Hell's Hatches

by Lewis R. Freeman

  CHAPTER XVI

  A SUDDEN VISITOR

  As a rider reins in his stumbling horse, so did I rein in my stumblingnerves. It was now or never, I told myself. If those final touches werenot given before I stirred from my tracks, they would never be given. Iclosed my eyes and my ears--not with my hands but by a sheer effort ofwill--and then, inch by inch, as though I were dragging it by thethroat, brought the phantom prototype back and forced it to merge withthe face on the canvas. The tip of my brush flashed twice, thrice. ThenI relaxed the tentacles of my will, and as the phantom face, receding,blurred to blankness, it left behind, where a wisp of green-smearedcamel's hair had touched the canvas, an expression of hell-hauntedterror streaming from the unnaturally dilated eyes of the _completed_picture-face.

  I was breathing heavily, like a coolie who throws down his back-breakingburden at the end of a hard climb, when I tossed aside my brush andpalette, but no wretch of a human pack-mule ever knew the depth ofrelief that was mine. A carrier could only experience the physicalsatisfaction of feeling his back was freed of a load: mine was thespiritual ecstasy of knocking off the shackles that had threatened tobind my soul. And now I was free to rush to the arms of the "GreenLady"! No more need of rationing my absinthe. I spilled the remainingcontents of the bottle at my elbow in the bowl of half-melted crackedice, and wolfed it greedily over the tilted brim.

  "Ple-ese, Whit-nee, I have the great hur-ree." Again came theclick-clack of the imprisoned latch and the thud of a knee or shoulderagainst the door.

  "One moment, Rona!" Steadied and alert, I set down the emptied bowl,threw a hastily-snatched couch-cover over the canvas so that the spaceupon which I had worked was hidden, and stepped to the door. Already Ifelt the exaltation and relief of having banished the dread phantom. Andthe picture face on the canvas--how easy it was to blot out! The hangingcorner of an old steamer-rug....

  Rona pushed in eagerly as I swung back the door, Suey relaxing hisrestraining grip and backing away noiselessly at my reassuring nod. Allthe old verve showed in the girl's high-flung head and flashing eye.Sullenness, depression, sadness alike were gone, replaced by an air ofeagerness, of suppressed excitement. She was still wearing the baggy_holakau_ the lady missionaries had wished upon her, but with it--loopedover her breasts and under her shoulders _sarong_-fashion--was thepeacock shawl, outlining softly the lithe curves of shoulder and hip andflowing clingingly in folds of amber and scintillant opalescence belowher knees.

  "Whit-nee, I come to make the good-bye," she gushed cooingly, catchingher breath. "Tonight I take boat go Seengapo. Whit-nee, I come here totell you I ver-ree sor-ree I make you troubl' 'bout the pick-yur. Itella you lie, Whit-nee. I cannot--make--the pick-yur. Bel-la, he say--"

  At that instant a strange thing happened. Two or three times since sheentered the room, Rona's eyes, as though drawn there irresistibly, hadwandered from mine to what could have appeared to her no more than acorner of plaid rug hanging over a broad blank of tightly stretchedcanvas. She had done this again as she started to speak, and it was aslight widening of her eyes that caused me to turn and follow herglance. The hastily-flung rug was slowly slipping back off the easel.The fringed corner hanging down in front was rising. Possibly a draughtfrom the open door had started the movement, or perhaps the swishingblows a wind-lashed tree was dealing the side of the house. Whatever wasthe cause, the effect was that of an invisible hand slowly drawing up acurtain.

  Rona's tongue framed the sentence that was in her mind, but thewords came brokenly as her puzzled wonderment increased. As herdouble-syllabled rendition of Bell's name fell from her lips theaccelerating slide of the curtain quickened to a run, and, with a flirtof green fringe, the masking corner disappeared over the top of theframe. The Face--"Slant" Allen's hell-haunted face, tortured andterrible--glared out at her from the broad white field of the canvas.

  There was sheer amazement in the down-drop of the girl's lean jaw and asuggestion of terror in the gasp with which she filled her deflatedlungs. But the piercing "_ey-yu_" with which that air was forced outagain was a battle-cry. Fortunately, I was standing a couple of pacesnearer the canvas than was she; but even with that handicap in my favourit was a near squeak. I caught the gleam of a flashing blade and a quickgrab sunk my crooked fingers deep into the flesh of a thrusting arm.Hurling the arrested figure back toward the door, I stooped and pickedup a knife--that beautifully balanced Portuguese throwing-knife thatAllen and I had been flinging at the swelling bole of the bigbottle-tree the previous Sunday. To this day I do not know whether Ronathought she was attacking a reincarnation or a ghost, or was only benton destroying an uncannily life-like portrait that awakened savagememories.

