Collection 2003 - From The Listening Hills (v5.0)

by Louis L'Amour

  The sound of firing had ceased. He slipped noiselessly through the jungle, and stared out. All was blackness beyond the edge of the trees and he could see nothing. He moved out, creeping slowly. Then he tripped and almost fell. He put his hand down. A dead man.

  Feeling around in the dark he found a pistol, which he tucked into his belt, and moved on. His eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, and he saw more bodies. There were corpses of white men among them, white men garbed as sailors.

  Whatever the cause of the fight, it had been desperate. Out across the water he caught the outline of a Samson post against the sky. Then he knew.

  The only ship in the Paagumene Bay with Samson posts had been the Benton Harbor. That meant Cowan’s ruse to make Meyer betray himself had been successful. Peter Meyer had received his message.

  Meyer, obviously, had been close by. That told Cowan that he had surmised the double cross Besi John Mataga had planned. Meyer’s arrival had precipitated a battle.

  One of Mataga’s sentries must have fired on the ship, and Meyer, fearing a trap, had responded.

  Steve Cowan stopped. What now? True, Meyer and Mataga were fighting, but that still didn’t help him. The shipload of chrome would be moving out, and the Japanese master spy, Koyama, was still loose. Also Isola Mayne was gone.

  Nothing was settled, nothing was improved. He was free, but apparently helpless. Then he recalled the vague, misty dream of his flight to Oland Point, when he had been a prisoner aboard the plane. How long had they been in the air? He had no way of knowing, but he recalled the camel’s hump, and the dark sky.

  The dark hump…Neangambo!

  He knew then. A Japanese submarine had surfaced in Nehue Bay. Neangambo was an island in the bay, and the dark hump of the hill and trees could be nowhere else near here. It must be the ship that had brought Koyama.

  He worked his way along the shore to the edge of a village and as he had hoped, he found a catamaran. He shoved off and after a moment was alone, and slipping across the dark waters.

  IT WAS ALMOST daylight when Steve Cowan, drunk with fatigue and his head throbbing with pain from the beating he had taken earlier, reached the shore opposite Neangambo.

  The ship he had seen leaving Oland Point, the Benton Harbor, was there, and not far away, moored to a piling, was his own plane!

  Steve Cowan wet his parched lips. All right, this was it. It was the work of minutes to bring the catamaran alongside the Benton Harbor. He paddled around to the bow, moored the boat to the anchor chain, and went up, hand over hand, at the risk of crushed fingers.

  The deck was dark and still. He moved aft, slowly. Voices came from the saloon port. He slipped closer, then glanced in.

  Peter Meyer, his face sour, sat at one end of the table. Nearby, her hands tied, was Isola Mayne. Behind her was the maid. Koyama sat with his back to the port, and across from him was Besi John Mataga, his face dark with fury.

  “So?” Koyama’s voice was sibilant. “You thought to betray us. Explain this, if you will.”

  Besi John laughed harshly. “Don’t blame me for that. It was Cowan’s work.” He looked at the stout shipmaster. “Steuben, I think Cowan knew about what happened. You may resemble Meyer enough to fool some, Herman, but you didn’t fool everyone!”

  The thin Japanese officer, Koyama, made a gesture of impatience.

  “All this is beside the point,” he hissed. “Why did you kill our agent, the butler? The Burma man was valuable.”

  “I tell you I didn’t know about it,” shouted Besi John, angrily.

  The Japanese master spy’s anger increased. “You are a fool!” he snapped. “For that you will die.” He waved his hand toward the women. “They must die, too. No one who knows our plans must remain alive.”

  Another voice, suave and smooth, broke in. “You must not do this, Commander Koyama. Miss Mayne is a famous actress, internationally known. She cannot disappear without causing complications. Better turn her over to my authority. I think I can make her see reason.”

  Esteville! The Frenchman was in this with them. All of which explained why the substitution of Steuben for Peter Meyer had been successful. Without hesitation Steve Cowan turned and walked into the cabin.

  Mataga saw Cowan first. Trapped and in danger of losing his life, the renegade had been waiting for a chance to escape from the ship. Like a flash he leaped from his chair, darted through another door and disappeared. A loud splash revealed he had gone over the side.

