Ja done, skipper." The old man creased his weatherbattered face in appreciation, and Hugo shouted down the companionway to the galley.

"Cooky, how's it for a pot of coffee?" But the reply was lost, for at that moment the console came to life dramatically. A row of lights blinked on above the control panel, the muted hum changed to a rapid beepbeep signal, and the screen glowed ghostly green.

"She's up!" Hugo shouted his relief, and ran to the set.

His first mate rushed through from his cabin behind the bridge, tucking his shirt into unb.u.t.toned trousers, his face puckered with sleep.

"About b.l.o.o.d.y time,"he blurted, groggily.

"Take over from Hansie," Hugo told him, and he settled into the padded seat in front of the ASDtc set.

"Right, bring her round two points to port and open her up.

The Wild Goose swung her head into the sea, and her motion changed from easy swoop and glide to a crabbing b.u.t.ting lunge, and the spray burst over the gla.s.s of the bridge.

Sitting before the console Hugo was tracking the flight of the balloon and keeping Wild Goose on an interception course.

Driven by the forty-knot north the balloon crossed the coastline, climbing swiftly to three thousand feet. Hugo manipulated the k.n.o.b on the console which sent the balloon a command to release gas and maintain att.i.tude.

Her response was recorded immediately on the screen.

"Good," Hugo whispered. "Good!" Then louder. "Bring her round a bit, Oscar - the balloon is drifting to the south." For twenty minutes more they b.u.t.ted through the swells.

"Okay," Hugo broke the silence. "I'm going to ditch her." He twisted the k.n.o.b clockwise slowly, expelling all the gas from the nylon balloon.

Ja. That's it. She's down." He looked out of the window above the set. The dust-laden clouds had brought the night on prematurely.

It was dark outside, with a low black ceiling through which no star showed.

Hugo turned his attention back to the set.

"That's it, Oscar. You're right on course, Hold her there." Then he glanced across at old Hansie and another younger crewman. They were sitting patiently on the bench against the far bulkhead. Both of them were clad in full oilskins, shiny yellow -plastic from head to ankle, with rnboots below that.

"Okay, Hansie," Hugo nodded. "You can get up in the bows. We are only a mile or so away now They climbed down on to the wave-swept deck, and Hugo watched them scuttling forward between each green burst of water and crouching in the bows. Both of them ducking each time another sweel poured over the top of them, their yellow plastic suits showing clearly in the murky deck tights.

"I'm going to switch her on now," Hugo warned the helm.

"We should have her on visual."

Hugo flicked a switch "on the panel, commanding the balloon to turn on her guide light.

Almost immediately there was a shout from Oscar.

"There she is. Dead ahead!" Hugo jumped up and ran forward. It took a few seconds for his eyes to adjust, then he made out the tiny red firefly of light ahead of them in the vast blackness of sea and sky.

It showed for a second then was gone in the trough of the next wave.

"I'll take her." Hugo replaced Oscar at the wheel. "You get on the spotlight." The beam of the spotlight was a solid white shaft through the darkness. The fluorescent yellow paint of the cylinder glowed in the circle of the spot.

Hugo lay Wild Goose upwind of the cylinder, and then allowed her to drift down gently on it. Hansie and his a.s.sistant were ready with the twenty-foot boat-hook.

Delicately Hugo manoeuvred down over the bobbing yellow cylinder, and grunted with satisfaction as the boat-hook slipped through the recovery ring and the cylinder was hauled in over the bows.

He watched while the two dripping oilskin-clad figures clambered back up the ladder into the wheelhouse, and laid the cylinder on the chart table.

"Good! Good!" Hugo slapped their backs heartily. "Now, go and get dry both of you!" They climbed down the companionway, and Hugo handed the wheel over to Oscar.

"Home!" he instructed him. "As quick as you like." And he carried the cylinder through into his cabin.

Sitting at the fold-down table in his cabin, Hugo unscrewed the lower section of the cylinder and took out the plastic container. He opened it and spilled the contents out on the table top.

He whistled softly, and picked up the biggest stone.

Although he was no expert he knew instinctively that it was a brilliant of exceptional quality. Even the roughness of its exterior could not mask the fire in its depths.

To him it was worthless, there was nowhere he could market a stone like that. There was no temptation to take it out of the Ring - all it would mean for him was fifteen years at hard labour.

The Ring was based on this mutual reliance, no one part of it could function without all the others - yet each part was self-contained and watertight. Only one man knew all its parts, and n.o.body knew who that one man was.

From the drawer beside him Hugo took out his tools and set them on the table. He lit the spirit stove and set the pot of paraffin wax in the gimbal above it to heat.

