The H. Bedford-Jones Pulp Fiction Megapack

by H. Bedford-Jones

  “I know that your friend Arevalo is up to some diviltry,” said Desmond, reaching into the corner bunk and securing O’Sullivan’s fiddle case. “What is it, d’ye know?”

  “No! But if you don’t cut me loose, ye blasted and bedamned papist, I’ll knock your—”

  “You’ll stay right here, eh? Exactly. Now, skipper, dear, let me impress upon your blighted brains that we’re in one hell of a tight place. From what we’ve learned, Arevalo and your gentlemanly mate were in partnership, and now Arevalo is in command o’ things. But I’m in command o’ the two after cabins, with all the cabin stores and a lot o’ bottled spring water; and we’re quite comfortable, thank you.

  “Stop your cursing and listen, ye righteous Belfast bloater! If I leave ye here, Mr. Arevalo means to finish you off proper; and unless ye promise to show the light o’ reason, I’ll leave ye here. I don’t want an obstreperous fool like you spoilin’ me plans. This situation demands delicacy and brains, neither of which you own. I don’t like you, and you don’t like me; but if ye pass your word to take orders from me I’ll cut ye loose.”

  “I’ll see ye damned first!” hoarsely returned the skipper.

  “Then good night to ye, and pleasant dreams,” said Desmond, starting for the ladder. “I’ll have the ship in charge by tomorrow night, but I’m afraid ye’ll not benefit by it, poor soul!”

  “Hold on!” muttered the skipper hastily. “Can’t ye see that I’ll agree?”

  “And no trouble from ye until we set foot ashore?”

  “Not a bit—but I’ll wipe your damned face off the map when we do!”

  “It’ll give me pleasure to reciprocate,” said Desmond, returning. “I’ll take me knife to these lines—heavens, but they’ve lashed ye tight! I don’t see why they were so afraid of you, when a native and a bunch of island scum could knock ye off your own quarterdeck.”

  The skipper uttered furious but inarticulate oaths, and staggered to his feet.

  “Give me your arm when we get up,” he said at last. “It’s a bad crack over the skull I got. Where are the devils?”

  Desmond explained the situation. Despite his weak and battered body, Canaughan was all for descending the after companion and catching Arevalo’s gang in the rear, but this Desmond refused to countenance.

  “It does ye credit,” he observed with a mild sarcasm that infuriated Canaughan anew, “but ’twill not do, skipper, dear. I’m none too good on my pins, nor are you, at present. Besides, why not let Arevalo have the ship a while, and see what he’s up to? Let him have her; let him work out his guts savin’ her, and when fine weather comes we’ll take her from him like that!”

  “Ye seem mighty confident,” returned the other.

  “I was never knocked in the head by me own men,” said Desmond, chuckling.

  The skipper said something under his breath, and added: “Let’s go, then,” in a tone of suppressed emotion.

  As the two men gained the deck, they heard the muffled report of a shot come from aft, followed by a chorus of yells, then silence.

  “More lively, now!” commanded Desmond sharply. “We’ll have the divil’s own time goin’ back the way I came. Where’ll I find a bit o’ loose line?”

  Canaughan indicated a line, and Desmond seized the coil in passing.

  At the after companion they heard a rumble of voices from below, but did not pause. As Desmond had thought, it proved no easy task to regain the stern window from the deck. The line was passed over the stern rail, and Desmond swung himself down first. Aided by the swing of the ship, he managed to hook a foot inside the window, and then let the line swing out until Canaughan had followed him, when he pulled in the skipper.

  “All serene,” said Desmond, landing Canaughan softly. “You pull the line after you, so they’ll not be guessing how you got away, and where.”

  He hastened into the lighted cabin, where he found O’Sullivan standing, automatic in hand. Juliana was still sitting as he had left her, staring at the door, whose shattered panel bore witness to the fiddler’s shot.

  “What’s doing?” demanded Desmond. “Here’s your fiddle, and the skipper’s coming.”

  “Glory be!” exclaimed the fiddler. “They’ve gone, sir.”

  “Gone? You’re sure?”

  “Aye. We heard ’em say something about waiting until the Chang Yan showed up, when everything would be all right.”

