark. "She will have fed you and cared for you, and washed your shirts. And considering you probably didn't pay your fare to begin with, that's not to be sneezed at."

Maurice expostulated, "Are you trying to suggest that I'm stowing away? Now there's an old-fashioned idea for you. Jim Hawkins on board the Arcadia."

"It doesn't matter to me," said Mark. "It's not my ship. At least not yet. I'm more interested in taking your money from you."

"Well, of course you are," said Maurice. "'And I shan't deprive you of the opportunity. It's a great risk, of course, but it's a fair one. All I want to know is, what can you put up in return? It has to be something pretty spectacular. Bonds, notes, something of that kind. After all"— and he said this with an unusual hint of concern—"you may be depriving me of my living."

For the first time, Mark saw a flaw in Maurice Peace's calm and enigmatic facade. The revelation was only brief—nothing more than a twitch at the comer of his ceaseless smile—but it was enough to show Mark that Maurice was growing a little too old and a little too cautious for big-time bets. Maurice was still a master of poker and rummy, and he could probably continue to make a respectable living out of cards for the next twenty years, or until he died. But to stake almost the entire gambling proceeds from the richest ocean voyage in postwar years on one single number—well, that was something different. That required a particular variety of nerve which Maurice Peace might no longer possess.

Maurice had seen for himself what happened to old men when they lost their edge. He had seen Jack ''The Spot' McLinton lose the seaside house he had built for his retirement on the single turn of a wheel of fortune. He had seen Walter Lillard carried dead from the Red Onion in Nevada, shot by an outraged opponent who had caught him using a Kepplinger holdout mechanism. And he had seen himself, in the glittering French mirrors of the Arcadia, a man past middle life who was still making a living out of kings and aces and jacks.

"I'll tell you what I'll bet you in return," said Mark, slowly, putting his arm around Marcia's bare shoulders, "I'll bet you my automobile."

"Your automobile?' asked Maurice suspiciously.

"That's right," said Mark. "It's a Marmon, 125-horsepower, only ten months old, and it's garaged in the hold right now, so you can inspect it if you want to. I think it cost $25,000 all told, or thereabouts. It has a cream kid interior, a cocktail cabinet, a gold-washed radiator, and all the gadgets you could wish for."

"Mark," interrupted Marcia, in horror. "That's your new car. You can't possibly bet that. Not that beautiful, beautify car."

"No, no, he's right," retorted Maurice. "He's asking me to give up all of my profits. It's only fair play that he should give up something that means as much to him in return. Money wouldn't mean anything to him, now would it? What's five thousand pounds to a man like Mark Beeney? Nothing at all! Write out a cheque, add a few noughts, he wouldn't even miss it. But a very special motor car: now, that's something different. To lose that motor car would hurt. And the whole point of this bet is that, if you lose it, it has to hurt. Am I right, Mr Beeney?"

"Yes," nodded Mark. "It has to hurt."

Maurice kept on smiling and cracked all the knuckles of his left hand one by one. "I should like a look, of course, at what I'm getting."

"You're very confident that you're going to win," said Mark.

"I always win," Maurice told him. "Just as you said, I'm one of your professional passengers."

At that moment, Harry Pakenow suddenly appeared, as if he had sprung up from a trap in the middle of a pantomime. His hair was sticking straight up and he was chewing a stick of celery.

"Mr Pakemoff," said Mark with well-simulated warmth. "I hope you're enjoying yourself."

"Pakenow," Harry corrected him. "But, yes, I think I am. I think I've discovered champagne."

"Fatal," said Maurice. "Take my advice, my boy, and stick to club soda. Champagne is the elixir of idiots."

"Well, you're probably right," Harry grinned, his eyes crescent-shaped behind his small wire-rimmed glasses. "But I've enjoyed it all the same. Did I hear you talking about Mr. Beeney's Marmon?"

