Fear is the Key

Only fifteen minutes had elapsed since I'd turned down the intake control of the carbon monoxide absorption unit but already the air in the cabin was growing foul. Neither Vyland nor Royale seemed to be affected; maybe they thought that that was the normal atmospheric condition, but they probably didn't even notice it. Both of them were completely absorbed in what could be seen, brightly illuminated by the for'ard searchlight, through our for'ard observation window.

I was absorbed in it myself, God only knew. A hundred times I had wondered how I'd feel, how I'd react when I finally saw, if ever I saw, what was lying half-buried in the mud outside. Anger I had expected, anger and fury and horror and heartbreak and maybe more than a little of fear. But there was none of those things in me, not any more. I was aware only of pity and sadness, of the most abysmal melancholy I had ever known. Maybe my reactions were not what I had expected because my mind was befogged by the swirling mists of pain, but I knew it wasn't that: and it made things no better to know that the pity and the melancholy were no longer for others but for myself, melancholy for the memories that were all I would ever have, the pity a self-pity of a man irretrievably lost in his loneliness.

The plane had sunk about four feet into the mud. The right wing had vanished — it must have broken off on impact with the water. The left wing-tip was gone, but the tail unit and fuselage were still completely intact except for the riddled nose, the starred and broken glass that showed how the DC had died. We were close up to the fuselage, the bow of the bathyscaphe was overhanging the sunken cabin of the plane and the observation chamber no more than six feet distant from those shattered windows and almost on the same level. Behind the smashed windscreens I could see two skeletons: the one in the captain's seat was still upright, leaning against the broken side window and held in position by the seat belt, the one in the co-pilot's seat was bent far over forward and almost out of sight.

"Wonderful, eh, Talbot? Isn't that just something?" Vyland, his claustrophobic fear in momentary abeyance, was actually rubbing his hands together. "After all this time — but it's been worth it, it's been worth it! And intact, too! I was scared it might have been scattered all over the floor of the sea. Should be no bother for an experienced salvage man like yourself, eh, Talbot?" He didn't wait for an answer but turned away immediately to stare out the window and gloat. "Wonderful," he repeated again. "Just wonderful."

"It's wonderful," I agreed. I was surprised at the steadiness, the indifference in my own voice. "With the exception of the British frigate De Braak, sunk in a storm off the Delaware coast in 1798, it's probably the biggest underwater treasure in the western hemisphere. Ten million, two hundred and fifty thousand dollars in gold specie, emeralds and uncut diamonds."

"Yes, sir." Vyland had forgotten he was an urbane top executive and he was back at the hand-washing again. "Ten million, two hundred and-" His voice trailed off slowly, faltered to a stop. "How — how did you know that, Talbot?" he whispered.

"I knew it before you ever heard of it, Vyland," I said quietly. Both of them had turned away from the window and were staring at me, Vyland with a mixture of puzzlement, suspicion and the beginnings of fear, Royale with his one good, cold, flat, marbled eye wider than I had ever seen it. "You're not quite so smart as the general, I'm afraid, Vyland. Neither am I for that matter. He caught on to me this morning, Vyland. I've worked out why. Do you know why, Vyland? Do you want to know why?"

"What are you talking about?" he demanded hoarsely.

"He's smart, is the general." I went on as if I hadn't heard the interruption. "He saw when we landed on the rig this morning that I only hid my face until I was certain that a certain person wasn't among the reception committee and that then I didn't bother any longer. Careless of me, I admit. But that tipped him off to the fact that I wasn't a murderer — if I were I'd have hidden my face from everybody — and it also tipped him off to the fact that I had been out on the rig before and was frightened someone there would recognise me. He was right on both counts — I wasn't a murderer, and I had been out on the rig before. In the very early hours of this morning."

Vyland had nothing to say, the shattering effect of my words, the limitless avenues of dark possibilities they were opening up had him completely off balance, too confused even to begin to put his conflicting thoughts into words.