Algernon Adonis Percival, civil and mining engineer, Cornell, had gone through certain rather harsh stages of development in the mines of Montana and later in the perilous districts of Northern Mexico. A year or two prior to the breaking out of the great World War, he was sent to South America to replace the general superintendent of a new copper-mining enterprise in a remote section of the Andes, on the Bolivian side of the mountains. Here he was in charge of the heterogeneous horde of miners, labourers, structural workers and assayists who were engaged in the development and extension of the vast concession controlled by his company.
His description of the camp or town in which this motley assemblage dwelt from one year's end to the other, far from civilization, was illuminating to the two sea-faring men. It must be confessed, however, that a sound reluctance to swallow the tale without the proverbial grain of salt caused them to watch closely for the slightest sign that might reveal to them the always-to-be expected and seldom successful duplicity so common in those harrowing days when all men were objects of suspicion. From time to time they glanced inquiringly at each other, but the stranger's story was so straightforward, so lacking in personal exploitation, so free from unnecessary detail, that they were finally convinced that he was all that he represented himself to be and that they had nothing to fear from him.
His long, hazardous journey by horse through the passes down into the forests and jungles, out upon the endless, sparsely settled pampas, and eventually into the remote village that witnessed the passing every second day of a primitive and far from dependable railway train, was presented with agreeable simplicity and conciseness. He passed briefly over what might have been expanded into grave experiences, and at last came, so to speak, to the gates of the city, unharmed, resolute and full of the fire that knows no quenching.
“By the way,” observed the Captain, still wary, “has it occurred to you we may be justified in suspecting that you deserted your post up there in the hills, and that you have betrayed the confidence of your employers?” Percival had completed what he evidently believed to be a full and satisfactory account of himself.
“I was in full charge up there, Captain Trigger. My contract had but a month more to run. I appointed my own successor, and the company will not be any the worse off for the change. My letter to headquarters, announcing my decision not to renew the contract, went forward two weeks before I left the camp. I merely anticipated the actual termination of my contract by a month or so, and as I handed my resignation at once to my own newly appointed superintendent, I submit that I acted in absolute good faith. I may say that he accepted it without a word of protest, sir. As a matter of fact, I told him in advance that I wouldn't appoint him unless he agreed to accept my resignation.”
The Captain smiled at this ingenuous explanation.
“I daresay I ought to put you under guard, Mr. Percival,” he said. “My duty is very plain. A stowaway is a stowaway, no matter how you look at him. The regulations do not leave me any choice. Maritime justice is rarely tempered by mercy. However, under the circumstances, I am inclined to accept your word of honour that you will not violate your parole if I refrain from putting you in irons. Have I your word of honour that you will not leave this ship until I hand you over to the proper authorities in the United States?”
“You have, sir.”
“You are a very head-strong, ambitious young man. You will not jump overboard and try to beat us into port under your own steam?”
“You may trust me, sir, never to give up the ship.”
“And you will kill as many Germans as possible?”
“Yes, sir,” said A. A. Percival submissively.
Captain Trigger arose and extended his hand.
“I've never done anything like this before in all my years as ship's master. You ought to be flogged and stowed away in the brig until you show a properly subdued spirit, young man. I suppose you've heard of the cat-o'-nine-tails?”
“My reading up to the age of fifteen was confined almost exclusively to the genteel histories of pirates, buccaneers and privateersmen, Captain Trigger,” announced A. A. Percival, taking the master's hand in a firm grip. “I wonder if you know what a black-snake whip is, or a cattle-adder? Well, they're both painful and convincing. As director of morals in the camp I have just left behind me, it was my official duty on frequent occasions to see to it that current offenders had from fifteen to fifty applications of the black-snake in a public sort of way. The black-snake, I may explain, could be wielded by a strong but unskilled arm. It was different, however, with the cattle-adder. That had to be handled by an expert, one who could stand off twenty paces, more or less, and crack the long lash with such astonishing precision that the tip end of it barely touched the back of the culprit, the result being a nobby assortment of splotches that looked for all the world like hives after the blood got back into them again. You see, I was chief magistrate, executioner ex-officio, chief of police, jury commissioner—in fact, an all-around potentate. Sort of Pooh-bah, you know. For serious offences, such as wife beating, wife stealing, or having more than one wife at a time, we were not so lenient. The offender, on conviction, was strung up by the thumbs and used as a target by amateurs who desired to become proficient in the use of the cattle-adder. Murderers were attended to a trifle more expeditiously. They were strung up by the neck.”
