But his employer, Lacost, and the other Colons had not put in an appearance until nine days previously. They had turned up in a battered seagoing launch named the Pigalle and, according to the island grapevine, one of them had let it out, during a drunken evening ashore, that Lacost and one of the others had only recently completed a two month prison sentence after having been caught smuggling drugs from Mexico into Tahiti. Soon after their arrival they had taken their launch and equipment out to the sunken Maria Ameba; but, having no licence, they had been warned off by the Resident and his Sergeant of gendarmes.
Lacost had defied them and refused to leave the site. The following day, de Carvalho had arrived in the Boa Viagem. He had brought no salvaging equipment with him, but had gone out to view the wreck. Both parties had then returned to harbour and two days ago both had sailed, it was thought, for Fiji.
In the light of the scanty information available, to find an explanation for these movements was not possible. It might be that Lacost, having sent his diver Macauta down to the wreck, had found there was no quantity of gold in her, after all. But if so why had he defied the Resident's order to leave the site, yet left after de Carvalho had gone out to it? Again, why, although the Colons had sailed from Revika in the
Pigalle two days before, had they left Macauta and their salvaging equipment behind? And, biggest question of all, why should Lacost and de Carvalho have lingered in Revika for several days, then sailed on the same day for Fiji?
Only one thing was clear. If there was treasure in the wreck, it was still there; so, if James chose to ignore the fact that he had no licence, his rivals had left him a free field to send divers down right away to get it, provided Ribaud took no steps against him in the next few days. And James had made it clear that, regarding himself as the rightful owner of the gold, that was what he meant to do.
When they had finished their meal Gregory said, `First things first. For the time being we must forget the gold and try to stave off Ribaud. While I was in my bath I did some pretty hard thinking, and if you'll give me a pencil and paper I'll draft a telegram I want to get off to him.'
From a fine old walnut Dutch bureau James produced
Gregory's requirements. After writing for a few minutes Gregory picked up the paper and read out
`Your two compatriots deprived of clothes by natives here. Suggest you send replacements by air. Am arranging agreed transfer of money to Credit Lyonnaise 44 Boulevard St. Germain. Do you wish Charles Lorraine be informed of transaction? Expect reply by 1800 hours. Dantès.'
James gave him a puzzled look. `I can't make head nor tail of it.'
`I'll interpret,' Gregory grinned. `The two compatriots are, of course, Fournier and Joubert. You, anyhow, are a native of this island and that's good enough. Ribaud is an old Secret Service hand and so am I. When such types get hold of an enemy, and have no means of handing him over to someone else who will keep him for a while from becoming dangerous, it is common practice to take away his clothes and shoes. Then, even if he does break out from wherever he had been locked up, it is difficult for him get very far or persuade anyone he happens to meet that he is not a lunatic. Ribaud knows that one as well as I do, so he'll jump to it that you and I debagged his two boys and left them to cool their heels in the nude.
`Having done that, it's obvious that at any time it suited us we could give them back their clothes. So “replacements” does not mean other sets of uniforms for them, but that Ribaud should send us our belongings. He'll get that one, too.
'Then there is the transfer of money. As I told you, I did not actually blackmail Ribaud; but when he had agreed to arrange our escape I offered to send quite a substantial sum of money to his bank in Paris. He accepted and gave me the address of his bank. It would have been round about four thousand pounds, but I felt that he would have earned it if he rigged matters with his police and had flown us to Tujoa.
`As things turned out, we've got to hand it to him as a conscientious servant of the French Republic. To make certain that we did not blow the gaff about the Russians and their rockets on Yuloga he attempted to send us back there, and leave it to them to see to it that we had no chance to talk. And he knew that little gesture would cost him the four thousand he might have pocketed if he had really connived at our escape.
`But now I am blackmailing him good, hard and proper. Only Fournier and Joubert believe us to be criminals and knew that he meant to give us back to the Russians. The other boys, all the police, obviously believed that they had been given the job of ensuring that we should escape because we were members of the Deuxième Bureau who had got ourselves into a fix. '
`If there is an investigation and they are questioned, having no axe to grind they will tell what they believe to be the truth and say that they were simply obeying the General's orders.
`If I send four thousand pounds to Ribaud', bank in Paris ' nobody will be able to contest the fact that he has received a large sum of money from me. And in certain circumstances somebody might require him to explain why I did so. In this telegram I have asked my old pal if he wishes Charles Lorraine to be informed of this transaction. Charles, of course, is General de Gaulle. You will remember that he took the double cross of Lorraine as his symbol for the Free French. Ribaud will pick that one up as swiftly, as I would drop a red hot coal.
`So, you see, he will be faced with a choice. Either he lets sleeping dogs lie and refrains for good from any attempt to have you and me arrested, or he will be called on to explain why he instructed his police to arrange our escape, and accepted a big bribe for doing so. I've given him until six o'clock this evening to make up his mind. Now, whether he gives in or, more maddened than ever by my threat, decides to go all out to get us, lies in the lap of the gods.'
13
Enter the White Witch
`He must give in; he must!' James cried, as Gregory sat back. `He'll be ruined if he doesn't. But why are you signing the telegram “Dantès”?'
`Oh, that's because I can't use my own name. You and I have become notorious in Noumea; so, if I did, everyone there through whose hands the message passed would know that we are in Tujoa. Then, like it or not, Ribaud would be forced to do his utmost to recapture us. Dantès was the hero of Dumas Pere's famous novel The Count of Monte Cristo. He was imprisoned on an island, in the Chateau d'If, and his getting away from it is the best known escape story in all French literature. The name is by no means an uncommon one, so it won't ring a bell with anyone on Ribaud's staff, but it will with him.'
The young Ratu's eyes showed schoolboy hero worship. `What a man you are!' he exclaimed after a moment. `No wonder you succeeded in fooling Himmler and the Gestapo all through the war. This is absolutely brilliant. The telegram gives nothing away to anyone who may read it. But to Ribaud its meaning will be as clear as crystal. He's got to let me go or be dismissed with ignominy as a corrupt official.'
`I hope you are right,' Gregory replied soberly. `But we can't count our chickens yet. Ribaud is both a tough egg and an honest man. He may decide to face the music. You see, he just might get himself in the clear if he told the truth and brought Fournier and Joubert to witness that all the time his real intentions had been to return us to the Russians.'
`Even then it would be difficult to laugh off that big bribe.'
`Yes. It's that on which I am counting. So I want to send another telegram, when we send this, to my bank in New York. It will be an instruction, verified by a code word that only they and I know, to pay that four thousand into Ribaud's bank with the least possible delay, and to inform him by highest priority cable that it has been paid in.'