But Foster would ultimately get the figures from the girl when they met as agreed the day after tomorrow—tomorrow now. It was a tangle. But Foster did not know that Lyman had already mailed the diary. Did he plan to get hold of the figures beforehand for his own purposes, and then denounce Lyman as the type he had already suggested, a charlatan who had been scared away by the discovery that he had a man of Stephen Foster’s caliber to deal with? What would be Foster’s purposes with the figures? Merely to dissuade his niece, make her project impossible? Or did he believe that the pearls might be on the wreck and mean to claim the whole for himself by outfitting an expedition in secret while demolishing Kitty Whiting’s plans and hopes?
There was the secret place aboard the Golden Dolphin that the girl had said only she and her father knew of. But who had devised it? How impossible was it of being discovered? A man of Foster’s type would take the wreck apart, crumble it and sift it if necessary, Jim fancied.
One fact seemed to Jim to stand out. He did not reason that he was in no position to argue soundly or logically, that he was biased by his capture and humiliation; but it appeared very clear to him that Kitty Whiting should not give out the precious figures to any one until—if she went—she were well on her way to the island. He had turned one little trick unconsciously in sending her the diary. To warn her further was impossible.
Thus revolving things, like a squirrel in its cage treadmill, Jim got little further than the squirrel progresses. Through some crevice the smell of tobacco came to him. Bill of the beard was outside watching that no one came accidentally to the abandoned farm, ready with an excuse if they did. Bud had supposedly taken the automobile. Jim began to cool down a little, the compression of his thoughts had carried them through heat to cold, to far more effective and energetic anger, once it got an outlet. He was able to shut off the roundabout process of his mind. Appetite for tobacco aided this, another physical need, hunger, assisting. It was with gladness that he dimly heard the arrival of a machine, then the voice of Bud. His door was opened and he was once more packed out like a bale, and deposited, seated, on an empty box. Bud produced a thermos bottle full of hot coffee, some rolls, butter, and crisp doughnuts. They untied the cords at Jim’s wrists, giving him his share of the food and a rusty tin cup for his coffee. By pressing his chin into his chest and lifting his restrained hands he could just make connection with his mouth, though Bud had to tilt the cup for him to finish his coffee. Bud did not eat. He smoked. Bill growled.
“Suppose you had ‘ham and’ in town there?”
“Prunes, cereal, ham and, hot cakes an’ maple syrup, coffee, and a cigar,” said Bud. “What you kickin’ at? You can’t drive the car.” Bill grunted and Bud gave him a cigar. He stuck a third in Jim’s mouth and lit it.
“I’ll remember that,” said Jim with gratitude. Bud nodded.
“So do, brother, if you figure that’ll do you any good. I don’t believe you and me is likely to meet again in a hurry, though. Take your time. We’ve got to tuck you up again soon.”
“If I give you fellows the figures now will you turn me loose?”
Both looked as blankly committal as men wearing goggle masks might be expected to.
“I don’t know a damn thing about your figures, nor Bill either,” said Bud. “We’re expressmen in this game. Deliverin’ you, brother, as per directions, charges collect, eh, Bill?”
“You talk too much,” was Bill’s contribution.
The cigars finished, Jim’s wrists were once more tied. He begged for a chance to walk about the barn, but they would not grant it. After he was trussed they re-sacked him, despite his protests. He gleaned one scrap of information.
Bud, in response to Bill, answered.
“’Bout thirty miles. Boss expects us round noon. We drive right into the garage, deliver and collect. That lets us out.”
Who was the boss?
Jim had hoped to get a look at the license plates on the car but Bud, Bill & Company, illicit expressmen, were too smart for that. This time he was not only deposited on the floor of the tonneau in his sacking, but a rug was flung over all. It was quite a while before they started. Once they stopped and Jim knew they were getting gasoline and oil, for Bill came into the tonneau and sat with his heavy-booted foot close to Lyman’s head, mutely promising what would happen if Jim tried to attract attention. The day was warm and he sweated profusely, and an infernal itching started, from which there was no relief. After a time they rolled over smoother roads and finally made a sharp right turn and came to a stop, the engine shut off. They had reached the garage of the boss. One of them went off to report and Jim still sweated in his sacks. Then the upper one was removed and he blinked up into the face of a red-faced man with a squash nose, little blue eyes and a bald head save for a tonsure of reddish hair; a big man with enormous chest and protruding paunch, with hair on his wrists and fingers, spider-wise. He surveyed Jim callously.
