"Till Monday then!" said Garth as Lawless stepped into the launch.
"To-day week it is, sir!" returned the captain as Carstairs cast him the painter.
"You might fire the gun to let us know you're back," cried the baronet.
"Right-o!"
Lawless turned to bend over the engine. Then he looked round quickly and grinned.
"Good luck!" he cried, "and good hunting!" and waved a friendly hand. With that he pushed over the lever and with a mighty flurry of propeller and vast bustle among the sea-birds on the foreshore, theNaomi'slaunch throbbed her way out into the bay towards where, spanning as it seemed the harbour's narrowest part, a creamy band of white spume marked the surf-line. Silently we watched the pretty craft, her paint and brass-work flashing in the morning sun, gliding through the green water. Then Lawless raised an arm in a parting greeting, and the white launch melted into the spume and spray of the open sea.
We stood on a long sloping beach of gleaming white sand shut in on all sides save the sea by lofty grey rocks. Their jagged points out-topped the bright-green fronds of the waving palm-trees which grew almost down to the water's edge. Their column-like appearance, coupled with the singular silence of the island, gave me a sort of solemn feeling, like being in a cathedral.
Some three hundred yards from where the foam-crested rollers beat their thunderous measure on the beach, the ground rose abruptly. The sand ended and became emerged in a tangle of coarse grass. Alternating with a wild and luxuriant undergrowth of a great variety of tree ferns and other plants, it formed a kind of tasselling to a great curtain of greenery which rose, as it seemed, sheer from the sea.
The verdure was so dense that it completely hid the bases of the pointed cliffs which, clustered together like a bundle of faggots, formed the high central part of the island. From some hidden source a clear cold stream of water came plunging down from the cliff, rushing and gurgling until it lost itself in the sea.
It was the first time I had ever set foot on an uninhabited shore. It was a curious sensation. The sea-birds wheeled aloft with their harsh melancholy cries; among the trees above the beach there was sometimes the flash of a brilliantly-plumaged bird and here and there some animal rustled in the undergrowth. But otherwise a deep silence brooded over the island. There was an atmosphere of expectancy about the place which rather intrigued me.
I lost no time in setting about choosing a site for our camp. The appearance of the foreshore, exposed to the full force of the wind in unfavourable weather, did not impress me favourably, nor, owing to the danger from lightning in the thunderstorms that spring up so suddenly in these climes, did the obvious solution of erecting our huts under the shelter of the trees higher up on the shore commend itself. Moreover, I knew very little about conditions on Cock Island and, were there any wild animals about, it would be as well, I reflected, to pitch our camp in some spot not easily accessible to attack.
After exploring round a bit I came, behind a mantle of hanging creeper, upon the mouth of a cave. Set in the lofty grey rocks dominating the beach, it was well clear of high-tide level and clean and dry into the bargain. The roof sloped somewhat, but there was ample clearance for Garth's six feet when he stood erect and the cave ran back for some twenty feet into the rock.
So we plumped for the cave. Having stripped to vest and trousers, Garth and I started carrying up our stores from where the launch of theNaomihad deposited them on the beach. While we stacked the various boxes neatly at the back of the cave, Carstairs was busy fitting up what he called his "field-kitchen." Higher up the rocks, in a little cavity well-sheltered from the wind, he installed his Primus stove, cook-pots and other impedimenta.
It was with the utmost reluctance that I spared the time for this tiring but necessary fatigue. I was on fire to be off into the interior of the island and locate the grave. Garth, too, was as keen as mustard, and fairly jumped at my proposal that, as soon as the stores were stowed away, we should set forth on a voyage of discovery.
It was a long job; for the cases were heavy and the going was bad, but when I stood on the beach below and, with the roar of the ocean in my ears, looked up at our temporary home, I felt rather pleased. Absolutely no trace of our presence was discernible. Though I was aware that perhaps not one vessel in two years called at the island, I have always had a very healthy respect for the long arm of coincidence. I did not wish my investigations at Cock Island to become the mark of prying eyes.
It was past three o'clock and the sun very warm when Garth and I set out. We took with us a flask of cold tea apiece, some biscuits and some dates and a shot-gun each. With a wave of the hand to Carstairs, our guns slung across our backs, we plunged into the tangle of steep woods growing down to the shore.
The climate of the island seemed to be temperate enough. The air was a little steamy but mild and at first there was a pleasant breeze off the sea to cool us. To be equipped for the rocky nature of the island both of us had brought stout hob-nailed boots, and we praised our circumspection when we realised that only by boulder-climbing should we gain access to the higher parts of the island.
The climbing was arduous (for neither of us was in form) but not too difficult. I kept a sharp look-out for any traces of former visitors. Once I found some sheep droppings and again a large bleached bone which looked as if it might have come from a sheep. But of man there was no trace.
