The borrowing days, p.4
The Borrowing Days, page 4
“You try there? Many soft seat.”
He pointed at the great forward saloon which shared Deck 7 with the bar. Susan shook her head.
“You go there,” he pointed at the starboard entrance. “I go here.”
He waved reassuringly from the portside doors.
They worked their way through the huge unlit saloon, peering at the chairs and the long couches in the uncertain moonlight and met at the brass rail which divided the forward range of windows from the sitting area. Their dim-lit reflections peered down at them from the angled glass.
“Not here,” said the young man. “Not there?”
Susan shook her head.
“I am called Tomas. I go look in all toilet for Men, no?”
Susan nodded, grateful for his help.
“I’ll try the Ladies’,” she said. “You never know...if he felt ill suddenly...”
“Good,” he said. “Two here.”
He pointed aft.
“Two there. Same all decks. Two here, two there. I go. We meet on Deck 3.”
Half an hour later they met on Deck 3. They had met several times before they reached that Deck but there had been no sign of Henry Penman, either in the lavatories, the lobbies, the saloons and bars, the games room or the library or the gym or the laundry room or indeed any place where a passenger might go.
On Deck 3 it was quiet but a light shone in the room behind the Reception Desk.
“You are who?” Tom asked.
“I am Susan,” she said, beginning to feel worried and angry with Henry for causing such an upset.
“Susan it is time to tell. They must know. We cannot look in cabins. They can. He is not anywhere we can look, so he must be where we cannot look. So we must tell.”
He jerked his head at the light.
“He has been gone now how long?”
“Since midnight.”
“It is now five of the morning. You must tell.”
He urged her to the desk and struck the bell firmly. After a short pause a slim figure appeared outlined against the light of the inner room.
“Yes?”
“We have a problem. This lady, she had lost her husband.”
He shifted his speech to Norwegian.
“He went for a walk on the deck shortly after midnight from what she tells me and has not come back to their cabin. We have searched everywhere we could but he is not to be found. We have been back to the cabin twice but he has not returned. It is, I think, a serious matter.”
CHAPTER TWO
“I see three hoggs on yonder hill...”
“For any favour!” asked Per. “Does she expect me to go and rout her husband out of the wrong bed?”.
The telephone quacked reproachfully.
“It’s Penman! You’re joking.”
The telephone denied this and Angerström looked up and grinned.
“Where have you searched?”
The telephone listed the various areas.
“Everywhere but the cabins,” said Per thoughtfully. “Have you alerted the son and the daughter...stepdaughter?”
The telephone said yes.
“Tell them I’ll meet them...where are they? Right I’ll meet them there. Stand by.”
He turned to Angerström.
“One of the passengers has got himself lost. Left his cabin not long after midnight for a walk on the deck and hasn’t come back. His wife fell asleep waiting for him and didn’t waken till after four. All public areas have been searched. And all the empty cabins. No sign of him.”
Angerström nodded.
“If it is that old bastard Penman, I wouldn’t look for him,” he said in his deep slow voice, “I’d be hoping he was at the bottom of the sea. He treats the crew like thralls and his family worse and his wife worst of all. If cabins are to be searched, the Captain must know.”
“I’ll see the family before I waken him. See how thoroughly they’ve searched. I’ll let you know what’s happening by this.”
He patted the walkie-talkie at his belt. Angerström nodded again.
As he clattered down the staircase to Deck 4 Per was unexpectedly thankful for his nursemaid. Angerström could cope with anything the sea, the ship or the weather threw at him and if Per was not mistaken the weather was deteriorating fast..
The family was in the smallish saloon which was called the Library on the port side of the main saloon on Deck 4. Books in four languages were shelved behind glass doors, magazines in cupboards below; heavy comfortable chairs and sofas were arranged around low tables. A computer table and terminal was installed against the forward partition. Curtained glass doors and windows divided the Library from the Saloon. With Harriet, Paul and Susan were Anna from Reception, Lars, the senior steward and the gangling hairy driver of the 4X4 he had watched board at Mehamn. A university student at a guess. It was Lars who spoke first.
“We have looked everywhere except in the occupied cabins,” he said. “All we have found is this...”
He indicated a heavy surgical stick, adjustable for height, with a plastic handle conforming to the grasp of a right hand. It was lying on one of the tables and round the middle was a wad of lavatory paper.
“Mrs. Penman says it belongs to her husband. Anna found it.”
“It was in the Ladies next to the lift aft on Deck 5,” she said. “It was in one of the compartments, leaning against the wall, not hidden, exactly, but it could have been missed by someone who was not looking for something or somebody.”
“I see you took a very sensible precaution.”
Anna went a little pink.
“Perhaps I read too many thrillers,” she said.
Per considered the rest of the company: Susan Penman looked haggard and anxious, and tired to death. Harriet, her face expressionless, sat on the arm of her mother’s chair, holding her hand. Those two were very close, he thought. Not alike, however: Susan was small-boned and slender. All they shared was their colouring. Harriet must take after her father. The son, what was his name? Ah, yes, Paul, he was sitting upright in his chair, trying to appear very alert. The student was leaning against one of the bookcases behind Susan Penman’s chair and looking with unconcealed admiration at Harriet. Per was conscious of a slight irritation.
