by Lou Cameron
Captain Gringo smiled innocently at Makomotu, who simply smiled back sort of bewildered. Captain Gringo felt awkward, so he told them both to keep up the good work and went back to his own cabin to see if his own vahine still loved him.
Apparently she did. So a short while later, Atanua was on top when the doorway of the smaller cabin slid open and Gaston said, “Eh bien, they told me I’d find you here. Has she got a friend who admires older men?”
Atanua was embarrassed enough to giggle and roll off. So Captain Gringo sat up and said, “Never mind all that. It’s getting late. How did you do with that fishing boat?” Gaston said, “It’s a two-masted lugger, decked forward the mainmast, avec a trés fishy-smelling open cockpit aft. I told them to slip up against our starboard side just after sundown.”
“You told ’em right. They should be invisible from shore and screened by the schooner’s bigger bulk from seaward as we pile aboard. Are you sure we’ll have the machine guns by then as well?”
“Mais non, nothing involving skullduggery is ever a sure thing. But the Maxim should be here about the same time. That is not the main problem, Dick. The rogues I recruited are willing to take us anywhere in their stinky species of boat. But they don’t know the Guardian Bank! The Costa Rican skipper says he has always tried to avoid them up to now. Something about sharks and uncharted reefs.”
Captain Gringo said, “Shit!” and swung his feet to the floor to haul his pants and boots on as the vahine cursed them both in her own lingo. The tall Yank stood up, strapped his gun rig on over his bare chest, and told Gaston, “We may have some guides. But not unless we can take some heavy firepower along as well. Let’s go below and see about some Krags for all hands, at least. How many people are we talking about?”
As they went out, Gaston explained there were a dozen Costa Rican fishermen, all trusted by their skipper, whom Gaston knew and trusted. But, such weapons as they had between them consisted mostly of machetes and antique pistols more suitable for killing sharks than the hired gun-slicks one might encounter among the keys of the Guardian Bank.
Captain Gringo found a ladderway down to the hold and Gaston followed. It was naturally black as a bitch down there until Captain Gringo struck a match, found a hanging lantern, and lit it. The dim light wasn’t as much an improvement as they’d hoped. All the cargo was securely lashed in place, of course, but Kanaka notions of order must have called for placing beans near rifle ammo, with the rifles nowhere in sight. Captain Gringo unhooked the lantern and moved forward between the stacks, muttering, “Come on. They probably have the Krags filed under ‘K,’ for coconuts.”
Actually, they found one case of rifles under cases of canned pineapple and a barrel of rum. As Captain Gringo manhandled it out in the aisle and knelt to jimmy it open with his knife, Gaston sniffed and said, “Do you smell something trés mysterious, Dick?”
“There’s no mystery. Her name’s Atanua, and you could use a bath right now, too. Today was really a scorcher.”
Gaston wedged himself out of sight between two bales as he insisted, “Mais non, I do not smell anything as lovable as pussy or even sweat. I smell the old familiar reek of burning gunpowder. It is a scent no old soldier ever forgets, hein?”
Captain Gringo looked up, sniffed, and said, “Jesus, you’re right! But who could have been firing a gun down here in the hold?”
Gaston’s voice was firm, despite the way his heart was pounding, as he said simply, “Dick, run!”
But Captain Gringo moved to join him instead, of course, and it was a good thing Gaston was so small. Nobody Captain Gringo’s size could have wedged himself between the steel hull and the bales from this angle as the old Frenchman kept moving toward the sputtering red eye of death in the form of a lit fuse glowing in the dark!
Captain Gringo just had time to spot it over Gaston’s shoulder and gasp before the little Frenchman’s strong hand had it snapped off and in his mouth. Gaston sizzled his tongue, spat, and said, “The taste leaves much to be desired, but the bouquet was trés unusual. Regard that amusing streak of powder burn leading down that ship’s rib from above. Some species of cochon planned this well in advance and simply had to light one end from up on deck! Let us see what the remaining fuse leads to, hein?”
They moved bales and boxes out of the way, then whistled as one when they found the dynamite, a lot of dynamite, fused to blow Orotiki and all aboard to kingdom come!