  Steve Cowan was too busy to follow. As Koyama lunged to his feet and whipped out a gun, Cowan raised his automatic and fired twice.

  The Japanese officer’s face turned sick, and he fell face forward across the table, dead.

  It had happened so suddenly that it was like a slow-motion picture, but almost at once the saloon blazed with shots. Steuben grabbed for his gun, and lunged to his feet, firing desperately. Esteville crouched down, out of sight.

  In a haze of powder smoke, Cowan saw Isola and the maid slip out of the door through which Besi John Mataga had disappeared. Steuben was down beside Koyama, now, the smoking pistol clutched in his lifeless fingers. Esteville was hiding behind a table. He had taken no part in the fight and there was no use remaining here any longer. Outside the crew had begun to shout and feet were approaching. So Cowan leaped through the doorway after the two girls, joining them at the railing.

  A sailor, in plain sight, opened up with a rifle and Cowan knocked him spinning with one shot. Then with bullets from other members of the crew pattering around him, he swung over the rail and dropped Isola and the maid into the water near the catamaran.

  More shots rang out and bullets snipped the water near the slim craft. Luckily the light, just before daylight, was not good, or they would have been slain. He continued to paddle furiously. Soon the freighter was out of sight and the firing stopped.

  The plane was ahead, and Steve Cowan swung in close, then crawled aboard. He helped the girls into the cabin and slid into place behind the controls. After several attempts, he got the motors started and warmed them up.

  When the ship was in the air, he took stock. The freighter below was moving now. They would get out, and get away fast. Soon Cowan noted two other freighters moving. A convoy, ostensibly bound for America, but, in reality, bound for Japan. The traitorous Pierre Esteville had made this possible.

  But even well-laid plans can fail. Cowan swung his ship, and went down in a ringing, whistling dive. Then he opened up with the machine guns. His heavy projectiles blasted the bridge and ripped away the pilothouse windows. The freighter swung suddenly, and turned broadside to the channel.

  Banking the Widgeon, Cowan swooped again. From stem to stern he plastered the freighters with gunfire. Then Isola screamed.

  Cowan turned in his seat, startled. Besi John Mataga was standing in the middle of the amphibian’s cabin, the small hatch to the bomb bay swinging on its hinges. As Cowan slid out of the seat and faced him, he sprang.

  There was no choice but to fight, so Cowan met the renegade’s rush. He got in one well-placed punch before Mataga closed with him, and the plane dipped dangerously.

  Then they were locked in a furious, bitter fight. The plane was forgotten, there was no time to think, to reason, only to act. Slugging like a madman, he broke away from those powerful, clutching fingers. He smashed a left to Besi John’s face, then a right to the windpipe. Mataga gasped, and sat down, then lunged and tackled Cowan and they both fell.

  Through a haze of blood, Steve Cowan saw Isola had taken the controls. Then the renegade lunged for him, knife in hand. Slapping the wrist aside with his left, Cowan grasped it in his right hand, then thrust his left leg across in front of Mataga’s and his left arm over and under Mataga’s right. He pressed down, and the half-caste screamed as his arm broke at the elbow, and his body lifted and arched, flying over the American’s hip.

  The right door had been knocked open, and the maid had been trying, vainly, to get it closed. Besi John’s body caught in the doorwa
y and then slipped through. He grabbed at the sill, desperately, and his fingers held for one breathtaking moment.

  With a kind of dull horror, Steve Cowan saw Mataga tumbling down, down, down toward the waters of the bay. When he hit, a fleck of white showed, and he was gone.

  Cowan turned, drunk with fatigue and punishment. Isola, her hair free in the wind from the open door, was flying the plane. She looked up at him suddenly, and smiled.

  He looked down. A long, slim destroyer was sliding past Neangambo Island. Another was off Tonnerre Point in the distance. Evidently the situation was under control.

  He collapsed, suddenly, upon the floor.

  When he opened his eyes, the ship was resting easily on the water. He looked up. An officer in the blue and gold of the Navy was standing over him.

  “All right, old man?” the officer asked, grinning. “You had a rough time of it. We had been checking Esteville, and were suspicious of Meyer. We have him—all of them—in custody.”

