Dangerous Cargo (16 page)

There was a murmur of assent. A voice cred: “Where’s your proof?”

“You’ll have to wait for proof until the officers are brought to
trial.”

“Will the owner be brought to trial for murder?”

“Certainly,” said Mme. Storey coolly. “Once we drop anchor everything will
have to come out.”

“Do you accuse us of being in this plot?” growled a deep voice.

“The majority of you are honest men,” said Mme. Storey, “or I wouldn’t be
talking to you like this. But there’s a crooked ring in the fo’c’sle. Let the
honest men think back over everything that has happened since we left New
York, and decide for themselves.”

The men began to discuss the matter amongst themselves in loud voices, I
judged that the current was running in our favour. But there was one opposing
voice somewhere in the back of the crowd; a young voice, saying: “Aah! you
fools! Can’t you see she’s just talking you round? She knows how to work
men!”

Mme. Storey’s keen ear recognised that voice. “Ha!” she cried. “There’s my
old friend Kid Wanzer! Bring him into the light, boys!”

Wanzer had not bargained for this. He made a break for the fo’c’sle but
was collared and dragged back, struggling. All his courage ran out of him. He
was brought to Mme. Storey’s feet shaking and cringing.

“There’s one of your crooks,” she said grimly. “He betrayed Bella and I
into the hands of a Chinese gang in Willemstad. Luckily we escaped.”

“She lies!” yelled Wanzer. But his own terrified voice convicted him. “Ah,
you dirty scum!” cried one of the men who was holding him, striking him on
the side of the head. Wanzer was in a fair way of being badly mauled when
Mme. Storey called up to Les for a pair of irons. He tossed them to her.

“Snap these on him,” she said, “and turn him over to the skipper.”

Wanzer’s hands were locked behind him. They ran him up the ladder,
pummelling him as they went. He collapsed in a corner of the deck above.

The crew promptly forgot him. A dozen questions were asked of Mme. Storey
at once. “One at a time!” she protested, waving her hands. Every question she
could hear she answered instantly and truthfully.

I noticed that McLaren, the burly chief engineer, had joined the group of
passengers. I was pretty sure that the Scotsman bore no love towards the
Germans on the bridge and that he would be on our side. However, he was
uncertain as to how the crew would take any interference from him, and he
said nothing, but merely watched the scene below with a grim face.

Suddenly the door from A deck corridor banged open, and two dishevelled
figures ran out into the space in front of Mme. Storey’s stool. It was Grober
and Niederhoff. At sight of them Les pulled his gun and took a step down. But
he immediately saw that the two officers were not armed. Putting up his gun,
he stayed where he was.

Grober shook both fists in the air. Such was his rage he could scarcely
articulate. “We were seized and tied up without warning,” he cried, “and
thrown in our rooms! Fulda, Bostock and the helmsman are lying helpless in
the wheelhouse now. They are in irons and I could not release them! Men, it
is a plot to save the owner from a charge of murder. This woman, for a price,
means to fasten the crime on us! on us!” He beat his breast like a
gorilla.

The men fell silent. It was impossible to tell how they would react to
this preposterous charge. Mme. Storey did not make the mistake of arguing
with Grober. She appealed to the crew. “Well, you’ve heard his story now,”
she said coolly. “It’s up to you to choose who you’ll have to take us into
port. There’s Les Farman, the American, and here’s Hans Grober, the
foreigner.”

They all shouted at once, some for Farman, some for Grober. The cries for
Farman were more numerous.

“This calls for a show of hands,” she said. “All who want Farman hold up
their hands.” A number of hands shot up. “Grober?” The crooks amongst the
crew saw which way the current was tending, and declined to advertise
themselves. Not a hand was raised.

“Well, Captain,” said Mme. Storey, “you appear to have lost out!”

“Outrage!” he muttered.

“One moment,” said Les, from the top of the ladder. “There can’t be two
skippers on a ship. I refuse to take the responsibility unless those two are
locked up.”

“Fair enough!” said Mme. Storey.

