Singing in the Shrouds

‘Quiet,’ he thought. ‘Very quiet, this stretch.’

By a strange coincidence (as he was afterwards and repeatedly to point out) he was startled at this very moment by a harsh mewing cry.

‘Funny,’ he thought. ‘You don’t often seem to hear seagulls at night. I suppose they go to sleep like Christians.’

The cry sounded again but shortly as if somebody had lifted the needle from a record. Moir couldn’t really tell from what direction the sound had come but he fancied it was from somewhere along the Cape Company’s wharf. He had arrived at the farthest point of his beat and he now returned. The sounds of activity about the Cape Farewell grew clear again. She was still loading.

When he got back to the passageway he found a stationary taxi wreathed in fog and looking desolate. It quite surprised him on drawing nearer to see the driver, motionless over the wheel. He was so still that Moir wondered if he was asleep. However he turned his head and peered out.

‘Evening, mate,’ Moir said. ‘Nice night to get lost in.’

‘And that’s no error,’ the driver agreed hoarsely. ‘’Ere!’ he continued, leaning out and looking fixedly at the policeman. ‘You seen anybody?’

‘How d’you mean, seen?’

‘A skirt. Wiv a boxerflahs.’

‘No,’ Moir said. ‘Your fare, would it be?’

‘Ah! My fare! ’Alf a minute at the outside she says, and nips off lively. ’Alf a minute! ’Alf a bloody ar, more likely.’

‘Where’d she go? Ship?’ asked Moir, jerking his head in the direction of the Cape Farewell.

‘ ’Course. Works at a flah shop. Cartin’ rahnd bokays to some silly bitch wot’ll frow ’em to the fishes, like as not. Look at the time: arpas eleven. Flahs!’

‘P’raps she couldn’t find the recipient,’ PC Moir ventured, using police-court language out of habit.

‘P’raps she couldn’t find the flippin’ ship nor yet the ruddy ocean! P’raps she’s drahned,’ said the taxi driver in a passion.

‘Hope it’s not all that serious, I’m sure.’

‘Where’s my fare comin’ from? Twelve and a tanner gone up and when do I get it? Swelp me Bob if I don’t cut me losses and sling me ’ook.’

‘I wouldn’t do that,’ PC Moir said. ‘Stick it a bit longer, I would. She’ll be back. Tell you what, Aubyn Dale’s on board that ship.’

‘The TV bloke that does the Jolyon Swimsuits commercial and the “Pack up Your Troubles” show?’

‘That’s right. Dare say she’s spotted him and can’t tear herself away. They go nuts over Aubyn Dale.’

‘Silly cows,’ the taxi driver muttered. ‘Telly!’

‘Why don’t you stroll along to the ship and get a message up to her?’

‘Why the hell should I!’

‘Come on. I’ll go with you. I’m heading that way.’

The driver muttered indistinguishably but he clambered out of his taxi and together they walked down the passageway. It was a longish passage and very dark, but the lighted wharf showed up mistily at the far end. When they came out they were almost alongside the ship. Her stern loomed up through the fog with her name across it.

CAPE FAREWELL

GLASGOW

Her after and amidships hatches had been shut down and, forward, her last load was being taken. Above her lighted gangway stood a sailor, leaning over the rails. PC Moir looked up at him.

‘Seen anything of a young lady who brought some flowers on board, mate?’ he asked.

‘Would that be about two hours back?’

‘More like half an hour.’

‘There’s been nobody like that since I first come on and that’s eight bells.’

‘ ’Ere!’ said the driver. ‘There must of.’

‘Well, there wasn’t. I been on duty here constant. No flowers come aboard after eight bells.’

PC Moir said: ‘Well, thanks, anyway. P’raps she met someone on the wharf and handed them over.’

‘No flowers never came aboard with nobody. Not since when I told you. Eight bells.’

‘Awright, awright, we ’eard,’ said the driver ungratefully. ‘Bells!’

‘Are your passengers all aboard?’ Moir asked.

‘Last one come aboard five minutes back. All present and correct including Mr Aubyn Dale. You’d never pick him, though, now he’s slaughtered them whiskers. What a change! Oh, dear!’ The sailor made a gesture that might have indicated his chin; or his neck. ‘I reckon he’d do better to grow again,’ he said.

‘Anyone else been about? Anyone you couldn’t place, at all?’

‘Hallo-allo! What’s wrong, anyway?’

‘Nothing so far as I know. Nothing at all.’

The sailor said: ‘it’s been quiet. The fog makes it quiet.’ He spat carefully overboard. ‘I heard some poor sod singing,’ he said. ‘Just the voice: funny sort of voice too. Might of been a female and yet I don’t reckon it was. I didn’t rekkernize the chune.’

Moir waited a moment and then said: ‘Well, thanks again, sailor, we’ll be moving along.’

When he had withdrawn the driver to a suitable distance he said, coughing a little because a drift of fog had caught him in the throat: ‘What was she like, daddy? To look at?’

The taxi driver gave him a jaundiced and confused description of his fare in which the only clear glimpse to emerge was of a flash piece with a lot of yellow hair done very fancy. Pressed further the driver remembered pin-heels. When she left the taxi the girl had caught her foot in a gap between two planks and had paused to adjust her shoe.

Moir listened attentively.

‘Right you are,’ he said. ‘Now, I think I’ll just take a wee look round, daddy. You go back to your cab and wait. Wait, see?’

This suggestion evoked a fresh spate of expostulation but Moir became authoritative and the driver finally returned to his cab. Moir looked after him for a moment and then walked along to the forward winch where he was received by the shore gang with a degree of guarded curiosity that in some circles is reserved for the police. He asked them if they had seen the girl and repeated the driver’s description. None of them had done so.

As he was turning away one of the men said: ‘What seems to be the trouble anyway, Copper?’