“It’s a big ocean,” he said. “And if we ever can find this thing again it’ll be just luck.”
“We’ll find it,” Sandra Ames assured him confidently. “Hugo will be able to. I know he will.”
Shayne let it go at that. There was no use telling her that if an offshore wind came up, they might never see Hugo Mollison again to tell him about the marker.
They began paddling the clumsy rubber raft as nearly straight west as they could. An hour went by, and Sandra’s hands were painfully blistered. Grimly she kept on paddling, but after two hours had to give up, tears of frustration in her eyes. Shayne continued to paddle, and a light breeze, setting shoreward came up. But even with the breeze he estimated they were making no more than two miles an hour, and by noon, there was still no sign of the Florida coast on the horizon.
He shipped his paddle and rested. His own hands were blistered now, and he examined them tenderly. The salt water that dripped down the paddle made each paddle stroke a torture.
“We seem to be making progress no place fast,” he said. “But don’t worry. Men have survived for weeks on a raft like this. And a fishing boat is bound to come past sooner or later.”
“I’m not worrying about that,” Sandra said, her voice strained. She sat huddled close to him in her light coat—not for warmth, because with the sun overhead the day had become sweltering, but to avoid sunburn. “I’ve been thinking—those men in the helicopter who tried to kill us. They must be part of a gang who knows about the submarine too. That man last night—the one who rescued Captain Tolliver—he must be part of the gang. The two men in the helicopter couldn’t be the only ones. There must be others. They’ll be wondering what happened to the helicopter. Maybe they’ll come looking for it. And if they find us while they’re searching—”
She shivered slightly, and her eyes were big as she stared at Michael Shayne. He had been thinking along the same lines, but saw no point in mentioning the possibilities.
“The chances are a hundred to one we’ll be picked up by a fishing boat,” he said with false heartiness. “No need to worry. Let’s have a bit of lunch.”
He sliced the loaf of bread they had brought along, and put strips of raw bacon between the slices. They each ate a raw bacon sandwich, and washed it down with a careful swallow of water. Then Sandra Ames stretched and yawned.
“I’m sleepy,” she said. “I think I’ll take a nap.”
She curled up, her head cushioned on the side of the life raft, and fell asleep. Shayne estimated the situation. The breeze was still moving them shoreward slowly. The sea was calm and empty. His hands were too sore for more paddling. Between one thing and another, he hadn’t had much sleep the night before. Presently he curled up in the remaining space, put his arm over his eyes, and fell asleep too.
How long he slept he didn’t know, but when he abruptly opened his eyes, the sun had descended in the sky quite a distance. The voice that had awakened him yelled again.
“Ahoy, the raft!”
Shayne turned, even as Sandra Ames stirred and sat up. A very fancy cabin cruiser was easing up to them. In the bow stood a short, plump figure holding a coiled rope.
“Get ready to catch a line!” the plump man called.
The redhead stared, and behind him the girl gave an excited gasp.
“It’s Hugo!” she cried. “Hugo and Pete! They’ve found us!”
Michael Shayne rubbed his jaw absentmindedly. “Well, by God!” he said. “Damned if they haven’t!”
10
The sleek cruiser knifed its way northward toward Biscayne Bay. It was full dark now and the wind had freshened. They rolled a bit as they cut through the long swells.
Shayne, wearing a sweater borrowed from Pete Ruggles, stood and smoked and watched Pete at the helm. The young man handled the helm as easily as if he hadn’t spent half the afternoon in the water, skin-diving down to the sunken K-341 again and again to bring up more packages of bills in watertight aluminum casings.
Up forward, Sandra was sound asleep in one of the two tiny cabins. She too had spent more hours in the water, diving down to the submerged submarine after they had been rescued. For after picking them up and hearing their story, Hugo Mollison had swung the cruiser eastward, made a quick estimate of tide and wind, and then, either by superhuman good luck or uncanny navigation, found the life belt they had left to mark the spot where the Golden Girl had gone down and the K-341 lay. He himself did not put it all down to luck.
