The Penal Colony (32 page)

On arrival just now Routledge had found
Thaine already at work, supervising Ojukwo, Chapman, and Betteridge
as they cut and finished the marked timbers whose measurements he
and Appleton had already approved. These three men were the finest
carpenters in the Village. Thaine excepted, only Betteridge had any
experience of boatbuilding, and then only of making a dinghy from a
kit. Most of the techniques of boatbuilding were new to them.

Leaving the plan-table, Thaine fastened the
offending shutter before returning to Chapman, who was using a spar
gauge and smoothing plane to round the bars of the two transom
handgrips.

Routledge sat down and began.

During his professional life he had seen and
handled many plans, but could remember none as thorough or as
beautifully drawn as those Thaine had prepared for the ketch. The
paper had been supplied by those villagers who received artists’
materials among their luxury goods. The earliest drafts had been
preserved in order to retain any useful ideas that might otherwise
have been lost. They were executed in pencil. For later work Thaine
had turned to felt tip, and then to Chinese ink and draughtsman’s
pens. Lacking a proper drawing board, templates, flexible curves;
lacking all aids, in fact, except compasses and a straight-edge, he
had produced drawings, in plan and sectional and three-dimensional
view, of such comprehensive accuracy that any competent boatyard
anywhere in the world would be able to build the craft without
further reference to its designer.

From what little Routledge knew about the
subject, the vessel seemed to be something quite revolutionary. It
was to be a fraction under eight metres in length and two and a
half in the beam, chine built of larch, oak, arbor-vitae, and
marine plywood, with a shallow draft and a double keel. Space
inside would be extremely limited, for the boat’s most striking
feature was the fact that it could be all but totally submerged and
still retain buoyancy. The submersion and subsequent emergence were
to be achieved so simply that Routledge, when first he had seen the
plans, had shaken his head in disbelief.

It was obvious that Thaine had already
assembled the ketch, in his mind, a dozen times over; had sailed
it, knew the way it would handle in calm water or rough. He had
incorporated each of Godwin’s requirements, however demanding. To
reduce the chances of detection by radar, no exposed metal was to
be used anywhere on the exterior. The blocks and cleats and
cringles and shackles were to be made of wood, and all screw-heads
sunk and plugged. For the same reason the design avoided sharp
edges, angles, and protrusions. The two masts, the spars, the
rangefinder and all the rigging would be stored in special
compartments flush with the deck. To evade the infrared detectors,
a wooden sprinkle-bar running the length of the boat, fed from
below by a hand pump, would keep the decking at the same
temperature as the surrounding sea.

To go with the drawings, Thaine had prepared
a complete production schedule, with cutting-lists, tables of
quantities, schedules for making and fixing the various fittings
and fastenings, plans for the steam-box which now occupied one
corner of the carpentry shop, and a list of the special tools,
cramps, and gauges required, with designs for those which had had
to be made on the island.

He had also played a part in helping Godwin
with the electrics. Power for the sonar, radio direction finder,
and the helmsman’s address system would be supplied by four
twelve-volt accumulators. For fear of detection by the Magic
Circle, there could be no electric motors on board, so the pump had
to be worked by hand. The sonar system-box would go in the bows;
the transducers were to be mounted amidships, externally, angled
vertically downwards inside fairing blocks to reduce turbulence.
Twin eighty-ohm co-axial cables – taken from the aerial for
Appleton’s flatscreen – ran upwards and aft to the helmsman’s
display unit, a backlit dial registering depths to a maximum of
thirty metres. The length and resistance of the co-axial cables
were of crucial importance, for the cables formed an integral part
of the sonar circuit.

All the specifications for the sonar had now
been settled and most of the wiring completed. Compared with even
the most basic model available commercially, it would be, as Godwin
freely admitted, primitive and clumsy. The transmitted signal was
of medium-to-high frequency with a rapid clock speed, giving
reasonable resolution at the sacrifice of range. The choice of
frequency and beamwidth had been forced on Godwin by the size and
limitations of his botched-up transducers. With Godwin’s approval
Fitzmaurice had felt-tipped the words
M. Mouse Electronics
Co.
and drawn Mickey’s smiling face under the plastic lid of
the system-box. But in theory the sonar was capable not only of
detecting approaching reefs but also of suggesting likely channels
between them, and that was all that mattered.