Mark gave Harry a small, irritated look—a look which Marcia recognised from those times when their love making had been interrupted by telephone calls. His Marmon was one of his most prized personal possessions, and he hardly ever talked about it, even to her. She knew how much it must have cost him to stake it against Maurice Peace's profits. It was rare, one of a kind, and if he lost it to Maurice Peace he would never have the heart to order another one the same. Marcia wondered if he would feel even half as distracted if he lost her.

"Mr Beeney's Marmon has become the subject of a bet," said Maurice Peace. "We are each going to estimate how many nautical miles the Arcadia will be able to cover during the twenty-four hours which commenced at noon today; and whoever bets the nearer figure will be the winner. My stake is, er, money. Mr Beeney's stake is his Marmon motor-car, which even as we speak is waiting for me in this stately vessel's hold."

Harry Pakenow uneasily rubbed the back of his neck. "I thought I heard you saying that you wanted to look it over," he said to Maurice.

"Indeed you did," Maurice enthused. 'You don't make a bet without seeing the colour of your competitor's money, now do you?"

"Well, I suppose you don't," said Harry, with a sort of laugh that was more like a series of painful hiccups. "But, you know ... a Marmon's a Marmon."

"Oh, I see," replied Maurice, taking hold of Harry's arm. "A Marmon's a Marmon, is it? Well, tell me, Mr Pakenow, just how many Marmons have you had the pleasure of owning?"

Harry tried to twist himself away, but Maurice wouldn't release him. At last Harry held still and admitted, "None, actually."

Maurice raised his head high and beamed. "None, the boy says. Well, how about a Packard, or a Stutz, or a Fierce-Arrow? None of those, either?"

"No," said Harry. "I've never owned a motor-car, as a matter of fact. I've never had the money."

"Well, that's a pity," said Maurice Peace. "I thought for a moment there, from what you said, that you were an expert on Marmons, and I was going to ask you to venture down to the hold with me and give me your considered opinion on what Mr. Beeney's stake was worth."

"You're really going to inspect it?" asked Harry.

"My dear boy, of course I'm going to inspect it. I'm going to give it the most thorough inspection that any automobile has ever been subject to. I'm going to jump up and down on the seats, to make the springs are intact. I'm going to poke about under the hood. I'm going to sniff the cognac in the cocktail cabinet. I'm going to fondle the leather to make sure that each seat came from the same herd of animals."

"The silver door handles were made by Buccellati, and the picnic basket was supplied by Abercrombie and Fitch," put in Mark. "I expect you want to check that all the teacups are intact."

"Of course," said Maurice, and then let out a short, staccato laugh. "Do you know something," he said, "I've always wanted a ritzy motorcar. Never in my life have I ever owned a really ritzy motorcar. I had a flivver a couple of years ago. I won it in a poker game in Elizabeth, New Jersey. But when the tyres wore out, I sold it to a pet-store owner in Queens for five dollars, to keep his hamsters in. A hamster hotel! I've never owned an automobile since."

"Well, now's your chance," said Mark. He extended his hand, and Maurice shook it. "I bet six hundred and thirty miles; what's your estimate?"

"Six hundred and thirty miles," beamed Maurice. "She'll never do it. I'll give you six ten."

"Are you really going to inspect the car?" asked Harry anxiously.

Maurice said, "Of course. I'm looking forward to it."

"I'm not sure that passengers are allowed to go down in the holds during the voyage," Harry told him.

"Oh, I'm sure I can find a way," Maurice told him. "Besides, what's it to you? Eat your celery and mind your own business."

Harry said, "Listen, Mr. Beeney here has accepted the bet without expecting to see any of your winnings in ready money. Why should you want to check out his car?"

"Because I'm a naturally suspicious man, my dear boy, and because I love to inhale the scent of pure luxury. There are certain aromas which every man must breathe in to his nostrils at least once during his lifetime if he wants to claim to St. Peter that he has lived at all. The smell of freshly casseroled partridge; the smell of a new pair of Gamba ballet shoes; the smell of morilles soaking hi hot water; the smell of Latakia tobacco snuff; the smell of the petticoats of a young girl the morning after her coming-out party."