  I swished the fallen rug from under the easel and rehung it--evenly thistime--before turning to confront Rona, where she was readjusting--withraised elbows and twinkling thumbs--the hitch of the peacock shawl inthe opposite corner of the room. She had scrambled to her feet again,but gave no sign of returning to the attack. Her eyes were snapping withanger and excitement, but I did not have the feeling that sheentertained any especial personal resentment against me for the roughhandling I had given her.

  "So it was you after all," I said slowly, fingering the tapering bladeof the tell-tale knife.

  Her lips moved as though in reply, but if she said anything coherent itwas drowned in the roar of a sudden gust of wind that buffetted thebungalow at that moment. I turned to the girl again after closing thenorth windows. Her eyes were fixed on vacancy now, and her head, withthe clean-cut chin slightly elevated, was turned sideways in an attitudeof listening. As the banging of the trees died down my own dullertympana registered a new vibration--and yet not quite new--somethingthat I had heard very recently. Ah, now I had it! The baying of a hound,very near and very eager. A red-hot scent beyond doubt, I told myself.But why were Rawdon's "nigger-chasers" running at that hour, and intothe teeth of a rising hurricane? There was questioning in both ourglances as the girl's eyes met mine, but in hers certainly no hint offear.

  Before either of us spoke a firm, quick step sounded from the back ofthe house, and a moment later, following a light tap on the door, Rangaentered from my bedroom. If he was surprised at Rona's presence, or ather somewhat dishevelled appearance, he gave no sign of it. Nor wasthere about me--now that I was holding the knife behind myback--anything to suggest to the Malay that he had stumbled upon asituation in the least out of the normal.

  Tuan "Slant" was sleeping heavily, he said, and so he had snatched theopportunity to come up for some of his own Borneo tobacco and a changeof clothes. They had nothing in the hospital large enough for him. Tuan"Slant" was growing stronger in body, but--he finished by tapping histemple and shaking his head dubiously.

  A heavier broadside of the gathering storm shook the house again, thistime sending a shudder through its stout frame and wringing a vibrant_ping_ from the tautened "hurricane cables" that guyed its windwardcorners. Out of the heart of that blast came the bell-mouthed baying ofthe nearing hound. He was still sounding his clear bugle notes as heswung in through the gate from the road, but down the driveway, with theincense of the burning trail conjuring visions of an imminent quarry inhis brain, he began tearing his throat with harsh, savage yelps ofeagerness. I was looking for his charge to come against the closed frontdoor, but a sudden shower of claw-spurned gravel rat-a-tat-ing againstthe glass of the French windows told that he had wheeled in his tracksand was circling to the rear of the house. A yell and a clatter ofsaucepans from the kitchen, a scramble of slipping claws upon thehardwood floor of the back hallway, and in from the open door of mybedroom--drooling-fanged, bloody-eyed and bloody-minded--came dashingthat black bolt of canine fury, closing on his cornered quarry for thedeath-grapple.

  Ranga, on entering, had moved a step or two aside from the door, asurvival doubtless of his training at sea, where an idle man blocking acompanionway or a ladder is liable to be taught manners by a rap on thehead. Rona was still in the cor
ner to which I had hurled her. I was atthe opposite corner, near the big canvas and twenty feet or more fromthe girl. The flying hound tried to check himself at the doorway, butthe polished floor gave him no grip for his claws. Down on his haunches,with forefeet poked rigidly ahead, he slid the full width of the room,tobogganing on a smooth-running Samoan mat for the last half of thedistance.

  With the certainty of Rona's guilt fixed in my mind by her possession ofAllen's knife, I had no doubt, from the moment the hound's bayingindicated it had turned into the clearing, that it was hot on her trail.But even so, the brute's entry by the bedroom door had been sounexpected and so swift that I had not stirred from my tracks to thegirl's defence when the snarling animal, shooting across the room,brought up against the wall close beside her. Even Ranga, leapingforward instantly as he had, was scarcely past the middle of the floorwhen the beast regained its balance and bearings almost at the girl'sfeet. Drawing back into the angle of the walls and crouching low like acornered cat, Rona awaited the attack, while Ranga, barehanded, and Iwith the throwing-knife rushed in to her aid. Without an instant'shesitation, the savage beast spun to a full right-about and, brushingthe girl's advanced knee as though it was no more than the piano stool,launched itself full at the throat of the yellow man.

