Dangerous Cargo (5 page)

“To hell with it! Do you want to drive me crazy?”

“I won’t go.”

“You’ve got to go!”

A thin hard note crept into Adele’s voice. “I won’t go. And you can’t make
me! This is our one chance to make a stake. If I passed it up, you would be
the first one to blame me when we went broke again. We’ve got to have money.
How are we going to live?”

There was a silence, then the man’s voice, humbled, indicating that he had
given in. “But you do care for me, don’t you?”

“You know I do!”

“All right,” he said. “If you’ll just let me see you once in a while, I’ll
keep quiet.”

“How can I do that?” mourned Adele. “Think of the risk! Oh, God! this is
awful!”

I stole away back up the stairs. I could not tell how suddenly this scene
might end. If the door opened there I was. Anyhow, I had learned the nature
of the situation. That was enough for the moment, I returned to the
winter-garden. The noisy game—or another game—was still in
progress. I let Mme. Storey know that I wanted to speak to her privately.
When she was able to get away we went down to the promenade deck. On the
stairway we met Adele coming up. She had brightened up her complexions and
passed us with a sweet insincere smile.

Out on deck as soon as I started to tell Mme. Storey what I had overheard,
she said:

“Come on; let’s try to intercept him on the way back to his quarters.”

Forward of the promenade deck and below it, there was a space between the
owner’s part of the ship and the fo’c’sle that they called the well deck.
There was a ladder leading down from the promenade. We descended it, and
waited at the foot while I told the rest of my tale. There was nobody
around.

A door opened aft, and our sailor came out of it. He was passing us
without paying any attention when Mme. Storey said softly:

“Holder!”

He jumped as if he had received a stab, and turned a terrified face. He
tried to recover himself but it was too late.

“Were you speaking to me?”

“No use trying to bluff it out,” said Mme. Storey. “Your talk with your
wife just now was overheard.”

“Spying!” he snarled.

She ignored it. “You and I have got to have a little talk.”

“You’ve got nothing to do with me!”

“If you act ugly,” she said coldly, “I shall have to tell Horace Laghet
that you are aboard this vessel. You can figure out what that will mean.”

He said nothing. His chin went down. I could hear him breathing fast.

“I don’t want to be a party to a killing,” she went on. “You’d better come
to my suite and talk things over.”

“Not allowed in that part of the vessel,” he growled.

“You have just come from there. If you are with me nobody will question
it.”

He shrugged and followed us. It was after midnight, and we met nobody in
the corridor. At a sign from my employer I locked the door of our
sitting-room after we had passed in. She said:

“Put up your hands!”

He stared at her open-mouthed, and did not obey until he saw that she had
taken a small automatic from the drawer of the table and was playing with it.
Then his hands went up fast enough.

“Search him, Bella.”

I took a gun from his hip-pocket. It was the only weapon he had on him. I
handed it to Mme. Storey and she threw both guns in the drawer and closed
it.

“You’re better off without it,” she said, smiling. “Sit down and relax.
Smoke a cigarette. I am not your enemy. In fact, I’m sorry for you, though
you appear to have got yourself into this mess. Well, we usually do.”

He sat down staring at her sullenly. He couldn’t make her out at all. He
lit a cigarette in trembling fingers. One could see the promising boy he had
been with his nice eyes, and thick wavy hair brushed straight back. Probably
spoiled by his mother.

“You and Adele are not divorced,” said Mme. Storey.

“No,” he growled.

“Were you living together up to the time she sailed?”

“Off and on.”

“When Adele told you she was going to make this cruise you didn’t
object.”

Holder was silent.

“Then why have you started to kick up a dust now?”

His muttered answer was the same he had given Adele. “I got to
thinking.”

“What started you thinking?”

“Aah! what’s the use of all these questions!” he blurted out.

“Somebody is using you as a tool,” said Mme. Storey calmly, “and I want to
find out who it is.”

This was evidently a new thought to him. He stared at her with distended
eyes, but said nothing.

“Somebody’s been after you,” she suggested. “Got you all stirred up.”

He shook his head. “Nobody ever said anything.”

