by Jerry eBooks
Roger Cass gave a start. He made out the vague form of the face behind those eyes, and the small, thin body. “Danton Collins!” he exclaimed.
The girl gasped, “Look where he is!” The spade-bearded little assistant to the girl’s father was almost directly over their heads, clinging to a high cross beam that arched high above this catwalk. Terror was mirrored in his eyes; he was clinging to the support desperately.
Roger Cass noted that there was an open porthole not far from Danton Collins’ head, high up the curving side of the ship’s hull. It must have been through this opening that they had heard the scream from the deck above.
Staring at the cringing man, Cass called out, “How the blazes did you ever get up there?”
For a moment, Collins’ teeth continued to chatter. Then he stammered, “That thing . . . got hold of me . . . knocked me out and . . . and carried me down here. When I came to, I . . . I climbed up here. I don’t know where he is now, but . . . but there is that!”
The last word came out in a sharp cry. Danton Collins, clinging to the beam with one hand, his spindly legs rapped around the support, pointed.
Both Roger and the girl followed his indicating hand. The light ray fell upon the battered, horrible face.
The face of Mark Irwin, protruding from the filthy bilge water, not a dozen feet from their feet!
There was no doubt but that the animal-hunter was quite dead!
ROLLINS cried: “That monster . . . that gorilla must have got him before he sneaked up behind me and knocked me out. I saw that . . . that face there in the water when I came to. Somehow, I . . . I climbed up here.”
They saw Danton’s head sway from side to side, his horror-bleared eyes wide with terror. He appeared to be looking, searching for something. He yelled:
“That thing . . . it’s still here! It must be!”
The girl swayed against Cass. “Roger!” she breathed. “Do you think . . .”
Trying to calm her, his voice steady, he said, “I think it is something far more sinister than that. And it isn’t here.”
Suddenly, she pulled at his arm. She cried, “He’s going to fall!” She indicated Collins, above their heads, a good dozen feet away.
What the girl said was true. Collins was swaying on the beam support. His eyes were half closed, only the whites showing weirdly.
Terror, Cass knew, had done this to the frenzied little man. Terror and fear. He was passing out, falling . . .
Roger yelled hoarsely, “Collins!”
But the man fell.
He cleared their taut forms by not more than four or five feet. He came down in a flat plunge, his back downward. His head struck the iron cat-walk with a sickening thud.
Katherine buried her face against Roger’s chest and gave a violent shudder. Cass stared. Somehow, he thought, little Danton Collins looked very grotesque lying there half across the narrow runway.
Gently, he eased the girl away from him, took a stride forward and bent down. His hands reached out and expertly felt at the base of the man’s skull. Then he was standing up again, moving swiftly back to the girl, leading her back along the way he had come.
“He broke his neck,” Roger said.
He got the sobbing girl out of there. He took her not back to her room, but to the bridge of the ship itself. There they found Captain Briggs still on duty with his first mate and the navigation officer.
Briefly, he reported the deaths to the stocky captain. Then he said, “As soon as Katherine gets hold of herself, I’d like to use your cabin. There’s something I’ve got to talk to her about.”
Briggs nodded. He indicated his quarters just aft of the bridge. “I’ll place a man on guard there,” he offered.
A little later, as Roger Cass led the girl to the privacy of the commander’s quarters, dawn—dark and dismal—was breaking over the distant horizon.
It had started to rain again.
CHAPTER VIII
Death for the Devil
THERE, in the quiet intimacy of the captain’s stateroom, he told Katherine of the thing which he’d kept solely to himself ever since he’d been under suspicion of murder.
He said quietly, “It concerns Steve, my brother.”
She had known Steve, naturally. For he had been there on the expedition, with them. They had looked like twins, these two.
The girl’s slim hand went to her mouth. “But Roger . . . Steve is dead. He died there in the jungle!”
