The Slave Market of Mucar (8 page)

He waited until the pipe was drawing properly before he continued.

"He's up there, now-undercover, of course. I should hear from him any minute. Let's hope he has something to report."

A few minutes later the phone rang. The colonel picked it up with a quiet smile of triumph.

It was the main switchboard operator of H.Q.

"There's a message coming over the shortwave, sir," he said. "I'll switch it straight through to you. Urgent and confidential."

"Right!" the colonel said. His face had come alive and he breathed deeply. He had all the instincts of the hunter, Ricketts thought, as the colonel opened the cupboard at the front of the desk and took out the special shortwave radio phone.

"Weeks speaking," he said crisply. "You didn't waste much time, evidently."

Ricketts could clearly hear Slingsby's voice, coming over the miles of space which separated them.

"Ten men, sir. From a common cell. All of them disappeared without a trace."

Weeks swore.

"I thought you would have some good news," he said.

"Sorry, sir," Slingsby said. "I'm doing my best."

"Never mind," Weeks said in a more placatory tone. "I'm never at my best at three in the morning."

"None of the men have been recaptured, sir," Slingsby said. "It must have been an inside job."

"Right," said Weeks. "Do what you can. And keep in touch."

He put the phone back in the cradle inside the cupboard and relocked the door. He leaned back in his chair again. Then he stood up abruptly.

"I'm going to change, Tim," he said. "Ring for my car. You and I are going to Masara Prison. Let's see how the warden explains this!"

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Warden Saldan was in his private bedroom in the administration block at Masara when the doorbell rang.

Throwing on his dressing gown, he hurried to open the door. It was Larsen.

"It's worse than we thought, sir," he said without ceremony.

"What do you mean?" said Saldan harshly.

He sat down on the edge of his bed and motioned to the chief officer to sit in an easy chair opposite him.

"You know you asked me to keep an eye on Slingsby?" the latter went on.

"I ought to, seeing that our conversation was less than an hour ago," Saldan said tartly. "Spit it out."

"You won't like it," Larsen said, acid creeping into his voice in return. "I went back to the cell after your warning. The door was open."

The warden was about to put his pajama-clad legs up into the bed, but he dropped them back on the floor with a thump at his colleague's remark.

"Go on," he said quietly.

"I crept up until I could see Slingsby," Larsen went on. "He was examining Zadok's cell inch by inch. I watched him for a while. Then he seemed to make up his mind about something. He got out a miniature radio-telephone outfit. I heard him speak to Colonel Weeks at Jungle Patrol Headquarters. He told him about the break and he said it must have been an inside job!"

Larsen expected the big man on the bed opposite him to go through the ceiling, but he was surprised at his reaction. His only sign of emotion was to put the knuckles of his big hands together and knead them as though he had an enemy's throat between them. His knuckles showed white with the strain.

"An undercover man," he said softly. "Just what we supposed might happen."

He relaxed and, to the astonishment of Larsen, a smile started spreading across his face. Even his white sear didn't look as sinister as usual.

"They outsmarted themselves, Larsen," he said. "This is just what we needed to get the Jungle Patrol off our backs. For good!"

The Phantom was sitting at the top of the cliffs near the prison. It was an hour before dawn. He rested on a small ledge, with Devil at his side. The wolf was silent, gazing downward at his master's shoulder, occasionally turning to give a somewhat puzzled look at the big man, but making no sound. He was too well trained for that. The Phantom's vantage point was a good one. The thin screen of bushes and long grass concealed him from below and he could not be seen from above because of the overhang in the cliff face. But he could see down on to the beach, particularly where the waves met the shore. That was where things were happening at the moment.

Guards were still trudging aimlessly up and down the shore. Now and again, one of the big dogs would give a whimpering cry and try to strain away from its handler into the surf.

A guard came running up and met two more almost below the Phantom. He could hear every word in the quiet night.

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"No sign of those guys in the swamp," the solitary guard said. The taller of the other two grunted.

"The dog must have picked up the scent of a crab," he said. "Not the prisoners. Anyway, handcuffed men couldn't swim out into that. Let's go."

The trio turned away along the beach as faint streaks tinted the eastern sky. The Phantom's strong, calm face was alive with his thoughts. He stroked his chin, and glanced at Devil.

"They could swim out, if a boat was waiting for them, old boy," he told the wolf, giving it an affectionate scratch behind the ear. Devil yawned and looked up at his master as though he agreed.

A moment later the Phantom flattened himself to the ground. He had heard the faint whine of a jeep coming up the cliff-top road above. Then he moved fast, Devil at his heels. Presently he came out on top of an S-shaped bend, overlooking the road about a hundred feet below. All the guards had gone now. He waited three minutes and then the jeep rocketed out of the first bend below. The Phantom had the tiny but powerful pair of night glasses at his eyes, focusing the eyepieces. He only had a few seconds, just enough to make out the white letters JUNGLE PATROL stenciled on the side of the jeep. He grinned.

"That got Weeks out of bed," he told himself.

He worked his way down to the base of the cliff. All was silent now except for the faint splash of the surf on the sand. The light was slowly strengthening, but the mist had gone. Devil followed on behind, cautiously sniffing the air. The Phantom would rely on him to give early warning of any impending danger.

Disentangling the guards' footprints from the mass of marks made by men and dogs in the soft sand, the Phantom worked his way patiently round the bay.

Presently, he passed another headland, a place where apparently the guards hadn't been. The tide sucked sullenly round slime-encrusted rocks. It was an evil place and the phantom had to wade waist-deep in the water, while Devil swam behind him. After a few minutes of this, the Phantom found himself in a tiny cove, almost entirely shut off from the sky by dark, menacing rocks. The sand looked almost black here in the dim light, but the big man could see a muddled trail made by men's boots coming down from a thin rift in the cliff face. They led to the water's edge and were then erased by the swirl of the incoming tide.

