Southtrap

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

I obeyed — fast. I took a minute to reach the day cabin, which was situated a deck lower.

Wegger jostled me in.

Linn stood defiantly at her father's desk. Her head was thrown back. She hadn't had the time to use the desk phone, if that had been her intention.

Wegger kicked the door shut and waved me to join her.

That was a very stupid thing to do, Miss Prestrud,' he remarked. 'Next time you might not be so lucky.'

'I'm not afraid of cheap threats,' she retorted.

'Shotton — get on that phone to the bridge,' Wegger said brusquely. 'Full speed ahead.'

I feared again for Botany Bay when I asked, 'Course?'

'Same course.'

Petersen answered my call. There was nothing about his reaction to indicate that he knew anything of what had taken place in the saloon.

'Mr Petersen,' I said. 'Full ahead, please.'

'Aye, aye, sir.'

I put down the instrument. 'Wegger,' I said. 'You won't get away with this. Where do you think you're going to run to in Antarctica? There aren't any ports. There's nowhere to hole up…'

He seemed amused. 'I know. You don't have to tell me.'

There was still something else imperative that I had to know.

'What about the buoy launch tomorrow?'

The hell with the launch,' he replied. 'I couldn't care less about the bloody GARP programme or whatever its name is.'

He had played me an ace with this reply. 'Fine. No launch then. No satellite trackings. No buoy or balloon positions. When that happens, a general alert will go out. The world weather spotlight is on this ship. After ten o'clock tomorrow morning the Quest will be the most sought-after ship in the Seven Seas.'

'You could be right,' he answered to my astonishment. I hadn't any idea how his mind was working; we were on different wave-lengths.

Linn interrupted, This was my father's ship. It's mine now. I'll use it any way I can to see you answer for what you did to him and the others.'

The lightning blazed in Wegger's eyes. 'They were bastards, all three of them. They got what they deserved.'

'You know as well as I do that the radio black-out won't last more than another couple of days,' I persisted. 'As soon as we're missed the search will be on. The Weather Bureau knows our expected daily position precisely.'

Linn added, 'We're also due to land the three met. men on Marion Island. The radio station there will be monitoring us round the clock from the launch-time tomorrow.'

Wegger said, completely out of the blue, 'I need people around me with guts. Shotton, how would you lose a ship in these parts if you had to? This ship in particular?'

The question and his changed tone took me wholly aback. 'The question's purely academic as far as I am concerned.'

He eyed me. 'I wonder.'

'What are you driving at, Wegger?'

'Nothing can get round the fact that you've killed four men,' Linn said hotly.

'I wonder,' he repeated.

'Say what's in your mind, Wegger,' I told him. 'You didn't bring us here to listen to riddles.'

'I would rather have discussed it with you alone, Shotton,' he answered. 'But the girl's thrust herself on us. If that's the way she wants it, fine. It means she'll have to pay the price also, if necessary.'

'You can't scare me,' rejoined Linn. 'I'm ready to pay any price to see you brought to book.'

'Fine words,' he sneered. 'Words are cheap. Deeds could be worth ten million dollars.'

'I don't know what you're talking about,' she replied.

'Your father did,' retorted Wegger. 'That's what this cruise is all about.'

It was Linn's turn to look puzzled. 'Ten million dollars? This cruise? I don't know what you mean.'

Wegger looked penetratingly from her to me. 'What did Prestrud and Jacobsen tell you about the capture of the whaling fleet?' he demanded.

'Little enough,' I answered truthfully. 'Captain Prestrud gave me his account when he was dying. It was incoherent. Jacobsen filled me out, but he became cagey when it came to Prince Edward Island and the details of the escape.'

Wegger said in a carefully controlled voice, The capture of the whaling fleet took place in January 1941 but the story goes back a lot further than that. Goebbels' propaganda blew up the capture until every angle was sucked dry.It was a great single-handed feat all the same, and Kruder was the man to carry it out. The bag was eleven catchers and two factory ships filled with whale oil. We — ' I did not miss his use of 'we' for the Nazis — 'were desperately short of oil at that time. Kruder was a hero in Germany. He was awarded the Iron Cross.'

He began to speak rapidly. 'The whaling fleet was important enough for the German Naval High Command to position the pocket battleship, Admiral Scheer, only six hundred miles from Kruder as a backup if needed. In the event she wasn't as you know.'

I interrupted him. 'Kruder knew the whaling fleet's rendezvous. You were responsible, Wegger. You sold your own country's secret warship, the Teddy, down the river.'

'It was war,' he shrugged. 'What does that matter now?'

'What does it matter now?' I echoed.

Linn sat down at the desk. The vibration of the Quest's engines at full revolution-plus rattled the fitments.

'You gave me a shock when you pulled out Teddy's chart,' said Wegger. 'However, it only told me what I already knew, that Prestrud was not on a pleasure cruise to Prince Edward Island.'