He shook his head. He felt very tired, suddenly. “No, he didn’t die,” said Roger Cass. “That was only a report I helped spread.”
The girl stared.
He continued swiftly, “When Steve got the fever, he acted very peculiarly. He . . . well, he wasn’t quite right. He broke away from camp one day. Later, some of the natives and myself found him, roaming the jungle, out of his head!”
“You mean, the fever did that to him?”
“That . . . and something else,” Roger admitted. “It was Steve who Benedict must have seen leaving Williams’ hut the night Williams was murdered. Benedict thought it was me. Everyone thought Steve had died of fever back there in the jungle, that the natives had buried him there. And so I took the blame, to shield him. There was the hope that he might return to normalcy.”
Katherine continued to stare in wide-eyed wonder.
“Just before I was placed aboard this ship,” he went on, “I bribed some of the natives whom I trusted. They knew where Steve was hiding out. They were to smuggle him aboard, hide him somewhere in the ship. They knew one of the crew who could be bribed. Who, I do not know. But I thought . . .”
“Yes?” the girl prompted breathlessly.
“I thought if this spell of Steve’s could be cured, if I could get him first-class care in New York, he might snap back to normal. I could learn what actually happened there in the camp with Williams. Perhaps he could clear himself!”
For long moments, the girl was very silent. Then she looked at Roger Cass. She said in a voice so low that he could hardly catch the words, “If he was smuggled aboard, and he is . . . insane, do you think that it could be he who—”
She left the sentence unfinished. But he knew what she meant. She referred to these deaths, these horrible deaths that had happened so swiftly and ruthlessly.
Roger paced the cabin silently. His fists were tight knots at his sides. He swung toward the girl and blurted: “Don’t you see, I don’t know. That’s the awful hell of it. I don’t know if he’s even on board!”
He stopped before the girl, trembling, his features strained and grim.
Impulsively, her hands closed tightly on his arm. She said nothing. But her eyes expressed more than words could ever tell.
He turned toward the door. “There’s something I’ve got to do. There’s something else I’ve got to find out.”
What he did was search the ship. He practically covered every rivet in her plates. And found—nothing.
Roger even studied the crew carefully. If one of them had been bribed by the natives, in order to get his brother aboard, he thought perhaps the man would act suspiciously. There would be a furtive manner about him.
But he saw nothing that would give him the slightest idea who the man might be.
THAT afternoon, in the dismal gray rain, they gave Dougherty, the detective, a sea burial. The other two—Mark Irwin and little Danton Collins—they had not yet prepared.
But Dougherty’s big form was wrapped like a mummy in white bunting. No part of him was revealed. With an American flag wrapped around the white cloth, the corpse was carried by members of the crew to the deck. Though they were husky sailors, it seemed that they were having quite a time managing their load.
Roger Cass, standing to one side watching, gave a start as two of the sailors almost dropped their end of the heavy burden. Then the wrapped dead man was placed on a wide plank that had been set, like a see-saw, across the rail.
The skipper read a few words from the Bible. He made a motion with h
is hand. The plank was upended and the corpse shot down into the rolling sea.
Roger turned away from the rail. He was thinking, Dougherty, a pretty decent guy . . .
Captain Briggs came up to him and said, “We’ve got the others in an old electric refrigerator off the galley. We didn’t have time to fix them yet. We prepared Dougherty last night.”
Cass nodded. He was glad that the girl was not here to witness the scene. She was asleep now, in her cabin.
Down deck came the restless chattering of the monkeys. It seemed to remind Captain Briggs of something. He stared at Cass, remarked, “I can’t understand it. We’ve searched everywhere—crew’s quarters, life boats, every part of the ship. There’s no trace of that damned gorilla!”
His pale gray eyes narrowed. “Doc, do you really think that blasted monster killed these . . .”
Suddenly, Roger was tense. There was something he had just noted—
He said, “Wait! How do we get to the galley?”
The skipper indicated a stairway.
