course, if you want to step straight into a hole, it’ll be your funeral, not mine,’ said the third officer.
Faggis had been working on his own. Right. Fell in with the girl, and got her to join forces with him. Right! And this Hammersmith affair had been their first job together. The girl had said so. Right. All clear so far.
Why hadn’t Faggis continued to work alone? P’r’aps he had had his eye on the old miser’s crib but required a partner to help him crack it. P’r’aps he needed someone small, like this girl, to shinny up a water-pipe, and then slip in through a window. P’r’aps he was tired of his own company, and liked the girl’s face. Anyway, into the house they get, and start collecting. Find plenty of new money. (The chap at the coffee-stall, who had left in a hurry, had paid in new money.) Then the old miser comes down, the girl does a bunk into the garden, Faggis attacks the old man, and kills him. Didn’t mean to kill him. But kills him. And, once you’ve started killing, you ain’t too pertickler if you have to go on …
‘Turn to the right, man, unless you want to get your face scorched off!’
Faggis rushes out into the garden. The girl scoots. Faggis follows. She gives him the slip, runs back to the house for a quick squint—plucky, that was!—and then off she goes again, with Faggis after her.
P’r’aps Faggis never let her out of his sight at all. That might be. Anyhow, he must have stuck pretty close, and he gave her a scare when she came barging round that corner, and bumped into Ben. Then Faggis probably lost sight of her till he picked her up again near the coffee-stall. That was why he slipped away from the coffee-stall so quickly. And after that, one by one, all three of them—the girl, Faggis, and Ben went into dockland through that open gate!
The girl got into the ship. Either to escape from Faggis, or from the police, or from both. By this time, she’d probably decided not to tell the police, but to concentrate on her own get-away. Her mind would be in a terrible tangle.
Yes, but something happened to Faggis before he got into the ship!
Ben’s mind grew dark, and he shuddered, for now he was dealing with the evidence of his own eyes, and not with mere theory. In spite of the unpleasantness of the business, however, he grappled with it, and tried to complete the story. He realised that his future actions, and possibly his future fate, might depend upon the extent of his knowledge.
Now, then! Get on with it! Girl in the ship. Faggis, not yet. Ben, asleep against a post. What happens?
Faggis wants to get into the ship, if he knows the girl has got in. If he doesn’t know, then he’s still poking around for her. Along comes a man.
‘Who are you?’ says the man.
‘Who are you?’ replies Faggis.
Something like that. Or perhaps Faggis doesn’t wait to inquire! He’d be in a stew. Anyway, there’s a tussle. P’r’aps the man is from the ship, and is trying to stop Faggis getting on it. P’r’aps the man recognises Faggis, and threatens to give him up. Or p’r’aps the man doesn’t know anything, but is going to make a row, and that’s the last thing Faggis wants. Slosh! The man goes down, hit with a spanner or a knuckle-duster. Probably a spanner. The third officer had referred to a spanner in the conversation in the coal bunker, and the report in the paper had said that the knife had been found by the police. Very likely Faggis had plenty of tools on him, and the spanner was one of them.
Down goes the man for the count. Death does the counting. He cries out as he goes down. Ben hears the cry, and thinks at first it is an echo of his own. The echo was this poor fellow’s death cry …
‘Now you’re for it,’ said the third officer. ‘We’re nearly there.’
What happens then? Faggis gets the wind up. He starts lugging the man he has killed towards the water, hears Ben approaching, drops the body, darts away, and leaves it for Ben to topple over.
Was Faggis watching Ben as he croquet-hooped over the dead body? Whew!
Next? That’s easy. Ben rushes off on his circular tour. Faggis returns to the body, continues with his journey, and drops the man into the water. Splash!
‘Stoker?’ thought Ben suddenly at this point. ‘The deader was a stoker!’
The thought was illuminating. Dead man, stoker. Faggis, who had killed the dead man, referred to by the third officer as ‘Mr Hammersmith Stoker.’ Taken on in his place, eh? By the third officer, who somehow got to know all about it! Now, why would the third officer take a murderer on to his ship, allowing him to fill the vacancy caused by the murder?
Ben turned suddenly, and stared at the third officer. The third officer stared back.
‘What the hell are you stopping for?’ demanded the third officer.
‘I was jest thinkin’,’ answered Ben, ‘’ow much I loves yer.’
The third officer swung him round and kicked him in the back.
‘Tha’s orl right,’ thought Ben, struggling not to cry. ‘You wait!’
The stomach of a ship, as has been indicated, is not the pleasantest place to reside in. The brain is more appealing. There are instruments in it which may fill a novice with a certain awe. There are wheels and levers, intricate barometers, compasses with bulbs and lights, and other electrical devices, all bearing the mute message, ‘Do not touch!’ But sunlight plays about them, and clear air bathes them, driving away one’s nightmare thoughts; and in the adjacent sanctuary where the brain rests, luxury mixes very pleasantly with necessity.
While Ben was ascending from the stomach, two men sat in the brain’s sanctuary. One was dressed in immaculate dark blue. His sleeve bore four imposing gold lines, the middle two interwoven to form a diamond. (The third officer’s sleeve had only one line, and his diamond was just tacked on.) His face was as immaculate as his cloth, but the immaculateness of both the face and the cloth spoke of efficiency, not of dandyism. The chief engineer can give orders with grease on his clothes and smuts on his face, but the captain’s appearance, saving in emergency, must be irreproachable.
The other man possessed quite another kind of distinctiveness. His clothes too, were of the best, if money stands for quality. Brown tweed, of expensive roughness. A coloured shirt that glowed in daring contrast to the suit. ‘I am right!’ it shouted to the doubter. ‘Notice my silk. Men who can afford me can make fashion!’ Brown boots, solid and highly polished. A tie that cost even more than it could show—it is a tragedy that mere appearance is so limited—and a pin to bring tears to covetous eyes. The pin was secretly secured against the covetous eyes, however, by an eighteen-carat gold clip.
And presiding above all this was a large monarch of a head, full of ancient business furrows that were now comfortable creases. A grey moustache, also large and comfortable, concealed the upper lip. But today something disturbed the usual ostentatious comfort of this man, and his eyes as they gazed at the captain sitting opposite were bright with restlessness.
‘Say,