“Good God, man,—do you mean to say you hung men in that off-hand fashion?” cried Captain Trigger, aghast.
“Not without a fair trial, sir. No innocent man was ever hung. There was no such thing as circumstantial evidence in that camp. The guilty man was always taken red-handed. We had good laws and they were rigidly enforced. There was no other way, sir. Short, sharp and decisive. It's the best way. Men understand that sort of thing and honest men approve of the method. You see, gentlemen, we had a hard lot of characters to deal with. I wish to add, however, that before I had been up there six months we had a singularly law-abiding and self-respecting camp. Crime was not tolerated, not even by the men who had once been criminals. If two men quarrelled, they were allowed to fight it out fairly and squarely in any way they could agree upon. Knives, hatchets and all other messy weapons were barred. It was either fists, pistols or rifles at a fairly long range, and under the strictest rules. Duels were fought according to Hoyle, and were witnessed by practically every one in camp. You will perceive that Copperhead Camp was no place for a coward or a bluffer or a bully. It takes a brave man to fight a duel with a chap who may be only half as big as he is, but who can shoot like the devil. So you see, Captain Trigger, the cat-o'-nine-tails has no terror for me.”
Mr. Mott regarded the young man with wide-open, somewhat incredulous eyes.
“You don't look like a fire-eating, swashbuckling party to me,” he said.
“I am the most peaceable chap you've ever seen, Mr. Mott. You needn't be alarmed. I'm not going to bite a hole in the ship and scuttle her. Moreover, I am a very meek and lowly individual on board this ship. There's a lot of difference between being in supreme command with all kinds of authority to bolster you up and being a rat in a trap as I am now. Up in Copperhead Camp I was a nabob, here I'm a nobody. Up there I was the absolute boss of five or six hundred men,—I won't say I could boss the women,—and I made 'em all walk chalk without once losing step. There were murderers and crooks, blacklegs and gunmen in my genial aggregation, men whose true names we never knew, men who were wanted in every part of the civilized world. The only place on earth, I suppose, where they could feel reasonably at home was in that gosh-awful nowhere that we called Copperhead Camp. You can't handle such men with mittens. And there were good men there as well,—good, strong, righteous men. They were the leaven that made the whole thing palatable. Without them I could have had no authority. But I dare say I am boring you. The present situation is the one we're interested in, not the lordly past of your humble and, I trust, obedient servant.”
His smile was most engaging, but back of it the two seamen read strength, decision, integrity. The gay, bantering, whilom attitude of this unusual young man was not assumed. It was not a pose. He was not a dare-devil, nor was he a care-free, unstable youth who had matured abruptly in the exercise of power. On the contrary, he was,—and Captain Trigger knew it,—the personification of confidence, an optimist to whom victory and defeat are equally unavoidable and therefore to be reckoned as one in the vast scheme of human endeavour; a fighter who merely rests on his arms but never lays them down; a spirit that absorbs the bitters and the sweets of life with equal relish.
Captain Trigger was not slow in making up his mind. This clean-minded, clean-bodied American with the confident though respectful smile, was a chap after his own heart.
“I hardly know what to do with you, Percival,” he said, a scowl of genuine perplexity in his eyes. “You are not an ordinary transgressor. You are a gentleman. You have exercised an authority perhaps somewhat similar to my own,—possibly in some respects your position up there was even more autocratic, if I may use the term. I am not unconscious of all this, and yet I have no choice other than that designated by law. The regulations are unalterable. It is a matter of morale, pure and simple. We are compelled to treat all stowaways alike. Of course, I shall not subject you to the ordinary—shall we say methods of—”
“Pardon me, Captain,” broke in the young man, his smile no longer in evidence; “I am asking no favours. I expect to be treated as an ordinary stowaway. Set me to work at anything you like and I will make as good a job of it as possible.”
“I was about to suggest that you serve as a sort of assistant to Mr. Codge, the purser. I've no doubt he could find something for you to do and—”
“If that is your way of punishing me, Captain Trigger, of course there is nothing for me to do but to submit.”
“Eh? I am sure you will not find Mr. Codge a hard taskmaster. He is quite a good-natured man.”
“Extremely kind and considerate,” hastily added Mr. Mott, reassuringly.
“But I don't want to loaf my passage home,” protested Percival. “I want to be sentenced to the hardest sort of labour, if you don't mind. I don't want to owe this steamship company a penny when I step ashore. It is your duty, sir, as master of this ship, to put me on the meanest job you've got.”
