The Dark Star

He had a book, one of those slobbering American novels which serve up falsehood thickly buttered with righteousness and are consumed by the morally sterilised.

And, as he smoked he read; and, as he read he listened. One eye always remained on duty; one ear was alert; he meant to see who was the owner of the white shoes if it took the remainder of the voyage to find out.

The book aided him as a commonplace accompaniment aids a soloist – alternately boring and exasperating him.

It was an “uplift” book, where the heroine receives whacks with patient smiles. Fate boots her from pillar to post and she blesses Fate and is much obliged. That most deadly reproach to degenerate human nature – the accidental fact of sex – had been so skilfully extirpated from those pages that, like chaste amœbæ, the characters merely multiplied by immaculate subdivision; and millions of lineal descendants of the American Dodo were made gleeful for $1.50 net.

It was hard work waiting, harder work reading, but between the two and a cigarette now and then Neeland managed to do his sentry go until dinner time approached and the corridors resounded with the trample of the hungry.

The stewardess reappeared a little later and returned to him his handkerchief and the following information:

Mr. Hawks, it appeared, travelled with a trained nurse, whose stateroom was on another deck. That nurse was not in her stateroom, but a similar handkerchief was, scented with similar perfume.

“You’re a wonder,” said Neeland, placing some more sovereigns in her palm and closing her fingers over them. “What is the nurse’s name?”

“Miss White.”

“Very suitable name. Has she ever before visited Herr – I mean Mr.– Hawks in his stateroom?”

“Her stewardess says she has been indisposed since we left New York.”

“Hasn’t been out of her cabin?”

“No.”

“I see. Did you inquire what she looked like?”

“Her stewardess couldn’t be certain. The stateroom was kept dark and the tray containing her meals was left at the bedside. Miss White smokes.”

“Yes,” said Neeland reflectively, “she smokes Red Light cigarettes, I believe. Thank you, very much. More sovereigns if you are discreet. And say to my steward that I’ll dine in my stateroom. Soup, fish, meat, any old thing you can think of. Do you understand?”

“Perfectly, sir.”

When she had withdrawn he kneeled down on his sofa and looked out through the port at the sunset sea.

There was a possibility that Scheherazade and her friends might be on board the Volhynia. Who else would be likely to take wax impressions of his keyhole and leave a scented scrap of a handkerchief on his stateroom floor?

That they had kept themselves not only out of sight but off the passenger list merely corroborated suspicion. That’s what they’d be likely to do.

And now there was no question in his mind of leaving the box in his cabin. He’d cling to it like a good woman to alimony. Death alone could separate his box from him.

As he knelt there, sniffing the salt perfume of the sea, his ears on duty detected the sound of a tray in the corridor.

“Leave it on the camp-table outside my door!” he said over his shoulder.

“Very good, sir.”

He was not hungry; he was thinking too hard.

“Confound it,” he thought to himself, “am I to squat here in ambush for the rest of the trip?”

The prospect was not agreeable for a man who loved the sea. All day and most of the starry night the hurricane deck called to him, and his whole anatomy responded. And now to sit hunched up here like a rat in the hold was not to his taste. Suppose he should continue to frequent the deck, carrying with him his box, of course. He might never discover who owned the white serge skirt or who owned the voice which pronounced is as “iss.”

Meanwhile, it occurred to him that for a quarter of an hour or more his dinner outside his door had been growing colder and colder. So he slid from the sofa, unstrapped the rubber band, opened the door, lifted table and tray into his stateroom with a sharp glance at the opposite door, and, readjusting the rubber band, composed himself to eat.

CHAPTER XVIII

BY RADIO

Perhaps it was because he did not feel particularly hungry that his dinner appeared unappetising; possibly because it had been standing in the corridor outside his door for twenty minutes, which did not add to its desirability.

The sun had set and the air in the room had grown cold. He felt chilly; and, when he uncovered the silver tureen and discovered that the soup was still piping hot, he drank some of it to warm himself.

He had swallowed about half a cupful before he discovered that the seasoning was not agreeable to his palate. In fact, the flavour of the hot broth was so decidedly unpleasant that he pushed aside the cup and sat down on the edge of his bunk without any further desire to eat anything.

A glass of water from the carafe did not seem to rid him of the subtle, disagreeable taste lingering in his mouth – in fact, the water itself seemed to be tainted with it.

He sat for a few moments fumbling for his cigarette case, feeling curiously uncomfortable, as though the slight motion of the ship were affecting his head.

As he sat there looking at the unlighted cigarette in his hand, it fell to the carpet at his feet. He started to stoop for it, caught himself in time, pulled himself erect with an effort.

Something was wrong with him – very wrong. Every uneven breath he drew seemed to fill his lungs with the odour of that strange and volatile flavour he had noticed. It was beginning to make him giddy; it seemed to affect his vision, too.

Suddenly a terrible comprehension flashed through his confused mind, clearing it for a moment.

He tried to stand up and reach the electric bell; his knees seem incapable of sustaining him. Sliding to the floor, he attempted to crawl toward the olive-wood box; managed to get one arm around it, grip the handle. Then, with a last desperate effort, he groped in his breast pocket for the automatic pistol, freed it, tried to fire it. But the weapon and the unnerved hand that held it fell on the carpet. A muscular paralysis set in like the terrible rigidity of death; he could still see and hear as in a thickening dream.

A moment later, from the corridor, a slim hand was inserted between the door and jamb; the supple fingers became busy with the rubber band for a moment, released it. The door opened very slowly.

For a few seconds two dark eyes were visible between door and curtain, regarding intently the figure lying prone upon the floor. Then the curtain was twitched noiselessly aside; a young woman in the garb of a trained nurse stepped swiftly into the stateroom on tip-toe, followed by a big, good-looking, blue-eyed man wearing a square golden beard.

The man, who carried with him a pair of crutches, but who did not appear to require their aid, hastily set the dinner-tray and camp-table outside in the corridor, then closed and bolted the door.

Already the nurse was down on her knees beside the fallen man, trying to loosen his grasp on the box. Then her face blanched.

“It’s like the rigor of death itself,” she whispered fearfully over her shoulder. “Could I have given him enough to kill him?”

“He took only half a cup and a swallow of water. No.”

“I can’t get his hand free–”

“Wait! I try!” He pulled a big, horn-handled clasp-knife from his pocket and deliberately opened the eight-inch blade.

“What are you doing?” she whispered, seizing his wrist. “Don’t do that!”

The man with the golden beard hesitated, then shrugged, pocketed his knife, and seized Neeland’s rigidly clenched hand.

“You are right. It makes too much muss!” tugging savagely at the clenched and unconscious hand. “Sacreminton! What for a death-grip is this Kerls? If I cut his hand off so iss there blood and gossip right away already. No – too much muss. Wait! I try another way–”