  Steve Cowan looked up. Isola. He had been wondering whose shoulder his head was lying on.

  “Then,” he said, still looking at her, “I guess everything is under control.”

  The naval officer straightened. He smiled. The Navy knows something of women.

  “Yes,” he said thoughtfully, “I’d say it was.”

  Backfield Battering Ram

  LEANING ON THE back of the players’ bench, “Socks” Barnaby stared cynically at the squad of husky young men going through their paces on the playing field.

  “You’ve got plenty of beef, Coach,” he drawled, “but have you got any brains out there?”

  Horace Temple, head coach at Eastern, directed a poisonous glare at the lean, broad-shouldered Barnaby, editor of the campus newspaper.

  “What d’you care, Socks?” he said. “Aren’t you one of these guys who thinks football is overemphasized?”

  “Me? I only think you’ve placed too much emphasis on sheer bulk. You need some smarts out there, that’s all.”

  “Yeah?” The coach laughed. “Why don’t you come out then? You were good enough at track and field last year.”

  “I haven’t got the time.”

  “Crabapples!” Temple scoffed. “You’ve got time for more activities and fewer classes than any man on the campus. Editor of that scurvy sheet, president of the Drama Club, Poetry society…Writing that thesis on something or other is the only thing that keeps you from graduating!”

  Coach Temple glanced back at the football field, and instantly he sprang to his feet.

  “Kulowski!” he called. “What’s the matter with you? Can’t you even hold a football?” He glared at the lumbering bulk of “Muggs” Kulowski. “Of all the dumb clucks! Kulowski, get off the field. When you aren’t fumbling, you’re falling over one of my best men and crippling him. Go on, beat it!”

  Muggs Kulowski looked up, his eyes pleading, but there was no mercy in Temple now. Slowly, his head hanging, Muggs turned toward the field house.

  “That guy!” Coach Temple stared after him. “The biggest man I’ve got. Strong as an ox, an’ twice as dumb. We’re going to get killed this year!”

  THOUGHTFULLY, BARNABY STARED after Kulowski. The man was big. He weighed at least forty pounds over two hundred, and was inches taller than Socks himself. But despite his size there was a certain unconscious rhythm in his movements. Still, in three weeks he hadn’t learned to do anything right. For all his great size, Kulowski went into a line as if he was afraid he’d break something, and his fingers were all thumbs.

  “You cut us a break, Barnaby. All you do is use that sheet of yours to needle everybody who tries to do anything. A lot you’ve done for Eastern.”

  Socks grinned. “Wait until after the Hanover game,” he said. “I’m just trying to save you from yourself, Coach. If you get by Hanover, we’ll say something nice. I’d like to be optimistic but I’ve got to call it as I see it.”

  BARNABY WALKED OFF the field, heading for the quad. Kulowski was shambling along ahead of him, and something in the disconsolate appearance of the huge Pole touched a sympathetic chord in him. More, he was curious. It seemed impossible that any man with all his fingers could be as clumsy as this one. Stretching his long legs, Socks Barnaby quickened his pace to catch up with Kulowski.

  “Hey, Kulowski, rough going today?” he asked, walking up beside the big fellow.

  “Yeah.” Muggs looked at him, surprised. “Didn’t know you knew me.”

  “Sure,” Socks replied. “Don’t let this get you down. Tomorrow you’ll do better.”

  “No,” Muggs said bitterly. “He told me yesterday that if I messed up one more time I was through.”

  “Can’t you get the hang of it?”

  “No.” The guy’s brow furrowed. “I don’t know what’s wrong.”

  “Well, football isn’t everything.”

  “For me it is,” Kulowski said bitterly. “If I lose my scholarship, I’m finished. And I want a degree.”

  “That’s something,” Barnaby agreed. “Most football players don’t care much about finishing. They just want to play ball. But if you lose the scholarship you can always get a job.”

  “I’ve got a job, but the money has to go home.” He glanced at Socks. “I’ve got a mother, two sisters, and a kid brother.”

  BARNABY LEFT KULOWSKI at the field house and started across the campus to the Lantern office in the Press Building. He was turning up the walk when he saw Professor Hazelton, and he stopped. The two were old friends, and Barnaby had corrected papers for him a few times, and written reviews for a book page the professor edited.