Aboard the chartered cruiser he had two skin-diving outfits, and using these, Sandra and Pete went over the side immediately. The life belt had shifted a little, but inside half an hour they found the sunken sub and brought up the first aluminum box of bills. They kept on diving until dark, and now forward there were twenty of the unopened, watertight containers. Shayne estimated they each held $5,000—a hundred thousand in all.
Hugo Mollison had stayed aboard directing operations, and making a chart of the spot. At dusk he had sighted on the sun on the horizon, and then on three different stars as soon as it was dark enough, making elaborate calculations. Then they had put back the life-belt marker, replacing the fish line with an anchor rope tied to a spare anchor, and headed back for Miami. Hugo was in the cabin now, putting down the results of his observations on a chart with great care and precision.
While Pete and Sandra were diving, he had questioned Shayne about the helicopter which had sunk the Golden Girl, gnawing his lip uneasily as he listened.
“The attack was tied in with the killing of Whitey and Shorty last night,” he said. “No doubt about it. The killer was keeping an eye on Captain Tolliver. Whoever he was working with wanted Tolliver free to lead them to the submarine. That helicopter was a smart idea. Taking off before dawn, it could cover an immense area in a few hours. Knowing what the Golden Girl looked like, as soon as it spotted you at anchor the pilot could feel sure you were over the U-boat. Of course, the men aboard—there must have been at least two—didn’t count on the captain having an automatic rifle aboard. That was good work, Mike—I’m glad you brought them down.”
“So am I,” Shayne said grimly.
“Actually,” Hugo Mollison went on, “that’s how we came to find you. Pete and I were too keyed up just to wait for you to get back. We had this chartered cruiser and decided to head south, hoping we might meet the Golden Girl on the way back. We saw a plane fall into the sea, burning, and headed toward the spot. But it must have sunk because we couldn’t find any traces. But we kept on, thinking we might find survivors, and when we sighted the raft we thought at first it was from the helicopter.”
“I see. Lucky for us.”
“Yes, finding you two was luck, and so was locating the marker you left over the U-boat. I’m sorry as the devil Captain Tolliver is dead, but I’m going to carry out my part of the deal, and pay the money to his estate.”
“He asked me to handle it for him, and turn it over to the St. Francis Foundling Home,” Shayne said. “Said you’d have a certified check. If you have it with you I can take it now.”
Hugo Mollison did not hesitate. He reached at once for his wallet and carefully brought out a crisp green check imprinted in red with the figures $100,000. It was made out to bearer.
“That’s how he wanted it,” he said, as Shayne folded it and put it into his pocket. “And because of the risk you took, I’m going to compensate you with an extra ten thousand. Does that seem a fair figure?”
“It sounds like a nice round figure,” the redhead said. Hugo Mollison seemed satisfied with the answer.
“We’re going to need your help,” he said. “I don’t know who was behind the attack on the Golden Girl, but we have to anticipate trouble. If you’ll work with us until we’ve finished with the K-Three Forty-One I’ll double that ten thousand.”
“I’ll see the job through,” the detective said, and Mollison nodded.
“Good man!” he said, heartily.
Now they were no more than three hours out of
Miami, and Pete Ruggles, at the helm, showed no sign of tiring. In the cabin, he could see Hugo Mollison stir. Hugo stood up, putting some folded papers in his pocket. Then he stretched, put on a jacket, and came out on deck. He stopped to speak to Pete Ruggles, then came forward to where Shayne was smoking, sheltered from the breeze.
“Well, that’s that,” he said with satisfaction. He put his hand into his coat pocket. “I have the U-boat pinpointed on my chart now. I could go back there blindfolded. All’s well that ends well.”
“It hasn’t ended well for Captain Tolliver,” Shayne said.
“No, of course not.” Hugo Mollison shook his head regretfully. “But somehow we will avenge him. For our own safety we have to find out who was behind the attack on him. I was thinking that might be in your line.”
“I think I’ve already got it figured, Hugo,” Shayne said. “You were behind it.”
Hugo Mollison’s round, plump features altered. The softness seemed to vanish like a mask being taken off.
