Dangerous Cargo (6 page)

Finally they went. Watching from the window, we saw them board a launch at
the quayside, and followed it with our eyes until it deposited them at the
ladder of the
Orizaba
. We could distinguish Adele’s pink dress
climbing the ladder. The two of them were swallowed up on deck. The launch
started back.

“Thank God that’s accomplished!” I cried.

Mme. Storey smiled dryly. “Unstable as water!” she said. “Such people
won’t stay put. We’d better stick around a while to make sure they don’t come
ashore again.”

“Let’s stay on in this hotel,” I urged. “You’ve done your job. You’ve
saved Horace Laghet. Don’t go back to that horrible yacht!”

“Harry Holder’s only a tool,” she said. “There may be a dozen such willing
tools aboard the yacht. We haven’t yet found the intelligence that directs
them.”

“Don’t go back!” I persisted. “The dice are loaded. You cannot win!”

“Maybe not,” she said soberly. “But I can’t throw up a job
half-finished…However, I don’t want to force you to anything against your
judgment. You can sail on the
Orizaba
, too.”

“You know I’m not going to leave you,” I muttered.

And so the subject was dropped.

The sun went down about six o’clock, and the tropical night descended
swiftly. We left the hotel and walked along the quay watching the animated
scene. Never in my life have I seen such a mixture of races. They speak an
uncouth dialect called papiemento, which appears to be a mixture of half the
languages on earth.

Presently we discovered that we were being followed by a sailor from the
Buccaneer
. He was making no effort to conceal himself, and it seemed
as if he wanted to speak to us. So we sat down at a sidewalk café to give him
the chance.

He came sidling up to our table with a sheepish look like a schoolboy. It
was a good-looking young fellow whom we had seen about the decks of the
Buccaneer
, but had never had any speech with. His name was Wanzer.

“I’ve deserted,” he said out of the corner of his mouth. “Can’t stick that
hell-hole!”

“Well!” said Mme. Storey, running up her eyebrows. “Why confide in
me?”

“Thought maybe you’d stake me to a suit of clothes,” he muttered. He
looked down at his smart white ducks. “How can I make a getaway in a fancy
rig like this?”

“What do you mean, hell-hole?” she asked.

“I’d tell you,” he said, “if I was only sure of getting clear. They’d kill
me if they found out I’d told anything. There’s dirty work on board. I don’t
want to have nothing to do with it…I’ll tell you everything if you’ll
protect me.”

“That’s a fair offer,” she said. “I’ll take you up.”

“Not here,” he said, glancing nervously around. “The bunch has gone off to
the ship. When they find that I’m missing they’ll send ashore to look for me.
I got to get under cover.”

“Well, let me see…” she began.

She got no further. “Oh, God! here comes the old man now!” said Wanzer in
a terror-stricken voice. And like a shadow he had slipped inside the
café.

In a moment or two Captain Grober, very stiff and seamanlike, came
sauntering by. At sight of us he clicked his heels together in the German
fashion and bowed from the waist. His handsome face was as expressionless as
a plaster wall.

“At your service, ladies,” he said. “I look for two missing seamen; name
of Johnson; name of Wanzer. Have you seen any of our white-suit sailors
during the past half-hour?”

“Why, no,” said Mme. Storey innocently. “Do you suppose they have run
off?”

The captain shrugged. “Who can tell?”

“But after only six days at sea with good food and good pay, why should
they become dissatisfied?”

“They are American seamen,” he said; “they expect to be treated like
royalty. It is not so with Germans.”

“How can you expect to find them single-handed?” she asked.

“My boat’s crew is searching through the town,” he said. “If they have
been hidden by others, of course, we shall not find them. There is no time to
make a house-to-house search. Fortunately, the yacht is fully manned. They
will be no great loss.”

“I am afraid you’re not very happy aboard the
Buccaneer
, Captain,”
she said, just to see what kind of an answer she’d get.

He looked at her sharply as if he was about to make a confidence; but he
thought better of it, and ended with a shrug. “It is a fine ship,” he said;
“the pay is very good. What more can a seaman ask?”

“Won’t you sit down and have a drink?” she asked.

He bowed again. “I thank you. I must get on with my search…The last boat
will leave at eight-thirty, madame.”

