Angel's Ransom (13 page)

It was a small advantage, almost more of a frustration than a hope. In all probability some inquiry would be made
in Monaco about a yacht that inexplicably abandoned its
crew. Questions might even be beamed at the
Angel
over
Radio Grasse, which handled all the ship-to-shore traffic in
that part of the Mediterranean. There was no way he could
put the information to practical use, yet it suddenly seemed
vitally important to Blake that he should know if such an
inquiry were being made.

It was seven o’clock in the morning when he switched on the radiophone. Radio Grasse began its daily schedule at
6.30, but the regular morning weather report and news of
interest to mariners was broadcast at
7.33, when an announcement
was also made of the list of vessels invited to
open communications and receive messages that had been
filed with the transmitting station. The
Angel
had been at sea
eighteen hours. Time enough for an inquiry to have begun,
if it had begun.

He passed the next twenty minutes trying to find a news broadcast in a language he could understand. There was a
possibility that a message for the
Angel
could come through
some other agency than Radio Grasse, but to explore the
shortwave channels he had to leave the wheel unattended,
and the stiff morning breeze had put up a sea that pushed
the
Angel
’s
bearing off as fast as he corrected it. He was
listening to a spate of rapid Italian from a Sardinian station
when Jules thrust open the door of the pilot-house to scowl
at him.

‘You’re leaving a wake like a crooked stick,’ he said. ‘What are you doing? What have you got that thing on for?’

‘Weather forecast. In ten minutes.’

‘Get away from it!’

Jules followed the order, when Blake did not immediately obey, by reaching for the fat cable that was the radiophone
’s
power artery. At his sharp tug there was a single crackling
flash, an acrid
odor
of burned insulation, and silence. To
make certain that the radiophone remained dead, the sailor
took a knife from his pocket and sawed the cable off at the
point it entered the cabinet.

‘I’ll give you all the weather forecasts you need,’ he growled. ‘You stick to do
ing what you’re told to do, Cap
tain. Right now you take half an hour off to go look at those
engines. They’re running hot, and God help you all if they
break down!’

‘I have asked Radio Grasse to request communication with the yacht,’ Neyrolle said. ‘The message went out with
the morning weather forecast and will go out regularly at
two-hour intervals. There is no compulsion on the
Angel
to be
listening for a call, and from what we know of Farr
’s
attitude
toward authority it is wholly possible that he will not choose
to respond even if the message reaches him. I can only hope
that he wishes to.’

‘And is able to,’ George said.

‘There is that to consider,’ Neyrolle agreed. He looked tired and worried. ‘
Peste
, if only we
knew
something.’

‘Is anything else news since yesterday?’

‘Unfortunately, no.’

‘What about the writ of attachment?’

‘The answers are negative, so far. We have not found that it was issued, and we have not proved that it was not issued.
I expect to hear by the end of the day.’

‘What then?’

‘It depends on what we learn. If an attachment exists, then it would seem quite reasonable that the
Angel
escaped
its service, as the engineer has suggested. If no attachment
exists, I shall’ - Neyrolle sighed heavily - ‘continue to
investigate.’

‘Why don’t you put the International Police on it? Or the American Sixth Fleet? The Navy is spread all over the
Mediterranean. It could find the
Angel
in hours.’

‘I shall not hesitate to ask for help from both organizations when I am reasonably sure that help is needed.’

The rebuke was plain. George flushed. Before he could fire back, the
sous-chef
went on, ‘At the moment, I need a
different kind of assistance.’

‘What kind is that?’

Neyrolle
shook a
Gauloise
out of a crumpled pack on his desk, offered one to George, and lit his own when the
reporter declined.

‘
S
omeone to talk further with the steward and the engineer. I suspect that more facts can be had from them by
proper questioning, but unfortunately they are both anti-police, the steward stubbornly so because he knows I am
skeptical
of his story. I doubt that I would learn more,
directly, than either of them has told already. On the other
hand, someone not connected with the police, a man with a
legitimate interest in the
Angel
as news, who could perhaps
buy a drink, join in cursing the stupidity of the flics and,
with what he already knows about the ways of Freddy Farr,
interpret other information intelligently - you follow me?’

‘I follow you. You need me, so you’re talking soft. Quite a change from yesterday.’

George made no attempt to keep the note of triumph out of his voice. Neyrolle spread his hands in a Gallic gesture of
helplessness, and did not let the other man see his eyes.

‘I need you,’ he agreed. ‘My hands are tied unless I am given something to go on. I do not even know that a crime
has been committed. Without that knowledge, I can neither
move forward nor stand still.’

‘I’ll make you a deal. You keep me posted on what you know, I’ll bring you whatever I can find out, and I get the
story, whatever it may be, exclusively.’

‘I concede that your help could be of value to me. But I can hardly be expected to pledge that I will say nothing at
all to any other reporter if I am questioned. I will guarantee
you preferential rights, not an exclusive story.’

