Lee Falk - [Story of the Phantom 10]

by The Goggle-Eyed Pirates (v0. 9) (epub)

  How It All Began

  Over four hundred years ago, a large British merchantman was attacked by Singg pirates off the remote shores of Bangalla. The captain of the trading vessel was a famous seafarer who, in his youth, had served as cabin boy to Christopher Columbus on his first voyage to discover the New World. With the captain was his son, Kit, a strong young man who idolized his father and hoped to follow him as a seafarer. But the pirate attack was disastrous. In a furious battle, the entire crew of the merchantman ivm killed and the ship sank in flames. The sole survivor was young Kit who, as he fell off the burning ship, saw his father killed by a pirate. Kit was washed ashore, half-dead. Friendly pygmies found him and nursed him to health.

  One day walking on the beach, he found a dead pirate dressed in his father’s clothes. He realized this was the pirate who had killed his father. Grief-stricken, he waited until vultures had stripped the body clean. Then on the skull of his fathers murderer, he swore an oath by firelight as the friendly pygmies watched. “I swear to devote my life to the destruction of piracy, greed, cruelty, and injustice, and my sons and their sons shall follow me.”

  This was the Oath of the Skull that Kit and his descendants would live by. In time, the pygmies led him to their home in Deep Woods in the center of the jungle where he found a large cave with many rocky chambers. The mouth of the cave, a natural formation carved by the water and wind of centuries, was curiously like a skull. This became his home, the Skull Cave. He soon adopted a mask and a strange costume. He found that the mystery and fear this inspired helped him in his endless battle against world-wide piracy. For he and his sons who followed became known as the nemesis of pirates everywhere, a mysterious man whose face no one ever saw, whose name no one knew, who worked alone.

  As the years passed, he fought injustice wherever he found it. The first Phantom and the sons who followed found their wives in many places. One married a reigning queen, one a princess, one a beautiful red-haired barmaid. But whether queen or commoner, all followed their men back to the Deep Woods, to live the strange but happy life of the wife of the Phantom. And of all the world, only she, wife of the Phantom, and their children could see his face..

  Generation after generation was born, grew to manhood, and assumed the tasks of the father before him. Each wore the mask and costume. Folk of the jungle and the city and sea began to whisper that there was a man who could not die, a Phantom, a Ghost Who Walks. For they thought the Phantom toas always the same man. A boy who saw the Phantom would see him again fifty years after; and he seemed the same. And he would tell his son and his grandson; and his son and grandson would see the Phantom fifty years after that. And he would seem the same. So the legend grew. The Man Who Cannot Die. The Ghost Who Walks. The Phantom.

  The Phantom did not discourage this belief in his immortality. Always working alone against tremendous—sometimes almost impossible—odds, he found that the awe and fear the legend inspired was a great help in his endless battle against evil. Only his friends, the pygmies, knew the truth. These tiny people, to compensate for their stature, mixed deadly poisons for use on their weapons in hunting or defense. But it was rare that they were forced to defend themselves. Their deadly poisons were known through the jungle, and they and their home, the Deep Woods, were dreaded and avoided. There was another reason to stay away from the Deep Woods— it soon became known that this was a home of the Phantom, and none wished to trespass.

  Through the ages, the Phantoms created several more homes or hideouts in various parts of the world. Near the Deep Woods was the Isle of Eden, where the Phantom taught, all animals to live in peace. In the southwest desert of the New World, the Phantoms created an aerie on a high sheer mesa that was thought by the Indians to be haunted by evil spirits and became known as Walkers Table—for The Ghost Who Walks. In Europe, deep in the crumbling cellar of the ruins of an ancient castle, the Phantom had another hideout from which to strike against evildoers.

  But the Skull Cave in the quiet of the Deep Woods remained the true home of the Phantom. Here, in a rocky chamber, he kept his chronicles, written records of all his adventures. Phantom after Phantom faithfully wrote his experiences in the large folio volumes. Another chamber contained the costumes of all the generations of Phantoms. Other chambers contained the vast treasures of the Phantom, acquired over centuries, used only in the endless battle against evil.

