The Golden Reef (1969) Read Online Free Page B

of pleasure.
    Bristow, that evening in the gunners’ messroom, seemed to be of the same opinion. ‘If the Old Man snuffs it there’ll be a right bastard to fill his shoes.’
    ‘What makes you think he’ll snuff it?’ Hagan asked. The petty officer had a tiny cabin of his own but for the sake of company he spent a lot of time in the gunners’ mess.
    ‘I heard he was bad.’
    Hagan sniffed. He was nearly twice Bristow’s age and he had a craggy, weather beaten face that was almost exactly as wide as it was long. ‘You heard! Galley rumours. If you believe half of what you hear on board this ship that’s ten times too much.’
    ‘This wasn’t a galley rumour. I had it from that little runt of a steward, Smith.’
    ‘What’s he know about it?’
    ‘He’s seeing after the Old Man. According to Smith the trouble’sa dicky heart. He thinks we ought to go back to Sydney and put him in hospital.’
    ‘That’s not likely. The cargo’s too important.’
    ‘You mean that gold?’ Keeton said.
    Hagan stabbed the air with his pipe. ‘You and your gold. That’s another rumour. Nobody saw any gold, did they? No, and if you ask me, nobody ever will, because there ain’t none.’
    ‘So why did they put an armed guard on that storeroom?’
    ‘Secret machinery, like I told you.’
    ‘Did you see the secret machinery?’ Bristow asked.
    Hagan sucked at his pipe and dropped the subject.
    The Valparaiso steamed serenely over a calm sea and the days passed like milestones on a journey. They were blue days – blue sky, blue water, and only the flash and stutter of foam at the bows and the churned-up wake astern to indicate that the ship was indeed moving onward and was not the motionless hub of a wide revolving wheel. Watches came and went. Keeton dozed in the Oerlikon box on the wing of the bridge for four hours at a stretch, dazed by the sun by day, unmoved by the brilliant display of stars by night; thinking only that here was another four hours of tedium to be endured and pushed away into the great unfillable store-cupboard of wasted time.
    He had seen Peterson only once since the captain’s collapse on the bridge. This was two days later and well after midnight. Keeton was half-asleep. He heard a cough and, turning, caught sight of a small figure outlined palely against the dark background of the wheelhouse. A second glance convinced him that this was no phantom but Captain Peterson, bare-headed and dressed in pyjamas.
    Keeton stared in amazement. Peterson was wearing felt slippers and the legs of the pyjamas flopped over them in loose folds.
    ‘Sir,’ Keeton said.
    Peterson turned his head and peered at the gunner. ‘Well?’
    ‘It’s chilly out here, sir. Should you be out? You’re not dressed. I mean—’
    ‘I am aware of the state of my dress,’ Peterson said acidly. ‘I am also aware of the temperature of the air. If I require advice onsuch matters from you or anyone else I shall ask for it. Until then perhaps you will be good enough to keep your observations to yourself and attend to your duty, which I believe is to keep watch.’
    ‘Yes, sir,’ Keeton said. He turned away, angry with himself as well as with Peterson. He had left himself open to the snub and he had got it. He would take care that it did not happen again. If Peterson liked to kill himself, let him.
    He heard the old man shuffling into the wheelhouse where the second mate was on duty, but he did not look round again.
    It was Bristow who, a few days later, brought the news to the gunners’ mess. Bristow was gasping with excitement.
    ‘He’s had a stroke. Captain Peterson’s had a stroke. He’s paralysed.’
    Keeton had been lying on his bunk reading a book. He sat up sharply and struck his head on the alarm-bell that was fixed to the bulkhead just above him. The bell emitted a faint note of protest like the tiny ghost of a call to action.
    ‘A stroke! Are you sure?’
    ‘That’s what Smith says. And he should know. He found