Captain Gringo growled, “Time for a roll call!” as he headed for the ladder, getting more pissed by the minute as his first numb surprise faded. He got Atanua dressed, sort of, to translate. Then he pounded on the mate’s door and had her tell him to get everyone out on deck, on the double.
A few minutes later, everyone was. Or everyone was supposed to be. The mate explained, through Atanua, that aside from the skipper who’d gone ashore to get the princess, they seemed to be missing the Chinese cook.
Captain Gringo asked the vahine how come they’d had a Chinese cook in the first place, and she explained, “Oh Dick, everybody knows it take a Haole to cook Haole food. We hadda bring canned goods along ’cause poi don’t keep good this long. Whassamatter you? You don’t like Chinee cooking?”
“Chop suey ain’t bad. But someone just tried to make a tossed salad out of us all just now.” He explained for her to translate; and once she had, the mate started war-dancing around in a little circle, shouting awful things about squint-eyed Haoles in his own lingo, apparently. The vahine said, “Makomotu say he never meet a Chinee who wasn’t motherfucker. He say it serve us right for taking him aboard at last minute without knowing his mamma and poppa. We go look for him now, no?”
“No. If it was your cook, he’s long gone. They’d have told him where to run for after he lit the fuse. They’d have had to. How many guys are about to stay aboard a vessel about to go through the roof?”
Likelike, who’d been watching and listening from a discreet distance, suddenly pointed and called out. Captain Gringo turned to see the princess and the skipper coming along the quay with a Costa Rican carrying her luggage from the hotel. They looked up, puzzled, and the skipper ran up the gangplank ahead of Manukai, gun drawn, to ask what the hell was up.
Captain Gringo said, “This schooner, almost. The timing is getting a little slicker now.” He turned to Gaston and asked, “How much time was left on that fuse when we found it, Gaston?”
Gaston nodded and said, “Oui, just about enough to be detonating the dynamite right about now!”
Princess Manukai came aboard, fanning herself with a straw hat that would have looked sillier atop her big head, and demanded, “Would someone please tell me what’s going on? First this crazy Kanaka drags me out of bed without even kissing me, and now we find everyone out on deck and all excited!”
Captain Gringo said, “It looks like another attempt to blow Your Highness higher than a kite. Fortunately, Gaston smelled something burning just in time. Our prime suspect is your Chinese cook. So let’s talk about him.”
Manukai gasped and said, “Hung Chang? I can’t believe it, Dick. He makes such great egg rolls!”
Gaston cut in, “I am sure he was a most ingenious and surprising chef, mon cher. The question is, who else could he have been working for, hein?”
Manukai turned to her skipper and said something in their own lingo. Kuruhai banged the palm of his hand against his brow and said, “Oh shit, that’s right! He used to work for the German missionary on Konakona! But I thought you just said you didn’t think it was the Germans who were playing so rough!”
Captain Gringo shrugged and asked, “What can I tell you? Sometimes a guy just guesses wrong, right?”
*
They kept the basement of the Puntarenas morgue as cool as possible. But, without true air conditioning, the atmosphere still left a lot to be desired. The naval attaché from the German consulate held a kerchief to his face as the morgue attendant switched on the overhead lights. But Von Linderhoff and the Costa-Rican police captain were made
of sterner stuff, or just knew better than to try.
The bodies of the German agents that Captain Gringo had left in the alley behind the whorehouse had been mistreated further before the police had finally found them in another alley a good three blocks away. They were missing their shoes and other valuables, and being rained on as they sprawled in the muddy yard of an abandoned house hadn’t done wonders for their appearance, either. They lay side by side on marble slabs, their muddy flesh cold and pale where it showed.
The police officer said, “Their passports were missing, of course. But fortunately one of my men recalled seeing the two of them going in and out of your consulate a lot, and of course, we have few blue-eyed blonds in this part of the world. Can you gentlemen identify either of them for us?”
Von Linderhoff said, “Of course. This one’s Herr Dorfler and the other’s name is Vogel. As you correctly assumed, they worked for my trade mission at the consulate. They were, ah, file clerics. Where did your men find them?”