Whether the thing would actually work no one
knew. Neither could anyone say whether the ketch would perform as
predicted. It might easily overturn or sink. The watertight glands
and hatchways were to be sealed with washers and pressure-joints of
fat-soaked goatskin, which might or might not be adequate in
practice. They had worked in fresh water, during prolonged tests at
the bottom of one of the wells, but when Thaine had asked to try
them in the more realistic conditions of the sea, the Father had
refused. Thaine had suggested using the cover of one fishing party
to set the test-rigs and another to retrieve them, but still the
Father had refused. No sea trials of any description were to be
undertaken. They were too risky: if the satellite picked up
anything remotely suspicious the whole project would be
threatened.

It was dangerous enough that each component
of the ketch had to be carried down to Star Cove. The larger and
more obviously suspicious assemblies would be taken down there
during fog, during the day; at night, moving figures on the cliffs
might show up on the infrared. Smaller pieces would be taken down
at random times and at long intervals, under cover of thick cloud
and at dawn or dusk, in a strict order worked out jointly by
Appleton and Thaine. Some components were already there, and the
building-moulds in the cave had been in position since early
November.

The final assembly process had been minutely
planned. Thaine would be virtually living in the cave during the
fortnight before the launch.

“Mr Thaine,” Routledge said.

Thaine approached.

“This hatch doubler. Part number 34.5.”

“What about it?”

“It’s down as five mil ply on the numerical
list and as larch on the cutting-list.”

“How many off?”

“Two.”

“Assembly 34. That’d be the for’ard
bulkhead.”

“Yes. The plan says ply.”

“That’s right. Change the cutting-list,
please, Mr Routledge. It’s just a clerical error. No sweat.”

Ojukwo, taking long, curling shavings from a
plank of larch on the other side of the workshop, briefly
interrupted himself and glanced this way, showing the whites of his
eyes, before returning to his jack-plane.

When, a little later, Thaine went to the
bungalow, Ojukwo came and looked over Routledge’s shoulder. He
pulled one of the plans from the heap. It depicted the electrical
system.

Routledge looked round. Since receiving his
note, Ojukwo’s manner had become even more withdrawn, not just
towards him, but towards everybody. He did not know whom to
suspect: but it seemed that the affair with Carter had stopped.
Carter had moved out of Ojukwo’s and into a single occupancy house
on the far side of the precinct.

“Pretty picture,” Ojukwo said. “Think we’ll
ever get it together?”

“You’d know that better than me.”

“Any detectors on board?”

“There’s no point. If we’re caught, we’re
caught.”

“What d’you mean, ‘we’?” Betteridge said.
“You ain’t got priority, have you, Mr Routledge?”

“No, I haven’t got priority. But I might be
going. Any of us might.”

“Pigs might fly,” Ojukwo said, moving
away.

Routledge made no comment.

So far, a hundred and thirty-nine men had put
their names forward for the lottery. The probability that any one
man would win a place was about 0.058. Fewer than six chances in a
hundred – of what? Going back to England?

Not England. Mexico, Brazil, Peru, perhaps:
from Shannon Airport an escaper could, with forged papers, make his
way across the Atlantic.

Routledge had assumed that the ketch would
head for Devon or Cornwall. That was the obvious place to go: but
in this, as in many of his assumptions about Franks and the
Village, he had been wrong. Instead of embarking on the
straightforward forty-kilometre crossing to the British coast, the
ketch would make a voyage over eight times as long, across St
George’s Channel to the Tuskar Rock at the south-eastern corner of
Ireland. It would follow the coast of Counties Wexford, Waterford,
and Cork, keeping out of sight of land until, after dusk, the
lighthouse on the Old Head of Kinsale signalled the approach to
Courtmacsherry Bay. Once in Ireland, Franks would give each man
money and the opportunity to choose his own destination.

Not England; Routledge would never go back
there, much as he wanted to see Christopher again. Maybe later,
when he was older, Routledge would be able to get some word
through, send him a ticket.

