A Bridge of Magpies

'No fishing is permitted here. There's a strict twelve-mile offshore limit'

Maybe I pulled my authority too hard, out of reaction over the crack about Jutta.

'So?'

'That's the law.'

'So? And you carry out the law?'

'If necessary. I'm the island headman. These waters fall under my authority.'

'You come aboard my ship with a gun and threaten me, eh?'

'I'm not threatening: just getting the record straight. There's no problem-provided you don't fish.'

'The record is straight then. Good morning!'

'If you don't know the law, you should.'

'Now I know it.'

'Good. Another thing. There's been a death on the island. One of my men..

I left out the details and purposely made Breekbout's end sound more like an accident. I wanted to hear what they had to say before I started talking about murder.

Kenryo cut me short. 'None of our men has been ashore. Sang A isn't in a hot seat'

'J didn't say you were. I'm investigating. I was away when it happened. It could be something more than an accident.'

Their faces remained blank.

'J'm also looking for a colleague of mine who seems to have disappeared: Dr Koch.'

'Never heard of him. We saw no one.' Kenryo's eyes were black and beady.

'Didn't you see the whaleboat being ferried around?' 'There was the storm. You couldn't see much. If he used the boat in the gale maybe he drowned.'

'The boat's safe at the island.'

'Then he didn't drown.'

This sort of thing was getting me nowhere. The ball was back in my court-if I'd ever managed to get it into theirs.

'Fair enough. This becomes a police matter, of course.'

They shrugged as if they realized, as I did, just how much that meant on the Sperrgebiet! There was nothing else to do but leave. We headed back to our boat. The group of plug-uglies, who had been standing chinning between themselves, fell silent; I'd get no more change out of their sullen faces than I had out of the officers.

We pushed off. I took the oars because I wanted to test my side. It was one of Possession's rare beautiful days: birds trailed over the anchorage like a king-sized paper-chase, fishtailing down after the shoals in the water. I hadn't much inclination to admire: I was smarting inwardly at the way my show of authority had fallen flat on its face on Sang A's deck.

'Captain Weddell!' Kaptein Denny was straining and peering at the land. 'It's the Land-Rover!'

Before I could turn to look, Junta exclaimed. 'There's been a fire.'

I looked. 'Not a fire. A conflagration?

The blackened skeleton of the vehicle stood out clearly against the champagne-coloured sand.

'No sign of Dr Koch,' Kaptein Denny observed.

`We'll soon check. Help me with the oars. We'll take the boat in.'

'It would be a mistake.'

'Mistake! Koch could be lying there…'

'Keep your voice down! They'll hear you aboard Sang A.' '

Well, say it, for pity's sake!'

'If Sang A wanted to fix us by taking a crack at our cutters while we're ashore, we'd be playing right into their hands by going there now.'

I eyed him with a new respect. The more so when I noted that Sang A's hoodlums were still lining the rails-watching us. 'What do you suggest?'

'We'll go ashore all right but we'll use both cutters for the trip.'

'It'll look pretty silly towing each other across such a small stretch of water.'

'It'll be sillier still if we should lose them. Without boats we'd be hamstrung.'

'Right.'

'Jt will also be a subtle demonstration of no confidence in our new neighbours.'

Jutte never stopped looking at the burnt-out vehicle. She was very withdrawn.

When we reached the cutters-Kaptein Denny took Ichabo in tow and made as wide a detour of Sang A as possible. The water was deep off the landing beach and we anchored close in. From our position a sandhill barred further view of the Land-Rover.

I took the rifle and made as much show of it as I could, for the benefit of Sang A. I was sure every move of ours was being watched through binoculars.

We landed. When we obtained our first clear sight of the vehicle I ordered Jutta to stay right where she was. It looked like a charred tree-trunk behind the wheel(

It was Koch.

I didn't feel the same revulsion for his remains as I had done for Breekbout's. Maybe the earlier shock had conditioned or numbed my reactions. It was only a faceless, blackened outline, really. We'd also come haJf-prepared for tragedy.

Kaptein Denny and I fanned out to approach the LandRover from both sides, J with the rifle cocked. As I walked cautiously through the sand I had a curious impression-one of those ready-made pictures the mind throws up in times of stress-that I'd seen it all before. It was coupled with the foreboding of a pattern of future tragedy, into which these two deaths were inexorably grooved.

I reached the driver's side of the Land-Rover at the same moment as Kaptein Denny got to the other.

'All clear!'

He straightened from the half-crouch he'd gone into when he'd circled round, and put away his knife.

'Look at this!'

The steel fascia was blackened and buckled. The bonnet was also starred with glass fragments from the windscreen. 'An explosion did this,' he said.

I tried not to give way to my doubts and suspicions before testing all the every-day possibilities.

'Of course it did. The tank went up. It's right behind the driver's seat?

'Jf it had, the force of it would have thrown him forward and out.'

'Some sort of freak accident.'

'It wasn't an accident. Come over to my side and see. His left leg's gone.'

I went round and joined him.

'Someone sneaked up aJongside and threw something next to him on the floor.'

'Something?'

'Grenade. That would account for all the buckling and glass out front.'

Bastards…l' I began and then took hold of myself: cursing wasn't going to help. 'This was done days ago.'

'Seker – for sure. The gale swept away the footprints. You couldn't prove anything against anyone now.'

'Except the grenade.'

'The trail's already cold. By the time the experts sort that one out it'll be in deep freeze. And Sang A will be over the horizon.'

'She's not bloody well going over any horizon! I'm going right back on board

'A lot of men have died in unexplained ways on the Sperrgebiet, Captain Weddell. You don't want to be among them.'

Our eyes locked. I felt instinctlvely he'd not had anything to do with the killings.

'Thanks,' J said. 'I needed that reminder. Now let's do something about Koch.'

'I've got some spare canvas aboard Gaok? We went to Jutta, who had been waiting behind the sandhill-and told her what had happened.

'Why?' she burst out. 'Why kill him? Why kill Breekbout? They didn't have any secrets worth murdering them for…'

She caught my warning glance and remembered the lost city and that Kaptein Denny didn't know about it. What did he know, though? He'd now moved right out of my area of suspicion and was firmly aligned with us against Sang A. That was merely the end of the negative aspect, however: he'd done nothing positive yet to win my confidence. And he often indulged in a mannerism which, from my point of view, wasn't at all positive: a nick of quartering the anchorage 117 as if he expected to lee something there. His quick survey always began down by the Bridge of Magpies and worked its way up-channel. His eyesight was so phenomenal that I was sure he'd spot anything long before Jutta or L

'I'll fetch that canvas.'

Kaptein Denny went off in the dinghy, leaving Jutta and me.

'Keep out of sight of Sang A-' I warned.

'The fact that they're a lot of weirdies doesn't turn them into murderers, Struan.'