  Thus, twenty generations of Phantoms lived, fought, and died, usually violently, as they followed their oath. Jungle folk, sea folk, and city folk believed him the same man, the Man Who Cannot Die. Only the pygmies knew that always a day would come when their great friend would lie dying. Then, alone, a strong young son would carry his father to the burial crypt of his ancestors where all Phantoms rested. As the pygmies waited outside, the young man would emerge from the cave, wearing the mask, the costume, and the Skull Ring of the Phantom; his carefree happy days as the Phantom’s son were over. And the pygmies would chant their age-old chant, “The Phantom is dead. Long live the Phantom ”

  This story of the Goggle-Eyed Pirates is an adventure of the Phantom of our time—the twenty-first generation of his line. He has inherited the traditions and responsibilities created by four centuries of Phantom ancestors. One ancestor created the Jungle Patrol. Thus, today, our Phantom is the mysterious and un-known commander of this elite corps. In the jungle he is known and loved as the Keeper of the Peace. On his right hand is the Skull Ring that leaves his mark—the Sign of the Skull—known and feared by evildoers everywhere. On his left hand—closer to the heart—is his “good mark” ring. Once given, the mark grants the lucky bearer protection by the Phantom, and it is equally known and respected. And to good people and criminals alike—in the jungle, on the seven seas, and in the cities of the world—he is the Phantom, the Ghost Who Walks, the Man Who Cannot Die.

  Lee Falk New York, 1973

  CHAPTER 1

  She didn’t suspect anything.

  The darkening waters of the Atlantic stretched calmly in every direction, a luxurious peacefulness was settling down on the Lido Deck of the S.S. Paradiso as twilight approached. Only a single swimmer remained at the deck pool. The board thwacked as the man made a final dive.

  Diana Palmer sat alone at a round plastic-topped table in the Lido Cocktail Lounge, sipping absently at her one gin and tonic of the afternoon. A slim, pretty, dark-haired girl, she was looking through the full-length blue-tinted window, not at the swimming pool but at the ocean beyond.

  Mawitaan is over in that direction, she thought to herself. We should see her lights in a few hours.

  Mawitaan, the next stop for this cruise finer, was a large port town and the capital of Bangalla.

  A blender began to whir behind the bar. The pudgy pink-faced man who was leaning on the bar, said, chuckling, “So that’s how you make one of those drinks, huh?”

  I hope he’ll be able to meet me, Diana thought. Well, let’s keep our fingers crossed.

  The only other people in the lounge were a young Dutch couple, newlyweds, very blond and tanned. The girl sat watching her husband, stirring her drink without looking down at it. On her wrist was a large diamond bracelet. As the soft orange lights came on, the circle of bright stones flashed for an instant.

  “Hey, now, that tastes good, great!” exclaimed the pudgy, pink man at the bar. “You ought to come back to Detroit, Michigan, and teach the bartenders at the Sheraton-Cadillac Hotel a few tricks.” He took another slurping sip. “What’s your name, anyhow?”

  “Peter, sir,” replied the mustached bartender.

  “Peter what?”

  “Maresca, Peter Maresca, sir.”

 
; “Glad to know you, Pete ... is that what they call you, Pete?*

  “No, sir. Peter.”

  “Okay, then, Peter. My name is Harlan Brupp. Kind of a funny name, I admit, but I guess I’m stuck with it.”

  Placing her glass on the table, Diana gathered up her handbag and scarf and left the room.

  Night was closing in. The water already seemed black, the spray of the liner’s wake a pale gray.

  Diana stood at the rail for several minutes. She had her eyes narrowed, trying to spot the first lights of Mawitaan. “Too soon, I guess,” she said to herself. “I know he’ll be there. He said he would, unless something urgent came up.”

  She turned away from the rail, found the stairwell, and climbed down the metal steps. Her cabin was two levels down, on the boat deck. Aboard the S.S. Paradiso that was called the Dante Deck, each deck being named after an eminent Italian.

  Of course, Diana reflected as she descended, in his life a good many emergencies do come up, but... no, I’m sure he’ll be there to meet me.