The scrub soon gave way to forest and for a good half hour we toiled up the jungle-clad slopes. Great trees formed an almost impenetrable roof over our heads through which the sunshine fell but sparsely. We went forward in a dim and mysterious twilight with no sounds in our ears other than the swift rushing of the stream which gave us our direction, our laboured breathing and the rattle of our nailed boots on the boulders. It was an eerie place which somehow filled me with misgivings.
Suddenly Garth, who was leading, gave a shout. He stood on the flat top of a rock, a dozen feet above my head, and pointed excitedly in front of him. I scrambled to his side.
We were looking down into a deep circular depression shaped like a basin. It reminded me of a quarry, but I imagine it was in reality the crater of some small extinct volcano. What had brought the shout to Garth's lips was the sight of a ruined hut which thrust its broken roof from out of a tangle of gigantic ferns.
So breathless were we with our climb that we were past speech. In silence we slithered and scrambled down into the hollow, the long tendrils of the plants twisting themselves round our legs and the thorns catching in our coats.
It was a rude timber shack with a door and a window, the interior choked roof-high with growing ferns. The timber flooring had rotted away and through the mouldering planks the jungle had thrust its shoots profusely as though to claim its own. But in one corner, where a roughly-carpentered bedstead of timber stood, some attempt had apparently been made to thin out the ferns for a space. On the bed there lay a rotting blanket; on the floor close by some empty canned beef tins red with rust. The blanket practically fell to pieces at the touch. It was not marked and, though we groped pretty thoroughly among the ferns, that was all we found in the hut.
"There's nothing here," I said at last. "Let's have a look round outside. I am wondering...."
The words died away on my lips. I had reached the hut door, my face turned towards the farther edge of the crater, the opposite side from that by which we had descended. A hundred and fifty yards from where I stood a large timber cross was planted in the ground. Between it and the hut lay a great isolated boulder which had probably concealed the cross from our view when we had climbed down into the hollow.
For a moment I could hardly speak. I have seen the proud loneliness of Cecil Rhodes' resting-place in the Matoppos; I have stood (like everybody else) in the amber light that bathes Napoleon's tomb "on the banks of the Seine among this French people I have loved so well." But I have never seen a sight more impressive than that solitary grave on that desert island set down beneath the little round canopy of blue sky which seemed to be borne by the lofty frowning cliffs towering all around. Beneath that plain wooden cross, I told myself, in a silence unbroken by Man, lies the Unknown. It was a mighty impressive thought.
A rudimentary path, still to be discerned through the all-pervading undergrowth, led, round the boulder of which I have spoken, to the cross. The grave lay out in the open in a little patch which had been cleared of ferns. As we came up to it I noted, with an odd little trick of the memory, that the grey and weather-beaten surface of the cross was highly polished, even as the beach-comber had described, by the action of the sand grains blown by the wind from the seashore.
Fashioned out of two baulks of timber wired together and solidly implanted in the ground, the cross stood at the head of a long hillock of earth. On the grave lay, face upwards, a small round mirror and, a little beyond it, an empty bottle, uncorked, which had fallen on its side.
"You see," I remarked to Garth, "it's just as Adams said!"
I stooped to pick up the mirror. Then to my surprise I saw that it was wired to a timber cross-piece which ran out from the cross as a support. It was a little glass set in a metal frame.
"It looks like a shaving-glass!" said Garth.
I did not undeceive him. I am not a secretive person by nature but by training. The very character of Intelligence work—the careful sifting of every apparently insignificant scrap of evidence, the lengthy process of surmise and deduction—tends to make one discreet, even when dealing with one's familiars, until a plain statement of fact can be drawn up. So I did not tell my host that, the moment I saw that the glass was attached to the cross, my brain leaped at the first clear clue to the Unknown's baffling cipher.
For the sight of the mirror, loosely wired so that it faced the foot of the grave, immediately brought into my mind the first line of that bewildering doggerel:
"Flimmer', flimmer' viel."
The reference to flashing surely indicated that the mirror was to be used as a heliograph. The next line—that about "the garrison of Kiel"—still utterly floored me; but, I reflected, since we had a heliograph, the following lines which I surmised to give a compass bearing of 27 degrees ("The Feast of Orders"i.e., Jan. 27), might well furnish the direction in which—for reasons still unknown to me—the sun's rays were to be flashed. The wiring of the mirror to the timber indicated the direction in which the bearing was to be taken. It looked to me as though the Unknown must have set up his own cross and wired the mirror to it before he died.
I opened the little leathern case which hung at my belt and drew out my prismatic compass, trusty friend of my campaigning days in France. The grave faced practically due north. I laid the compass on the mirror and took a bearing of 27 degrees. The white arrow on the floating centre of the compass swung round. The mark of the 27th degree pointed towards a gaunt and barren pile of rock on the far side of the crater. I took as my line of direction a tall bush aflame with some gorgeous flower on the edge of the clearing.
