A Fine Night for Dying

The dinghy suddenly lifted on a wave, poised for a moment, then dropped in across a line of creamy surf, sliding to a halt as she touched shingle. Mercier shipped his oars, slipped out and pulled her round, prow facing out to sea. As he straightened, a light pierced the darkness, dazzling him momentarily.

He raised a hand defensively; the light was extinguished, and a calm voice said in French, ‘You’re late. Let’s get moving.’

It was the Englishman again; Rossiter. Mercier could tell by the accent, although his French was almost perfect. The only man he had ever known Jacaud touch his cap to. In the darkness he was only a shadow, and so was the man with him. They spoke together briefly in English, a language Mercier did not understand, then the other man stepped into the dinghy and crouched in the prow. Mercier followed him, unshipping the oars, and Rossiter pushed the boat out over the first wave and scrambled across the bow.

Jacaud was waiting at the stern rail when they reached the launch, his cigar glowing faintly in the darkness. The passenger went up first and Rossiter followed with his suitcase. By the time Mercier had reached the deck, the Englishman and the passenger had gone below. Jacaud helped him to get the dinghy over the side, left him to lash it to the deck and went into the wheelhouse. A moment later, the engines rumbled softly and they moved out to sea.

Mercier finished his task and went forward to make sure that all was secure. Rossiter had joined Jacaud in the wheelhouse and they stood together at the wheel, the Englishman’s thin, ascetic face contrasting strongly with Jacaud’s-opposite sides of the coin. One an animal, the other a gentleman, and yet they seemed to get on with each other so well, something Mercier could never understand.

As he moved past the wheelhouse, Jacaud spoke in a low voice and they both burst into laughter. Even in that, they were different, the Englishman’s lively chuckle mingling strangely with Jacaud’s throaty growl, and yet somehow they complemented each other.

Mercier shuddered and went below to the galley.

For most of the way the passage was surprisingly smooth, considering what the Channel could be like at times, but towards dawn it started to rain. Mercier was at the wheel, and as they started the run-in to the English coast, fog rolled to meet them in a solid wall. He stamped on the deck, and after a while Jacaud appeared. He looked terrible, eyes swollen and bloodshot from lack of sleep, face grey and spongy.

‘Now what?’

Mercier nodded towards the fog. ‘It doesn’t look too good.’

‘How far out are we?’

‘Six or seven miles.’

Jacaud nodded and pulled him out of the way. ‘Okay – leave it to me.’

Rossiter appeared in the doorway. ‘Trouble?’

Jacaud shook his head. ‘Nothing I can’t handle.’

Rossiter went to the rail. He stood there, face expressionless, and yet a small muscle twitched in his right cheek, a sure sign of stress. He turned and, brushing past Mercier, went below.

Mercier pulled up the collar of his reefer jacket, thrust his hands into his pockets and stood in the prow. In the grey light of early dawn the launch looked even more decrepit than usual and exactly what it was supposed to be – a poor man’s fishing boat, lobster pots piled untidily in the stern beside the rubber dinghy, nets draped across the engine-room housing. Moisture beaded everything in the light rain and then they were enveloped by the fog, grey tendrils brushing against Mercier’s face, cold and clammy, unclean, like the touch of the dead.

And the fear was there again, so much so that his limbs trembled and his stomach contracted painfully. He wiped his mouth with the back of one hand and started to roll a cigarette, fighting to keep his fingers still.

The launch slipped through a grey curtain into clear water, and the cigarette paper fluttered to the deck as Mercier leaned forward, clutching at the rail. Two hundred yards away through the cold morning a sleek grey shape moved to cut across their course.

Jacaud was already reducing speed as Rossiter appeared on deck. He ran to the rail and stood there, one hand shielding his eyes from the rain. A signal flashed through the grey morning and he turned, face grim.

‘They’re saying “Heave to, I wish to board you.” It’s a Royal Navy motor torpedo-boat. Let’s get out of here.’

Mercier clutched at his sleeve, panic rising to choke him. ‘Those things can do thirty-five knots, monsieur. We don’t stand a chance.’

Rossiter grabbed him by the throat. ‘Seven years, that’s what you’ll get if they catch us with him on board. Now get out of my way.’

He nodded to Jacaud, ran along the deck and disappeared below. The engines roared as Jacaud gave them full throttle, spinning the wheel at the same time, and the launch heeled over, almost coming to a dead stop, then surged forward into the fog.