  Ranga's counter was swift, sure and terrible. He might have beenfighting bloodhounds barehanded from childhood, for all the surprise anddismay he showed at the sudden attack. Where my own instinct (if I hadnot tried to side-step the charge completely) would have been to grapplefor the brute's throat from beneath, he simply struck--or rathergrabbed--down from above. The impact crushed the snarling beast to thefloor, but when Ranga raised his arm again he was gripping hisstruggling canine adversary by the scruff of the neck. Or rather, Ithought it was the scruff. In reality his grip was a bit more inclusive.

  Holding the floundering black form at arm's length with no more effortthan if it had been a terrier, Ranga suddenly tightened his hold. I sawthe hound's red-lidded eyes grow slant and elongated like a Chinaman'sas the skin of its scalp was drawn backward in the relentless viseclosing from behind; then a grinding snick cut short an unearthly screamof pain, and the hound was dangling limp and lifeless with a crumpledspine at the end of a gibbet of knotted yellow muscle. Ranga tossedlightly aside what a moment before had been a flying bolt of wrath, andwhere the great head doubled under against a flowered chintzwindow-curtain I saw the sprawling outline of a tooth-torn ear,doubtless the scar of a fight with a luckier ending.

  In its strangely terrible tenseness, the electrically charged silencethat succeeded has no parallel in my experience. Not a word was spoken.The only sound was the banging of the wind-wrenched trees against thehouse and the nearing mutter of the thunder in the north. Thesignificance of the fact that it was Ranga the dog had been trailing waslost upon neither Rona nor me, nor yet upon the big Malay himself. Thelatter met my questioning glance steadily for a moment, but it was thegirl's piercing stare of fierce concentration that drew and held histroubled black eyes. While one might have counted fifty those two stoodand (as I have since understood) communed with eye and mind. It was asudden thunder-clap that broke the connection and checked the interflowof thought. Ranga had not winced at the blinding flash andclose-following crash, but Rona's higher strung nerves fluttered for aninstant, and the wire was down. But Ranga's words indicated that themessage was about complete.

  "Yes, I did it, Tuan," he said quietly, turning toward me as thoughanswering my unspoken question. "It had to be, Tuan, and--yes, I didit."

  It was not until afterwards I recalled that it was to Rona I addressedmy protest. "But 'Slant' swore to me that he did not kill Bell; that hewas in no way responsible for his death, first or last."

  A spasm of passion twisted the girl's face to the seeming of an ape's asshe caught the drift of my words, and her reply was almost a scream."Not ke-el Bel-la? 'Slan' do worse than ke-el. He--"

  The chorus of the leashed pack that checked her words came from so closeat hand that it made itself heard above the now unbroken roar of thestorm. There was the clang of shod hoofs on a metalled road, too, and Ithought I could distinguish the shouts of men. The hunt was closing infor the kill.

  "I think I go now, Tuan. I like the better to fight outside." Ranga'svoice was as quiet and controlled as when he had told me the news fromthe hospital a few minutes before; but there was the lust of battle inhis flashing eyes, eagerness for action in the quick heave of his chest.

  There was no time to debate and decide the question as to who hadcommitted the outrage upon Hartley Allen, or of what justificationthere might have been for it. One thing only was clear to me, and thatwas that I was not going to throw either Rona or Ranga to the dogs--no,nor to the law either--if there was any way of avoiding it. My mind--aswas always the case when I had fasted long and drunk absinthesparingly--worked with lightning swiftness.

  "Don't fight unless you have to," I said, stepping closer to Ranga asthe wind and thunder threatened to drown my voice. "Follow down thestream over the falls. Jump won't hurt you--plenty of water at thebottom. That'll throw off the dogs. Then follow the path by the flumedown to the sea. The rain'll kill your trail for the dogs. It ought tobe starting any minute now. Wait for me on the pier by the old sugarmill. I'll come for you in a boat as soon as I can."

