Dark Side of the Street pc-5

by Jack Higgins

  "There's nothing he can do," Chavasse said. "If he tries to warn them we're on our way, they'll want to know how we found put where to head for in the first place. How long do you think he'd last after that?"

  Pentecost looked at him over his shoulder, eyes widening as the significance of what Chavasse had said sank home and Youngblood laughed harshly.

  "You've got a point there. No reason he shouldn't take a rest for a little while though," and he kicked Pentecost in the side of the head.

  Pentecost rolled over, struggling for breath, aware of the clang of the door closing at the top of the steps and then he plunged into darkness.

  Pain exploding in a chain reaction brought him back from darkness as someone slapped him across the face and a voice repeated his name over and over again. He opened his eyes and stared up into Simon Vaughan's pale face.

  "You do look a mess, old man. Presumably they've been and gone?"

  Pentecost pushed himself up on one elbow. "There were three of them," he croaked. "Not two like you said. Two men and a girl."

  "So that's where she got to! Dear me, I have been careless. Unfortunately I had a little mechanical trouble with the car on the other side of Worcester. I was delayed for the best part of an hour." He helped Pentecost to his feet and sat him in a chair. "When did they leave?"

  Pentecost looked at his watch and found that it was almost seven o'clock. "It can't be more than half an hour."

  "I see. You told them where to go, did you? Bragg's Boatyard, Upton Magna?" Pentecost stared at him, uncertain of what to say, so confused by the pain in his head that he was unable to think straight and Vaughan sighed. "You shouldn't have done that, you know."

  "I couldn't help it," Pentecost said wearily. "They'd have killed me if I hadn't told them. You could probably still catch them."

  "I'm sure I can," Vaughan said. "I have two considerable advantages. A very fast car and the fact that I know exactly where I'm going. They, on the other hand, will have to stick to the backroads and check every signpost and the Dorset countryside can be very confusing at night."

  Pentecost stirred uneasily as Vaughan moved round behind him. "You know your trouble, old man? You think you've got brains, but you haven't-just a certain amount of low cunning. I can't say it's been a pleasure."

  His clenched right fist rose and descended in a hammer blow that splintered the bone at the base of Penetcost's skull. He gave a strange, choking cry and would have tumbled from the chair if Vaughan hadn't held him upright.

  He walked round to the front of the chair quickly, dropped to one knee and then straightened, Pentecost draped across his right shoulder in the fireman's lift.

  Vaughan crossed to the oven Pentecost had turned on and switched it off. As the flames died away, he opened the glass door and the seven-foot base plate rolled out smoothly on its castors. He dropped Pentecost on to it, arranging his limbs neatly, pushed the plate with its burden back inside and closed the glass door.

  He paused to light a cigarette, then pulled the switch. Pentecost's body seemed to jump out of the darkness as great tongues of flame sprang from the brickword to envelop it. His clothing ignited in a second and then, incredibly, an arm was half raised, flaring like a torch and the body moved.

  Vaughan watched with interest for a couple of minutes, then closed the outer steel door, turned the dial up to maximum and went up the stairs quickly.

  A mile the other side of Gloucester, he pulled up at a phone box and dialled World Wide Exports in London.

  "Hello, sweetie, I'm afraid things didn't go according to plan at all here. Our friends are now on their way to Dorset."

  "That's a great pity. What are you going to do about it?"

  "I think I'd better handle things personally from now on. I'll see they get the usual transportation, but somehow, I don't think they're going to manage to raise a landfall."

  "That sounds promising. I'll pass the message along."

  "You do that. I'll follow in another boat to report personally. Should be there for breakfast."

  "I'll let him know."

  The line went dead and Vaughan moved out, whistling softly, got into the Spitfire and drove rapidly away.

  10

  Three to Four- Rain Squalls

  Upton Magna was a fishing village which in other times had enjoyed a considerable importance, but now its population had dwindled to little more than two hundred and there were few boats in the small harbour.