“Lock them up!” yelled the crew, starting forward. I suppose they were
delighted at the idea of getting their hands on their former masters.
However, Mme. Storey jumped down from her stool and, spreading her arms wide,
held up the rush for a moment. Under cover of her skirts the two officers ran
pell-mell for the ladder and scrabbled up on all fours, Fulda treading on
Grober’s heels. Les received them at the top and led them, with Wanzer,
meekly into captivity. The anger of the crew evaporated in a roar of laughter
at this undignified exit.

“Well, that’s that!” said Mme. Storey, with a decisive gesture. “See you
later, sailors.” They cheered her as she ran up the ladder.

The guests crowded around her admiringly—except the jealous Adele
and her cavalier, who looked on with sneers. Above all the fulsome voices
could be heard Sophie’s shrill cackle: “Darling! you were
marvellous!…marvellous!”

Mme. Storey looked them over grimly. “We haven’t yet got solid ground
under us,” she said. “You’d better keep your congratulations for a
while.”

Beckoning to Horace and to me, she hastened along the deck after Les
Farman. Horace was scowling at her in sullen pain. Bluebeard had met his
match. Mme. Storey was not thinking about him. When she put the crowd behind
her her face showed white and strained. It had not been so easy at it
looked.

IT was decided to confine our five prisoners in Horace’s den
up on the boat-deck. This room had but the one door, a heavy teak affair,
opening on the starboard side in plain view of the bridge. Thus it would be
under the observation at all hours of whoever was on watch. It had three
windows which screwed shut in heavy weather. By removing the brass handles
and substituting common nuts, the windows could not be opened except with the
aid of a wrench.

Some of the furniture was taken out to make room, and mattresses laid on
the floor. Irons were left on the legs of the prisoners, but removed from
their wrists, so that they could feed themselves or read or smoke. Captain
Grober protested angrily against being locked up with a steward and a common
sailor, but Les merely grinned. “You’ll fare worse ashore,” he said.

The helmsman, a man called Roberts, was set free, since there was nothing
against him. The whole ship was rotten with enemies and spies. We could only
deal with that problem by maintaining a superior morale.

While the prisoners were being looked after, Mme. Storey and I visited the
Captain’s cabin aft of the chartroom. The cords with which he had been bound
lay on the floor where they had been dropped in his haste. They had been cut
through with a sharp instrument. One of the drawers of his dresser stood
open. It had not been so before. The drawer contained his toilet articles in
neat array. There was an empty space amongst them.

“Their friend,” said Mme. Storey, “whether he or she, entered this room
first and removed the Captain’s gag. The Captain told him there was a knife
in the drawer and he cut the cords. Then they went across the hall and freed
Niederhoff.”

On the coverlet of the bed she found a tiny smear of fresh blood. “Hm!”
she said, “it was either a woman or a man unhandy with a knife. He cut
himself in his haste.”

“Or the Captain,” I put in.

“No, himself. The Captain’s feet rested on this spot. He was wearing
boots. The woman or man that we are looking for has a little cut on his left
hand.”

In Niederhoff’s room we found a silver pocket-knife with the Captain’s
initials on it; H.G.

When Mme. Storey told Les what she had discovered, he said, scowling: “By
God! I’ll make him tell who set him free!”

“How?” she asked dryly. “Under torture?”

Les looked like a nice boy caught in mischief. “Hell, no!” he growled; “I
couldn’t torture a prisoner.”

“Quite!” she said. “We’ll find out some other way.”

Dinner was served about nine. Except for the delay, it was exactly the
same as any other night. The shaded lights, the flowers, the deft servants;
the beautiful dresses of the women and the gleaming bosoms of the men.
Hors d’oeuvres
, soup, fish, etc., each with its proper wine. The
guests were thirsty and the champagne flowed generously. The same rattle of
talk and meaningless laughter—only to-night one could hear sharp,
nervous overtones.

Everybody was present at the table. If nothing else, curiosity brought
them. Their faces offered an interesting study in expression. Everybody was
watching his neighbours covertly. Everybody knew without being told that
Captain Grober had not got up the murderous plot all on his own. Everybody
knew there was a Judas amongst us. The real Judas, of course, was making
believe to be suspicious of his neighbours too.

Mme. Storey talked as foolishly as the rest—but with a purpose.
While she rattled I knew that she was listening to every word that passed,
and weighing its significance. Often she was steering the talk without
appearing to, Adele never spoke except in an undertone to Tanner.

“Horace, what port are we making for?” asked Sophie.