  Diana’s cabin, T-43, was an outside one on the port side. As she neared the door of the room, the door of T-51 opened.

  Out stepped Brian Folkestone, a long, lean young man. “Good evening, Miss Palmer,” he said, grinning. He had a pleasant outdoor face and sandy hair worn relatively short.

  “Looking forward to Mawitaan?” she asked, inserting her key.

  “Not especially, no,” he replied. “Frankly, the part of these ocean cruises I like best is when you are out in the middle of the vast unlimited sea with nothing at all about. You know, something of that ‘water, water, everywhere’ feeling.” He grinned again. “Of course, when one has had the unfortunate privilege of growing up in Liverpool, one can never think completely kindly thoughts about any harbor town.”

  “Coming from the Midwestern United States,” said Diana, “I’m still not jaded, I guess. And besides. . . She let the sentence trail off unfinished.

  “Besides you’re meeting someone important to you in Mawitaan,” the blond young man finished for her.

  “How’d you know that ?

  His grin flashed wider. ‘Just another sample of the fabled Folkestone perceptiveness, Miss Palmer. You have a look about you indicating you’re going to be met. And I’ve noticed during the day that whenever Mawitaan was mentioned, you got a special sort of look in your eyes.”

  “I didn’t realize I was so obvious.”

  “Only to someone with the fabled Folkestone perception,” he said. “Would you allow me to have a drink with you, Miss Palmer? It’s probably my last chance.”

  “Thanks, but I’m just coming back from one of the cocktail lounges,” said the dark-haired girl. “And I have some things to take care of before dinner. But perhaps after dinner and before we dock?”

  After a second, Folkestone said, “Yes, let’s do that.

  . I’ll find you then.” Giving her a final grin, he went striding off down the pale-blue corridor.

  Diana’s nose wrinkled slightly as she pushed open the door of her cabin. A faint scent lingered in the corridor, a mingling of lemon and sandalwood. The aftershave Folkestone always wore.

  “He’s a little generous with it, maybe,” Diana mumbled to herself. She closed the door, crossed to the square porthole, and looked into the night.

  Still no sign of the shore lights of Mawitaan.

  Peter, the Lido Deck bartender, went walking down the corridor which led from the rear of the lounge to the radio room. On his upturned palm rested a tray which held a can of cola and a plastic glass full of shaved ice. He knocked on the door of the communications room, humming under his breath.

  “Yq,” called out a voice inside.

  Peter pushed into the room. “I don’t see how you can drink this stuff night after night. ’

  The redheaded, freckled radioman was sitting in a squeaky swivel chair in front of his equipment. “Hard liquor makes me dizzy.” He grabbed the can off the tray and yanked the opening tab.

  Peter handed him the glass, swung the now empty

  tray up under his arm. He leaned against a pale-blue wall. “Some guy told me this afternoon I’d like it in the United States.”

  “Didn’t you inform him you hailed from Newark?”

  Peter shrugged. “People expect something more romantic than that on a cruise. I told him I lived in Milan.”

  The door swung suddenly open. “Surprise ” announced a fluty falsetto voice.

  The two men turned toward the door.

  A tall figure in a long tan caftan stood there. He held a .38 revolver in his gloved right hand. A stocking mask had been pulled Over his head, a mask with a wide toothy grin painted on it. Covering his eyes were a pair of thick goggles.

  “What is this?” asked the radioman, the soft drink can still bubbling in his hand.

  “What the hell do you think it is?” asked the goggle-eyed figure. “It’s piracy on the high seas, lads.”

  After ordering both of them over against the far wall, the figure proceeded to smash the radio-sending equipment with a crowbar he’d brought along for the purpose.

  CHAPTER 2

  The captain of the S.S. Paradiso was a small curly-haired man who could never seem to shave quite close enough. It was his nightly habit, before dinner, to stroll down to the galley on the foyer deck of his liner and inspect the pastry carts. If he noticed something especially nice, he’d have it set aside.

  As he came along an empty corridor on the starboard side of the ship, someone hailed him from behind. “There you are, Cap. Just can’t curb that sweet tooth of yours, eh?”

