Daniel Blake bolted upright in bed, not sure whether it was the steep roll of the ship or the sound of something crashing against the bulkhead that woke him. He braced himself against the roll and pressed the light button on his watch. Almost one o’clock. He didn’t think he’d slept, but he must have. He felt groggy, worse than if he’d stayed awake. He rubbed his face in his hands and tried to focus on the noise he’d heard. The steep roll hadn’t been followed by another, so the weather was still holding, but something was obviously loose on deck. His gut tightened at the thought of going out there alone, but a loose piece of gear on a ship in heavy weather was something that couldn’t be ignored. He slipped the Beretta out of its holster and stuck it in his belt, then scooped up the three-cell flashlight he’d found in the engine room. He cracked the door of the cabin and aimed the light out into the passageway.
“What was that?” Blake heard a confused, half-awake voice say behind him. He played the light on the door of Frank Kozlewski’s cabin. The chief’s puffy face, screwed up into a squint, peered out through the partially opened door. The few remaining strands of hair on his head stood looped over his scalp like McDonald’s golden arches.
Blake sighed. As irascible as the old chief was, sometimes he loved the guy. He was always there without being asked; if there was trouble in the air, he would sense it and come.
“I don’t know,” Blake said. “Sounded like it came from out there.” He pointed the beam of light toward the forward door that led out onto a narrow promenade deck that surrounded the passenger staterooms. He opened the door into the wind, stepped out onto the partially exposed walkway and swept the light around. He froze at the sight of a crumpled form lying against the forward bulkhead of stateroom number two. Kelly’s stateroom. The instant his beam of light hit the shapeless form, he knew who it was. “Get Doc,” he said over his shoulder.
Kneeling, Blake beamed the light into Sparks’s face and grimaced at the gaping wound that had been his mouth. He felt for a pulse in the carotid artery, though he could tell at a glance that it was no use. The feel of Sparks’s veal-like skin repulsed him. He glanced at the open louvers of the air vent above and knew immediately what the electrician had been doing. Anger boiled up inside him with an intensity that made his hands tremble. The stupid lecherous bastard had jeopardized them all. Getting under way now was less certain than ever, maybe impossible.
Blake stood over Sparks’s body, oblivious to the rain slanting into the promenade deck, and told himself to get a grip. He didn’t like anger; it made a man lose control, do things he wouldn’t normally do. He stepped back into the cabin area and rapped lightly on the door to stateroom number two.
“Who is it?” he heard Kelly say from behind the louvers.
“It’s me, Lieutenant Blake.”
The wooden door opened with a shudder and Kelly peered out. “What is it? What’s happened?” she asked. Maria was standing behind her, looking around her shoulder, trembling.
“Are you two okay?” Blake asked. Kelly’s hair was wet, and she appeared to have pulled on her dungarees hastily after getting out of the shower. He told himself his anger toward Sparks was because he’d put them in jeopardy, but he knew now there was more to it than that; the thought of those weasel eyes looking at Kelly nude filled him with a rage that startled him.
Kelly opened the door wider and saw Doc Jones rushing by with his medical kit. “What’s going on? What was that crash?”
Blake blocked her passage with his arm. “It’s okay. Just go back to sleep.”
Kelly looked at him with raised eyebrows. “Lieutenant, I think I have a right to know what’s going on.”
“Hey, Lieutenant,” Doc Jones called from outside.
Blake looked away. Kelly pushed past him, out the door to the open promenade deck. Forgetting about the girl, Blake started after Kelly. He came up behind her as she froze at the sight of Doc Jones bent over the body of John Sparks. She stared down at the body, then at the hose reel, then up at the air vent with its louvers pried open. She turned and looked at Blake with her mouth open, eyes wide. Maria came through the door, walking toward her, coming up behind Blake. “No, don’t . . .” Kelly said. “Stop her.”
Blake turned and stepped toward the girl, too late. Maria gaped at the body and let out a shriek. She dropped the blanket and clutched her head with both hands, grimacing as if trying to block out what she was seeing, then spun around and threw herself against Blake. She laid her head on his chest and began to cry with wet, muffled sobs.