Some cautious instinct made me detach the mirror. Holes had been bored on either side of the frame through which strands of copper wire were passed and knotted to holes bored in the timber cross-piece. I removed wire and all and slipped the mirror into my pocket. Garth did not notice the action; for he was busy pottering about the clearing. From the luxuriant undergrowth he ultimately collected a cigar box which, I made no doubt, was the identical one from which the man Dutchey had established the fact that Black Pablo and his friends had visited the island. It was curious to find everything in the same state as it had been left more than a year ago. I felt rather like a man must feel who violates a grave.
"There's a path beyond," Garth said, pointing over to the left. "It leads to the spring. I found an old bucket on the bank. But otherwise there's no sign of our Unknown friend here. In fact the whole place looks as if it had been undisturbed since the flood. Whew! but it's hot! Okewood, I believe we're going to have a storm!"
The air was indeed strangely oppressive. The patch of sky which thatched the clearing was now flecked with daubs of white cloud and there was a curiously menacing stillness in the atmosphere. On trees and bushes the leaves hung motionless without a tremor. We sat down to cool off a bit.
"It doesn't look too good to me," I answered. "Garth, I shouldn't wonder if we were in for a soaking to-night!"
Sir Alexander Garth, Bart., who had never slept out in the rain in his life, smiled in rather superior fashion.
"I shouldn't wonder," he returned. "As a matter of fact, I rather like roughing it. It's a devilish healthy life, my boy! What's the next move? Has the grave given you any ideas for the location of the treasure?"
I pointed at the scarlet bush.
"Do you see that plant with the red flowers?" said I. "I have a fancy to take a stroll in that direction and see how far we can get up the cliff."
Garth struck his palm with his clenched fist.
"Okewood!" he exclaimed, "By Jove! I believe you're on to something!"
"I am!" I answered rashly and cursed myself for a babbling fool. For Garth, his curiosity afire, forthwith plied me with questions.
"Don't press me just yet!" I countered. "I'm still groping in the dark. You shall know all in good time!"
But he would not be pacified. Two heads were better than one, he argued, and very often a clear-sighted, shrewd man of business could see a deal farther than an expert.
"Well," I said, "for all that, I think I'll keep my own counsel until we've looked round a bit more!"
At that Garth became huffy. We were partners in this venture, he reminded me, and we must have no secrets. He did not think he should have to recall that fact to my mind.
The stifling heat and the fatigue of our long climb had made us both a bit cross, I suppose. At any rate I was pretty short with him.
"My dear fellow," I said, and rose to my feet by way of putting an end to the conversation, "all in good time. In this sort of work one must work alone, at any rate in the initial stages. Give me a little breathing space!"
Garth followed my example and stood up.
"Shall we go on?" he asked.
He spoke without heat, but there was a look in his face which reminded me that at our first meeting, I had noticed signs of temper about his nose and mouth. Garth was a man who obviously did not like to be thwarted. Now I thought I knew where Marjorie got her proud temper from.
A little puff of hot wind came whirling into the hollow. The trees swayed to it as it rustled through the leaves with a melancholy sound.
"We don't want to go too far," remarked Garth, cocking an eye at the sky, "or we shall have this storm on us before we can get under cover at the camp."
At the first blush the cliff on the far side of the hollow looked perfectly inaccessible. But handy to my bush with the red flowers a succession of flat boulders, like a giant's staircase, enabled us to scramble up until we found ourselves on a plateau of rock dominated on one side by an immense crag which towered above our heads in a succession of shelving ledges. In front of us the ground dropped to a steep nullah from which rose a sheer wall of rock and barred the way.
It was a desolate scene. Neither tree nor shrub nor anything green grew in this barren landscape of grey and friable volcanic rock. The bare and frowning heights oppressed me. I turned to Garth.
"This looks like the end of things," said I, "unless we can find a way up by these terraces. What do you say? Shall we have a try?"
"If we could manage to reach that first shelf," my companion answered, "we could at any rate get a view. There's nothing to be seen from here."
I had to give Garth a back to do it and his sixteen stone I felt convinced, punched a pretty pattern of his hobnails into my skin. However, at the cost of my back and sundry abrasions of his hands and knees, Garth at last gained a footing on the sheer face of the rock and then, giving me a hand, swung me up beside him. After a vertiginous climb, which at one time brought us on to a ledge a hundred feet above the nullah, we struck something like a steep track that eventually landed us on the first terrace.
The view was disappointing. We were still too low to clear the frowning cliffs encircling the nullah and we looked forth on the same gloomy prospect of grey volcanic peaks that had confronted us from below. The shelf on which we stood was only about thirty feet wide and ran for a distance of sixty yards across the face of the cliff and then stopped abruptly. It had obviously been cut by the hand of man out of the friable rock; for a number of caves scooped out of the back wall showed that cave-dwellers must have lived here in that remote period when the island had been inhabited. The ledge was in fact nothing but a street for communication between the different cave-houses. The caves were low-roofed and empty. By craning our necks upward we saw that the whole face of the cliff was thus honeycombed with cave-dwellings in a succession of terraces. At the far end the steep track, by which we had gained access to the first terrace, wound its way upward to the higher levels. There were three terraces in all.