'It was my father's dream,' Linn said vehemently. 'He talked about it for years. He saved and bought his own ship especially to go to Prince Edward.'

'So would I have, if I hadn't been in gaol,' he retorted. 'So would I, for the sake of ten million dollars.'

'Go on,' I said, watching all the time for an opportunity to jump him.

'I was one of three radio operators in Pinguin,' he went on. 'I handled the confidential signals from OKM — German Naval High Command — to Kruder. Would it surprise you to know that the whaling fleet was only the raider's secondary objective? That the pocket battleship had sealed orders to stand by because… because…'

He stumbled, as if he couldn't bear to part with the secret.

Then he said, 'I will tell you. When Germany attacked Poland at the beginning of the war the Free City of Danzig, which was the real reason for the Allies' intervention — they had guaranteed its status — sent its entire gold holding to the United States for safe-keeping. It was in gold ingots — ten million dollars' worth. That was what Pinguin and the Admiral Scheer were after, not the whaling fleet.'

His disclosure had Linn sitting bolt upright in her chair.

The Danzig authorities consigned it via Narvik,' he went on. 'The gold was in Narvik when we Nazis attacked the port. The Norwegians escaped with it in their whaling fleet. That is why OKM despatched Kruder into the Antarctic after the fleet, and into the bargain was willing to risk a pocket battleship. At that time Germany was desperately short of foreign exchange in the form of gold. Ten million dollars of it would have been a godsend.'

'How do you know all this, Wegger?'

'I saw it,' he answered simply. 'I lived with it for eight months. In the great cave on Prince Edward. Gold ingots. Ten million in gold. In a torpedo casing.'

'A torpedo casing!'

'Prestrud, Torgersen and Jacobsen took the torpedo with them when they escaped,' he continued in a strained voice. 'They were very daring. Prestrud towed the torpedo clean past Kruder. Jacobsen and Torgersen shielded his flanks with their catchers so that the raider wouldn't spot it. I heard them talking about it when I came round and they had got clear.'

Linn and I stared at him.

He went on matter-of-factly, 'The Free Norwegians had hidden the gold in a German torpedo casing during the attack on Narvik — no one would have looked twice at a stray torpedo casing in all the confusion. They had it rigged in the slip of one of the factory ships. All they had to do was to knock out a shackle and it slid into the water of its own accord. That's how Prestrud got it and towed it away. The plan had all been carefully worked out beforehand. It worked — except for me.'

'You're imagining things, Wegger,' I said. 'Prince Edward must have blown your mind. If those three skippers had wanted to stash the gold away the last thing they would have done was to have left you there with their secret.'

They meant me to die!' he burst out. "They meant me to die, don't you understand! They never thought I'd survive and be rescued! It was cleaner than shooting me!'

'So you told the British cruiser about the gold and everyone lived happily ever after!' I retorted derisively.

The cruiser's boat never landed — I told you that!' He started to shout. Then he got a grip of himself and said more quietly, "The gold is still there. On Prince Edward. In the great cave. Deep. That's why I had to stop Holdgate. No one has ever been deep inside it, except me. That's the reason why Prestrud organized this cruise. It was a cover. He intended to lift the gold — my gold, you hear! My gold! I lived with it, nearly went out of my mind watching over it, month after month…'

There was no such thought in my father's mind,' Linn said coldly. 'I know. If there had been any truth in this yarn of yours he would have gone straight to the authorities and told them. He was that sort of man. He wouldn't have wanted it for himself.'

Wegger laughed harshly, sceptically. 'Every man has his price — ten million dollars!'

'Wegger,' I said, 'I think we all need a drink.'

He waved me to the cabinet with the Luger and stepped well back to keep it aimed on me. 'Right. But no tricks, Shotton.'

There's no gun hidden amongst the bottles,' I said sarcastically.

I poured three brandies and handed them round.

Wegger wouldn't let me come close. He made me put his drink on the desk where I couldn't reach him.

He took a long pull at it and then said breathily, 'Shotton, we can do a deal. If you will take this ship to Prince Edward and lift the gold, I'll cut you in to the tune of one million dollars. In gold bars. No questions asked.'

'In a ship that the whole world's looking for? Be your age, Wegger.'

'It's easy,' he went on quickly. 'You don't have to do anything but agree. We can go ahead with launching the buoy after we've rescued Botany Bay's crew. Everything will then be according to schedule and no suspicions roused. Then we can push on to Prince Edward. We'll use the motor-launch to transport the gold from the cave to the Quest. Then we'll go on to Mauritius…'

'Mauritius? That's a new one.'

'Yes, Mauritius,' he went on excitedly. 'See here — since the island became independent it's become the fag-end for things the rest of the world doesn't consider respectable. Black market gold, for instance. Gold — no questions asked.'

I shrugged.

'I tell you, it's true!' His voice rose. 'Mauritius is the Indian Ocean terminal of the gold-smuggling pipeline. The centre is Dubai, in the Persian Gulf. Dubai will handle any amount of hot gold. The dhows take it to India, Hong Kong, anywhere. At a premium.'

