Night Over Water (54 page)

It was secured by one simple lock, which he snapped with the blade of his penknife.

As well as the lock, it had six brass clasps that were fastened without keys. He undid them all.

The trunk was designed to be used as a wardrobe in a stateroom on board a liner. Harry stood it on end and opened it up. It divided into two spacious cupboards. On one side was a hanging rail with dresses and coats, and a small shoe compartment at the bottom. The other side contained six drawers.

Harry went through the drawers first. They were made of light wood covered in leather, and were lined with velvet. Lady Oxenford had silk blouses, cashmere sweaters, lace underwear and crocodile belts.

On the other side, the top of the trunk lifted like a lid, and the hanging rail slid out to make it easier to get at the dresses. Harry ran his hands up and down each garment and felt all around the sides of the trunk.

Finally he opened the shoe compartment. There was nothing in it but shoes.

He was crestfallen. He had been so sure that she would have her jewels with her; but maybe there was a flaw in his reasoning.

It was too soon to give up hope.

His first inclination was to look for the rest of the Oxenford family’s luggage, but he thought again. If I were going to transport priceless jewels in checked baggage, he thought, I would try to conceal them somehow. And it would be easier to make a hiding place in a big trunk than in a regular suitcase.

He decided to look again.

He started with the hanging compartment. He put one arm inside the trunk and one outside and tried to gauge the thickness of the sides: if they seemed abnormal there might be a hidden compartment. But he found nothing unusual. Turning to the other side, he pulled all the drawers out completely—

And found the hiding place.

His heart beat faster.

A large manila envelope and a leather wallet were taped to the back of the trunk.

“Amateurs,” he said, shaking his head.

With growing excitement he began detaching the tapes. The first item to come loose was the envelope. It felt as if it contained nothing but a wad of papers, but Harry ripped it open anyway. Inside were about fifty sheets of heavy paper with elaborate printing on one side. It took him a while to figure out what they were, but eventually he decided they were bearer bonds, each worth a hundred thousand dollars.

Fifty of those added up to five million dollars, which was a million pounds.

Harry sat staring at the bonds. A million pounds. It was almost too much to take in.

Harry knew why they were there. The British government had brought in emergency exchange-control regulations to stop money leaving the country. Oxenford was smuggling his bonds out, which was a criminal offense, of course.

He’s just as much of a crook as I am, Harry thought wryly.

Harry had never stolen bonds. Would he be able to cash them? They were payable to the bearer: that was stated plainly on the front of each certificate. But they were also individually numbered, so that they could be identified. Would Oxenford report them stolen? That might mean admitting he had smuggled them out of England. But he could probably think of a lie to cover that.

It was too dangerous. Harry had no expertise in the field. If he tried to cash the bonds, he would be caught. Reluctantly, he put them aside.

The other hidden item was a tan leather folder like a man’s pocketbook but somewhat larger. Harry detached it.

It looked like a jewelry wallet.

The soft leather was fastened with a zipper. He opened it.

There, lying on the black velvet lining, was the Delhi Suite.

It seemed to glow in the gloom of the baggage hold like stained glass in a cathedral. The profound red of the rubies alternated with the rainbow sparkle of the diamonds. The stones were huge, perfectly matched and exquisitely cut, each one set on a gold base and surrounded by delicate gold petals. Harry was awestruck.

He picked up the necklace solemnly and let the gems run through his fingers like colored water. How strange, he thought bemusedly, that something should look so warm and feel so cold. It was the most beautiful piece of jewelry he had ever handled, perhaps the most beautiful ever made.

And it would change his life.

After a minute or two he set down the necklace and examined the rest of the set. The bracelet was like the necklace, with alternating rubies and diamonds, although the stones were proportionately smaller. The earrings were particularly dainty: each had a ruby stud with a drop of alternating small diamonds and rubies on a gold chain, each stone on a tiny version of the same gold petal setting.

Harry imagined the suite on Margaret. The red and gold would look stunning on her pale skin. I’d like to see her wearing nothing but this, he thought, and the vision gave him an erection.

He was not sure how long he had sat on the floor, gazing at the precious stones, when he heard someone coming.

The first thought that flashed through his mind was that it was the assistant engineer; but the footsteps sounded different: intrusive, aggressive, authoritarian ... official.

Suddenly he was taut with fear, his stomach tight, his teeth clenched, his fists balled.

The steps came rapidly closer. In a sudden frenzy of activity Harry replaced the drawers, threw in the envelope containing the bonds and closed up the trunk. He was stuffing the Delhi Suite into his pocket when the door to the hold opened.

He ducked behind the trunk.

There was a long moment of silence. He had a dreadful feeling he had not got down fast enough, and the guy had seen him. He heard moderately hard breathing, like that of a fat man who has hurried upstairs. Was the fellow going to come right inside and look around, or what? Harry held his breath. The door closed.

Had the man gone out? Harry listened hard. He could no longer hear breathing. He stood and looked out. The man had gone.

He sighed with relief.

But what was going on?

He had a notion those heavy footsteps and hard breathing belonged to a policeman. Or maybe a customs officer? Perhaps this had only been a routine check.

He went to the door and cracked it. He could hear muffled voices from way off in the flight cabin, but there seemed to be no one right outside. He stepped out and stood by the door to the flight cabin. It was ajar, and he could hear two male voices.

“The guy ain’t on the plane.”

“He has to be. He didn’t get off.”

The accents were a muted American that Harry recognized as Canadian. But who were they talking about?

“Maybe he sneaked off after everyone else.”

“So where has he gone? He’s nowhere around.”

Had Frankie Gordino made his escape? Harry wondered.

“Who is he, anyway?”

