The Mask of Sumi

by John Creasey

  Mannering found that easy to believe.

  “If Nares makes too much of a nuisance of himself—”

  Mannering stopped, for he realised that her eyes were laughing at him. He squeezed her hand.

  “Except for murderers, I can look after myself well,” she declared.

  He was still feeling a little rueful, as he went on: “There’s one other thing, Pearl.”

  “And what is that?”

  “I want to search each man’s cabin, soon.”

  “Oh,” Pearl said, very thoughtfully. “I begin to see.”

  “And I need to be sure that he won’t come in while I’m doing it.”

  “But, John, if anyone should see you, what will you do?”

  “In everything except giving advice to beautiful young women I can handle things reasonably well,” he retorted.

  They laughed together; it was good to hear her happy, but he could not get Nares’ comment out of his mind.

  “When will you want to make your first visit?” Pearl asked.

  “I’ll try O’Keefe, between four o’clock and half past. He usually comes up for tea in the drawing-room.”

  “I will be there with him,” she promised. “But isn’t Nares a greater suspect?”

  “The best time to make sure he’s out of his cabin is during the evenings, when he’s either drinking or dancing,” Mannering said.

  “Tonight it is dancing,” Pearl remarked. There wasn’t much she missed.

  At ten past four Mannering saw her sitting with O’Keefe, who was talking earnestly. Could he have sent those notes? They had seemed much more like notes which Nares would write.

  Mannering went out, and down to B Deck, where O’Keefe had one of the deluxe cabins. It was a ‘dead’ time of day. The Purser’s office was not open, and the Indian stewards were off duty. Even the bath-boys were absent. Two young girls, their long legs beautifully tanned, young bosoms beautifully rounded, were talking about what to wear at the dance tonight. Mannering realised that they had noticed him; it would have been better if they hadn’t. He turned into the narrow passage leading to O’Keefe’s cabin.

  He felt completely on a limb. If he were caught, Cross could not possibly overlook it.

  Mannering tried the handle of the door; and it was locked.

  Now his heart began to beat faster. At sea, few people locked their doors. Had O’Keefe some special reason for doing so? Mannering took a pen-knife out of his pocket, one with a pick-lock blade. It clicked open. Someone walked along the passage – a woman, heels tapping. Mannering hunched his shoulders to lose height, and waited until she passed; he had no idea whether she had noticed him.

  He inserted the pick-lock blade. The lock was straightforward, and Mannering had never lost his dexterity in the use of the pick-lock. He felt it catch on the barrel, twisted, and heard the lock click back. He thrust open the door and stepped inside.

  He heard a rustle of sound and his heart leapt; but it was a shirt, blowing in the breeze of the electric fan. He closed the door. O’Keefe also kept his inside window up – the one with slats; he meant to make sure no one could get in.

  Was it possible that the first attempt would be lucky?

  It was a quarter past four; Mannering believed he could rely on another twenty minutes.

  He began on the cases. There were seven large and three small. The first three he tried were unlocked and contained clothes and oddments, the fourth was locked. He used the pick-lock, and in a few dexterous movements, had the case ready to open. He thrust the lid back. It was filled with cigarettes, gin, and whisky, presumably bought very cheaply at Gibraltar. Mannering moved each packet of 200 cigarettes and each wrapped bottle, made sure the mask wasn’t there, and started again.

  He forced one more locked case, threw back the lid, and started at the sight of English currency. After the first shock, he counted; it contained over a thousand pounds in sterling notes and nearly as much in East African, Rhodesian, and South African money. He relocked the case, very thoughtfully. O’Keefe wasn’t what he seemed but Mannering’s interest was not in this kind of currency fraud. He ran through the drawers, the wardrobe, and everywhere a box containing the mask might be found, but there was nothing.

  He listened at the door for a moment, heard no sound, stepped outside and locked the door with the skeleton key.

  He stepped into the passage, and no one was about.

  A few yards along the passage was Corrison’s cabin. Corrison didn’t drink tea, but always champed at the bit until the bar was open at five o’clock. Mannering went along to his own cabin, which wasn’t locked. He opened the door, and had his second shock, this one much greater. A pair of long, slender, lovely legs were stretched out on his bed; a woman’s legs. She was wearing shorts, and a shirt blouse, the top buttons of which were undone. She was smiling at him, her hands behind her head, and the position thrust her bosom forward. Her hair was glossy and dark. She was Naomi Ransom, whom he and Pearl had played in a doubles match of deck tennis.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Mannering.”

  “Hallo,” said Mannering. “Don’t you take tea?”

  “No more than you do,” Naomi Ransom said.

  She was a suspect only because she had booked her passage just a day before the ship had sailed, and was not known by the British India Line. She was due to get off at Mombasa, and was officially touring.

  “Oh, I hate tea,” Mannering said, and leaned over her to press the bell for the steward. She moved her right arm, and held his wrist. It hurt a little from the Gibraltar bruise, but Mannering did not show it.

  “I shouldn’t,” Naomi said. “It isn’t proper to entertain a lady in your cabin.”

  “Oh, ladies are always welcome,” Mannering said. “And I’m sure my steward wouldn’t be shocked.”