“Not where they were killed, Señor. They were already a bit stiff when someone rolled them over a garden wall to be found in due course in rather grotesque positions. The one you call Vogel had been stabbed in the back, by an expert. The other had been shot in the back. There are no powder stains on his clothing, so that was the work of an expert as well. We were hoping you could give us some indication as to motive. It is odd to find two minor employees of your consulate murdered and robbed on the same day, do you not agree?”
Von Linderhoff shrugged and replied, “You would know better than us how safe the streets you patrol might be, Captain. I can think of no motive other than robbery. They were, as you say, minor employees, not involved in any important matters.”
The Costa Rican looked politely at the naval attaché, who removed the kerchief from his face long enough to say, “I did not even know them. I may have seen them about the consulate, but they did not work for my section.” Then he covered his face again. It didn’t really help.
Von Linderhoff said, “Naturally, as soon as your own coroner releases the bodies to us, we shall ship them back to the Fatherland for proper burial. Meanwhile, is it possible to have them, ah, embalmed?”
The Costa Rican cop nodded with an agreeable smile and said, “Most of what you are smelling is a woman fished out of the harbor yesterday. If someone doesn’t claim her soon, we may have to put her back. Rock salt, as you may have noticed, has its limitations.”
He nodded to the attendant and they all left. Outside, Von Linderhoff waited until the Costa Rican officer had shaken hands with them and gone the other way before he told the naval attaché, “I can play rough, too. I have been trying to handle the matter in a civilized way. But when one is dealing with mad dogs, one does not simply wave the gun about. One shoots! Is it safe to assume that gunboat of yours has something more serious than blank saluting rounds for its weaponry, Bachmann?”
The navy man looked uncomfortable and replied, “We are of course ready for Der Tag any time the treacherous British mean to start it. But we are hardly authorized to lob one-fifty-fives at anyone without a declaration of war!”
“What do call what just happened to Dorfler and Vogel, a declaration of love?”
“No, but they were professional secret agents paid to accept certain risks, even in peacetime, Herr Von Linderhoff! What you are asking of the Kriegsmarine is another matter entire! The gunboat Seeshlange is hardly a spy vessel! She openly and proudly flies the flag of the Fatherland, and have you forgotten the Monroe Doctrine? The Yankees would have a fit if we openly fired on anything in these waters!”
Von Linderhoff s voice dropped a few degrees, from already cool to icy, as he said flatly, “I am not asking the Seeshlange to do anything. I am ordering it. Have you forgotten who is the senior official of the Reich here, Bachmann?”
The uniformed officer answered just as coldly. “I am well aware of our respective ranks, Herr Linderhoff. But I still take my orders from the Kriegsmarine, not Military Intelligence! My orders are to cooperate with you, not to get Germany into a war Der Kaiser may not have been planning to have this season f I shall have to cable Berlin for authorization before we shoot even your mad dogs with one-fifty-fives, in American waters!”
Von Linderhoff grimaced and said, “Do you know what I think is going to happen when Der Tag arrives? I think everyone is going to be waiting for permission to fire as the enemy marches up the Unter Den Linden! This is an emergency, you blockheaded Bavarian!”
“Nevertheless, I must have authorization from Berlin before I order Seeshlange and her people into warlike action.”
“Then let’s do so, damn it! How long will it take you to cable home and get your damned authorization?”
Bachmann shrugged and said, “Less than twenty-four hours if the Admiral is not at his country estate. Perhaps sooner if he agrees. Personally, I still think you are out to crush a cockroach with a steamroller. Have you ever seen what a one-fifty-five does to everything all around when it hits?”
“I have. Blowing the bastards to bloody hash is less than they deserve!”
*
By the time the sun had flashed green and vanished, everyone aboard the Orotiki but Kuruhai had calmed down a bit. The big skipper still wanted to weigh anchor and charge the blackbirder base like a bull under sail. But as he kept drinking to soothe his nerves, he was too pooped to swat a fly by the time the extra weapons were smuggled aboard, so nobody was paying any attention to him.
