Death in the Andamans by M. M. Kaye

further away we are from the wind and the windows, the cosier we’ll be. All those black, wet panes of glass give me the shivers.’
    Charles and John Shilto carried the table of drinks between them, and the party moved gratefully into the more cheerful atmosphere of the drawing-room where the sound of rain and wind was less obtrusive. But Copper laid a hand on Nick’s sleeve and stopped him as he was about to follow them: ‘Nick … what happened? We were terribly worried about you.’
    â€˜We?’ inquired Nick with the ghost of a grin.
    â€˜I,’ corrected Copper gravely. ‘We were only half-way home when the storm hit us, and I was convinced you’d be drowned.’
    â€˜Your conviction was shared,’ said Nick lightly. ‘To tell you the truth, Coppy, I thought we were done for, and I still can’t make out how we all managed to get away with it.’
    â€˜Not all,’ said Copper with a shiver.
    â€˜You mean Ferrers? Oh, he’ll be all right. Probably been picked up by now, if he hasn’t swum ashore.’
    His tone was light enough, but he avoided Copper’s eyes and she flushed resentfully: ‘Don’t talk to me as if I was in the kindergarten, Nick! You know he hasn’t got a chance, don’t you?’
    Nick shrugged his shoulders. ‘Well — yes. I’m afraid he’s done for all right, poor devil. God, what a jolly Christmas Eve!’
    â€˜Tell me what happened to you,’ commanded Copper, perching on the arm of a verandah chair and clasping her hands about her knees.
    Nick hesitated for a moment and jerked his shoulders uncomfortably as if to shrug off an unpleasant memory. Then, ‘It was the queerest thing I’ve ever experienced,’ he said. ‘We heard it coming. It made a noise like an express train in a tunnel, rushing towards us; very faint at first, but getting nearer and quicker and louder. And then it hit us as though it were something solid made of reinforced concrete. We hadn’t time to think and barely time to get the sail down. It caught us broadside on and just flattened us out. One minute we were pegging along in a flat calm, and the next second we were in the water with all hell let loose round us …
    â€˜We tried to count heads, and as far as I know everyone was O.K. Then the rain arrived, and after that you couldn’t see your hand in front of your face. The boats kept bumping into each other, bottom-side up, and the sky was pitch black and the rain ricocheted off the water in a boiling fury. There wasn’t anything to do but just hang on like grim death. I don’t know where everyone else had got to, but I managed to get Ruby astride the keel of my boat, and I think someone else was hanging on to the other end, though I’ve no idea who it was. And there we stuck for what seemed like an hour or so, until the forest-launch bumped into us and nearly slaughtered the lot of us.’
    â€˜But hadn’t you all drifted apart by then?’ inquired Copper.
    â€˜Oddly enough, no. I’d an idea that we’d be picked up at opposite sides of the bay, but I gather we weren’t more than twenty feet apart when the launch found us. Though even then Hamish’s boat took a bit of finding; we must have passed her a dozen times without spotting her. It was only when we’d got everyone on board that we realized Ferrers was missing.’
    â€˜But didn’t anyone see him go?’
    Nick gave a short, mirthless laugh. ‘No. And it’s not surprising, with three boats all barging about in the smother and everyone concentrating on sticking like a limpet to the nearest bit of woodwork. Ronnie Purvis says he thought he was on the end of my boat, but the chap on the launch says he thinks he only pulled in Ruby and myself and that there wasn’t a third person with us. So you can see how easy it would have been to lose sight of Ferrers.’
    Copper