“How did you become involved with this?” he asked him.
“Tomas helped me look for Henry,” Susan said, sitting up. “I must have wakened him when I went to look in the bar on Deck 7 and afterwards he helped me search. He has been very kind and very helpful.”
Tomas flushed bright pink and mumbled something that nobody could hear.
“You are absolutely certain,” Per asked Susan, “that this stick belonged to your husband?”
“As certain as one can be,” Harriet answered for her. “We know it well, he is never without it. It is his sceptre.”
“Whatever do you mean?” asked Paul.
“A sceptre is a symbol of power,” Harriet reminded him and looked around. “I think you’ll all agree my step-father uses it as that.”
Per searched his memory and recalled the stick’s having been flourished at the entry-port at Bergen when someone tried to push in front of Penman, again, thumped on the deck when he was being given the key-card of his cabin and was told it was not yet quite ready for occupation. Yesterday afternoon in the bar he had thumped it at Harriet herself. He saw Lars nodding agreement and recalled certain stick-flourishing contretemps in the dining saloon. What Harriet said was true. The stick from having been merely a find became more significant. ‘He is never without it.’ Wherever he was now, he was without his sceptre.
“Everywhere we have searched,” said the steward. “In most cases twice, so Tomas here tells us. In the empty cabins also. As well, we have searched in the bars and kitchens and storerooms and as well such other places where passengers should not go.”
“Now we must ask you to have the occupied cabins searched,” Anna explained. “In one of these is the only place he can be.”
“For that I must have permission from the Captain,” Per, said and Lars nodded. “I‘ll call him from Reception, Anna, if I may.”
A glance at Lars indicated that he was to stay with the party in the library. Lars nodded and said he was sure they could all do with a cup of coffee and he would send for some.
A certain brightening indicated that he had gauged their needs exactly.
In Anna’s office, she sat down at the board put on her headset and set the light flashing over the label Captain’s Night Cabin. It had flashed only three times when it was answered.
“Duty Officer, Per Berg, sir,” said Per. “I am afraid I have a problem to report.”
He went on to explain succinctly, the apparent disappearance of Mr. Henry Penman.
The Captain’s response, which was relayed over the loudspeaker, hastily adjusted by Anna, was even more succinct, suggesting he would be no loss and whoever had shoved him overboard was a public benefactor. Anna mimed shock and then giggled.
“We need your permission to search the cabins, sir. The occupied cabins.”
“Carry on. The sooner the better. Tell people to be as discreet as possible. Reception to ring everyone before the knock on the door. Oh, and warn them at the same time that there is bad weather on the way and things may get a little lively. It might take their minds off why the cabins are being searched.”
Per raised his eyebrows at Anna who sat down at the console and pulled the list of cabin passengers to her.
“Where’s the family?” asked the Captain
“In the book-room. Lars has laid on coffee.”
“Tell them I’ll be with them in five minutes. You be there too. Tell Lars he is to organize searching the cabins. As tactfully as possible, please. Two people always and one a girl. No questions to be answered, except about the weather.”
Captain Oleg Svensson was in his late fifties, had been at sea since he was fifteen and regarded his present job as a way to ease himself into a reluctant retirement. He was of medium height, blue eyed and bearded and might have been exhibited in a glass case as an example of the species, ‘seaman’. He came in, nodded a greeting, sat down in a chair opposite Susan Penman and asked without preamble,
“Did he always go for this walk before bed?”
Susan nodded.
“He said it helped him sleep.”
“Did he do the same when he was at home?”
She nodded.
“Where we live there is a garden in the square and he walks round that twice or three times.”
“Did he go at the same time every night?”
“No. It varied. Sometimes he went right after dinner, sometimes about eleven. Last night it was much later.... we had been all together in the cabin, talking....”
She looked fleetingly from Harriet to Paul.
“I tried to persuade him not to go, I thought it was too late and too cold but he would not listen.”
“That was a mistake,” Harriet said. “You should have encouraged him to go and he would have stayed.”
There was a startled silence. Paul agreed with a slight smile. His father could be very perverse, he said.
“Were you all still in the cabin when he left?”
“Yes,” Paul said. “I suppose we stayed about ten minutes after he went out. I wanted to have another shot at...to have another word with him when he came back. But I saw Susan was very upset. There had been an argument, you see, and it had got quite heated. Harriet told her to go to bed and try to sleep and forget all about it. If there was anything more to be said it could be said in the morning. She left at the same time as I did, telling Susan to ring her in the cabin if there was...if she needed anything.”
“You didn’t either of you see him when you were going to your cabins?”
“No,” Harriet said. “He usually walked on the Promenade Deck, unless it was blowing hard or raining and we both have cabins on Deck 6.”
“And did you go to bed?” asked Svensson.