“We’ll be there,” said Mme. Storey. “We are dining ashore.”

He backed away, still bowing, and went on down the quay. When he had
passed out of sight we finished our drinks and went inside the café. It was a
humble place, and the rough customers gaped at the brilliant apparition of
Mme Storey. She addressed herself to the proprietor, a burly Dutchman.

“The sailor in the white suit who came in just now. Where is he?”

He pointed impassively to an open door leading to a yard in the rear. “I
not know, my lady. He run through.”

While we stood there wondering what to do, a small, ragged boy with a
café au lait
complexion pulled timidly at Mme. Storey’s skirt. He was
offering her a scrap of paper on which was scribbled in pencil:—

“I’ll wait for you at Feng Lee’s restaurant. He gives sailors a hideout.
W.”

“Where is Feng Lee’s restaurant?” Mme. Storey asked the stolid
Dutchman.

He pointed through the door and across the big canal. “Scharlo.”

“Is it a respectable place?”

“Very nice. Very nice.”

Outside we picked up a dilapidated car that was waiting for hire. The
driver knew all about Feng Lee’s. “Very nice. Very nice,” he said in his
turn. We rattled over the pontoon bridge, turned to the left along the quay
on the other side; crossed a shorter bridge over an inlet, turned to the
right and stopped. It was not far.

Mme. Storey made a sharp survey of the place before getting out of the
car. While it was not Pierre’s or Marguery’s it had the look of a popular
restaurant. In the West Indies the Chinese restaurants are generally the
best. It was wide open to the street, and brilliantly lighted inside. It was
too early for dinner, but there were already several people at the tables.
Plenty of people passing to and fro outside. In short, nothing to arouse
suspicion.

My employer paid off the chauffeur and we went in and sat down. Each small
table had a red-shaded lamp on it and a few limp paper flowers in a holder.
Around the walls hung red banners engrossed with Chinese characters. In one
corner an immense phonograph was braying forth: “Lazy-bones.” Just like
home.

A smiling Chinese boy came to take our order. They are an engaging race,
but inscrutable. Mme. Storey asked for Feng Lee, and the boy went back and
fetched the proprietor from the kitchen. This was a tall, portly Chinaman in
native costume; very dignified and wearing the beaming Oriental smile that
may mean anything or nothing. He bowed and awaited our commands.

“The sailor in the white suit said I should find him here,” said Mme.
Storey.

“He is waiting in the kitchen,” said Feng Lee in perfect English. He
glanced at the other diners and lowered his voice. “Would you mind stepping
out there? The sailor does not want to show himself.”

There seemed to be no reason why we should refuse. We went through a
perfectly ordinary swing door into an ordinary kitchen: range, carving table,
sink, racks of dishes. Dinner was in full course of preparation. There were a
number of Chinese standing about: cooks, waiters, dishwashers, all of whom
turned smiling faces at our entrance. I didn’t see Wanzer.

While I was looking at the smiling Chinamen, their smiles changed
horribly.
They were all looking at something beyond me
. My blood
froze. Before I could act, something thick, soft and all-enveloping was
thrown over my head and drawn tight. A hand thrust the stuff into my mouth
and I could make no sound. Nor did I hear a sound from Mme. Storey beside me.
A rope was hastily thrown around my body, pinning my arms fast. Several hands
picked me up and ran me through a door, across the dirt-paved court, through
another door which rolled heavily to behind me, and through a third door
which was unlocked with a creaking key.

Inside I was dropped on a board floor. I heard the fall of another body
near me. An immensely heavy wooden door thudded to with a dull sound and the
key creaked in the lock. Then silence, except for the soft lapping of water
somewhere beneath me.

IN their haste the Chinamen had not made a very good job of
tying me up. I found I could move my arms a little. By rolling on the floor
and twisting my arms I succeeded gradually in working the ropes up to my
elbows. That freed my forearms, and the rest was easy. When I sat up clear of
the ropes and the suffocating quilt, a voice near me asked:

“Are you all right, Bella?”

The quiet tones put new heart into me. I schooled my voice to answer as
steadily as she had asked: “All right!” Upon putting out my hand I found that
she too had freed herself. Wherever we were it was black as the pit.

