The Shipkiller

by Justin Scott

  He soldered a metal T in the middle, and when he was done he leaned on the workbench, too exhausted to move, staring at the antenna. After a while he looked at his watch. The hands blurred before his eyes. Three in the morning. He’d been at it ten hours straight. He was reaching for the light switch when he heard footsteps approaching the open end of the boat shed. It was a dark night and only the Channel lights shone in the harbor. A shadow moved across the reds and greens.

  “Still at it,” said Culling.

  “Just finished.”

  Culling moved into the garish light of the fluorescents.

  “I was just leaving,” said Hardin, wondering what he was doing at the yard at this hour. “I’ve got to borrow a dinghy and get some sleep.”

  “What’s this?” asked Culling.

  “Radar antenna.”

  “Made out of chicken wire?”

  “It works.”

  Culling nodded. “I like that. You’ve a way of making things simple.”

  “Things that work are simple.” He reached for the light switch. “I have to get to sleep.”

  “What’s in the box? ”

  “What box? ” asked Hardin, his voice loud in the quiet barn.

  “The nacelle thing under your boat.”

  “Water. I told you, I left it open for ballasting.”

  Culling shook his head. “You went for something and you got it.”

  “What are you talking about? ”

  Culling walked slowly around the circle of light, pausing to nod and gaze at Hardin’s tools and equipment. He fingered the dipole antenna in the middle of the crescent-shaped reflector. Hardin watched, his mind in turmoil.

  Suddenly, Culling looked him straight in the face.

  “You’re not an Irish gunrunner. You’re not a drug smuggler. What contraband could you have gone for?”

  Hardin broke the long silence. “Don’t you think,” he asked quietly, “that if I had gone for contraband it would be dangerous to ask?”

  Culling chuckled his quiet, knowing laugh. “I do not think you’re the type of man who would harm me.”

  “Can we leave it at that?” asked Hardin.

  “I keep asking myself, what is he up to?” said Culling. He nodded at the workbench. “What is he doing in my yard?”

  “I’m building a long-range radar.”

  “And sonar?”

  “Yes. And I’m leaving very soon.”

  Culling stared at him a long time. Then he walked around the bench to the bow of the old MTB. He caressed the curve that loomed above their heads.

  “A brave lady,” he said, speaking half to himself, half to Hardin. “She took a direct hit off Cherbourg in the autumn of forty. Almost blew her out of the water. Smashed her starboard engine. But she brought her boys home, what was left of them. When we pulled her in here, we found her back was broken. She couldn’t have gone another mile.”

  As he described the wooden boats dueling the German coastal squadrons, the old man’s memories built images in Hardin’s mind. He saw at dusk the small gray MTBs slipping out the slit in the cliffs and heard their engines thunder south. And he saw the boatyard at dawn, when Culling’s men lined the quay, waiting for the damage, and behind them the ambulances, and then the group commanders, counting the survivors in the misty morning light.

  Culling stroked the blistered wood. “We stripped her parts, then they moved the MTB base up the coast and that was the war for this yard . . . Here, I’ll show you something.”

  He walked Hardin into the darkness beside the boat and ducked under the hull amidships. Hardin crouched beside him.

  “Got your little torch?” asked Culling.

  Hardin flicked on his penlight.

  “Over there,” said Culling. “That’s it.”

  The beam settled on a wide steel scoop that protruded from the bottom of the boat.

  “Water intakes for cooling the engines,” Culling explained. “There’s another one there and two more on the starboard side.”

  “What about them? ”

  “Every night they had a kill, there were some boats they always had to tow home because these intakes were blocked and there was no water to cool the Rolls-Royces. Do you know why?”

  “No.”

  “We had exile crews on the MTBs. Free French. Poles. Dutch. Some hated the Germans more than I could imagine. And when some of those young boys sank a German E boat, they put the helm over and ran back through the survivors. Back and forth through the swimming men. Their flesh blocked the intakes and the engines overheated and stalled. I know. We had to clear them.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “They wasted the chances we gave them,” said Culling. “It was more important to sink German boats than kill German sailors. They disabled their own boats when they should have continued the attack.”

  Hardin stood slowly and rubbed his bad knee. “I’m not sure what to say to you.”

  “You’re safe in this harbor,” said Culling. “Stay as long as you need.”

  “An out-of-pattern operator.”

  “An apparent free lance.”

  “Out of nowhere.”

  Miles Donner’s informal inquiries at MI 6, at the Deuxième Bureau, and at the CIA produced nothing about the theft of the Dragon that the Mossad hadn’t already learned. The MP was still unconscious and the Germans were checking on every American doctor who’d entered their country in the past six months.

  Donner didn’t put much stock in the doctor theory, and even if the apparent free lance was one, he wouldn’t have entered through Immigration. But the thought of an unknown roaming Europe with an antitank weapon made him very nervous, particularly since the other agencies’ informants had turned up no hints of big IRA Provisional or Red Army operations in the offing. That made Israel a very likely target.

  He cashed in a number of one-time favors and repeated his unofficial questions at higher levels. The answers were the same. Nothing new had broken. One thing. It wasn’t new, but a tough, elderly MI 6 agent—a man who had done the impossible and infiltrated the Jewish Irgun terrorists before Partition—raised a question that had been bothering Donner.

  “Why didn’t he kill the soldier who sold him the weapon?”

  Donner walked the streets of London trying to picture the man. He wanted him to be something simple, like a bank robber or a highwayman looking to stop an armored bullion truck, but that was wishful thinking. A criminal, even a clumsy amateur, would have murdered matter-of-factly to cover his tracks. An idealist? He shook his head. That sort would kill faster than a professional.

  Not that he himself wasn’t an idealist, he thought quickly, but you didn’t kill a man who might be useful again. And if a man posed a threat, you shouldn’t be dealing with him in the first place. He shook his head again. Guessing why the man hadn’t killed was getting him nowhere. He needed facts.

  He availed himself of sources at Fleet Street, but the newspaper reporters could add nothing. Stymied, he entered their morgues and systematically pored through the recent past, looking for upcoming public events that might provoke a terrorist attack. He began to feel the unusual sensation of panic.

  8

  “I say, Mr. Culling? Is that Dr. Hardin up there? Or is it a clever monkey?”

  Ajaratu Akanke sounded angry.

  Hardin looked down from his perch in a bosun’s chair atop the Swan’s mast. The boat lay fifty feet beneath him in the shape of a woman’s eye. Ajaratu stood beside Culling on the quay, blocking the hot June sun with her hand. Her lab coat hung open, and with her head thrown back her wheat-colored cotton blouse stretched tightly over her soft-looking breasts and the lean muscles of her flat belly. A blue turban covered her hair and a stethoscope dangled from her pocket.

  “It must be a monkey,” she said. “Dr. Hardin would have told his physician that he was back from his sail days ago.”

  “I’m really sorry,” Hardin called.

  Culling rallied to his defense. �
��He’s a busy one, miss. All day on the boat and half the night in the shed.”

  “How are you, Peter?”

  “Fine.”

  “What are you doing up there?”

  “Running waveguide.”

  “Really? What sort of waves do you intend to guide?”

  “Radar.”

  “Inside the mast?”

  “It’s hollow.”

  “Curious.”

  She bent her head and listened to Culling. Hardin continued lowering the flexible square tube into the mast. His tools were in a canvas sack slung over his neck.

  “How are we doing down there?” he called.

  Culling hopped onto the boat and disappeared below. Moments later Hardin felt him tug the lower end of the waveguide. He fed more into the mast and Culling pulled it out of the hole he had cut in the aluminum near the Swan’s ceiling and ran it back to the chart table where Hardin was installing the radar.

  Culling appeared in the cockpit. “That’s enough.”

  Hardin fastened his end to the reflector mounting that he had already bolted to the mast.

  “Peter?”

  “What?” He shone his penlight into the mast. He would fasten the waveguide at the bottom, but it looked as if it might flap loosely in the middle. It had to be secured halfway down, but the mast was less than a foot in diameter and there was no way he could reach halfway down it with a tool.

  “Can you hear me, Peter?”

  “Yes, what is it?” He wiped perspiration from his eyes.

  “I said, how’s your head?”

  “Busy.”

  “I’d like to examine you.”

  If he drilled a pair of small holes halfway down the mast he might be able to hook a loop of wire around the guide and draw it tight. Have to be careful not to puncture the guide, though. He should have drilled the holes first. He was rushing, getting ahead of himself, making small mistakes.

  “I said that I’d like to examine you.”

  Hardin’s lips compressed with frustration. He should have thought about fastening the guide before he ran it down the mast. He was falling behind. The radar wasn’t finished and he still had to install the new generator to augment the boat’s alternator, then provision the boat—storm sails—he’d meant to take the main to the sailmaker this morning to sew a third line of reef slabs—clothes, charts . . . The list seemed endless.

  “Peter?”

  “I’m very busy.”

  “I gather that,” called Ajaratu. “Perhaps I could conduct my examination over dinner.”

  “Tonight?” His mind whirled. He had to get started on the generator. “I have to work kind of late. . . .”

  Her voice turned professional. “Then I’ll expect you in my infirmary at nine tomorrow morning, Dr. Hardin.”

  She spun on her heel and stalked back to the white Rover. Her light wraparound skirt flowered open as she thrust angrily into the driver’s seat. The car shook when she slammed the door. Hardin tried to untangle himself from the bosun’s chair, his mind unexpectedly lingering over a fleeting glimpse of her long, slim thighs flickering like black fire.

  “Culling! Stop her!”

  Culling scampered after the Rover which was backing and filling, turning toward the drive, bracketed between spurts of flung gravel. Hardin cupped his hands over the top of the mast, pulled himself up, and kicked his feet free of the canvas seat. Then, taking his T-shirt which hung from his back shorts pocket, he wrapped the cloth tightly around the aft stay, clamped his hands around the cloth, and slid down the dizzy angle from the top of the mast to the stern.

  He landed lightly, favoring the bad knee, jumped to the quay, and ran past Culling after the Rover. Ajaratu watched him come. Her full brown eyes were as clear and deep and cool as forest springs.

  “You are a monkey.”

  “I apologize,” Hardin panted. “I get too far into my own head sometimes. I would like very much to have dinner with you.”

  “If you’re not too busy.”

  “Eight o’clock?”

  “I’ll pick you up here,” she said. “We’ll eat at a casual place. You can bring your tools.”

  The car shot around the old boat barns and disappeared in a cloud of dust.

  Culling chuckled. “Quite a lady, the Duchess.”

  “The Duchess?”

  “Aye. We named her that when she got here. It’s in the back, you know.”

  “What’s in the back?” asked Hardin. Culling, he had learned since they had been working together the last few days, held a complex opinion on everything that caught his notice.

  “Aristocracy. Their backs don’t bend like ordinary folk. She’s got that back.”

  Hardin considered Ajaratu’s erect bearing. “So she does.”

  “Paint her white and she could be the Duchess of Cornwall.”

  Hardin looked at him sharply, but there was no malice in his tiny blue eyes.

  That afternoon, while he was drilling the holes in the mast to secure the waveguide, Hardin punctured the tubing. He had to rip it all out, shop thirty miles away for more, and then hoist himself back up the mast to install the new. He was in a foul temper when Ajaratu picked him up for dinner.

  She was sitting in the backseat of the Rover. A grinning hospital orderly ushered Hardin in beside her and chauffeured them past Fowey toward the cliffs. Ajaratu explained that as this might be her last dinner out in England, she intended to enjoy it without worrying about passing a Breathalyser test. At her request, Hardin opened the champagne which lay between them in a bedpan full of ice.

  At the cliff tops, they took the bottle and walked from the car and watched silently as the sun dropped into the sea. Hardin felt the strains of preparation slowly slide from his body. A gentle melancholy took their place. Champagne and the shanghaied—but amply compensated—driver were Carolyn things to do. He refilled their glasses.