Marcia couldn't help laughing. "You're quite a character, Mr. Peace, if you don't mind my saying so."

"My love, we are at sea," said Maurice. "And the enchantment of being at sea is that one may be exactly what one wishes to be. To sail in a luxury liner is a dream—a dream from which one will only awake when her prow nudges the pier."

Harry Pakenow was now very agitated. He knew that he was overreacting, but he was too intoxicated to be able to stop himself. His fear of Maurice Peace opening the trunk of Mark Beeney's Marmon and discovering his thirty sticks of dynamite took him like a kind of seizure, a spasm of panic that made him wince and tremble as if he had suddenly developed acute malaria. It was not that he was afraid of arrest. He was quite reconciled, and always had been, to the idea that he might have to serve a long jail sentence for what he was doing—or even be hung. Plenty of other young Marxists had been martyrs to the cause of overthrowing world capitalism—shot, electrocuted, and strangled by judicial ropes. Harry always used to say at his revolutionary meetings that every mink coat and every chinchilla beret was matted with the blood of America's young activists. No, what he was most afraid of was failure, of having to stand on board the Arcadia as she arrived in New York. He had already sent coded letters to all of his friends in America, warning them of the Arcadia's impending sabotage, and to have to face them and say that he had been foiled by a middle-aged gambler in a food-stained dinner jacket—well, that was unthinkable.

"Are you all right, Mr Pakenow?" asked Marcia kindly. "You've gone very pale."

"Too much champagne, that's the trouble," said Maurice. "Come on, my friend, sit down and put your head between your legs, and I'll have the steward bring you a strong cup of Bovril. Steward!"

"It's—quite—out—of—the—question—to—inspect," quavered Harry. His teeth chattered, and perspiration ran down the sides of his face. Maurice Peace ushered him over to a leather club chair, and pushed him gently into a sitting position.

"You'll be all right, old man. It's delayed shock, probably, from that gallant rescue of yours. Ah, steward. Will you bring this gentleman a cup of hot Bovril, please? He's feeling a little out of sorts."

Just then, like a dark cloud passing over the sun, George Welterman appeared, his forehead still bruised, his eyes as unpleasant in their aspect as a rained-off picnic. He was holding a large balloon glass of Denis Mounie cognac, which he swilled around and around in a hand. "Something wrong?" he asked Maurice, although his stare was reserved for Mark Beeney.

"Only a slight case of inexperience with the giggle water," said Maurice.

"You mustn't," Harry insisted. "You can't—"

"You mustn't?" inquired George. "Yon mustn't what?"

"He's spifflicated, that's all," said Maurice. "He's got this notion into his head that I mustn't look at Mr. Beeney's motorcar, and for some screwy reason it's got him all excited."

"Why should you want to look at Mr Beeney's motorcar?" George asked, swilling his brandy around.

"Because I'm going to win it, that's why," Maurice told him. "Mr. Beeney has bet that the Arcadia will cover six hundred and thirty nautical miles by tomorrow noon. I have bet him, in return, that she won't make better than six hundred and ten. If Mr. Beeney loses, he will have to give me his motorcar."

"Well, well. From what I hear, that's a very special piece of automobile. Didn't I read a piece about it in Popular Finance?

"And Collier's," put in Mark. "They ran a whole spread on it."

George Welterman took that remark as an invitation to step a little closer. He stood over Mark and Marcia for a moment or two, one hand in his pocket the other cupping his brandy glass, and as Maurice said later, "You could almost hear the snakes hissing in his brain."

"That sounds like a bet that I'd enjoy a share of," George said to Mark after a while. "In fact, there's nothing I'd like better than to take that automobile off your hands."

"What would you want with a twenty-five-thousand-dollar Marmon with silver handles?" Marcia asked him.

"Oh, nothing," smiled George. "But I'd take considerable pleasure in running it into a solid concrete wall."

"You know something," said Maurice, "you're a Philistine."

