Cargo of Coffins (7 page)

In his commodious cabin, at one, he sat down to eat his luncheon in solitary gloom. His appetite was small, completely taken away by the knowledge that Paco, ex-convict, dope-smuggler and multi-murderer, would be buried as he had lived, in complete deceit.

He could not dispel the lowering cloud of apprehension which closed gradually in upon him. Something was wrong with all this. The danger had not ceased. He felt it had just begun. A nameless premonition of disaster hung around him. Paco, certainly, was not through with this ship and Miss Norton. But there was no arguing the slowness of the wavering pulse and the death rattle he had heard in Paco’s throat.

Bleakly, he hunched over his laden board and stared unseeing at the shining riot guns and rifles in locked racks on his walnut wall.

Had Paco made some rendezvous with criminals at sea?

Lars reproached himself for not acting in Rio. But how could he have done anything without bringing about his own return to the Penal Colony? Certainly a man owed himself some protection.

Shock-haired Ralph knocked on the door and Lars bade him enter. Ralph Norton would have been handsome had he thought more about his personal appearance and less about his dreams. He was younger than Terry—Lars judged about eighteen.

“This is a pretty awful thing,” said Ralph, lying back in the captain’s easy chair and shoving his long legs out before him. “I’ll bet you feel pretty bad about losing your pal, huh?”

Lars thought it better not to answer that.

“The whole ship is in an uproar,” said Ralph. “Nobody had the least idea Paco was a real prince. Aunt Agatha will never get over making him wait upon her. Think of it! A real prince all the time. The girls feel pretty silly and pretty sad over the way they talked about wanting to meet princes when they had one right there.”

“Ever think that might be a fake?” said Lars.

“A fake!” cried Ralph. “Why should it be a fake? Good God, the man wouldn’t own up to it until he was dying, would he? And a man on his deathbed wouldn’t tell a lie. There’d be no point in it.”

“That is what is worrying me,” said Lars.

“What?”

“Nothing. I suppose Terry will radio the news this afternoon.”

“She can’t,” said Ralph. “Those documents are a sacred trust. She isn’t supposed to let anybody know about it until those letters he wrote have been placed in the right hands. Terry keeps her word. You don’t seem very excited about it.”

Lars speared a potato with his fork and ate it.

“Wasn’t he your best friend?” persisted Ralph. “He said he was.”

“Sure,” said Lars. “My very best friend.”

Ralph missed the irony. “I get it. You’re taking it big. Sure you would. A fellow like you who’s been all around wouldn’t break down or get excited. Say, this ship is sure getting its share of dead men. First Simpson and then Paco. Wonder who’ll be next? These things run in threes, you know.”

“Do they?” said Lars.

“Sure. Everything I read says they do. Railroad wrecks and drownings and things. Of course there’ll be three.”

Ralph found it very unsatisfactory to try to talk to this big blond fellow who had come into the Norton employ. For the space of a minute he scrutinized Lars. Here was a man, thought Ralph, who had seen things and been places. He was toughened and could be expected to put up a mean fight against anything from a lion to a pirate crew. He ended up by respecting Lars’ reticence. Ralph got up.

“Gee, I sure wish you’d told us Paco was a prince, Skipper. You’d have saved the ladies a lot of worry about the things they didn’t do. Well, see you later.”

He did not get out of the door. Kenneth charged through the opening and collided with him. Kenneth was too excited to launch into any preliminaries. He threw his news into the room as though it were a hand grenade.

“He’s alive! A couple sailors just went in to dress him up before we made port and they found his heart was still beating! Now what the hell do you know about that!”

Lars put down his fork and looked at the racked riot guns. The keys were sharp against his thigh.

“Paco’s alive?” cried Ralph excitedly, as he came up recovering from the collision. “Gee whiz, lemme see him!”

Kenneth was already on his way out. He was babbling to Ralph, “His pulse was clear stopped last night. I felt it myself! And now he’s breathing and he’s got some color in his cheeks. Good God, Ralph, do you realize we’ve got a real, live prince aboard the
Valiant
?”

Lars went over to his desk and sat down. He opened a series of drawers until he found the cartridges which fitted the guns. He checked them and then locked them up. He examined his .38 and found it in good order. He slid it into his waistband and smoothed his crisp white jacket over the bulge it made.

He went to the racks and made certain that he had the right keys. He locked them securely and then placed his keys in the pocket nearest his .38.

He went back to his desk and sat down facing the door, cap pulled down hard, mouth tight with anger.

“Damn him,” said Lars venomously. “I might have known. Arabian
benj
! He dared take the risk of dying from it just to slow down his black heart. God knows what he’ll do with this new power.”

CHAPTER SIX

Unlucky Latitude

A
LL
day the glass had been falling. The sea calmed until it was a stiffly bending sheet of gray iron. The only wind which stirred was that made by the
Valiant,
and this wind was a sluggish thing as though the ship struggled through a vast area of invisible glue.

From horizon to ominous horizon, no cloud stood alone, but the blue had become discolored until it was no color at all. And millimeter by millimeter, the glass continued its inexorable course down past the false markings of “Storm.”

There was no storm here. Only a vast, crouching space of quiet sea and unmarked sky. But there would be a storm. Lars Marlin could feel it as certainly as he could feel the slow roll of the deck beneath his solidly planted feet.

Johnson, corpulent and common, came at eight bells in the afternoon to relieve Lars. He looked at the chart which lay with stubbornly curled edges upon the charting table and placed a pudgy finger near the cross which Lars had just made.

“South latitude thirteen,” said Johnson, as near as he ever came to a joke. “We won’t find any luck around here. God, I can’t even breathe it’s so hot.”