“My word!” exclaimed Captain Trigger.
“I'm blessed!” said Mr. Mott.
“Up where I've been running things and cock-walking like a foreman in a shirt-waist factory, I made the rules and I enforced them. I want to say to you that no favours were shown. If the Prince of Wales had drifted in there, dead broke, and asked for something to eat, he would have got it, but you bet your life he'd have had to work for it. A tramp's a tramp, no matter how much purple he's been used to, and you can say the same for a stowaway. What's the matter with me taking the place of one of those deck-hands, or whatever you call 'em, you lost last night?”
“What's that?”
“Swabbers, maybe you call 'em. Men that mop up the decks after everybody else has turned in.”
“What are you talking about?” demanded the Captain, sitting up very straight. Percival stared at him in astonishment.
“I thought you knew about it, of course. Good Lord, sir, don't you know that a couple of your men jumped overboard last night,—or early this morning, rather? Just as the ship was rounding that big headland—”
“Good God, man, are you in earnest?” cried Mr. Mott, starting toward the door.
“I certainly am. I took them for deserters, of course,—not suicides, because they didn't forget to put on life preservers before they jumped. I haven't a doubt they were picked up, so there's no use worrying. A minute or two after they went over,—from the bottom deck or whatever you call it,—I heard a motor boat popping away like a gatling-gun not far,—”
But he was alone. Captain Trigger had dashed out of the cabin in the wake of the First Officer.
Algernon Adonis Percival stared blankly at the open door.
“Good Lord, why all this excitement over a couple of bums?” he said, addressing space. “If they were working for me, I'd thank the Lord to be rid of 'em so cheaply. They—Hello!”
The Second Officer popped into the room.
“Come along with me,” he snapped. “Lively, now. Just where and when did you see a couple of men go overboard? Quietly, now. We don't want to alarm the passengers.”
Within five minutes after Percival's disturbing report, the officers of the Doraine, with set faces, were employed in a swift but silent investigation. Before many more minutes had passed, at least a portion of the stowaway's story had been verified. Two men were found to be missing, although, strange to say, they had not been missed up to the time that noses were counted. They were down on the ship's roster as Norwegians, New York registry, and had come down with the Doraine on her trip from the north.
Percival repeated his story, but had little to add in the way of detail. He had stolen on deck some time after midnight for a breath of air, risking detection, and from the shelter of a secluded corner well aft had heard the two men swabbing the deck below. Suddenly they ceased work, and he prepared to creep back to a place of safety, concluding that they were on their way to the upper deck.
He went to the rail to listen. The two men were almost directly below him, and he could see the upper portions of their figures as they leaned far out over the rail, apparently looking into the swirling waters below. Quite distinctly he heard one of them say, in English: “We got to do it now or never.” The other mumbled something he could not distinguish. He was only mildly interested, not anticipating what was to follow. For a few seconds he heard them scrambling and puffing and then he saw them quite plainly on the rail, their figures bulky with what he identified as life buoys, a faint light from somewhere falling directly upon the grayish-white objects in which they were swathed.
One of them uttered the word “Now!” and to his amazement they shot out, as one man, into the black-ness below. There was a single splash. For a moment or two he stood spell-bound. Then he heard some one running along the deck below. Convinced that the incident had been witnessed by others, he darted into the companion-way and made his way back to the stateroom of the sick passenger. Through the lightless porthole he listened for the terrifying shout, “Man overboard!” It did not come, but his ear caught the staccato beat of a motor near by, striking up abruptly out of the swish of rushing waters. In his ignorance, he decided that it was a boat from the ship going to the rescue of the daring deserters, and calmly waited for the engines of the mighty Doraine to cease their rhythmic pulsing. He fell asleep.
When he awoke, he concluded that he had dreamed the whole thing. This conclusion was justified when he asked his wretched “bunkie” if he had observed him leaving the room during the night. The answer was a mournful negative, followed by the sufferer's more or less positive declaration that he was staring wide awake the whole damned night long.
Percival, unconvinced, boldly made his way to the lower deck and discovered that two life buoys were missing from their supports, a circumstance that put an end to the hope that he had dreamed it all. His own affairs however now loomed large, taking precedence over the plight of the men who had deliberately abandoned the ship. In any case, the ship's officers had done everything that could be done in the matter. He was genuinely astonished to learn that the act of the two men was unknown to the Captain.