  Baring his teeth in a quick grin of comprehension, the big fellowwheeled and started for the front door. I caught his arm and checked himjust in time. "This way!" I shouted. "Through my bedroom window. Beatit! _Lekas!_"

  Again that intelligent tooth-flash of understanding. Ranga'sforeshortened bulk was making a blurred blot against the blue-greenlightning flash playing across the rear bedroom window as I turned toanswer a heavy banging at the front door. Everything considered, I havealways felt that I got away fairly well with the situation with which Inow found myself confronted. It was Harpool, the Chief of Police, whostaggered into the room, bracing back against the push of the stillrising wind. The flutter of the lightning revealed two or three horsesin the driveway, and three or four men following a bunch of howling dogsaround the corner of the house.

  I was on the point of opening up at the Chief with a facetious sallyabout the way he was sending his hounds around to frighten my ladyvisitors, when I chanced to glance to the corner where Rona had been,and lo--I had no lady visitor! The girl was gone, but whether under thecouch or out of one of the windows I could not guess. So I only gapedrather stupidly and said nothing, leaving the Chief to open the attack.I was glad the face on the canvas was covered, and only wished there hadbeen time to throw something over the crumpled remnants of the bigblack-and-tan.

  "I am quite satisfied it isn't you we want, Mr. Whitney," Harpool began,with a shade of embarrassment, I thought. "But the fact remains thatRawdon's hounds have followed a live scent straight to this house, and Ihave every reason to believe they are on the trail of the man who tiedup Hartley Allen. Perhaps you can explain--"

  "I think I can," I cut in, anxious to gain time for the fugitive, butrealizing that no end would be served by trying to conceal his identity."You're right that it was a hot scent. Just a few degrees too hot foryour canine deputy there in the corner. It's the end of _his_ trail, I'mafraid."

  The Chief strode over to the limp corpse and turned it with his foot."Who killed this hound?" he demanded angrily, regarding me suspiciouslyfor the first time.

  "Not I, Chief," I replied jauntily; "but can't you guess? You can seefor yourself that he hasn't been shot--or clubbed--or poisoned. Well,then--look at that neck. Do you know of more than one man in these partscapable of snapping a bloodhound's spine between his thumb andforefinger?" (I added that little thumb-and-forefinger touch with maliceaforethought, for I wanted to impress upon Harpool--for whatever itmight be worth--that it was no old broken-down of a "Squid" Saundersthat he was going to try to run to earth out there in the darkness.)

  The Chief's honest eyes opened with amazement as the answer dawned uponhim. "You don't mean the big Malay?" he ejaculated i
ncredulously. "Why,he has been tending Allen like a sister for two days. Everyone in thehospital has been speaking about his devotion."

  "No other," I answered. "Ranga came up from the hospital less than halfan hour ago to get a shift of togs. Five minutes later that hound cametearing in through the back entrance and flew at his throat--right herein my studio. You see the result. That fellow can drop a horse with hisfist--a dog is no more than a flea to him."

  "I can hardly believe it," said the Chief, shaking his head; "but thefact remains that if the hound went for him, he's our man. I hope wewon't have to shoot him.... But Rawdon will never stand by and see hisdogs pinched out like that. This fellow was his best hound by a mile.Drive him crazy when he finds it's been dished. Gawd, that neck mighthave been run over by a steam tram! What in hell--"

  A bedlam of howls and yells and savage oaths rising from the rear of thehouse at this juncture broke in upon the Chief and caused him to bolt onthe double through the door of the corridor leading to the kitchen. Theunearthly racket, with the rattle of pistol shots spattering through it,made me certain that Ranga had run afoul of the hunt at his first jump.Shuddering at the thought of the terrible fight that must ensue, Ipushed on after Harpool, reaching the further end of the corridor justin time to catch his reeling form as he staggered back from a bulletthat had burned his scalp the instant he opened the kitchen door.Astride the sill of a kicked-in window sat old Rawdon, his bearded facedistorted with fury and pain, coughing, sneezing, cursing, and firingimpartially at all parts of the long, low room. Under the sink, almostat Rawdon's feet but quite out of pistol range, crouched Suey, blinkingblandly and rubbing his almond eyes. He it was who was the author of anunpremeditated diversion which was the only thing in the world thatprevented Ranga being nabbed at the outset.