“No. I thought it might be better to wait till he came back,” Susan Penman told him, “I sat on the bed thinking he would be in any minute but I was tired and....well, anyway, I fell asleep. When I woke up it was after four and I wondered if he had sat down somewhere too and fallen asleep. Then I found he had forgotten to take his key-card. I supposed he might have gone and found somewhere to sleep rather than waken...”
“Never!” said Harriet.
“I was tired. I might not have wakened when he knocked.”
“Not the way he’d have knocked. He’d have hammered with that stick of his till the whole ship was awake, never mind you. And even if you’d slept through the din he’d have got the desk to ring. Or routed out someone with a passkey. The last thing he would have done would be to have gone meekly away and curl up on a sofa.”
Paul chuckled and Susan glanced at the others with some embarrassment and caught Anna smiling.
“Well, maybe not, but anyway I went to look for him and I woke poor Tomas here. I didn’t mean to....”
“I am not deep sleeper,” said Tomas. “And I see she is worried. I think at first he go sleep with someone but she say he is eighty....”
“He was such a help, he really was,” said Susan hastily.
“When we not find Mr. Penman I say we must tell some person and we do,” Tomas told them. “And still he is not found.”
There was a short silence.
“You say at the time he left the cabin we were in port. Is it possible that he could have got off at Mehamn?” asked the Captain.
“No,” Per said. “Impossible. The disembarkation was supervised the whole time, Anna was at the passenger gate with her list and she would have known Mr. Penman. Any of the crew would have recognized him. He had made himself known.”
Anna nodded emphatically.
“Could he have smuggled himself into one of vehicles?” Svensson asked.
“Bernt Olsen was on duty and he says no one other than the three drivers came by that way when he unlocked the door to the car deck and he knew them, all three, because they are regulars. Both vans were locked front and back. However, I have telephoned the Mehamn Port Master and he says he noticed no stranger and neither did his staff. In any event, he says, where could he have gone? Mehamn is not large, there is only one hotel close to the harbour and by the time we berthed it was midnight. They would probably have been closed.”
“True,” agreed Captain Svensson and he pulled at his neat, white beard. “Who is on the helm?”
“Angerström, sir.”
“Good. Tell him to bring the ship about and steam slowly back over our course until I order otherwise. Alert the rescue teams and have them stand by the inflatables. Put two men on each of the searchlights. Issue them with night-glasses. Alert the shore rescue service to stand by.”
He looked sympathetically at Susan who was looking at him in round-eyed dismay.
“Mrs. Penman. If he is in someone’s cabin as I very much hope he may be....”
“But what possible reason could there be for that?” demanded Harriet.
“A friend asked him for a drink, may be?”
“He has no friends,” said Harriet. “And he has made none during this voyage.”
“Of that you may be very sure,” Paul added.
The Captain looked at them and frowned.
“This search will be no more than a little delay. If he is not in any place aboard...well, the sooner the sea-search is begun and the shore rescue service alerted the better his chances.”
Per, talking into his walkie-talkie, noticed that Susan went very white and clung to her daughter’s hand.
“Now, Mrs. Penman, I think you should stay here and drink some of that coffee. And I wish that you, Miss....”
“Hamilton,” Per supplied hastily, in the process of instructing Angerström.
“Hamilton?”.
“Mrs. Penman is my mother,” Harriet explained. “Henry Penman is my stepfather. I’ll stay with Mama, if I may.”
Captain Svensson nodded approvingly and turned to Paul, looking at his dark, narrow face and his thick black hair and his almost black eyes. Henry Penman had been fair-skinned and blue-eyed. Paul Penman seemed an unlikely son for him. All he had taken from his father was his height.
“I understand you are his son, sir.”
Paul nodded. He had interpreted that look. It was one he saw often.
“We are not alike, I know. But it is true. He told me once that I was very like my mother who was Brazilian. She is dead. I don’t remember her.”
One says things like that, Paul thought, half listening to the instructions being poured into the walkie-talkie, and it really gives a wrong impression. Being like my mother was a crime in his eyes, he made that plain enough. If he had to be lumbered with a child he would have preferred another version of himself.
“Now I wish that you should all stay here in the library,” said Svensson. “Lars will see that breakfast is brought to you and I know you will wish to be spared the curiosity of the other passengers.”
“I wish I knew,” said Susan. “It’s the uncertainty....”
“So do we all, Mrs. Penman, so do we all. However, if your husband is not to be found aboard by this search we must reflect that, barring helicopters, there is one way only in which a man can disappear from a ship at sea.”
On this chilling note he went out, nodding to Per to follow him. Per went after him still issuing instructions over his walkie-talkie to a sleepy crew-member about manning the searchlights. The door swung to behind them.
“A bad business,” said the Captain, moving into the lobby. “And coming on top of the trawler in Magerøysundet, a bloody nuisance.”
The ship quivered and rolled under their feet as she began the stately ninety-degree turn which would take them back westward. Per clicked the walkie-talkie off.
