The After House

by Mary Roberts Rinehart

  CHAPTER XI

  THE DEAD LINE

  Mrs. Johns and the stewardess came up late in the afternoon. We hadrailed off a part of the deck around the forward companionway for them,and none of the crew except the man on guard was allowed inside theropes. After a consultation, finding the ship very short-handed, andunwilling with the night coming on to trust any of the men, Burns and Idecided to take over this duty ourselves, and, by stationing ourselvesat the top of the companionway, to combine the duties of officer onwatch and guard of the after house. To make the women doubly secure,we had Oleson nail all the windows closed, although they were merelyportholes. Jones was no longer on guard below, and I had exchangedSingleton's worthless revolver for my own serviceable one.

  Mrs. Johns, carefully dressed, surveyed the railed-off deck with raisedeyebrows.

  "For--us?" she asked, looking at me. The men were gathered about thewheel aft, and were out of ear-shot. Mrs. Sloane had dropped into asteamer-chair, and was lying back with closed eyes.

  "Yes, Mrs. Johns."

  "Where have you put them?"

  I pointed to where the jolly-boat, on the port side of the ship, swungon its davits.

  "And the mate, Mr. Singleton?"

  "He is in the forward house."

  "What did you do with the--the weapon?"

  "Why do you ask that?"

  "Morbid curiosity," she said, with a lightness of tone that rang falseto my ears. "And then--naturally, I should like to be sure that it issafely overboard, so it will not be"--she shivered--"used again."

  "It is not overboard, Mrs. Johns," I said gravely. "It is locked in asafe place, where it will remain until the police come to take it."

  "You are rather theatrical, aren't you?" she scoffed, and turned away.But a second later she came back to me, and put her hand on my arm."Tell me where it is," she begged. "You are making a mystery of it,and I detest mysteries."

  I saw under her mask of lightness then: she wanted desperately to knowwhere the axe was. Her eyes fell, under my gaze.

  "I am sorry. There is no mystery. It is simply locked away forsafe-keeping."

  She bit her lip.

  "Do you know what I think?" she said slowly. "I think you havehypnotized the crew, as you did me--at first. Why has no oneremembered that you were in the after house last night, that you foundpoor Wilmer Vail, that you raised the alarm, that you discovered thecaptain and Karen? Why should I not call the men here and remind themof all that?"

  "I do not believe you will. They know I was locked in the storeroom.The door--the lock--"

  "You could have locked yourself in."

  "You do not know what you are saying!"

  But I had angered her, and she went on cruelly:--

  "Who are you, anyhow? You are not a sailor. You came here and weretaken on because you told a hard-luck story. How do we know that youcame from a hospital? Men just out of prison look as you did. Do youknow what we called you, the first two days out? We called you Elsa'sjail-bird And now, because you have dominated the crew, we are in yourhands!"

  "Do Mrs. Turner and Miss Lee think that?"

  "They feel as I do. This is a picked crew men the Turner line hasemployed for years."

  "You are very brave, Mrs. Johns," I said. "If I were what you think Iam, I would be a dangerous enemy."

  "I am not afraid of you."

  I thought fast. She was right. It had not occurred to me before, butit swept over me overwhelmingly.

  "You are leaving me only one thing to do," I said. "I shall surrendermyself to the men at once." I took out my revolver and held it out toher. "This rope is a dead-line. The crew know, and you will have notrouble; but you must stand guard here until some one else is sent."

  She took the revolver without a word, and, somewhat dazed by this newturn of events, I went aft. The men were gathered there, and Isurrendered myself. They listened in silence while I told them thesituation. Burns, who had been trying to sleep, sat up and stared atme incredulously.

  "It will leave you pretty short-handed, boys," I finished, "but you'dbetter fasten me up somewhere. But I want to be sure of one thingfirst: whatever happens, keep the guard for the women."

  "We'd like to talk it over, Leslie," Burns said, after a word with theothers.

  I went forward a few feet, taking care to remain where they could seeme, and very soon they called me. There had been a dispute, I believe.Adams and McNamara stood off from the others, their faces notunfriendly, but clearly differing from the decision. Charlie Jones,who, by reason of long service and a sort of pious control he had inthe forecastle, was generally spokesman for the crew, took a step ortwo toward me.

  "We'll not do it, boy," he said. "We think we know a man when we seeone, as well as having occasion to know that you're white all through.And we're not inclined to set the talk of women against what we thinkbest to do. So you stick to your job, and we're back of you."

  In spite of myself, I choked up. I tried to tell them what theirloyalty meant to me; but I could only hold out my hand, and, one byone, they came up and shook it solemnly.

  "We think," McNamara said, when, last of all, he and Adams came up,"that it would be best, lad, if we put down in the log-book all thathas happened last night and to-day, and this just now, too. It's freshin our minds now, and it will be something to go by."

  So Burns and I got the log-book from the captain's cabin. The axe wasthere, where we had placed it earlier in the day, lying on the whitecover of the bed. The room was untouched, as the dead man had leftit--a collar on the stand, brushes put down hastily, a half-smokedcigar which had burned a long scar on the wood before it had gone out.We went out silently, Burns carrying the book, I locking the doorbehind us.