  Bragg's boatyard was out on the point beside an old stone jetty, a collection of dilapidated clapboard buildings, untidy stacks of ageing timber and a line of boats hauled clear of the water that looked as if they never expected to sail again.

  It was just after half past nine when Vaughan entered the village and drove along the main street. There was a small, whitewashed public house about half way along with a car park behind. He left the Spitfire there, well out of sight in the shadows, and went the rest of the way on foot.

  There was a light at the window on the right of the front door of the house directly underneath the faded board sign that carried the legend George Bragg-Boat-builder-Yachts for hire. He went up the steps to the rickety porch and peered in through the window.

  The room was half office, half living quarters and hopelessly cluttered and untidy. Beyond the wooden reception desk beside the entrance, George Bragg was reading a newspaper at a table which seemed to be covered with a week's accumulation of dirty dishes.

  He was well into his sixties, a great bear of a man with a grizzled untidy beard. He got to his feet and, to Vaughan's surprise, reached for a crutch. He picked up an enamel mug and hobbled to the coffee pot on the stove, his right foot dragging awkwardly in a plaster cast.

  Vaughan pushed open the door and went inside. Bragg turned quickly in surprise, still holding the mug in one hand and the coffee pot in the other.

  "I wasn't expecting you, Mr. Smith."

  "What happened to the foot?" Vaughan said.

  Bragg shrugged. "Bloody silly, really. Tripped and fell over a pile of scrap on my way through the yard the other night."

  "Tanked up to the eyeballs as usual no doubt," Vaughan said. "How bad is it?"

  "I've broken a couple of bones."

  "Good! As it happens that suits me very nicely. Is the Pride of Man ready for sea?"

  "As always, just like you ordered. Are you taking her out?"

  He was a man stamped with failure. It showed clearly in the broken veins on his face, the bleary drink-sodden eyes, but he was desperately eager to please this strange, dark young man with the white face who was the one thing which had stood between him and ruin for almost two years.

  "Not this time," Vaughan said. "But some people will be arriving within the next hour at the outside. Two men and a girl. They'll give you the usual password and they'll expect to be passed on."

  Bragg looked dubious. "I'd like to oblige, but I'm not too sure I could make the trip with this foot of mine."

  "As I said before, that suits me fine. The foot gives you an excuse not to go. Make it seem even worse than it is. One of the men is a small boat expert anyway-an ex-petty officer in MTBs. He could probably sail the Pride of Man round the world if he had to."

  "You mean you actually want these people to go out on their own?"

  "That's right. They'll ask you for a route and destination and you'll give it to them." He smiled. "They won't get there, of course, but there's no reason why they shouldn't travel hopefully for a while."

  "What about you?"

  "As far as you're concerned I don't exist. I'm going down to the boat now to arrange things. I'll come back along the shore, just in case they turn up early." He produced his wallet, took out five ten pound notes and dropped them on the table. "Fifty now and fifty after they've gone-okay?"

  Bragg scooped up the money and stuffed it into his hip pocket. "Fine by me, Mr. Smith. I'll handle it just the way you said."

  "See that you do," Vaughan said and the door closed behind him.

/>   Bragg hobbled across to a cupboard by the sink, opened it and took out a bottle of whiskey. There was little more than an inch left in the bottle when he held it up to the light and he cursed softly. He swallowed what there was, tossed the bottle into a corner and sat down at the table to wait for what was to come.

  Vaughan went down the stone steps and jumped for the desk of the Pride of Man, wet with rain in the sickly yellow light of the single lamp at the end of the jetty. There was no time to waste and he went straight below, peeling off his raincoat as he descended the companionway.

  He opened a locker beneath one of the padded bench seats and took out an aqualung and several other pieces of skin-diving equipment which he laid on the centre table.

  He knelt down and reached inside the now empty locker. There was a sudden click and the base of the cupboard lifted right out to disclose a secret compartment. There were several interesting items inside. A Sterling sub-machine gun, two automatic rifles, several grenades and half a dozen limpet mines in a straw filled box, each about the size of a dinner plate.