Mme. Storey wasted no time in lamentations. “Let’s figure this out,” she
said. “When we drove across the bridge over the inlet we turned into a street
on our right. Feng Lee’s joint was on the right-hand side of that street. We
were carried out through the back of his premises. Therefore this must be his
go-down on the shore of the inlet. Hence the sound of lapping water.”

Meanwhile, I had started to explore our prison on hands and knees, feeling
before me as I went.

“Wait a minute,” she said. “I’ll show a light.”

She had been seized so quickly that the rope had caught her little handbag
under her arm, and she still had it. I heard her tapping a cigarette. She got
her lighter and struck it. The little flame revealed her quiet face almost
smiling, you would have said. She drew on the cigarette and held the lighter
aloft so we could see.

A small chamber, perhaps ten by ten and eight feet high, all tightly
sealed in with smooth, matched boards. The walls gave back a dull sound when
rapped with the knuckles; double walls insulated with some sound-deadening
material. The door was so snugly fitted that we had some difficulty in
finding it. The keyhole did not come through to our side.

“About eight hundred cubic feet of air,” I said casually. “How long will
that last for two?”

“The oxygen will be gone before morning,” said Mme. Storey, “but, of
course, we can drag on for a while after that.” She dropped her cigarette and
trod out the spark. “No use feeding our oxygen to the gasper.”

Apart from the door, there was nothing to break the smooth walls of our
cell except a big hook depending from the middle of the ceiling. Mme. Storey
took a good look at it, and shut off the tiny light. “We must hoard the
juice,” she said.

She continued her deliberations in the dark. “Do you recognise that smell,
Bella?”

I took a sniff of the faint, acrid odour that filled the place, and said
at a venture: “Poppies.”

“Right. Call it opium. Feng Lee must deal in it in a big way, and this
will be his store-room. What’s the hook for? Well, if there’s water
underneath, it would be natural to float a boat under and bring the stuff up
through a hole in the floor. The hook is to support the tackle. If my
reasoning is correct, there’s a trapdoor under the hook, Bella.”

“The floor is perfectly smooth,” I objected.

“Let’s look.”

With the aid of the light we succeeded in outlining the trap in the floor,
but it was so snugly fitted there seemed to be no possibility of raising it.
We clawed at it in vain.

“Save your finger-nails,” said Mme. Storey. “Let me try to dope this thing
out. There must be some way of raising it.”

“Maybe they push it up from below,” I suggested.

“Never! That would make it too easy for Feng Lee’s rivals to come and rob
his secret store.”

With her sensitive fingers she patiently tested each short length of plank
in the trap-door. We saved the light. Suddenly she said: “This piece is not
nailed, though it is set in tight.”

She got a nail-file out of her bag and set to work to prise it under the
end of the board. It was a tedious job. In the end, when we were not
expecting it; the loose board suddenly sprang up. We hastily lit the light
and saw beneath the false flooring a heavy iron ring for raising the trap,
and two bolts driven into the side beams to prevent it from being shoved up
from below.

We drew back the bolts, and thrusting the loose piece of board through the
ring, stood one on each side of the trap, and raised it between us. We let it
thud back on the floor. Having no hinges, it came away clear. We dropped on
our stomachs and held the little light down in the hole. A puff of wind blew
it out, but we saw the sulky gleam of water eight or ten feet below.

“At any rate, we won’t suffocate now,” remarked Mme. Storey dryly.

The trap-door was oblong in shape. Without saying anything further, she
shoved it around until the wide side was athwart the hole in the floor. Then
she tied together the ropes that had bound us, and tied one end to the iron
ring. My heart sank when I saw what she was up to. It was not sharks that I
feared, but a smaller and deadlier creature. All I said was:

“Barracuda.”

“Oh, the barracuda is a sporting fish,” she said lightly. “He’s no wharf
rat.”

I wasn’t so sure of that, but it was useless for me to protest; useless to
offer to go in her place.

She tucked her dress around her waist, and lowered herself through the
hole. She slowly sank out of sight. The light had been left to me. I reached
it down through the hole so she could see, shielding it from the draught with
my free hand. Presently her voice came up: