The Leper Ship

by Peter Tonkin

  Then, abruptly, Niccolo was coming towards him, his right hand swinging up and his left hand reaching out. John didn’t have time even to react. In the right hand as it swung up he noticed a short club. Then the left hand caught his shoulder and swung him aside and the charging bulk of Bernadotte exploded into his view. The club fell on the crewman’s head, just behind the left ear, with a percussion that sounded to John like a Magnum pistol going off. Bernadotte went down again.

  The two men stood and looked down at him. With each choking breath he took, blood sprayed over the deck from the ruins of his nose and lips. ‘Dr Higgins said she doesn’t want Bernadotte in the infirmary,’ said John after a while. ‘Miss Fittipaldi has warned her that he is trouble.’

  Niccolo laughed, a hard bark of sound. ‘Then I have a rest cure for him.’ He tossed the club up in the air and caught it reversed. John saw it was actually a rust-chipping hammer. ‘A rest cure in the chain locker.’

  John turned to go, then turned back again. ‘In among all that holidaying,’ he said, ‘get him to tell you what started this.’

  *

  If John had gone to her for sympathy as well as tending, then he was disappointed. The men who had carried the beaten stewards to her had managed to describe the fight in a surprising amount of detail. He found her enraged. He stood like a schoolboy while she cleaned up the last groggy steward in icy silence and shooed him out of the surgery. Then she swung on John. ‘Was there no other way?’

  ‘Well, I…’ The same feeling swept over him now as he had felt when he realised the crew were not going to back him against the giant. Except that this was more difficult to deal with. He could hardly attack his own wife. Or dock her one day’s pay.

  ‘Bloody men! Good God, what’s the point? I mean what’s the point of us women nursing you and tending you when all you do is go straight out and get yourselves hurt again?’

  ‘Really, I…’

  ‘Don’t you try to defend yourself, John Higgins! How long have I known you? Hardly more than six months and in that time you’ve got yourself hit over the head, beaten up, kidnapped and shot. And damn near suffocated. Now here you are, starting the same cycle all over again! Take your shirt off.’

  ‘Actually, it’s my knees…’

  ‘Take your trousers off as well then.’

  ‘Asha, darling, can we do this in the cabin, please? It’s just scrapes and scratches. The odd bruise. Bring some iodine and tincture of Arnica.’

  ‘This isn’t the Dark Ages! Tincture of Arnica! Shall I bring some leeches as well?’

  Her voice was increasingly high. John thrust past her and closed the outer door. There was a lock on it so he locked it; he didn’t want this to get too public. There was no way of knowing what the effect of his fight with Bernadotte might be, but he could see only damage being done if he fought with his wife in public too. Then he remembered that the chef was in the ward and went through there. But no. The chef had gone. So had Salah, Fatima and Gina. They were alone.

  ‘All right!’ he snapped. ‘Forget the leeches.’ He ripped the shirt tails out of his trousers and tore the garment off. If he heard her gasp of shock at the state of his torso, he didn’t show it. He unbuckled his belt and undid the zipper with almost insane force. The last shreds of his self-control had gone now. He had completely lost his temper with her. He couldn’t even begin to work out why it had happened. The rage just swept bitterly over him. The trousers fell and he kicked them off tangled round his shoes.

  His knees were black, as though he had been playing in the dirt like a naughty boy. Her practised eyes saw the swelling and understood the pain he must be feeling from the puffy discoloration. From head to foot he was a mess. His torso was scratched and bruised. The pit of his gunshot wound was so florid she thought for a terrible moment it was bleeding. His thighs too were bruised and welted and his shins looked as though they had been kicked.

  ‘Where do you want me?’ he snarled.

  ‘On the examining couch,’ she snapped.

  He walked over and lay down in icy silence. She had never seen him so angry, and had never been so angry with him. She opened her pharmacy cabinet and started getting out the ointments and salves she needed. ‘I might need some support on the knees,’ he said. ‘Have you any tubular bandage?’

  ‘You don’t need support. You need to lie down.’

