Fighting Byng Part 13

Scotty grinned again.

"They think they know it all, especially about machinery, when, as a matter of fact, everything they have is stolen. It's their perverted, thieving ego, Scotty. They even murder more efficiently than anyone else."

Scotty laughed outright. "I wonder if they will have a different kind of h.e.l.l or heaven?"

I felt sure of Scotty now, so I said, "Scotty, they know nothing about heaven. About h.e.l.l, what they don't know now they will learn when America gets in the game. This very case may be the one to bring us in."

Scotty started to yell but I put my hand over his mouth. "Anyhow," he whispered, "I got one whoop coming to me later--eh?"

"You have, Scotty--stick tight, all ears and eyes, and no tongue." He stood grinning after me as I went my way. "I'll see you soon," I said in parting.

CHAPTER XV

For a long time the Transatlantic Banking Company, which I have mentioned on several occasions, puzzled me. I wondered if it was truly a big bank, and why it should hold an interest in Bulow and Company.

My suspicion was that it might figure in the matter at hand as it did in Howard Byng's affairs fifteen years previously.

That point mystified me. It took a long time to reason it out, although I was looking for the cloven-hoof in banks, and even governments, and I did believe that the Kaiser had been planning a world conquest ever since he tucked France's thousand millions into his wallet and went away with his chest out.

I did believe that the Germans nourished and practiced morganatic marriage, the well-spring of most all forms of concubinage and degeneracy, liberally imported to New York and all other large cities of the world--the tap-root of the social evil. The entire German royal crowd are s.e.xual degenerates. We allow the male as well as the female of this species to enter respectable residential sections, social clubs, and churches, there to rub elbows and even kiss with their scarlet lips girls and boys, thus encouraging further acquaintance with their kind of "morality."

We can see all that now, but I, like millions of others, didn't fall for its enormity until actually struck by lightning, so to speak.

The Kaiser's coterie had started out to seduce the world, and came with a clean, pink face. Kultur, music, art, science--frequently stolen--a stab at literature, and a big display of substance--money--were used as wedges. They began as the libertine always begins, by cloaking themselves as respectable. h.e.l.l's reward is ashes, bitter, acrid, scalding ashes, slow in coming and sometimes at the expense of blood and millions. Adjectives, adverbs and qualifying phrases have lost their power to convey a conception of the underground system of the Hun.

While we dislike sermons and smile sometimes at our own moralizing, and hate bristling, pregnant facts, nevertheless we have faced a wall of them, and it remains to be seen whether we smash it, thereby letting in the noonday sun, or shall walk cowardly around the truth to further plague ourselves and generations to come.

I took the early train to Canby's place next morning, convinced that Bulow and Company's cutter was going out on an expedition that meant harm to the little girl's father, whom I had not met. I wondered if his delightful daughter, whom I had learned to venerate, would allow me to use a motorboat so I could go to her father. I found myself thinking of her as an "oasis on a barren Key." Of how much self-interest was concealed in that who shall be the judge? I mean the possibility of excitement, lure of danger, of serving and making a record with the Government which signed my vouchers. This child would become a valuable witness. I recalled what the old judge had said about the odor the papers gave off to him--white paper and ink can give a terrible stench to our sixth sense if one has the nostrils to detect it.

I walked through the store and came out on the big veranda, only to see her hurrying in from among her flowers. Coal-black Don was sitting on the wharf, bareheaded.

"Mr. Wood, I knew it must be you because the train never stops for anyone else!" she exclaimed, navely, coming up and offering me a delicate but firm little hand. "Is there something wrong? Are we going to get the goods? Daddy was so glad I ordered them and is planning on them.

"He started early for the Tortugas and will not come back till late. I tried to keep him here, and out of the water, but I can't. I know he is diving again. I can tell by his red eyes when he returns. He talks about doing it so that I may go North to school, and makes me forget how hard he is working by telling me how much fun it is, and how he made a dummy man for the sharks to charge at. As soon as they bite at it a torpedo goes off and kills them. He says that long before he gets old he will really quit, and we will be so happy together."

"But I want to see your father this morning; in fact, it is important," I insisted quietly.

"Is it very--very important?"

"Yes, it is very important." I'll admit I lacked courage to tell her why, for it seemed a pity to disturb her delightful state of mind.

"I could take you out there in the _t.i.tian_, but my father would be displeased if it were not something very important. I never did that before," she said, coming closer and eyeing me fearlessly.

"Your father would not be displeased. He would say you were the bravest and best little girl in the world." She had apparently been taught to obey and never thought to ask why I wanted to see him.

"Oh, I will gladly go. I love the water and the _t.i.tian_ is so fast and seems to love it, too," and with no more ado she called to Don to bring the _t.i.tian_ alongside the wharf and take off the cover.

The negro slid off, turtlelike, into the ebb tide and waded out to the boat, which he soon made ready for the trip.

The girl felt for her shark knife, to be sure it was there, and went into the store and got her rifle. "Daddy says for me never to go out without a rifle and a shark knife, as I may need them any time," she explained as I looked on wonderingly.

