Endangered Species (38 page)

‘Bloody hell, James Dent's aboard.' Rawlings was clearly more apprehensive at the appearance of the chairman of Eastern Steam than the hostile intent of Her Majesty's Navy.

As the little warship ran up alongside and slowed to match her speed with that of the elderly cargo-liner, Mackinnon stared down on the blond, swept-back hair of the ship owner, saw him point, presumably recognising the figure above them, and watched the naval officer beside him put the portable loud-hailer to his mouth.

‘Captain Mackinnon!'

The naval Lieutenant's voice echoed eerily off the old
liner's wall side, as though they were in some vast cave rather than the open air.

‘You must stop your ship. You are forbidden entry into Hong Kong Harbour. I am empowered to arrest your vessel if you attempt to enter.'

Mackinnon watched the patrol boat's First Lieutenant lean over the bridge front and the Bofors was trained sharply to starboard. Bristling at the indignity of being brought under the cover of a gun his taxes paid for, he disdained a hailer and bellowed back at the young officer:

‘I demand a port of refuge. I am almost out of fuel and I have four dead on board in addition to the boat people you can see. Furthermore I am committed to the Lye Mun Pass now and unable to turn around. I suggest you take that ridiculous gun off us and send someone on board . . .'

A clatter of wooden rungs striking steel told where the Bosun and Braddock had thrown the pilot ladder over the side.

Aboard
Starling
there was a brief moment of consultation.

‘So, James Dent represents the government of Hong Kong, does he?' Mackinnon muttered to himself. ‘He must have been pulling some high strings.' He called over his shoulder. ‘Go down and welcome our guests, Alex . . . You stay here, mister,' he added, as Rawlings made a move towards the ladder. Mackinnon watched while the
Starling
edged closer and bumped gently alongside the rope ladder.

Below him, the patrol boat's skipper handed over to his Number One and led James Dent down on to her deck, then forward to where the
Matthew Flinders
's pilot ladder dangled. The two men scrambled aboard and, with a grumble of her Paxman diesels, HMS
Starling
pulled off and ranged herself off the
Matthew Flinders
's side.

Mackinnon heard the step on the ladder and swivelled to meet the intruders. Stevenson appeared first and, proper to the last, introduced the naval officer.

‘Lieutenant Drinkwater, sir,' he said, adding after a slight pause, ‘And Mr Dent.'

‘So, the Navy's here, Lieutenant Drinkwater,' Mackinnon said, holding out his hand and marvelling at the youth of the naval officer. ‘I recall another
Starling
, d'you know?
She
was the toast of the Western Approaches.'

The apparent cordiality disarmed the boy as Mackinnon detached his hand, turned to the civilian bringing up the rear and with deliberate impudence greeted his employer.

‘Well, well, what seduces a shipowner from his VDU, James?'

Dent with equally offensive purpose ignored Mackinnon's outstretched fist.

‘I thought so,' he said quickly. ‘This is done on purpose, isn't it, Mackinnon?'

‘That might be a perceptive remark, James,' Mackinnon replied smoothly, ‘it might even do your conscience credit in respect of my shortly to be out of work crew, but it is a foolish one.' Mackinnon addressed the naval officer. ‘Lieutenant Drinkwater, my ship has just suffered an ordeal in passing through Typhoon David – you may inspect the logbook and the damage if you are not inclined to believe me – and we are desperately short of oil fuel. The Chief Engineer, who was, incidentally, killed in the typhoon, was under orders from this gentleman here not to over-bunker, to have only enough fuel to reach Hong Kong . . .'

‘Just a minute,' broke in Dent, but Mackinnon discarded his mask of exaggerated bonhomie in a flash.

‘Hold your tongue, young man. I still command this ship. My demand for refuge is paramount. Moreover,' he went on, addressing Drinkwater again, ‘I have had to put down a misguided attempt to take over the ship.'

‘By the Vietnamese?' the naval Lieutenant asked.

‘Yes. They have an understandable aversion to going to Shanghai.'

‘You say you are in command now, Captain, so you are clearly not in need of our traditional support in quelling insurrection,' Drinkwater said, revealing either a quick
intelligence or a good briefing, ‘nor are you a British ship.'