  ‘I can’t.’ He glanced at his watch. Swore. ‘What’s the time? I’m taking Niccolo’s watch at sixteen hundred so that he can start getting this piece of floating scrap iron into some kind of shape.’

  ‘Very noble. So you’re not only Neanderthal, you’re workaholic. Why didn’t I notice this earlier?’ She began to tend him, none too gently.

  ‘I’ve got no bloody choice. Ow! This ship is a danger to navigation. The standard insurance certificate up on my desk isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. If anything, anything, goes wrong, we’re all in deep trouble. And from the look of things, all too much is waiting to go wrong! Think about it, for God’s sake! Think about what’s on the deck. In the holds. That fiasco this morning proved that if we went down now, no one would stand a chance of getting in a lifeboat. Would you want to swim around waiting for help while a couple of thousand tons of chemical and nuclear waste washed up out of the sea underneath you?’

  She was half sitting beside him now, one buttock on the edge of the couch, rubbing ointment on to his chest. She shuddered. ‘No,’ she said. She had looked in Captain Fittipaldi’s plastic body bag. She had seen what the stuff could do.

  ‘Right. I’ve got to lick this crew into some kind of shape! I mean, there’s more than a week to go before we pick up the Naples pilot. We’ve a lot of busy waters to get through. If you think this calm weather’s going to last, you’re wrong. The only man aboard I really feel I can trust is Niccolo and he keeps getting even the simplest things wrong. And on top of that I’ve got that great ox Bernadotte all but declaring mutiny. Jesus!’ The exclamation came as a combination of frustration and Asha’s application of a salve to the tender scar tissue over his old wound.

  ‘About Niccolo,’ she said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I don’t think it was all his fault. I’ve been talking to Gina. She’s a nice kid but not too bright. And she’s still in shock. She’s been talking to Fatima and me a lot and I’ve been reading between the lines a bit, I suppose.’

  ‘What has she said?’

  ‘I get the impression that her father was a bit of a failure. Niccolo may not have been up with all the things that a first officer ought to have done, but that’s because he’s been doing the captain’s job since the Napoli set sail. And, from the sound of it, Cesar does a fair amount of Marco Farnese’s job too.’

  There was a short silence, then John nodded wearily. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I thought it had to be something like that.’ He sighed. ‘That’s better.’ She was working on his knees now, and his knees had been really sore.

  ‘What is the time?’ he asked again.

  She glanced at her watch. ‘Two.’ She finished one knee and started on the other. He leaned back and closed his eyes. After the fight, a combination of reaction and exhaustion rolled over him.

  ‘I’m wiped out,’ he said. ‘Have you got anything that would pep me up a bit?’

  She flexed his right leg gently and rolled a tube of elastic bandage up his calf. She unrolled it and smoothed it into place. She reached across his lap and took his left leg. The strain on her blouse caused several buttons to pop open.

  ‘Pep you up?’

  ‘Keep me going.’

  She pulled up the second tube. As she settled it into place, she pressed herself gently against his upper thighs. To tend the stewards, she had donned a starched white coat. The coolness of it against his flesh made him gasp. She leaned down as though she hadn’t heard the sound and kissed him just above the edge of the bandage. The flesh of his leg was hot and the hair tickled her lips and nose.

  ‘All better,’ she said, sitting
up again.

  He was watching her now, and he didn’t look quite so fatigued. ‘I’m not pepped up yet, though,’ he observed.

  ‘Well, let’s just see what we can do about that,’ she answered.

  She moved out of his sight and his attention wandered for an instant. Then she was back beside him, tantalisingly close, her fingers busy with the top button of her starched coat.

  Dreamily, he slid an arm round her hips, hugging her to his chest, running his hand lovingly down her flank. He repeated the caress twice before he realised what she had done. The starched cotton was too warm. Too smooth. Surely even that gossamer Teddy would have seams or ridges to be felt through the crisp cloth.

  ‘What…’ He began to sit up but she pushed him gently back. As she did so, she leaned forward and a glimpse down the front of the coat confirmed what his fingers led him to suspect.

