It was to be five long days before I saw the Chief again.
I became really concerned about him during that time. What if he’d run into trouble with the Glasgow police because of smuggling whisky?
I needn’t have worried. One grey and overcast Friday saw the Chief standing at Li Jing’s door. He was well-scrubbed, clean-shaven and beaming with joy.
In spite of the fact that Li Jing’s little house was already full, she suggested that the Chief should move in with us. The Chief thanked her and agreed, but said it would only be for the weekend as he had to return to Glasgow on Monday morning. The police were doing what they could to get to the bottom of Moira’s various shady dealings and wanted to question the Chief about the voyage of the Valkyrie to America with a cargo of smuggled whisky. 433
The Chief had no reason to be worried about his part in the business. The police had already assured him of that. The logbook of the Valkyrie proved that the vessel had never been in American waters, so neither the Chief nor his crew could actually be charged with smuggling. The business of transporting the whisky into United States’ territorial waters had been done by American gangsters in fast motorboats.
Bernie was initially rather shy when faced with the Chief. He kept his distance and gave him uneasy looks. The Chief, for his part, had never met Bernie before and was utterly amazed to learn that Bernie was Moira Gray’s brother.
“But how does all this fit together?” he wondered.
Li Jing told him the little she knew about my time in the Oswald Street house. And she showed him the newspaper articles about the gun battle and about the police action against Moira’s gang.
After listening and reading the Chief looked at me and said, “Once we get back to Lisbon, you are going to have to take out your old Underwood. I have a feeling that it’s some story you have to tell!”
And then I noticed that the Chief’s jaw was trembling just a little. 434
“I’ve been so damn worried,” he said. “There were times when I thought of jumping ship, but I had the crew to think about as well.”
I nodded and patted the Chief’s arm to show that I understood. A captain does not leave his crew in the lurch.
It’s as simple as that.
That night the four of us sat around the table in the conservatory. The Chief had a bottle of whisky he’d pinched from the Valkyrie’s cargo.
“It’s pretty cheap stuff, I imagine,” the Chief said, “but at least it’s been well and truly shaken up by the waves.”
After the Chief and Li Jing had clinked glasses, she said, “Now I want to hear everything that happened to you since we met last.”
The Chief started by telling Li Jing about Fillingsworth, the detective, and how we fell into the hands of Moira and her Oswald Street gang.
“The pearl necklace, then… You don’t have it any longer, do you?” Li Jing asked.
“No,” the Chief said. “I suppose it’s lost for ever. Lord Kilvaird no doubt lost the necklace in a poker game.”
I wondered whether I should borrow Li Jing’s Corona and 435write down everything I knew about what had happened with the necklace. But I thought it could wait.
Meanwhile the Chief told us about his voyage across the Atlantic and back. He told of the drama involved in handing over the smuggled whisky to the gangsters from New York. And he told us how one of the Valkyrie’s deckhands had fallen from the rigging in hard weather.
“The lad survived,” the Chief said, “and that’s the most important thing. But while we were still in the harbour at St Pierre, the sea froze over, so that when we were eventually ready to continue the voyage, it was no longer possible to get out into open water. It was almost a month before a Canadian icebreaker turned up and opened a channel for us.”
The Chief also told us about several really severe storms they’d been hit by, the last of them the worst. Strong winds had pushed the vessel farther and farther north until the Chief decided to seek a safe haven in the Faroe Islands. They spent a week moored in Tórshavn before they could cast off and sail the last leg of the trip to Scotland.
As a memento of his adventures on the Valkyrie, the Chief now had some nasty scars on his nose as a result of frostbite.
“And that was the only reward I got for this trip,” he said.
Then he turned to Bernie. “You must tell me how you ended up coming here with Sally Jones.” 436
Bernie fidgeted nervously and threw a glance in my direction.
“Well… I mean… so much happened that evening… I don’t really know…”
I was forced to intervene. I stood up, fetched a pen from Li Jing’s desk and wrote on a slip of paper:
bernie saved my life
Li Jing and the Chief both leant forward to read what I’d written. The Chief looked at me questioningly and I responded with a firm nod.
The Chief turned to Bernie and held out his hand. “I thank my lucky stars that Sally Jones had the good fortune to meet a kind and courageous friend like you! I am grateful to you, Bernie!”
Bernie looked at the Chief. He was uncertain, unable to decide whether he had heard properly or whether the Chief was teasing him.
Eventually, however, he realized that the Chief actually meant what he was saying. A smile lit up Bernie’s face and he bent down to shake the hand the Chief was holding out.
This was the second time I’d seen Bernie smile. And it was at least as extraordinary as it had been the first time.