"Innes, Hammond - The Killer Mine" - читать интересную книгу автора (Innes Hammond)

Hope you take this opportunity to come over -- it's a mining job and right up your street.

Your old chum, Dave.

I folded the note and put it back in my wallet. Shorty had come out to the lignite mine with it himself. That had been in August with the sun beating fiercely down, the earth baked brown and the dust rising in choking clouds. How different, I thought, to this clean, sparkling air with the sun shimmering on the wet pavements. In that moment I held my fate in my hands. I didn't know it then, of course, but I had only to forget all about Dave Tanner and seek a job on my own and the thread that was leading me to Cripples' Ease would be broken. And I came so very near to breaking it. I thought of the Arisaig and how Mulligan had cheated me. If those were the sort of men Dave mixed with . . . and the job he had for me - no questions asked, that was what he had written. That could only mean one thing - a racket of some sort. I recalled the man himself. Neat, dapper, quick-witted - a Welshman. He wasn't the sort to live strictly within the law. Even as a corporal in charge of a Water Transport coastal schooner, he'd had his own little rackets - shipping personal consignments of silk stockings, wrist watches and liquor from Livorno to Civitavecchia and Napoli, and on the north-bound trips, olive oil, sweets and nuts. I put my hands in my pockets and immediately encountered the remains of my meagre five pounds.

I turned then and went along the quay. In that moment the fatal decision was made. Harbour Terrace was behind the gas works, a narrow street running up from the harbour. Number Two was next to a corn merchants, the end house of a long line, ill exactly alike. There were torn lace curtains in the window and that air of faded respectability that belongs to the boarding house throughout the English-speaking world.

A girl answered my ring. She was about twenty-eight and wore a yellow jumper and green corduroy slacks. She smiled at me Brightly, but with the lips only. Her grey eyes were hard and watchful.

'Is Mr Tanner in?' I asked.

Her lips froze to a thin line. Her eyes narrowed. 'Who did you say?' she asked. Her voice was thin and unmusical.

Tanner,' I repeated. 'Mr Dave Tanner.'

There's nobody of that name living here,' she said sharply and started to close the door as though to shut out something she feared.

'He's an old friend of mine,' I said hurriedly, leaning my bulk against the door. 'I've come a long way to see him. At his request,' I added.

There's no Mr Tanner living here,' she repeated woodenly.

'But -" I pulled the letter out of my wallet. This is Number Two, Harbour Terrace, isn't it?' I asked.

She nodded her head guardedly, as though not trusting herself to admit even that.

'Well, here's a letter I received from him,' I showed her the signature and the address. 'He's a Welshman,' I said. 'Dark hair and eyes and a bit of a limp. I've come all the way from Italy to see him.'

She seemed to relax. But there was a puzzled frown on her face as she said, It's Mr Jones you're wanting. His name's David and he has a bit of a limp like you said. But he's away to the fishing now.' And then the guarded look was back in her eyes as though she'd said too much.

'When will he be back?' I asked. There was an uneasy emptiness in my stomach, for he must have had a reason for changing his name, and I didn't like the frightened look in the girl's eyes.

'He left on Monday,' she said. 'And this is Wednesday. He can't possibly be back till tomorrow. Might even be Friday. It depends on what the weather's like.'

'I'll come back this evening,' I told her.

'It won't be any use,' she said. 'He can't be back till tomorrow.'

'I'll come back this evening,' I repeated. 'What's the name of his boat?'

'No good coming this evening. He won't be here. Come tomorrow.' She gave me a bright, uncertain smile and closed the door on me.

I lunched on fish and chips and then went down to the South Pier to make a few inquiries. From an old salt I learned that David Jones was skipper of the Isle of Mull, a fifty-five ton ketch used for fishing. He confirmed that the Isle of Mull was unlikely to be back for at least another day. But when I asked him where the Isle of Mull did her fishing, his blue eyes regarded me curiously and I had that same sense of withdrawal, almost of suspicion, that I had had when talking to the girl at Harbour Terrace. 'Over to Brettagny mebbe, or out to the Scillies,' he told me. 'T'edn't like 'erring, 'ee knaw. 'Tis mackerel and pilchard 'e be after, an' it depends where 'e do find'n.' And he stared at me out of his amazingly blue eyes as though daring me to ask any more questions.

After that I went back into the town. It was just after three. The sun had gone out of the sky and the mist was coming down in a light drizzle. Penzance looked wet and withdrawn. Until shortly before eight o'clock, when I walked back through the gathering dusk to Harbour Terrace, I was still free to make my own decision. For the space of a few hours I could have broken that thread of destiny and with luck I'd have eventually got passage in a ship to Canada, and so would never have discovered what happened to my mother.

But fear and loneliness combined is a thing few men can fight. Tanner was the only soul I knew in a strange country. He was my one contact with the future. What did it matter if he were mixed up in some shady business? I was a deserter. And since that put me outside the law so long as I remained at liberty, it was outside the law that I should have to earn my living. To that extent I faced up to the reality of my situation. What I could not face up to was the uncertainty and difficulties of the unknown if I tried to fend for myself. I took the easy way, comforting myself that if I didn't like Tanner's proposition, I could decide against it later.

And so as a clock down by the harbour struck eight I turned up by the gas works into Harbour Terrace. The single street light showed the rain dancing on the roadway and water swirling down the gutters of the steep little street. It was an older woman who answered the door this time. 'Is Mr David Jones back yet?' I asked her.