Then he poured the diamonds into a shiny metal can. It was the type of ordinary commercial can used for packing and preserving foodstuffs.

Balancing against the ship's motion, he lifted the pot from the stove, and poured the steaming liquid wax over the diamonds, filling the can to rim level.

The wax cooled and solidified quickly, turning opaque and white.

The stones were now incorporated in a cake of wax that would prevent them rattling, and would give the sealed can authentic weight.

Hugo lit a cigarette and crossed the cabin to look out into the wheelhouse. The helmsman winked at him and Hugo smiled.

He went back to the table, the can was cool enough to handle. He placed the circular lid over it, and moved to the portable jenny bolted to a chest of drawers. Carefully he clinched the lid into place, his eyes squinting at the smoke from the cigarette that dangled from his lips.

Satisfied at last he set the sealed can on the table, while he went to where his jacket hung on the door. From the inside pocket he pulled out a manilla envelope, then from the envelope he drew a printed, colour-screened label. He came back to the bench and meticulously pasted the label around the can. On the label was a highly glamorized artist's conception of a leaping pilchard, making it look like a Scottish salmon.

Pilchards in Tomato Sauce." Hugo read the label aloud, as he leaned back to admire his work. "A product of South West Africa." He smiled with satisfaction and began packing his equipment away.

How much?" The foreman of the fish pump called across the narrowing gap between Wild Goose and the jetty.

"About fifty tons," Hugo shouted back. "Then the norther chased us home."

"Ja. None of the boats stayed out." The foreman watched his gang secure the mooring ropes, and swing the hose of the vacuum-pump over Wild Goose's hold to begin pumping out her pilchards.

"Take over, Oscar." Hugo picked up his jacket an 1 cap.

"I'll be back tomorrow." He jumped down on to the jetty and strode down towards the canning factory with its awesome stink of pilchard oil. His jacket was slung over his shoulder, one finger hooked through the tag.

He went down an alley between the boiler rooms and the fish-drying plant, across a wide yard where the bags of fish meal were piled to the height of a double-storey building. He turned in through the double doors of the cavernous warehouse filled to roof height with cardboard cartons, each stencilled with the words: 1 gross cans.

Consign to: Pilchards in tomato sauce.

Vee Dee Bee Agencies Ltd.

32, Bermondsey Street, London, S.E. I He went into the cubicle that served the warehouse k storeman as an office.

"h.e.l.lo, Hugo. Good trip?" The storeman was Hugo's brother-in-law.

"Fifty ton." Hugo hung his coat casually on the hook behind the door. "I've got to take a leak," he said, and went to the latrine across the floor of the warehouse.

He came back, and drank a cup of tea with his brotherin-law. Then he stood and said, "Jeannie will he waiting."

"Give her my love."

"She don't need yours. She's going to get plenty of mine!" Hugo winked, and took his coat from the hook. It was lighter now, the can was gone from the pocket.

He went through the main gates of the harbour, exchanging a casual greeting with the customs officer, and went to the battered early model convertible in the car park.

He kissed the girl at the driving-wheel, threw his coat on the back seat and climbed in over the door.

"You drive," he told her, grinning. "I want both hands free." She squeaked and pulled his hand out of her skirts.

"Can't you wait till we get home?"

"I've been at sea for five days and I'm hungry as h.e.l.l."

"You're a caution, you are." She laughed at him and started the car.

This was Sergio Caporetti, the man Johnny had chosen to captain Kinesher. He was a round man, the same shape as a snowman. He filled the doorway of Johnny's office, and his great belly bulging into the room ahead of him. His face was round also, like a baby's - but the beautiful dark Italian eyes fringed with thick lashes like a girl's.

"Come in, Sergio,"Johnny greeted him. "Nice to see you." The Italian crossed the room deceptively quickly, and Johnny's hand was completely engulfed by the enormous hairy paw.

"So, at last we are ready," Sergio grunted. "Three months I sit on b.u.m do nothing. Look at me - " He slapped his belly with a sound like a pistol shot." - fat! No good."

"Well, not quite ready." Johnny qualified the statement.

He was flying Sergio and his crew over to England well ahead of time. He wanted the big Italian to have plenty of opportunity to study and get to know the revolutionary new equipment with which Kingfisher was fitted. Then when the vessel was ready for sea, Sergio would sail her out to Africa.

"Sit down, Sergio. Let's go over the crew list-" When Sergio left an hour later, Johnny went as far as the lift with him.

"If you have any problems phone me, Sergio."

"Si." Sergio shook hands. "Don't worry - Caporetti is in charge. All is well." On his way back Johnny stopped at the reception desk.

"Is Mrs. Hartford in today?" he asked one of the little receptionists, and both of them replied in chorus like Tweedledum and Tweedledee.

