Risk

5

Monday night the boat was anchored somewhere, but it stopped after I got my supper and started again before Tuesday mid-morning. It rained most of the time, drumming on the hatch. I was glad of the respite from the engine but in general the misery level was a pain.

When he brought the morning food he fixed the hatch open. The extent of my relief was pathetic.

Shortly after, they stopped the engine and put up the sails, and the grey sky outside slowly cleared to blue.

I ate the hard boiled eggs and the apple and thought about the thick slice of bread, upon which, for the first time, he had given me butter. Then I pulled a button off my shirt to use as a scraper, and transferred as much of the butter as I could to the stubborn nuts and bolts on the flushing lever. Then I ate the bread. Then I sat on the floor and one after the other warmed the nuts with my hand in the hope that the butter and ham fat would melt into the screw threads.

After that I ripped a length of the rubberised waist band from my trousers, and fished out of the bottom of one of the sail bins the white net which I had stored there after the storms.

It was activity for activity’s sake, more than any real hope. I wound the waistband twice round the piston-rod nut, because it was the nearest, and fitted over that the chromium hook which had attached the net to the upper berth. Then I tugged the net.

After a second of gripping, the hook slid round on the cloth and fell off. I tried again, folding the waistband so that it had an elasticated side against the hook as well as against the nut. That time the hook stayed in place; but so did the nut.

I tugged several times. If I tugged very hard, hook, waistband and all came off. Nothing else happened. I slung the net back into the sail bin in depression.

After that I sat for ages with my hand on the piston-rod nut, until it was as warm as a handful of pennies clutched by a child. Then I wound the strip of waistband round quickly three times, to make the nut larger to grip, and then I tried it with all my remaining muscle power.

The waistband turned in my hand.

Damn it to hell, I thought hopelessly. I pulled it off and wound it on again, trying to grip it more tightly.

It turned again.

It may seem ridiculous, but it was not until it turned more easily the third time that I realised I was turning the nut on the bolt, not the waistband on the nut.

Unbelievable. I sat there looking idiotic, with my mouth open. Excitement fluttered in my throat like a stifled laugh. If I could get one off, what about the other?

Time hadn’t mattered for the first one. I’d had nothing else to do. For the second one, the hinge, I was feverishly impatient.

I warmed the nut, and wound on the waistband, and heaved; and nothing happened.

Heaved again.

A blob.

It had to move, I thought furiously. It simply had to. After several more useless attempts, I went back to basics.

Perhaps after all the tugging session with the hook had had some effect. I scooped out the net and applied it to the hinge nut, and tugged away with enthusiasm, replacing the hook every time it fell off. Then I made myself warm the nut as thoroughly as I had the other one, so that the heat from my hand was conducted right to the inside, where the melted grease and the minute heat-expansion of the metal could do their work. Then I wound on the waistband again and practically tore all the ligaments in my arm and back with a long and mighty heave.

And that time again, the waistband turned. That time again I couldn’t be sure until the third turn, when the nut started moving more freely, that I’d really done it.

I climbed up on the sail bin and squinted out at the free world. To the left all I could see was sky and a sparkle of sun on water. I turned my head to the right and nearly fell off my perch. To the right there was a sail, and shining below it, green and rocky and moderately close, there was land.

I thought that if he came along at that moment to shut the hatch I would perversely be grateful.

Only desperation made me do what I did next, because I was sure that if he caught me in mid-escape he’d tie my hands and leave me in the dark on starvation rations.

The risk that I wouldn’t get out unseen was appalling. My present conditions were just about bearable; my future afterwards wouldn’t be.

Yet if I hadn’t meant to risk it, why had I laboured so long on the nuts?

I went back to the loo and unscrewed the nuts completely. I knocked the bolts out, and pulled the whole lever free.

Without it, no one could flush the loo. I thought grimly that it would be an added complication if I found myself back in the cabin with it gone.

There was no sign of anyone on deck, and as usual I couldn’t see if the boat was on automatic steering or whether there was anyone at the helm.

Hesitation was only in my mind. Looking back, it seemed as if I did everything very fast.

I pulled the hinged props of the hatch down inside the cabin, which one would do in the normal way if one wanted to shut the hatch oneself from the inside. This had the effect of slackening the guy-rope action of the chains crossed over the top.

Through the much reduced gap, little more than a slit, I poked the lever, aiming at where a link of chain was hooked over the cleat.

