by Mike Lee
"Because you're a liar and a thief," Morton stated. "People like you don't put much stock in personal honor."
Kahn studied Morton carefully. "A comment based upon your vast knowledge of human nature, I suppose," he said. "Well here's a curious little anecdote for you: I keep my promises. Always. If I give you my word, it's iron."
"Yet you'll cheat old folks out of their life savings peddling fake influenza cures," she shot back.
"Of course. I don't give my word to just anyone...and, if folks are dumb enough to fall for my pitch, they deserve it," Kahn answered. "Get down off your high horse, sister. You're afraid to accept that I might have a shred of integrity. In fact, you can't bear to think that we're even a little bit alike. That's hardly a Christian attitude...Comrade."
He expected her to fly off the handle, but Morton surprised him. Instead, she coolly met his stare. "So why did you make the promise to Hayes in the first place. It obviously wasn't out of any sense of compassion." Her eyes narrowed thoughtfully. "Was it guilt? I bet that's it. Once upon a time you were in over your head and Hayes bailed you out. He even saved your life. You'd screwed up, and he felt sorry for you, and it's eaten at you ever since."
Kahn's expression darkened. He stepped closer, looming angrily over the diminutive pilot. "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, Comrade," he said quietly. "You'd do well to remember that."
Before she could reply, he gritted his teeth, collecting himself, and turned to Dugan. "Deadeye, why don't you take the good Comrade here to the galley and scare up some coffee? You could stand to have a break...and so could I."
Dugan took one look at Kahn and hustled Morton off the bridge without another word. The pirate captain stared after them long after they'd gone.
"When am I ever going to learn to stop arguing with women?" he muttered, shaking his head.
The Hawai'ian island shone like an emerald against the sapphire blue of the Pacific, ringed with white sand beaches that shone in the warm afternoon sun. Massive, purple-black thunderheads were gathering behind the dark bulk of Mauna Kea, the island's restive volcano, sending warm, wet gusts of wind down its slopes and through the bustling streets of Hilo.
The new capital of the kingdom of Hawai'i had grown rapidly along the shore of Hilo Bay, with modern stone buildings set among stately wood and bamboo structures. As the taxi made its way through a maze of twisting, crowded streets, Kahn watched native Polynesians in colorful local garb brushing shoulders with suit-and-tie Englishmen, Frenchmen and North Americans. It was as if Manhattan or Washington had been dropped into the middle of the garden of Eden; before long Kahn's thoughts turned to what manner of serpents such a paradise would harbor.
The taxi was shown through the gate at the British Embassy, a tall stone building just a few blocks away from King Jonah Kuhio Kalaniana 'ole's newly-completed palace. By the time the car pulled around to the building's grand entrance a gentleman in a somber gray suit was waiting for them at the steps, as though they had been expected. He flashed a dazzling smile as Chiang Liu-Mei emerged from the car, welcoming her to the island with all the respect accorded to visiting dignitaries. She accepted the courtesies graciously, and Kahn could see the relief in her eyes as she found herself back in the embrace of civilization. The gentleman ushered Chiang, Kahn and Morton inside; Hetty remained with the ship under vociferous protest, but Kahn insisted on meeting the British with Morton alone.
They were taken across a marble foyer and up a grand, sweeping staircase built in the best traditions of British Imperialism, and led through a pair of polished teak doors into a richly appointed office. The embassy official crossed the large room and paused at a set of French doors that opened onto a sunlit balcony. "Miss Chiang Liu-Mei and associates," the official announced to the men waiting there.
A wicker table and chairs had been arranged on the balcony, with a view which overlooked the bay. Two men in tailored suits rose to their feet. The first one was a tall, dapper gentleman of middle years with a thick mane of iron-gray hair and blue eyes that shone from a tanned, weathered face.
"Miss Chiang," he said warmly, taking her hand. "What an honor and a pleasure it is to meet you. I am Sir Trevor Carlyle, His Majesty's Ambassador to the islands." Carlyle gestured to his companion, a gentleman not much younger than the ambassador, who gave the impression of a mild-mannered scholar-save for his cold, appraising stare. "This is William Downing, with the Foreign Service. He's been instrumental in working out the details of our arrangement with your father."