Mackinnon knew Rawlings was behind him, heard his noisy exhalation of satisfaction as the perceptive Drinkwater cornered him. He wished his Chief Officer was neither so abominably crude, nor so insufferably stupid. It pained him, after so long an acquaintance, not to have earned a better opinion in Rawlings's estimation. The Chief Officer seemed to derive even greater satisfaction from Lieutenant Drinkwater's next remark; or perhaps his noises of concurrence were for Dent's consumption, non-verbal communications of being in dispute with his Captain, caught on the fence of loyalty and conscience but thereby revealing he was really on the side of the twin shibboleths of law and order.

‘You are flying the red ensign of Great Britain quite illegally, Captain.' Lieutenant Drinkwater gestured aft.

‘Alter course position coming up, sir,' prompted Stevenson. Ahead of them green hills rose on either bow and between them could now be clearly seen the harbour with its throng of anchored and moored ships, its criss-crossing traffic of ferries, junks and
wallah-wallahs
. On the port bow a shanty town appeared to tumble down the side of the headland. Beyond, office buildings rose from the city's traffic haze and houses climbed the slopes of the Peak almost to the summit, where, shrouded by a light swirl of cloud, the villas of the
taipan
squatted amid rich foliage. Above the urban sprawl of Kowloon opposite, a Jumbo jet lifted from Kai Tak, angling above the harbour as it swung and headed south towards Singapore.

This was, Mackinnon thought, a crazy moment, a moment of true farce, the end of everything for him, for there could be no going on beyond it. Here, at the doorstep of Britain's last colony, the ‘fragrant harbour' nicked from the old moribund Celestial Empire, a British master-mariner on a ship whose nationality was a commercial expedient, was about to be threatened, bullied, or perhaps arrested by an
officer in the armed services of the state to whom he paid his taxes, for the crime of claiming the ancient right of refuge. The young officer, brought up on a diet of ‘my country right or wrong', was angry at Mackinnon's truculence as much as by the embarrassing presence of the unwanted refugees below them.

Beside the naval officer the ship's owner, himself brought up on the self-justifying and apparenly irrefutable dictates of profit, sought immediate disencumbrance of the human flotsam his ship had picked up. Moreover, he had enlisted, through God knew what network of artifice and connivance, the help of the Royal Navy.

‘Take her in Alex, if you please.'

‘Aye, aye, sir.'

Mackinnon turned his attention back to Dent and Drinkwater. ‘It may be a technicality that this ship is not British, Lieutenant, and I'd personally be quite glad to stand up in court and tell you and the rest of the world why I have a nostalgic and hopelessly out-of-date affection for that bit of bunting hanging over the arse end of my ship, but that's all airy-fairy nonsense. The fact is, I've no fuel, my ship's company have taken some knocks, I've a dead woman and I have had a British national killed on board, in front of witnesses, by a Vietnamese gunman. I have had a second British national die accidentally, and another in the line of doing his duty. I therefore insist you allow me to anchor in the quarantine anchorage until we solve this little impasse.'

‘Mackinnon . . .' Dent began, but Mackinnon rounded on him.

‘
Captain
Mackinnon to you, and before you say anything, there is nothing further you can do to me. I shall walk down the gangway the instant the anchor brings up. British or Panamanian, it doesn't matter, I command until the ship is brought safely to port. You are both powerless to prevent my doing anything else. Whatever the circumstances, gentlemen, illegal flags and frustrated owners notwithstanding, I alone
am responsible for the ship.'

Leaving them staring open-mouthed after him, he addressed the eavesdropping Rawlings.

‘Have the Carpenter stand by the starboard anchor, Mr Rawlings,' he said, and he was consoled by the astonished obedience of the Mate. ‘Perhaps, Lieutenant,' Mackinnon threw over his shoulder, ‘you'd like to make the necessary arrangements with the authorities. Help yourself to our VHF radio. Turn it up, will you, Sparks?'

Lieutenant Drinkwater was about to remonstrate, thought better of it and took the handset from the Radio Officer. Mackinnon crossed the wheelhouse and confronted Rawlings.

‘Get that man out of the urinal, mister,' he ordered curtly, ignoring Dent, who was recovering from his discomfiture.

‘Captain Mackinnon, you'll regret this, you know . . .'

