Hell's Hatches

by Lewis R. Freeman

  CHAPTER XIX

  AFTER ALL

  I had not planned by what route I should go to the South Seas, and itwas only because an Orient-Pacific liner chanced to be the mostconvenient connection at Brindisi that I went by Australia instead of byIndia and Singapore. I was rather glad, on the whole, that I was goingto have an opportunity to learn something at first-hand of HartleyAllen--or, Sir Hartley, as he had become since I left Australia. Thatmuch I had been able to gather from an item I had read in _The Times_shortly after my arrival in Paris. This stated that Sir James Allen,Bart., Agent in London for New South Wales, had just died of pneumonia.Being without male issue, it was understood that the title would pass tohis younger brother, formerly a well-known racing man, and more recentlyin the public eye through his heroic action in navigating a labourschooner full of plague-stricken blacks through the Great Barrier Reefto Queensland.

  Nothing was said in the local item of the outrage aboard the _CoraAndrews_, but the day following a dispatch from Sydney stated that SirHartley Allen was recovering his health and strength at a sanitarium inthe interior, from which, however, it was not expected that he would bein a condition to be discharged for several months. The shock to hisnervous system from the mysterious attack upon him in Townsville threemonths previously had been so great that only time could obliterate thetraces of it. He had not yet been allowed to see any of his old friends,but the correspondent affirmed on good authority that Sir Hartley'sreason, so long despaired of, had been fully regained.

  From the fact that the attack was still spoken of as "mysterious," Itook it that Allen, for some reason of his own, had refrained fromrevealing the identity of the person who had left him to die lashed tothe wheel of the _Cora_. What that reason might be, was one of thethings I hoped to learn when I should see him in Australia.

  Hartley Allen was still in a sanitarium in the Blue Mountains, I learnedon my arrival in Sydney, but of late there had been little news of him.He was believed to be getting stronger, slowly but surely, though nohope was held out that he would appear in the saddle again for at leastanother season. It was unlikely that I would be permitted to see him,but there would be no harm in trying. I should, of course, communicatewith his physicians, not with Allen himself.

  By a lucky chance, in wiring the head of the institution where Allen wasunder treatment, I stated that I was a former friend of his from theIslands. A reply arrived the same day, telling me to come on at myearliest convenience. The eminent nerve specialist in charge of the casedrove down to meet me at the train. It was very fortunate indeed, hesaid, that I had mentioned in my telegram that I had known Sir Hartleyduring his residence in Melanesia. He had failed, very stupidly, torecognize my name as that of the famous artist who was about to paintSir Hartley's picture when the attack upon him occurred. As aconsequence, he was about to wire a refusal to my application, when herecalled that news from the Islands was the one thing in which hispatient had shown any great interest. Accordingly, he had asked SirHartley himself if he cared to see a certain Roger Whitney, latelyarrived in Sydney. The eager interest manifested by his patient was themost encouraging symptom the latter had shown since his mind hadcleared. If I would carefully refrain from introducing any subjectcalculated to excite Sir Hartley nervously, he was confident that myvisit would be productive of nothing but good. It was even possible,should it prove convenient to me, that he would want me to remain forseveral days. Sir Hartley was quite sound in brain and body. What heneeded was increased vigour of both, and to this end he would have todevelop a greater interest in living than he had yet shown. It was justpossible there was something on his mind....

  After leaving my coat and bag in the reception-room, the doctor led meout across a bright solarium. We would find Sir Hartley out of doors, hesaid, probably playing polo. He seemed to hate the very thought ofhaving a roof over him, even to sleep under. It was a strange sight thatmet my eyes as we came round the corner of the veranda. In the shade ofa grove of blue-gums and stringy-barks a wooden horse had been erected,saddled with a light pigskin, and provided with snaffle and curb reinsrunning back from the angling bit of board that served as "head."Astride the saddle, in the famous short-stirruped "Slant" Allen seat,booted, spurred, and in immaculate whites, slashing smartly atgrass-stained and dented bamboo-root balls that were alternately tossedin and chivied by a pair of bare-footed youngsters, was a familiarfigure. Save for the white hair (which I had already seen) and theabsence of the former coat of tan, he did not, from a distance, appeargreatly changed. It was not until his eyes met mine at close range thatI was conscious of the weary listlessness which, like a bed of ashes,smothered the coals of his old fire.