  Turning, the captain found himself facing a tall robed figure with a grinning mask and tinted goggles. “Who-?”

  “What is the more appropriate question, Cap,” said the figure in his high-pitched voice. He pointed a snubnosed .32 at the captain. “What I am is a pirate.”

  “Pirate? How—?”

  “How’s a good question, but not one I’m going to answer,” piped the masked pirate. “Now, I’d like you to trot along with me to the ship’s safes. You’re going to open them wide. And step lively, Cap, we’re on a very tight schedule.”

  “You can’t...

  “Sure, we can.” He pushed the revolver up close to the captain’s face.

  The lovely blonde Dutch girl finished zipping up her black dress and reached toward the dressing table for her bracelet.

  “Drop it in the bag instead, sweet.”

  The girl spun, gasping. “Get out of herel Piet!”

  The goggle-eyed pirate standing in the opened doorway of the cabin held a brown plastic garbage bag in one gloved hand, a .45 automatic in the other. “Don’t pay any attention to her, Piet,” he said in his falsetto voice. “It’ll only—”

  The husband came barging out of the bathroom, a shaggy white ship towel wrapped around his middle. “What’s going on here?” .

  “That’s easy to answer,” replied the looter. I'm collecting everybody’s valuables. Drop that bracelet in the bag now, please, madam. Then toss in everything from that lovely jewel case of yours. You, Piet, can contribute all the cash in your wallet and that watch on the table there. It looks expensive enough to bother with.”

  “I will not.” Piet came charging at the tall robed figure.

  Casually, the masked pirate swung out with his gun hand. The blow cracked across the blond young man’s cheek and nose.

  He took a wavering step sideways, his feet tangling with each other, then fell to his knees.

  His wife cried out.

  The pirate aimed his gun at the fallen man’s head. “Hurry up with those jewels, sweet, or I’ll do more than simply slap your new hubby around.”

  “Yes, yes, very well.” Shaking, her tanned face now a brownish gray, the girl did what she was asked. “There,” she said when her black jewel case was upended over the waiting plastic bag.

  “Money from the wallet, too, remember?”

  “Yes, all right, here.”

  “Th
ank you most kindly, ma’am.” The pirate backed out into the corridor.

  Later, when the passengers and the liner s officers got together to talk about what had happened, everyone was certain there were at least a hundred of the grinning goggle-eyed pirates involved in the looting of the S.S. Paradiso.

  Actually, they did it all with one man under two dozen. But they did it swiftly and efficiently, following a carefully worked-out plan, a plan which was a variation of the one which had served them well on two previous and highly successful occasions.

  The pirates managed to clean out the ship’s safes, knock out the radios, lock up the crew, control the engine room, and steal the money and valuables of nearly five hundred of the ship’s fourteen hundred passengers. In this latter looting, they restricted themselves to the most expensive decks.

  Diana was still in her cabin, working on a letter to her Uncle Dave, when her turn came.

  “Handbag, please, miss, and billfold,” suggested the robed figure who stepped across the threshold. “Hurry it up if you will. I’m running almost six minutes behind schedule.” His voice was high, piping, like an animated cartoon character.

  “I didn’t know we were having a costume ball this trip.” The dark-haired girl set aside her fountain pen.

  Td truly love to tarry and exchange quips, miss, but it’s not in the plan,” the goggled pirate told her. He gestured with his .38 revolver. “Clean out your handbag and drop the money in this plastic sack if you will. And I think we can use that watch on your wrist.”

  “You’re really serious?’

  “Oh, very much so. Please hurry, I shouldn’t like to have to knock you out.”

  “No, I suppose that would take even more time.” Standing, she earned her puree over to the sack the pirate held in his left hand. “Looks like you’re doing pretty well.”

  The bag was nearly a third full of money and jewelry. “Yes, there’s a pretty affluent crowd of passengers aboard.”

  Diana took out her money clip, dropping the cash from it into the bag. Then she unfastened her watch and added that. “You don’t actually expect to bring this off, do you?”