dead brother.
There was a sound as of a long-pent breath being released throughout
the saloon and then the silence was total. Ian was the first to
stir.
“That’s the mannie I found. . ..” His voice tailed off as Mark
switched his eyes to him. “Ah, Ian Lewis. So it was you who clobbered
me, was it? he said pleasantly, and then his voice hardened. “You’d
have done better to stay in your Highland hovel, you Scots peasant.”
The whole pattern of events of the last few months had suddenly been
shuffled like the pieces in a kaleidoscope, to present an entirely new
picture. It was no wonder that Ian hadn’t recognised the bearded man
he found on our raid on Sirena; he had last seen Mark as a boy. I
might have recognised him, but I hadn’t taken the trouble to look. We
weren’t looking for a dead man that night in Nuku’alofa.
I looked round at the others. Their expressions were a mixture of
amazement and slowly dawning comprehension.
Clare gave Mark one long, measured look, then made a small contemptuous
sound and turned back to her father. Campbell took her by the wrist
protectively, never taking his eyes off Mark. He said nothing.
Ian was furious and showed it, while Geordie merely stared
speculatively at Mark under lowered brows. Paula had made a sudden
move as if to go to him, but she shrank back and hid in the shadows
at
Geordie’s back. Taffy didn’t show himself at all.
Of them all, Mark was watching me. “Hello, Mike,”he said soberly.
I said, “Mark, for God’s sake – I-‘ He was urbane where I was
dumbfounded. He lifted the notebook and some papers in his hand.
“I’ve been rooting about in your laboratory. So kind of you to have
done the preliminary survey for me. I couldn’t have done it better
myself.” He dropped the papers on the table.
Ian looked at him with black anger in his eyes. “I wish that I’d hit
you a bit harder,” he said harshly Mark smiled at him but said
nothing.
He picked up my notebook again and flicked the pages with one hand.
“We seem to have struck it rich, Mike. There may be billions in all
this, don’t you agree? A pity you wasted your time but never mind, you
saved me a bit of work.” I spoke through a dry throat. “You’re a
bastard, Mark.” “Oh, come on, Mike. Aren’t you maligning mother?” He
looked around. “And who else have we? Yes, Wilkins, isn’t it? What’s
it like on Tyneside these days, Geordie?” Geordie showed his
disgust.
“A bit cleaner than this; saloon.” “We will have our little jokes,”
said Mark lightly. “And my dear old boss, Mr Campbell, the fallen
warrior and Clare.I’m sorry you had to be here, Clare.” She refused to
look at him and said nothing. It irked Mark and he shrugged
petulantly, turned away and peered behind Geordie.”Andwho’sthe
youngladysittinginthe shadowThe, asked. “I didn’t know you were such a
one for the ladies
Mike.” He moved round the table and stopped suddenly. His face went
very pale. “Paula!” he whispered. He turned his head quickly to
Ramirez. “You didn’t tell me she was aboard.” Ramirez shrugged.
“Just another woman,” he said casually.For an instant they glared at
one another and I had an insight into their relationship.Paula stood
up.
“Mark – oh Mark! I thought you were dead.Why didn’t you come to me,
Mark? Why didn’t you trust me?” Ramirez laughed softly.Mark actually
looked troubled. “I’m truly sorry,” he said.”Sorry you had to be on
this ship.” He made a curious gesture as though wiping her away, and a
prickle ran up my spine. In that one sudden movement he had rejected
us all – wiped us out of his world.Paula took a step forward. “But
Mark, L . Ramirez snapped out a curt phrase in Spanish and one of the
guards lifted his rifle. The meaning was unmistakable.Paula stopped
dead and looked at Mark with the comprehension of horror. His eyes
flickered and he looked away from her and she slowly fell back into a
chair and buried her face in her hands. I heard the racking sobs that
shook her, and saw Clare move to put her arms round her shoulders.I had
to force myself to speak calmly. “We all thought you were dead.