Long hours of inspection had given me the impression that those chains had no other fastening. Putting a link over the hook of the cleat must have seemed safe enough, because they were certain I had no means of dislodging them. I stuck the lever into the chain on the right, wedged it securely, and pushed. With almost miraculous elegance the whole chain slid loosely outwards, and the link fell off the cleat.

Without pausing for anything but mental hip-hoorays I applied the lever again, this time to where the fore and aft chain was fastened on the bow side. Again, with no more fuss, the link slid off.

I was committed. I couldn’t get the chains back on again. I had to open the hatch now, and climb out. There was no retreat.

I took the lever with me as a last resort against recapture, putting it out first on to the deck. Then with both hands I released the hatch from the hinged props and pushed it wide. Eased it down gently until it lay flat, fearing to let it crash open and bring them running.

I snaked out onto the deck on my stomach. Rolled to the right, under the jib sail. Reached the railing, grabbed it with both hands, and bunny-hopped fast over the side, going down into the sea straight and feet first, like a pillar.

It wasn’t the safest way of disembarking, but I survived it, staying down under the surface until my lungs protested. Surfacing was one of the most anxious moments of my life, but when I cautiously lifted mouth, nose and eyes above the water, there was the boat a hundred yards away, steadily sailing on.

With a great intake of air I sank down again and began to swim underwater towards the shore; gently, so as to make no notice-attracting splash.

The water was chilly, but not as cold as I’d expected. The shore, when I came up again, looked about a mile away, though distances at sea were deceptive.

The boat sailed on peacefully. It must have had a name on it, I supposed, though in the flurry I hadn’t seen one. I wondered how long it would be before they found I had gone. Supper time, with luck.

The land ahead looked a most promising haven. To the left it was rocky, with grassy cliffs, but straight ahead lay a much greener part, with houses and hotels, and a strip of sand. Civilisation, hot baths, freedom and a razor. I swam towards them steadily, taking rests. A mile was a long way for a moderate swimmer, and I was nothing like as strong as I had been twelve days earlier.

I looked back at the boat. It had gone a good way along the coast: growing smaller.

The big mainsail was sagging down the mast.

God, I thought, my heart lurching, if they’re taking down the sails they’ll see the open hatch.

Time had run out. They knew I had gone.

I ploughed for the shore until I felt dizzy with the effort. Swam until I had grey dots before the eyes and even greyer dots in the mind.

I wasn’t going back into that dark hole. I absolutely couldn’t.

When I next looked back all the sails were down and the boat was turning.

The hotels ahead were in a sandy bay. Two big hotels, white, with rows of balconies, and a lot of smaller buildings all around. There were some people on the beach, and four or five standing in the water.

Five hundred yards, perhaps.

It would take me years to swim five hundred yards.

I pushed my absolutely useless muscles into frantic efforts. If I could only reach the other bathers, I would be just one more head.

The boat had not been travelling very fast under sail. They would motor back faster. I feared to look round; to see them close. My imagination heard him shouting and pointing, and steering the boat to intercept me, felt them grabbing me with boathooks and pulling me in. When in the end I did nerve myself for a look, it was bad enough, but still too far to distinguish anyone clearly.

Next time I looked, it was alarming. They were catching up like hares. The nearest point of land was still about three hundred yards away, and it was uneven rock, not easy shelving beach. The sand lay in the centre of the bay: the curving arms were shallow cliffs. I would never reach the sand, I thought.

And yet... sailing boats had deep keels. They wouldn’t be able to motor right up to the beach. Perhaps, after all, I could get there.

I had never felt so tired, so leaden. The hardest steeplechase had never demolished me so completely, even those I’d lost from being unfit. My progress through the water grew slower and slower, when speed was all that mattered. In the end it took me all my time to stay afloat.

There was a current, which I hadn’t noticed at first, carrying me to the left, drifting me off my line to the beach. Nothing fierce; but simply sapping. I hadn’t enough kick left to overcome it.

Another look back.

Literally terrifying. I could see him on deck, standing in the bows, shading his eyes with his hand. He had come back on a course closer to the shore than when I’d jumped, and it was the shoreline he seemed to be scouring most closely.

I swam on with feeble futile strokes. I could see that I was not going to reach the sand. The current was taking me inexorably towards the higher left hand side of the bay, where there were trees to within ten feet of the waterline, and rocks below the trees.