  They were harmless until activated, but it was only the work of a minute or so to prime the fuse on one of them. He checked his watch, saw that it was just coming up to ten o'clock and turned the time switch through four complete revolutions. He stripped to his underpants quickly, pulled on the aqualung and went on deck.

  He lowered himself over the side, clutching the mine to his chest with one hand, paused to adjust the flow of air from his aqualung and sank beneath the surface.

  The water was bitterly cold, but there was no time to worry about that and he worked his way along to the stern of the boat. At that depth there was enough diffused light from the lamp on the jetty to enable him to see what he was doing and he chose a spot close to the propeller, the limpet mine's powerful electromagnets fastening instantly to the steel hull. He smiled through the visor of his mask and surfaced, well satisfied.

  As he crossed the deck to the companionway, a van turned into the yard and halted by the house. As he watched, the lights and engine were switched off and he went down to the saloon quickly.

  He replaced the skin-diving equipment in the locker, dressed hurriedly and went back on deck, pulling on his raincoat. As he paused in the shadows, he heard low voices at the end of the jetty as someone approached and went along the lower boardwalk quickly, jumped down to the beach and hurried into the darkness.

  It was quiet and still when Chavasse cut the Ford's engine and they sat there in the darkness of the boatyard, rain drumming on the roof of the van.

  "Well, this is it. The end of the line with any kind of luck."

  "It looks like the last place God made," Youngblood said and then the front door opened suddenly beside the lighted window and Bragg appeared, leaning on his crutch.

  "Who's out there?"

  Chavasse and Youngblood moved forward, Molly a pace or two behind and they halted in a little group at the bottom of the step.

  "We're trying to get to Babylon," Chavasse said. "We heard you might be able to help."

  Bragg stared at them for a long moment, a frown on his face and then he nodded slowly. "You'd better come in."

  He made hard weather of his passage across to the table and sank into his chair with an audible sigh of relief. He wiped sweat from his face with a soiled handkerchief and looked them over curiously.

  "I wasn't expecting anyone. They usually give a week's notice."

  "We're something special," Chavasse said. "There wasn't time to let you know."

  "Well, I'm not sure." Bragg sounded dubious. "The boat's ready to go-always is, but I broke two bones in my foot the other day. Takes me all my time to get to the door and back, never mind make the run to Longue Pierre."

  "Longue Pierre?" Chavasse said. "And where would that be?"

  "About twelve miles southwest of Alderney in the Channel Islands," Youngblood broke in and grinned as Chavasse turned to him in surprise. "You're forgetting, boy. The Channel was my stamping ground during the war and after it. I know it like the back of my hand."

  "He's right," Bragg said. "It ain't much of a place. About a mile across with cliffs three or four hundred feet high on one side. There's only one possible anchorage. That's on the south side of the island. There's an old jetty and not much else."

  "Who lives there?"

  "Don't ask me, mister. I do what I'm paid to do which is run people across, leave 'em on the jetty and come right back again. There's a house. I know that 'cos I've seen it from the sea, but not much else."

  "Who pays you?"

  "A fella called Smith. Drops in maybe once in every two or three months, but usually, he just gives me a ring on the phone." He shook his head and looked worried. "Funny I haven't heard from him about you people."

  "You will," Youngblood said. "And you'll get paid, I promise you. What kind of boat is it?"

  "A motor cruiser-the Pride of Man. Thirty footer built by Akerboon. Twin screw, steel hull."

  Youngblood whistled. "That's some boat. How is she powered?"

  "Penta petrol engine. She'll do about twenty-two knots at full stretch, but not tonight. The weather's not too good."

  "What's the report?"

  "Wind force three to four with rain squalls and fog in the morning."

  "A cake-walk."

  "Think you can handle her?" Chavasse asked.

  "Handle her? I could sail her across the Atlantic if I had to."

  "You'd have a job, mister," Bragg put in. "Her range is only six hundred including the reserve tank."