Why did you do it?” “I had to die,” he said. He perked up – the
change of subject took his mind off Paula. “The police were after me
and getting a little too close, so I conveniently killed myself.” I
suddenly knew another black truth. “You did kill Sven Norgaard, didn’t
you.” He turned on me. “What else could I do?” he said
defensively.
“The bloody fool wanted to publish. Him and his bloody scientific
integrity – he wanted to give it all away, billions of dollars that
belonged to me – to me, do you hear that? I made the discovery, didn’t
I?” His voice tailed off, and then he added softly, “I had to kill
him.”
The silence was murderous and we all stared at the egomaniacal horror
that was my brother- He straightened up and said. “And then I killed
myself. The police would never look for a dead murderer. Wasn’t that
pretty clever of me, Mike?” “It was stupid,” I said flatly. “But then
you always were a stupid man.” His hand crashed on the table and we
all jerked at the sudden violence. Only Ramirez watched him unmoved
and dispassionate. “It wasn’t stupid!” he yelled. “It was a damn
good idea! But I’m surrounded by bungling idiots.” “Like Kane and
Hadley,”I said.”That’s right, them,” he agreed, suddenly calm
again.”Those damn fools gave me appendicitis, of all things. I could
have killed that madman, Hadley – there was no need to invent extra
details.” “I’m sure you could,” I said. “But it was you who bungled
it.You should have told them precisely what to say.” He betrayed for
the first time his lack of authority. It had nothing to do with me,”
he said sullenly.
“Ernesto fixed it.” I shot a sidelong glance at Ramirez. “So he’s a
bungler too?” Ramirez smiled sardonically and Mark said nothing. I
went on, “You bungled again when Hadley let your papers and the nodules
go. You should have taken them with you – that was bad planning.”
“They got them back though.” “Not quite, Mark. I had a nodule still
and I had your diary.” He reacted to that with white-faced fury, then
subsided and nodded thoughtfully. “You were lucky. You read it?” “Oh
yes,” I said casually. “A simple code, really.” And watched him
swallow his ire yet again as item by item I did my best to undermine
his self-confidence. Then he suddenly, laughed.”That lunatic,
Hadley.
But you all thought I was dead anyway.
And poor old Ernesto here was getting all the blame.That was really
funny.” Ramirez, who had been leaning negligently against the
bulkhead, suddenly straightened, his face cold. “This is a pointless
conversation,” he said shortly.Mark said, “Let me have my fun, old
boy.
It isn’t often a, corpse can hold an inquest on himself. I’m getting a
kick out of it.” Ramirez looked at him contemptuously. “All right.
It won’t make any difference,” he said dismissively. I knew that he
was only waiting for word that his crew had separated the two ships
before he did what he was going to do – and I had a good idea what that
was.I rubbed my ear – there seemed to be something getting in the way
of my hearing, and Ramirez’s voice had seemed to vibrate in a curious
way. The ship creaked and rocked uneasily, and I wondered what was
really happening outside.But it was also important to me to hear what
my brother had to say, and I pushed the thoughts that were bothering me
to the background.”My inquest,” Mark said again. “Let’s develop this
interesting theme.” “Yes, let’s do that,”-said Campbell suddenly.I
turned to find him sitting up on the settee, waving away Clare and
Ian.
“Let’s do that,” he repeated, and I noticed that his voice was stronger
and his speech clearer. “Let’s consider the burning of a hospital and
the murder of a doctor and fourteen of his patients.”
Mark flinched. “I didn’t do that. It was Hadley again.” “Hadley
again,” I said caustically. “You sound as pure as Hadley’s pal
Kane.”
“You condoned it,”said Campbell relentlessly.”It was nothing to do with
me. I didn’t even know about it until afterwards. That man’s beyond
controlling.” Ramirez had picked up my injudicious reference to Kane
and was looking at me enquiringly. He was very acute.”You have spoken
to Kane again, Mr Trevelyan? He was supposed to come to me in
Nuku’alofa, but I didn’t see him there.” I tried to make the best of
my slip. “Yes, we’ve spoken to him. He’s told us a great deal too