  ‘Asha! What are you doing?’

  ‘I’m pepping you up, darling.’

  ‘Wearing me out, more like!’

  ‘Oh no. This is just what your doctor ordered.’ She undid the lowest button and pulled the flaps of the coat wide. ‘See?’ she purred, ‘it’s working. This little bit’s pepped up already.’

  She undid the next button and climbed nimbly up on to the table to kneel astride him. ‘Now don’t tell me,’ she said gently, leaning forward on to all fours, letting her hair fall in a fragrant veil around his face, ‘don’t tell me you’ve never played doctors and nurses.’

  10

  Doing Niccolo’s watch for him that afternoon proved to be three well-invested hours for John. He did little enough at first other than sit in the watchkeeper’s chair in a daze, kept awake only by the combination of aching knees and sharp hunger. He viewed the dazzling afternoon sun on the flat calm of the Mediterranean with every evidence of distaste and spent so little time looking at it that he would have been lucky to spot a craft on a converging course, let alone have stirred himself to do anything about it before disaster struck. But he felt at peace with the world. With himself. With his wife.

  At about five thirty, Professor Faure appeared. John shrewdly suspected the elegant old man was only up here to escape the activity he could hear going on at boat deck level and below, but he was pleased enough to see him. He had some things to get sorted out.

  ‘Tell me about the deck cargo, Professor.’

  ‘That is difficult, Captain. I am afraid I don’t know exactly what it is.’

  ‘Tell me what you can about it.’

  ‘Firstly, I do not know where it originally came from, what it is a product of or what it was used for. I assume it is all some kind of chemical waste but it might conceivably have biological elements as well. I have not worked for Disposoco for very long, I’m afraid. I don’t even know whose idea it was to take it and dispose of it in the desert. Whoever had that bright idea is no longer on the same payroll as I. That I am sure of!

  ‘I can tell you a little more about what it is contained in and what it can do, however. It is contained in specially strengthened drums within those containers piled upon the deck. The drums are packed into the containers themselves particularly carefully. Niccolo oversaw that, along with just about everything else. I made it clear to him that the drums should not be allowed to roll about or strike each other. We do not want them ruptured!’

  ‘Could they be explosive?’

  ‘Merde! I hadn’t even thought of that. But no. It is highly unlikely that there is anything explosive in there. Explosive, no. Corrosive, yes.’

  ‘How corrosive?’ John was thinking in terms of the deck paint being damaged.

  Faure paused. ‘You have, perhaps, heard of the film Alien?’ He wrinkled his nose as though referring to the cinema was beneath his professorial dignity.

  John couldn’t see where this was leading at all. ‘Yes,’ he admitted. He had seen both the film and the video; they were popular on tankers.

  The professor nodded. ‘Perhaps you remember the scene where they try to cut the first creature from the face of the man who discovered the eggs.’

  John remembered. A creature like a silver lobster had wrapped its legs round the head of one of the characters and his friends had tried to cut it off.

  He sat up straight, catching his breath.

  When they cut it, it had bled a kind of acid which had burned its way with incredible rapidity straight through the spaceship’s metal deck. And it had done so with enough power to leave a considerable hole.

  He looked across at Faure and met his gaze. The Frenchman was deadly serious about this.

  The acid in the film had gone on to burn its way through the next deck as well, its force hardly abated. And, dripping down from the molten deckhead, it had burned through the next deck too.

  He had to be exaggerating. ‘You’re not serious? I remember that stuff in the film burning through three steel decks!’

  ‘Really? I remember it burning through four steel decks. And yes, I am serious. That is what I meant by specially treated containers. That is what I mean by corrosive. Have you seen Captain Fittipaldi?’

  Asha had mentioned something about the late captain. Perhaps he should take a look. He shook his head. Faure nodded. ‘When you see what it did to his hands, you will have a clearer idea.’

  ‘Very well. What about the stuff in the holds?’