When I’d got to the numb stage of thinking drowning would be preferable to recapture, and doubting if one could drown oneself in cold blood, I found suddenly that I could no longer see for miles along the coast. I had at last got within the embracing arms of the bay. When I looked back, I couldn’t see the boat.

It didn’t stay out of sight long. It crept along in a straight line until it reached the centre of the bay, and there dropped anchor. I watched it in sick glimpses over my shoulder. Saw them unbuckle a black rubber dinghy and lower it over the side. Caught an impression of them lowering an outboard engine, and oars, and of two of them climbing down into the boat.

I heard the outboard splutter into life. Only about thirty feet to go to touch the land. It seemed like thirty miles.

There was a man-made strip of concrete set into the rocks ahead of me at the water’s edge. I glanced along the shore towards the beach, and saw that there were others. Aids to bathers. The most heartening aid in the world to the bather approaching at snail’s pace with the hounds of hell at his back.

The dinghy pulled away from the anchored boat and pointed its bulky black shape towards the shore.

I reached the strip of concrete. It was a flat step, set only inches above the water.

No grips for hauling oneself out. Just a step. I put one hand flat on it and raised a foot to it, and used jelly muscles to flounder up onto my stomach.

Not enough. Not enough. The dinghy would come while I was lying there.

My heart was pounding. Effort and fear in equal measures. Utter desperation took me to hands and knees and set me crawling up the rocks to find shelter.

Ordinarily it would have been easy. It was a gentle shore, undemanding. A child could have jumped where I laboured. I climbed up about six feet of tumbled rocks and found a shallow gully, half full of water. I rolled into the hollow and lay there panting, hopelessly exhausted, listening to the outboard engine grow steadily louder.

They must have seen me, I thought despairingly. Seen me climbing up out of the sea. Yet if I’d stayed at the water’s edge they would have found me just as surely. I lay in defeated misery and wondered how on earth I could live through whatever was coming.

The dinghy approached. I kept my head down. They were going to have to come and find me and carry me, and if I could raise enough breath I’d yell until some of the people on the beach took notice, except that they were far enough away to think it was all a game.

The engine died and I heard his voice, raised but not exactly shouting.

He said, ‘Excuse me, but have you seen a friend of ours swim in from the sea? We think he fell overboard.’

A woman’s voice answered him, from so close to me that I almost fainted.

‘No, I haven’t seen anybody.’

He said, ‘He takes drugs. He might have been acting funny.’

‘Serves him right, then,’ she said, sanctimoniously. ‘I’ve been reading. I haven’t seen him. Have you come from that boat?’

‘That’s right. We think he fell overboard about here. We heard a splash, but we thought it was just a fish. Till after.’

‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Why don’t you ask along the beach?’

‘Just starting this side,’ he said. ‘We’ll work round.’

There was a noise of oars being fitted into rowlocks, and the splash and squeak as they pulled away. I stayed where I was without moving, hoping she wouldn’t have hysterics when she saw me, dreading that she would call them back.

I could hear him, away along the shore, loudly asking the same question of someone else.

Her voice said, ‘Don’t be frightened. I know you’re there.’

I didn’t answer her. She’d taken away what was left of my breath.

After a pause she said, ‘Do you take drugs?’

‘No,’ I said. It was little more than a whisper.

‘What did you say?’

‘No.’

‘Hm. Well, you’d better not move. They’re methodical. I think I’ll go on reading.’

Incredulously, I took her advice, lying half in and half out of the water, feeling heart and lungs subside slowly to a more manageable rhythm.

‘They’ve landed on the beach,’ she said.

My heart stirred up again. ‘Are they searching?’ I said anxiously.

‘No. Asking questions, I should think.’ She paused. ‘Are they criminals?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘But... would they take you from here by force? With people watching?’

‘Yes. You heard them. If I shouted for help, they’d say I was crazy with drugs. No one would stop them.’

‘They’re walking round the far side of the bay,’ she said. ‘Asking people.’

‘My name is Roland Britten,’ I said. ‘I live in Newbury, and I’m an accountant. I was kidnapped twelve days ago, and they’ve kept me on that boat ever since, and I don’t know why. So please, whoever you are, if they do manage to get me back there, will you tell the police? I really do most desperately need help.’

There was a short silence. I thought that I must have overdone it; that she didn’t believe me. Yet I’d had to tell her, as a precaution.

She apparently made up her mind. ‘Well then,’ she said briskly, ‘time for you to vanish.’

‘Where to?’

‘My bedroom,’ she said.