  “You should be.”

  “It doesn’t happen easily.” Mannering moved back from the bed and pulled up a chair. “Apart from compromising yourself, what are you doing here?”

  She looked at him from beneath fine dark curling lashes. She was strikingly handsome, but far more important just then, she was superbly confident.

  She smiled very slowly; some would say seductively.

  “Shall we say five hundred pounds?”

  “That’s a lot of money,” Mannering remarked.

  “Not for you.”

  “It’s a lot of money for anybody.”

  “Not for John Mannering of Quinns.”

  He smiled at her amiably.

  “I know some of you are expensive, Mrs. Ransom, but aren’t you pricing yourself out of the market?”

  “I’m past being insulted,” she said, “and I’m not selling my feminine charms.”

  “Then why do you expect to get five hundred pounds?”

  “For my silence,” she said.

  “Oh,” said Mannering softly. “Blackmail, is it?”

  “That’s right,” Naomi Ransom said sweetly.

  “What do you think you can blackmail me about?” inquired Mannering.

  “Your visit to Ralph O’Keefe’s cabin, with a skeleton key,” she said. “You wouldn’t like to spend the rest of the voyage confined to this room, would you?”

  Chapter Ten

  BARGAIN

  “No,” Mannering admitted after a moment’s reflection. “It’s too hot to live in a cabin for so long.”

  “I thought you would see reason.”

  “I don’t think five hundred pounds is reason.”

  “I do,” she said.

  Mannering smiled amiably.

  “But you’re wrong,” he said. “Get up and get out.”

  She didn’t move.

  “Naomi, I don’t want to ask you again,” Mannering said.

  “John, dear
, you can’t bluff me,” she retorted.

  “Bluff?” he echoed as if intrigued. “We’ll see if it’s bluff.” He took her right wrist, pulled it free, and twisted. She gasped, and sat up, breasts strained forward against the shirt blouse, which was small for her. He twisted again, so that her arm was behind her in a hammer lock.

  “Legs off the bed,” he ordered.

  “You’re going to regret this, you know.”

  He let her wrist go, but before she could do anything he slid one arm beneath her shoulders and one beneath her knees, lifted her off the bed and carried her to the door. He thrust one arm past her, opened the door, thrust her forward and said: “Next time, Naomi, call only by appointment.”

  She recovered her balance in the little hallway outside his room, and twisted round to look at him. She was breathing rather hard, but smiling. She looked quite magnificent, with her head tossed back and her body thrust forward.

  “John,” she said, “I’ll forgive you just this once.”

  She went off.

  Mannering closed the door and stood by the bed for a few seconds, vaguely aware of the perfume rising from the pillow. He was hot from the exertion; it was much hotter here than he had realised. He had a sip of iced water from a thermos jug, and stepped to the window.

  He heard a rustle of movement, just outside.

  He thrust himself forward but the window wasn’t open wide enough. He pulled it down, and peered out in time to see a pair of blue shoes and bare ankles disappearing round a gangway. He sprang to the door, but before he reached the passage again, it was empty except for a mother and a tiny tot, coming slowly along.

  “Good afternoon,” the mother said to Mannering. She looked exhausted with the heat.

  “Hallo,” Mannering beamed at the child. “Did you see anyone coming along here just now?”

  “No, I’m afraid I didn’t,” the woman said. “I’ve only just come from the ballroom.”

  “Mummy, come on!” the tot urged.

  “I’ve promised to take her in for a swim,” the mother said. “She simply loves the water. And she must be hot, poor child.”

  She hurried past, brushing back her sweat-damp hair.

  Mannering went back to his cabin, very thoughtfully. It was bad enough to have been found out; but to think that someone else may have overheard what he and Naomi Ransom had said made the situation ever more delicate if not dangerous.

  Where had she been when he had searched O’Keefe’s cabin?

  Would he have been wiser to talk to her?

  He tried to persuade himself that he had proved that he could not easily be intimidated, and that could only be a good thing. He changed into borrowed swimming trunks, took a borrowed towel, and was about to put on the borrowed sandals when he realised that the woman might have left something here. He ran through the drawers and wardrobe, and his two cases. Everything seemed just as he had left it. He was still uneasy when he left his cabin.

  Upstairs, the deck was beginning to fill up again. Several people were in the pool, including the mother and tiny tot. He waited for a chance, and dived in cleanly. He came up at the other side of the little pool, next to a blonde whom he did not know well.

  “Isn’t it lovely?” she asked in a noticeably South African accent.

  “Just right,” he said.

  Then he saw Naomi Ransom, poised on the edge of the pool. Several men by the rails were watching her. She looked quite beautiful as she waited until a spot was clear, and then dived in. She made hardly a splash.

  Soon, she was treading water by Mannering’s side.

  “When can I make that appointment?” she asked.

  “Shall we have a drink at seven o’clock in the smoking-room?”

  “That sounds more amenable!” Immediately she had spoken she swam away from him.

  He got out, towelled gently to avoid sweating too much and ordered a whisky and soda. Pearl was sitting just outside the bar, with Nares.

  “Hallo,” Mannering said. “So you two know each other.”

