Medusa by Hammond Innes Page A

the American said.
    I nodded, laughing ruefully. To own this sort of a vessel I’d have to sell both our villas. They were in our joint names, and even if Soo agreed and we succeeded in selling them on the present market, it would probably not be enough. The ship needed painting, of course, and the scrape along the outer curve of the port hull was deeper than I had thought. It looked as though some frames might be broken. But otherwise she seemed in remarkably good shape. There was even a big semi-inflatable mooredalongside with wheel steering, spray screen and remote controls to the outboard engine.
    I hauled myself back on to the American’s deck. ‘You came through Gib, you say. Did you see a Royal Navy frigate in the harbour there?’
    â€˜Not that I recall. It’s a big place, all those high stone quays, and anyway we were round in the marina.’ And he added, ‘We saw some US Navy ships though. They were powering through the Straits as we came in from Cape St Vincent. Destroyers by the look of them. More watchdogs for the Sixth Fleet’s carriers, I guess.’
    I was back on the dock then, wondering why anyone should want an old fishing boat like the
Santa Maria
in place of that cat. I could see her name now. It was on the flat, sloping stern of each hull –
Thunderflash
. If I owned a machine like that … I turned back to the American. ‘What made you think I was the owner?’
    He smiled and gave a quick shrug. ‘Something in the way you were moving about her. Thought maybe it was a delivery job.’ There had been four of them on board, he told me, when they came in that morning. One he took to be the skipper, two were obviously crew, and there had also been a short, dark man dressed in a suit who looked and behaved like a passenger. They had had to clear immigration, as well as health and customs, so he presumed the boat had come from France or Italy, which could of course mean Corsica or Sardinia. The passenger had gone ashore immediately afterwards, the skipper about an hour later, while the others just sat around drinking wine and listening to the radio. The skipper had returned about half an hour before I had arrived with a man who was obviously Flórez and the four of them had then gone across to Anton’s for a drink.
    The café-bar was almost opposite the Estacián Maritima, just back of the Customs House. Above it loomed the older part of Mahon, clouds scudding over a moon-dark sky. As always at this time of night, the barwas dark and very crowded. They were at a table at the far end, heads close together, coffee cups and glasses at their elbows, a bottle in the centre. They were talking in English and as I approached I heard one of them say, ‘Fifteen minutes, and that’s not driving fast.’
    Flórez saw me then, and as he switched on a smile and got to his feet, the man sitting with his back to me raised his hand as though for silence. ‘You want a drink with your coffee, Mr Steele?’ Flórez called the order to the barman and pulled up a chair. ‘Later we go over to the ship.’ He didn’t introduce me to any of the others, merely saying I was the man he had been talking about.
    There was a short, awkward silence after I had sat down. I was between Flórez and the man I took to be the skipper. He wore an old reefer and his neck stuck out of the collar of it like a column running straight up into the long, narrow head. His face, what little I could see of it in that light, was weathered to a dark brown, a strong, flamboyantly handsome face with a powerful jaw line and a nose that hung straight and sharp over a narrow, tight-lipped mouth. It was an almost Gallic face, the eyes very bright, the brilliance of the whites under the thick head of black hair giving them a wide-eyed look that was almost a stare. A little black moustache, turned down over the corners of the mouth, seemed to split his features in two,