‘They’ll merely lead us a dance, and we shan’t be any nearer to a solution of our problem. Yes, I see what you mean. All right, we’ll steer clear for a bit. As the dredger is anchored off the Isle of Wight, perhaps the cruiser will turn up there, too.’
Chapter Thirteen
OPERATION DREDGER
‘… but the entrance demands only ordinary caution.’
e. keble chatterton – The Yachtsman’s Pilot
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‘Where are we making for, child?’ asked Mrs Bradley, later.
‘Well, I’m not going to put in to Lymington if I can help it,’ said Laura, ‘with those British Railway steamers bucketing past and the stream of the Solent acting horrid, as it’s bound to do after a day like this, I should think. What about making for the Beaulieu River, and then creeping back on the trail?’
‘It is your cruiser,’ said Mrs Bradley, ‘and I should think that would do very nicely, except that we mustn’t let them get away from us, and we don’t want to meet any liners coming out from Southampton.’
‘They’re mostly away by five on this tide, I think, and probably the railway steamers have finished for the day. What about Keyhaven? By the time we’re behind Hurst Castle they won’t be able to pick us out, and it will look as though we’re going to find moorings there for the night. Then, when we like, we can cross towards the Isle of Wight and pick up the trail again from there. We’ll have to moor until dusk, and then we’re not likely to be recognized if we have to go fairly close to them.’
Keyhaven was small, and a number of yachts and cruisers had permanent moorings there. The tide was sufficient, and Laura knew enough to keep clear of eddies. She picked up the leading marks, and went in.
The mud-flats on either side of the anchorage were covered with marshy grass and, except for Hurst Fort, to the south-east, there was no eminence on the low-lying shores. They remained stationary long enough for Laura to row the dinghy to the steps near the inn, where she purchased a quart of beer and made inquiries about moorings.
By the time she got back to Canto Five it was becoming dark, so she suggested to Mrs Bradley that they might as well have a quick meal and then move off. They put on their lights and chugged steadily and slowly past a single line of moored craft until they gained the entrance and were off Old Pier but some distance from it. The High Light was already functioning, and they soon left it almost directly behind them as they crossed the narrowest part of the Solent and made for the shore of the Isle of Wight near Sconce Point. Here Laura steered north-east, and crawled round the coast to the little bay for which the dredger had made. It was still just sufficiently light for them to recognize her unmistakable silhouette with the erection to take the bucket-chain, and the buckets themselves slanting stiffly from amidships towards and under the crane in her bows. She was squat, utilitarian and ugly, almost a repulsive sight except for her funnel, which had the comical effect of having been borrowed from the Rocket and stuck on like a clown’s hat in a pantomime.
‘Something frightfully squamous about dredgers,’ muttered Laura. ‘Where do we go from here?’
‘Anchor at the farther end of the bay. Then we’ll row off in the dinghy, beach her, and stroll along the shore to see what can be seen. The moon is up, so the darker it gets now the better. We should be able to find some vantage-point from which we can observe without ourselves being noticed.’
This proved easy enough. The beach was sandy on an outgoing tide, and behind it rose cliffs which offered shadowed nooks in any one of which it was possible to hide. They strolled by the edge of the water for a time, and, as they approached the anchorage of the dredger, they altered course to gain the shadow of the cliffs. In the first alcove they tried, Laura almost fell over a courting couple, but except for these, and three girls who were taking a stroll by the edge of the water, there seemed to be nobody about. They found a suitable spot and sat down on the rubble which at some time had fallen from the cliff.
The dredger was correctly lighted, but not a sound came from her, although they sat there for over an hour.
‘I’m going to paddle the dinghy out to her and have a look-see,’ said Laura. ‘I don’t believe there’s anybody on board.’
‘Then I’m coming, too, dear child.’
They returned to the dinghy, now exposed by the moonlight, pushed off, and stepped aboard, wet, but (in Laura’s case), happy to be doing something active. It did not take long to reach the dredger, for the tide did most of the work. They reached her to find a rope-ladder trailing over the side.