  The late black-and-tan, in following Ranga's trail, had entered thekitchen by snapping his way through the light screen door. To preventhis lines being thus penetrated a second time, the foxy Celestial, whenhe heard the main pack rallying to the attack, closed and bolted theheavy outside door of his domain and, with a little surprise packet inhis hand, took station beside the little swinging window above the sink.Waiting with true Oriental restraint till the clamouring enemy wascompactly bunched upon the porch outside, Suey gently raised the screenand emptied the contents of a can of red pepper into their midst. Thepaprika appeared to have been pretty fairly divided between three of themost oncoming of the dogs and their equally forward master. The houndsquit for the night, then and there, but the old bushranger's fightingspirit urged him on to make the best stand he could with his automatic.Considering the way he was being racked with coughs and sneezes, andthat he only blazed away at the creak of an opening door his streamingeyes could not locate, his shot that welcomed the Chief was by no meansuncreditable. It cut a neat furrow through Harpool's stubby pompadourand even drew a drop or two of blood.

  The Chief's fervent swearing stayed Rawdon's murderous hand just as hehad finished fumbling a fresh clip of cartridges into his emptied"thirty-eight" and was about to start fusillading anew. Roaring mad ashe was, his first thought was for the dogs. "Get a wet rag round themuzzles o' Dingo an' Jackaroo 'fore you let 'em inter this 'ell 'ole,"he growled between sneezes. "Our bloke's somew'ere in this 'ere 'ouse,"he went on, laving his smarting eyes at the water-tap of the sink aboveSuey's jack-knifed form. "Don't let 'im slope by the front door, Chief,now we've got 'im in 'is 'ole."

  "Sloped already," snapped Harpool laconically, adding that most of thesloping had been done while Rawdon was setting his dogs on a "ballyChink cook." In a few terse sentences the Chief explained the way thingsstood, giving it as his opinion that their man would be trying to followthe stream right across the plantation and down through the belt of bushto the mangrove swamps. The loss of the big black-and-tan was so great acalamity for the old bushranger that it had the effect of soberingrather than further exciting him. His red rage burned white and flamedinwardly rather than outwardly. "I'll know 'ow to even up for 'imkillin' Starlight w'en I gets that bloody wombat in a patch o' dry bush.Nice bit o' a torch that greasy 'ulk o' 'im'll make. Come along! We'll'ave a better chance o' makin' a quick bag if we get 'im in sight 'forethe rain starts."

  There were still left two dogs with undamaged "noses." Fearful thatthese, if they took the bridle-path down the right side of the creek,might pick up Ranga's trail where he would have left the stream at thepool, I made bold to suggest a plan calculated to carry them wide ofthat danger point. "Why don't you ford here," I said, "and push straightacross the plantation to the end of the big loop the stream makes roundthe nigger village? Your man will be all of an hour making that point ifhe wades by the stream. You can make it through the cane in twentyminutes and be waiting there to bag him."

  The Chief was inclined to favour the plan--until Rawdon cut insarcastically with: "An' wot's to pervent the bloody bloke's givin' usthe slip a 'undred times 'tween 'ere an' there? One hound down each sideo' the stream--that's the only way to be sure o' clappin' our 'ooksinter 'im."

  That was sound reasoning of course--from Rawdon's standpoint,--and Ididn't dare urge my plan any further. Ten minutes later, when a suddeneager baying came down the wind from the direction of the waterfall, Ifelt sure my worst fears were realized. It was, therefore, with only thefaintest hopes of success, that I pulled myself together to take thefirst step in making good my promise to pick up Ranga at the pier of theold sugar mill.

  The priceless Suey had crawled out from under the sink as the sounds ofthe hunt grew faint, and turned to tidying the kitchen as thoughcleaning up after a pack of bloodhounds was just a pleasant littleincidental of the day's work. When I ordered him to get me out a freshbottle of absinthe he did not even forget the cracked ice. I told him Ishould probably be away for most of the night, and that if Rona showedup in the interim to see that she was made comfortable till my return."All lightee girl-ee. Otha fell-ee too much peppa can have," he saiddecisively. I told him to do what he liked to Rawdon, but to give theChief a shake-down if he asked for it.

  Quaffing a couple of glasses of raw absinthe, I filled a flask, pulledon a pair of riding-boots and a raincoat, and pushed out onto theveranda. The wind had not increased greatly in force, but the lightningand thunder were flashing and crashing almost simultaneously overhead,and the first big drops of rain were beginning to spatter. The moon washidden behind a dense pall of black cloud, so that it was by theincessant flicker of the lightning that I sized up the threesaddle-horses tied at the side of the driveway and picked the rangywaler of the Chief as the likeliest rough-weather beast. I had nocompunction to taking him, as the bunch would be breaking away anyhow assoon as the sagging bottom of the cloud overhead dropped its contents onthem. I preferred not to have my own saddle-horse left standing in thetown if it could be avoided. There would be enough tell-tale posts onthe course I was going to try to negotiate without deliberately plantinganother one.