“They say he’s an ‘associate’ of this hoodlum they got on the plane.”

So Gordino himself had not got away; but one of his gang had been on board, had been discovered and had made his escape. Which of the respectable-looking passengers could it have been?

“It ain’t a crime to be an associate, is it?”

“No, but he’s traveling on a false passport.”

A chill struck Harry. He was traveling on a false passport himself. Surely they could not be looking for him?

“Well, what do we do now?” he heard.

“Report back to Sergeant Morris.”

After a moment the scary thought dawned on Harry that he could be the one they were looking for. If the police had learned, or guessed, that someone on board was going to try to rescue Gordino, they would naturally run a check on the passenger list; and they would soon discover that Harry Vandenpost had reported his passport stolen in London two years ago; and then they would only have to call at his home to learn that he was not on the Pan American Clipper but sitting in the kitchen eating his cornflakes and reading the morning paper, or something. Knowing that Harry was an impostor, they would naturally assume he was the one who was going to try to rescue Gordino.

No, he told himself, don’t jump to conclusions. There could be some other explanation.

A third voice joined in the conversation. “Who are you guys looking for?” It sounded like the assistant engineer, Mickey Finn.

“Guy’s using the name of Harry Vandenpost, but he ain’t him.”

That settled it. Harry felt stunned with shock. He had been found out. The vision of the country house with the tennis court faded like an aging photograph, and instead he saw a blacked-out London, a court, a prison cell, and then, eventually, an army barracks. This was the worst luck he had ever heard of.

The assistant engineer was saying: “You know, I found him sneaking around here while we were at Botwood!”

“Well, he ain’t up here now.”

“Are you sure?”

Shut up, Mickey, Harry thought.

“We looked all over.”

“Did you check the mechanics’ stations?”

“Where are they?”

“In the wings.”

“Yeah, we looked in the wings.”

“But did you crawl along? There are places to hide in there that you couldn’t see from here in the cabin.”

“We better look again.”

These two policemen sounded kind of dumb, Harry thought.

He doubted whether their sergeant would trust them very far. If he had any sense he would order one more search of the plane. And next time they would surely look behind the steamer trunk. Where could Harry hide?

There were several little hiding places, but the crew would know them all. A thorough search was bound to take in the bow compartment, the toilets, the wings and the shallow void in the tail. Any other place Harry could find would surely be known to the crew.

He was stuck.

Could he leave? He might sneak off the plane and get away along the beach. It was a slim chance, but better than giving himself up. But even if he could get out of this little village undetected, where could he go? He could talk his way out of anything in a city, but he had a feeling he was an awfully long way from any cities. In the countryside he was a dead loss. He needed crowds, alleyways, railway stations and shops. He had an idea that Canada was a pretty big country, most of it trees.

He would be all right if only he could get to New York.

But where could he hide in the meantime?

He heard the policemen come out of the wings. For safety he ducked back into the hold—

And found himself staring straight at the answer to his problem.

He could hide in Lady Oxenford’s trunk.

Could he get inside? He thought so. It was about five feet high and two feet square: if it had been empty you could have got two people into it. It was not empty, of course: he would have to make room in it by taking out some of the clothes. Then what would he do with them? He could not leave them lying around. But he could cram them into his own half-empty suitcase.

He had to hurry.

He crawled over the piled luggage and grabbed his own suitcase. Working feverishly, he opened it and stuffed Lady Oxenford’s coats and dresses into it. He had to sit on the lid to close it again.

Now he could get into the trunk. He found he could close it from the inside easily enough. Would he be able to breathe when it was shut? He would not be inside for long: it might get stuffy but he would live.

Would the cops notice if the clasps were undone? They might. Could he close them from inside? That looked difficult. He studied the problem for a long moment. If he made holes in the trunk near the clasps, he might be able to poke his knife through and manipulate the clasps through the holes. The same holes would bring him air, too.

He took out his penknife. The trunk was made of wood covered with leather. The dark green-brown leather was imprinted with a pattern of gold-colored flowers. Like all penknives, his had a pointed implement for getting stones out of horses’ hooves. He set the point in the middle of one of the flowers and pushed it in. It penetrated the leather easily enough, but the wood was harder. He worked it in and out. The wood was about a quarter of an inch thick, he guessed. It took a minute or two but eventually he got through.

He pulled the point out. Because of the pattern, the hole could hardly be seen.

He got inside the trunk. With relief he found that he could close and open the clasp from inside.

There were two clasps on top and three down the side. He went to work on the top ones first, as they were most visible. He had just finished when he heard footsteps again.

He got inside the trunk and closed it.

Somehow it was not so easy to close the clasps this time. Standing with his legs bent he found it difficult to maneuver. But he managed it at last.

His position was painfully uncomfortable after a couple of minutes. He twisted and turned but got no relief. He would just have to suffer.

His breathing sounded very loud. Noises from outside were muffled. However, he could hear footsteps outside the hold, probably because there was no carpet there and vibrations were transmitted through the deck. There were now at least three people out there, he guessed. He could not hear doors opening and closing, but he felt a much nearer step and knew someone had come into the hold.

A voice came suddenly from right next to him. “I don’t see how the bastard got away from us.”

Don’t look at the side clasps, please, Harry thought fearfully.

There was a knock on the top of the trunk. Harry stopped breathing. Maybe the guy just leaned his elbow on it, he thought.

Someone else spoke from a distance.

“No, he ain’t on this plane,” the man replied. “We’ve looked everywhere.”

The other party spoke again. Harry’s knees hurt. For God’s sake, he thought, go and chat somewhere else!

“Oh, we’ll catch him all right. He ain’t gonna walk a hundred and fifty miles to the border without somebody sees him.”