“Because of a fight I didn’t start?”
“Because you’ve injured three men who will lose at least a month’s wages between them. And something else that’s infinitely more important.”
“What’s that?”
“The insult. An off-islander proved himself more than a match for not one, but three respected fishermen of Port Noir.”
“Respected?”
“In the physical sense. Lamouche’s crew is considered the roughest on the waterfront.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Not to them. It’s their honor. … Now hurry—get your things together. There’s a boat in from Marseilles; the captain’s agreed to stow you, and drop you a half-mile offshore north of La Ciotat.”
The man with no memory held his breath. “Then it’s time,” he said quietly.
“It’s time,” replied Washburn. “I think I know what’s going through your mind. A sense of helplessness, of drifting without a rudder to put you on a course. I’ve been your rudder, and I won’t be with you; there’s nothing I can do about that. But believe me when I tell you, you are not helpless. You will find your way.”
“To Zurich,” added the patient.
“To Zurich,” agreed the doctor. “Here. I’ve wrapped some things together for you in this oilcloth. Strap it around your waist.”
“What is it?”
“All the money I have, some two thousand francs. It’s not much, but it will help you get started. And my passport, for whatever good it will do. We’re about the same age and it’s eight years old; people change. Don’t let anyone study it. It’s merely an official paper.”
“What will you do?”
“I won’t ever need it if I don’t hear from you.”
“You’re a decent man.”
“I think you are, too. … As I’ve known you. But then I didn’t know you before. So I can’t vouch for that man. I wish I could, but there’s no way I can.”
The man leaned against the railing, watching the lights of Ile de Port Noir recede in the distance. The fishing boat was heading into darkness, as he had plunged into darkness nearly five months ago.
As he was plunging into another darkness now.
3
There were no lights on the coast of France; only the wash of the dying moon outlined the rocky shore. They were two hundred yards from land, the fishing boat bobbing gently in the crosscurrents of the inlet. The captain pointed over the side.
“There’s a small stretch of beach between those two clusters of rock. It’s not much, but you’ll reach it if you swim to the right. We can drift in another thirty, forty feet, no more than that. Only a minute or two.”
“You’re doing more than I expected. I thank you for that.”
“No need to. I pay my debts.”
“And I’m one?”
“Very much so. The doctor in Port Noir sewed up three of my crew after that madness five months ago. You weren’t the only one brought in, you know.”
“The storm? You know me?”
“You were chalk white on the table, but I don’t know you and I don’t want to know you. I had no money then, no catch; the doctor said I could pay when my circumstances were better. You’re my payment.”
“I need papers,” said the man, sensing a source of help. “I need a passport altered.”
“Why speak to me?” asked the captain. “I said I would put a package over the side north of La Ciotat. That’s all I said.”
“You wouldn’t have said that if you weren’t capable of other things.”
“I will not take you into Marseilles. I will not risk the patrol boats. The Sûreté has squadrons all over the harbor; the narcotics teams are maniacs. You pay them or you pay twenty years in a cell.”
“Which means I can get papers in Marseilles. And you can help me.”
“I did not say that.”
“Yes, you did. I need a service and that service can be found in a place where you won’t take me—still the service is there. You said it.”
“Said what?”
“That you’ll talk to me in Marseilles—if I can get there without you. Just tell me where.”
The skipper of the fishing boat studied the patient’s face; the decision was not made lightly, but it was made. “There’s a café on rue Sarrasin, south of Old Harbor—Le Bouc de Mer. I’ll be there tonight between nine and eleven. You’ll need money, some of it in advance.”
“How much?”
“That’s between you and the man you speak with.”
“I’ve got to have an idea.”
“It’s cheaper if you have a document to work with; otherwise one has to be stolen.”
“I told you. I’ve got one.”
The captain shrugged. “Fifteen hundred, two thousand francs. Are we wasting time?”
The patient thought of the oilcloth packet strapped to his waist. Bankruptcy lay in Marseilles, but so did an altered passport, a passport to Zurich. “I’ll handle it,” he said, not knowing why he sounded so confident. “Tonight, then.”
The captain peered at the dimly lit shoreline. “This is as far as we can drift. You’re on your own now. Remember, if we don’t meet in Marseilles, you’ve never seen me and I’ve never seen you. None of my crew has seen you, either.”
“I’ll be there. Le Bouc de Mer, rue Sarrasin, south of Old Harbor.”
“In God’s hands,” said the skipper, signaling a crewman at the wheel; the engines rumbled beneath the boat. “By the way, the clientele at Le Bouc are not used to the Parisian dialect. I’d rough it up if I were you.”
“Thanks for the advice,” said the patient as he swung his legs over the gunnel and lowered himself into the water. He held his knapsack above the surface, legs scissoring to stay afloat. “See you tonight,” he added in a louder voice, looking up at the black hull of the fishing boat.
There was no one there; the captain had left the railing. The only sounds were the slapping of the waves against the wood and the muffled acceleration of the engines.
You’re on your own now.
He shivered and spun in the cold water, angling his body toward the shore, remembering to sidestroke to his right, to head for a cluster of rocks on the right. If the captain knew what he was talking about, the current would take him into the unseen beach.
It did; he could feel the undertow pulling his bare feet into the sand, making the last thirty yards the most difficult to cross. But the canvas knapsack was relatively dry, still held above the breaking waves.
Minutes later he was sitting on a dune of wild grass, the tall reeds bending with the offshore breezes, the first rays of morning intruding on the night sky. The sun would be up in an hour; he would have to move with it.
He opened the knapsack and took out a pair of boots and heavy socks along with rolled-up trousers and a coarse denim shirt. Somewhere in his past he had learned to pack with an economy of space; the knapsack contained far more than an observer might think. Where had he learned that? Why? The questions never stopped.
He got up and took off the British walking shorts he had accepted from Washburn. He stretched them across the reeds of grass to dry; he could discard nothing. He removed his undershirt and did the same.
Standing there naked on the dune, he felt an odd sense of exhilaration mingled with a hollow pain in the middle of his stomach. The pain was fear, he knew that. He understood the exhilaration, too.
He had passed his first test. He had trusted an instinct—perhaps a compulsion—and had known what to say and how to respond. An hour ago he was without an immediate destination, knowing only that Zurich was his objective, but knowing, too, that there were borders to cross, official eyes to satisfy. The eight-year-old passport was so obviously not his own that even the dullest immigration clerk would spot the fact. And even if he managed to cross into Switzerland with it, he had to get out; with each move the odds of his being detained were multiplied. He could not permit that. Not now; not until he knew more. The answers were in Zurich, he had to travel freely, and he had honed in on a captain of a fishing boat to make that possible.
You are not helpless. You will find your way.
Before the day was over he would make a connection to have Washburn’s passport altered by a professional, transformed into a license to travel. It was the first concrete step, but before it was taken there was the consideration of money. The two thousand francs the doctor had given him were inadequate; they might not even be enough for the passport itself. What good was a license to travel without the means to do so? Money. He had to get money. He had to think about that.