  Youngblood grinned. "Enough and to spare forpassage to the islands. Your troubles are over. You can stay home and watch your foot."

  "I don't know," Bragg shook his head. "It's Mr. Smith's boat, not mine."

  Youngblood sized him up quickly, taking in the stale whiskey breath, the watery eyes. He pulled out Crowther's wallet, selected a five pound note and dropped it on the table.

  "I noticed a nice little pub up the street as we came in. I bet you could drag that leg of yours up there if you really tried."

  Bragg looked down at the note hesitatingly, then sighed and stuffed it into his pocket. "I only hope I'm doing the right thing." He opened a drawer and produced a copy of the Channel Pilot. "You'd better have this. Three lights on your way out. Keep 'em in line and you can't go wrong."

  Youngblood picked up the book and turned to Chavasse, his face alive with a new kind of light. "What are we waiting for?"

  The door banged behind them, rattling the frame and Bragg sat there staring into space, a frown on his face. After a while he sighed, put a hand in his pocket and pulled out a handful of money. He looked at it blankly for a moment, then got to his feet and reached for his crutch. A drink, that's what he needed-perhaps two. Something to make him forget the people he had just met, something to shut out the thought of what was going to happen to them out there in the rain and darkness. Most of all, something to make him forget Smith.

  He hobbled to the door, took down an oilskin and left.

  The Pride of Man waited at the end of the jetty and Youngblood took in her flared, raking bow and long sloping deckhouse with a conscious pleasure. He was as excited as a schoolboy with a new toy.

  "My God, I can't wait to get my hands on her."

  Chavasse shook his head. "It's too damned easy."

  "What is?" Youngblood demanded impatiently.

  "The way Bragg took everything we said. It doesn't make sense. I think I'll go back and see what he's up to."

  "Suit yourself," Youngblood said. "But I'm making ready for sea. Anything over ten minutes and you've had it."

  He meant every word, so much was obvious, but Chavasse didn't waste time in arguing. He turned back and ran back along the jetty into the darkness of the boatyard.

  There had certainly been something indefinable in Bragg's manner which had made him feel uneasy, that was true enough. For one thing the old man's story had been too pat and he carried about him an aura of unctuous villainy, imposs
ible to eradicate.

  But more important than that was the fact that he had to get in touch with the Bureau if he was to stand any hope of survival at all once he reached the island and this was his last chance.

  He passed the house silently, moved out of the entrance to the yard and paused in the shadows. Bragg was swinging along the pavement in front of him looking considerably more agile than he had earlier, in spite of his crutch. He crossed to the little pub and went in and Chavasse moved along the street to the telephone box on the corner.

  He dialled his number quickly and was answered almost at once. There was a brief moment when Jean spoke to him and then Graham Mallory was on the line.

  "Paul? Where are you?"

  "Upton Magna-a little fishing port near Lulworth. Now get this-we're about to leave by boat for an island called Longue Pierre which is twelve miles southwest of Alderney in the Channel Islands. I want to know anything you can tell me about the place and I can only spare you three minutes."

  "We're already hooked into Information," Mallory said. "Keep on talking while they're checking."

  "You'll want to pull in a lump of dirt called Sam Crowther who runs a place called Wykehead Farm near Settle in Yorkshire. God knows how many he's seen off. Then there's a woman called Rosa Hartman. She lives at Bampton outside Shrewsbury. I'm sorry for her, but she shouldn't have joined."

  "Anyone else?"

  "A man called Pentecost who has a place called Long Barrow House of Rest outside Gloucester and the old villain I've just been dealing with. Name of Bragg. Runs a boatyard here."

  Mallory cut in on him. "Your information on Longue Pierre is coming through now. The island and the only house on it are owned by the States of Guernsey. They've been leased for the past two years to Count Anton Stavru."

  "Haven't I heard of him?"

  "Very probably. Shady financier always floating big deals that come to grief. Investigated by Fraud Squad a few times, but he's always managed to get out from under. He's managing director of a firm called World Wide Export. Is any of this helpful?"