"How do you do," Chiang said, smiling politely. She turned to Kahn. "Let me introduce-"
"Jonathan Kahn," Carlyle said with a smile, reaching for his hand. "Your reputation precedes you, Mister Kahn."
The pirate took the diplomat's hand. "Am I to take that as a compliment or an indictment, Ambassador?" he replied.
"I'd say bringing Miss Chiang here safely makes the answer self-evident," Carlyle answered smoothly, refusing to take the bait. "We were just enjoying our afternoon tea. Do join us, please."
The Ambassador nodded towards the table's three empty chairs, and Downing stepped around to pull one out for Chiang. Kahn took one of the proffered seats, and Morton did likewise. The Collective pilot had grown increasingly restless since they had arrived, and now it looked like she was working up the nerve to speak.
Carlyle was quick to take control of the conversation, however, entreating Chiang to relate the details of her capture and imprisonment at the hands of the Japanese. The young woman went on to describe what she remembered of her rescue, and her subsequent journey to Hilo.
After nearly an hour she set her teacup down and folded her hands in her lap. "I do hope you'll forgive my frankness, Sir Trevor, but now I must ask if your country's offer to my people still stands. I learned just before my capture that the Japanese army had surrounded Nanking, and I fear that the situation for China is very grave indeed."
The Ambassador leaned forward and rested a paternal hand on Chiang's arm. "You may be assured, young lady, that His Majesty's Government stands behind the Chinese people in their time of peril. But," he added, "there is the matter of your country's payment. Was it not to be delivered to you in the Empire State weeks ago?"
Chiang nodded. "That is correct. I was sent ahead to sign the necessary documents while the gold itself followed in a well-defended airship traveling along a highly secret route. It was hoped that the Japanese would believe the gold was with me, in the event their agents worked up the courage to openly interfere with our mission." The young lady smiled ruefully. "Compared to the arms payment, I was considered expendable.
"Unfortunately, something went wrong," she continued. "The airship made its last report over Taiwan, and then was to assume radio silence until reaching the coast of Hawai'i. We have heard nothing more after that."
Kahn digested the news. "The Japanese couldn't have intercepted the shipment-otherwise they wouldn't have bothered capturing you."
"Your airship might have run into bad weather," Downing said quietly. "There's been a typhoon brewing east of the Phillipines for the last two weeks. They could have been lost in the storm."
"Or possibly they were attacked, but managed to escape pursuit," Chiang countered. "There were a few prearranged locations along the route, where the airship was to take refuge-in the event they couldn't continue to New York-then call for assistance. The captain was ordered to take no chances that might risk the loss of the gold."
She paused, considering her options, then continued: "There is one such location in the Marshall Islands, approximately halfway between here and Taiwan. If the airship survived, that is where we will find it."
"Except that we don't have any zeppelins immediately available to undertake a rescue," Downing said.
"Really?" Kahn asked, genuinely surprised. "I would have thought your forces here would be better equipped."
"Our 'friend,' the good King Jonah, frowns on the presence of armed British troops on his islands," Downing said. "An armed
zeppelin would be...a political difficulty for us."
"Even if we had a zeppelin," Carlyle added, "if that typhoon starts to move our way, as the reports indicate it might, we'd be sending the expedition into the teeth of the storm.
"However," the ambassador continued, "we may have another-albeit unconventional-option. I'm certain Mister Kahn and his resourceful crew can recover the gold with little bother."
"He could. However...he won't." Kahn said. "Never mind the fact that I'm short on crew and my ship is damaged-that area is probably thick with pirates and Japanese patrols. Plus there's the typhoon. No way," he said, rising to his feet. "I've got better things to do. Like paying off Don DeCarlo and waiting for the reward on my head to blow over."
"Ah, yes, the $10,000 dollar reward," Carlyle said. "I can see how that would make your professional life rather difficult. We might be willing to help with that."
Kahn paused. "You can call off the reward?" he asked cautiously.
"I don't see why not," the ambassador said confidently. "Who do you think posted it in the first place?"
"You put the reward out on us?" Kahn replied, thunderstruck.