They shipped their oars and Laura caught hold of the anchor-chain and pulled the dinghy close in to the side of the dredger. The manoeuvres, although they had been carried out with caution, had not been soundless, so, whilst the dinghy gently eased herself up and down, Laura and her employer listened intently. There was nothing to be heard, however, except the lazy slap of the outgoing tide against the shoreward side of the dredger, so, after a while, Laura muttered:
‘Unship your right-hand oar, and, when I say Now, pull us round a bit so that we’re stem-on to this anchor-chain. I’m going aboard.’
Mrs Bradley felt for the small revolver which she had carried all day in her skirt-pocket. She was almost certain that there was nobody on board, but she did not intend to take chances.
‘Right,’ she said. Laura shifted her grip on the anchor-chain.
‘Now!’ she said, and as the dinghy came round she stood up and made a cat-jump. The anchor-chain slackened suddenly, and Laura, afraid of smashing herself against the hull, let go and fell into the sea. She came up, spitting, and swam round to where they had seen the rope-ladder dangling over the side. Up this she went hand over hand, and climbed aboard. Mrs Bradley, who had heard the splash and guessed not only what had happened but what Laura would do, appeared on the seaward side of the dredger again and caught Laura’s softly-muttered ‘O.K. I’m aboard’.
It was soon certain that she was alone on the ship. She had never been on a dredger before and at any other time would have been interested in its machinery and gear; but, for one thing, below deck everything was dark, and, for another, there might be no time to lose. By the time she had groped her way down a slippery iron companion-ladder to the cabin she had made so much noise that she must, she thought, have awakened even the heaviest sleeper, if he were on board. She was about to feel her way on deck again… for it was uncomfortably eerie on the dredger… when she bit her tongue in nervous astonishment as a voice in the darkness said:
‘Polypodium Vulgare, dammit! Polypodium Vulgare, dammit! Polypodium Vulgare, curse your silly eyes!’
‘Good Lord!’ said Laura, recovering her nerve. ‘Captain Flint in person! All right, Polly! Pretty Polly, then!’
‘Lastrea Filix-Mas! Lastrea Filix-Mas! Filix-Mas! Filix-Mas! Filix-Mas!’ screamed the parrot. Laura wasted no more time on blandishments. She crawled up on deck and called over the side to the occupant of the dinghy:
‘Nobody here but a parrot saying… get it, quick, while I remember… Polypodium Vulgare, dammit and Lastrea Filix-Mas. Doesn’t mean a thing to me, unless it’s some more of those ferns. Shall I risk putting on a light in the cabin, do you think?’
‘No. Come half-way down the rope-ladder and I’ll give you my torch. Are your hands dry?’
‘Yes. I’ve rubbed them dry groping about up here. Wasn’t I an ass to fall in? I’m squelching water all over the place!’
The torch changed hands at the third attempt, and Laura, taking the ends of the large handkerchief (in which Mrs Bradley had cradled and tied the small torch) between her teeth, climbed aboard again.
With the torch to aid her, a search of the interior of the dredger was simple but unrewarding. The parrot had turned either sulky or sleepy, and did not utter again except to give an indignant squeal as the tiny beam of light invaded its cage. Except for an empty wine-bottle and the remains of a loaf of bread on a wooden platter with a knife beside it on the cabin table, there was no indica
tion (but for the presence of the parrot) that any human being had set foot on board until Laura’s own arrival, and she was about to return to the deck and so to the dinghy when she said aloud:
‘Grass idiot! Think, woman, think!’
Having thus addressed herself, she put Mrs Bradley’s torch with some difficulty into the sopping-wet pocket of her slacks, picked up the knife by the tip of the blade and, folding the bottle-neck in Mrs Bradley’s handkerchief, she essayed the companion-way once more. Risking every moment being precipitated backwards by the motion of the anchored vessel, which, although not heavy, was more than a little noticeable to a person with both hands full, Laura managed to get up on deck.
‘I say!’ she called over the side. ‘I’ve impounded two fingerprinted objects. Do you suppose they’re any good?’
‘The police, no doubt, will think so, but if you bring them away with you the persons who have charge of this vessel will know that someone has been on board. I think we might risk that, though.’