  ‘I cannot be any more precise about its origin or its nature. I’m not sure whether it is plutonium, for instance, or another of the heavy metals. It is highly radioactive, however. It is the equivalent of what they call a “dirty” bomb, I believe. We discovered a slight crack in one of the casings. That is all we found. We found no flaws in any of the casings you have aboard here. But that one flaw was enough to irradiate a whole section of the desert. And we are carrying several hundred casings.’

  ‘Did you tell any of this to Captain Fittipaldi?’

  ‘Yes. He had not seen Alien, however.’

  ‘But he understood about the nuclear waste?’

  ‘Fully. More so than you, perhaps. He may not have seen the movie, but he saw what the radiation did in the desert.’

  John sat silent for a moment. ‘Niccolo said Mr Cappaldi advised Captain Fittipaldi to have the doors between the holds welded shut.’

  ‘That’s right. It scared them, you see. What the radiation had done to the local villagers. It scared me too. I advised them both to ensure that the nuclear waste be loaded in such a way that the casings could not be damaged. You have heard, perhaps, of the China syndrome?’

  ‘Another film.’

  ‘Really? I was referring to the idea. That if nuclear material is insufficiently protected from the influence of other nuclear material, it will heat itself up to such a temperature that it will burn its way right through the earth’s crust. So that, if such a thing happened in the United States, the nuclear waste would burn its way through to China.’

  ‘Except that it would in fact settle at the earth’s core.’ John knew his elementary physics as well as the next man.

  ‘It would, yes, if not for the Chernobyl effect.’

  John shook his head, not really understanding this.

  ‘Water,’ said the professor quietly. ‘The molten core would hit water long before it hit the centre of the earth. And a hot nuclear core hitting cold water results in a huge explosion, a kind of atomic bomb. Yes. That is what Captain Fittipaldi was frightened of creating in Napoli’s holds: an atomic bomb.’

  Just then Niccolo came in through the door from the starboard bridge wing. ‘Captain, I have brought the third officer to relieve you for the next few minutes. We are now more ready, I think, for this evening’s lifeboat drill.’

  ‘Right,’ said John and stood. Faure’s visit had had its effect: he was now wide awake; his appetite was gone, and the pain in his knees seemed less important somehow. ‘Professor, if you would just go to your lifeboat station. Marco, you have the con; sign on to the log, please. Niccolo, sound “abandon ship”.’

  Niccolo had
drawn up a manifestly sensible set of lifeboat lists and this time there was much less confusion. The passengers designated for each lifeboat assembled in straight lines according to the order that their names appeared and it was easy to see who belonged where. The lifeboats were swung out on their davits without incident and the whole exercise was completed within twenty minutes.

  The crew returned to their late-running day work, the officers returned to their hard-working gangs. The stewards returned to their dining rooms and the chef took his team back into the galley to finish preparing dinner. The scientists had been reluctant to join any of the work gangs and John popped his head round the door of the video room on his way back up to the bridge to catch them there, settling down to watch some football. Professor Faure crossed the room to him. ‘It seems your men think deck work is beneath them,’ observed John.

  Faure had the grace to look a little sheepish.

  ‘Right,’ snapped John. ‘You can organise them into watches. At eight in the morning and four in the afternoon I want all of the deck and hold cargo checked for damage and leakage. All of it. Carefully.’

  When he walked out into the corridor he was overcome by the aroma of dinner cooking and suddenly his appetite returned. Forty-eight hours ago, he had enjoyed a light wedding breakfast of smoked trout and noisettes of lamb at his wedding reception. Twenty-four hours ago he had thoughtlessly consumed a thin gammon slice with a round of pineapple, two fingers of potato croquette, a small brown roll and a glass of red wine. He was not a great trencherman, but so much had happened during those two days that his intake of food seemed totally inadequate. Whatever he could smell now was going to be served in half an hour, at seven; for a moment, he poignantly regretted taking the four to eight watch.

  Back on the bridge, he relieved Marco, crossing to the log to sign on. Glancing up the page over Marco’s untidy, boyish record of wind, weather and kilometres sailed, he was surprised to see something he had not noticed before. It was a list of names. Marco was on his way out, but John called him back. He pointed to the list.