  “What the divil!”

  A cry of relief broke from Juliana as the sturdy skipper appeared and shook hands. Canaughan, however, could throw no light upon the mystery of the Chang Yan; he had never heard of any such craft, he vowed.

  “Well, let be,” said Desmond. “So long as they’ve gone we can recuperate in peace. Tomorrow I’ll set me brains to work, and we’ll consider the matter o’ taking over the ship. Did ye get Arevalo, Michael Terence?”

  “I did not, sir,” rejoined the fiddler mournfully. “I got somebody, but not him, more’s the pity!”

  “Better luck next time, then,” and Desmond took a cheroot. “Skipper, will ye have a bite of supper? Then Michael Terence will play us a tune, maybe, and we’ll have a drink to our good luck, and go to sleep. There’s but two bunks for the three of us, but we’ll manage.”

  “Arevalo has something up his sleeve,” said the skipper dourly. “And we’re not headin’ south at all, but drivin’ west. Everybody’s gone mad, I’m thinking! What’s it all mean?”

  “Cheer up, I’m perfectly sane,” and Desmond laughed. “And mind, skipper, that you’ve passed your word to be a righteous man!”

  Canaughan gave him an eloquent look, and rubbed his cracked sconce.

  “Wait till we get ashore, that’s all!” he said grimly. “Just wait!”

  CHAPTER V

  THE “CHANG YAN”

  When Rosemonde Burley, becoming impatient with the lack of shipping, took passage from Saigon on the unspeakably vile Chinese junk, Chang Van officialdom was scandalized. But the imperturbable Rosemonde, with her widow’s weeds and her Croix de Guerre, was not a person to be interfered with. Rather, they decided mournfully, she was a person to be married—alas!

  “If I am to have charge of a nursing station at Ben Ho, up the coast,” she declared, “I am not going to rot in Saigon mes amis! This junk is going there. Voila! You will not send me, therefore I go. Unsafe? Bah! After my brave American was killed at Chateau-Thierry did I not drive an ambulance at the front? Did not Monsieur le President himself decorate me with the Cross? Bah! I’ll snap my fingers at those yellow men if they say two words to me! And I can use an automatic pistol, eh? Assuredly!”

  She simply refused to be interfered with. Everyone at Saigon knew her sad and glorious story—how she had married an American, an officer among the first in France; how he had fallen but a few weeks later; how Rosemonde had gone to avenge him with an ambulance; and how, the war ended, she had come out to the colonies to take up nursing duty. Not for money, either, since it was said that she was wealthy enough to enjoy life had she so desired.

  “Eh, bien!” said the governor general the night the Chang Yan sailed, as over the dinner table he told his guests about Rosemonde Burley. “There is the spirit of France for you, there! Nom d’un nom, but she will meet adventure, that woman! She is of a great spirit; a flame is in her. As for the junk, I think it is safe enough.”

  Rosemonde thought the Chang Yan safe enough also. Except for sixteen Chinamen, she was the only person aboard; but she had a decent cabin, was waited on with great respect, and the captain was a humorous soul named Hi Lung, who spoke a little French and grinned often.

  True, the junk was a junk, with a big eye painted on either bow, a bamboo sail or two, and a sublime faith in heaven. She stank abominably. Her cargo was supposed to be rotten copra from Siam, and was consigned to Nanking, so no one asked what it really was; but the first day out, when Rosemonde saw the yellow mate break out a five-tael tin of opium from a sack of rotten copra, she guessed that this would prove a lively voyage. It di
d.

  In the Far East, as in the Far West, the World War has appreciably affected the general conditions of life, and particularly of woman’s life. Rosemonde Burley, although by reason of her marriage an American citizen and proud of it, had found no difficulty in obtaining a colonial post from France. Behind the lines, and ahead of the lines, Rosemonde had seen many things, and had done many things; she had pulled a loaded ambulance out of hell and had shot three treacherous boches while doing it.