Blake awkwardly put his arms around her, feeling helpless. He wanted to tell her she’d be okay, but the words wouldn’t come. He nodded to Kelly. “Take her back to your room.”
“Come on, sweetheart.” Kelly wrapped the blanket around the girl and led her away.
“He’s dead, Lieutenant,” Doc Jones said after they were out of sight. “I’m sure about this one. Neck’s broken. Spine’s severed. Must have died almost instantly.”
Tobin stepped out into the promenade deck and started toward Blake. His face was drawn up into a pale grimace. Blake thought he looked sick.
Tobin stopped and stared down at Spark’s body. He looked at Blake and said, “Sir?”
“What is it, Tobin?”
“I heard the commotion, sir. I thought it might be Alvarez.”
“Alvarez? What about him?”
“He’s gone, sir.”
“What do you mean he’s gone? Gone where?”
“He had a packet of money. In his shirt. He said he got it in the number three hold. He said he was going down to get some more.”
“When? How long’s he been gone?”
“Over an hour, sir.”
“Damn it, why didn’t you stop him?”
“I tried, sir. He pulled a knife. I couldn’t do anything with him.”
“Why didn’t you come and get me?”
“I’m sorry, sir,” Tobin said, looking down. “I should have. I was afraid to leave my cabin.”
“That’s just great,” Blake said. “If we lose another man, there goes any chance of getting under way.”
The corpsman nodded at Sparks’s body. “What’ll we do with him, sir?”
“Lay him out in his stateroom,” Blake said.
“We’re in the tropics, Lieutenant,” Doc Jones said. “We can’t leave him there too long. How about the frozen-food locker?”
“The power’s been off for a couple of days,” Blake said. “It wouldn’t be much better. Just put him in his stateroom for now.” He knew what their chances of surviving a tropical cyclone were without the ability to get under way and thought it was a moot point where they put him; they were all likely to end up in the same place anyway. “Tobin can help you.”
Doc Jones and Tobin scuttled off carrying Sparks’s body between them, and the chief and Blake stepped back into the stateroom area, out of the rain now driving into the promenade deck.
“Looks like we better get up another search party,” the chief said.
Blake shook his head. “There are a thousand places he could hide on a freighter.”
“What are we going to do? We can’t just let him pick us off one at a time.”
“We’re not going to go searching for him in the middle of the night,” Blake said. “That’s just what he’d like us to do. That’s why he killed Sparks, to bait us into looking for him.”
“Poor Sparky,” the chief said.
“If Sparks had stayed in his stateroom, he’d have been okay.”
“Well, I reckon that’s that for getting under way,” the chief said. “Without an electrician, there’s no way.”
“We might still have a chance,” Blake said, “as long as we can keep the emergency diesel running.” He glanced up at the small white emergency light in the passageway, secure in the knowledge that Sergeant Rivero was standing watch in the engine room. Blake could see the chief thinking the same thing he was; then he saw the look on the chief’s face change. He felt it too; the vibratio
n in the deck was changing, winding down. He heard the diminishing whine of the diesel engine. The tremor in the deck shuddered to a halt as the overhead light flickered to a tiny glow in the filament, then went out entirely. Blake gasped as though all the air had been sucked out of his lungs. He stood in the black silence that followed, the hair bristling on the back of his neck. “Mother of God,” he heard the chief say.
Blake stood at the hatch leading down into the engine room, cocked pistol in his right hand, flashlight in his left. He drew in a deep breath and nodded for the chief to follow him.
“You ain’t going to fall for that, sir?” The chief was standing behind him, rasping in his ear. “I’m telling you it’s him, that son of a bitch is down there. He’s killed Rivero, and he’s knocked out the generator. He’s baiting you, trying to draw you down-”
“What choice do we have? Without that generator, we’ve had it.”
“Not necessarily. The weather ain’t too bad. Maybe that cyclone-”
“It’s coming, Chief. Trust me. I can feel it in the way the ship’s moving. The barometer’s dropping like a stone.”
