It was probably a couple of seconds before Marsh realised what was happening, but for him it seemed to be an unreal moment suspended in time before the awful, unreal truth dawned on him.
“Oh my God,” he cried. “No!”
The bullets punctured the water throwing up small columns as they peppered the pool of light on the surface. Marsh screamed and spun away from the circle, clawing madly in a desperate attempt to escape the creeping, deadly shots. The gun barked out its shattering message, each slap of the water moving inevitably towards him as the circle of light maintained its deadly grip on his desperate struggle.
He dived beneath the surface as a bullet ripped into his leg behind the knee. The pain was excruciating but Marsh knew he had to ignore it and pull himself down deeper beneath the water. He could still hear the plucking sounds as the bullets spent their energy just above his desperate struggle for survival.
He stopped well below the surface and turned towards the hull of the ship. The pain in his leg was almost too much to bear, but he knew he had to ignore it. He didn’t know what to do for his own survival, and all he could think of was to swim towards the belly of the freighter and find a dubious sanctuary.
As he touched the cold, metal surface of the ship, he paused and let himself drift slowly upwards until his head cleared the water. He stopped and pressed his cheek against the cold steel. He reached down and fingered the wound in his leg. He guessed that he wasn’t seriously injured; perhaps it was because the water had absorbed much of the bullet’s energy. But for all that, it still felt as if his leg had been severed. He knew the blood would be oozing from it and once more the fear of sharks crept up his spine.
Marsh looked back towards the circle of light. It was still moving about, still searching for him. There was no shooting now and the uncanny silence had returned. He trod water, keeping his eyes fixed firmly on the light. He had no idea what to do now; if he swam away from the ship he would eventually drown. If he gave himself up and threw himself on their mercy…. No, they would kill him before he had even asked for sanctuary.
He heard a sudden splash, the sound of something entering the water. A boat perhaps? The sound came from the stern. Marsh was roughly amidships. The voices returned, shouting from the deck. They sounded agitated, but they were quick, clear, unmistakeable words of command and they flew from the deck above down to the men in the boat.
Marsh tensed, pulled his elbows in and let himself sink deeper until his nose was barely clear of the surface. His common sense told him he was in a trap from which there was no chance of escape. Swim away and drown or remain by the ship and be slaughtered. He knew he had little choice but to swim away, but where to?
Suddenly he heard another voice calling out excitedly. It was coming from the boat, and the man calling out was shouting wildly. The wavering beam of light stopped and moved rapidly across to the boat. It picked out some of the floating wreckage of the Ocean Quest. Now everybody seemed to be getting excited and there were voices issuing commands from everywhere. Marsh inched his way carefully along the hull, moving towards the bow. He intended to use the current distraction to make his way clear of the ship and as far away from it as possible.
Then a hand reached up out of the water and touched him.
Marsh gasped in sheer fright. His spine went rigid and a massive shudder plunged down his back. He spun round and instinctively lunged with his elbow. It thudded into something soft. He went rigid then as he saw Walsh’s corpse roll over and the pale, dead face came up from beneath the dark surface.
He almost lost the will to live then. His nerves were strung so taught they were almost at breaking point, and only a superhuman effort of will stopped him from screaming in uncontrollable terror. Seeing his friend float up from the deep like an underworld spectre, his white face masked in the appalling rictus of death was almost too much for Marsh’s singing nerves to take.
His spine loosened in another massive shudder and he pushed the corpse away. The cadaver refused to move and he lunged at it, feeling sick. He pulled his good leg up and gave the body a massive kick. It drifted from him, face up, away from the hull of the ship. Marsh clawed at the steel hull and pulled himself away from Walsh’s drifting body.
Suddenly there was a cry of exultation from the deck and a rapid succession of shots. Marsh could hear the bullets thudding into Walsh’s body. He saw it roll over under the thudding impact and the shooting stopped.
He was stunned by the horror of it all. He felt sick and weakened, and his strength seemed to be slipping away from him. The water lapped over his face and he felt lethargic and weak. Marsh knew the sea well; he had lived with it most of his life. It had always been a source of immense pleasure to him and he knew how it could turn suddenly and become a threat. He knew that to weaken was to succumb to its inherent menace and had learned to live with the dangers.
He now had to call on those years of experience and his own strength of will to restore his capacity for survival. There was still considerable danger and Marsh knew that he had to recognise that in order to cope with it and survive. There was still a great deal of shouting going on and he could see the men now in the rubber dinghy, shrouded in a circle of light, round Walsh’s body. It was an ironic twist of fate, he thought, that Walsh had saved him that night, even in death.
He considered his situation and knew it was hopeless; there was nothing he could do to resolve it. There would be no sanctuary on the ship and the sea offered no hope. He was hundreds miles from land. To the north lay the island of Haiti. Northwest was Jamaica and beyond that the yawning gap between the Yucatan Peninsula and Cuba. Jamaica might just as well have been on the Moon for all the good it was going to do him. Whatever he tried, he would be dead within hours. If nothing else, the sharks would see to that.
He edged his way towards the bow of the ship, clinging to the hull, still not knowing what he would do. While the ship was there it was a floating sanctuary; a tangible hope; but all in the mind now.
He swam to the forward end of the freighter and round to the other side. Then he pushed away from the ship, knowing that the crew would only be interested in what was happening elsewhere and not in the darkness where he was. They had their quarry and would be seeking no more. He was about five yards from the ship when he suddenly swam into the anchor chain.
And that was when he saw the other ship!
He held on to the anchor chain, his mouth open in complete shock. He tried gathering his senses and marshalling his fading strength, to make sense out of all this. To see the other ship was certainly a complete shock, but as he reflected on it he soon realised that it was not as surprising as he had first thought; it was almost certainly a transfer of cargo that was about to take place and probably a haul of drugs or illicit arms. And whatever the reason was for these two ships to come together, it did not bode well for him.
And then he thought about Greg Walsh and his unusual decision to sail this far from Freeport for no other reason than he said he fancied a longer trip. Could it be possible, Marsh wondered, that Walsh expected these two ships to be here? And was his long standing friend and business partner involved in something covert and illegal? Whatever the answer was, Marsh realised that there was very little chance of finding out, because he was unlikely to survive much longer. Unless he could get on board the second ship unseen.
The second vessel was a lot smaller than the freighter that had smashed through the Ocean Quest, no more than about six thousand tons by Marsh’s reckoning. Because she was smaller, her draught was lower and offered him a better chance of getting on board and concealing himself.
He knew there was no way he could get up on to the deck of the freighter, although he had contemplated climbing up the anchor chain. To attempt it would have been suicidal. The smaller ship offered him a marginally better hope.