“Then it was a letter; an anonymous letter. Signed Well-Wisher or
something like that. Good old Well-Wisher!”

“God! How do you know that?” he said, staring.

“I am merely following out a process of deduction,” she said with a shrug.
“This letter asked you as a man and an American if you were willing to stand
for your wife going on a cruise in Horace Laghet’s yacht. It told you what
other men would think of you. It suggested that if you had a spark of
manliness in you, you’d put a stop to it.”

From the frightened look that appeared in his eyes it was evident that she
had hit on the truth, or close to it.

“Such letters always run true to form,” she went on. “It suggested that
you ship aboard the yacht so you could see what went on…”

“That was the second letter,” he muttered, forgetting himself.

“Oh, there were two,” said Mme. Storey. “Sort of follow-up system. I
suppose the second letter told you just where to go, what to say, what name
to give. Told you everything would be made easy for you very likely. Told you
you had friends who wouldn’t see you wronged!”

His hang-dog look confessed that she was right.

“And you fell for it!”

“I was like a crazy man,” he muttered. “I couldn’t help myself.”

“What happened after you got aboard?” she asked.

“Nothing. I was treated like anybody else.”

“Who approached you? What proposition has been made?”

No answer from Holder.

Mme. Storey took the gun out of the drawer and examined it. “You got this
after you came aboard?”

“Well, I found it in my bunk,” he muttered. “There was a box of shells
with it.”

“And you were glad to get it,” she suggested. “You didn’t trouble where it
came from.”

No answer.

“Sooner or later you would have shot Horace Laghet.”

“Well, that’s my business,” he growled.

“You would certainly have shot him that first day when he attacked you if
you’d had the gun then.”

He scowled and twisted in his seat.

“And what would have happened afterwards? You would have gone to the
chair, or at least to prison for life, and somebody would have reaped a
golden harvest from Horace Laghet’s death.”

Holder said nothing.

“What do you propose to do about it?” she asked.

Like a child he took refuge in his stubborn silence.

“Are you willing to put yourself in my hands?”

“What do you want to do?” he asked suspiciously.

“Arrange for your passage from Curaçao back to New York.”

“And leave her with him!” he growled. “I’m only flesh and blood!”

“You’ve got to face realities!” said Mme. Storey. “If you don’t go ashore
to-morrow, and stay ashore, I’ll have to tell Horace Laghet who you are.
That’s my job.”

There was no answer.

“Adele isn’t worth it,” she said softly.

He hung his head.

“You know it,” she murmured compassionately, “but you’re in hell just the
same.”

A spasm of intolerable pain twisted his face. His endurance snapped. “Aah!
What is it to you?” he snarled, jumping up. “You think you have me on the
grill, don’t you? Good sport to sit there and watch a man squirm! I know
women…Well, to hell with you! To hell with you! I won’t leave this vessel
without my wife, and that’s flat!”

Mme. Storey shrugged and spread out her hands.

Holder’s voice scaled up hysterically. “Go ahead and tell Laghet!” he
cried. “Tell him! Tell him! I have plenty of friends aboard. The crew is with
me. They’re men, not dogs. And if Laghet slays a finger on me they’ll mutiny.
Do you know what that means? Mutiny! It will sweep you all overboard! If you
know what’s good for you, you’ll be the one to go ashore to-morrow. I’ve
warned you now! Go ashore and stay ashore, if you ever want to see New York
again.” Shaking and gasping, he turned and rattled the door.

“Let him out,” said Mme. Storey quietly.

I unlocked the door and he ran down the corridor. I turned and faced my
employer.

“You dare not tell Laghet,” I said. “Holder has the whip-hand over us.
What can you do?”

“It appears to be up to Adele,” she said, smiling enigmatically. “I will
go and talk to her.”

ON the following day after lunch the
Buccaneer
cast
anchor off the port of Willemstad in the island of Curaçao. There is a
dangerous current off the mouth of the harbour and as Horace Laghet intended
to remain only long enough to pick up Martin Coade, his secretary, they
didn’t want to take the big yacht inside.