We rested for a while on our rocky shelf and ate some biscuits and chocolate. From our post of vantage we looked down on to the grave in the clearing. The sun had gone in but it was still oppressively sultry. The sky had assumed a forbidding leaden tinge. It looked like some great furnace door radiating a fierce heat from the fire within.
Whilst we ate our frugal lunch we discussed our plans. We decided that, in view of the weather, we would break off our exploration for the day, return to camp and get comfortably installed and make an early start the next morning in order to visit the upper ledges of the rock. Garth had apparently quite recovered his equanimity after our little breeze.
The descent from the rock was a thrilling business. In places the track had crumbled away and more than once we found ourselves, held only by the nails of our boots, on a slippery slope overhanging a sheer deep drop. I have a poor head for heights and to me it was a nightmare experience. The result was that our progress was slow and it took us a full hour to make the descent. By the time we had reached the rocky plateau the wind was whirling the grey volcanic dust in great pillars about our heads. The sky had grown perceptibly darker with an eerie yellow glow and a few big drops of rain splashed down on the bushes. With startling suddenness a long drawn-out rumble of thunder awakened a thousand echoes as it reverberated among the lonely island peaks.
"By George," said Garth turning up his coat collar, "we're going to catch it, Okewood. We'll have to steer clear of these trees."
"We'd better make a bolt for the hollow," I counselled. "The hut is out in the open. If it stands the wind it will give us some shelter!"
We started to run while the light perceptibly diminished, like a lighting effect on the stage. We were actually crossing the hollow when the storm broke. There was a blinding glare of lightning, a deafening peal of thunder and the light went out while, with a whooshing and rushing and crashing, the rain suddenly descended in what seemed to be a dense sheet of water.
"The hut!" I shouted in Garth's ear.
Well it was that we were just upon it or in that inky darkness we should never have found it. Over the wooden bedstead in the corner the roof was whole and solid and it kept the worst part of the rain off us, though we were splashed by the cataract of water which poured off the roof into the centre of the hut. The air was so highly charged that one could almost smell the electricity in the atmosphere as the lightning rent the sky in blinding flashes which illuminated the whole clearing and the trees and cliffs all round with the brightness of daylight.
The storm was at its height; the thunder was echoing in and out of the rocky hollows of the island and in the moments of stillness the gurgling and splashing of the rain filled our ears. Then came a blinding lightning flash, brighter and more enduring than the rest. It lit up the whole clearing and revealed the cross over the grave of the Unknown standing out hard and black against a fantastic background of bending, straining tree-trunks with branches and leaves blown out in the wind. And by its light, before the brightness died, I saw the figure of a man standing with bowed head at the grave.
I saw only him for the fraction of a second, a young man, tall and slim and very blonde, in a shirt open at the neck and riding-breeches, his head bared to the storm. The water streamed off his face and clothing; but he stood perfectly still in an attitude of reverence. In that wild setting of tempest-swept rocks the apparition seemed like some spectre of the Brocken. Or one might have thought that the storm had summoned forth the Unknown himself from his grave.
The vision fairly staggered me; for my mind was imbued with the idea that the island was uninhabited. But my brain keyed up by the events of the day, did not dwell for an instant on any supernatural explanation of the apparition. I promptly asked myself whether, after all, there were people living on the island or whether the man I had seen had, like ourselves, landed from some passing ship.
But then, without warning, there came an ear-shattering metallic crash, as though a big shell had exploded beside us, the earth shook and a perfect tornado of wind and water descended upon the clearing, clawing and tearing at the hut until it seemed as though the beams of the flimsy structure to which we desperately clung would be wrenched from our grasp. The inky-black sky appeared to split across in a jagged band of light which again showed up the clearing as bright as day. But now the tall wooden cross stood aloft in solitary majesty once more. The figure at the graveside had vanished and the clearing was entirely deserted. I asked myself whether the apparition had not, after all, been the figment of my imagination. Garth had seemingly remarked nothing so I resolved to say nothing about it unless he should ask me.
But now, amid the grumbling and rumbling of the thunder receding into the distance, the storm was passing. The air reeked with the stench of sulphur and I guessed that the appalling crash we had heard had marked the fall of a thunderbolt. Slowly the light was coming back and, though the rain yet descended in torrents, the downpour was much less heavy.
We were in a sorry plight, the pair of us. Our thin garments clung to us like wet swimming suits and our teeth chattered in our heads.
"We appear to have timed things very badly," grumbled Garth, wringing the water out of a corner of his tussore jacket. "We had plenty of warning of this storm. I should have thought we might have managed to have got back to the camp in time to escape it...."
I wiped the water out of my eyes and grinned.
"Oh," I said lightly, "a ducking won't hurt us! Look, the rain's stopping already...."