The grey walls moved in, hiding them from sight, and the door to the companionway banged open and Rossiter appeared with the passenger. He was a black man of middle years, tall and handsome, and wore a heavy overcoat with a fur collar. He looked around in bewilderment and Rossiter spoke to him in English. The man nodded and moved forward to the rail and Rossiter pulled out an automatic pistol and struck him a heavy blow at the base of the skull. The man lurched to one side and fell to the deck without a cry.

What happened next was like something out of a nightmare. The Englishman moved with incredible speed and energy. He grabbed a heavy chain from the stern deck and wound it around the man’s body several times. He gave it a final turn about the neck and hooked the two loose ends together with a spring link.

He turned and shouted to Mercier above the roaring of the engine, ‘Okay, grab his feet and over with him.’

Mercier stood there as if turned to stone. Without hesitation, Rossiter dropped to one knee and heaved the man into a sitting position. The man raised his head painfully; the eyelids flickered, then opened. He glared at Mercier, not in supplication, but in hate; his lips parted and he cried out in English. Rossiter stooped and manoeuvred him across his shoulders, then straightened and the man went over the rail, headfirst into the sea, and disappeared instantly.

Rossiter turned and struck Mercier heavily in the face, sending him sprawling to the deck. ‘Now pick yourself up and get to work on those nets or I’ll send you after him.’

He went into the wheelhouse. Mercier lay there for a moment, then got to his feet and stumbled along to the stern. It couldn’t have happened. Oh, God, but it couldn’t have happened. The deck slanted suddenly as Jacaud spun the wheel again, and Mercier fell on his face in the pile of stinking nets and started to vomit.

It was the fog that saved them, spreading out halfway across the Channel, shrouding them from view on the run back to the French coast.

In the wheelhouse, Jacaud swallowed rum from the bottle Rossiter passed and chuckled harshly. ‘We’ve lost them.’

‘Your luck is good,’ Rossiter said. ‘You must live right.’

‘Pity about the package.’

‘That’s life.’ Rossiter seemed completely unconcerned and nodded to where Mercier crouched by the nets, head in hands. ‘What about him?’

‘A worm,’ Jacaud said. ‘No backbone. Maybe he should go for a swim, too.’

‘And what would you tell them in Ste-Denise?’ Rossiter shook his head. ‘Leave it to me.’

He went along the deck and stood over Mercier with the rum bottle. ‘You’d better have a drink.’

Mercier raised his head slowly. His skin was like the belly of a fish, the eyes full of pain. ‘He was still alive, monsieur. Still alive when you put him into the water.’

Rossiter’s pale flaxen hair glinted in the early morning sun, making him look strangely ageless. He stared down at Mercier, his face full of concern. He sighed heavily, crouched and produced an exquisite Madonna from one of his pockets. It was perhaps eight inches long and obviously extremely old, carved by some master in ivory the colour of his hair, chased with silver. When he pressed her feet with his thumb, six inches of blue steel appeared as if by magic, sharp as a razor on both edges, honed with loving care.

Rossiter kissed the Madonna reverently, without even a trace of mockery, then stroked the blade against his right cheek.

‘You have a wife, Mercier,’ he said gently, and his face never lost its peculiarly saintly expression for a moment. ‘An invalid, I understand?’

‘Monsieur?’ Mercier said in a whisper, and the heart seemed to stop inside him.

‘One word, Mercier, the slightest whisper, and I cut her throat. You follow me?’

Mercier turned away, stomach heaving, and started to be sick again. Rossiter stood up and walked along the deck and stood in the entrance of the wheelhouse.

‘All right?’ Jacaud demanded.

‘Naturally.’ Rossiter took a deep breath of fresh salt air and smiled. ‘A fine morning, Jacaud, a beautiful morning. And to think one could still be in bed and missing all this.’

2 (#u536697fe-7ffc-599c-bd7f-4f793128aa54)

Fog rolled in across the city, and somewhere in the distance ships hooted mournfully to each other as they negotiated the lower reaches of the Thames on the way out to sea. Fog – real fog of the kind that you seemed to get in London and nowhere else on earth. Fog that killed off the aged, choked the streets and reduced one of the world’s great cities to chaos and confusion.

Paul Chavasse abandoned his taxi at Marble Arch and whistled softly to himself as he turned up the collar of his trenchcoat and passed through the gates of the park. There was only one thing he liked better than fog and that was rain. An idiosyncrasy with its roots somewhere in youth, he supposed, or perhaps there was a simpler explanation. After all, both rain and fog enclosed one in a small private world, which could be very convenient at times.