  Mrs. Johns, sitting near the companionway with the revolver on herknee, looked up and eyed me coolly.

  "So they would not do it!"

  "I am sorry to disappoint you--they would not."

  She held up my revolver to me, and smiled cynically.

  "Remember," she said, "I only said you were a possibility."

  "Thank you; I shall remember."

  By unanimous consent, the task of putting down what had happened wasgiven to me. I have a copy of the log-book before me now, the one thatwas used at the trial. The men read it through before they signed it.

  August thirteenth.

  This morning, between two-thirty and three o'clock, three murders werecommitted on the yacht Ella. At the request of Mrs. Johns, one of theparty on board, I had moved to the after house to sleep, putting myblanket and pillow in the storeroom and sleeping on the floor there.Mrs. Johns gave, as her reason, a fear of something going wrong, asthere was trouble between Mr. Turner and the captain. I slept with arevolver beside me and with the door of the storeroom open.

  At some time shortly before three o'clock I wakened with a feeling ofsuffocation, and found that the door was closed and locked on theoutside. I suspected a joke among the crew, and set to work with mypen-knife to unscrew the lock. When I had two screws out, a womanscreamed, and I broke down the door.

  As the main cabin was dark, I saw no one and could not tell where thecry came from. I ran into Mr. Vail's cabin, next the storeroom, andcalled him. His door was standing open. I heard him breathingheavily. Then the breathing stopped. I struck a match, and found himdead. His head had been crushed in with an axe, the left hand cut off,and there were gashes on the right shoulder and the abdomen.

  I knew the helmsman would be at the wheel, and ran up the aftercompanionway to him and told him. Then I ran forward and called thefirst mate, Mr. Singleton, who was on duty. He had been drinking. Iasked him to call the captain, but he did not. He got his revolver,and we hurried down the forward companion. The body of the captain waslying at the foot of the steps, his head on the lowest stair. He hadbeen killed like Mr. Vail. His cap had been placed over his face.

  The mate collapsed on the steps. I f
ound the light switch and turnedit on. There was no one in the cabin or in the chart-room. I ran toMr. Turner's room, going through Mr. Vail's and through the bathroom.Mr. Turner was in bed, fully dressed. I could not rouse him. Like themate, he had been drinking.

  The mate had roused the crew, and they gathered in the chart-room. Itold them what had happened, and that the murderer must be among us. Isuggested that they stay together, and that they submit to beingsearched for weapons.

  They went on deck in a body, and I roused the women and told them. Mrs.Turner asked me to tell the two maids, who slept in a cabin off thechartroom. I found their door unlocked, and, receiving no answer,opened it. Karen Hansen, the lady's-maid, was on the floor, dead, withher skull crushed in. The stewardess, Henrietta Sloane, was faintingin her bunk. An axe had been hurled through the doorway as the Hansenwoman fell, and was found in the stewardess's bunk.

  Dawn coming by that time, I suggested a guard at the two companionways,and this was done. The men were searched and all weapons taken fromthem. Mr. Singleton was under suspicion, it being known that he hadthreatened the captain's life, and Oleson, a lookout, claiming to haveseen him forward where the axe was kept.

  The crew insisted that Singleton be put in irons. He made noobjection, and we locked him in his own room in the forward house.Owing to the loss of Schwartz, the second mate, already recorded inthis log-book (see entry for August ninth), the death of the captain,and the imprisonment of the first mate, the ship was left withoutofficers. Until Mr. Turner could make an arrangement, the crewnominated Burns, one of themselves, as mate, and asked me to assumecommand. I protested that I knew nothing of navigation, but agreed onits being represented that, as I was not one of them, there could beill feeling.

  The ship was searched, on the possibility of finding a stowaway in thehold. But nothing was found. I divided the men into two watches,Burns taking one and I the other. We nailed up the after companionway,and forbade any member of the crew to enter the after house. Theforecastle was also locked, the men bringing their belongings on deck.The stewardess recovered and told her story, which, in her own writing,will be added to this record.

  The bodies of the dead were brought on deck and sewed into canvas, andlater, with appropriate services, placed in the jolly-boat, it beingthe intention, later on, to tow the boat behind us. Mr. Turnerinsisted that the bodies be buried at sea, and, on the crew opposingthis, retired to his cabin, announcing that he considered the positionof the men a mutiny.

  Some feeling having arisen among the women of the party that I mightknow more of the crimes than was generally supposed, having been in theafter house at the time they were committed, and having no references,I this afternoon voluntarily surrendered myself to Burns, acting firstmate. The men, however, refused to accept this surrender, only two,Adams and McNamara, favoring it. I expect to give myself up to thepolice at the nearest port, until the matter is thoroughly probed.

  The axe is locked in the captain's cabin.

  (Signed) RALPH LESLIE. John Robert Burns Charles Klineordlinger (Jones) William McNamara Witnesses Carl L. Clarke Joseph Q. Adams John Oleson Tom MacKenzie Obadiah Williams