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He set his glass down very carefully. He was really letting himself go to-night, he'd allowed that dark craggy face its second expression in ten minutes and it wasn't a very encourag-ing one. Then he picked up his glass and grinned, "You don't know what you're saying," he said kindly. "Your neck—that's what comes from the blood supply to the brain being interrupted. You're not fit to fight off a teddy-bear. Who's going to look after you if they start playing games?" "I'm sorry,' I said. I meant it. I'd worked with Hunslett maybe ten times in the ten years I'd known him and it had been a stupid thing for me to say. About the only thing Hunslett was incapable of was leaving your side in time of trouble. "You were speaking of Uncle?" "Yes. We know where theNantesville is. Uncle could get a Navy boat to shadow her, by radar if------" "I know where she was. She upped anchor as I left. By dawn she'll be a hundred miles away - in any direction." "She's gone? We've scared them off? They're going toJove this." He sot down heavily, then looked at me. "But we have her new description------" "I said that didn't matter. By to-morrow she'll have another description. TheHokomaru from Yokohama, with green top-sides, Japanese flag, different masts-----" "An air search. We could-----" "By the time an air search could be organised they'd have twenty thousand square miles of sea to cover. You've heard the forecast. It's bad. Low cloud - and they'd have to fly under the low cloud. Cuts their effectiveness by ninety per cent. And poor visibility and rain. Not a chance in a hundred, not one in a thousand of positive identification. And if they do locate them - if - what then? A friendly wave from the pilot? Not much else he can do." "The Navy. They could call up the Navy-----" "Call up what Navy? From the Med? Or the Far East? The Navy has very few ships left and practically none in those parts. By the time any naval vessel could get to the scene it would be night again and the Nantesville to hell and gone. Even if a naval ship did catch up with it, what then? Sink it with gunfire with maybe the twenty-five missing crew members of theNantesville locked up in the hold?" "A boarding party?" "With the same twenty-five ex-crew members lined up on deck with pistols at their backs and Captain Imrie and his thugs politely asking the Navy boys what their next move was going to be?" "I'll get into my pyjamas," Hunslett said tiredly. At the doorway he paused and turned. "If theNantesville had gone, her crew - the new crew - have gone too and we'll be having no visitors after all. Had you thought of that?" "No." "I don't really believe it either."