“By not doing so, you may lose a hell of a lot of lives, Shaw.”
“Yes, sir, I’m aware of that.” Shaw had gone a little pale. “But believe me, it’s the only way. This thing’s so big… it’s vital we get hold of Lubin, sir, really vital. So long as Lubin’s about, there’ll always be a danger.” He sat forward in the chair, earnestly. “Some one will show up before long, I’m certain. Will you trust me, leave this to me a little longer, sir? If I don’t get a lead fairly soon, well, then we’ll have to think again and probably make a search. But I’d much rather it wasn’t yet.”
Sir Donald paced up and down, frowning. Then he stopped, swung round and faced Shaw. He said abruptly, “Very well, Shaw. You’re in charge of that side of things. But I hope you won’t run my ship too close to the rocks, you know. I’ve a hell of a lot of lives on my hands — and that’s my responsibility.”
Shaw said, “I know, sir. I’ll do my best.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
After dinner Colonel Gresham was waiting in the lounge on the veranda deck when Shaw strolled up casually, dropped into an armchair beside the sandy man. A steward brought coffee, and they struck up a desultory conversation through the strains of the ship’s orchestra tuning up for a dance in the Square, to all intents and purposes two strangers meeting. Away across the sumptuous lounge with its thick, fitted carpeting and comfortble chairs, Shaw caught sight of the man he’d seen earlier, glancing now through a magazine. He didn’t appear to have noticed Shaw. He was smoking a cigar, and he sipped now and again at a glass of brandy, looked bored until another man came up, a tall man with a pitted face and a bulbous nose. This man sat down beside him and put a pack of cards on a table between them.
In a low voice Shaw said, “Don’t look now, Colonel, but there’s a man who I think recognized me this afternoon — and I’ve a faint idea I’ve seen him before somewhere too, but the penny hasn’t dropped. You may have seen him around.” He described the man. “Just take a look in a minute, would you, and tell me if you know who he is.”
Gresham laughed. “I think I’ve guessed, but I’ll wait till I see.” Some moments later he glanced round quickly, said: “Yes, thought so. Our inveterate and intrepid card-player. Andersson. Not quite my cup of tea, y’know, but a decent enough feller. He’s a Swede.” He glanced sideways, seeming amused. “Why the cloak-and-dagger? Think he’s Lubin, what?”
He laughed, a staccato bark.
Shaw said, “Not Lubin. He doesn’t fit with a photo I saw just before I left London… He stopped then, very suddenly, felt a strange prickly sensation in his flesh. As he spoke of the photographs, his mind had gone back in a flash to Carberry’s office in the Admiralty, to Carberry saying they’d never had a photograph of—Karstad. Those eyes, those curious, penetrating eyes. Karstad had had eyes like that, Shaw remembered. He remembered so vividly now that he couldn’t think why he hadn’t cottoned on straight away. The eyes were just about all he recalled now of that brief glimpse he’d had years before of Karstad, but when he came to think of it the rest of the man did fit with the time-blurred mental image, the outline that remained… and he remembered too, as In a kind of flash-back, that the Karstad of years ago had been smoking a cigar — for what that was worth. He stiffened, felt himself going cold. Could that man be Karstad? In the circumstances the answer could very well be — yes. And if he had recognized Shaw that afternoon, that could have been from a photograph. Shaw didn’t doubt that his picture adorned many ‘rogues’ galleries throughout the intelligence services of the other side, and an agent might be expected to watch out for new faces boarding at Naples. But, if that man was Karstad and had recognized him, why hadn’t he come forward? The deduction stood out a mile — Karstad wasn’t on their side after all. Then why had he contacted Donovan? Shaw’s thoughts went round and round…
Gresham was going on, “Quite an interesting feller, y’know. Had a chat or two with him, but he spends a good deal of his time drinking — or playing cards!” He laughed again, spoke behind his hand in a harsh whisper. “Not sure he isn’t a bit of a card-sharper, matter of fact!”
“What does he talk about that’s interesting?”
“Oh, this and that, y’know… he was in a German concentration camp, that’s why he and I have things in common. I happened to spend some of the war in a P.O.W. camp, d’you see. We’ve yarned about things.”
“Uh-huh… I’ll have a word with him myself one day. I don’t know anybody called Andersson so far as I remember, but I’m sure I’ve come across that chap. Tell me, Colonel — does the name Karstad mean anything to you?”
“Can’t say it does. Why?”
“Only that I think that chap could be Karstad.” He told Gresham what was known about the double agent. “Don’t ask me any more just now, and keep this under your hat. I’ve got just a suspicion that if Andersson is Karstad, and knows I’m aboard, something may happen pretty soon. Meanwhile, I’m going to ask you to keep your eyes skinned and watch all you say to him, Colonel.”
Gresham seemed put out at that. He said stiffly, “I’m not in the habit of talking about my work to everyone I meet.”
“I know,” Shaw said quickly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. Well — what about going below?”
“Very well, Shaw. Stay around for a minute or two after I leave. I’ll be down at the for’ard end of the dining-room deck, starboard side. There’s a door into the working alleyway from there, and we go from there along to the entry into the tween-deck in Number One hold.”
“Right.”
Shortly after that Colonel Gresham got up stiffly and strolled away. He stopped to chat gallantly to two old ladies, and his abrupt laugh floated back to Shaw. A little later he moved slowly away as though he was going nowhere in particular.
Shaw drank up his coffee, sat there thinking. He didn’t like the thoughts that came to him as a result of what Gresham had said in the Captain’s cabin earlier, his hints about a full-scale attack. While REDCAP was there, all was well. But without it… what then? A teeming country, rampantly on the march, the endless hordes sweeping Western civilization off the world’s map, those millions of men backing up the decontrolled missiles, every major power wiped out? Under such massive nuclear potential, the world could be knocked out almost before anyone realized what was going on.
Shaw gave an involuntary shiver.
Three minutes later Shaw met Gresham at the door into the working alleyway, walked along with him through passages cluttered up with domestic materials, crates of tinned food, stewards’ accessories, hatchways leading down into the bowels of the ship where the cool-rooms and the deep-freeze stores were situated. Shaw asked:
“What are the guarding arrangements, Colonel?”
Gresham laughed. “Pretty good ones! You’ll see for yourself. The entry into the tween-deck is kept locked all the time, I’ve got two armed men on watch together at the crate, and they’re in telephone communication with the bridge and with my cabin.”
“Uh-huh. Sounds all right.”
After they had gone down a short steel ladder, they came up to a firescreen door and Gresham brought out a bunch of keys on a chain round his waist. He fumbled at the lock, went through and along to a watertight door, swung the handwheel which released the clips, and pushed it open. They walked into the tween-deck running along the ship’s side above the lower hold. Well lashed to ringbolts in the bulkhead with steel-wire cable, REDCAP’s crate stood upright, vast, bulky, awesome. One of the two MAPIACCIND guards came forward, saluted Gresham.