by Max Brand
CHAPTER 36
"This man Campbell," said Harrigan, "he's a true man, McTee, and hestood up to White Henshaw for my sake--for the sake of me and hisBobbie Burns. They plan to take him to hell tomorrow, Angus, and I'vean idea that there's one chance in the thousand that I could steal inon the dogs tonight and bring him back with me."
"Can they do anything worse to him than they're doing to us?"
"Maybe not, but my heart would lie easier, McTee. I'll wait for thefever o' the sun to go out of me head an' for the crew to get drunk an'a little drunker."
So they waited while the noise of the nightly carousal waxed high andhigher, and then died away by slow degrees. At length Harrigan stoodup, gripped the hand of McTee in silent farewell, heard a whispered"Good luck!" and slipped noiselessly down the ladder and started acrossthe deck in the shadow of the rail. From any portion of the main cabineyes might be watching him; there was only the one chance in ten thatthe lookout whom Hovey had certainly stationed would not perceive himas he crept along under the shadow. Accordingly he went blindlyforward.
If the lookout saw him, at least there was no outcry, no general alarm.He stood flat against the wall of the main cabin at length andrehearsed a plan, listening the while to the lapping of the wavesagainst the side of the ship. Then he stole step by step up the ladderto the upper deck. His head was already above the ladder when he heardthe light padding of a bare foot and saw a figure around the corner ofthe cabin.
Harrigan ducked out of sight and clung to the iron rounds ready to leapup and strike if the sailor should descend the ladder, though in thatcase the alarm would be given and his errand spoiled; but the sailorwas apparently the lookout set there by Hovey. He stayed at the head ofthe ladder a moment, humming to himself, and then turned and walked onhis beat to the other side of the ship. Harrigan slipped onto the deckand ran noiselessly to the side of the cabin. Here he flattened himselfagainst the wall until the sentinel had again made the turn of hisbeat, and as the latter moved dimly out of sight through the darkness,the Irishman stole down the deck toward the forward cabins.
The first two windows showed dark and empty; if there were anyoneinside, he must be asleep in the drunken torpor into which most of thecrew seemed to have fallen. The door of the third room, formerlyoccupied by the second mate, stood ajar, and here by the dull light ofan oil lantern, he saw Campbell tied hand and foot to a chair. He wasplaced close to a little table whereon sat a bottle of whisky, a siphonof seltzer, a tall glass, meat, bread, water--everything, in fact, withwhich the senses of the starving man could be tormented. And near him,sitting with elbows spread out on the edge of the table, was one of thefiremen, grinning continually as if he had just heard some monstrousjoke. The expression of Campbell was just as fixed, for his small eyesshifted eagerly, swiftly, from the food to the water, and back again.
The fireman--the same tall, gaunt fellow who had demanded that Hoveyturn over Campbell to him and his companions that day--now leanedforward and raised a dipper of water from a bucket which sat on thefloor, and allowed it to trickle back, splashing with what seemed toHarrigan the sweetest music in the world. Hovey must have taught himthat trick, and its effect upon Campbell was worse than the beating ofthe whips. The fireman let his head roll loosely back as he laughed,and while his head was still back and his eyes squinting shut in theecstasy of his delight, Harrigan leaped from the shadow of the door andstruck at the throat--at the great Adam's apple which shook with thelaughter. The blow must have nearly broken the man's neck. His headjerked forward with a whistling gasp of breath, and as he reached forthe knife on the table, Harrigan struck again, this time just behindthe ear. The man slid from his chair to the floor and lay in a queerheap--as if all the bones in his body were broken.
"Harrigan! Harrigan! Harrigan!" Campbell was whispering over and over,but still his eyes held like those of a starved wolf on the food. Themoment his ropes were cut, he buried his teeth in the great chunk ofroasted meat.
Harrigan jerked him away and held him by main force.
"Be a man!" he whispered. "We've got to take this food and this waterback to the wireless house--if we can get there with it. Take hold ofyourself, Campbell!"
The engineer nodded. Voices came close down the deck; instantlyHarrigan jerked up the glass globe which protected the lantern's flameand blew out the light. They crouched shoulder to shoulder.
"I thought he was in here," said a voice at the door.
"He was," answered Hovey's voice, "but I guess they took him below--they said it was too cool for him up there. Ha, ha, ha!"
Their steps disappeared down the deck. After that Harrigan dared notshow a light in the cabin window. He and Campbell located the meat andbread, which were given into the engineer's keeping, while Harrigantook the bucket of water. They slipped out onto the deck and hurriedaft, keeping close to the side of the cabin, for the starlight wouldshow their figures to any watchful eyes. At the rear edge of the cabinHarrigan halted Campbell and whispered: "There's a guard here. I gotpast him in the dark, but two of us loaded down like this can never gounseen down that ladder. We've got to get rid of him."
And he pulled out the knife which he had kept with him ever since theoutbreak of the mutiny. They waited without daring to draw breath untilthe sailor came padding by with his naked feet. Harrigan crept outbehind him, and when the sailor turned at the rail, the Irishman leapedin and struck, not with the blade, but with the haft of the knife; hecould not kill from behind.
If it had been a solid blow, the sailor would have crumpled silently asthe fireman had done a few moments before, but the impact glanced andmerely cut his scalp as it knocked him down. He fell with a shout whichwas instantly answered from the front of the ship.
