The new moon sets at 11:47. We will sail at midnight." But Kyller could not rest. The girl's face, pale, smeared with her tears, haunted him. The strangled breathing of the dying man echoed in his ears, and that nagging doubt scratched against his nerves.
There was something he must remember. He flogged his tired brain,
and it balked.
Why was the man disguised? If he came as soon as he had heard that his wife was a prisoner he would not have had time to effect the disguise.
Where had the man been when Fleischer had captured his wife? He had not been there to protect her. Where had he been? It must have been somewhere near at hand.
Kyller rolled on to his stomach and pressed his face into the pillow. He must rest. He must sleep now for tonight they would go out to break through the blockading English warships.
A single ship against a squadron. Their chances of slipping through unchallenged were small. There would be a night action. His imagination was heightened by fatigue, and behind his closed eyelids he saw the English cruisers, lit by the flashes of their own broadsides as they closed with Blitcher. The enemy intent on vengeance. The enemy in overwhelming strength. The enemy strong and freshly provisioned,
their coal-bunkers glutted, their magazines crammed with shell, their crews uncontaminated by the fever miasma of the Rufiji.
Against them a single ship with her battle damage hastily patched,
half her men sick with malaria, burning green cordwood in her furnaces,
her fire-power hampered by the desperate shortage of shell.
He remembered the tiers of empty shell racks, the depleted cordite shelves in the forward magazine.
The magazine? That was it! The magazine! It was something about the magazine that he must remember.
That was the thing that had been nagging him. The magazine!
"Oh, my GodV he shouted in horror. In one abrupt movement he had leapt from his prone position on the bunk to stand in the centre of the cabin.
The skin on his bare upper arms prickled with gooseflesh.
That was where he had seen the Englishman before. He had been with the labour party in the forward magazine.
He would have been there for one reason only sabotage.
Kyller burst from his cabin, and raced, half dressed, along the corridor.
"I must get hold of Commander Lochtkamper. We'll need a dozen men strong men stokers. There are tons of explosive to move, we'll have to handle it all to find whatever the Englishman placed there.
Please, God, give us time. Give us time!" Captain Otto von Kleine bit the tip from the end of his cheroot, and removed a flake of black tobacco from the tip of his tongue with thumb and fore finger. His steward held a match for him and von Kleine lit the cheroot. At the wardroom table, the chairs of Lochtkamper, Kyller, Proust and one other were empty.
"Thank you, Schmidt," he said through the smoke. He pushed his chair back and stretched out his legs, crossing his ankles and laying his shoulders against the padded backrest. The breakfast had not been of gourmet standard; bread without butter, fish taken from the river and strong with the taste of the mud, washed down with black unsweetened coffee. Nevertheless, Herr Fleischer seemed to be enjoying it. He was beginning his third plateful.
Von Kleine found his appreciative snuffling distracting.
This would be the last period of relaxation that von Kleine could anticipate in the next many days. He wanted to savour it along with his cheroot, but the wardroom was not the place to do so. Apart from the gusto with which the Herr Commissioner was demolishing his breakfast, and the smell of fish there was a mood among his officers that was almost tangible. This was the last day and it was heavy with the prospect of what the night might bring. They were all of them edgy and tense. They ate in silence, keeping their attention on their plates, and it was obvious that most of them had slept badly. Von
Kleine decided to finish his cheroot alone in his cabin. He stood up.
"Excuse me please, gentlemen." A polite murmur, and von Kleine turned to leave.
"Yes, Schmidt. What is it?" His steward was standing deferentially in his path.
"For you, sir." Von Kleine clamped the cheroot between his teeth and took the note in both hands, screwing up his eyes against the blue spiral of tobacco smoke. He frowned.
This woman, and the man she claimed was her husband, worried him.
They were a drain on the attention which he should be devoting entirely to the problem of getting Blitcher ready for tonight. Now this message what could she mean "He could save your ship'? He felt a prickle of apprehension.
He swung around.
"Herr Commissioner, a moment of your time, please." Fleischer looked up from his food with a smear of grease on his chin.
Ja?"
"Come with me."
"I will just finish.
"Immediately, please." And to avert argument von Kleine stooped out of the wardroom, leaving Herman Fleischer in terrible indecision,
but he was a man for the occasion, he took the remaining piece of fish on his plate and put it in his mouth. It was a tight fit, but he still found space for the half cup of coffee as well. Then he scooped up a slice of bread and wiped his plate hurriedly. With the bread in his hand he lumbered after von Kleine.
He was still masticating as he entered the sickbay behind von
Kleine. He stopped in surprise.
The woman sat on one of the bunks. She had a cloth in her hand and with it she wiped the mouth of a black man who lay there. There was blood on the cloth. She looked up at Fleischer. Her expression was soft with compassion and sorrow, but it changed the moment she saw
Fleischer.
She stood up quickly.
"Oh, thank God, you've come," she cried with joy as though she were greeting a dear friend. Then incongruously she looked up at the clock.
Keeping warily away from her, Fleischer worked his way around to the opposite side of the bunk by which she stood.
He leaned over and studied the face of the dying man.
There was something very familiar about it. He chewed stolidly as he puzzled over it. It was the association with the woman that triggered his memory.
He made a choking sound, and bits of half chewed bread flew from his MOuth.
"Captain!" he shouted. "This is one of them one of the English bandits."
"kno," said von Kleine.
"Why wasn't I told? This man must be exeCuted immediately.
Even now it might be too late. justice will be cheated."
"Please, Herr
Commissioner. The woman has an important message for you."
"This is monstrous. I should have been told..."
"Be still," snapped von Kleine.