  Allen had just poked away the first of two successively thrown balls ina sweet-running dribble, and sliced off the other in a sharp-angling"belly cross," when he raised his eyes and caught sight of the doctorand me coming down the steps. Swinging a bit uncertainly out of thesaddle, he came toddling in a swaying childlike trot across the grass.His grip was firmer than I had expected, and the thought flashed throughmy mind that this was the very first time I had ever shaken hands withhim.

  "I've been wondering when you were going to turn up, Whitney," heexclaimed eagerly. "There's something I've been waiting to talk to youabout." He spoke in generalities while the doctor lingered, saying thathe had given up his old idea of returning to the Islands, and that,instead, he was hoping to get away before long to a back-blocks stationhe owned and ride the boundaries for a year or two. But when thespecialist, evidently assured that his experiment was getting under wayproperly, quietly excused himself, Allen led me over to the wooden horseand launched at once into a subject which had doubtless occupied hismind for many days. From ancient habit he leaned, as he spoke, now onthe hollow pigskin of his "pony," now on the flexible Malacca handle ofhis polo mallet.

  "You're the only man in the world I can talk to about this now,Whitney," he said with a queer new quaver of weakness in his voice. "Isuppose that's because you're the only person I ever talked to aboutit--before. I take it, Whitney, that you had no great difficulty inmaking up your mind as to who was responsible for--for my night ofcontemplation on the _Cora_?"

  "Well," I began evasively, "I had such grave doubts about Ranga's guiltthat I went to some little trouble to get him away. Mostly old 'Choppy'Tancred's work, though."

  "Good old 'Choppy'!" said Allen with an appreciative grin; "on hand atthe right time as usual." Then, with serious interest: "But thegirl--how did she manage to get clear?"

  "Just turned up and helped herself to a place in the launch I wassending Ranga off in," I replied, a bit worried at my failure to leadthe conversation away from subjects "calculated to excite Sir Hartleynervously."

  "And you were also convinced of _her_ innocence, I suppose," he said,eyeing me with a strange smile across the leather-bound handle of hismallet.

  "On the contrary," I answered; "I knew that she was guilty. I had takenyour throwing-knife away from her the same night. I knew that Ranga wasquite innocent, even though the police, through a silly ball-up, trackedhim down with their dogs."

  "Then why did you let the girl go?" he pressed.

  "Because I thought I knew Rona well enough," I replied evenly, "to feelsure that she wouldn't have done--what she did, unless she was convincedin her own mind that she had a good reason for it." It was a stiff joltfor a sick man, that; yet, for the life of me, I couldn't have made anevasive answer.

  But there was a smile of untold relief on Allen's face as he leaned overand laid his hand on my arm. "You were right, Whitney," he said in avoice that trembled with the depth of its fervour. "You were right. She_did_ have good reason. I ought to have seen it all along."

  "I don't quite understand," I said, greatly puzzled. "Do you mean thatall you told me about your--your having nothing to do with Bell's deathwas not true?"

  "Not at all," he replied, with unexpected vigour. "Everything that Itold you that afternoon at the _
Australia_ was true--according to myunderstanding of the moment, I mean. But later my understandingbroadened a bit, you must know. A chap doesn't spend a night tied upalone with the spirits of three or four white men, and Gawd knows howmany blacks, without coming to comprehend some things that have eludedhim before. I didn't go all the way off my chump till well along towardmorning, you see; and I was broadening my understanding all the time."

  "I was never able to make out," I remarked somewhat irrelevantly, "howthe girl managed to get the best of you the way she did."