"I am not complaining about getting wet," observed Garth with an air of dignity which went ill with his bedraggled appearance—he was squatting on his hunkers squeezing out his hat—"I can, I believe, put up with the hardships of an expedition like this as well as any man. But I do think the—er, staff work this afternoon leaves something to be desired. To be wet to the skin an hour's tramp from camp may amuse you, Major Okewood, but the prospect of a heavy chill does not strikemeas being funny in the least!"
In high dudgeon he placed upon his head the shapeless mass of soggy felt which had once been a hat.
"I vote we make a move for the camp," he proposed. "That is, if anything is left of it. I should not be in the least surprised to find the cave under water, our stores ruined and Carstairs drowned—or struck by lightning, as like as not. I don't wish to seem inquisitive, Major Okewood, but might I inquire what progress this afternoon's unfortunate jaunt has brought to your investigations?"
I was rather nettled by the line he was taking, and the way he manhandled my name irritated me.
"You needn't worry," I retorted curtly. "I'm perfectly satisfied so far!"
"Indeed," replied the baronet—he was struggling to free himself from a giant creeper which had firmly fixed itself about his sodden clothes. "I am sorry I cannot share your optimism. But then I'm wholly in the dark—maybe, it's just as well—about this infernal wild-goose chase. Damn it," he cried suddenly, "can't you lend me a hand to get this blasted root off my legs?"
I hastened to release him, fuming and fretful.
"We shall be home in no time," I said soothingly to humour him, for he was like a spoilt child, "and you'll see what marvels Carstairs has accomplished in the way of making us comfortable. And you needn't worry about the cave. It's splendidly sheltered. Not a drop of water will get in!"
Night was falling by the time we emerged from the steamy atmosphere of the sopping woods and made for the faint glow of light which shone from our cave. Carstairs met us at the entrance. He had fully justified my prophecy to Garth.
Our beds were made up, one on either side of the cave, and our washing and shaving kit laid out on toilet tables improvised out of boxes neatly covered with clean white paper. Hot water steamed in our wash-basins and a dry change of clothing was laid out on the beds. In the centre of the cave, on packing-cases covered by a white damask cloth, the table was set for dinner. A hurricane lamp, placed in the centre, was flanked by enamel cups from the picnic basket filled with bright flowers and on the ground a bottle of Garth's excellent champagne was cooling in a bucket of spring-water.
We lost no time in changing, and within a quarter of an hour were sitting down to what was, in the circumstances, an extraordinarily well-cooked meal. Garth's ill-temper melted perceptibly and it was with the utmost cordiality that he raised his glass and pledged the success of the expedition. The ingenuity of the incomparable Carstairs had so completely reproduced the atmosphere of civilisation that it was difficult to believe we three were dining on a lonely islet in the middle of the Pacific.
After dinner Garth yawned expansively and opined that he would turn in. The unwonted exercise of the afternoon, he declared, had fagged him out. But I had no mind for bed. My brain, stimulated by the unaccustomed environment, was active. The apparition at the graveside during the storm had profoundly disquieted me and I wanted to think. So I strolled outside for a solitary pipe beneath the stars.
On the shore I found Carstairs, pipe in mouth, contemplating the sea. I love the old-time Regular, such as Carstairs, with his twelve years' service in the Sappers, was, his loyalty, his quiet efficiency, his eminent common sense. And as between two professional soldiers a bond of silent sympathy had established itself between Carstairs and me. We had not even discussed the incident of the drink I had given him that night on board the yacht. Having ascertained that Carstairs was practically a total abstainer, I gave Mackay a hint to forget all about his nocturnal diagnosis. I had my own theory about that drink and perhaps Carstairs had his; anyway, we did not discuss it.
"Grand night, sir!" said Carstairs, taking his pipe out of his mouth as I approached over the sand.
"Wonderful!" I commented. "Good spot this, Carstairs!"
The man did not reply. He was sucking on his pipe which did not seem to be drawing well.
"It's a uncanny kind o' place, as you might say, sir!" he remarked presently.
"Well," I observed, "it's a bit lonesome, I suppose. But all desert islands are that!"
"Lonesome?" retorted the man. "I wouldn't have nothing to say agin it if it were lonesome. I'm partial to the moors and such-like places meself. I never was a one for the towns, sir. But I don't like all these tall rocks and all these quiet trees at the back of one. They give me the fair 'ump!"
I laughed.
"You want the desert, Carstairs," I said. "Nothing but sand and then some. No trees looking at you there!"
"It ain't altogether the trees an' the cliffs!"
The man paused and scratched his head with the stem of his pipe.
"There's something sort o' creepy about this place, sir!"
"How do you mean?"
"Well," he said slowly, "it's a funny thing, but all the blessed evening I've had a kind o' feeling as if I was being watched. You know how it was in the war, sir—w'en you was workin' out in No Man's Land on a pitch-black night, scared to death you was walkin' into Fritz's line, tellin' yerself all through 'If you can't see him, he can't see you' but feelin'—well, as though there was nothin' but eyes starin' at you all around!"
He shook himself.
"It fair gives me the creeps!" he finished.