“Hell, sir, let’s get some backup-”
“Who would you get?” Blake said. “Doc? Tobin? Robertson? What good would they be? A bunch of unarmed people stumbling around in a dark engine space? That’s just what he’d want.” He shook his head. “We can’t afford to lose anyone else.” Blake took a deep breath. “Let’s go. All I need is someone to cover my back.”
The chief glanced over his shoulder. “Who’s going to cover mine?” He pulled the slide back on his pistol, cocking it with a satiny click.
“Be careful with that damned thing,” Blake said. “Come on.” He started slowly down the ladder into the black hole of the engine room, thinking he’d been right about one thing. El Callado was obviously insane, but that didn’t mean he was stupid. He’d seen the guard posted over the emergency diesel generator and understood that it was important. After killing Sparks, and probably Alvarez, he’d killed Rivero and disabled the generator as a way to draw them out and hunt them down in the dark, on his terms. And the worst part about it was that Blake had no choice but to go along. He stopped on the third step down and listened. The only sounds were the waves lapping against the hull and the chief’s ragged breathing behind him. “Sergeant Rivero,” he called.
The sound of his voice echoed in the silence.
The knot tightened in his stomach. Every instinct he had told him to get out of there. Blake descended a few more steps down the ladder, beaming his flashlight ahead of him into the cave-like darkness. He paused and aimed his light down into the lower level, trying to see the emergency diesel generator.
“I don’t like this search one little bit,” the chief said in Blake’s ear, his whisper pronounced in the deathly quiet.
“Shh,” Blake said, straining to see and hear. The beam from his flashlight was nearly overwhelmed by the blackness, the quiet so intense he could hear the faint skittering of rats in the bilges. He descended the remaining steps down to the catwalk that circled the engine space and paused, beaming his light below, straining to see the generator.
The faintest whisper of movement caught his ear, something coming toward him. Fast. He flashed his light ahead. The beam illuminated a dark form flying through the air, arching into him. He shoved the chief flat and started into a crouch, twisting to one side on the narrow catwalk. Something heavy hit him on the left side and knocked him back over the chief. He heard Kozlewski’s pistol fire, the shot ringing his ears. He felt a dull thud, then a sharp pain in his shoulder. He felt warm blood seeping through his khaki shirt. The chief struggled to get up, and Blake pushed him back down as the object reversed itself and flew back over their heads.
“Christ, I didn’t mean to fire,” the chief said in a choked voice. “Did I hit anything?”
Blake struggled to aim his flashlight. He got it in focus as the object made another pass over their heads. Moving slower now, he could see what it was: the body of Seaman Luis Alvarez suspended by its ankles, flying noiselessly through the air.
Blake lay back in the darkness, sweating and clammy, gripping his arm, listening to the whisper of the body traversing over their heads, waiting for it to slow. He reached up and struck it a glancing blow with his foot. It wobbled to a stop, dancing at the end of the ropes that held it. Blake steadied the body and beamed the light on its face. The yawning hole that had been a mouth was stuffed with crisp $100 bills, stuck together with dried blood like a paper flower. Alvarez’s bosun’s knife was embedded up to the handle in his chest.
“That sick son of a bitch,” Frank Kozlewski hissed in Blake’s ear. “Why would he do a sick thing like that?”
“He’s sending a message for us to stay away from the money,” Blake said, grimacing. “He wanted to make sure we got it.”
Blake sucked in a deep breath and called, “Sergeant Rivero.”
There was no answer.
“You’re hurt, sir,” Chief Kozlewski said, staring at the field of dark red spreading around Blake’s upper arm.
“Yeah, you shot me, you bastard,” Blake said, his voice tinged with irony.
The chief’s face fell like a mud slide. “Oh, Christ, no.” Kozlewski ripped Blake’s shirt open and gaped at the wound. “You’re bleeding like a stuck pig, sir.” The chief pulled his red bandanna out of his rear pocket, twisted it around Blake’s upper arm and tied it into a square knot. He retrieved his pipe lighter, stuck it through the loop in the bandanna and twisted it tight.
“Don’t drop that lighter into the bilges or we’ll really be finished,” Blake said, grimacing.
