Free Three and One Make Five by Roderic Jeffries Page A

the two deaths. Despite Superior Chief Salas’s scorn, there were times when one had a gut feeling about a case that was taller and broader than logic and could not be denied. But unless fresh evidence came to light there now seemed little chance of ever finding out what that connection was or what part it had played in their deaths.
    He shrugged his shoulders. The dead men had been foreigners. He drank the coffee and it warmed his stomach and soothed away his frustrations.
     
    The trawler yacht was an off-shore cruiser, sufficiently seaworthy for quite heavy weather. She was 38 feet long and had, at cruising speed, a range of 1,000 miles or a maximum speed of 20 knots. She possessed a stateroom, a double berth cabin, two toilets and a shower room, a main saloon with dining area, and a deck-level galley. In daylight her lines were more purposeful than beautiful, because of her deep bulwarks and large wheelhouse. But riding to anchor in moonlight, with her lines softened and slightly blurred, she became touched by the sea’s romance.
    There was virtually no tide and, in that part of the bay where she lay, very little current. She headed south-east while a schooner, moored only a couple of hundred metres away, headed south-west: with her higher superstructure, she was more influenced by the breeze. A light shone from her saloon and this, shimmering, stretched across the water almost parallel to the moonlight’s path. Beyond that, there were no signs of life aboard her.
    At 2304 hours—the time was logged by the assistant harbourmaster—there was a heavy explosion and seconds later flames belched out of her shattered accommodation. The assistant harbourmaster called on the crew of a fishing-boat, about to put to sea, to help him and they sailed him over to the blazing vessel. Showing considerable courage, he tried to quell the fire with the two chemical extinguishers he’d taken with him, but it proved a hopeless task.
    The boat continued to burn until sufficient of the hull had been consumed for the sea to enter. She began to settle, the flames retreated, and finally she sank. As she went down, a badly burned body floated clear of her. Overcoming the nausea which the task produced, the assistant harbourmaster lashed the body to the side of the fishing-boat and then gave orders for them to return to the harbour.
     

 
CHAPTER 10
    On Tuesday morning, Alvarez parked by the side of the harbourmaster s office, half way up the eastern arm of the harbour, and went inside. The harbourmaster, a grizzled man in his late fifties, shook hands. ‘Well, we’ve identified him, Enrique. We’d the name of the boat from when she arrived— Janet II —and I’ve checked her out. She was from Palma, on charter, and the man who chartered her was called Peter Short.’
    ‘Was he English?’
    ‘That’s right.’
    ‘Here on holiday?’
    ‘That’s not clear. But apparently he owns a house just outside Llueso, so he may live here. He told the charterers that a friend of his was coming over from England and he wanted to take him lo Menorca.’
    ‘Did they have any idea when the friend’s supposed to arrive?’
    ‘I didn’t bother to ask.’
    ‘Did the charterers give you his address?’
    The harbourmaster looked down at a sheet of paper on his overcrowded desk. ‘Ca Na Rostra. They think he told them it was up the Laraix valley.’
    ‘Have you any idea what caused the explosion?’
    ‘Can’t be certain, of course, but I’ll give you ten to one it was leaking gas. All the boats these days have bottled gas for the cookers and refrigerators and the equipment isn’t always maintained as it should be—they don’t renew the tubing every third year: that sort of thing. The gas escapes and as it’s heavier than air it sinks to the deck and gradually builds up. Something causes a spark and . . .’ He clicked his thumb against his middle finger.
    ‘Later on, I’ll want a word with the charterers—who are they?’
    ‘Bonnin.