  "Oh, that," he said lightly, in a voice that indicated he rated it as anegligible incidental to the "broader understanding" that had come tohim as a consequence. "Well, I suppose you have a right to know if youare interested in that phase of the affair. I simply got tired ofholding out against the girl, that was all. Her relentlessness wore medown. It was not long after our return to Townsville that I realizedthat her picture stunt was only a blind. She counted on it to get meaway to the schooner, where she could finish me off on the scene of--ofmy offence. I won't need to tell you that hit me jolly hard. Trainingout Yusuf and making a clean-up for Doc Oakes' mission with him helpedwhile it lasted; but I gave up as soon as that was over and there wasnothing to do but wait and brood. Since I knew she'd have her way in theend, I told myself that the sooner it was over the better. That was thereason I finally consented to go off to the schooner with her when shewaylaid me on the north road, the day after I paid you my last visit.

  "She must have planned the whole thing in advance for the place at whichshe intercepted me was at the point where the road ran nearest to thewreck of the _Cora_. As it was low tide, we were able to walk on thesand to within fifty yards of the heeling hulk. Careless of consequencesas I was, I readily enough consented to her suggestion that I wade theremainder of the way, carrying her in my arms. For the rest, it was moreor less of repetition of her little coup at Kai. She pinched the knifefrom my belt while I was wading out with her, keeping it carefully outof sight while we were walking round the deck of the schooner. I missedit presently, but thought it had fallen from its sheath while I wasclambering over the side. Leaning over to look for the knife in thewater, I felt the point of it on my neck. Same old place--just over thejugular. Trick she learned from the Malays.

  "I told her to hurry up and get the job over. She coolly replied thatthis wasn't the place she had had in mind for it, and would I mindcoming aft to the cockpit? Confident that she knew how to do the thingwith decency and dispatch, and heartily glad to get life's fitful dreamover anyhow, I went. Just like a lamb to the slaughter, Whitney. Itsounds foolish, but I assure you that's just the way it happened. Theidea was so fixed in my mind that a plain every-day throat-cutting wasall she was figuring on, that I let her get three or four hitches of thelog-line around my shoulders before it occurred to me that she mighthave a few refinements in pickle. I started to put up a fight at that,trying to force her to use the knife straightaway. Do you think shewould do it? No fear. She wouldn't deviate from her set program by ahair. Rather than risk having the joint jolted into my jugular so that Iwould bleed to death quickly and painlessly, she dropped the knife andused both hands on the log-line. We had a hell of a tussle, Whitney, butshe wore me down. Those three or four well-thrown hitches she had tostart with were too much of a handicap.

  "When she finally had me bound fast, she sat down on the rail of thecockpit to recover her breath. I tried to argue with her, pointing outthe certainty that I would be seen and rescued in the morning if sheleft me as I was; whereas, if she would cut my throat then and there, itwould finish things for good and all. I also reminded her that dead mentell no tales; that she would be much less likely to get into troubleherself if there was no one to bear witness against her. (Fancy a manhaving to rack his brain for arguments like that, just to get his throatcut, Whitney.) The girl admitted the soundness of my contentions, butdeclared she was willing to run all the extra risk for the sake ofcleaning up the job 'good an' propa.' (One of Bell's expressions, that,wasn't it?)

  "Then--I must have begun losing my nerve a bit, I think--I told her Ihad never yet been able to twig why she had a grudge against me at all;said I'd only done for Bell what I'd be jolly glad to have another mando for me under similar circumstances, and probably a lot more twaddlealong the same line. She listened for a while, as though she ratherenjoyed hearing me rattle on in that vein. Then she got up anddisappeared down the half-open companionway. When she came back on deckshe had an empty whisky bottle in her hand, probably one of a stack leftin my cabin. This, with some effort on her part and much to my furtherdiscomfort, she wriggled under the lashings about my chest until sheseemed satisfied it was held securely. Then, binding a filthy gag ofoakum in my mouth, she stood off and looked me over critically. 'Ithe-enk you will twe-ig ver-ee much pu-retty soon, Mista "Slan',"' shefinally chirruped with a knowing nod of her head. Without once lookingback, she stepped to the side, jumped over, and waded ashore. I neversaw her again--in the flesh, I mean. It took a deal of squirming toshake that bottle out. The satisfaction of hearing it break when it hitthe deck was the only comforting thing that happened in the wholenight."