A hurried conference of the ship's officers and the commander of the gun-crew resulted in a single but definite conclusion. The desperate, even suicidal manner in which the men left the ship signified but one thing: the absolute necessity of flight before an even more sinister peril confronted them. Not a man on board doubted for an instant that they had taken their chance in the waters as a part of a preconceived plan, and they had taken it with all the devilish hardihood of fanatics.
The presence of the motor craft, so far out from port, lurking with silent engine in the path of the steamship, could have but one significance. It represented one of the carefully thought-out details in a stupendous, far-reaching plot.
If there were signals between the motor boat and the two men aboard the steamship, they were not observed by the lookouts. In all probability no signals were given. The little craft was to be at a certain place at a certain hour,—and she was there! The men who jumped knew that she would be there. A black, tiny speck on the broad expanse of water, sheltered by a night of almost stygian darkness, she lay outside the narrow radius to which visual observation was confined, patiently waiting for the Doraine to pass a designated point. There was to be no miscalculation on the part of either the boat or the men who went over the side of the big steamship into the seething waters.
The closest inquiry among the members of the crew failed to reveal any one who had witnessed the leap of the men. Percival was positive, however, that some one ran along the lower deck, but whether toward or away from the spot where the men went over he had no means of knowing. He offered the suggestion that there were three persons actually involved, and that one of them, more than likely the victim of a coin-flipping decision, had remained on board to complete the work the trio had been chosen to perform, even though death was to be his lot.
The Second Officer had been regarding Percival with ever-growing suspicion.
“Is there anything to prove, young man, that you are not the one who stayed behind to complete the job?” he demanded at last.
“Nothing,” said Percival promptly, and somewhat scathingly, “nothing at all, except the trifling fact that I am here talking it over with you gentlemen instead of attending to my business, as any honest conspirator should be doing. You may be quite sure of one thing: if there is a man on board this ship whose business it is to finish the job, he isn't idle. He's getting on with the job at this minute, gentlemen. If you'll take my advice you will institute two investigations. First, search the ship from stem to stern, from keel to bridge, for bombs or infernal machines. Second, ask your rich passengers if they have lost anything in the shape of pearls, diamonds, coin of the realm, or anything else worth jumping into the ocean for.”
Captain Trigger looked at him over the top of his eye-glasses.
“You are not in Copperhead Camp at present, Mr. Percival,” he said stiffly.
The young man flushed. “I beg your pardon, Captain Trigger,” he said simply.
“All you have to do,” said the Second Officer, fixing him with an inimical eye, “is to answer questions and not to tell us how to run this ship.”
Percival did his best to hold back the retort, but, failing, released it with considerable sharpness:
“Well, if I was running this ship I'd head her for shore pretty damned quick.”
The American in command of the gun-crew was the only one who smiled, and he did it openly. Captain Trigger's face darkened redly.
“Take this man in charge, Mr. Shannon. He wants work. Give it him. Under guard.”
“Am I suspected, Captain Trigger, of being in league—”
“Every man, every woman on board this ship is suspected,” said the Captain with decision. “Every one, sir, from myself down. The rest of us grasp that fact, even if you do not.”
And so it was that while Algernon Adonis Percival, under the watchful eye of a burly seaman, fell to work scraping the scuppers on the boat deck, the stern business of searching the ship went forward with a thoroughness that left no room for doubt as to the fears and apprehensions of the men who had her in charge. Despite the fact that intensive, anxious hours of delving revealed no hidden, sinister agent of destruction, there was no relaxation on the part of the officers and crew. One by one the passengers were examined; their rooms and their luggage were systematically overhauled. No one resented these drastic operations, for by midday the whole ship's company knew what had transpired during the night. Eagerly they answered the questions, cheerfully they submitted to the examination of their effects, and then fell silent and subdued, oppressed by the suspense that hung over the ship like a cloud. Crew and passengers alike underwent the most rigid questioning, the high and the low, the rich and the poor, the young and the old.
Early that morning, in fact some time prior to the time that Percival told his story, the wireless operator reported that his transmitter was out of order. While he was satisfied that the apparatus had not been tampered with, he was plainly affected by the rather grim coincidence. He was an old and trusted man in the service, competent, efficient and loyal.
