There was no one on deck. The mooring light glowed steadily aft, but the cabin was dark. I pulled myself over the rail, extracted Wilhelmina from the watertight bag, and crouched silently on the deck for a moment, listening.
Still, no sound.
I leaned back over the rail and motioned for Li Chin and Michelle to join me. Li Chin came up first, as fast and agile as an acrobat. Michelle came after her, slower, but with surprising sureness and ease. By the time I had lowered my oxygen tank and mask to the deck, the two women stood dripping beside me, their fingers working at the tank harnesses.
"You stay here," I whispered to Michelle. "Li Chin and I are going to say hello to whoever's in the cabin."
And, I hope, asleep, I added mentally.
Michelle shook her head violently.
"I'm coming with…"
I grabbed her face in both hands and stared at her hard.
"We've been through this before," I whispered, through gritted teeth. "I said stay here."
She glared back defiantly for a moment. Then her eyes dropped and she gave a barely perceptible nod. I released her face, motioned to Li Chin, and crept silently forward across the deck. At the door to the cabin I stopped, and crouched motionless, listening.
Nothing. Not even a snore. Not even heavy breathing.
Li Chin raised her eyebrows at me questioningly. I nodded. She flattened herself to one side of the door as I cautiously tried the door handle.
It turned.
Slowly, I pushed the door open a crack. In the moonlight that came through the portholes, I could see two bunks, storage cabinets, a table, and a bench.
The bunks and the bench were empty. The bunks were neatly made up.
There was no sign of any human presence.
I motioned again to Li Chin, and cautiously, silently, slid through the crack in the door, spinning to avoid anyone who might be behind it.
No one.
Li Chin behind me, I pushed back the door to the galley.
Empty.
And there was no further place in the cabin or galley where anyone could hide. I stood for a moment, thinking. The dinghy meant someone was aboard. If not in cabin or galley, where? The one hatch had been tightly battened.
The same thing must have occurred to both of us simultaneously, because Li Chin suddenly grabbed my arm and gestured toward the bunks. Then she held up two fingers, and raised her eyebrows questioningly.
She was right. It was far too big a boat to sleep only two people. I let my eyes move slowly over every inch of the cabin wall.
They stopped at a panel in the far end, beyond the galley.
Motioning to Li Chin to cover me from behind, I padded silently to the panel, and began to feel its edges. If they concealed a trick lock or spring, they concealed it well. I gently pressed the ornamental molding around the panel, working my way carefully up one side, over the top, and down the other side. I was just starting on the bottom molding when I heard a creaking sound behind me. I turned, and cursed inwardly.
I had been working on the wrong panel. The panel I should have been working on was the one beside the door through which we'd entered the cabin. That panel had slid back.
And behind it stood a tall, lean black man. He was wearing flowered pajamas. He was pointing a shotgun. At me.
His lips were smiling. His eyes weren't.
"My, my," he shook his head gently. "You folks sure are quiet. I hardly knew I had visitors at all."
I shot a glance at Li Chin. She was standing too far from the shotgun to grab it before it could blast one of us to kingdom come. And her little derringer was nowhere in sight. She saw me looking at her, and shrugged as though with regret.
"Sorry, Carter," she said. "I… well… you know, damnit, the truth of the matter is, I forgot to take it out of the bag."
"Great," I said grimly.
"Forgot to take it out of the bag?" the black man said in mock wonderment. "Forgot to take what out of the bag? The cat?" He shook his head again. "You folks puzzle me. You sure do."
His left hand — the one that wasn't holding the shotgun — moved down to a table by his side, in the cabin beyond the trick panel. He popped something into his mouth and chewed leisurely, his eyes never leaving us a second.
"Now, I dig visitors, being a friendly kind of cat myself. And I sure appreciate your making a little call on me, being as I was feeling kind of lonely, having fired my watchman for being more dedicated to the sauce than to the Lady Day. His left hand descended again, and again popped something into his mouth. It looked suspiciously like a piece of chocolate. "But, being basically a curious kind of cat, I sure would dig knowing the purpose of your visit. I mean, could you lay a little information on me as to exactly what the scene is here?"
I glanced at Li Chin and shook my head slightly. We both remained silent.
The man shook his head again. Another chocolate — that was definitely what they were — was chomped down onto by strong looking teeth.
"Well, T sure am sorry to hear that," he said. "I genuinely am. Because that means I'll have to make a little call on the ship-to-shore, you dig? Have to have a little conversation with the local constabulary."
I still said nothing. He moved slowly, his eyes alert, into the cabin where we stood. He motioned Li Chin to back up still further.
"Second thoughts?" he asked. "Do I hear any second thoughts?"
If he could have heard my thoughts, he wouldn't have been talking to us. He would have been trying to deal with Michelle — who was coming down the steps into the cabin on cat feet, Li Chin's derringer pointed square at the back of the black man's skull.
"Well, that's a pity," he said. "That's truly a…"
"Don't move!" snapped Michelle. She slammed the nozzle of the derringer hard against the man's skull. He froze. "Drop the shotgun!"
He didn't move an inch. Not even his eyeballs. But his hands didn't loosen their grip on the shotgun, either.
"Well, now," he said slowly. "I don't believe I'll do that. I'm sort of attached to this shotgun, you might say. And my finger is sort of tight on the trigger, you might say. You might even say that if some mean dude were to put a bullet through my head, that finger would tighten on the trigger through reflex action, and your two friends would find themselves decorating the wall."
We all stood frozen in silence, a tableau of guns, tension, and pounding hearts.
Suddenly, in a blur of astonishing speed for one so tall and gangly, the man dropped and whirled. The stock of the shotgun caught Michelle in her belly. She crumpled and gasped. The derringer dropped, and the black man had it in his left hand half a second later. But Li Chin was already on the move. Her right foot shot forward as her whole body slid forward. The shotgun sailed from the black man's grasp and landed against a bulkhead. Seconds later it was in my hands, pointed squarely at him.
But the derringer, now in his hand, was jammed against Michelle's neck, pointing upward toward her skull. And he held Michelle's body between himself and me — and the shotgun and Wilhelmina.
He chuckled.
"A Mexican standoff, I do believe. Or how about, an Afro-American standoff, in this case. Or, not to neglect the little lady, a Chinese-American standoff?"
He was right. He could keep us immobilized, using Michelle's body as a shield, for as long as he could stand up. But he was immobilized too. In order to use the ship-to-shore radio, he would have to release Michelle, which he couldn't do without giving us the drop on him.
I wasn't about to risk getting Michelle's skull blown off.