“When the first blast hits, I’ll be on the bridge. If I’m not, call me.”

There was something in Lars’ granitelike expression and something in his voice which caused Johnson to salute and say no more.

Lars stepped out of the chart room and into the
bridge wing
. He stared out over the immense sameness of wind and water which blended into a sullen murk. His undershirt, beneath his stiffly starched exterior, was pasted hotly to his lean ribs.

He was waiting for something, he seemed to know that the something was coming. Inactivity had worn his nerves paper-thin and even his great stolid calm was on the verge of cracking.

He would welcome the coming violence of this blow. But now the sea was dead and the air was too thick to breathe.

He heard footsteps coming up to the bridge, careless, confident steps. He turned and saw Paco rise in sections to the level of the bridge deck.

Paco was grinning. He had changed subtly. There was less of furtiveness about him, more of command. He was dressed to his part as Prince of Spain. He wore Kenneth’s clothes and looked better in them than Kenneth’s spinelessness ever could. Rakish yachting cap, silk shirt, muffler of silk with small figured anchors of blue in it, correct trousers and spotless shoes. The whiteness of his attire set off the swarthiness of his features.

Lars stood solidly and watched Paco approach, face impassive but thoughts all focused on Paco’s heart. The blue patch pocket made an excellent target.

“Well, am I good or am I good?” said Paco. He came to a halt, lit a monogrammed cigarette and flipped the match down into the dead sea. He faced Lars, grin widening. “For two days I’ve raised hell about them opening those letters before they were sure I’d passed to the Great Beyond and now I got them eating out of my hand. Did I tell you I was a genius?”

Lars looked his contempt.

“Don’t you believe it even yet?” said Paco in mock surprise. “Why, Lars, that’s ungrateful of you. After all I’ve done! And you know, of course, that I’ll see you get entirely free of French officers. Oh, yes, of course, Lars. And haven’t I built you up to Terry?”

“It’s
Terry
now, is it?” said Lars.

“Sure,” said Paco. “She fell for this prince gag like a ton of bricks. I’m on easy street. As soon as she carries out my orders—”

“Your orders? Are you ordering this ship now, too?”

“Certainly I am!”

“And where are we going?”

Paco grinned. “You’ll know soon enough. Terry and the rest are ‘thrilled to death’ about it. Quite an adventure for them.”

“You’ve still got me on the bridge, Paco.”

“Is that a threat?” smiled Paco. “I think you’ll go along with me—unless you want to land back in the swamps. It’ll be Madame Guillotine next time. And by the way, Lars, it’s not Paco now. After this, address me as ‘Your Highness.’ I think I shall have to require that of you.”

Lars clenched his fist and Paco saw it without any change of countenance.

“I wouldn’t,” said Paco.

“You’re taking this yacht to do your dirty business for you?” said Lars.

“Of course. I might add, Lars, that you would be wise to follow orders. Everything and everybody is on my side now. Even you!” He laughed amusedly at this and turned and went down the ladder and out of sight.

Lars looked back at the sea again. The keys to the gun racks were hard and sharp against his thigh. But he knew too well that any move he made would result in his sacrificing his own life.

He stood there for an hour, though he knew he was off watch and would need a short sleep to take his night trick. And at the end of that hour his reverie was cut short by a white swirl of skirt to his right. He had not heard Terry Norton approach.

He whirled about, startled for an instant. Then he saluted gravely. And then he saw something in her expression which alarmed him a little. She was very cold and formal—and could that be distrust in her beautiful face?

“Yes, ma’am?” said Lars.

“I have orders for you, Captain Lowenskold. Since discovering the real identity of Prince Enríque, we have made a change of plans. As we are a yacht we can enter ports at random.”

Lars hesitated. He knew this was far from the right time to tell her anything but he thought that if he could give her some slight warning . . .

“Miss Norton, are you sure about Paco?”

Her tones were ice. “You mean His Highness?”

“I mean Paco Corvino. Miss Norton, I’ve got a hunch—”

“Are you, by any chance, trying to discredit him after seeing those certificates? Really, Captain Lowenskold, His Highness was right.”

“About what?” demanded Lars.

“About you. I think it only right to tell you that he has discovered some things about you which are not very flattering to your character, and if he had known them he never would have recommended you as captain after poor Simpson’s death. If you are trying to undermine my faith in His Highness, save yourself the breath. I came to give you orders.”

The way she said that cut Lars deeply, gave him clearly to understand the fact that he was presuming when he considered himself higher than a butler aboard the
Valiant.

“As you can navigate and as you are the only man with a master’s license here, and as Johnson long ago refused command because he neither wants it nor has a ticket, you shall remain in your present status. However, any false step will bring your downfall with great quickness.”

Stiffly, shivering with rage, his face white, Lars said, “You came with orders.”

“Yes. You are to proceed to
Cayenne
.”

“Where?”

“Cayenne, French Guiana.”

“But, Miss Norton—”

“Are you going to obey my orders?”

Lars saw the futility of trying to interfere and the question blazed like lightning through his brain. What devilish scheme had Paco thought up? Why did Paco, ex-convict, want to place himself in the jaws of the Penal Colony once more?

“Are you going to obey?” said Miss Norton commandingly.

Lars turned on his heel, jaw set, eyes stubborn.

He entered the chart room.

“Mr. Johnson. We are changing our course for Cayenne. What is our position?”

“Latitude thirteen, sir. You saw it yourself an hour ago.”

“Yes,” said Lars in a voice as dead as the calm. “I saw it myself.”

He picked up the dividers and stood looking at the widely spread chart and then, with a vicious snap of his hand, he speared the dot which was Cayenne. The dividers stuck there, quivering.