"He says, with a shark knife, rifle, some 'terrors,' an oxygen tank and a good boat, there is little danger," she volunteered, somehow thinking it necessary to rea.s.sure me as we walked to the power boat now ready for us.

The boat evidenced a feminine touch. Painted, varnished, bra.s.s s.h.i.+ning spick and span, as would the engine room of an ocean liner. Perhaps thirty-five feet over all without a cabin, though there were bunks for two in the bow ahead of the steering wheel protected from the weather by a cowl over which the little girl could just see when standing. The s.h.i.+ning, six-cylinder motor, with up-to-date starter and reverse clutch, was in the center at the bottom of an open c.o.c.kpit extending clear astern, surrounded by seats under which was closed storage s.p.a.ce.

"You see," she said, placing the rifle in a convenient leather holster under which hung binoculars, "we used this boat to sponge from for a long time, but since Daddy got the _Sprite_ and gave the _t.i.tian_ to me I have changed it some--and painted it up to suit myself," she added, as the motor sprang into life at her touch. The cutter moved instantly toward the entrance of the little bay and out on the Gulf into a slight head wind.

"Better come up here under the cowl, for she throws a spray after she gets full headway, even if there is no sea," she warned, not moving her eyes from her steering course and glancing occasionally at the compa.s.s in the miniature binnacle.

I took a seat on the side opposite her, protected from the spray as the _t.i.tian_ eagerly reached ahead. The craft seemed vitalized by her presence, and sped like the wind over the long swells now coming head-on from somewhere out in the great Gulf.

She charmed me, standing there at the wheel, on the opposite side of the c.o.c.kpit, receiving the spray on her boyishly cropped hair--a baptismal glory. She was a picture with her perfectly shaped, natural feet, plump but sinuous legs bare to the knees, brown arms, remarkable chest, chiseled nose and chin, and a wonderfully calm, seraphic face, delighted with the exhilaration of motion and speed. Her great thought was that she was performing some big service for the father she loved so much. The picture will remain with me forever.

"How long will it take to get there?" I finally asked, thinking of the possibilities in Bulow and Company's movements. My intuition had flogged me to suspect certain happenings during the previous night, after I had parted from Scotty. Notwithstanding a good night's sleep my suspicions were even yet strong within me, and I actually prayed that results would spare this child from a knowledge of the savagery of the people with whom I was likely to deal.

I was positive that harm was meant to Canby, when and where was the only question. But why did they want him?--why the warrants? Why their visit to his warehouse?--and why their cannon and rifles, and other paraphernalia?

The child finally seemed to come out of a delightful reverie. She glanced back at the motor, whose every valve, spring and cylinder was humanized--biting eagerly in answer to her will.

"If Daddy is where I think he is we will reach him in another half hour; it's only about twenty-five miles from here and the _t.i.tian_ behaves well. She knows she has a guest aboard," she added with a smile.

I looked at my watch. We would arrive there a little after twelve. If the little Scottish engineer had not failed we would be there in time, and then I could have another laugh at my ominous premonition that counseled such extreme haste and energy.

Finally I saw the little girl's hand leave the wheel, and reach. I watched her take from the leather pocket a pair of gla.s.ses and raise them to her eyes, meanwhile steering with the other hand.

I am willing to admit a thrill of relief when she exclaimed:

"There he is. I can see the _Sprite_ now, I know her, as far as I can see--her lines are so different."

I arose hastily and peered in the direction she indicated. She handed me the gla.s.ses. I could but faintly discern the boat, but we were traveling so fast I soon made out a trim motor boat about as long as the Boche cutter, evidently anch.o.r.ed to the leeward of one of the straggling coral formations of the Tortugas group. I swept the sea, but at that moment could see no other vessel. She must have noted my relief as I returned the gla.s.ses.

"I was sure I could go straight to him. I haven't missed it much," she said, clapping her hands delightedly. "You see I wasn't two points off where he is anch.o.r.ed," she added, changing her course to bear directly down upon him, the spot now easily visible to the naked eye.

Antic.i.p.ation of the loving welcome she would receive beaming in her happy face.

My exultation did not last long. I detected something moving in the sea beyond the island. I reached for the gla.s.ses instantly to a.s.sure myself that my imagination was not tricking me. Without a possible doubt the Boche boat was coming up toward Canby's boat, s.h.i.+elded by the little island.

Scotty's work had delayed them some, but not quite enough. Heavy forebodings again possessed me as I watched the boat stealthily approaching. Screened by the island between it and the Canby boat, it dashed forward at express speed. The _Sprite_ was manifestly at anchor with no signs of life aboard. No doubt Canby was diving and the Boche had selected that moment in which to strike.

CHAPTER XVI

Living this episode over again, I labor with the inadequacy of any combination of words to describe it. I saw the Boche boat bearing down like the wind upon the Canby boat--its intended victim. I was now positive, and I exulted in mind that I had Bulow in the toils. I was witnessing an overt act. But I hoped it would not bring harm to the child, such a slight bundle of charming girlhood. I cannot describe my feelings as the Boche boat, on evil bent, came swooping down from one direction and we from another with no chance to arrive there first.

And if we did arrive ahead of them how could we contend with a five-pound cannon which I knew they had mounted the day before?