“That him?” he asked.
“No,” said Bill. “It ain’t him. We let him go. This is a pal of ours we rigged up this way because that’s the way he likes to ride. You got the wire, didn’t you? You know he was identified at the other end. What’s eatin’ you? Come through with that two hundred berries and take your package and we’ll call it a day.”
The consignee’s red face turned crimson, then purple. His pig eyes glittered and he closed his great fists. Then he laughed.
“Comedian, eh? All right. Take him upstairs and put him on the bunk. Make me out a receipt for the money and I’ll give you one for the sailor lad.”
“Is this the boss?” asked Jim. The trio looked at him as if they had forgotten he was anything but a dumb parcel. The red-faced man nodded.
“I’ll talk to you later,” he said. Jim had already connected him with the sea. He could not be fooled in several small but significant tricks of manner, aside from the blue anchor tattooed on the back of the right hand—a fouled anchor, one end of the rope continued to form a circle and frame to the design. “Take him up, boys; I’ll go and get your dough.”
The room above, reached by an open stair, was fitted as a chauffeur’s bedroom. The garage was a large one. Through a window Jim caught sight of a big house, elaborately built of stone, many windowed, tiled of roof, with a tower at one corner and wide porches. Like the barn it was set on a hill, though he had not noticed the gradual slopes by which they had reached it. Beyond trees and the tops of other houses he saw a dark blue line, pearly clouds above it, land beyond it; it was the sea, running into a deep bay. They had brought him clear across the state.
The bed was comparatively comfortable, bound as he still was. Bud found pen, ink, and paper on a table and commenced to make out a receipt. Bill strolled to the window. The red-headed man, the boss as they called him, could not be the owner of so fine a place, Jim was certain. Caretaker probably; caretaker of a big summer home not yet opened for the season, perhaps a sort of sailing master for a yacht of the owner later on. He came back by the time Bill had made out his receipt. Bills changed hands and two slips of paper. Bud came over to the bed.
“So long,” he said. “Times are hard, pal. It was a chance to get some easy money. No hard feelings?”
“Only on the back of my head,” Jim smiled. It was not the underlings he was after.
“You talk too much,” snarled Bill. “Come on, if you want to get back tonight.” They left the room and backed the car out. Jim heard it spinning over the gravel of the drive. He looked at Redhead, who had drawn up a chair by the side of the bed and seated himself.
“See here, my lad,” said Redhead. “Those landlubbers have lashed you over-tight. I’ll loosen you up a bit. You and me should get along fine, seein’ we’ve both smelt blue water. Aye, an’ sailed it. You slip me your word not to try and get funny and I’ll cast you loose entirely. Not that it ’ud do you any good. But I’m an amiable man, when I’m allowed to be, an’ a mean cuss when I’m riled.” He set his big hands in either pocket of his coat and brou
ght out from the one an automatic pistol and from the other a slingshot—much the same weapon, Jim thought ruefully, that had laid him out at the other end of the trip.
“That goes,” he answered. In a moment he was untriced, using his liberty to chafe his arms and legs, then sitting on the bed.
“Nothin’ like bein’ as comfortable as you kin,” said Redhead. “My name is Swenson, my lad. You and me’ll get along fine. All I want from you is a little information, and if you’re a wise man you’ll come through first instead of last, and save us both a heap of trouble. For you’ve got to come through.” The rumbling voice deepened on the last words; the red face coarsened, if that were possible, with an outthrust of the big jaw and a malicious light in the little eyes accompanying the balling up of great fists. “Then we’ll have a snack to eat and a taste of grog. The real stuff. They kin make drinkin’ unlawful but they can’t make it unpopular, an’ what the public wants, they most usually gits. How’ll that suit you?”