  The cane fields in the valley were glistening with the opening volleysof the rain as I spurred across the clearing, stabbing the night withsilver gleams in the lightning flashes as the bayonets of massed troopsthrow off the rays of the sun. The wind was behind me as far as the mainroad; then side-on, but broken by the wall of the thick-growing trees. Iput the waler at top speed, anxious to cover all the distance possiblewhile the footing was good. I was halfway to town before the storm letgo in real earnest, and from then on it was about as much of a swim as aride, especially after the hillsides began to spill off on the lowerlevels. My mount was a sensible beast, evidently no stranger to tropicalcloudbursts. He took the initiative readily when I ceased to urge him,and kept plugging right on through the storm at a good steadybusiness-like jog. Nothing but my good fortune in getting a jump on therain prevented my going out in this first lap of my race, as all of thefour bridges I had to cross must have washed away within a very fewminutes from the time I put them behind me. Indeed, one of the twohorses I had left in the driveway, after both had broken away as I hadanticipated, was drowned in t
rying to flounder through an open crossing.

  The worst of the terrific downpour was over as I rode into the town, butthe wind--as was to be expected--was blowing with increased force.Everyone had been driven indoors by the rain, so that it was in an emptystreet I dismounted and left my horse, knowing that he would be pawingat his own stable door within a very few minutes. The rest of the way tothe landing I covered on foot. As I had feared, the creek was empty oflaunches. I would have to see what could be done at the Burns, Phillipoffices, which, busy with manifests and other odds and ends of businessincident to an imminent steamer sailing, were still lighted up. It wasan alternative I was very reluctant to resort to, as I had been hopingthat my visit to Captain Tancred might be managed on the quiet. Just asI turned to go a red light, bobbing past the outer end of the jetty,caught the tail of my eye, and, on the off chance that it might be acraft I could hire, I held on at the steps. Smartly handled in the nastycross-lop, a small but powerful steam launch bumped in alongside thelanding stage.

  "Can I get you to take me off to the _Mambare_?" I demanded of theuniformed youth who came bounding up the steps.

  "Glad to do it, sir. This is her launch," was the cheery reply. "Just infor clearance papers. Be back in a jiffy. Climb aboard and make yourselfcomfy in the cabin." Then, as an apparent afterthought: "You're sailingwith us, aren't you? Can't take off visitors at this hour. No way to getback. Getting under way at midnight." He had so little doubt that I wasa belated passenger, perhaps delayed by the rain, that my nod was quitesufficient to reassure him. Five minutes later we were shoving off forthe run back to the line of lights where the _Mambare_ tugged at hermoorings.

  The sea was white with foam outside the jetties, but with waves and windalmost dead astern the sturdy little launch made very comfortableweather of it. It was by no means as bad as it had been coming in, saidthe young officer, who turned out to be a freight clerk. As the gangwaywas already raised and the launch had to come in anyway, we remainedaboard her and were hoisted right up and swung in to the chocks on the_Mambare's_ boat-deck. My companion hurried at once to his office to goover his pouch of papers, while I, locating it without asking anyone fordirections, went forward to the Captain's cabin under the bridge.

  The faint shadow of constraint on Captain Tancred's face as I entereddisappeared the instant his ready mind divined I had come to him forhelp. "So they're after ye at last, lad," he said, sympathy andsatisfaction queerly blended in his deep voice. "Weel, noo, tell me a'aboot it. I ken we'll be findin' a way oot for ye."

  I told him all that he needed to know as quickly as possible, making apoint, however, of omitting to state that the man I wanted him tosmuggle away to the Islands had confessed to committing the outrage uponHartley Allen. "Slant" was an old friend of "Choppy's," and I felt surethat the latter, far from being a witting party to helping the man whohad attacked him escape from justice, would undoubtedly lend every aidto placing him where he would receive his just deserts. Luckily, thequixotic old Scot was not a man to ask searching questions. He wasplainly disappointed that it was not I who was fleeing the law, butthere was ready consolation in the fact that a friend of mine, in verysore straits, might be saved from being torn to pieces by a pack ofbloodhounds if he was picked up at a certain point on the north coastbefore morning.

