Flying Dutch Tom Holt Read online

  ‘Where’s this panel you were talking about?’ he said, scanning the vellum carefully. The Professor pointed. It was blank.

  ‘Just here?’ he said.

  ‘That’s right,’ said the Professor.

  ‘And I just fill it in, do I?’

  ‘Precisely, my dear fellow.’

  ‘Got a pen?’

  The Professor produced one from his jacket pocket.

  ‘Something to rest on?’

  ‘Here,’ the Professor said impatiently, and thrust a book of mathematical tables at him. Vanderdecker thanked him, wrote something in the panel, and signed his name with a flourish. The Professor peered over his shoulder and then stared at Vanderdecker in disbelief. Although the Flying Dutchman’s handwriting was usually about as intelligible as Linear A hastily written with his left hand by a drunken scribe, the Professor could clearly see that Vanderdecker had inserted ‘Jane Doland’ in the Benefit of Policy panel.

  ‘Now then,’ Vanderdecker said, ‘we’d better put this in a safe place, hadn’t we? It’s just as well you reminded me, or I’d have had it in my wallet when we went into the power station, and I don’t imagine it would have lasted very long in there. When I think how I’ve been lugging this thing round with me all these years, it’s a wonder it’s survived this long.’ He thought for a moment, and then put it back in his wallet and went forward to have a word with the pilot.

  ‘That’s fine,, Vanderdecker said, as he sat down again beside the Professor. ‘I explained to the pilot that if I didn’t come back he was to post it to Jane, care of Moss Berwick. I don’t actually know her address, but I expect it’ll reach her there all right. I mean, if you can’t trust an accountant, who can you trust?’

  ‘But...’ spluttered the Professor.

  ‘It was a good thing you mentioned it, you know,’ said the Flying Dutchman happily. ‘To be honest with you — and this is of course in the strictest confidence — I think Miss Doland is getting rather fed up with her career in accountancy and wouldn’t mind spreading her wings a bit. A nice little legacy might come in very handy, I imagine, although I assume she’ll have to pay tax on it. Oh I forgot, she’s an accountant, they know about that sort of thing. That’s all right, then.’

  ‘Do you realise,’ said the Professor, ‘what you’ve just done?’

  ‘Yes,’ Vanderdecker said.

  ‘No you don’t.’

  ‘Actually,’ Vanderdecker said through a big smile. ‘I do. I’ve entrusted the economic future of the free world — when I was a boy, the free world was anything Philip of Spain hadn’t got his paws on yet, and precious little there was of it too; shows how things don’t change much, doesn’t it? On balance, though, I think Philip was a better bet than you, if you don’t mind me saying so. At least he had interests outside his work. I think he collected the bones of saints, or was that Louis the Ninth? — the economic future of the free world, as I was saying, and all that sort of thing, to a singularly clear-headed and conscientious person, who will be able to look after it much better than either of us. No offence intended, Professor, but you’ve got rather too much of a vested interest for my liking. And most of all you don’t have any hobbies; workaholic, I think they call it now. I never could stand workaholics. We must be nearly there by now.’

  Montalban quivered slightly, and then sat back on his hard vinyl-covered seat, breathing heavily. ‘You’re mad,’ he said.

  ‘Sergeant Pepper to you,’ Vanderdecker replied affably. ‘Also, nuts. Is that Suilven I can see down there? Can’t be far now. I’m really rather looking forward to this.’

  Below them, the coastal mountains of Caithness ranged up into a bleak, wet sky. The first mate, who had slept soundly ever since the helicopter’s rendezvous, with the Verdomde, woke up, stretched his arms and said, ‘Are we nearly there yet?’

  ‘Nearly,’ Vanderdecker said. ‘I can’t see the sea.’

  ‘Big deal,’ grumbled the first mate.

  ‘True,’ Vanderdecker said. ‘But after it’s over I’ll buy you a pint. How does that grab you?’

  ‘Thanks, skip,’ said the first mate eagerly. ‘What exactly is it we’re going to do?’

  ‘We’re going to put out the fire,’ Vanderdecker said.

  ‘Oh.’ The first mate frowned. ‘Why?’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Oh.’ The first mate thought about it, and could see no objection. ‘And then you’ll buy me a pint?’

  ‘If humanly possible, yes.’

  ‘Suits me,’ said the first mate. Then he went back to sleep.

  Danny Bennett peered through the perspex window of his helicopter and wiped away the little patch of view-obscuring condensation that his breath had formed on it. A BAFTA award, certainly, but probably posthumous. It looked decidedly hairy down there.

  It hadn’t exactly been easy getting here. Even after he had managed to persuade Neville, the helicopter-flying stockbroker sidekick of megalomaniac academic Professor Montalban, to pilot the spare chopper — the gun had helped, of course, but he had still had to work at it — there had been the problem of persuading the camera crew to participate in the biggest scoop since Watergate. They had been rather less easy to persuade, since they were under the impression that possession of a valid union card made them bullet-proof, and he had had to resort to bribery. In fact, he had pledged the Corporation’s credit to a quite disastrous extent — tuppence on a colour licence would only just cover it — and had Harvey not backed him up and said he would square it with the Director-General the whole thing would have fallen through. Harvey, clearly, was so overjoyed at the thought of Danny Bennett flying to certain death that he was ready to break the habit of a lifetime and agree to authorise expenditure.

  Still, here they were and there was the story, unfolding itself in vivid sheets of orange flame below them. On Danny’s knee rested a quite exquisite Meissen geiger counter, borrowed from Montalban’s study, and at the moment the needle was still a millimetre or so clear of the red zone. Probably far enough. Danny communicated with the pilot, and told the cameraman to roll ‘em.

  Danny peered out through the perspex once again. Vander­decker’s helicopter had touched down about half a mile away, just outside the red zone — pity he hadn’t been able to get an interview with him, but there it was — and the small party had scrambled out of it and started to trudge towards the distinctly unfriendly-looking power station complex. Even as he wittered frenetically into his pocket tape recorder, Danny’s eyes were fixed on his targets, as he expected them at any moment to dissolve into little whiffs of gamma particles (Danny’s knowl­edge of nuclear physics was mainly drawn from reruns of Buck Rogers). He glanced across at the cameraman to make sure that the Aaten was pointing where it should. It was. Would the radiation cock up the film? Well, too late to worry about that now. Better by far to have filmed and lost then never to have filmed at all.

  ‘They’re approaching the main entrance now,’ he muttered into his pocket memo, his voice as high and agitated as a racing commentator’s. ‘They haven’t been burned to death yet, but surely it can only be a matter of time. And who can doubt that the question on their lips — if they still have lips at this moment, of course — is, what reforms to the nuclear power station inspectorate can the Government propose now if they are to retain any credibility whatsoever in the eyes of the nation? Did anyone in Downing Street know that this was likely to happen? Was there a cover.. .?‘

  Before he could say ‘up’, there was a deafening roar, and the helicopter was jolted by a violent gust of air as the front part of the power station collapsed in a cloud of smoke and yellow flames. The Meissen geiger counter started to play ‘Lilliburlero’, which was presumably its quaint, Augustan way of signifying danger. Danny stared but there was nothing to see, just swirl­ing clouds of smoke. He turned away and told Neville to take the chopper out of there fast.

  ‘Did you get all that?’ he asked the cameraman breathlessly. The cameraman looked at him.

  �
�Oh sod it,’ he said, ‘forgot to take the lens cap off. Only kidding,’ he added quickly, as Danny’s face twisted into a mask of rage and his hand moved to the butt of the gun. ‘Can’t you take a joke all of a sudden?’

  ‘No.’ Danny snapped. ‘That’s my award you’ve got in that thing, so for Christ’s sake stop farting around.’ The strains of ‘Lilliburlero’ had died away, and the elegant needle was back out of the red zone. ‘Right, Neville,’ he shouted at the front of the helicopter, ‘let’s go back and have another look.’

  Neville shook his head. ‘No can do,’ he shouted back. ‘No fuel. Sorry.’

  Danny swore. ‘What do you mean, no fuel?’

  Neville pointed at what Danny assumed was the fuel gauge, although for all he knew it could be the tape deck, and shrugged.

  ‘You clown!’ Danny shouted. ‘The story of the decade and you choose this moment to run out of petrol.’

  ‘It’s not petrol,’ said Neville, ‘it’s aviation fuel.’

  ‘I don’t care if it’s methylated spirits,’ Danny yelled. ‘Go some­where where we can get some more and be quick about it.’

  Neville consulted a map. ‘Inverness,’ he said.

  Danny, who had been to Inverness, shuddered, but there was nothing he could do. ‘All right,’ he said, ‘but get on with it.

  As the helicopter turned, Danny peered frantically out of the back window, and could just see the bright glow of a burning power station through a miasma of black clouds.

  ‘Don’t go away,’ he said, ‘we’ll be right back after the break.’

  Just another day at Broadcasting House. In the rather battered and uncomfortable suite assigned to the lost sheep who run Radio Three, a harassed-looking man in what had been, thirty years ago, quite an expensive tweed jacket told the listening public that they had just been listening to a sonata by Berg. Long ago, when the jacket had been new and the world had been young and not quite such a miserable place, someone out there might have cared.

  The harassed-looking man announced Schubert’s ‘Unfinished Symphony’, took off his earphones and fumbled in his pocket for his packet of peppermints. All gone. Damn.

  ‘George.’

  The door of the studio had opened — a curious event during working hours. Had someone lost his way looking for the lavatory? No, for the stranger had spoken his name. George turned his head.

  ‘News flash, George. We interrupt this programme, and all that.’

  ‘Fancy,’ George said. ‘The last time I did one of these was poor dear President Kennedy. What’s up this time?’

  ‘Nuclear power station in Scotland’s blown up,’ he was informed. George raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Well, now,’ he said, ‘how dreadful.’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘I mean,’ George said, ‘we’ll have to reorganise the whole afternoon schedule. After all,’ he explained, ‘I’m sure there’ll be lots and lots of these little bulletins as the long day wears on, and that’ll make it impossible to play the Bartok. Can’t play Bartok with holes in it, it’s not right.’

  ‘Well absolutely.’

  ‘I’m glad you agree,’ George replied. ‘Have they come up with a revised schedule?’

  ‘No, George, they haven’t,’ he was told. ‘I imagine they’ve been too busy playing at being journalists to give any thought to anything so important.’

  ‘Now, now,’ George said, frowning, ‘there’s no call for sarcasm. You’d better leave it all to me, and I’ll just have to cobble something together.’

  ‘That’s fine, then,’ said George’s interlocutor. ‘I’ll leave it all up to you. Let no one say you didn’t stay calm and do your bit in the crisis.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Like the orchestra on the Titanic.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Don’t mention it.’ The door closed, and George thought for a moment. In the background the music played, but the only effect it had on George was to inspire the reflection that the ‘Unfinished Symphony’ would be used to it by now, and he could safely take it off in a moment to read the news flash. What could he think of for an impromptu programme with interruptions?

  From a purely aesthetic point of view, it would be appropriate at this stage to describe the interior of the power station in which Vanderdecker, Montalban, the crew of the Verdomde, and a cat of indeterminate breed are just now wandering about. However, there is such a thing as the Official Secrets Act, and authors don’t like prison food. Take Oscar Wilde, for example.

  ‘What,’ Vanderdecker asked as he opened a curtain door leading to a certain room in a building, ‘did you have to bring that cat for?’

  ‘Guinea-pig,’ replied Montalban through the charred wisps of fabric that had once been a handkerchief held in front of his nose. The first mate frowned.

  ‘What, to catch one, you mean?’

  Montalban stopped in his tracks and turned round. ‘To catch one of what?’ he asked.

  ‘A guinea-pig,’ replied the first mate. ‘Is that why you brought the cat?’

  Montalban smiled. ‘No, no, you don’t quite seem to follow,’ he said. ‘The cat is a guinea-pig.’

  ‘No it’s not,’ the first mate replied, ‘it’s a cat.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Vanderdecker said hastily, ‘it’s a cat, isn’t it, Montalban? Are you still wearing your reading glasses?’

  ‘The cat,’ said Montalban slowly, ‘is here to perform the function of a guinea-pig.’

  The first mate’s frown remained as constant as the Northern Star. ‘You mean, running round inside a little wheel or some­thing?’

  ‘Yes,’ replied the Professor; he was a quick learner. ‘If necessary.’

  ‘I see,’ said the first mate, and added, ‘Why?’

  ‘Because,’ explained the Professor, and reached into his pocket for another handkerchief. Unfortunately, there wasn’t one. Nor was there a pocket. There wasn’t, in fact, a fibre of cloth among the whole party; just hot but invulnerable flesh.

  ‘Stuffy in here, isn’t it?’ said Wilhelmus. ‘Can’t we open a window?’

  ‘Not really,’ Vanderdecker said. ‘A bit counterproductive, that would be. Look, isn’t it about time we started doing some­thing, instead of just wandering about like this?’

  ‘If you’ll just bear with me a little longer,’ the Professor said, ‘I hope to be in a position to make a final assessment of the extent of the problem facing us.’

  A large and jagged slab of masonry dislodged itself from the roof and fell heavily onto the precise spot Sebastian would have been standing on if Vanderdecker hadn’t rather uncere­moniously moved him. Sebastian scowled and muttered some­thing under his breath.

  ‘Right, then,’ said the Flying Dutchman positively. Deep inside he could feel himself starting to get angry. The last time he had been angry was many years ago, when, thanks to a series of accidents and coincidences, he had wandered into the middle of the Battle of Trafalgar just as the French were on the point of victory, and a cannonball from a French ship of the line had smashed a hole in the Verdomde’s last barrel of Indian Pale Ale. The Flying Dutchman had felt guilty about what happened next ever since, and the sight of Nelson’s Column always made him feel slightly ill.

  ‘Where are you going?’ Montalban asked.

  ‘Never you mind,’ Vanderdecker replied. ‘Just lend me that cat for a moment, will you, and then you can go away and have a nice cup of tea or something. Cornelius, Sebastian, you follow me. The rest of you stay here.’

  Montalban handed over the cat, which was growling slightly, and watched helplessly as the Flying Dutchman stalked off through a door whose existence is not explicitly acknowledged. The door closed, and a moment later flew open again as the room beyond it blew up.

  ‘Now now, Sebastian,’ roared a voice from the heart of the flames.

  ‘Oh dear,’ Montalban said. ‘I really don’t think he should have gone in there.’

  The other members of the crew tried to peer through th
e cloud of smoke, flame and debris, but it was impervious to sight. They could, however, hear loud banging noises.

  ‘Antonius, Johannes, Wilhelmus, Pieter, Dirk, Jan Christian! Over here, quick as you like!’ came a thunderous command. ‘Cornelius, grab the cat!’

  Montalban was left standing alone in the middle of a burn­ing room. He didn’t like it much. It was unnerving, what with the falling masonry and everything, and he hadn’t had a rock cake in five hours.

  ‘Wait for me,’ he said.

  Jane had always hated Ceefax. It wasn’t just the way the blasted thing played ‘That’s Entertainment’ on the electronic organ at you while listing the latest casualties in the Mexican earth­quake; it wasn’t even the mule-like persistence with which it kept giving you a recipe for chicken la king when you wanted the weather forecast. It was the little numbers at the top of the screen that really made Jane want to scream. She was alone in the house, and there were no neighbours close enough to be disturbed. She screamed.

  Then she pulled herself together again and pressed some buttons on the remote control. Back to the index. Yes. Fine. Stay with it. News Update — 351. Key in 351 .Today’s recipe is Tournedos Rossini. Eeeeeeeeek!

  Try the other channel, said a little voice inside Jane’s head. It’ll be just as bad, but the recipe may be different. She tried the other channel and found the index number for News Up­date. She pressed the necessary buttons. She got the Australian Football results.

  A person could make a fortune, she decided, reinventing the carrier pigeon. Or smoke signals. Craftily, she went back to the main index and keyed in the code for the recipe. There was a flicker of coloured light, the television sang ‘I Did It My Way’ and she got the Australian Football results. Melbourne, it seemed, was having a good run this season. Come on, you reds.