Doctor Who_ The Sea-Devils - Malcolm Hulke [23]
‘How do you really expect me to believe in... in Sea-Devils?’ he asked.
‘We both saw one,’ said Jo.
‘Now just a minute,’ said Captain Hart, sensing an inconsistency, ‘a little while ago you said you only saw a silhouette, Miss Grant.’
‘It was the silhouette of a Sea-Devil,’ insisted Jo, exasperated by the captain’s disbelief. ‘In any case, you’ve spoken to the man we brought back from the oil-rig. He saw one kill his friend.’
That was true. On their return in the helicopter, Clark had been put straight into the sick-bay, and Captain Hart had spoken to him there. Even so, Hart remained sceptical. But he tried to be fair. ‘I want to put this suggestion to you both,’ he said. ‘The man Clark is obviously in a very poorly condition—mentally, I mean. Let us presume that yesterday, for some reason, he killed his companion—’
The Doctor suddenly interjected: ‘You’re accusing that man of murder!’
‘I’m simply suggesting what might have happened,’ said Captain Hart, and then continued: ‘While mentally unbalanced, he killed his companion. Then you two arrived. As you pointed out, Doctor, he tried to kill you. Fortunately, he was unsuccessful in that attempt, but he may have been successful in communicating his madness to you.’
‘Captain Hart,’ said the Doctor with studied emphasis, ‘I know about communicated madness. I can assure you that none of us are mad. I have seen, and been chased by, a Sea-Devil.’
Captain Hart came back and sat down again at his desk. He was an intelligent man, but he was being asked to believe in something which exceeded all his previous knowledge. ‘All right,’ he said at last. ‘May I, for the sake of my own conscience, hear your story again?’
Jo got angry. ‘We’ve already told you everything!’
‘It’s all right, Jo,’ said the Doctor. ‘Captain Hart’s quite right in wanting to be sure that we are telling the truth.’ Slowly, and carefully, the Doctor started to tell Captain Hart once more about the events on the oil-rig.
Trenchard drove his landrover carefully along the road leading to the Naval Base. From time to time he glanced at the heap of rugs, travelling blankets, and his golf bags, which made a mound on the floor behind his driving seat. He had already committed one major crime—allowing his prisoner to leave the prison without authority from the Prison Department. Now, as he approached the gates of the Naval Base, he was about to commit yet another—he was going to delude a representative of the Lords of the Admiralty into believing that he, Trenchard, was the only occupant of the landrover.
At the gates he stopped, and their Lordships’ representative, in the person of Chief Petty Officer Beaver, came up to the driver’s window and saluted. ‘’Afternoon, Mr. Trenchard. Want to see the captain?’
‘If I may,’ said Trenchard, always polite to lower-deck ratings. ‘I was just passing.’
‘I think he’s got visitors,’ said C.P.O. Beaver, ‘but I imagine he’ll have time for you.’ He opened the gates to admit the landrover. As Trenchard went by he called out cheerfully, ‘How’s the Master getting on?’
Trenchard almost jumped out of his driving seat. ‘Very well, thank you,’ he said, ‘considering...’ He realised Beaver’s question had no point behind it; it was just a pleasantry. After all, everyone on the island knew about the château and its celebrated prisoner.
Usually when Trenchard visited Captain Hart he parked his landrover right outside the main administrative block. It was his little way of showing that he was a cut above the other people who parked in the base’s car-park. Today, however, he decided it was wise to follow the custom of the common herd. He headed his landrover into the car-park at the side of the main building, and stationed it unobtrusively between two other vehicles. He stopped the motor, carefully pocketed the keys, and noted that his heart seemed to be pounding very fast. Without looking round to the mound of rugs and blankets behind him he said, ‘We are now in the car-park. I shall be gone for about twenty minutes.’ There was no reply.