The soldiers of fortune took the tarp-wrapped machine guns to Manukai’s spacious quarters, by royal command; and as they unwrapped them on the rug while the princess watched—interested but ignorant of such matters—Captain Gringo said, “Okay, this Maxim could use more oil, but it’s not in bad shape. How do you like your Browning, Gaston?”
Gaston growled, “I can man a machine gun in a pinch, but this species of junk seems to have been used as an agricultural implement more recently.”
He unscrewed the side plate, disengaged the action, and added, “I take that back. It’s been soaking in a cesspool for some time. But at least there is so much oily shit ground into the parts they have not rusted too badly. Give me time to completely strip and reassemble this abused child, and she just might fire again someday.”
Captain Gringo adjusted the head spacing on his own weapon as he told Gaston, “You’ll have plenty of time. I’m leaving you here as I scout the Guardian Bank with those fishermen, if they ever get here. I don’t think anyone will feel up to rushing this schooner while I’m gone; but if they do, you, the crew’s rifles, and that Browning ought to discourage hell out of them.”
If he’d expected an argument from the pragmatic little Frenchman, he didn’t get one. Gaston nodded and said, “Oui, I could hold that gangplank against all comers without a machine gun. But I’d better fix this one and haul the gangplank in just the same, hein?”
Captain Gringo consulted his watch and began to rewrap the Maxim as he said, “Let it go for now. We’d better get this one and its ammo amidships in case that fishing lugger ever shows up.”
He glanced up at the big Kanaka girl and asked, “Is it okay for Gaston to leave this junk here and clean it later, Honey?”
She smiled fondly at both of them and replied, “Gaston sure isn’t about to spend the night in anyone else’s quarters, Dick. By the way, don’t you mean to say aloha properly before you sail out of my life for Tangaroa-knows-how-long?”
He laughed and said, “We’ll have a celebration when I get back. I may need my strength out on those reefs.”
“Hell, Dick, you got a machine gun; and how much running around do you expect to be doing on a bitty boat. Let’s have a nukilua now!”
Captain Gringo hefted the wrapped machine gun to his shoulder, got to his feet, and said, “I’ll send Gaston right back to you. But first he has to help me get underway.”
She didn’t argue. But she was getting undressed as the two of them left. Outside, Gaston sighed and said, “You mig
ht have at least made la zigzig with her once, you lazy child. I’m getting too old to keep oversized sex maniacs contented. ”
“You’ll just have to try harder. I don’t want Kuruhai jumping the gun while I’m not around to stop him, and she’s the only person on board with the rank to stop the skipper without busting his head.”
“I know. Mon Dieu, the things my tongue and I have to go through just to stay alive!”
“Does she really like that as much as fucking?”
“Merde alors, if there is anything of a sexual nature that big spoiled brat doesn’t like, I’ve yet to find it; and I have already explored her body to the point of fatigue! It’s simply not just, Dick. Here you are leaving me alone with a shipload of nubile vahines, and all my talents are required for political fornication!”
He was still bitching about it as they placed the Maxim and its ammo cases against the starboard bulwark, amidships. They gazed over the side. It was a lot like staring into an inkwell. Farther out on the dark waters of the harbor, they could see the illuminated bridge and portholes of the German gunboat. But her outlines were invisible against the black velvet sky. Captain Gringo said, “If your recruits get here before moonrise, we’ll have nothing to worry about. What time are we talking about?”
“Do I look like an almanac? The moon rose after midnight last night, and it’s twenty minutes later every night, non?”
“Yeah, we still have plenty of time. But I still wish they’d get here so I could go round up those fräuleins.”
“You mean to take both, Dick?”
“Have to. Only one of them speaks English, and we can’t leave the sister who speaks only German stranded in a Spanish-speaking port. I might be able to talk the redhead into staying here with you and the others. But I still have to go get both. So where the hell is that fishing lugger?”
Gaston suggested, “Why don’t you get them now? By the time you get back, our fishing friends will have either arrived or we’ll know they have had second thoughts. In either case, those German girls will be as safe here as anyone could be at Mamma Rosa’s, non?”