“Come on,” snapped Cass.
Puzzled, Captain Briggs followed after him.
Several moments later they reached the galley of the ship. They passed storerooms. Beyond these were a row of refrigerators of the size used in meat markets.
Cass turned to the man with him, demanded, “Which one?”
“Which what?”
“The refrigerator where you left Dougherty all fixed for burial.”
Briggs stared. He stepped forward, opened a heavy door and led the way inside. It was an old refrigerator, with room enough for a man to stand erect inside. The place had been cleared out.
Briggs indicated the empty space. “We had him in here,” he explained.
Strangely, Roger Cass looked disappointed at something.
Outside the box, he paused, asked,
“Are there any other empty refrigerators?”
The captain looked at Cass as though the young man had suddenly gone berserk. Then he turned toward another unit. The refrigerator was the size of the first, but contained several small doors instead of a single large one.
Briggs reached for one of the door handles, explaining, “This box is arranged with sliding shelves.” He gave a wry grin. “Something similar to a morgue storage—”
He had swung open the door, started to pull out one of the long sliding shelves in order to illustrate. And then his weathered features went white with horror.
Dougherty, the big, heavy-set detective, was laid out on the movable shelf!
A FEW moments later, Roger was saying to the ship captain, “The way they staggered—four husky seamen—under the load of that sheeted corpse gave me a hunch. That explains why there was never any attack from that gorilla. He was dead all the while. The real murderer got down here after you had prepared Dougherty, made the switch, and you buried the gorilla in Dougherty’s place!”
Briggs looked like he was going to choke. He stammered, “He . . . the murderer, was afraid we’d find the gorilla’s body?”
Cass nodded.
“But who is the murderer?”
Roger’s steady gray eyes were bright. He gripped the man’s arm, urged him forward. “I have an idea. But first, I want to send a cablegram. A couple of them. If you could rush them through—”
“Sure!” said Briggs, and led the way.
Roger Cass did not sleep while he awaited replies to those cables. He stalked the decks restlessly. The grayness of day gave way to night. It had stopped raining now, but the sky was black and overcast. The ship plowed ahead relentlessly through the rolling seas.
The reply to one of the cables came at ten that night. Roger read it swiftly, his hands trembling. He passed it to the skipper, said, “That gives you some idea.”
The message read:
THE PERSON YOU ASK ABOUT SWINDLED SEVERAL NEW YORK MILLIONAIRES BEFORE LEAVING ON THAT VOYAGE. AS FAR AS WE KNOW, HE IS BROKE. HE WILL PROBABLY TRY ANY SCHEME IN ORDER TO GAIN HIS STATUS. HE BEARS WATCHING.
The cable was from a New York bank president whose word could not be questioned.
Captain Briggs looked at Roger Cass.
“What are you going to do?” he asked.
“First,” Roger explained, “I’ve got to see Katherine. There’s something I asked her to do.” His eyes were thoughtful. “And then there’s something else. As soon as I check on it, I’ll let you know.”
“I’ll be on the bridge,” said the skipper.
Roger nodded, left the radio room, proceeded back toward his own cabin. He passed tall, lanky Professor Owen on the way up.
“Have you seen Captain Briggs?” Owen wanted to know.
Roger told him where he could find the captain, then continued on.
He had just turned down a narrow, dimly lighted passageway when he heard a cabin door open, very quietly, it seemed.
ROGER drew back, pressed against I the wall. Some distance ahead he saw a figure emerge from the cabin and move quietly down the passage. It was too shadowy here to make out who the person was; besides, he quickly disappeared in the opposite direction.
But Roger Cass noted the doorway through which the man had stepped. He moved that way silently, stood listening outside the panel a moment.
He heard no sound from within the stateroom. Then his sensitive fingers were gripping the doorknob. He released the latch soundlessly, eased inside the room. The place was in darkness, the shutters drawn across the windows. He listened. He heard the distinct sound of someone in bed, asleep. The breathing was regular and steady.
