She nodded. “Roger.”
He took the automatic out of his belt and put it on the seat beside her. “You know how to operate the safety on this?”
“No. I don’t know anything about guns at all.”
He showed her. “That’s all there is to it, besides pulling the trigger. If Morrison should make it out here and get aboard, kill him. None of this TV routine of pointing it at him and trying to impress him. Put it in the middle of his chest and empty the clip.”
She looked apprehensive. “I think I get the message. All this is just in case you don’t come back? Is this anchor really necessary?”
“Absolutely. But there’s no danger. I’m just covering all bases.”
“All right. Anything else?”
“That’s all, except looking the other way till I get in the water.”
She turned away while he stripped down to his shorts and dropped over the side with the mask. Adjusting the latter, he went under. Some of the boxes he had thrown overboard were piled up almost to the surface under the schooner’s side. He pulled them down so the schooner wouldn’t fall over against them on the next low tide in the event they didn’t get off this time. There was no hull damage, at least on this side. Her keel was stuck in the bottom—just how far, he couldn’t be sure. A lot would depend on what kind of tide they got this time. He surfaced for another breath, and Rae Osborne was leaning across the deck looking down at him. “Be careful,” she said. He nodded, went under, and picked up the anchor.
It was still heavy, even submerged, but the weight held his feet firmly against the bottom so he had no difficulty walking. He noted with satisfaction that the water was slightly deeper astern; once they got her back as far as twelve or fifteen feet, they’d have it made. He walked bent over and leaning forward to cut down the water’s resistance. He turned and looked back. The water was as transparent as air; he was going straight, and the line was paying out beautifully. He was about thirty feet past the stern now. Dropping the anchor, but holding a bight of the line in his hand, he let himself rise until his face broke the surface, took a quick breath, and pulled down against the weight of the anchor and its chain. He picked it up and went on.
The bottom so far was all sand, with patches of grass. There were numbers of conchs scattered about in the grass, and once he saw a leopard ray and a small barracuda. The current was beginning to bother him now as he got more line out. The schooner was fading out behind him, and it was harder to keep in a straight line. He surfaced again.
Nothing happened. Morrison still hadn’t seen him. The bottom sloped downward. He was going down into the channel, in water ten to twelve feet deep. Just before the schooner disappeared completely behind him, he picked out an isolated clump of grass ahead for a landmark. The going was harder now; it was backbreaking work pulling the line. He surfaced again, and just as he sucked in his breath and went under, something exploded against the water off to his left like the slap of a canoe paddle. He felt a little chill of apprehension. Morrison had located him at last.
The next time he surfaced, the explosion was nearer, and the third time he barely had his head under when the bullet struck and ricocheted off the surface so close to him he could feel the impact in the water. Nobody could sight and shoot that fast; Morrison was tracking him. He had his course figured out, and how far he was going each time, and was waiting. Well, he could solve that. He picked up the anchor, but this time, instead of plowing on until he was out of breath, he stopped after three steps and began pulling the line toward him and gathering it in coils. When he surfaced, he was twenty feet short of where Morrison was expecting him. When he went down again he was able to make a fast thirty feet with the coiled slack line he had. Both times, the shots were wide.
But he was beginning to be afraid now. He wasn’t getting enough oxygen for the tremendous exertion of pulling that anchor warp across the tide, and carbon dioxide was accumulating to dangerous levels in his body. Those hurried gulps of air weren’t enough; he had to stay longer on the surface, or drown. Then, suddenly, he could get no slack at all. He’d come out to the end. He took another breath, heard the bullet strike somewhere beyond him, and worked the anchor back and forth, digging its fluke into the bottom. He started back, going very fast now, pulling himself hand over hand along the warp. When he came up for air, Morrison wasn’t expecting him in this direction, and there was no shot. He had to surface once more on the way back, and then he could see the schooner’s stern ahead of him. Just as he was about to black out completely he came up under her side and lay on the surface too weak to move as he held onto the line and drank in air in long, shuddering breaths.
Rae Osborne was just above him, the fear still showing on her face. “Let’s don’t go through that again. I thought he was going to kill you.”
Ingram could only nod. It was two or three minutes before his strength began to return. “Toss the line up over the boom,” he directed, “and pass me the other end.” He caught the doubled line and managed to pull himself on deck. She disappeared down the ladder while he slipped on the khaki trousers, and when she came back she silently handed him a towel. He collapsed on the cockpit seat and mopped at the water running out of his hair.
“That was a little too much,” he gasped. “I guess I’m an old man.”
“Not old, Ingram. But a man.”
He glanced up quickly. There was sudden confusion in her face. “Well, thank you,” he said, surprised.
The old arrogance of manner was back now and everything was under control. “Forget it,” she said indifferently.
“Sure. But sometimes I wish I could figure you out.”
“Really? I thought you’d done a beautiful job of that—and expressing your opinion.”
“So I was wrong,” he said uncomfortably. “But I did try to apologize, didn’t I, when I found out it was just an act?”
“Oh, that.” She dismissed it with a shrug. “I was talking about Nassau, there in the Carlton House bar.”
He stared at her, completely baffled. “Carlton House? When were you in there?”
It was her turn to stare. She sank down on the opposite side of the cockpit just as one of Morrison’s 30-caliber slugs struck the foremast and went screaming off across the water; neither of them even noticed it. “Oh, good Lord! You mean you didn’t even see me?”
“No,” he replied. “I didn’t see you anywhere. Except there in your room.”
“Ouch! Don’t remind me of that. I guess I’m the one who owes you an apology. But I was furious. I thought you’d done it deliberately.”
“I’m sorry,” Ingram said. “That’s happened to me before. I’m an absent-minded goof at times, and I think I was reliving my past.” He was conscious of still being puzzled, however; she was too intelligent to get very upset over anything as petty as that.
She grinned. “I don’t think you’ve grasped the real beauty of it yet. Most of the time I seem to have all the social grace of a water buffalo. It’s just carelessness, but it can lead to some very embarrassing situations. You remember I got out of the taxi to go shopping, and asked you to take my things on to the hotel and register for me. I was two blocks away before it dawned on me this was a little on the casual side, to say the least, since I didn’t know anything about you at all. There was no telling what you might think, or how you might take it. And to make it worse, I couldn’t even remember exactly what I’d said. But of course when I got out to the Pilot House Club everything was all right. Apparently whatever I’d said hadn’t been that ambiguous, and I’d been embarrassed about nothing. It even struck me as a little funny—until I walked into the Carlton House bar where you were drinking beer and sat down around the curve of the bar and smiled at you, and you looked right through me and three feet out the other side. So much for the amusing little situation.”