Now Carstairs was a plain honest-to-God Englishman from the New Forest, the very incarnation of the soldier from the English shires whose sheer lack of imagination and consequent inability to accept defeat in any circumstances clear broke the German spirit in the war. There was no associating that good-humoured face, that big mouth and button nose, with the idle fears of an overheated imagination. There are some people—I am one—who, even though they see nothing, have the faculty of detecting the presence of human beings in their vicinity. I recalled the eerie sensation I myself had had on landing but, of course, above all I thought of that bowed figure which the lightning had shown me standing by the grave in the clearing.
I was filled with the deepest foreboding. If there were people on the island, surely they must have remarked the arrival of theNaomi. Would they not have announced themselves to us? What object could they have, supposing Carstairs was not mistaken, in slinking round the camp?
Well, it was no part of my plans as yet to communicate my fears to Carstairs. So I rallied him gently.
But Carstairs stuck to his guns.
"It come over me so strong w'en you and the guv'nor was away this evening," Carstairs said, "that no less than four times I left my cook-pots to have a look round...."
"Well, and did you see anybody?"
"Not a blessed soul!"
"Did you hear anything?"
"No, sir!"
Yet the man was not to be shaken.
"W'en I was servin' dinner jes' now," he persisted, "I was as sure as sure there was a chap watchin' me from just about there,"—he turned and indicated the black shape of a palm on the fringe of the shore,—"not doin' anything but jes' settin' there, spyin'!"
The man knocked out his pipe.
"I'm to call you gentlemen at four, sir. If you didn't mind, I think I'll get down to it!"
This little bit of trench slang (which, being interpreted means to retire for the night), uttered in our romantic surroundings, amused me not a little.
"Good night, Carstairs!"
"Good night, sir!"
He plodded up the beach, his feet making no sound on the soft sand, a white, ghostly figure against the dark foliage. Then he was swallowed up in the mystery and silence of the night.
There was no moon, but in compensation such a prodigious display of stars as only the tropics can show, blazing and twinkling in their myriads till one could almost believe the heavens were in motion. On the open shore there was yet a kind of half-light but beyond, where the woods began, the blackness of the night was Stygian.
Carstairs was right. This island was an eerie place. The absolute stillness of the night, marred only by the mournful rhythm of the waves, seemed to accentuate that air of expectancy about it which I had already remarked. I found myself thinking of the island as of a stage set for the performance of some play.
Here, perhaps, I reflected, the Unknown, destined for that nameless grave I had come to seek, had landed, carried ashore, maybe, by his native crew. I tried to picture him, with death in his face, painfully scrawling the message which had so strangely come into my hands. What manner of man was this Unknown? A German officer, a naval officer probably (as the reference to Kiel seemed to indicate). And for whom did he write? For Germans, for a German. Yet there were no Germans, as far as I knew, in the gang that had taken two men's lives to get the message now reposing in my pocket. Black Pablo, Neque, El Cojo.... these were Spanish names.
El Cojo? "He who goes with a limp."Der Stelze, Clubfoot, had been the nickname of that other cripple, the man of might in that Imperial Germany which sank to destruction in the fire and smoke of the Hindenburg Line, whose ways lay in dark places, whom everybody feared but whom so few had ever seen.... If he could rise from his grave and seek me out on the island, then, indeed, might my imagination, like poor old Carstairs', people these darkling woods with hidden spies!
Sunk in my thoughts I had wandered on heedlessly, going ever deeper into the tangle of the forest. But now the undergrowth, growing thicker, barred my further progress and I came to an abrupt halt with the thick tendril of some creeping plant wound about my body. On it blossomed a gaudy flower with a heavy, musky scent. The touch of the creeper on my bare arm made me shrink.
It was as dark as pitch in that jungle-like forest. A phrase I had read somewhere about "opaque blackness" flashed into my mind. I realised I stood an extremely good chance of being lost, and cursed myself for a dreamy fool. Fortunately, I had the orientation of our camp—I had taken it that afternoon on the beach—and I knew that, by striking west, I should roughly hit Horseshoe Harbour where we had put ashore.
I took out my compass and opening the lid, bent over the luminous needle. I stood absolutely still to allow the pointer to swing to rest. Then, from the black depths of the forest all about me, a gentle droning fell upon my ear. I listened. No mistake was possible. It was undoubtedly a human voice. And it was softly humming, as a man might hum quietly to himself, to pass away the time. I listened again. The voice rose and fell, with now and then a break, but always on a muted note. Suddenly, I caught the melody, a melancholy, haunting refrain with a phrase, as in a folksong, that came again and again. And I felt the perspiration break out on my brow, my heart grow cold within me, as I recognised the air....
"Se murio, y sobre su cara"Un panuelito le heche...."
It was the song of Black Pablo, the singer in the lane.
I remained rooted to the spot. The droning chant went on. How far the singer was from me, it was impossible to estimate; for a voice carries far at night—he might be anything from twenty to a hundred yards away. There was nothing to do but retire;.... in that clammy, steamy darkness any idea of stalking a man was out of the questions.