It was fantasy, all fantasy, a way of passing
the time. In the first place he would never win a berth on the
ketch. In the second place, even if it could be launched, the ketch
would never survive in mid ocean. It would hit a rock, spring a
leak, be run down by a tanker. Or Godwin had been deluding himself
and everybody else with his estimation of the Magic Circle. In his
mind Routledge saw the ketch caught in the searchlights of the
helicopter, heard the words “Turn back!” blared through the tannoy.
Soon another helicopter would arrive, and a hydrofoil with even
brighter searchlights. Probably the ketch would be sunk there and
then.

On the other hand, Routledge told himself,
why shouldn’t it all work as planned? Franks could scarcely have
found anyone better than Randal Thaine to build him a boat.
Routledge thought of the astonishment he had felt when first he had
loosed off a bolt from Martinson’s crossbow. Compared with some of
the other gadgets Thaine had made, the crossbows were nothing.
Routledge thought of the sawbench, the windmill, all the machinery
in the metalwork shop. And Godwin: he wasn’t exactly a cretin,
either. From bits of junk he had actually made a functioning
sonar.

Yes. It might all work. It really might.

And then again it might not. And even if it
did, Routledge wouldn’t win a place, so what did it matter
anyway?

In his heart of hearts he knew he would
nevermore set eyes on his family, his son, his mother, his sisters,
even his wife, his soon-to-be ex-wife.

Bleakly he brushed them all aside and gave
his full attention to his work. “Assembly 78, cockpit trim,” he
breathed. “Angled beam, part number 78.1. Four off.” He scanned the
working cutting-list. “Arbor-vitae. Arbor-vitae. There it is.”

“Talking to yourself again, Mr Routledge?”
Betteridge said lightly.

“It beats talking to you lot,” Routledge
said, equally lightly, forcing himself to smile.

He caught Ojukwo’s eye.

Ojukwo was not smiling back.

Appleton he knew. The other one, the one
carrying the oil drum, he didn’t think he did. They were making
their way out to the end of Azion Point, at the tip of the Village
peninsula, overlooking the Mare and Foal, fifteen hundred metres
from Obie’s vantage place on the brow of Pulpit Head.

The wind, coming in freezing buffets from the
south-west, straight at him, made it impossible to hold or even get
a steady image. His eyes were streaming; he was so cold that he
could no longer keep still. If only he had some proper leather
gloves, with fingers, not these old holey socks he was using as
mittens. They both had leather gloves, those two Village bastards,
and warm coats, and scarves, and, he was sure, long woolly
underwear too.

The weather was showing no sign of improving.
The snow dusting the bracken had been there since New Year’s Eve,
and now it was the middle of January. Sert never usually got this
cold. Palm trees had once grown in the hotel grounds.

Obie hated the winter. He hated everything
about it, the darkness, the cold, the lack of food. In Peto’s time
it had been bad enough, but now Obie lacked even the smallest
privilege and had to take his chances along with the rest. He had
not eaten anything substantial since the day before yesterday, when
he and Martinson had shared a pot of rabbit stew.

Life would get better in the spring. Not just
because the seabirds came back then, but because Martinson was
going to scrag Nackett, who, unfortunately for him, was too stupid
to have twigged Martinson as a threat. He should have killed
Martinson last summer when he had been laid up with his broken leg.
The leg was better now. Martinson was almost as strong as ever.

He had not told Obie all his plans, that much
Obie knew. They involved Wayne Pope, and possibly one or two others
in the brain gang. Martinson had also been working, slowly and
insidiously, on Nackett’s people. He had already got to Bubbles;
maybe to Craddock as well.

So far, Obie’s part in the master plan had
consisted mainly of spending long hours out here on the cliffs with
the binoculars, observing the comings and goings of the villagers.
Without a wristwatch, without a pencil or paper, it had been hard
at first to establish any pattern, but in the past two weeks one
had begun to emerge.

The border patrols, in which Martinson was
greatly interested, now operated in daylight as well as after dark.
Each patrol group comprised six men, divided into two parties which
each covered half of the border, the centre point being marked by a
red rock. In addition, the two gates were manned by three men
apiece, giving a total of twelve guards on duty at any one time.
Shifts lasted eight hours. A minimum of four crossbows was deployed
continuously, one with every group of three men.