I allowed a little false admiration to creep into my reply in order to extract more from him.

'You seem to have done your homework pretty well, Wegger.'

'Listen, Shotton, you don't have to get involved. You only have to stay not involved — get me? Your ship has been hijacked. The guns are on you. You only have to string along with me and not interfere.'

I sensed Linn's tension.

'For a million dollars? What rake-off do those two thugs with machine-pistols get?'

'A million each,' he replied, too readily. 'It's share and share alike.'

'And you get the lion's share.'

'I've taken the risks. It's my plan.'

'You want me to sail the Quest to Mauritius once the gold's aboard — for what reason? Everybody aboard knows the hijacking score. It won't wash.'

'You could have developed engine trouble — any sort of eyewash. Even that you're sailing under threat of death if you don't go.'

'And in Mauritius I simply allow you to climb overboard with your load of gold and disappear? What do you take me for?'

'You don't have to go into port if you don't want to,' he explained. 'You drop Ullmann and Bravold and me off out at sea in the motor-launch once we're within reach of Mauritius. We'd disappear. Your nose would be clean. You could go ahead then and report the hijacking like an innocent victim. You'd have a million dollars — in that safe there behind you.'

I kept stringing him along. 'It could be feasible.'

'John!' Linn's protest was agonized. 'John! You wouldn't…!'

'Let him finish. How would you expect to get away with it?' I asked Wegger further.

'I know whom to contact. Ten million in solid gold can buy anything.'

'Less three,' I said. 'Remember — one million for me, one for Ullmann, one for Bravold.'

He stood considering me for a long moment. Then he dropped the Luger's muzzle. 'You'll go along with me then, Shotton?'

'John!' exclaimed Lino. 'John!'

I said deliberately, 'Wegger, you can go and stick yourself and your plan and your million dollars up the Quest's sewerage outlets. I'll turn you in, whatever.'

The gun came up again and he pointed it at my head.

'You fool, Shotton! You blundering, do-gooder fool! It could have been so easy for you. You know too much now. The girl too. Your usefulness ends once we've lifted the gold at Prince Edward. Don't say I didn't give you the chance!'

Linn put her arm hard in mine. It was worth more than ten million dollars.

I said with more bravado than I felt, 'If this story of yours is true, Captain Prestrud would — as Linn says — have turned the gold over to the proper authorities years ago.'

'Proper authorities — bullshit!' he exploded. 'Whose gold is it anyway? It wasn't Prestrud's any more than it was mine to begin with! And where is the Free City of Danzig today? It doesn't even exist. The Russians swallowed it up when they took over Poland. It was ten million dollars' worth of gold floating around without an owner. Prestrud meant to lift it, I tell you! That's what this cruise is all about! Erebus and Terror! My oath! What a cover story! And everyone fell for it, except me, who knew! Why do you think he was so keen on having Jacobsen along? They were both in it, up to the hawsehole! Now you're playing along because you think you'll get his daughter! You won't, I say! You won't live to see the end of this bloody Erebus-Terror cruise, I promise you that!'

Think, Wegger,' I snapped. 'I'll grant you the gold story just for the sake of the argument. So Prestrud and Jacobsen waited all those years just so that Prestrud could save up and buy a ship and fake a cruise when there was ten million dollars for the taking…'

'He needed a ship!' Wegger was losing control over his voice. They needed a ship to do it! They wouldn't share their secret…'

'Ten million dollars — belonging to no one in particular.' I went on sarcastically. They could have bought a dozen ships after the war for that! There were plenty of enterprising gentlemen around at the time who would have been only too willing to give them a ship. For that matter, why the hell didn't you try for it?'

'I was in gaol — I told you.'

'You've been out of gaol for years,' I rejoined. 'You've had plenty of time yourself. Why didn't you try for a ship without waiting until the Quest came along?'

His voice was sour with anger and frustration. 'The whaling went bust in the Southern Ocean after the mid-sixties. The catchers didn't go South any more.'

'You could have picked up a laid-up catcher for a song in Cape Town or Durban any time during the past decade.'

'You've never been in gaol,' he got out. 'You've never…'

'Never killed a man, Wegger?'

I thought he was going to come at me with the Luger. He'd reversed it almost involuntarily in his grip and had it by the barrel. I decided to dodge and try a swing at him with the brandy bottle if he did.

But instead he said threateningly, 'There are still a couple of things I need you for, Shotton. But I warn you, try anything on, you or the girl…'

As if to reinforce his threat, he strode across to the desk and plucked the phone out by its wire and threw it down. Then he went to the door and jammed the key savagely into the outer lock.

'I'll come back for you when I've tidied up in the saloon. Then you'll come with me to the bridge and tell 'em I've taken over. That we're headed for…'

'There's no place to hide down here, Wegger — remember that.'

'No?' he replied with a sneer. 'I'll teach you how to hide a ship in the Southern Ocean.'