  She was perfectly able to use an automatic without wincing; but this did not imply that she was an unwomanly virago. Far from it! Every line of her trim, petite body expressed a vigorous womanhood, a sweetly feminine allure. She was not beautiful, perhaps, but she had the great gift that is beyond beauty—a spirit gently great, tenderly strong. And she had learned, in the bitter crucible, to take care of herself with an aggressive swiftness. Like many another who had passed through the Great War, she now laughed at the worst which the world might proffer.

  “One who has been through hell,” she would say, laughing, “does not fear purgatory, eh?” And this was true, Rosemonde feared nothing.

  On the morning after leaving Saigon, the junk was out of sight of land—which was not as it should be. Captain Hi Lung grinned and winked humorously about it, saying that the eyes on the bow of the Chang Yan had become crossed and were seeing crooked; but at noon he fussed with his queer instruments and pored over his queer charts with absorbed interest, and an hour later the junk caught the tip of the hurricane that had swept the San Gregorio away from Manila. By night all was serene again and the sails hoisted and Hi Lung stated that in the morning they would be within sight of land.

  But when morning came there was no land.

  Rosemonde was not aware of the fact until nearly noon, for she was looking forward to hard work and believed in sleeping while the sleeping was good. When she did come on deck she found that not only was land out of sight, but the junk seemed to be heading east rather than north—a strange thing, since Cape Padaran must have long ago been rounded. Rosemonde verified her facts by her watch compass, then looked for the skipper. He was again working with his charts and instruments on the after deck.

  It was at this moment that Rosemonde first realized that she was not the only passenger aboard. Sitting beside the captain and inspecting the charts was a stranger—a yellow man also, but dressed in European clothes, and very well dressed to boot. He had the same odd cast of features as most of the other men aboard, that is, instead of owning the oblique eyes of the usual son of Han, he had very straight brows and eyes.

  Having comprehended these facts in about ten seconds, Rosemonde turned and went below again to her stateroom. It was a rough, bare little chamber, formed by knocking two former cabins into one. For a few moments she sat quietly, her brown eyes reflectively studying the little gilt Buddha set against the wall near the entrance. She had set her door ajar, and left it so.

  If there were anything queer about this cruise, she deduced, the strange passenger had something to do with it. To deal with Hi Lung would lead to nothing, in such case Rosemonde believed in going to headquarters, and it looked as though the stranger were headquarters in this instance. She knew also that there was a cabin adjoining hers, because she had seen the China boy who served as steward going in there with dishes the evening previous.

  Knowing better than to attempt any explanation out on deck, where trouble was too apt to be precipitated with the crew shuffling around, Rosemonde took her automatic and went out into the deserted passage. At the door of the adjoining cabin she knocked; there was no reply. She tried the door, found it unlocked, and entered, closing the door behind her.

  This cabin was as bare as her own, two suitcases standing against one wall and a Burberry raincoat flung over the bunk. This proved that the strange passenger was the owner, since he alone seemed to wear European clothes, and that Burberry had not been obtained outside a British colony. Rosemonde sat down and waited composedly.

  Twenty minutes later the door opened and the strange passenger entered his cabin. He did not see Rosemonde until he had closed the door and started toward his bunk; then he looked into the mouth of her automatic, and obeyed her instantly.

  “Sit down and be quiet,” she said in a calm voice. “What is your name, please?”

  The yellow man was obviously astonished and disconcerted. Any yellow man would be, upon finding a white girl in his cabin and an automatic under his nose.

  “I am Chan Mow Su,” he said, slightly agitated. “Ah—you are Madame Burley!”

  To her surprise, he spoke very good French. “Certainly,” she responded coolly. “I do not intend to hurt you, but I desire information. You seem to know all about me. Who are you, and where is this ship going?”

  “If you will allow me,” he said politely, “I will hand you my card.”

  She nodded, but watched him narrowly as he produced a handsome card-case and selected a card, which he extended upon the card were the words, in English: “Prince Chan Mow Su, Sat On Road, Bangkok Wholesale Imports and Exports.”

  “May I ask what has disturbed you?” he inquired smoothly. “I gave strict orders—”

  “I am here to ask questions before answering them,” said Rosemonde. “What have you to do with this ship, and where is she going?”

  The prince had by this time quite recovered his bland composure.