This was Clark Benedict’s room.
Stealthily, Roger Cass headed across the room. He found the door leading to the bath. He went inside, closed the door quietly behind him, switched on a light. He had to work fast . . .
He found a small bottle that was in the medicine closet, put it in his pocket, turned off the light and carefully opened the door to the bedroom again.
The steady breathing sounds were still coming from the bed.
Cass started easing toward the passageway door, to get out of here before . . .
The frantic scream came from somewhere along the corridor outside the room. It was cut off almost the moment it started, as though someone had been throttled. It was Katherine’s voice!
And at the same moment, there was a grunt from the man sleeping in the bed and his feet swung over the edge of the thing. He leaped toward the wall, located the light switch, flooded the room with revealing brilliance.
It was the bony, tall thin man—Paul Francis.
ROGER CASS did not hesitate. He was across the room almost the moment the lights came on. His hard fist swung.
Crack!
It was a neat blow, well-aimed. The beanpole of a man toppled sideways, collapsed like a deflated accordion. He lay still.
Roger whipped toward the hall again, flung open the door and went streaking down the passageway. He came to his own cabin, heard the muffled sounds coming from within. The door was closed.
And locked.
Roger Cass threw his hard shoulders against the panel and felt pain lance through his back. The door was a solid as an oak. He cried: “Katherine!”
From within the room, there was a cry. There quickly followed a sound like a heavy hand hitting someone’s face. Katherine moaned. Roger heard that moan, and rage brought a red haze before his wild eyes. He tried smashing against the door with his body again. It was he who had told her to wait here for him!
And then, surprisingly, it swung open and he almost toppled into the room.
Katherine, her clothes disheveled, had just been knocked away from the cabin door again by the powerful, bald-headed man who was leaping after her now.
The girl’s father, Owen, was on the floor. His mouth was smeared with blood and he was striving to stagger to his feet.
The baldheaded man saw this, leaped toward a heavy wooden mallet that was lying on the bed. His big hand scooped it up.
But instead of leaping toward Owen�
��he swung the mallet at Roger’s head.
Miraculously, Roger Cass ducked the blow. He escaped having his brains smashed out by the barest fraction of an inch. He whirled back, dived for the powerful man’s legs and brought him to the deck.
But it was like taking hold of a thrashing bull. The man, though half on his back, whipped up the deadly mallet again.
Roger made a frantic attempt to grab the fellow’s wrist—and failed. The mallet started swinging . . .
Katherine, with a terrified small scream, leaped. The toe of her dainty foot caught the big man in the wrist. Paralyzed fingers relaxed and the mallet dropped to the floor.
“Gott!” the man said gutturally
He was on his feet then, his powerful arms stretched out for wiry Roger Cass.
It was then that voices shouted down the passageway. Men were running.
With a sudden, wild expression, the baldbeaded man backed off, leaped out into the hallway, started aft. The running men were coming from the other direction.
But Cass went out into the passage, leaped after the escaping man as his hand reached in his pocket for the automatic. Because of the girl and her father, because of the close quarters, there had been no chance to use the gun in the cabin.
Roger yelled, “Stop!”
But the baldheaded man plunged on. He cleared the end of the passageway, momentarily disappeared from sight. But Cass heard his heavy feet pounding up a ladder to the next deck.
He followed.
The others were behind him now, yelling, excited.
The trail led forward again, toward the forecastle deck. Roger arrived out on the deck to see the big man leaping toward the animal cages, toward . . .
Horror took hold of Cass. What wild idea did the fellow have? Roger saw that the man was streaking toward the big cage of the black panther. His hand was already on the lock.
“Stop!” Roger Cass roared again. The man fumbled with the lock. Behind Cass, the voice of the skipper, Briggs, bellowed, “Shoot, damn it!”
Cass fired a single shot.