  They ate dinner at a restaurant in Fowey. It was a tourist place with pine-paneled walls and a panoramic view of the harbor and the dim cottage lights of Polruan on the opposite shore. As it was early June and a week night, the room was nearly empty. When they had eaten, the proprietress bought them brandy and told Ajaratu how sorry the village was that she was leaving.

  “All packed?” asked Hardin when they were alone again.

  “I shipped the last crates to Lagos this morning. All I’ve left are my suitcases.”

  “Excited?”

  “No, I’m a bit confused.”

  “About what? ”

  She sipped her brandy, swirled it luxuriously in her mouth, eyed its color in the light of the candle. “All sorts of things. This and that . . .”

  “Like what? ”

  She met his eyes. Then she looked away and her voice lightened artificially. “Funny things. Wondering what it will be like not to be special-looking anymore. For most of my time in England I’ve been the one black flower in a field of lilies. I’m noticed. It won’t be quite like that at home.”

  Hardin grinned. “You’ll be noticed. You’re a very beautiful lady.”

  “Thank you.” Her cheeks darkened.

  She was wearing a pale-blue dress that bared her arms and the fine lines of her neck. He tried to think of a term to describe the color of her silky skin. He hadn’t thought of it before, but it was neither black, nor brown, nor any shade he could describe with a single word. A blend, he decided, a deep rich hue somewhere between dark coffee beans and shimmering creme de cacao.

  “Who’s this lucky politician?”

  “Did I tell you about him?”

  “Mentioned it.”

  “Actually, he’s the son of an important politician. I’m not sure he’ll amount to as much. He’s well intentioned, but it’s hard to be a man with such a man for a father.”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Spoken like the son of such a man?” asked Ajaratu.

  “In ways.”

  “You never tell me about him.”

  Hardin smiled; the brandy was
giving him a beautiful buzz.

  “I’ve been chasing after him since I was twelve. That’s how old he was when he ran away to sea. He was born in eighteen eighty-seven and you could still do that in those days.”

  “He was much older than you.”

  “Oh, yes. Almost fifty when I was born. He fought his way up to second mate on a square-rigger in the South Pacific when he was sixteen. And I mean fought, because in those days any rank under chief officer had to be defended with your fists. The chief knew how to navigate, so hitting him was a serious offense. Anyway, my father got his master’s ticket. Then he went back to New York and became a doctor. All on his own with no help from anybody.”

  Hardin looked out the window. A brightly lighted coastal freighter was slipping into the harbor, curiously out of place against the dark hills and the few remaining lights in Polruan. The freighter passed from sight, heading up to the clay docks, and Hardin found Aja-ratu’s face reflected in the glass, watching him.

  “And he had a comfortable life by the time you came along,” she said softly.

  “That’s right.”

  “A quiet life.”

  “Yes.” She was pumping him. He felt threatened, and added brusquely, “A number of living-room therapists have told me that’s why I joined the navy and why I sail, and why I quit practicing medicine. They’ve concluded that I can’t take my own life seriously when I compare it to his. They’re full of crap.”

  “I didn’t say a word.”

  “I joined the navy because I like the sea. Which is one of the reasons I sail. I quit practicing for various reasons, among them the simple fact that electronics fascinated me. Why else would I go back to school when I was thirty-six years old? Carolyn had gone back then, too, studying gynecology, so it meant we had some lean student years.”

  A smile lighted his face. “And as far as taking life seriously is concerned, when we first met, Carolyn said I was the most serious thirty-three-year-old since Alexander the Great. . . . She got me to lighten up.”

  He sipped his brandy reflectively. After a while, he looked back at Ajaratu. “You know something? The trouble with having an older father is that most of his life has happened already. When you get back to Lagos you’ll see your father doing what he does, general-ing . . . being important. I missed that with my father. All I ever knew were stories about things that happened before I was born. They seemed very important and unsurpassable.”