Sidestepping down the room, Kerans steadied the revolver in his hands, the huge negro's single cyclopean eye following him. Then he stepped on the open teeth of a necklace clasp, involuntarily stumbled back against a sofa.
As he steadied himself against the wall Big Caesar launched himself through the air at Kerans, the knife driving through the air in a short arc like the tip of a propellor. Beatrice screamed, her voice abruptly drowned in the tremendous roar of the Colt. Jolted by the recoil, Kerans sat down in the sofa, watched the mulatto crash crookedly against the doorway, the knife spilling from his hand. A strangled bubbling grunt erupted from his throat, and with a cataclysmic wrench which summed up all his pain and frustration he tore at the bead curtain and ripped it from the transom. The bunching muscles of his torso contracted for the last time. Draped in the curtain, he fell forwards onto the floor, his vast limbs like a bloated giant's, the thousands of beads spilling around him.
"Beatrice! Come on!" Kerans seized her arm, steered her past the prostrate body into the ante-room, his right hand and forearm numb from the jarring discharge of the Colt. They crossed the alcove, and raced past the deserted bar. Overhead a voice shouted from the bridge, and footsteps hurried across the deck to the rail.
Kerans stopped, looking down at the voluminous folds of Beatrice's gown, then abandoned his plan to retrace his entry over the stern paddle.
"We'll have to try the gangway." He pointed to the unguarded entrance by the starboard rail, the beckoning night-club cupids with flutes to their ruby lips dancing on either side of the steps. "It may look a little obvious, but it's just about the only way left now."
Half-way down, the gangway began to rock in its davits, and they heard the Admiral bark down at them from the bridge. A moment later the shotgun roared out, the pellets slashing through the clapboard roof over their heads. Kerans ducked, at the mouth of the gangway craned up at the bridge, now directly overhead, saw the long barrel of the shotgun sticking into the air as the Admiral manoeuvred about.
Kerans jumped down into the square, took Beatrice by the waist and swung her down. Together they crouched under the hull of the depot ship, then darted across the square to the nearest street.
Half-way there Kerans looked over his shoulder as a group of Strangman's men appeared on the far side of the square. They shouted to and fro with the Admiral, then spotted Kerans and Beatrice a hundred yards away.
Kerans started to run on, the revolver still clasped in his hand, but Beatrice held him back.
"No, Robert! Look!"
In front of them, stretched arm to arm across the full width of the street, another group approached, a white-suited man at its centre. He strolled along, one thumb hooked casually into his belt, the other signalling his men on, his fingers almost touching the tip of the machete brandished by the man next to him.
Changing direction, Kerans pulled Beatrice diagonally across the square, but the first group had fanned out and cut them off. A starshell went up from the deck of the ship and illuminated the square in its roseate light.
Beatrice stopped, out of breath, helplessly holding the broken heel of her gold slipper. She looked uncertainly at the men closing in on them. "Darling… Robert-what about the ship? Try to get back there yourself."
Kerans took her arm and they backed into the shadows below the forward paddle, hidden by the blades from the shotgun on the bridge. The exertion of climbing aboard the ship and then running about the square had exhausted Kerans, and his lungs pumped in painful spasms, so that he could barely steady the revolver.
"Kerans…" Strangman's cool, ironic voice drifted across the square. He advanced at a relaxed amble, just within range of the Colt but well screened by the men on either side of him. All carried machetes and pangas, their faces amiable and unhurried.
"Finis, Kerans… finis." Strangman stopped twenty feet from Kerans, his sardonic lips wreathed in a soft smile, surveying him with almost kindly pity. "Sorry, Kerans, but you're being a bit of a nuisance. Throw away the gun or we'll kill the DahI girl too." He waited for a few seconds. "I mean it."
Kerans found his voice. "Strangman-"
"Kerans, this is no time for a metaphysical discussion." A note of annoyance crept into his voice, as if he were dealing with a fractious child. "Believe me, no time for prayers, no time for anything. I told you to drop the gun. Then walk forward. My men think you abducted Miss Dahl, they won't touch her." He added, with a touch of menace: "Come on, Kerans, we don't want anything to happen to Beatrice, do we? Think what a beautiful mask her face will make." He tittered insanely. "Better than that old alligator you wore."
Phlegm choking his throat, Kerans swung around and handed the revolver to Beatrice, pressing her small hands around the butt. Before their eyes could meet he looked away, inhaling for the last time the musky perfume on her breasts, then began to walk out into the square as Strangman had ordered. The latter watched him with an evil smirk, then suddenly leapt forward with a snarl, whipping the others on.
As the long knives lanced through the air after him Kerans turned and raced around the paddle, trying to reach the area behind the ship. Then his feet slipped in one of the foetid pools, before he could catch himself he fell heavily. He scrambled to his knees, one arm raised helplessly to ward off the circle of raised machetes, then felt something seize him from behind and pull him backwards roughly off balance.
Recovering his foothold on the damp cobbles, he heard Strangman shout in surprise. A group of brown-uniformed men, rifles at their hips, stepped rapidly from the shadows behind the depot ship where they had been hiding. At their head was the trim, brisk figure of Colonel Riggs. Two of the soldiers carried a light machinegun, a third man two boxes of belt ammunition. They quickly set it up on its tripod ten feet in front of Kerans, levelled the perforated, air-cooled barrel at the confused mob backing away from them. The rest of the soldiers fanned out in a widening semi-circle, prodding the slower of Strangman's men with their bayonets.
Most of the crew were shambling backwards in the general melee across the square, but a couple of them, still holding their pangas, attempted to break through the cordon. Instantly there was a short decisive volley of shots over their heads, and they dropped their knives and fell back mutely with the rest.
"Okay, Strangman, that will do very nicely." Riggs rapped his baton across the Admiral's chest and forced him back.
Completely disconcerted by all this, Strangman gaped blankly at the soldiers swarming past him. He searched the depot ship helplessly, as if expecting some large siege cannon to be wheeled forward and reverse the situation. Instead, however, two helmeted soldiers appeared on the bridge with a portable searchlight, swivelled its beam down into the square.
Kerans felt someone take his elbow. He looked around at the solicitous beak-like face of Sergeant Macready, a submachine-gun in the crook of his arm. At first he almost failed to identify Macready, only with an effort managed to place his aquiline features, like a face dimly remembered across the span of a lifetime.
"You all right, sir?" Macready asked softly. "Sorry to jerk you about like that. Looks as if you've been having a bit of a party here."