“So!” he said. “You are a better detective than I thought.” His hand remained in his pocket. “And how did you come to that conclusion?”
“I was a little slow,” Michael Shayne said harshly. “I’m not proud of myself. The truth is, I was pretty puzzled myself. Until this afternoon. Then when you rescued us so promptly, and found your way back to the K-Three Forty-One as if you were riding down a concrete road, I knew there was funny stuff going on. It wasn’t too tough to figure out what.”
“Indeed?” Even Hugo Mollison’s faintly English accent seemed to have changed, hardened, become more guttural. “What kind of funny stuff?”
Shayne took a deep drag on his cigarette, and the tip glowed scarlet in the darkness.
“You weren’t taking any chances from the beginning. You obviously gave Sandra a couple of little gadgets to take along with her last night. I can guess what they were. One of them was a miniature directional radio signaling device. She carried that in her overnight case. In fact, I found it while you were busy helping them bring up the stuff from the K-Three Forty-One. She started it broadcasting as soon as she got aboard the Golden Girl. It gave you a line on the boat at all times. All you needed was a directional radio, tuned to the right band. You have one on this cruiser which led you to our life raft, since Sandra was smart enough to bring the device along in her bag.
“The helicopter was also equipped with a directional radio that enabled it to home on the Golden Girl. After all, it came straight for us, and it wasn’t on any search pattern at the time. It knew where it was going. You planned for the helicopter to mark the spot and to eliminate us, because we were now superfluous and would make too many people knowing the secret. As for Sandra, she’d done her job and could be dispensed with. Being a German, you have no great sentiment about a woman you are making use of.”
“Ach!” Hugo Mollison’s eyes narrowed. “You are clever, Mr. Shayne. Did you guess that Sandra also had with her an ingenious little device that emits sounds under water? She took it down and left it in the K-Three Forty-One. We have sonic detectors which led us directly to it. That life preserver—it was just a red herring so you wouldn’t wonder when we found the spot again.”
Shayne shrugged. “That figures,” he said. “You’d naturally take double precautions. And now you have the spot well charted. So you can get rid of me and Sandra and go back to get the rest of the counterfeit when it’s convenient and no one is paying any attention to you any more.”
“Ach!” Mollison said again, a little grunt of surprise. “You knew it was counterfeit?”
“That didn’t take much figuring,” Michael Shayne told him easily. “Hell, the Germans were printing counterfeit money long before the war ended—British and American both. Played the devil with the Bank of England for a while. It stood to reason the Nazis wouldn’t have any million dollars in clean new bills by the time the war ended. They had to be counterfeit. That explained a lot of things—one of them being Tolliver’s trips north.
“The captain was no fool. He took only as much of the phony as he could pass at one time. Then he sold what he bought with it, and gave the cash he collected to the St. Francis Foundling Home. If the money had been good he could have found ways to get it to them with less trouble. And knowing it was probably counterfeit told me what you were really after. The plates. Are the plates aboard the K-Three Forty-One too, Hugo? Was that part of some cute Nazi scheme to set up headquarters in South America and flood the world with fake United States money? What do you figure those plates are worth to you now, if you can get them? Twenty million? Fifty?”
“A hundred million, perhaps. Who knows?” The plump man shrugged. “My friend, you are smart enough to be a German.”
“I suppose that’s meant to be a compliment,” Shayne grunted. “Tell me, Hugo, were you in German Intelligence?”
“German Naval Intelligence,” Mollison said. “Yes, I’ve been hunting for a clue to the whereabouts of the Three Forty-One ever since the war ended. I knew the counterfeit was turning up, and I knew the submarine went down somewhere off Florida. I finally became attracted to the curious pattern of Captain Tolliver’s life, and realized my search was ended.
“I hired Sandra, for a pretty girl can often persuade a man, even an old man, to do something he might not do for another man. Naturally, I was gratified to have Tolliver co-operate with me willingly, but equally naturally, I had him watched at all times. It was Pete Ruggles’s brother who was watching the captain last night, and who rescued him from Whitey and Shorty, not knowing you were also on the same errand.