George ignored him. He sipped his cognac and watched Mark with those disturbing eyes of his, and said, "I'll bet that the Arcadia a manages more than six hundred and thirty miles. At least five miles more."

"That means she's going to have to average twenty-six and a half knots all the way," said Mark.

"She's easily capable of it," said George.

"Well, I don't think you stand much of a chance," commented Maurice.

"That's what the family doctor said when I was born. But I survived, and flourished."

"Is that what you call it?"

George couldn't resist a grin. He liked being insulted. It showed him that he was getting under people's skin. In a peculiar way, it was a substitute for being liked. If he couldn't be adorable, at least he could be irritating.

"What are you going to put up in return?" Maurice Peace wanted to know. "I've already staked five thousand pounds. It has to be something that makes your pips squeak."

George didn't take his eyes off Mark Beeney once. Even those passengers who hadn't caught the gist of their conversation could sense at once the cat's-fur charge of electricity that had been generated by their mutual dislike. Mark, to George, was everything for which he felt utter contempt in modern business: smooth, good-looking, image-conscious, nouveau riche. "Ballet dancers" was how he usually described young men like Mark. In return, Mark found George Welterman crass and insensitive and bullying. They would have hated each other even if they hadn't been rivals in business.

"Mr. Peace," said George, still watching Mark intently, "I don't really have anything to offer which would interest you, except money. So, if you win, I'll offer you five thousand pounds, to match your stake. Is that acceptable?"

"What if Mr. Beeney wins?"

"If Mr Beeney wins, I'll withdraw my offer for Keys Shipping; let them sink or swim, and give Mr Beeney the opportunity to buy up the Arcadia. That's what you want, isn't it, Mr Beeney?"

"Can you afford to do that?" Mark asked, narrowly. "What the hell will the people at IMM have to say if you withdraw?"

George said, "They'll just have to live with it, and so will I. But I'm not going to have to withdraw. As usual, I'm going to win."

"So you bet six hundred and thirty-five?" said Maurice, taking out the telltale stub of pencil that always identifies a gambler.

"Do we shake hands on it?" asked George.

Mark hesitated for a moment, and then held out his hand. "Mr. Welterman, I think you have yourself a bet."

Maurice glanced up from his notepad. He suddenly realised that this contest had very little to do with him at all. In the guise of a I wager, the two most powerful men on the Arcadia had at last faced up to each other in a silent, intent contest. There was him more than a motorcar or a business deal involved in this bet; there was masculine pride, ferocious honour, and reputation.

Maurice asked, "Are you coming down to the hold to inspect the automobile with me, Mr. Welterman?"

George thought about it, and then said, "No, I don't think that will be necessary. I know just how much attention and money Mr. Beeney has lavished on it: engine tuned by Wolf Barnato personally; upholstery hand-stitched in France. I read all about it in the magazines. Besides, I think I'd rather wait until I can sit behind the wheel and call it mine."

"Well... I guess you've got a point there," said Maurice. "No point in ogling it until its yours. Or mine, as the case may be."

Harry raised his spiky head and said in a bewildered voice, "You're not going to look it over?"

"I don't think so," Maurice told him. "We're going to wait until we've won it. We've only got twelve hours to wait before noon tomorrow, in any case. Then we'll know."

"Twelve hours," Harry repeated.

Maurice bent over him, his hands on his knees, and looked worriedly into his face. "Are you sure you're feeling all right, my dear boy? Maybe you should lie down."

But Harry shook his head and irritably pushed away the cup of Bovril that the steward had just brought him on a tray. Now, because of the ridiculous whims of these wealthy gamblers, he was faced with the prospect of setting off his bomb in mid-Atlantic or not at all. There was no choice left to him. The Arcadia was going a to have to go down in deep water, and that would mean that she would undoubtedly take hundreds of her passengers with her. His act of revolutionary war had been forced on him before he was ready, and he was going to have to carry it out almost at once, without hesitation and without mercy.

He took off his spectacles and blinked at the blur of faces and black and white dinner suits. He almost wished that he knew how to pray.