All the events of the past week came tumbling into my brain. They had tracked me down, then, and now I was at grips with El Cojo's famous organisation.... But this was no time for speculation or surmise. I could think matters out afterwards; for the moment I must keep my mind clear and concentrate on getting out of this dense jungle quietly and quickly.
Now the humming had ceased. Did it mean that the singer was moving forward? I strained my ears but could catch no sound other than the rustle of the leaves as they dripped moisture. To move in silence through the clinging undergrowth was, I knew, a thing impossible. An old memory of capercailzie shooting in Russia came to my aid. One stalked the male bird perched on a tree-top as he uttered his love-call to the females at the foot. When he called one moved; when he stopped, one halted.
The droning recommenced. Did my ears mislead me? It certainly sounded nearer now. My compass lying flat in my left palm, I moved swiftly forward, heading for the west. When the humming ceased, I stood still and pushed on again as soon as it was resumed.
A horrid thought assailed me. Was the singer the spy whose unseen presence had impressed itself on Carstairs that evening? Or were there others? Had the cordon let me through only to draw in upon me as I returned? I had no weapon; for I had given Carstairs my revolver to clean and oil on our return from camp that evening after our wetting.
The crooning chant had grown much fainter. I must be drawing away from it. I paused an instant to wipe away the sweat which was pouring into my eyes. Then came a sudden crash in the undergrowth close to hand. I steeled myself to the encounter, getting my back to a tree and striving—but how vainly?—to pierce with my eyes that bewildering pall of darkness. Another heavy crash, a frightened squawk, and I breathed again. It was only one of the island pigs whose nocturnal rambles I had disturbed.
And now for full five minutes I had heard the singer no more. The forest was getting lighter, and like blissful music there came to my ears the distant surge of the sea. Presently, without further incident, I stepped out on the beach not more than twenty paces from our cave.
A black shape rose out of the darkness at my feet. It was Carstairs. I put my hand over his mouth and drew him into the cave. The place re-echoed with Garth's rhythmic snoring.
"You were quite right, Carstairs," I whispered. "There is someone in the woods back there! Have you heard or seen anything?"
"No, sir!" the man returned. "But I was that certain sure there was somebody round the place that I nipped in and got a pistol to sit up and wait for you...."
He showed me the automatic in his hand.
"I don't like the look of things at all, Carstairs," said I, "and that's a fact. I'm not getting the wind up over a lot of shadows; but I don't propose to risk having the camp rushed. You've got some bread-bags and the like, haven't you? Well, get one of the shovels and start filling 'em with sand, will you? If we can run up a bit of cover round the entrance to the cave, one man ought to be able to hold it against all-comers. Meanwhile, I'll wake Sir Alexander here!...."
It is a little embarrassing to rouse a man up out of his beauty sleep and tell him you have been keeping essential facts from his knowledge. However, I could at least honestly claim that, until that moment, I had nothing stronger than suspicions to go upon.
Propped up on his elbow, Garth heard my whole tale just as I have set it down here, from the moment that John Bard identified Black Pablo with the man who had kept watch outside Adams' hut down to the strange happening in the woods that night.
"Just what we are up against, Sir Alexander," I concluded, "I don't know. But we're here for a specific purpose and I feel sure you will agree with me that we should not allow a band of filthy cut-throats to deter us from it!"
"Certainly not, my boy, certainly not!" declared the baronet. "As a matter of fact, I cannot really believe that these fellows really intend us any harm. After all, we're British subjects and a little of Britain goes the deuce of a long way in these parts...."
"Very possibly, sir," I replied, "but you must remember we do not know how strong this party is. Force is the ultimate sanction of the law, they say; but on this particular island British prestige is backed up by exactly three very imperfectly armed Britishers...."
"If you'll allow me to say so," Garth broke in pompously, "you go rather fast. From the accident that you overheard on an island which we previously believed to be uninhabited a song you heard sung (in peculiar circumstances, I grant you) at Rodriguez, you appear to assume that the men who murdered Adams have landed on this island. Your song may be a popular favourite in Rodriguez; everybody may be singing it. Have you thought of that?
"If this figure you saw at the grave and this man whom you heard humming in the forest belong to this mysterious gang led by El What's-his-name, then they must have followed us here. But how did they come? We have seen no steamer. If, on the other hand, the song incident is capable of some simple explanation such as I have suggested, your last valid link of evidence connecting these mysterious visitors of Cock Island with El Thingumybob's gang snaps."
This was very ingenious. But it didn't convince me. The intonation of the singer in the forest was identical with that of the man in the lane. Of that I was sure. Besides, in the back of my mind lurked a half-formed suspicion about Custrin which I had not as yet thought proper to communicate to the worthy cotton-spinner. And, as for having seen no steamer, I recollected that launch which had put out from Rodriguez after us.
