Chapter Four #3
Perhaps they were right. Holding his nose, he returned for another bucketful.
No wonder they didn’t want to attempt this ruse unnecessarily.
When time came to unload, not only would the fish have to be disposed of but the burlap swathing the bottles would have absorbed the stench.
Patrick could only hope he would not be expected to help with that, too.
As he worked, he kept an eye on the destroyer.
At first, the four smoke trails grew more indistinct.
The distance between her and Barleycorn must be increasing, Patrick realised.
Gradually, the four appeared to merge into one as she came around to chase the rumrunner.
And then the intervening distance began to shrink.
Patrick started to wonder what American gaols were like. It was a happier alternative to wondering what it felt like to be shot.
The lookout on the roof shouted to his shipmates, “OK, go ahead!”
One of the men put down his bucket and moved aft, where he crouched to fiddle with three cylindrical canisters. Puzzled, Patrick stopped mucking about with fish and moved closer to watch. The man delved into the pockets of his pea jacket, came up empty-handed, and called to Patrick, “Matches?”
Patrick threw him a box, his aim sure despite the motion of the boat.
The seaman caught it. Cupping his hands, he struck a match and applied it to the top of one of the canisters. He paused to study the result. No effect was visible to Patrick, but the man nodded in satisfaction and proceeded to light the other two canisters.
The third failed to ignite on the first try. By the time he got it going, smoke billowed from the first and streamed out behind the Barleycorn.
“Tell the skipper to give it a couple of minutes,” he directed Patrick.
Grinning, Patrick hurried forward. The destroyer was already invisible. Therefore, he presumed, Barleycorn was invisible to the destroyer.
Leaning down, he passed on the message. The skipper glanced back through the rear window at the thickening, spreading screen, then gestured to him to enter.
He obeyed. “They’ll never catch us now,” he said with enthusiasm.
“They won’t.”
“Oh.” Patrick pondered. Of course, the destroyer would have a radio transmitter.
At this moment, they were doubtless sending out wireless messages to all Coast Guard ships within reach, with details of Barleycorn’s course.
“Oh,” he said again, crestfallen. Given the hint, the conclusion was obvious, and he should have worked it out for himself right away.
The skipper glanced back again at the smoke screen, then changed course.
Since the skipper didn’t dismiss him, Patrick stayed below, dropping onto the stool.
This time, the result of his subsequent cogitations was still less cheering: The skipper expected shooting, and since the codes Patrick carried were important to the success of the lucrative business, he was to be protected.
He didn’t exactly want to be on deck, dodging flying bullets, yet he felt like a coward, hiding out of sight while the others risked their lives on deck.
If he had fought in the War, would he have been one of those who did his duty, even a hero, perhaps, or would he have funked it?
He couldn’t help wondering, though it was a futile question.
He had been too young to bear arms for king and country.
Not that his present business was in any way comparable. He was doing nothing illegal by English law, but he was deliberately flouting American law. In American terms, he was a criminal.
Too late to worry about that. He had a job to do for his family, and he’d do it unless prevented by force majeure.
The approach of force majeure was announced just a few minutes later.
“Cutter on the starboard bow.” The man relaying the sighting from Jed on the wheelhouse roof stayed by the open door.
Patrick stared through the windscreen, or whatever it was called on a boat. He couldn’t see the cutter, but what had been a shadow on the horizon was now unmistakably land, green and grey and growing clearer by the moment.
“He’s spotted us. Changing course to intercept, and there’s another on the port bow.”
The skipper’s mouth took on a grimmer set, but he held steady on their course.
“Jed reckons they’ll fall astern afore they’re in range.”
That sounded like good news to Patrick. However, this time he paused before voicing his relief.
The cutters would be behind Barleycorn, but within firing range nonetheless.
One on each side, they could rake the launch from stem to stern if she refused to stop—or they could hold their fire, follow her to her landing place, and make their arrests on shore.