George shook his head stubbornly.

‘That
’s
not enough. If I’m going to work for you, I’ve got to have an assurance that it will pay dividends. My time is all
I’ve got to sell.’

Neyrolle hesitated for another moment, then shrugged. ‘Very we
ll
. I am in no position to bargain.’ He was, if
George had known him better, altogether too humble. ‘The
engineer can be reached through the Commandant du Port,
on the Quai des
É
tats
Unis. The steward
–’
he went
through the papers on his desk until he found the address he
was looking for ‘ - at La
Rascasse
. It is a small bar and
cafe at the foot of the Quai du Commerce. If he is not there
they will take a message, but please do not waste any time.
You understand my position.’

‘Better than you think,’ George said.

Neyrolle
lit another
Gauloise
and smoked thoughtfully for some minutes after the reporter left his office. He had
satisfied himself that George was not a gambler, in any
sense. His interest could not be won with the probability of
an exclusive story, only a guarantee of it. It made the puzzle
of the article on Freddy Farr written for a doubtful return
more
than ever puzzling.

He called his clerk and made inquiries about the
dossier
on Saunders, George. The clerk reported nothing new. Inquiries
were still in process.

George tried La
Rascasse
first because it was closer than the office of the Port Commandant. He had good luck. A
waiter pointed Cesar out, alone on the terrace. The steward
had a
pastis
in front of him and was in the process of getting
drunk, from the number of saucers on the table to mark the
drinks he had already taken that morning. George identified
himself, ordered a coffee and another
pastis
, and mentioned
Sûreté
Publique
.

No more was necessary. Cesar was ripe for an attentive and not too
skeptical
audience.

‘It is easy to see how a bonehead like Michaud can fail to see the truth when it sticks him in the eye,’ he said sourly.
‘But when a man whose business it is to catch crooks refuses
to accept the fact of a
gangsterism
because we do not have
gangsterisms
in Monaco
–’
He shrugged, finished his drink,
and began on the new one George had ordered. ‘Ah, well.
Your health, monsieur. And frustration to all flics.’

‘Tell me what happened yesterday morning, Cesar. From the beginning.’

‘I have already told all there was to tell.’ Cesar made a face. ‘M. Neyrolle has it, in writing.’

‘I’m not the flics, and I want to hear it over again. Go ahead. Talk.’

‘Well
–’

George was a good listener. He closed his eyes and let Cesar ramble, interrupting now and then only to take him
back over a detail that was not clear. Cesar had had just
enough drink to stimulate his memory and, to the same
extent, his imagination.

‘ - snappy about it when I tried to tell him the
permis
was a blind to get us ashore,’ he said at one point in the narrative.

‘Of course he’d had this dame aboard most of the night, so he couldn’t have got much sleep, and he was in a hurry
–’

‘Wait a minute!’ George sat up straight. ‘What dame?
You’re talking about Blake now, aren’t you?’

‘That
’s
right.’

‘He had a girl aboard during the night?’

‘A female, anyway. I’d turned in. I didn’t see her.’

‘How do you know she was there, then?’

Cesar explained about the handbag. George said, ‘ Couldn’t it have been one of Freddy
’s
girls, thinking he was aboard?’

‘Maybe. But Freddy
’s
girls generally own something
flossier in the way of handbags, and anyway he doesn’t go
for innocents. Or maybe they don’t go for him.’

‘How do you know she was an innocent?’

‘Why, the stuff that was in her purse. You can always tell.
A femme du monde
, now, she carries a certain set of junk, a
schoolgirl something else. This one was in between. Not
Freddy
’s
type at all.’

‘Was Blake - did he often have women aboard?’

‘Never that I know of. The dames were always Freddy
’s
dames. Of course it
’s
hard to tell what the captain did when
he was ashore, but he didn’t spend much time ashore. The
Angel
is his girl.’

George began to feel the thrill of discovery. He questioned Cesar at length without learning more about the mysterious
midnight visitor, but he had enough to take to Neyrolle. The
rest was up to the
sous-chef
’s
organization, which, as George
knew, was highly efficient at routine investigations. All they
needed, he thought - and jeered inwardly as he hurried back
to the
Sûreté
Publique
- was the kind of a lead a good news-hawk could give them. He was feeling pleased with himself.

One of the motors was running hot, as Jules had said, but only one. An oil feed line was plugged. It took Blake barely
five minutes to clear the block. He used another twenty
minutes to check temperatures and pressures, assuring himself that nothing else in the engine-room required immediate
attention. He was grateful that Michaud
’s
superb care of the
Angel
’s
motors made trouble improbable.

But he had other cares besides the motors. Climbing the engine-room ladder after he had finished below, he went over
in his mind the list of duties of the crew for which he was now
sole substitute. Deck, machin
ery, deckhouse, cabins, galley –

He remembered the stove that was not working, and went forward.