him with the blank stare of someone in a trance. It hadn’t been more than two seconds.

In spite of the roaring in his head, his voice seemed to be perfectly matter of fact. 'I don’t care if you lay this double-gaited son of a bitch,’ he said, ‘but could you do it somewhere else? I’d like to think the pool’s exclusive, anyway.’

There was a gasp behind them then. He whirled, and Gerry was staring at all three of them, her eyes sick with loathing. She turned and ran. There was a snarl from the Porsche out in the driveway, a scream of rubber, and she was gone.

There was no use trying to catch her; he’d just have to keep calling her at the dormitory tonight until he could get her to come to the phone. Maybe he could make her understand he’d been operating in shock himself. He went back to the studio, and was in one of the projection rooms two hours later when the call came from the California highway patrol. She’d spun out through a guardrail on the San Diego Freeway.

Afterwards, when he walked away from the hospital isolated from everything in his private world of silence, all he had to hang onto was the knowledge she hadn’t done it deliberately; she was too healthy-minded and vital for that. She was just burning out her anger and disgust by driving too fast, a kid hitting back blindly at the only things available at the moment, the throttle of an overpowered car and the speed laws promulgated by the same can of worms.

* * *

It was a lovely face, he thought, with magnificent bone structure, and he was conscious of a desire to tell her this, but she was probably already convinced he was some kind of nut. He was appraising the exquisite effect of that slight tilt to the eyes when a little black streak trickled briefly down her cheek like running mascara and then disappeared under the pelting of the rain. Now another oozed from the blond hair plastered to her head. He was wondering at this when she said, ‘There’s soot or something in the rain. It’s on your face.’

The ship, of course! It was the fallout from the fire. He swung his head, searching the limits of the rain-swept void around them, but could see nothing except the short and choppy sea fading away into the murk. In the squall it could be blown for miles. But there was more of it now. Sooty splotches were dotting her arms. It had to be nearby. He turned, eyes slitted against the spindrift and rain, and stared directly to windward. Then he saw it—not the ship itself, but a faint and shapeless wash of orange glowing through the gray. He spun Karen around and pointed.

There was no way to tell how far away she was or in what direction she was going. It was simply a color without form or dimension, and they had no framework or orientation except the wind, which could be veering all around the compass. But it was growing brighter, he thought, conscious of the pounding of his heart.

Then they could see the flames and the dark clouds of smoke, and the side of the ship began to materialize in the mists at the limit of visibility. It was in profile, going past them very slowly with scarcely any disturbance to the swell or the confused and choppy sea set up by the squall.

‘The engine’s stopped!’ Goddard said. ‘And she’s lost most of her headway.’

Karen slipped out of the life ring. They each hooked an arm through it and began to kick in the direction of the ship. She was fading from view into the curtain again, off to their right, but the glow was still visible and he knew she was slowing all the time.

12

They must be almost there, Antonio Gutierrez thought; he should see the pretty blonde one any minute now. One could see the ship was stopping, just as it had when they had gone back to pick up the big American on his rubber raft. The engine room telegraph meant nothing to him, and he had no way of knowing the Leander had been moving through the water only from her own headway ever since Lind and the others had run from the bridge.

But it was very difficult to see anything in all this rain, and to make it worse nobody even appeared to be watching for her.