Thackeray came aboard in a glistening wet yellow oilskin that reached to his ankles and they went to Smith’s deck cabin. Thackeray shook the folds from a clean, white handkerchief, wiped a face that was even longer than usual and asked in a tone between hope and apprehension: “Did you find her?”
Smith nodded. “She refused to heave to and continued to claim she was a neutral. Have you heard any report that she was calling the shore stations?”
“None.”
“She was sending hard enough to someone, and in code. And our wireless picked up a reply that was a Telefunken transmission. That scarcely sounds neutral to me.” He paused as Thackeray stared at him, then: “I sank her!”
Thackeray’s lips tightened till they became a thin, sulky line as Smith pushed on, his voice dangerously quiet.
“She was not the only collier to sink. I met the Mary Ellen south of here. Her engines were broken down and she was being driven on to a lee shore where she had no damned business to be and her Master said you sent her! She sank!”
A nerve twitched a corner of Thackeray’s mouth. “It seemed best.”
“Best! If her engines hadn’t broken down I’d have missed her altogether!”
“— and in accordance with your request for assistance.”
Smith stared at him. “My request? I asked you to fetch her here to wait for me.”
“You asked me to bring her down from Guaya because you badly needed coal. You didn’t say she was to wait.”
“I didn’t need to! Because you couldn’t send her anywhere because you didn’t even know where I was going.”
“I knew you sailed south.”
“That is a very general direction in a very large ocean.”
“I am no seaman.”
“Yet you instructed the Master of the Mary Ellen to sail south.”
“I was repeating your instructions.”
“I told you —”
“I remember very well what you told me, Captain. I only wish I had a witness to the conversation.”
Smith sat silent. There was a little gleam of triumph in Thackeray’s eyes and Smith had not missed the point of his words. Smith did not have a witness either, so it was his word against Thackeray’s. He looked at Garrick, who was peering at Thackeray with distaste. It was obvious who Garrick believed. Smith was confident he knew what a Court of Enquiry would believe if they were asked by Thackeray to accept that a seaman had left instructions to send a collier to sea with the vague direction to head south. No seaman in his right mind would—
His thoughts stumbled, then limped on. Three ships sunk in forty-eight hours, two of them claiming to be neutrals and the Master of the third believing him to be a madman.
Thackeray had sent the Mary Ellen south knowing very well the odds were that Thunder would miss her. Because Smith had wrecked his cosy little world. Because he hated Smith.
He looked at Thackeray and could read all this in the man’s remote face. But prove it? He rubbed his hands across his face. He felt tired and said tiredly, “There will be a Court of Enquiry.” He was done with Thackeray.
Thackeray was not done with him. He said with satisfaction, “No doubt. The attitude of the Chileans has hardened even further. I understand the Master of the Gerda is screaming to high heaven that she was neutral and there is no evidence to the contrary. They’re really angry.” He did not say they were howling for Smith’s head but that could be read between the lines. “They were very suspicious about the seaplane and why the pinnace went to her. I told them I knew nothing about it.” He was washing his hands of that. “They’re very hostile. My protest about the German breach of neutrality was accepted and that’s all.”
“What breach of neutrality?”
“The Leopard, the gunboat interned here. There was no sentry aboard her, only one on the quay and last night, after you sailed, it seems he abandoned his post. She got up steam and slipped away.”
“What?”
“There’s quite a strong German faction here. So when she was interned her crew were left to live aboard. She wasn’t disabled but all her ammunition was taken off and put in bond in the Naval Arsenal. That was partly because she is, or was, tied up close to the town and they didn’t want a lot of explosives lying around there indefinitely, but it also satisfied the neutrality laws, in that she could not fight.”
“So she went to sea toothless.” Smith scowled but it was a comforting thought in one way. “With what object?”
“Object?”
“She can’t sail to Germany and in her present state she can’t fight. What reason could she have for going to sea?” He supplied the answer himself. “She’s gone to meet the cruisers.”
It was one more piece of evidence, circumstantial no doubt, but it fitted. Garrick looked thoughtful.
Smith said, “The cruisers can supply her with ammunition, and what’s more she will be one more pair of eyes for them.” Thackeray would not appreciate that. He had not stood on the bridge of Thunder that morning, cursing the lack of an extra pair of eyes.
He prompted Thackeray bitterly because Thackeray was piling it on. “Anything else?”
Thackeray hesitated, seemed reluctant, then said, “I had a cable. Kunashiri is in these waters. She’s a long way north but she’s steaming south. She’s due at Guaya in thirty-six hours or less …”
Smith stared at him, slowly taking it in. Japan was an ally and Kunashiri was one of the big, new Japanese battlecruisers, fast enough to catch a German armoured cruiser, her twelve-inch guns big enough for her to stand off and destroy the victims when caught. Smith had wished for a consort and now he had one with a vengeance.
He found he was on his feet, and laughing. Then he remembered: the battle-cruiser was his salvation but first he had to reach her. He said brusquely, “I must ask you to excuse me now. Ariadne and Elizabeth Bell should be ready to sail soon and I want to leave for Guaya as soon as possible.”
And he wanted to be quit of Thackeray with his narrow mouth and narrow cunning, his stupidity.
Thackeray did not move. He was looking down at his hands that were clasped as if in prayer and Smith could not see his eyes though he saw the twist of the lips as Thackeray spoke. “I received a second cable. This one said that Wolf and Kondor have been sighted in the Indian Ocean and the hunt has started there.” He looked up at Smith and the eyes glittered. He had held it back to the end though it made the rest irrelevant.
Smith could not speak.
Garrick said, “Could easily be a mistake, sir. Some of these merchant chaps …” His voice trailed away and Smith knew Garrick did not believe what he had said because Garrick had always doubted. Only Sarah Benson … Garrick did not look at him. Smith thought, ‘Never kick a man when he’s down.’
Thackeray said, “They’re searching.”
Garrick said, “I think it’s time you went ashore Mister Thackeray.” Now his voice held distaste. Thackeray pulled his oilskin about him. “I’m not going ashore. I’ve booked a passage in the Elizabeth Bell as far as Guaya. I think it’s time I compared notes with Mr. Cherry, particularly as he may be called home over this — this unfortunate affair.”