"I'll tell you something else," Garth resumed, "that perhaps you don't know, major. Many of these Pacific islands do contain treasure; not doubloons but something almost equally valuable; phosphates. Adventurers are always roaming about the Pacific prospecting for guano deposits and mighty shy they are, many of 'em, of casual visitors. Now you mark my words, these chaps who have been behaving so oddly are in all probability just a band of shysters from Rodriguez—without any concession, of course—dropped here by a ship to look for phosphates. They think we've come to jump their claim...."
I felt very perplexed. Garth was a hard-headed Lancashire business man and there seemed to be a good deal of horse sense in what he said. And yet somehow....
I walked to the entrance of the cave and looked out. In awe-inspiring majesty the sun came rolling up from the east and the glistening beach was dyed in the hues of the morning. A few paces away Carstairs was shovelling sand for dear life. Already he had filled a dozen stout cotton bags.
"You may be right, Sir Alexander," I said at length. "I hope you are. But even if these gentry are concession-hunters we have to bear in mind that they are a cut-throat lot. They are quite capable of shooting first and of asking your name afterwards. I'm going to run up a little sand-bag parapet at the mouth of this cave. It commands a fine field of fire and will allow you or Carstairs to challenge anybody who comes within thirty yards. As soon as we've put the place in a proper state of defence I'm going out to do a little reconnoitring on my own...."
"My dear fellow," remarked Garth, sitting up in bed and nursing his toes, "to hear you talk you'd think the blessed old British Empire had ceased to count in the world. Foreigners can't go about murdering British subjects, you know. They'd have the Foreign Office on them damned quick, send a cruiser and all that sort of thing. However," he finished indulgently, "I'm quite prepared to hold the fort while you have a look round. I'm not sorry to have a lazy morning for, to tell you the truth, I'm so stiff from our climb yesterday that I can scarcely move!"
Rather with the air of Daddy helping his little boy to build sand-castles, Garth assisted me to erect a parapet at the mouth of the cave. There were not many sand-bags, but we helped out with some cases of tinned provisions, putting the sand-bags on top and then a layer of sand scooped out from the foot of our fortification. The screen of creeper across the entrance to the cave, while it obscured the view from outside, was not so dense as to prevent anybody within from commanding the approach to our stronghold.
Carstairs brought coffee and sandwiches and at my request filled my flask with brandy and brought me my automatic pistol and a couple of charges of ammunition. Then, turning my back on the sea, I once more struck out into the woods.
My plan was to make for the grave in the clearing. This should be the test. If our mysterious visitors were after the treasure I made sure I would come upon them in the vicinity of the grave. For, as far as I knew, the grave was the only indication they had to guide them in their hunt. It was still very early, and if I could gain the clearing unobserved, I would post myself at some convenient point, perhaps on the high ground beyond the grave, and await events.
I went forward very cautiously, my pistol cocked in my hand. I stopped repeatedly and listened; but, save for the hubbub of the birds in the trees, all was still around me. The burbling stream that fell from the high ground of the island to the beach gave me my direction.
I had reached a narrow ravine at the end of which was that flat rock whence, on the previous evening, Garth had described the ruined hut. On a slab which formed a convenient step to mount the boulder something white caught my eye as I came down the nullah. To my unbounded surprise it proved to be one of those cheap cigar-holders made of cardboard which so many Germans use.
I stooped to examine it. The holder with its quill mouth-piece, was quite clean and obviously brand-new. Therefore, it was no relic of the former visitors to the island.And it had not been there yesterday. I had mounted by this very slab to stand by Garth on the flat rock and if the holder had been there, I could not possibly have failed to see it.
It looked as though it might have dropped out of a man's pocket as he was scrambling up the rock. The name of a popular firm of cigar-merchants, with branches all over Germany, was printed on it. "Loeser und Wolff, Berlin. S.W. Friedrich-Strasse," I read. I knew the shop well. I had bought cigars there scores of times in the past....
A sudden feeling of uneasiness, an acute sense of danger, came over me. To be shadowed is an almost everyday experience on our job and one develops a kind of sixth sense in detecting it. I had the distinct impression that somebody was watching me.
My brain worked swiftly. I was in the open, without cover, liable to be shot down with impunity from the edge of the ravine. To keep perfectly calm, to show no signs of fluster and, above all things, to spot your man without his knowing that he has been seen, is the only safe course in moments like this. My grip tightened on my pistol as, very slowly, I began to raise my head....
The top of the rock above me was level with my eyes. As I lifted them my gaze fell upon a monstrous mis-shapen boot, projecting awkwardly over the edge. For the moment, I had no eyes for the huge figure that stood there resting on the rubber-shod stick. I could only stare, like one transfigured, at that sinister club-foot, as a voice, a well-remembered voice that for months had haunted me in dreams, cried out sharply:
"Stay as you are and raise your hands! Quick! And drop that gun!"
I glanced up and as I lifted my arms, my pistol rattled noisily on the slab below.
Over the barrel of a great automatic clasped in a huge hairy hand, the Man With the Clubfoot was looking at me.