'Never mind all that. What happened?'
She shrugged. 'Nothing – nothing at all. And I found out at about the same time that Pop was having his troubles with Suarez-Navarro, so I didn't tell him, or anyone – though I think he guessed something. Have you noticed that he only praises Mark as a scientist, not as a person?'
'And then Mark vanished.'
'That's right. He'd gone and I never saw him again.' She looked ahead over the bows. 'And now he's dead – his body lies somewhere out there – but he's still pushing people around. We're all being pushed around by Mark, even now-do you know that? You and me, Pop and the Suarez-Navarro crowd, your friend Geordie and all your commando pals – all being manipulated by a dead man with a long arm.'
Take it easy,' I said. She sounded terribly bitter. 'Mark's not pushing anyone. We all know what we're doing, and we're doing it because we want to. Mark is dead and that's an end to him.'
Ill
It was time to change the subject. I used the standard approach.
Tell me about yourself, Clare. What do you do? When did your mother die?'
'When I was six.'
'Who brought you up? Your father was away a lot, wasn't he?'
She laughed. 'Oh, I've been everywhere with Pop. He brought me up.'
That must have been some experience.'
'Oh, it was fun. I had to spend a lot of time at boarding schools, of course, but I always went to Pop during the vacations. We weren't often at home though – we were mostly away. Sometimes on a skiing holiday, sometimes to Europe or Australia or South America during the longer vacations. I was always with Pop.'
'You're well travelled.'
'It was tricky at times though. Pop has his ups and downs -he hasn't always been rich. Sometimes we had money and sometimes we didn't, but Pop always looked after me. I went to good schools, and to college. It was only last year that I found out that once, when Pop was on a crest, he'd put aside a fund for me. Even when he was busted he never touched it, no matter how much he needed money.'
'He sounds a fine man.'
'I love him,' she said simply. 'When the Suarez-Navarro mob put the knife into him it was the first time I was old enough to understand defeat. I got down to studying stenography and so on, and he made me his confidential secretary when he couldn't afford to hire one. It was the least I could do – he'd lost faith in everybody and he had to have someone around he could trust. Although I didn't feel too trusting myself just about that time.'
'He seems to have survived.'
'He's tough,' she said proudly. 'You can't keep Pop down, and you can bet that in the end Suarez-Navarro will be sorry they ever heard of him. It's happened to him before and he's always bounced back. I still work for him. I'
'Whatever it is, say it.'
'I had you checked out in London, when you were preparing for this trip. I didn't want Pop stung again. Besides…'
'My name was Trevelyan?'
'Oh, I'm so sorry,' she said. 'But I had to. You checked out fine, you know.' For the first time since I'd known her she was a little shy. She went on. That's enough about the Campbells. What about the Trevelyans – about you?', 'What about me? I'm just a plodding scientist.'
We both laughed. Plodding certainly didn't describe this airy swooping progress, and it eased her tension.
'Most scientists seem to be looking up these days, not down.'
'Ah, space stuff,' I said.
'You don't seem very enthusiastic.'
'I'm not. I think it's a waste of money. The Americans are spending thirty billions of dollars to put man into space; in the end it could cost ten times that much. That works out at about twenty thousand dollars for every square mile of airless lunar surface. You could get cheaper and better land on earth and if you poured that much money into the sea the returns would be even better. I think the sea is our new frontier, not space.'
She smiled at the missionary note in my voice. 'So that's why you became an oceanographer.'
'I suppose so – I was always in love with the sea.'
'And Mark? What made him one? I don't think I've ever known two brothers more different.'
I said, 'Mark was eaten up with ambition. How he got that way I don't know – I think some of it was jealousy of me, though God knows what he had to be jealous about. When my father died Mark seemed to go wild; mother couldn't control him. Since she died I've had nothing to do with him – he went his way and I mine. It hasn't always been easy having a brother like that in my line of work. People sometimes confuse us – to my detriment.'
'And his advantage.'
'Why, thank you, lady,' I said and bowed; and our relationship suddenly took a step forward.
Trevelyan; that's Cornish, isn't it? Are you Cornish?'
'Yes. We're descended from the Phoenician and Carthaginian tin traders. Hannibal is still a popular name in Cornwall, though not in our family, thank God.'
'You're kidding.'
'No, I'm not. It's a fact.'
We had a long, relaxed and easy conversation that night, talking about everything under the sun and moon, and by the time she went back to her cabin I had a better idea about both Clare and her father. Campbell was a difficult man to assess, not very forthcoming about himself and sticking to business most of the time. This talk with Clare had given me something of his background and I felt more than ever that he was a man to be trusted.
And then there was Clare herself. I found myself wondering if she could bring herself to trust another Trevelyan, or whether Mark had soured her on Trevelyans for life. I mentally chalked up another stroke against Mark. I spent a long time thinking about Clare before I turned in.
And then I suddenly thought of what she had said about Mark – of his dead hand pushing people around like pawns on a chessboard. It was true; everything we had done or were doing stemmed from Mark and his character. It was as though Mark had been a showman and we were his puppets as his skeletal hands pulled the strings. It was a shuddery thought to go to sleep on.* 2*
We entered a region of small revolving storms as Kane had predicted. They ranged from mere waterspouts, ten yards across, to monsters fifty feet in diameter. These squalls provided exhilarating sailing as long as care was taken. Esmerelda would be foaming along beneath a brilliant1 blue sky when the horizon would darken and within minutes the water would be dark and wind lashed, and when the storm had gone there would be rainbows plunging into the sea and the faithful trade wind would pick up again, driving us deeper into the heart of the Pacific towards the south-east corner of French Oceania.
Sixteen days after leaving Panama Geordie figured out the midday sights and announced, 'We're nearly there. We'll enter the search area this afternoon.'
We had decided not to tell the crew too much, and so Geordie gathered them and merely said that I wanted to stooge about looking for a particular sort of water condition, but that everyone was to be on the watch for shoals. Everyone knew there wasn't much land out here and his request may have sounded strange, but they willingly organized for extra eyes on each watch, and we had a man up the foremast with binoculars a lot of the time. To my mind that was just a token that a search was in progress as I didn't think they'd spot anything, but for everyone else it perked up interest. We arranged for some dredging, to give the teams practice as we went along.
I was in the chart room early the next morning with Campbell and Geordie, going over the chart and the Pilot. I said, 'The Erato spotted Minerva here – that was in 1890. In 1920 another ship placed Minerva here, stretching east-north-east for two miles. As Robinson points out, there's a difference often miles.'
Campbell said, 'It's strange that there should only have been two sightings in thirty years.'