After six days at sea the sight of land was grateful to the eye though it
was but a brown and treeless island. However, the beach was of the whitest,
the sky of the bluest, and the town picturesque enough with its steep-roofed
Dutch houses bordering the quays. In designing those roofs the prudent Dutch
were not taking any chances of a heavy snowfall.

It put Horace in a temper to learn that the liner
Orizaba
which was
bringing Martin Coade from Europe had not yet arrived. “Nothing to see in
this damned hole but oil refineries,” he growled.

Nevertheless the indefatigable Adrian insisted on getting up a shore
party. Horace refused to accompany them, and Mme. Storey begged off on the
pretext of having letters to write. All the others went ashore in the launch.
Adele’s pretty face was drawn and haggard under the careful make-up. She had
put herself into Mme. Storey’s hands the night before, and during the morning
had smuggled a small bag containing some clothes into our cabin.

About the same time another launch set off from the yacht carrying a party
of sailors who had been granted four hours’ shore leave. Harry Holder was
amongst them. Adele had communicated with him.

About an hour later the
Orizaba
hove in sight, and Mme. Storey sent
word on deck asking to be carried ashore. She carried Adele’s little bag.

Horace was on deck, and his eyes narrowed at the sight of the bag. “Are
you leaving us?” he asked, laughing. It had an ugly ring.

“Not yet,” she answered, smiling. “I have a lot of stuff to send in the
mail, and this is the easiest way to carry it.”

He only half believed her, and for a moment I thought she would be obliged
to open her bag like a departing servant. However, she smiled him down.

“Do you want company?” he asked with a hang-dog air.

This was awkward. “Just as you like,” she said calmly. “I shall be pretty
busy at the post and the cable office.”

He turned away sorely. “We sail at nine,” he said.

I breathed again.

The entrance to the great inner harbour of Willemstad is by way of a
mile-long passage like a big canal. The town spreads along both sides of it.
The oddest feature of the place is a pontoon bridge over the canal. The
middle pontoon is equipped with an engine and paddle wheels, and when a
vessel wishes to pass through, the bridge gives a shrill toot and paddles
itself out of the way. I am sure there is not another bridge like it in the
world.

Mme. Storey and I landed on the quay and struck into the narrow streets of
the town, gazing around us like idle sightseers. When we had satisfied
ourselves we were not being watched, we made our way to the principal hotel
and engaged a front room. A noticeboard in the lobby informed us that the
Orizaba
would sail for Panama at 7 p.m.

According to pre-arrangement we were presently joined in our room by
Adele, followed a moment or two later by Harry Holder. The latter had
procured a suit of shore clothes from an outfitter. Apparently a
reconciliation had taken place between the pair. It was almost piteous to see
how hungrily the man’s eyes dwelt on his wife’s beautiful face. Adele was
tense and jumpy.

“Has Horace come ashore?” she asked.

My employer shook her head.

“Oh, what will he say!” murmured Adele.

“It would have been better to have it out with him,” said Mme. Storey
dryly. “Then you could have taken all your clothes.”

“I couldn’t face him!” murmured the girl.

Mme. Storey shrugged. “Where are the others of the party?” she asked.

“They hired an automobile to tour the island. I refused to go because of
the dust. They didn’t suspect I was going to give them the slip. They are
dining at a Chinese restaurant.”

There was little more to say. We sat down watching through the windows.
Holder took Adele’s hand between his, but she jerked it away pettishly. She
was ashamed of him in his common, ill-fitting clothes.

Mme. Storey smoked impassively.

Our windows commanded a view of the sea. We saw the
Orizaba
drop
anchor and immediately become surrounded by a fleet of small boats. Amongst
them we distinguished a launch from the
Buccaneer
. After a while it
returned to the yacht bearing Martin Coade, All we could distinguish at the
distance was that he was accompanied by a small mountain of baggage.

“Martin’s out of the way,” said Mme. Storey. “You’d better go aboard now.
Stay in your cabin until she sails.”

We shook their hands and wished them a pleasant voyage. Mme. Storey had
already given them sufficient money to carry them to New York. They had
shipped on the
Orizaba
as Mr. and Mrs. John Matthews. The man was wild
to get aboard the vessel, but Adele, shaking with terror, held back. Through
the window she searched the quay anxiously before she would venture out.