“What do you want?” asked Jim. Swenson winked.
“I want the latitude an’ longitude, the true and correct position of a certain island somewhere in the South Pacific. Where’s the little log, my lad?” Jim laughed.
“I gave it to a man.”
“Name him.”
“My Uncle Samuel.” For a moment Swenson glowered, then guffawed.
“That’s a good un. Fooled me at first. Mailed it, eh? Who to?”
“I’m not telling.”
“No?”
“No.” Swenson appeared to consider the quality of his refusal.
“That’s what I get by treating you so smooth, eh? Well, I’ll try the other tack. I’ll treat you rough. I hear you’ve held a ticket. So did I. And they knew me as ‘Hellfire’ Swenson. Ever hear of Hellfire Swenson?” Jim had heard of the man. A few years before Swenson had been brought to New York on charges forwarded by the American consul at Capetown, accused of violating the seamen’s act forbidding corporal punishment, during a voyage from San Francisco to the Cape. Also charged with murder on the high seas. It had been a case discussed on every American ship. There had been handcuffings followed by beatings with knotted towels and a club. The crew had been forced to obey orders at the muzzle of a revolver. A seaman had jumped overboard two months out of San Francisco, to avoid the abuse. Repenting of his act, he had clutched a rope trailing from the stern of the ship, begging to be hauled aboard, and Hellfire Swenson, it was alleged, had forbidden any member of the crew rendering aid. The sailor finally lost his grip and was drowned. Swenson had been backed up by his mates and the charges were, in the main, not proven. But Hellfire Swenson lost his ticket. Jim surveyed him without blanching but he wondered no longer that this blackguard had been named the boss. How he got the position of caretaker, if indeed he held it, was a mystery.
“You’re on land now, Hellfire,” he said. “Bully driving won’t get you anything. But I’ll tell you one thing and be damned to you. You can hand it on to Foster with my compliments. The little log is in the hands of the properly interested party.” Swenson’s fists tightened; he blinked his piggy eyes, but showed no other signs of special interest in what Jim had said.
“That’s news. As for Foster, whoever he is, that’s news, too. I’m actin’ in this for myself, my lad.”
Aside from the character of the man, Jim set this down as a lie. If Swenson knew the value of the figures he must know the history connected with them. Whether Foster was hiring him or not, the name would be familiar to him. Swenson went on:
“I reckon you took a good look at them figgers before you mailed ’em. I’m takin’ your word about the mailin’. You’re a smart lad. Never mind the log. You come through with the position, or it’s no grog an’ no grub an’ worse to follow. I’ll leave you to think it over. Lie down, stretch out. Spread-eagle. Turn over on your belly.”
Swenson had broken Jim’s own parole by his own actions. Liberty was stopped, the prospects of semi-starvation substituted. Hellfire was rising from his chair. He was a big man, but he moved quickly. And Jim was quicker. Pretending to obey, he stretched out his hands, half turned over and then reversed, plumping the pillow he had clutched fair and hard at Swenson. It took the ex-skipper in the face and chest with force enough behind it, combined with the way it shut off his wind, to send Hellfire staggering back a step. That was enough. He tangled with the chair and went over backward while Jim leaped for the door. There was a spring lock on it and the catch had been shot by Swenson when he came in. As Jim tugged at the handle and then sought for the combination Swenson rolled nimbly over, snatched his gun from his pocket and fired from the floor. The bullet slapped into the door panel too close to Jim’s head to be either safe or pleasant.
“Stand up to the door there or I’ll put a leak in your skull!” The voice of Hellfire roared with stentorian, after-deck purpose. That jig was over. Jim stood against the door Y fashion, arms up and wide. “Turn about, march over to that bed. On your back!” There was the clink of metal as Swenson groped in a drawer with one hand, the other holding his gun trained on his prisoner. Then Jim found himself handcuffed to the bedposts, a pair of cuffs for each wrist. His ankles, spread on request coupled with the muzzle of the gun thrust into the small of his back, were dexterously lashed to the foot posts, and he lay there with some play to hands and arms but secure as a hogtied steer, face upward.