"Of course," Downing said. "We had been watching the Japanese embassy from the moment we knew that Miss Chiang had been captured. We were planning a rescue attempt of our own but you beat us to the punch. The only theory we could come up with was that you'd somehow found out about the arms deal and kidnapped Miss Chiang to demand a ransom."
Kahn leaned forward, looming over Downing and Carlyle. "But now, of course, you know the truth-and will cancel the bounty on my head."
Carlyle's smile turned cold. Completely nonplused, he sat back in his chair and sipped at his tea. "The moment you return with the gold, the price on your head will be a thing of the past, I can assure you. Downing here and some of his men will accompany you to the island and assist in recovering the shipment."
"I must go as well," Chiang said, in a tone that brooked no argument. "So that I can confirm the transfer of the gold from my country to yours."
Carlyle started to protest, but saw the look in Chiang's eye. "Very well," he said with an elegant shrug. "I admire your courage in the face of danger, Miss Chiang." He set his teacup down and stood. "It's good to see such an example of cooperation between our governments...and, of course, concerned 'private citizens' such as yourself, Mister Kahn. You'll no doubt want to leave without delay, so Mister Downing will escort you downstairs and secure a cab."
"Hey! Not so fast!" Morton shot to her feet. The words she'd been working up to came out in a rush. "Mister Ambassador, my name is Angela Morton. I'm a captain in the air militia of the People's Collective, and I'm Kahn's hostage. I request asylum...until I can be returned to my government and country."
Carlyle looked from Morton to Kahn. "Indeed?" His eyebrows arched. "I'm shocked. Certainly His Majesty's government is sympathetic to your plight. We would be pleased to extend to you our hospitality in this difficult time. As soon as this present crisis with China is resolved."
Morton's hopeful expression froze. "You wouldn't-"
The ambassador tried to look apologetic, but the effort didn't quite reach his eyes. "I must. National interests, you know. Don't worry. The trip will be over before you know it."
Thunder rolled ominously down the slopes of dark Mauna Kea.
Chapter Eleven: Into the Storm
"If you ask me, I say we throw the lot of 'em into the sea," Hetty growled, glaring at Chiang Liu-Mei and her British entourage.
The view ports of the Machiavelli's observation deck were open, letting in the briny smell of the ocean as the zeppelin hugged the rocky coastline of an island barely ten miles across. If the island had a name, it wasn't on the detailed map Dugan had acquired in Hilo; once the airship was safely away from the Kingdom of Hawai'i, Chiang tapped a well-manicured nail over a brown dot in the Marshall Islands and left it at that.
Since then the daughter of Chiang Kai-Shek had been withdrawn and increasingly anxious, no doubt fearful of what Kahn and his crew would find once they reached their destination. The future of her country rested in large part on the gold that-hopefully-awaited them there. She paced the airship's observation deck, her shoulders uncharacteristically hunched, as if the suspense was a physical weight that threatened to crush her.
If Chiang had grown silent in the face of her concerns, the six men sent along by the British ambassador to take charge of the gold were all too eager to share their ideas about the expedition. Ostensibly they were associates of William Downing, a bookish-looking member of Britain's Foreign Office, but Kahn thought the men were the youngest, fittest bureaucrats he'd ever met. He figured they were either handpicked soldiers or spies, members of their country's vaunted Secret Service. Despite the fact that they knew next to nothing about airship operations, their leader-a dashing fellow named Rupert Gordon, offered an endless stream of "suggestions" about every conceivable aspect of the "operation."
Jonathan "Genghis" Kahn-master of the zeppelin and leader of the Red Skull Legion pirate gang-eyed the British team, clustered aft along the starboard ports, each clutching a set of powerful binoculars. "Don't tempt me, kid," he growled. "We've got enough problems as it is."
We, indeed, Kahn thought ruefully. The fact of the matter was, it was his obligation to an old associate that had gotten them into trouble in the first place. Artemus Hayes had saved his life many years ago, when a high-stakes poker game went sour in New York City. Kahn had misjudged their mark, a Republic of Texas oil tycoon, and never dreamed the man would catch them dealing from the bottom of the deck. The memory of terror and helplessness when the tycoon threw the cards in the air and stuck a gun in his face still haunted him. Hayes, of course, never let him live it down.