Now there were low headlands on either side as Barleycorn entered a bay.
A Klaxon horn blared, followed by a loud-hailer: “U.S. Coast Guard. Barleycorn, stand by to be boarded.”
The skipper’s response was to shout to the man at the door, “Get Jed off the roof, and all of you lie flat!”
“But skipper—”
“Get your heads down!”
The man disappeared.
Another hail was followed by a warning shot screaming overhead.
A fountain of water and mud arose where it landed in the shallows.
The Barleycorn veered left, then right, then left again.
Patrick assumed they were dodging further shots, until he realised the banks were closing in as they sped up a narrowing, winding inlet.
And ahead loomed a low drawbridge—a very low bridge.
“Skipper—”
“Duck!”
Patrick flung himself to the floor, arms covering his head. Above him, the roof splintered and disappeared, the smokestack crumpled, and windows shattered as they struck the bridge.
The skipper bobbed up and resumed steering, his gaze fixed on the river ahead. His cap had been knocked off and shards of glass glittered in his hair and whiskers. He spared a quick glance back at Patrick, prone amid the wreckage, and a manic grin bared his teeth.
“Too shallow for the cutters,” he explained, “and they can’t fire in case there’s people around.”
“Geez, skipper!” came a choking protest from the deck to the rear.
Half-hidden by smoke billowing from the truncated smokestack, three wobbly figures were picking themselves up from the backswept rubble of the roof.
Barleycorn was now moving too slowly in the narrow channel to disperse the pungent fumes.
Coughing, the men stumbled forward, one of them dabbing at a trickle of blood running down his cheek.
“Geez, skipper, there ain’t much of that drawbridge left. The township’s not gonna be too happy.”
“We’ll tell ’em a Coast Guard shell demolished it. They can try for compensation. Jed, get forward and watch for shoals. The rest of you, watch for the shore signal.”
Patrick said hesitantly, “There’s a chap over there who seems to be trying to attract our attention.” He pointed at a couple of men on the wooded bank, one waving both arms, the other launching a dory.
Throttling back, the skipper kept just enough way on the launch to hold her in place against the current in the middle of the stream. The dory pulled alongside and the oarsman hung on to a fender. On his face, a naturally dour expression seemed to be warring with inward amusement.
“You’re to unload in town,” he said laconically.
“In town?” Turning his head, the skipper stared at him.
“Ayup.”
“What’s going on?” Patrick asked uneasily in a low voice. “Has something gone wrong?”
“Looks that way.”
“Is it safe to go into the town? Won’t the police be waiting for us?”
“We’ll find out.”
“You trust the man who told us—?”
“My brother.”
Patrick didn’t like to point out that history was full of brothers betraying brothers, starting with Cain and Abel. After all, he trusted his own brother, the old stick-in-the-mud!
Meantime, the oarsman had briefly conferred with his passenger. He hoicked a thumb at Patrick and asked his brother, “That the fella you picked up out there?” The thumb hoicked seaward.
“Ayup.”
The thumb indicated his companion. “This fella’s come to pick him up.”
In contrast to the overall-clad boatman, the other was wearing a yellowish brown suit, of a colour and cut that would have raised eyebrows in London—but Patrick had no way of knowing whether it was proper business dress in America.
The passenger started to stand up, subsiding abruptly as the dory rocked but raising his brown fedora enough to show reddish hair and bright blue eyes in a pale face scattered with pale, blotchy freckles.
An Irishman, if ever Patrick had seen one.
“Now?” asked the skipper.
“Ayup.”
Patrick retrieved his kit bag from under a heap of debris and clambered out of the remains of the wheelhouse.
He turned to thank the skipper, receiving a silent nod in response.
With a wave to the deckhands, he went over the side and landed nimbly enough in the dory to preserve his self-respect.
His natural inclination was to introduce himself, but he recalled the ban on naming names and refrained, uttering merely, “How do you do?”