"No, Mr. Lance."

"Has she phoned to say where she is?"

"No, Mr. Lance." Tracey had disappeared. Five days now there had been no sign of her, her new office was deserted and unused.

Johnny was worried and angry. He was worried that she had gone on another hinge, and he was angry because he missed her.

He was scowling ferociously as he went back into his office.

"Goodness me." Lettie Pienaar stood beside his desk with a batch of mail in her hand. "We do look happy. Here's something to cheer you." She handed him a postcard with a colour picture of the Eiffel Tower. It was the first word from Ruby since she had left. Johnny read it quickly.

"Paris - " he said, " - is fun, it seems." He tossed the card on to the desk and plunged back into the day's work.

He worked late, stopped at a steakhouse to eat, then drove back to the silent house in Bishopscourt.

The crunch of tyres on the gravel drive and headlights flashing across the bedroom wall woke him.

He sat up in bed as the front-doorbell began a series of urgent peals and he switched on the bedside light. Two o'clock - Christ!

He pulled a dressing-gown over his nudity and tottered down the pa.s.sage, switching on lights as he went. The doorbell kept ringing.

He turned the front door key. The door flew open and Tracey came in like a strong wind, clutching a briefcase to her chest.

"Where the h.e.l.l have you been?" Johnny was suddenly fully awake, angry and relieved.

"Johnny! Johnny!" She was dancing with excitement, incoherent, her cheeks flaming and eyes shining. "I've got them - at least, it, both of them."

"Where have you been?" Johnny was not to be so easily sidetracked, and with an obvious effort Tracey brought her excitement under control, but she was still smiling and gave the impression of humming like an electric motor.

"Come." She took his hand and dragged him into the lounge. "Get yourself a large whisky and sit down," she ordered, imperious as a queen.

"I don't want a whisky, and I don't-" "You'll need one," she , and went to the open liquor cabinet, poured a ma.s.sive whisky into a crystal gla.s.s, squirted soda into it, and brought it back to Johnny.

"Tracey, what the h.e.l.l is going on?"

"Please, Johnny. It's so wonderful, don't spoil it for me.

just sit there, please!" Johnny sank reluctantly into the chair, and Tracey slipped the catch on her briefcase and drew out a sheaf of doc.u.ments. She stood in the centre of the floor, and took up the pose of a Victorian actress.

"This she explained, is a translation from the original Cerman of a proclamation by Governor in Council dated 3rd May 1899 and issued at Windhoek. I will leave out the preamble and go straight to the meat." She cleared her throatand began reading: "In consideration of the sum of 10,000 marks which is hereby paid and received, the rights to mine, win, recover, collect or carry away all metals, whether base or precious, stones whether base, semiprecious or precious, minerals, guano, vegetation and other substances organic or inorganic for a period of Nine Hundred and Ninety-Nine years is granted to Messrs Farben, Hendryck and Mosenthal S. A Guano Merchants of 14 Bergenstra.s.se, Windhoek, in respect of a circular area ten kilometres in radius whose centre shall be a point situated at the highest elevation of the island lying on lat.i.tude 23" 15" South and longitude 15" 12" East." Tracey paused and looked at Johnny. He was frozen, stony-faced, staring at her with all his attention. She went on quickly, gabbling it out.

"All the old German mineral concessions and rights were ratified by the Union Parliament when the Union of South Africa took over the mandate after the Great War." He nodded, unable to speak. Tracey's smile kept breaking out.

"That concession still has all the force of law behind it.

The grant of any subsequent rights is invalid, and although the original grant was mainly for the recovery of guano yet it covers precious stones also." Again Johnny nodded, and Tracey put the doc.u.ment at the bottom of the sheaf of papers in her hand.

"The concession Company, Farben, Hendryck and Mosenthal S. A is still in existence. The Company's only remaining as set, apart from any long-forgotten concessions, is an old building at 14 Bergenstra.s.se, Windhoek." Tracey seemed to change the subject suddenly.

"You asked me where I have been, Johnny. Well I've been to Windhoek, an dover most of the worst roads in South West Africa.

The Farben, Hendryck and Mosenthal Company is owned by the brothers Hendryck, a couple of Karakul fur farmers. They are a pair of horrible old men, and when I saw them slitting the throats of those poor little Persian lambs just to prevent the fur uncurling, well-" Tracey paused, and gulped. "Well, I didn't explain to them about the concession. I just offered to buy the Company, and they asked twenty thousand and I said "sign", and they signed and I left them chuckling with glee. They thought they'd been terribly clever. There! It's all yours!" Tracey handed the Agreement to Johnny and while he read it she went on.