D-Notice by Bill Walker (big ebook reader txt) 📗

she said that? Not “I don’t want to be here,” but “can’t.” It was an odd thing to say, and at the time, he’d let it go. Now, it boiled up into his conscious thoughts, and he fought the urge to ask her about it. After all, she was panicked, and people often said and did things that made no sense when caught in its grip. And who wouldn’t want to get out of a situation like that?

That was it, wasn’t it?

Still, he wondered if it would happen again. He needed her cool, steady nerves if they were going to make it through this ordeal. The taxi driver, a reed-thin Cockney with one eye permanently crossed, interrupted his thoughts.

“Where’ya want to be dropped, Guv?” the man said, tobacco-stained teeth flashing.

“The Ferry terminal.”

“Right-o, Guv.”

The taxi pulled up to the main terminal a moment later, and Michael shoved two five-pound notes into the driver’s hairy fist. The man smiled and bowed.

Outside, the damp fetid air embraced them, smelling of equal parts diesel fuel, salt, and rotted fish. Mist rolled in off the Channel, and somewhere off in the distance a ship’s horn blew.

For the hundredth time, Michael felt the pocket of his jacket for the passport, taking a measure of comfort from its heft. It also fed his fear of discovery, gnawing at him like a rat desperate enough to chew off its own leg to escape a trap. Erika grabbed his hand and squeezed.

“Maybe we should try the airport,” she said. “It might be safer.”

Michael shook his head. “First place they’ll be looking. The second is here. We’ll buy our tickets and walk to the ferry. If anything looks out of the ordinary, there are a hundred places we can get out.”

He led her to the terminal, a large ultra-modern building, brightly lit and kept far cleaner than he would have assumed. Even at this late hour it was choked with people.

Michael turned his attention to the ticket counters. Hugging the walls, they fronted a section of glassed-in offices, with each passenger line represented. He scanned the dizzying array of signs until he spotted one halfway down that read: Dover-Ostend Ferry in bright red type.

The ticket agent smiled when they approached.

“May I help you?” she asked.

“Two for Ostend, please,” Michael said.

The young woman nodded. “That will be twenty-two pounds.”

Michael reached for the money in his trousers and felt icy fingers crawling up his back.

Someone was watching them!

He knew it. The feeling was strong, nearly corporeal, and it sat on his shoulders whispering into his ear with a tiny insistent voice: Get Out!

While the agent punched up the tickets, he turned first one way, and then the other, trying to discern who among the throng might be surveilling them.

Calm yourself, Thorley, you’re getting paranoid. Take it easy.

He took a breath and thought it through. None of the people he saw looked the type, none looked like a trained killer, though perhaps that was what made them professionals.

Stop it.

If any of these people were after them, would they really sit by and wait to act? Not bloody likely. They were safe for the moment. They were—

“Here you are, sir,” the ticket agent said, reaching over the counter. “Two for Ostend.”

Tickets in hand, Michael and Erika walked quickly through the terminal toward the entrance to the ferry. A line of people waited to check in, delayed by two Immigration officials who were examining each and every passenger, checking their faces against a pair of photos in their hands. Michael pulled Erika up short and they melted into the passing crowd, taking a strategic position next to a newsagent’s kiosk.

“What now?” Erika asked, her blue eyes flashing.

Michael pretended to study the newspaper headlines while he pondered their next move. The ferry was out of the question. They’d never get past Immigration without being apprehended. And even if they somehow managed to get by those two goons, it was more than possible that someone waited on board, someone who wouldn’t be satisfied with an arrest. And who would miss two fugitives gone overboard in a dark, choppy sea? Suddenly, he smiled as an idea kindled in his mind.

“Come on,” he said, taking her hand.

Retracing their steps through the terminal, Michael led Erika out of the gate and down the narrow road leading back into town. The mist had thickened, rolling in off the harbor and wrapping them in its damp arms. Staying to the seaward side, they passed through Dover proper and on to the Prince of Wales docks. It was quieter here, the sounds of the Ferry terminal lost in the lapping of the waves and the groan of the fishing boats against their moorings.

Every craft lay dark and silent, their owners long since gone home. There was nothing to do but go back to London, or try the ferry and risk imprisonment, or worse.

“You wanted to steal a boat, didn’t you?” Erika said, giving voice to his idea. It sounded reckless and stupid coming from her.

“I didn’t know what else to do. I just realized that I know next to nothing about them.” He turned to her. “I don’t suppose you know how to hot-wire a boat and navigate through this.” He pointed to the fog, now nearly impenetrable.

Erika shook her head. “I’m sorry.”

And then he heard someone whistling. Aware that sound carried further on nights such as these, it nevertheless sounded close by. He recognized the tune. Glenn Miller’s “Moonlight Serenade.”

Motioning her to follow him, Michael led the way further down the quay, taking each step with caution. Up ahead, he spotted the faint amber glow from an oil lamp. The closer he drew to the whistling’s source, the more he could discern