  We located the cove of the old sugar mill on the chart withoutdifficulty, and in his bulky volume of "Sailing Directions" found thecomforting assurance that it afforded especially good shelter in anortherly blow. There was no surf, it was stated, and the shore wasalmost steep-to. This was all in our favour. He was sailing at midnight,the Captain said. The hurricane was central over the New Hebrides, so itwas only the tail of it flirting across the Great Barrier--nothing hewould dream of sticking in harbour for. Doubtless he would be able tofind an excuse to heave-to off the cove, while I piloted the launch into get our man. Then, if I didn't care to return and take a pleasurevoyage with him to Insulinde and the Straits, I could drop off and makethe best of my way home.

  The Captain had just finished telling me how he had made a point ofbringing his old launch crew with him from the _Utupua_--"the lads I usefor speshul wark, ye ken"--when the freight clerk who had brought me offentered the cabin with a number of papers and letters. On the top of thepile was a red envelope marked "Rush." "Choppy" tore the letter open atonce. The up-flop of his grizzled side-burns at the sudden flexing ofthe jaw muscles at their roots gave me warning of the coming jolt.

  "We'll nae be gettin' under wa' the nicht, Ryerson," he said quietly tothe freight clerk. "Will ye be sae guid as to bid the Chief an' the Mateto step this wa'. Mair carga the morrow," he added by way ofexplanation. To the Chief Engineer, when he came, the Captain merelycountermanded an order for steam on the capstan at seven bells, andwarned him to keep the pressure in the boilers high for fear the steamermight part a mooring cable if the wind increased. The Mate he ordered tobe ready to handle a consignment of silver bullion and ingot copper thatwould come in a tug from the _Moresby_ as soon as she arrived from thesouth in the morning. He also told him to have the crew of the steamlaunch called away at once, so as to put "yon gentleman" ashore asquickly as possible. If the Mate was lively about it, "Choppy"suggested, he might find that the fires of the launch had not yet beendrawn from her trip to the landing. If so, that would save time ingetting up steam.

  Not until all of this was ordered did he turn to me with: "The de'il'sain luck, lad. Nae gettin' awa' afore eight bells, noon, the morrow.Shipment frae Broken Hill catchin' up wi' us in the _Moresby_."

  "That means that the game's up and you're sending me back becausethere's no hope of doing anything?" I asked in dismay.

  "Nae, nae, lad," he soothed. "No' so fast. Just a wee bit o' a shift o'program, that's a'. True I'm sendin' ye ashore in the launch, but whenshe comes back I'm hopin' tae find oor mon in yer place. Do ye ken noowha' I'm drivin' at?"

  "Do you mean to send the launch all the way round from here?" I demandedin astonishment; "and then to keep him aboard here in the harbour forten or twelve hours before you sail? Isn't that asking for trouble bothways? Even if the launch stands up against the gale outside, aren't youdone for if they come off from town and make a search of the steamer?"

  Old "Choppy's" blue eyes twinkled merrily at the latter suggestion. Thepolice never did seem to have any luck in searching his ships, helaughed. As for the launch--it was new, its engine was unusuallypowerful, and it would have "Pisco" at the wheel. "Pisco," he explained,was a Chilean who had been with him for years, and had never been knownto fail at a pinch. He thought that combination ought to win out. Ididn't mind a bit of slap-banging off the point, did I? That settled it.If he was willing to risk his own launch and his own career to save _my_friend, it was not for me to hang back. Fifteen minutes later we hadbeen lowered over the side and were rounding under the _Mambare's_ fineclipper bows into the teeth of the gusty norther. It had been agreedthat I should pilot "Pisco" to the rendezvous and deliver my man intohis care. "Choppy" undertook to do the rest.

  What the hard-bit old sea-dog had characterized as a "bit o'slap-banging" off the point proved to be a frontal attack upon asruffianly a bunch of headseas as it was ever my lot to face in anythingsmaller than a ninety-ton schooner. Stoutly built and over-engined asshe was, the launch was quite equal to the task of driving her nosethrough the waves, but--not being built for submarine service--proved adismal failure at getting rid of the solid green water that deluged heras a consequence. Knot by knot, cursing fluently in picturesque _roto_Spanish the while, "Pisco" rang down the engine, until finally thepugnacious little craft ceased tunnelling the bases of the seas andcontented herself with boring neat round holes in their curling crests.By this method she shipped no more water than her scuppers could putback where it came from. The only fear now was that enough spray mightsplash down her squat funnel to quench the fires, and to minimize thechances of this, the resourceful "Pisco" made the lookout stand so thathis broad chest would receive and deflect the heaviest rushes of thethre
atening flood. Fortunately, the distance to be run head-on to theseas was comparatively short. Once round the point the alteration ofcourse brought the wind and the waves on the starboard beam, and thoughshe now just about rolled her side-lights under, it was fairly quietgoing compared to the buffeting outside.