Mackinnon paid no attention to the dialogue Drinkwater was having with the shore authorities. Instead he watched approvingly as Stevenson conned the ship through the narrow passage. The Second Mate had a natural aptitude; what a pity it was going to go to waste.

Drinkwater put down the VHF. ‘I've cleared the matter for the time being, Captain. You may use the immigration anchorage.' A certain relief was obvious in the naval officer's tone.

‘I'm obliged to you, Lieutenant.'

Dent spun on his heel and went out on to the bridge-wing. Drinkwater looked sheepishly around the wheelhouse.

‘I think you'd better take charge of this,' Mackinnon said, picking up Phan's machine gun from the flag locker and handing it to the Lieutenant. ‘You're the gunnery expert . . . ah Mr Rawlings.'

Rawlings appeared in the wheelhouse doorway with the trussed and downcast Phan. Mackinnon grinned at Drinkwater. ‘And you have custody of this fellow, Lieutenant.
He
tried to take the ship from me too.'

Mackinnon did not quite carry out his threat of walking down the gangway directly the ship was brought to her anchor. In fact the
Matthew Flinders
was forbidden to lower her gangway and Lieutenant Drinkwater's departure heralded the arrival of a squad of police while a police patrol launch circled the ship ceaselessly.

Disarmed by Mackinnon's obduracy and reduced to impotence when Drinkwater found no grounds to enforce the prohibition of the
Matthew Flinders
's entry, Dent had departed in a fury. Imprecations had been muttered about old fools and ingratitude and something about what Mrs Mackinnon would think about it all. Even the young naval officer, confused and embarrassed by the obvious innate honesty of Mackinnon's claim, had been drawn into these half-hearted threats.

‘A sound and fury signifying nothing,' Mackinnon had said to the wheelhouse as HMS
Starling
bore away their visitors.

‘I shouldn't be too sure,' the cavilling Rawlings had mouthed in a low voice behind Mackinnon's back. He could still not quite believe the audacity of Mackinnon's act, for Dent had repeated the order to take the ship to Shanghai and the Captain had refused it.

‘Let Rawlings do it,' Mackinnon had said, ‘he'll be able to retire to the shires and stick ‘Captain' in front of his name. No
one will ever know it was only for four days.

At almost that very moment a deputation from the crew, led by the Bosun, had arrived to announce their refusal to take the ship beyond Hong Kong.

‘I'll get a local crew to do it,' raged the thwarted Dent.

‘Then there's no problem, is there?' Mackinnon had temporised mildly, escorting Dent to the bridge ladder. If the appearance of the Bosun had not been evidence enough of the undercurrents racing through the vessel, of others settling their own individual fates while the political aspects of the ship's entry into Hong Kong were being disputed on the bridge, the crowd assembled at the foot of the ladder proved it beyond doubt.

They had stood mute, a triangle of upturned faces with Tam, clutching the baby, at their apex. For a moment Drinkwater and Dent had paused, their vulnerability as individual men overriding the pomp of their respective offices. Then the expectant seven score of supplicant souls drew back and allowed them to pass with a noise like wind through dry grass.

Now, lying in his bath contemplating the mound of his hairy belly, Mackinnon could find himself wishing they had not consented to so smooth a passage for the twin emissaries of authority. But perhaps, he chastened himself, a show of hostility would have destroyed what little hope of official compassion existed. Pragmatically he knew he had provided the hard-pressed Hong Kong government with but one more burden. But politicians and diplomats, he consoled himself, should have to earn their money and privileges in the same harsh world as common dogs like seamen.

The thought amused him and he fumbled for the soap, thinking of Shelagh and that the day was not yet over.

There was a general air of resentment at the refusal of the Immigration Officers to clear the ship and allow the crew shore leave.

‘More days more dollars,' advised the Bosun, grinning at the padre from the Mission to Seamen who had been allowed on board, alone among the queuing tailors, vendors, barbers and sew-sew women bobbing alongside in
sampans
and
wallah-wallahs
. Even Dent could not deny the rights of the dead to decent burial.

‘It's odd, you know, Padre,' said Stevenson, deputed to liaise, ‘the man Macgregor was a holy terror – if you'll pardon the expression – when he was alive, but dead he was the trump card the Old Man played to get us in here.'