  "And you say that you understand why she did it?--that you believe shewas justified?" I exclaimed incredulously, shuddering at the horror of acold-blooded cruelty that even Allen's deliberately matter-of-factrecital could not obscure.

  "Most assuredly," he replied with an enigmatic smile. "I'm just a bitsurprised that you don't see it yourself, Whitney. It seems to me that achap like you ought not to miss a point like that. But then, you haven'thad a night alone on the _Cora Andrews_ to broaden your understandinglike I have."

  "What was it?" I asked bluntly, completely mystified and not a littleawed.

  "Just this," he answered, growing suddenly serious. "That bottle Ishoved along to Bell the night he died had been partly emptied--by me,of course. Well, the first thought that entered the girl's head, whenshe came across it on the deck near his body, was that he had beendrinking from it. In spite of all my assurances to the contrary, itseems that she was never able to rid her mind of that idea. That was--"

  "But couldn't she see _why_ you offered him the whisky?" I interrupted."What if he did drink some of it? She must have known it was the onething that would have saved his life."

  "Ah, that is just where you miss the point, Whitney," he cried. "Andthat was just where I always missed it until--she showed me the way to abroader understanding. Don't you see that Rona realized that keepingaway from whisky, as he had sworn he would, had come to mean more toBell than even a new lease on life? Well, she did. But, even so, onewould hardly have expected her to fall in with the idea. And yet, don'ther actions prove that she even did that? Whitney, I've never comeacross anything comparable to the straight physical passion of those twofor each other. And, if anything, hers was the hotter flame of the two.There must have been something of the impetuousness of her rages in herloving,--for.... Well, the most maddening of all the thoughts I tried solong to stifle in Kai was the one that those frequent welts andabrasions appearing on Bell's neck and cheeks and arms were not from thebites of no-nos or mosquitoes. And yet, loving his body like that, sheloved his soul enough more to be willing to give up the body that thesoul might pass in peace. It was because she thought I had intervened todestroy that peace of soul, Whitney, that she--well, the effect of itwas to pave the way to my broader understanding."

  THE END

  WOODS & SONS, LTD., PRINTERS, LONDON, N. 1.

  Transcriber Notes:

  Passages in italics were indicated by _underscores_.

  Small caps were replaced with ALL CAPS.

  Throughout the document, the [oe] ligature was replaced with "oe".

  Throughout the dialogues, there were words used to mimic accents ofthe speakers. Those words were retained as-is.

  Errors in punctuation and inconsistent hyphenation were not correctedunless otherwise noted.


  On page 34, "dispayed" was replaced with "displayed".

  On page 67, "skin-kicking" was replaced with "shin-kicking".

  On page 74, an apostrophe was added in 'Slan'.

  On page 102, "Ulupua" was replaced with "Utupua".

  On page 159, a period was added after "he was going through".

  On page 176, "its" was replaced with "it's".

  On page 188, a quotation mark was added before "On the off chance".

  On page 203, "at the botton" was replaced with "at the bottom".

  On page 205, "twentyfive" was replaced with "twenty-five".

  On page 233, "back of the easel" was replaced with "back off the easel".

  On page 238, "in no may" was replaced with "in no way".

  On page 241, "ejaculted" was replaced with "ejaculated".

  On page 246, "Marbare" was replaced with "Mambare".

  On page 282, "firsthand" was replaced with "first-hand".

  On page 285, "listnessness" was replaced with "listlessness".