  I gave "Pisco" his course for the first leg in by the lights of the bigsugar central, and then, as we opened up the inner bay, gave him abearing on the notch--barely guessable against the overcast west--wherethe old cartroad grade pierced the brow of the cliff. The clouds wereracing overhead and the baffling cross-gusts on the surface would havemade it bad business for a sailing craft. But for a launch the task wasa comparatively simple one. The loom of the old mill was discernibleagainst the darker opacity of the cliff at a couple of hundred yards,and the right-angling lines of the pier at half that distance. As thelatter was sure to have been built of the eternally-lasting _jarra_, Iknew that it would be as solid and serviceable as the day it wasabandoned.

  I had not thought it best to risk dampening Captain Tancred's enthusiasmby confessing that I thought it was a good ten-to-one against my man'sturning up at the rendezvous. Indeed, I could see no grounds whateverfor hoping that Ranga had shaken the pursuit--already at his heels--andwon through to the appointed place. Nothing short of a miracle couldhave compassed it, I told myself. It was on the off chance that themiracle had been wrought that I was keeping my promise.

  "'Bout half a point to sta'boa'd, Tuan. Way nuf now! Steady!" That deeprumbling voice from the darkness was a welcome surprise. "Pisco,"heeding the quiet directions, brought his launch alongside the broadsolid flight of steps as neatly as he would have laid her up to the_Mambare's_ gangway in broad daylight.

  Ranga was coming down the steps--with a slowness which I attributed tothe fact that they were probably very slippery--when I heard a thud onthe deck behind me, such a sound as a heavy, soft bundle thrown downfrom above might have made in striking. A second or two later there wasan ejaculation of astonishment somewhere aft, probably from "Pisco," Ithought, as the words were Spanish. I did not try to puzzle out thepurport of them at the moment, as my attention was occupied with Ranga,who seemed to be hesitating at the last moment about coming aboard.Twice or thrice he drew back his foot from the rail, as though uncertainof his balance. And when the great bulk of him finally did surgeforward, it was with a lurch that took all my strength to check it andprevent his reeling on across the narrow bow and over the other side. Hesteadied himself slowly, with a great intake of breath. "Sorry--maketrouble,--Tuan. Now--I go aft."

  "I am leaving you here, Ranga," I said quickly, for I was gettingnervous about a movement of lights I had observed along the flume in therear of the big sugar mill. "Captain Tancred will look after you on thesteamer, and put you off wherever you want to go. He also has some moneyfor you. Good luck!"

  The big fellow took a long shuddering breath, and when he spoke it wasas though he had rallied himself from a spell of faintness by sheerforce of will. "Some day, Tuan--I pay you back--for all you do. Solong." He turned with painful deliberation and started to edge alongaft. I was a bit surprised that he had not grasped my extended hand, butcould not be sure that he had been aware of it in the dark. It did notoccur to me until afterwards that he had not used his own hands on therail of the stairway in descending, and that he had seemed to shoulderhis way back to the cockpit rather than to grope. I waited until hisswaying shoulders ceased to blot the blinking of the phosphorescent seasastern, and then swung off to the stairs.

  "All clear!" I called softly to "Pisco," as I felt the solid stepunderfoot. "Shove off when you're ready. _Buena fortuna!_"

  It was doubtless "Pisco's" ejaculation in Spanish a few moments before,lurking in the back of my mind, that prompted me to speed the spiritedcoxswain in his own tongue. On the heels of that "_Buena fortuna!_" thewords he had spoken flashed up in my memory. "_Cristo! Porque lamuchacha?_" It could hardly have been a sarcastic dig at Ranga'shesitancy in stepping aboard, I reflected as I mounted theslippery--astonishingly slippery--steps. He would not have expressed itquite that way in that case. A sudden slip in a slimy patch at the headof the steps put an end to conjecture for the moment, and when Iregained my feet the answer was written across the cabin doorway of theturning launch. The lamp inside had--purposely--been turned very low,and the blurred silhouette of the figure that came groping out to whereRanga had collapsed on a cockpit transom might easily have been that ofany one of old "Choppy's" true and tried launch crew. But wet amber silkreflects a deal of light, and there was only one peacock shawl in theworld--or in that neck of the world at least.