  “Prof, don’t you have Muggs Kulowski in a couple of classes?”

  “Yes, of course. Why do you ask?” Hazelton was a slim, erect man of thirty-five and had been a crack basketballer.

  “An idea I’ve got. Tell me about him.”

  “Well,” Hazelton thought for a moment. “He always gets passing grades. He’s not brilliant, mostly a successful plodder.”

  “How about recitations?” Barnaby asked.

  “Very inferior. If it wasn’t for his paper work he wouldn’t get by. He’s almost incoherent, although I must say he’s shown some improvement lately.”

  After a few minutes, Socks Barnaby walked on into the office. He sat down at the typewriter and banged away on a story for the Lantern. It was several hours later, as he was finishing a letter to a girl in Cedar Rapids, when he remembered that Kulowski was working at the freight docks. On an inspiration, he got up and went out.

  He liked Coach Temple. He and the coach had an old-time feud, but underneath there was a good deal of respect. Knowing a good many of the faculty and alumni, Barnaby had heard the gossip about the coach being on his last legs at Eastern. He had to turn out a team this year or lose his contract.

  The fault wasn’t wholly Temple’s. Other schools had more money to spend, and were spending it. Yet, here at Eastern, they expected Temple to turn out teams as good as the bigger, better financed schools.

  Temple had a strategy. Digging around in the coal mines and lumber camps he had found a lot of huskies who liked the game, and many of them had played in high school and the Army. He recruited all he could but the teams he fielded were often uneven. This time it was his backfield where the weakness lay. They lacked a hard-hitting offensive combination. Kuttner was a good steady man, strong on the defense, and a fair passer and kicker. Ryan and DeVries were both fast, and fair backs, but neither of them was good enough to buck the big fast men that Hanover and State would have.

  THE FREIGHT DOCK was dimly lit and smelled of fresh lumber, tar, and onions. Socks walked out on the dock and looked around. Then he saw Kulowski.

  The big fellow hadn’t noticed him. In overalls and without a shirt, with shoulders and arms that looked like a heavyweight wrestler’s, he trundled his truck up to a huge barrel, tipped the barrel and slid the truck underneath, dipped the truck deftly, and started off toward the dim end of the dock.

  Soc
ks walked after him, watching. There was no uncertainty in Muggs Kulowski now. Alone here in the half-light of the freight dock, doing something he had done for months, he was deft, sure, and capable.

  “Hi, Muggs,” Socks said. “Looks like you’re working hard.” Kulowski turned, showing his surprise.

  “Gosh, how did you happen to come down here?” he asked.

  “Came to see you,” Socks said casually. “I think we should get together on this football business.”

  Kulowski flushed. “Aw, I’m just no good. Can’t get it through my head. Anyway, Coach is dead set against me.”

  “D’you play any other games?” Socks asked.

  “Not exactly.” Kulowski stopped, wiping the sweat from his face. “I used to play a little golf. Never played with anybody, just by myself.”

  “Why not?”

  “I guess I wasn’t good enough. I could do all right alone, but whenever anybody got around, I just couldn’t hit the ball. I couldn’t do anything.”

  Socks sat around the dock, strolled after Kulowski as he worked, and talked with the big fellow. Mostly, he watched him. The big guy was doing a job he knew. He was not conscious of being observed, and as he worked swiftly and surely, there wasn’t a clumsy or awkward thing about him.

  “I had trouble with games ever since I was a kid,” Muggs Kulowski admitted finally. “My old man used to say I was too big and too awkward, and he made fun of me. I guess I was clumsy, growing fast and all.”

  “Muggs.” Socks stood up suddenly. “We need you out there on that field this year. We need you badly. You know where Springer’s barn is?”

  “You mean that old red barn out there by the creek?”

  “That’s it. You meet me out there tomorrow. Bring your football suit, and don’t tell anybody where you’re going. We’re going to work out a little.”

  They settled the time, and then Socks walked back to his room. He knew what it meant to grow fast and be awkward. His own father had been understanding, and had helped him get by that awkward period. But he knew how shy he had been himself, how it embarrassed him so terribly when anyone had laughed.