‘They’d know, anyway. I’ve dripped everywhere. I’ve got a wine-bottle and a bread-knife. Only thing is, I don’t know how to get them down to the dinghy. If only it was an iron ladder instead of rope! How can we manage? I can bring the knife down between my teeth, I suppose, but I don’t know what to do about the bottle.’
‘Is it empty?’
‘Yes, and it’s got the cork in it.’
‘Drop it overboard into a patch of moonlight and I’ll retrieve it if I can. The sea won’t wash off fingerprints if they are reasonably oily, and, fortunately, most of them are!’
With their treasure trove, as Laura deprecatingly and jokingly called it, they returned straightway to the cruiser, and Laura changed her clothes.
‘And now for old Trench’s tip, and the Damp House… funny name!… at Bridbay,’ said Laura, starting up her engine. ‘Hope we don’t run into our returning sand-dredgers going round the next point!’
They ran into nothing except the moonlight, and in less than half an hour were between the leading-beacons at the entrance to Bridbay Harbour. As they passed the beacons and were rounding the bend between the lighted buoys which showed the way to the anchorage, the clock on a nearby church struck the witching hour.
‘Midnight, and all well,’ murmured Laura, as the anchor went in. ‘Now where’s the dump we’re after, I wonder?’
‘We must wait for dawn,’ said Mrs Bradley. ‘For one thing, we’d better have some sleep, and, for another, we can’t go looking for the house at this time of night.’
‘I’m hungry, too,’ said Laura. ‘We’ve had nothing except that biscuit and cheese and beer at Keyhaven since we had our lunch.’
‘Quite so. You will turn in while I get some soup and sandwiches ready.’
‘Don’t trouble about sandwiches for me! A thick slice or two of tinned tongue and a couple of wedges of bread and butter will do me fine. You haven’t told me yet what you make of the parrot’s Latin or whatever it was.’
‘I am extremely interested in the parrot’s conversation, and extremely grateful to the parrot,’ Mrs Bradley responded. ‘Polypodium Vulgare is the Common Polypody, and stands, possibly, in the fern code, for Our Men, or something of that sort. I deduced this from the parrot’s habit of following up the repetition of the name with the irritable “dammit”. This indicates, of course, that some stupid or uneducated person was being given a password which would reveal that he was a member of the gang to other members. The parrot’s second repetition, Lastrea Filix-Mas, the Male Fern, is, just possibly, the code name by which the leader of the gang is known. There is a certain arrogance about the choice of this name which causes me to think it may be —’
‘The boss’s signature-tune? Sounds all right. Of course, we’ve nothing to go on.’
‘Except Asplenium Septentrionale, the Forked Spleenwort, indicating, I think, that two attempts at something are to be made. But I admit this is all so much guesswork, and my reading of the fern-code is possibly ludicrously wrong. Here is your soup, and I have added baked beans from a tin.’
Just as the cruiser’s portholes began to turn grey, Laura, who throve and flourished on an average of three hours sleep a night, rose from her bunk and went on deck. The harbour water was a sea of mist and near the Canto Five lay yachts and cruisers of all sizes and many designs, but she could not see far enough to know whether the rusty cruiser which had taken stores from the dredger was in the harbour or not.
‘Go and look for our friends if you want to, while I get breakfast,’ said Mrs Bradley’s voice behind her. ‘A towel and a bathing cap are sufficient camouflage, I think.’
Laura went below, exchanged her pyjamas for a bikini, draped the largest towel she could find around her powerful and beautiful shoulders, pulled on her swimming cap and dropped into the dinghy.
The morning brightened rapidly and the baffling haze on the water began to lift. She spotted the rusty cruiser with a thrill of joy, and marked its position. It was lying almost under the drawbridge, close to the steps, a fact which seemed to indicate that its crew had business ashore.
Laura sculled on, under the bridge, which carried a toll-road inland. Beyond the buoyed channel and the toll-house, she found a suitable spot to swim. The water was cold at that time in the morning, and breakfast, she thought, must not be long delayed, so she contented herself with a brisk five minutes in the water, and then, draping the towel around her almost naked body, she rowed rapidly back to Canto Five.