“Pete’s brother was one of the two who died in the helicopter this morning. I promised Pete he could have the pleasure of killing you, but I see I must break my promise—you are too dangerous to take chances with. So, my friend—”
Deliberately Hugo Mollison withdrew a snubnosed automatic from his coat pocket and leveled it at Shayne’s stomach. The detective took another drag on his cigarette—and flipped the flaming tip straight at Hugo Mollison’s eyes.
Instinctively the plump man ducked and Shayne’s hand came down jarringly on Hugo’s right wrist. The gun fell to the deck. Mollison brought his head up with a butting motion and caught Shayne’s chin with it. Jarred by the impact, the detective fell backward against the cabin wall, dragging the smaller man with him.
“Pete!” Hugo Mollison shouted hoarsely, then Shayne’s hands went around his throat. He squeezed, and felt Hugo going limp in his grasp like a mechanical doll running down.
But Pete, abandoning the wheel, was charging for him, a glitter of steel in his hands. The smooth, schoolboy face was contorted with hatred, and the way Pete held the knife proved he knew how to use it.
Michael Shayne picked up the struggling Hugo and threw him at Pete. Pete put up his hands to ward off the hurtling figure, dropped the knife, and managed to break the force of the blow by deflecting Hugo to the side. Hugo wasn’t so lucky. His body crashed to the rail, he screamed once as if his back had broken, then he whipped over the side and disappeared into the dark, foaming water.
Pete hesitated an instant as his horrified gaze followed the disappearing figure of Hugo Mollison. Shayne charged him. Pete, holding the rail for support, brought up his foot and drove it into Shayne’s chest. The redhead grunted as his breath was violently expelled, and went backward onto the deck as the cruiser, with no one at the wheel, swung broadside and heeled violently to a wave.
The same movement of the deck that made Shayne lose his balance, caught Pete as he tried to follow up the kick. With the deck slanting away behind him, Pete began running backward to keep his balance. Shayne found himself rolled against the rail. By the time he untangled himself and got to his feet, hanging onto the rail as the craft still rolled wildly, Pete was gone. Shayne guessed that he had just kept running until he brought up against the after rail, and momentum had carried him on over it into the ocean.
He pulled himself to the wheel, grabbed it, and got the boat’s bow into
the wind. Then he swung her around in a great circle. He made two more circles without spotting anyone in the water. Then he straightened out and turned north again.
In one of the cabins, Sandra Ames was still asleep.
11
Michael Shayne eased the boat into the ranks of craft moored in the basin of some private yacht club. He didn’t know which one it was and didn’t care. He spotted an empty mooring buoy, managed to catch it and secure the boat. Then he went to wake up the girl.
Sandra stumbled on deck, rubbing her eyes. “Why, we’re back,” she said sleepily. “Where’s Hugo?”
“He got off at the last stop,” Shayne said. “He had urgent business with some fish.”
“What?” She gazed at him blankly. “I don’t understand.”
Shayne jerked his thumb. “Back there,” he said. “Hugo is showing the barracuda how tough he is.”
Her eyes mirrored shock. “Hugo dead!” she whispered. “And Pete? Where’s Pete?”
“Pete couldn’t bear to leave Hugo. No, I didn’t kill them. They just abandoned ship. After trying to kill me.”
“They tried to kill you?”
“They tried. It didn’t work. You should be glad. Because after they killed me they were going to kill you.”
“No!” Her voice was taut. “No, Hugo wouldn’t have killed me! I was working with him!”
“Hugo had Whitey and Shorty killed last night. He had Captain Tolliver killed this morning, and the idea was to kill you and me at the same time and wipe the slate clean. A very efficient fellow, Hugo. That’s what comes of being in the Engineers and Intelligence, both.”
She shook her head, dazedly. “He was some kind of crook,” she said unsteadily. “I knew he was a confidence man of some kind. But I didn’t know he was a killer.”
Mike Shayne's Torrid Twelve Page 5