She was a great one for punches in the mental solar plexus. In spite of the grimness of things in general, I almost laughed.

‘Can you see me?’ I said.

‘I can see your feet. I saw all of you when you climbed out of the sea and scrambled up here.’

‘And how do I get to your bedroom dressed in a wet shirt and underpants and nothing else?’

‘Do you want to avoid those men, or don’t you?’

There was no answer to that.

‘Stay still,’ she said sharply, though I had not in fact moved. ‘They’re looking this way. Someone over there seems to be pointing in this direction.’

‘Oh God.’

‘Stay still.’ There was a longish pause, then she said, ‘They are walking back along the beach, towards their boat. If they don’t stop there, but come on this way, we will go.’

I waited dumbly, and more or less prayed.

‘There’s a path above us,’ she said. ‘I will hand you a towel. Wrap it round you, and climb up to the path.’

‘Are they coming?’

‘Yes.’

A triangle of brightly striped bathing towel appeared over the rock by my head. There was little I’d ever wanted to do less than stand up out of my insecure hiding place. My nerves were all against it.

‘Hurry up,’ she said. ‘Don’t look back.’

I stood up, dripping, with my back to the sea. Pulled the towel towards me, wrapped it round like a sarong, and tackled the rocky upgrade to the path. The respite in the gully had given me back a surprising amount of energy: or perhaps it was plain fear. In any case I climbed the second stage a great deal more nimbly than the first.

‘I’m behind you,’ her voice said. ‘Don’t look back. Turn right when you reach the path. And don’t run.’

‘Yes ma’am,’ I said under my breath. Never argue with a guardian angel.

The path was fringed on both sides with trees, with a mixture of sand and bare rock underfoot. The sunshine dappled through the branches and at any other time would have looked pretty.

When the path widened she fell into step beside me, between me and the sea.

‘Take the branch path to the left,’ she said, drawing level. ‘And don’t walk too fast.’

I glanced at her, curious to see what she looked like. She matched her voice: a no-nonsense middle-aged lady with spectacles and a practical air. Self-confident. Tall: almost six feet. Thin, and far from a beauty.

She was wearing a pale pink blouse, fawn cotton trousers, and sandshoes, and she carried a capacious canvas beach bag.

Beach. Swimming. In March.

‘Where is this place?’ I said.

‘Cala St Galdana.’

‘Where’s that?’

‘Minorca, of course.’

‘Where?’

‘Don’t stop walking. Minorca.’

‘Island next to Majorca?’

‘Of course.’ She paused. ‘Didn’t you know?’

I shook my head. The branch path reached the top of a shallow gradient and began to descend through more trees on the far side.

She peered to the right as we went over the brow.

‘Those men are just coming along the lower path, heading towards where I was sitting. I think it would be a good idea to hurry a little now, don’t you?’

‘Understatement,’ I said.

Hurrying meant stubbing my bare toes on various half-buried stones and feeling the dismal weakness again make rubber of my legs.

‘While they are looking for you on the rocks, we will reach my hotel,’ she said.

I shuffled along and saved my breath. Glanced over my shoulder. Only empty path. No pursuing furies. So why did I feel that they could see through earth and trees and know exactly where to find me?

‘Over that little bridge, and across the road. Over there.’ She pointed. ‘That’s the hotel.’

It was one of the two big white ones. We reached the wide glass doors and went inside. Made it unchallenged across the hall and into the lift. Rose to the fifth floor. She scooped some keys out of her beach bag, and let us in to 507.

We had seen almost nobody on the way. Still enough warm sun for holidaymakers to be out on the beach and for the staff to be sleeping.

507 had a sea-view balcony, twin beds, two armchairs, a yellow carpet, and orange and brown curtains. Regulation hotel room, with almost none of my saviour’s belongings in sight.

She walked over to the glass door, which was open wide, and half stepped onto the balcony.

‘Do you want to watch?’ she said.

I looked cautiously over her shoulder. From that height one could see the whole panorama of the bay. There was the boat, anchored in the centre. There was the dinghy on the sand. The headland where I’d crawled out of the sea was to the right, the path leading to it from the beach showing clearly through the trees like a dappled yellow snake.

Along the path came the two men, my familiar warder in front, making for the sand. They trudged slowly across to the dinghy, still looking continually around, and pushed it into the sea.

They both climbed in. They started the outboard. They steered away from the beach.

I felt utterly drained.

‘Do you mind if I sit down?’ I said.