  “She is chartered to me, and is going to land you at Ben Ho—ultimately,” he replied. He was a bulky man, square jawed, and obviously no one’s fool. “When I heard at Saigon that you were seeking to take passage I ordered Captain Hi Lung to accommodate you. I trust there was no harm in that? I had not intended to intrude myself upon you.”

  Rosemonde met his smiling gaze frowning a little.

  “If you are going to land me at Ben-Ho, why are you heading to the east?” she asked.

  “Unfortunately, madam, we have urgent business which must be attended to. You shall reach your destination without harm and with very slight delay—”

  “I think you had better go directly up the coast to Ben Ho and land me, then attend to your private business,” said the girl with disconcerting directness. “I paid for a passage upon such an assumption. Captain Hi Lung has lied to me consistently. I think you had better do this.”

  “Unfortunately we cannot,” returned the other. “We are supposed to meet another ship at a certain definite time in a certain definite spot A great deal of money depends upon it. After the meeting you shall be landed—”

  “I’m tired of evasions, monsieur,” cut in Rosemonde coldly. “I am not to be trifled with. To be frank, I don’t believe a word of your story, and I have no intentions of being calmly abducted. You are not a prince for there are no princes in China, therefore you—”

  “For the love of Heaven!” interrupted the yellow man desperately. “You are unreasonable! No one is abducting you. I can give you every proof of my identity; these men aboard have known me for years. And I am not a Chinaman; I am a Manchu as my features testify, and a prince of the Manchus.”

  “No matter,” said Rosemonde, unmoved. “You have opium in the cargo, and I think your entire story is a lie. You are evidently engaged upon some illegal business, into which you have no right to drag me. Besides ships do not meet each other in mid-ocean, as you are doing, unless there is some thing very wrong. I do not choose to be a party to such things, you comprehend?”

  Prince Chan said something in Mandarin which sounded like curses.

  “You are taking a wrong view of everything!” he broke out. “But, madam, now can you help yourself?”

  Rosemonde eyed him calculatingly.

  “I can shoot you through the right foot,” she observed, “and thus render you incapable of further action. I can do a great deal of damage, in fact, and I propose to do it, unless this ship is headed for the coast immediately.”

  The Manchu met her gaze for a moment. In her eyes he read an unflinching purpose, and for a moment his own
black eves flickered with admiration. When he spoke it was smoothly and in bland accents that told he was setting himself not to cope with a woman, but to conquer an adversary.

  “Madame Burley, will you listen to me a moment? I shall be frank with you. These men in this ship are Manchus like myself; members of the same trading guild, associates with me and with other Manchu princes in a large organization. This guild of ours collected over a million dollars’ worth of opium in Bangkok, Siam; we leased from the Chinese republic the privilege of retailing this opium in certain provinces of China. At the last moment we learned that President Hsu Shih-ch’ang had not only revoked the license of our syndicate, but had also destroyed the twelve hundred chests of opium already in Shanghai—worth fourteen millions in dollars—ninety million francs!”

  “Yes,” broke in the girl scornfully, “China has a better president than a Manchu would ever make—an opium dealer who calls himself a prince, to the disgrace of his ancestors!”

  The yellow features of Prince Chan darkened slightly at this thrust.

  “Accordingly,” he pursued, “we resolved to save the wreck of our fortunes by turning over this opium at Bangkok to another party, who would dispose of it elsewhere. We are now on our way to meet this other party. The meeting, you understand, has long been arranged. Now that I have been absolutely frank with you, holding back nothing, I trust that you will give your assent to our plans? They will not inconvenience you, madam; you will have nothing whatever to do with the opium transaction; you will in no way be connected with it. Can you not, Madame Burley, adjust yourself to the situation? Believe me,” he added softly, “you will lose nothing by it.”

  This final subtle suggestion, which might have been a veiled hint either of threat or of bribery, was a mistake, and a costly mistake.

  Up until that instant Rosemonde had been watching the prince with calmly reflective interest, held by his air of earnestness, by his fluent French, by his obvious appeal to her sympathies, by the very confidence reposed in her. But that veiled suggestion at the end chilled and penetrated through her hesitation. Unreasonably, perhaps, it angered her.