He'd lived for the day when he could even the scales and pull Hayes' fat out of the fire. Kahn thought the time had arrived when Hayes appeared out of the blue, asking for his help to rescue a Chinese girl held by the Japanese. What Hayes hadn't mentioned was that the girl was the daughter of China's president, Chiang Kai-Shek, and that she had been in Manhattan to broker an arms deal between her country and Britain. Every step he'd taken since the raid on the Japanese Embassy seemed to mire him deeper in a web of international intrigue that pushed him around like a pawn on a grand chessboard. Now he sensed they were approaching the endgame.
Kahn eyed the dense jungle growth surrounding the island's twin peaks. The Chinese zeppelin carrying the arms payment had never reached the Empire State; either it had fallen prey to pirates, Japanese patrols or the increasingly hostile weather. If the airship had been too damaged to complete the journey, there had been several waypoints planned where the zeppelin could lay up and call for help. The island was one such waypoint, and the likeliest place the Chinese airship would be hiding.
"Why didn't Hayes tell you who she was, or why she was in Manhattan in the first place?" Hetty asked, as if reading his thoughts. Perhaps she was-they'd been wingmen as long as Kahn had been terrorizing the skies over North America.
The pirate leader shrugged. "He probably didn't know. Mercenaries aren't usually kept well-informed by their employers. Or maybe he was afraid I'd balk, knowing who Chiang Liu-Mei really was, and planned on letting me in on the full picture only after I'd rescued her. Instead he caught a bullet, and here we are."
"What I want to know," said a small, hard-eyed woman to Kahn's left, "is why no one has heard any word from this gold-laden airship." Captain Angela Morton of the People's Collective Air Force-"The Dusters" as they were colloquially known-rested her hands on the edge of an open view port and leaned out into the warm tropical breeze.
She had come on board the Machiavelli as the Red Skulls' prisoner after an abortive raid on her hometown of Deadwood, and had only reluctantly cooperated with the crew on their desperate flight across the country. But a change had come over her since her encounter with the British ambassador at Hilo, where she'd seen firsthand how even great nations put their ethics aside where hard curren
cy was concerned. She'd been silent for a long time afterwards, then suddenly began to act as though she were just another member of the crew.
"It's been, what, almost three weeks since the zep disappeared?" she continued. "You'd think they'd have gotten a message to someone by now."
"That's concerns me, too," Kahn said. "Even if their radio was damaged, they've had plenty of time to make repairs."
"So something else happened once they got here," Hetty said thoughtfully. "You don't think the Japanese caught up to them, do you?"
Kahn shook his head. "I doubt they would have followed us across the continent if they already had the gold." From the moment the Machiavelli left Manhattan they had been hounded by a Japanese airship, commanded by a ruthless Imperial naval officer named Murasaki. They managed to track the Red Skulls as far as Sky Haven, the pirate city in the Free Colorado Rockies, but Kahn was certain they'd slipped out of Hawai'i without any sign of pursuit. There was no way the Japanese could find them now, since they hadn't even known where they were headed until the last possible moment. "There are, however, other possibilities."
"Such as?" came a cultured, British voice. Rupert Gordon spoke the question with a friendly smile, but something about his manner turned it into something of a demand. Kahn wasn't certain if it was Rupert's imperious tone that irritated him so...or the fact that the Englishman had managed to cross the length of the observation deck without the pirate leader noticing him.
"Pirates, Mr. Gordon," Kahn replied curtly. "According to the newsreels, these islands are a favorite hiding place for pirate bands. It's possible that the Chinese might have stumbled onto one."
Gordon sniffed dismissively. "Attacking relatively unarmed merchant zeppelins is one thing, Mister Kahn, but a military airship is another matter entirely. I doubt the Chinese would have much to fear from some South Seas rabble. In fact," he continued, "I and my men are coming to the conclusion that the zeppelin was likely lost at sea." He nodded towards the island. "I rather think a thousand-foot-long airship would be hard to miss, don't you think? Yet there's no sign of her."