“Now think it over, my bucko.” Swenson left the room. Jim heard his tread descending to the garage floor, crunching on the gravel, dying away. Presently a fly began to bother him, a small but persistent tormentor that seemed to appreciate the fact that it was immune from pursuit. Another followed, roaming over his skin, exploring his ears, the cavities of his nose. Jim grinned and bore it. The morning passed; the sunlight shifted on the walls; afternoon came and his enforced position became well-nigh intolerable. He early realized that his ankle cords had sailors’ knots in them and that all effort to release them meant only chaffing and cutting of the flesh above his low shoes. He could wriggle his body a little and shift his head on the pillow that Swenson had restored to the bed. He made up his mind to capitulate, but not to do so with too great appearance of eagerness lest Swenson should suspect the truth—that Jim was going to supply false figures. He had no cause to bother about the hurry; Swenson was taking his time. Jim got hungry, then drowsy. Sleep conquered stomach and he found surcease from all inconvenience in slumber. He did not wake up until twilight was approaching, which meant somewhere between eight and nine o’clock in the evening. Now he was ravenous, but he lay there in the growing dusk for quite a while before he heard steps outside coming up the ladder, and the opening of the door. A light was switched on and Swenson stood looking at him as he twisted himself for a survey.
“Had enough, my lad?” asked Hellfire. “I’ve got some sandwiches here and something on the hip for you if you’re goin’ to be sensible. I’ve had lunch and supper myself, piping hot. How about it?”
Jim strove to inject sullenness into his voice.
“I’m not a damned fool,” he said. “I’ll talk business.”
“Nothing to talk about, my lad. You give me them figgers.”
“I want to know where I get off. I’m out of a job. I expected to get a berth or money through them, or a stake.”
“We’ll fix that up. Berth or money. Mebbe both.” There was something about Hellfire that dimly reminded Jim of Stephen Foster in the bland, apt way with which he made promises.
“I’ll take some of the money now,” he said. “Show me a hundred bucks and I’ll talk. I’ll want four hundred more later.”
Jim never expected to see the four hundred. He was willing to accept fifty cash, but that much he needed. If Swenson had been willing to pay out two hundred dollars for the delivery of Jim he ought to be able to advance more for the contents of the package. Jim had no scruples about taking the money. He had had between eleven and twelve dollars in his pocket the night before. If it was there now he did not know, and had had no ch
ance to find out. Bud would not have taken it, but Bill might. He owed seven and a half at the Foxfield Hotel and he did not know how far away he was from there. He was going there by the quickest way he could find and pay for, as soon as he got his release, or made one for himself. He did not trust Hellfire but he sought to allay the latter’s alertness by his own acting.
Swenson counted out some bills from a good-sized roll and laid them on the bed, just beyond reach of Jim’s hand.
“Five twenties there,” he said. “Spiel the figgers and I loosen up; you pouch the money and then you pouch the food. Four hundred more later.”
“It’s one-thirty-two, fifty-four west, longitude,” lied Jim.
“Hold on. Wait till I put it down.” Swenson got pen and paper.
Jim repeated.
“One-thirty-two, fifty-four west, longitude. Forty-four, twenty-nine south.”
“Got a good mem’ry, have you?”
“Yes. Why?”
“If you should happen to repeat them figgers any time later on and not get ’em the same you’re goin’ to have a mighty hard time rememberin’ anything from then on. Sure you got ’em right?” Jim repeated them with a laugh. And made a note to mark them down somewhere for handy reference as soon as he got a chance, though he had carefully selected them and felt sure of remembering them. But a threat like this from Swenson was not apt to be vague and he was far from out of the woods yet.
“Pretty far south, ain’t it, for jungle?” asked Swenson a little suspiciously.
“No farther south than New Zealand. Almost the same latitude as Dunedin. Tropical enough there. And the Antarctic drift is well below fifty in that longitude.”
The Pirate Story Megapack: 25 Classic and Modern Tales Page 7