His assistant, the night operator, however, had made less than half a dozen voyages on the Doraine. He was an Englishman, a cripple; twice he had been rescued after vessels on which he sailed were sent to the bottom by German submarines. His credentials were flawless. He was on duty during the night just past, and had picked up several indistinct, incomplete radio messages. There was nothing wrong with the receiving or transmitting apparatus when he went off duty at six in the morning, and as his superior came on at the same hour,—they exchanged greetings at the door of the wireless house,—it was absolutely impossible for any one to have entered the well-guarded room without attracting attention. Cruise, the chief radio-man, had his assistant routed out of bed and together they worked like beavers over the disabled mechanism.
Hour after hour, the nervous, uneasy passengers paced the decks. Few remained indoors, and few possessed the calmness to loll in deck-chairs.
Percival toiled cheerfully, but with eye and ear alert for the first inkling of definite peril. With commendable thoughtfulness, he had shed the clean white shirt and collar so generously supplied by his fellow townsman, and had donned a commodious sea-jacket.
He could not help observing the dark, suspicious glances cast upon him by the deck-walkers, nor were his ears proof against audible comments. Mothers nudged their children and said, in slightly lowered but distinctly impressive tones:
“That's the man. He's a stowaway.”
“See, Wilfred,—see the man? No, no! The one with the mop, dear. Don't go near him.”
“What a dreadful looking creature he is.”
“The Captain captured him this morning away down in the bottom of the ship. He was stealing a ride.”
“Poor fellow! He doesn't look like a bad man, does he?”
And so on and so forth, as the day went along.
Masculine strollers had very decided opinions about him. Mr. Landover, the banker, stopped to discuss the toiling menial with Mr. Nicklestick, Mr. Block and Mr. Fitts.
“He ought to be in irons,” said Mr. Landover, glowering at Percival. “That's what I told the Captain a little while ago. He's a bad egg, that fellow is. I'm a pretty good judge of men, gentlemen, and I don't often make mistakes. That fellow is a fugitive from justice, if he isn't something worse. Observe the cut of his mouth—ah! see that? What did I tell you? Did you ever see a more evil grin?”
“Take it from me,” said Mr. Nicklestick, “that guy knows a good deal more about what is going on aboard this ship than he lets on. He ain't as simple as he looks. I told Captain Trigger just now that he ought to give him a dose of the third degree. That's the way to get to the bottom of this business. String him up by the thumbs till he squeals. What say, Mr. Fitts?”
Mr. Fitts, the architect, was a mild man.
“He strikes me as a rather honest looking sort of chap,” he said, and was promptly glared at by his companions. “Of course,” he hastened to add, “I am not saying that he is all right. He may be as crooked as the deuce. I'm only saying he's got a rather pleasing sort of face.”
“The most innocent, open-faced young fellow we ever had in the bank,” said Mr. Landover, “turned out to be the damnedest rascal I've ever encountered.”
“How did you happen to have him in the bank if you are such a good judge of men?” inquired Mr. Fitts, utterly without malice.
Mr. Landover reddened. “My dear sir, I do not come in contact with every employe of the bank. You forget that it is quite an immense institution.”
“It sure is,” said Mr. Nicklestick. “I'm thinking of transferring our account to your bank, Mr. Landover. We've been banking with—”
“I vas telling my vife at lunch,” broke in Mr. Block, twitching his Hebraic nose emphatically,—“not that we could eat any lunch, by gracious, no!—I vas telling her I bet my boots dere ain't enough life-boats to get as much as half of us off safe in case something happens. I counted up all the life-boats I could see, and ven I estimate the number of peoples on board, w'y, by gracious, the loss of life vould be frightful, gentlemen. The only chance we would haf would be for approxi-madely fifty percent of the peoples on board to be killed outright by the explosion.”
“I hear there is a detective from Chicago on board, with a prisoner,” ventured Mr. Fitts. “Why doesn't the Captain ask him to have a look at this stowaway fellow?”
“What would be the good of that?” demanded Mr. Landover. “I never saw a detective in my life that knew what to do in an emergency. Soon as you get one of them where he can't telephone in to headquarters for instructions he's as helpless as a baby. Don't talk to me about detectives. Why, this fellow would simply laugh in his face.”
“Just, as he is laughing in yours at this moment, Mr. Landover,” pursued Mr. Fitts pleasantly.
“The damned rascal,” said Mr. Landover, and stalked away.
“There goes one of the biggest figures in the United States,” said Mr. Nicklestick, looking after the banker. His remark was addressed to Mr. Fitts. “I wish I had his brains.”
“Dey vouldn't do you any good, Nicklestick,” said Mr. Block, “unless you had his money too also.”
“If I had his brains,” said Mr. Nicklestick, “he wouldn't have his money, so what's the difference?”
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