“When you going to get it through your head that we ain’t going to be getting under way?”
“Don’t give up yet. Rivero could still be alive.”
“Yeah, and the Pope could be married.” Kozlewski released the tension on the bandanna, and bright red blood oozed out of the hole in Blake’s biceps. The chief twisted it tight again. “It ain’t slowing down none. You’re going to have to hold it while I go for Doc.”
Blake felt the vibration of footsteps coming down the ladder. He motioned for Kozlewski to be quiet and lay back, shielding the chief. He aimed the Beretta at the part of the ladder he could see, holding it steady on his knee, ready to blow apart the first thing that moved. A flashlight beam flickered.
“Lieutenant Blake,” Doc Jones called down in a tremulous voice. The beam of his flashlight hit Blake in the face. “Are you all right, sir? I heard a shot.”
“Doc,” Blake said, breathing out. “You’re a welcome sight, but that’s a good way to get shot.” He eased the hammer back down on the automatic, awed by the courage it must have taken for the corpsman to come down into this black hole looking for him. “Come join the party.”
Doc Jones stood over them, looking at Alvarez’s body suspended in the air, his dark face drawn. He bent down and looked at Blake’s arm. “Jesus Christ, sir, what happened?” Without waiting for an answer, he pulled a bottle of something purple out of his medic kit and began swabbing out the wound.
Blake grimaced at the sting of the antiseptic.
“It went all the way through,” Doc said. “Who shot you?”
“Never mind. Just clean it up,” the chief said.
“It’s clean,” Doc said, swabbing it out, “but you really need some stitches to close that up properly.”
“Ain’t you got any?” the chief asked, holding the light.
Jones shook his head. “It’s one thing I didn’t bring. There might be something in the ship’s infirmary.”
“We don’t have time for that, Doc,” Blake said. “Just tape it up and dress it tight.”
The corpsman looked at him questioningly.
Blake nodded encouragement. “It’ll be okay. I heal fast.”
Jones closed the wound and placed a layer of gauze over it. “Stretch your arm out and relax it as much as you can.” The corpsman ripped off a length of tape with his teeth and bo
und it tight. “Now don’t move that arm any more than you have to.” He smiled and added, “Sir.” He looked up at Kozlewski. “Help me get him back to his cabin, Chief.”
“Negative,” Blake said. “I’ve got to get the diesel running. Help me get down to it.”
“Excuse me, sir, but I can’t let you do that,” the corpsman said. “You’re in shock, you’ve lost a fair amount of blood. You need to get some rest, sleep would be even better.”
“I will, just as soon as we get the diesel up and running. Help me down.”
The corpsman looked at Kozlewski.
“Ain’t no use arguing with him,” the chief said. “He’s under the delusion we’re going to get this thing under way.”
Kozlewski and Jones helped Blake to his feet and walked him down the ladder to the next level below. Blake leaned against the corpsman and beamed his light over the emergency diesel generator. He could feel the heat of the engine rising up from the deck grids.
“Where the hell is Sergeant Rivero?” the chief said, glancing around.
Blake didn’t answer, certain they’d find the Colombian marine’s mutilated body when they got the power back on, hoping against hope they’d find him alive. With the beam of his flashlight, he traced the fuel lines coming in and the exhaust lines going out. He retraced the lines and stopped at a gate valve in the fuel line about chest high. Layers of paint around the valve stem were twisted free. Normally open, the fuel-line cutoff valve had obviously been closed, shutting off the fuel supply to the engine. The chief saw it at the same time and stepped forward to open it. Blake held his light on the valve as the chief twisted it counterclockwise.
“Let’s fire it up, Chief.”
“Aye, aye, sir.” Kozlewski bent over the control panel and engaged the starter. The batteries spun slowly. “That ain’t a good sign,” the chief said.
“Let them rest for a minute and try it again,” Blake said, leaning against Doc Jones, his arm throbbing. He felt light-headed.
“You ought to be in bed, sir,” Doc Jones said.
Blake felt the blackness closing in on him. He slumped against the corpsman.
Point of Honor Page 21