There was grape-fruit, cereal, toast and scrambled eggs for breakfast, and the crew did not stop to wash up, but, while the morning was still very young, they went ashore and tied up at the steps near which the rusty cruiser was moored.
No one was visible or audible on board her, and Laura would have been tempted to try the tactics which she had already carried out on the dredger, but time pressed if they were to find Damp House before the village was stirring.
They crossed the drawbridge, placed the fee on the tollhouse window-sill – the gates had been left open – and came into the village past the harbour-master’s house and the post office. At the end of the next street was a fourteenth-century church, and not far away were some shops and a small hotel. Beyond the hotel was a long, narrow pier and nothing else, but between the back of the post office and the landward side of the hotel was a narrow lane of concrete which led back to the harbour. To the right, another lane led to the castle, refortified during the war to control the entrance as it had done in the Middle Ages. Between the castle and the harbour wall was a house of moderate size with heavily-curtained windows and a door which had neither letterbox, knocker, name nor number.
‘This might be it,’ said Laura, ‘but we’d better finish exploring, I suppose. If it is it, I wonder what Trench meant by calling it Damp House?’
They finished exploring the village, and even walked a mile or so up the hill which bore the only inland road, but no dwelling was named Damp House.
‘Well, the first thing to do when the post office opens is to telephone Detective-Inspector Vardon and tell him where we are and where the highly-suspect dredger is. Then he can make up his mind what to do,’ said Mrs Bradley. ‘I shall also tell him about the parrot with the remarkable turn of speech. There is no doubt that we are on the right track. After we have sent out our message, the next thing to do will be to keep a watch on this house, and how that is to be managed without ourselves being detected, I confess that at the moment I do not know.’
‘Let’s get back to the cruiser and plan the campaign. Then, when we come ashore again, you can send your message to the cops and I’ll go and interview the harbourmaster.’
‘An excellent idea,’ said Mrs Bradley. As they walked back to the steps beside which the dinghy was moored, Laura suddenly said:
‘Come to think of it, what did you make of Miss Franks’ admission that Faintley had asked her for a loan of four hundred pounds?’
‘Interesting and possibly instructive. I have thought about that a g
ood deal. Miss Faintley had her salary which, although in one sense inadequate, was enough to live on; she rented, but had not bought, the flat for herself and her aunt, yet she asked for the loan, and must have needed it pretty badly if she thought that Miss Franks would supply it, for Miss Franks, no doubt, has the Jewish sense of money values. I think that at some time we might contact Miss Franks again. That four hundred pounds might be significant.’
‘And, meanwhile, what do we do?’
‘Thereby, as they say, hangs a tale. Pray step into your dinghy and let us go.’
Laura complied with this polite request, and they were soon back on board Canto Five.
‘What did you mean by saying thereby hangs a tale?’ Laura inquired, as she sat on the cabin-top and stared out to sea.
‘How soon can you see the harbour-master?’ Mrs Bradley inquired.
‘Any time after nine, I expect. Why?’
‘His house might afford an excellent base from which to keep an eye on our suspects, if the nameless house near his is the one we want.’
‘Yes, I’d thought of that. But how do we get him to play ball?’
‘I will telephone first. The rest should then be easy.’
‘Sez you, with all respect. But we can try.’
As soon as the church clock struck nine, Mrs Bradley went ashore in the dinghy while Laura washed up the breakfast dishes. Mrs Bradley was back inside half an hour.
‘Give the Inspector time to telephone the harbourmaster,’ she said, ‘and then I think you can go ahead.’
The harbour-master was an old sailor. He was friendly and obliging, and would have been so, Laura concluded, even without the knowledge that their errand was of public importance. As it was, he had agreed to allow her to use a window on the first floor of his house if the police report justified this, so that she could keep a watch on the house without a name. What part Mrs Bradley proposed to play while she herself was thus employed, Laura did not know, and she was too well-disciplined to inquire about it. She was startled, however, by Mrs Bradley’s next question.
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