"A gang of men, Devil," the Phantom told the wolf. "Question is, how did they break out and get here?"

He looked out to where a faint, thin mist lingered to seaward. The slap of the sea on this hostile shore sounded cold and lonely.

"Handcuffed men couldn't swim in that sea," said the Phantom to the dim shoreline. "A boat was waiting to take them away. But where?"

He retraced his steps up the draw toward the crack in the cliff face.

"If we can't thud where they've gone, let's find out where they came from," he told Devil. The big wolf's yellow eye's flashed in the gloom as he followed the Phantom up the trail. A few moments more and they had arrived at a barrier of tall grasses growing out of the base of the cliff. Parting the fronds and branches, the Phantom found the entrance of a deep cave.

They went on in. It was only about four feet high so the Phantom let Devil walk a yard in front, while he followed behind on hands and knees.

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"Not a natural tunnel, but man-made," he mused. "This may be it."

They went on for several hundred yards; it was inky black, but occasionally the Phantom's pencil flashlight illuminated the way ahead. The tunnel seemed to stretch on forever. Presently, as its direction curved a little to the right, the big man sensed that it was taking them under the prison walls. A few minutes later, the flash showed him that the place was a cul-de-sac. The tunnel ended in a solid wall of masonry-but it was masonry with a difference. On the bottom center slab was a large metal handle let into the surface of the stone.

"Well, Devil," the Phantom said. "This looks like it. Let's push and see what happens."

He seized the handle in both powerful hands and eased the great slab forward; when it had gone a foot or so a sliver of light came through. The Phantom enlarged the space by cautious maneuvering until he could see in. When he was satisfied that there was no-one about he crawled through.

"The common cell!" he told Devil. "This is how they did it!"

The big wolf licked his jaws with a pink tongue. His white teeth showed in the gloom of the tunnel.

"You'd better stay there, Devil," the Phantom said. "I shan't need you just yet."

He slid the masonry back in Devil's disappointed face and made sure the stone made a perfect joint with its fellows. Faint noises came down the prison corridor but no one was in sight at all. The Phantom stood in deep thought beside the wall. There were faint scratches on the floor where the stone must have been levered to and fro many times over the years. It did not seem possible that the authorities could have overlooked such an obvious escape route, unless they were incredibly slack. That was a remote possibility, but there was more likely some other sinister reason behind it, the big man felt. He obviously should tell the warden of his discovery at once.

The Phantom spun round as a rough voice sounded through the gallery.

"Hey, you!"

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CHAPTER 7

COLONEL WEEKS IS BAFFLED

The Phantom hurled himself beneath the cover of a bunk and crouched down, wondering where the shout had come from. He could have sworn he hadn't been seen. There came the sound of footsteps hurrying along outside the bars.

"The warden wants you, Slingsby!" said Larsen's voice. "And don't be long about it, He doesn't like to be kept waiting!"

The Phantom recognized the young Jungle Patrol man as he went hurrying by the cell. He relaxed then and got in closer to the wall. He put the pistol back into the holster in his belt.

Colonel Weeks's face was set like a rock as he strode into Saldan's office. The warden was dressed by now and sat blandly behind his desk, a red bow tie crouching like a butterfly beneath his thick jowl.

"Yesterday, I sent men over to suggest tighter security," the colonel said, when perfunctory introductions had been effected. "Now, yet another jailbreak!"

Saldan's eyes looked unflinchingly at the colonel, but his tone was mild as he replied.

"We regret it as much as you do, Colonel."

"Regrets aren't enough," snapped Weeks. "Before I go to the governor, any ideas about this break, Warden?"

Saldan smiled a curious smile. "Maybe," he said, his fingers touching a buzzer on his desk.

The door opened to disclose in the opening a big guard named Mattock and another, younger man whom Weeks and Ricketts recognized at once as Slingsby.

"You sent for us, Warden," said Mattock. He had insincere, piggy eyes which blinked above his Che Guevara mustache.

"Yes!" snapped Saldan. "Jungle Patrol's interested in our break. Where were you guards at the time?"

He spread out his hand in introduction.

"This is Colonel Weeks. Or perhaps you've met?"

He glanced ironically at the Jungle Patrol chief as he spoke, but the colonel's face was impassive.

"No, sir," said Slingsby, facing toward Saldan. "I was in the cellblock."

"That's a lie!" snapped Mattock unexpectedly. "Sir, I saw him hanging around the common cell just before the break."

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"You're quite wrong," Slingsby protested, turning toward the big guard. "I was in my room at the time of the break."

"Alone in your room, eh," said Saldan, his face flushing with rage. "Search him!"

"For what?" protested Slingsby, as Mattock grasped him by the shoulder. He dared not look at Colonel Weeks, who remained silent at his own side of the room.

"Maybe this!" said Mattock grimly. "Looks like our pass key!" His hand had come out of Slingsby's uniform pocket with the thick metal key.

"I never saw that in my life!" protested Slingsby, shooting a glance at the colonel for the first time.

Colonel Weeks thought things had gone far enough. "Now just a minute," he told Warden Saldan. "This guard happens to be Jungle Patrolman Slingsby, so he can't be responsible for your jailbreak!"

Saldan's eyes looked icily at the colonel as he got to his feet. "What is a Jungle Patrolman doing in my prison?"

"I sent him on a mission," said the colonel.

Saldan was pounding on his desk at this point. Veins stood out angrily on his neck.