A Twist Of Sand

I trained my glasses on a fixed bearing. At thirteen fathoms under Etosha, that should be just about right.

"How much water under her now?"

John's voice was surprised.

"By the deep twelve."

"Good. Take the helm, will you, John? We should pick it up in a moment. It'll be tricky. I don't want that Kroo boy spoiling things."

A flicker of light, like a halo, twitched across the landward side of the fog. Here it comes… I thought.

A bright shaft, almost like a searchlight, struck the outward opaque edge. The sun, as I had assumed, had glanced off the startling white surface of the great saltpan north of Sierra Point; along its beam I hoped to see the bald, eroded hill which stood out at the back of the two saltpans.

Like a revelation, the fog opened and my landmark was as clear as day.

"High hill bearing red oh-three-three," I grinned at John, enjoying the complicated problem in navigation.

But my professional pleasure was spoiled. Stein was on the back of the bridge with the woman.

"You see, my dear; what I mean when I say that Captain Peace knows the Skeleton Coast quite as well as they say in the bars at Walvis. Look! no charts, no references — it's all in his head. It looks so very simple, does it not? But do you realise that if he didn't know exactly what he was doing, he'd tear the bottom out of her in three minutes?"

The girl said nothing. I couldn't worry about them now.

"Steer three-four-oh," I said in a flat voice.

Etosha came round in a sweeping arc, blinking into broad sunlight for a minute as she cocked a snook at the dun coastline with its balding fringes of windswept weed here and there.

"Steady as she goes," I said to John. "Put the Kroo boy on now."

I had my fix and Etosha. was set for Cape Frio. Beyond that…

Fortunately it was just as suitable for dropping a boat off Cape Cross.

I turned to Stein.

"In half an hour," I said acidly, "I shall stop the engines and drop a boat over the side. This woman of yours is going ashore." I looked at the composed face under the duffle-coat hood.

"You've got about twenty minutes to get your things together."

Stein grinned his ray-like grin. This was the sort of situation he loved.

"May I introduce," he said calmly, "Dr. Anne Nielsen, of the National Zoological Museum in Stockholm."

I gazed at her in cold rage.

"You're losing time," I snapped. "If your things aren't ready, I'll throw them over the side after you."

"Dr. Nielsen," Stein continued, "is the only scientist in the world — at least in this generation — to have actually examined the species Onymacris in the flesh, or shall we say, in the shell?"

I still did not catch on.

"What all this mumbo-jumbo has to do with me, I am at a loss to know," I retorted. Etosha was cutting through the fog and it gave an eerie air of making everything a little larger — like her eyes.

"Shall I explain, that Dr. Nielsen is my principal assistant on this trip and she will accompany me in order to establish whether or not the Onymacris beetle lives on the Skeleton Coast. It will be a discovery of the first importance, both to science and the world. Captain Peace," he said and his voice hardened, "you will understand that there is no question of putting Dr. Nielsen ashore? She comes with me."

The thought gave me a jolt. If I did away with Stein, she'd have to be a victim too. I must have been pondering this deeply until suddenly I was aware that I was staring at her; the only sound on the bridge was the click of the ratchet on the helm.

I looked from her to him.

"Very well," I said, "but I hadn't bargained for a woman. On a ship like this there's not much room. You'll have to find a corner somewhere. Mister Garland will see to that. And — Stein — if you have any more surprises in your party, you'd better tell them to me quickly, or else…" I left the sentence unfinished.

Stein said smoothly. "My personal bodyguard and general factotum is, of course, Johann."

"Johann!" I gasped. "That mad U-boat rating! God's truth, Stein, what is this?"

"It's my expedition and you are going to put us ashore at a spot which — I hope sometime to-day you will be good enough to show me on a chart. My objective on land is slightly west of the Baynes Mountains."

I stared at him in open disbelief. The woman first, the mad German rating second, and the Baynes Mountains third.

"The Baynes Mountains!" I exclaimed. "You're crazy, Stein! No white man has ever set foot inside them."

"Except Baynes," retorted Stein.

"And do you really expect me to hang around the Skeleton- Coast while you traipse off to the Baynes Mountains ъ — you'll take a month at least to get there."

"Depending," interrupted the girl, "where you put us ashore."

"That's fair enough," I replied. The freshening wind blew back the hood. Her hair was very lovely. "But when I undertook to convey you to the Skeleton Coast, I understood that you were making a quick run ashore — at the most two or three days. There was no mention of a specific objective."