“Farman is working out our position now,” he answered. “We’ll decide
later.”

“Heavens! I suppose that will mean weeks and weeks of delay at some stuffy
little island. What a bore!”

“But, mother, the islands are beautiful!” protested Celia, looking at
Emil. “What fun it would be to explore one of them thoroughly.”

Sophie paid no attention to her child. “Rosika, how you lied to me about
Fahrig being a thief!” she said. “Why didn’t you tell me the truth? Didn’t
you trust me?”

“Didn’t want to frighten you,” said Mme. Storey. “I thought you’d screech
and alarm the ship…You did screech!”

“Only a little one. Anyhow, somebody screeched before me.”

“That was Fahrig.”

“All that yelling broke out on deck while I was still only half dressed,”
Sophie went on in her vivacious fashion. “It was perfectly awful to have to
sit there and finish, not knowing what was going on!”

“Finest thing I ever heard of!” said Martin, blinking at her. “I will lay
it before the Carnegie Hero Fund. Woman bravely remains at her mirror making
up her face after mutiny breaks out!”

“Don’t be horrid!” said Sophie. “Where were you, I should like to
know?”

“Dressing,” said Martin. “In my cabin astern I couldn’t hear anything. I
didn’t know anything was wrong until I got up on deck.”

“Wasn’t it awful!” cried Mme. Storey, laughing. “I must have been drunk
with excitement. I have no idea now what I did or said. It has passed
completely out of my mind.”

There was a general chorus around the table. “Rosika, you were
marvellous!” etc.

“Just what was I doing when you came on deck?” she asked Martin
laughingly.

“Let me see,” he answered, “I was dazed with it all. It took me a minute
or two to get the hang of it. The first thing I can remember is hearing you
tell the sailors how you caught Fahrig.”

“Oh, the worst was over then! You should have seen Farman slide down from
the bridge.”

“Everybody’s hero!” said Martin sarcastically.

Horace looked at him with quick sympathy. “Sure!” he said, “I’ve had about
all I can stomach of the noble Farman!”

“Well, thanks to him we’re having our dinner!” put in Emil.

Horace glanced at him in dislike.

“Rosika!” cried Dr. Tanner from the other end of the table, “do you mean
to say when you and Bella led the Captain out of the winter-garden you stuck
him up by your two selves?”

“Oh, no, we had a couple of husky sailors out on deck…Didn’t he go like
a lamb to the slaughter!” she laughed.

“Why didn’t you call on me and Adrian for help?”

“You weren’t armed. We didn’t want a rough and tumble.”

“By the way,” said Horace, looking up, “what did you do when the racket
broke out. I didn’t see you rushing to our aid.”

“My first thought was of the women,” said Tanner. “I ran down to A deck to
get Adele.”

“Oh, yes?” said Horace sarcastically.

Tanner swelled a little. That was his inferiority complex working. “I
wouldn’t let Adele finish dressing. I threw a cloak around her shoulders and
pulled her up on deck. It’s always my instinct to get out in the open when
there’s trouble.”

“Yes!” said Horace.

“I wonder how the Captain and the first officer got loose,” said Celia
innocently.

The same thought was in everybody’s mind. There was an awkward pause, then
we all started talking.

“I was dressed before the trouble started,” Emil volunteered. “I happened
to be up forward when somebody yelled mutiny’ on the bridge, and Farman came
sliding down right in front of me.”

“I wouldn’t let Emil get in it,” said Celia.

“Funny thing mob psychology,” said Martin in his owlish style. “It was
that little crack of Rosika’s about the electrician that really saved all our
necks.”

“But that was right at the beginning,” I said.

“My child,” he retorted, “I have heard the whole story six times over
within the hour…No matter how they may be yelling for blood, if you can
make them laugh they’ll turn around and eat out of your hand!”

“Out of Rosika’s hand,” amended Emil.

“Did you ever hear such fiendish yelling!” said Sophie, with a
shudder.

“Do let’s talk about something else,” said Adrian plaintively. Adrian had
better control of himself at dinner, but he was jumpy. There was a bright red
spot burning in either cheek. He had drunk a lot of champagne.

His remark attracted Horace’s attention to him. “And what did you do in
the great war?” he asked with a cruel smile.