“Uh, howdy.”
“What went wrong, sir?” Patrick asked the local man as he rowed them towards the riverbank. “Why is the Barleycorn going into the town?”
“Farmer called the feds.”
“After taking our money for the use of his barn!” the Irishman exclaimed. He sounded more American than Irish, and very angry.
“Changed his mind,” the skipper’s brother said mildly. “It’s a free country. Man’s allowed to change his mind.”
“Not after taking our money. He’s going to regret it, I can tell you.”
“Not too badly, if you want folks hereabouts to cooperate in future.”
“He called the feds.”
“And his boy called us. So what happens? The feds rope in the local cops and every last one of ’em heads out to the farm to set an ambush.
So ‘stead of a dozen men tramping to and fro through the mud from river to farm with their arms full, Barleycorn sails into town and unloads at the dock, straight onto the trucks. Sounds like a good deal to me.”
He shipped his oars as the dory nosed into the bank. Patrick jumped ashore with a painter. He tied up securely to a stake he found there, then turned to take the oars and boat hook from the boatman.
“Thanks.” The man joined him, handed him his kit bag, and took the oars.
“Thank you, for ferrying me from Barleycorn.”
Patrick used the boat hook to bring the dory close and then gave the Irishman a hand up onto the bank.
The air was so thick with animosity, he felt a nervous desire to chatter but managed to keep his mouth shut.
The local man led the way into the woods, along a barely visible path. Birds fell silent as they passed.
In the rear, the city man, wearing utterly inappropriate shoes, picked his way with care through the damp leaf mould. Patrick paused to let him catch up.
“Where are we going?” he ventured to ask.
“To see a man. You don’t need to know his name, but he works for the Eyetie who works for the big boss, your customer. That is, you are Patrick Jessup, I presume?”
“Yes. And you?”
The man considered a moment. “I guess you’ll have to know sooner or later, seeing I’m going to England with you.”
“You are?” Patrick exclaimed.
“Yeah, so they tell me. Someone’s gotta make sure our competitors don’t get at you. But don’t let’s talk about that here. It’s none of the hick’s business.” He nodded towards the man trudging ahead. In a low voice he added, “You can call me Mickie Callaghan. Pleased to meetcha.”
“Callaghan! That’s my mother’s maiden name.”
“No kidding. Well, is that a coincidence or what?”
The local man was waiting for them beside an unpaved road. He had stowed the oars in a farm cart pulled off onto the verge. The cart horse was looking back at him with patient hope.
A little farther along, a large Packard was parked; half-concealed by bushes, it faced in the opposite direction from the cart.
Callaghan pointed. “That’s us.” He looked Patrick up and down.
“Mary Mother of God, you’re a mess altogether.
You brush yourself down before you get into my auto.
I guess I better pay this guy off, or he’ll be calling the feds on us. ”
Patrick handed the boat hook to the boatman and went on to the car. As he took off his jacket and shook the wood and glass debris out of it, he watched Callaghan hand over a wad of banknotes. Both he and the recipient looked grim.
Patrick was glad he was not the object of their anger.
His energy was beginning to flag. He hoped he wouldn’t be expected to crank the Packard.
When Callaghan came over and curtly gestured to him to get in, he realised with relief that the car had a self-starter. Callaghan climbed in behind the wheel.
He stuck his hand inside his jacket, pulled out a pistol from a shoulder holster, and chucked it onto the backseat.
The Packard failed to start on the first attempt. Before Callaghan could press the button again, the local man came up from behind. Boat hook in hand, he loomed over Callaghan.
“I’m telling you,” he said, and his voice carried no less conviction for being calm and quiet, “you and your buddies better not be seen in these parts ever again if any harm comes to that family.”
The motor caught and they spurted away in a cloud of dust. Like it or not, Patrick was committed to travelling with the aggressive, vengeful, and armed Irishman.