‘How far?’ Bristow asked.
‘About four hunded miles maybe.’
Bristow looked aghast. ‘As far as that? We’ll never make it. Not in that boat.’
‘Plenty of people have sailed further than four hundred miles in open boats.’
‘Maybe they have, but—’
‘Do you want to stay here and rot?’
‘Well, no, but—’
‘Then it’s the boat or nothing.’ He had made his decision and he knew that Bristow would fall into line; he would never face being left alone on the wreck. ‘Now this is the plan — when we reach Fiji we say nothing about the ship being on a reef.’
‘I don’t see—’
‘Oh, for crying out loud!’ Keeton’s patience with Bristow had no great endurance. ‘What have you got for brains? Dough? What happens if we say the ship is on a reef? They send out a salvage expedition for the gold. And what do we get? A big thank you and nine months’ pay. That’d be fine, wouldn’t it?’
‘Oh,’ Bristow said, and he thought this over. ‘Oh, yes, I see what you mean. But how do we explain where we’ve been all this time? Nobody’ll ever believe we’ve just been drifting about in an open boat, living on rain water and fish.’
‘It happened like this,’ Keeton said. ‘After the others left the ship and the storm died down we managed to patch up the only remaining lifeboat, and then because the ship was gradually sinking we got away in the boat. It was just in time, too, because we saw the ship sink not half an hour later. After that we sailed for about a week before drifting up on an uninhabited island. We stayed on the island for about nine months, living on coconuts and fish and hoping to be picked up. Finally we decided to take a chance again in the boat.’
‘Well, that’s not far off the truth anyway. It sounds likely enough. But I still don’t see how we get the gold.’
‘We scrape some money together; it may take us a few years but it’ll be worth it in the end. Then when we’ve got enough we pick up an old fishing boat or something of that kind which we can sail out here, and we take off the gold.’
A grin slowly spread over Bristow’s face. ‘I’ve got to hand it to you, Charlie. You’re the boy with the brains, I’d never have thought of that.’
‘I know,’ Keeton said. He turned away from Bristow. ‘We leave tomorrow.’
Bristow turned his head and stared out over the wide, rippling surface of the sea. ‘It’s going to be a long voyage,’ he said. ‘Oh lord, it’s going to be a long, long haul.’
They stocked the boat with provisions; they filled wooden breakers and metal cans with fresh water and stowed them in with the provisions. They rigged a canvas awning over the fore part of the boat and put under it mattresses and blankets. Keeton also took Peterson’s sextant and the charts that he might need.
‘Don’t you think it’ll look queer you having them?’ Bristow asked. ‘You wouldn’t be expected to know anything about navigation.’
‘I’ll get rid of them before we make our landfall.’
‘How about taking a few bars of gold?’
‘Talk sense. How would we explain that?’
‘Yes, I suppose it would be a bit difficult. Pity though; we could have used some gold to buy that other boat.’
‘We’ll just have to work for it.’
Keeton made a last survey of the ship. He climbed up to the bridge and looked at the gaping hole in the boat-deck that had been torn by the shells from the submarine. It seemed that all that had happened half a century ago. He was no longer the man he had been then; he was older, harder; his outlook had subtly changed. He knew now exactly what he wanted, and he meant to get it whatever obstacle might lie ahead.
The edges of the hole had become weathered; it was no longer a fresh, raw wound; it was a scar on the body of the ship. So much time had passed that Keeton had almost forgotten the dead men — Hagan and the others; they had passed out of his life and would enter it no more. Nor did he now feel any resentment against Rains for abandoning the ship and leaving him and Bristow to their fate. For he saw that this had all turned out for his own benefit. If Rains had not gone the treasure would never have been his — his and Bristow’s. It was Rains who, all unwittingly, had presented this chance of a fortune.
He wondered what the Valparaiso would look like when they returned. Months must pass between that time and the present, years even. There was a long voyage ahead, a long voyage both ways. Much could happen to the Valparaiso in the interval. Suppose some other ship should eventually sight her; suppose a boarding party should be sent across; suppose the treasure should be discovered? He refused to think of such a possibility. No one must come, no one. He would have hidden the wreck if that had been possible, but he had to leave it; he had to leave the treasure exposed to the greedy hands of anyone who might chance upon it. There was no alternative.
‘No one will come,’ he muttered. ‘It’s mine now. No one is going to take it away from me.’
He went back to the boat and gave it a final examination. All was in order; all that could be done to ensure the success of the voyage had been done. He looked at the sky; it was clear and blue, giving no hint of bad weather. The sea reflected the sky’s blue, and a light breeze just touched its surface, scarcely ruffling it. The reef showed as a man’s backbone shows beneath the skin.
Keeton turned and saw Bristow. ‘Tomorrow we’ll be away,’ he said. ‘It’ll be good-bye to all this. You’d better have a good night’s sleep. It may not be so easy to sleep in the boat.’
‘It’s not insomnia that’s worrying me,’ Bristow said.
Chapter Nine
The Wind and the Rain
The boat went down jerkily as they paid out the falls. One end dipped as the rope slipped through Bristow’s hands and Keeton yelled at him savagely.
‘Don’t let her go like that. Do you want everything tipped out? Hold her, damn you. Hold her.’
Bristow held her, the rope biting into the soft flesh of his hands. Keeton’s hands were hard and the rope did not hurt them; he paid out his fall steadily and watched Bristow sweating on the other.
The boat was still tilted slightly when it hit the water. Keeton could hear the smack as it struck. He released the rope and ran to the side, peering down. The boat was floating on an even keel, bumping gently against the ship’s plates, ready to go.
‘Come on then,’ Keeton said.
He went down the Jacob’s ladder and the boat came up to meet him, as though offering itself to his service. He stepped on to a thwart and looked up to see Bristow still hesitating, apparently unwilling to take this final step.
‘Well, are you coming or aren’t you?’ Keeton shouted. ‘I’m not hanging about here all day.’
He began to release the shackles, and out of the corner of his eye he saw Bristow scrambling down the ladder. The hazards of the unknown in Keeton’s company obviously scared him less than the known terrors of the wreck with no one to share his vigil.
They cast off and pushed away from the ship’s side. They rowed for a time, then shipped the oars and stepped the mast. They hoisted the yellow sail and let it fill with the light breeze. They looked back and saw the diminishing outline of the Valparaiso. It was three hours before they lost sight of her, and then it was as though she had never existed; she was swallowed by the ocean, engulfed by the vastness of this world of sky and water.
‘Do you think you’ll ever be able to find her again?’ Bristow asked doubtfully.
‘I’ll find her,’ Keeton said. ‘If she was sunk in the depths of hell I’d go down there after her. I’d go anywhere for that gold.’