"Down the ladder! Run for it!" cried Harrigan to Campbell, and as theengineer clambered down, he stood guard above.
The sailor leaped up from the deck and lunged with a knife gleaming inhis hand, but Harrigan slashed him across the arm, and he fled howlinginto the dark. Before Hovey and his men could reach the spot, Harriganhad climbed down the ladder with his precious bucket and was fleeingaft to the wireless house.
As he reached it, lights were showing from the main cabin, and therewere choruses of yells announcing the discovery that Campbell wasmissed. But Harrigan and the rest of the fugitives scarcely heard thesounds. The Irishman was busy measuring as carefully as he could in thedark dippers of water which the others drank.
There was no sleep that night, partly from fear lest the infuriatedmutineers should at last attempt to rush the wireless house, partlybecause they ate sparingly but long of the meat which Harrigan carvedfor them, and the bread, and partly also because of a singular odorwhich they had not noticed when they were tortured by thirst andhunger, and which now they observed for the first time. It waspeculiarly pungent and heavy with a sickening suggestion of sweetnessabout it. None of them could describe it, saving Harrigan, who had beenmuch in the country and likened the odor to the smell of an old strawstack which lay molding and rotting.
It seemed to increase--that smell--during the night, probably becausetheir strength was returning and all their senses grew more acute. Itwas a torrid night, without moon, so that the blanket of dark pressedthe heat down upon them and seemed to stifle the very breath.
With the coming of the first light of the dawn they noticed a peculiarphenomenon. Perhaps it was because of the evaporation of water underthe fire of the sun, but the _Heron_ seemed to be surrounded with awhite vapor which rose shimmering in the slant rays of the morning. Buteven when the sun had risen well up in the sky, the vapor was stillvisible, clinging like a wraith about the ship. They wondered idly uponit, and wondered still more at the heat, which was now intense. Theywere interrupted in their conjectures by the call of Kate summoningthem to the wireless house where Henshaw lay apparently at the lastgasp.
He had altered marvelously in the past two days. That resemblance whichhe had always had to a mummy was now oddly intensified, for the cheekswere fallen, the neck w
ithered to scarcely half its former size, theeyes sunk in purple hollows. He murmured without ceasing, his voice nowrising hardly above a low whisper. Kate sat beside him, passing herhands slowly over his temples, for he complained of a fire risingwithin his brain.
His complaints died away under her touches, and he said at last, calmlybut very, very faintly: "Beatrice, there is one thing I have not yettold you."
"Yes?" she asked gently, though she averted her eyes, for all the longhours he had filled with the stories of his crimes upon earth werepoured into the ear of the spirit of his Beatrice, as he thought. Onelast and crowning atrocity was yet to be told.
"I have left out the greatest thing of all."
He paused to smile at the memory.
"You remember Samson's death, Beatrice? And how he pulled the housedown on the shoulders of his enemies?"
"Yes."
"That was a wonderful way to die--wonderful! But I, Beatrice, look atme, child!--I have surpassed Samson! Listen! You will wonder and youwill admire when you hear it! When I got the word that you were dead, Iknew two things: first, that the prophecy of my death at sea would cometrue, and secondly that my gold must perish with me. You will neverguess how long I pondered over a way to destroy my gold before I died!You will think I could have simply thrown it into the sea? Yes, but theship was filled with men ready to mutiny, and they were hungry for mywealth. They would never have allowed me to destroy that gold! So Ithought of a way--ah, it was an inspiration!--by which I could destroymy body, my wealth, and the lives of all the mutineers at once. LikeSamson, I would pull the house on the heads of my enemies. Ha, ha, ha!"
His laughter was rather a grimace than a sound.
He went on: "See how cunningly, how carefully I worked! First I blew upthe three lifeboats so that there would be no escape for the crew. ThenI tampered with the dynamo so that it burned out, and they could notsend out a wireless call for help. That touch was the best of all.Well, well! Then I went down into the hold, deep down, and I started afire in the cargo. And then--"
"Oh, my God!" stammered Sloan.
The others were white, but they gestured at Sloan to silence him. Thewhisper continued: "And then I knew that they were done for. The wheatwould not break into a sudden flame, but it would smolder and glow andspread from hour to hour and from day to day. The crew would knownothing of it for a long time. But when they guessed at what washappening, they would open the hatches to fight the fire with water.Then what would happen? Ah, my dear, there was the crowning touch; forwhen they opened the hatches, the current of air would feed the fireand the ship would be instantly in flames. And so they would burn likedogs with water, water all around them, and no boats to put off in--noboats. Ha, ha, ha!"
He choked with his laughter and gasped for breath.
"If it were possible for a bodiless spirit to perish, I should thinkthat I am dying twice, Beatrice. The air is thick--this air of hell!"
He broke off short in his whispering and raised himself suddenly to anelbow. With the coming of death his voice grew strong and rang clearly:"They are in the corners--they are coming closer! Beatrice! Brush themaway with your fingers as cold as snow. Beatrice, oh, my dear!"
And he was dead as he fell back on the bunk.
Sloan was already on the deck outside the wireless house, shriekingwith all the power of his lungs: "Fire! Fire! The wheat in the hold!"