  “We certainly do,” Nares said. He winked.

  “Have you been swimming?” asked Pearl.

  “Just a dip. Now I have to go and play deck tennis,” Mannering said. He disappeared into the blazing white sunlight, but did not go to the next deck for the sports; he hurried down to B Deck.

  Nares had a small, inside room – the kind of room a man without much money would have. The door was unlocked. Mannering stepped inside, knowing that a bath-boy and a cabin boy had seen him; but three doors led off here.

  The room was a shambles. At first, Mannering thought that someone must have searched here and turned it upside down. Soon he realised that this was normal for Nares. Shirts, trousers, swimsuits, and ties littered the bed, dressing-table, and chairs. Oddments of creams, tanning lotions and pomades cluttered the dressing-table, too; this was more like a woman’s room than a man’s.

  There were only three cases and a brief case. All were unlocked and each except the brief case was empty. He looked through the brief case. Inside were some letters from a tea planter in Nyasaland, confirming the offer of a post of overseer at two thousand pounds a year ‘all found’. Earlier letters referred to Nares’ lack of experience.

  Mannering put these all back.

  Nares was obviously hard up or he wouldn’t have taken such a job. A man in financial difficulties might do a lot of peculiar things for money.

  Mannering opened the only section of the brief case he hadn’t yet inspected. He unfolded a letter, and as he ran his eye down it, saw a paragraph which read:

  “You owe over three years’ alimony to your ex-wife, and unless you find a substantial sum shortly you will be put into the bankruptcy court by your tailors and your shoemakers.

  You must get a job, and I strongly advise you to try to get one out of England. Carole won’t be patient forever.”

  Mannering folded the letter and put it back.

  As he always did in such moments he felt as if he were a heel to invade another man’s privacy in such a way – even a man like Nares. Then he reminded himself that Nares might easily have been approached to carry that mask, yet there was no sign of it here.

  Mannering went back to his cabin and changed. There was the usual flurry of young and old in the passages. He went up to the smoking-room, and the Indian Mehta came across and said: ”Oh, Mr. Mannering.”

  ”Hallo.” Mannering smiled.

  “I believe we have to do battle together.”

  “Have we?” Mannering didn’t know what the man meant: it was almost as if Mehta was challenging him before he, Mannering, searched his room.

  “I have just won my round of deck quoits. We are in the semi-finals.”

  “Oh,” said Mannering. “Congratulations. Shall we play tomorrow?”

  “Any time you wish.”

  They settled for ten o’clock. Mannering walked on. A few people, also changed for dinner, were in the smoking-room, but there was no sign of Naomi Ransom. Nares was in the smoking-room, changed, a drink in front of him. He waved.

  “Come and have one.”

  “Another time, thanks,” Mannering said.

  Then he saw Naomi Ransom.

  She was stunningly beautiful in a short cocktail dress, high on one shoulder, off the other. Her hair was beautifully done, and she wore a single camellia in it, the same red as her dress. She looked as sleek and faultlessly turned out as if she had come from a Paris or Mayfair salon. Every man in sight turned his head. One, a deep-tanned, handsome man was approaching Mannering; he stopped.

  Naomi drew near Mannering and touched his hand lightly.

  “Hallo.”

  “You look ravishing.”

  “Always the gallant.”

  “Not always, but certainly now.�
��

  “Mr. Mannering—” The deep-tanned man was Major Mick Thomas, the chairman of the Sports Committee; young Joslyn was his chief aide.

  “Hallo, Mick,” Naomi said.

  “Beautiful as ever, sweetheart,” Thomas said. “Come and join my party.”

  “I think John has designs on me,” Naomi said. Her eyes seemed to laugh at Mannering; honey-coloured eyes with beautiful lashes.

  “Can’t say I blame him,” said Thomas. “Er—Mr.—John—would you do me a very great favour?”

  “Be careful of him,” said Naomi. “He probably wants you to judge the fancy dress competition.”

  “Don’t spike my guns,” Thomas protested.

  “No, what I would like is you to be the announcer and auctioneer at the race meeting tomorrow night,” he went on. “The man who was to do it has got laryngitis. It isn’t very much, really.”

  “It’s a hard evening’s work,” said Naomi. “I’ve heard all about it.”

  “You’re such a help,” said Thomas, reproachfully.

  “I’ll be glad to,” Mannering said.

  Thomas’s face lit up.

  “That’s jolly decent of you. Everyone will be delighted. Glad to see Naomi hasn’t much influence over you.”

  He hurried off.

  “Where shall we go?” asked Mannering. “This is too public.”

  “The quietest place is the drawing-room,” Naomi said.

  “And we must be quiet for blackmail.”

  “Yes, mustn’t we,” she said sweetly. They went along, talking idly, to the almost empty drawing-room, took seats out of earshot of anyone else, and ordered gin and French.

  “Now to business,” said Mannering. “You think you saw me go into O’Keefe’s cabin.”

  “I know I saw you.”

  “Where were you?”

  “In the cabin opposite.”

  “Yours?”

  “Yes. I share it with two other women.” She rested a hand on Mannering’s arm. “I’m in a generous mood, John.”