Murder Madness
CONCLUSION OF A FOUR-PART NOVEL
_By Murray Leinster_
_The deck was covered with panic-stricken folk who hadcome in awful terror to watch. And all were slaves to The Master._]
[Sidenote: Bell has fought through tremendous obstacles to find andkill The Master, whose diabolical poison makes murder-mad snakes ofthe hands; and, as he faces the monster at last--his own hands startto writhe!]
CHAPTER XV
The door of the car swung wide, and Ortiz's pale grim face peered inbehind the blue steel barrel of his automatic. He smiled queerly asJamison, with a grunt of relief, tapped Bell's wrist in sign to putaway his weapon.
"Ah, very well," said Ortiz, with the same queer smile upon his face."One moment."
He disappeared. On the instant there was the thunderous crashing of aweapon. Bell started up, but Jamison thrust him back. Then Ortizappeared again with smoke still trickling from the barrel of hispistol.
"I have just done something that I have long wished to do," heobserved coolly. "I have killed the chauffeur and his companion. Youmay alight, now. I believe we will have half an hour or more. It willdo excellently."
He offered his hand to Paula as she stepped out. She seemed to shuddera little as she took it.
"I do not blame you for shuddering, Senorita," he said politely, "butmen who are about to die may indulge in petty spites. And thechauffeur was a favorite with the deputy for whom I am substituting.Like all favorites of despots, he had power to abuse, and abused it. Icould tell you tales, but refrain."
* * * * *
The car had come to a stop in what seemed to be a huge warehouse, andby the sound of water round about, it was either near or entirelybuilt out over the harbor. A large section near the outer end waswalled off. Boxes, bales, parcels and packages of every sort wereheaped all about. Bell saw crated air engines lying in a row againstone wall. There were a dozen or more of them. Machinery, huge cases offoodstuffs....
"The Buenos Aires depot," said Ortiz almost gaily. "This was the pointof receipt for all the manufactured goods which went to the _fazenda_of Cuyaba, Senor Bell. Since you destroyed that place, it has not beenso much used. However, it will serve excellently as a tomb. There arecases of hand grenades yonder. I advise you to carry a certain numberwith you. The machine guns for the air-craft, with their ammunition,are here...."
He was hurrying them toward the great walled-off space as he talked,his automatic serving as a pointer when he indicated the variousobjects.
"Now, here," he added as he unlocked the door, "is your vessel. TheMaster bought only amphibian planes of late. Those for Cuyaba wereassembled in this little dock and took off from the water. Yourdestruction up there, Senor Bell, left one quite complete butundelivered. I think another, crated, is still in the warehouse. Ihave been very busy, but if you can fuel and load it before we areattacked...."
They were in a roofed and walled but floorless shed, built into thewarehouse itself. Water surged about below them, and on it floated afive passenger plane, fully assembled and apparently ready to fly,but brand new and so far unused.
* * * * *
"I'll look it over," said Bell, briefly. He swung down the catwalkpainted on the wings. He began a swift and hasty survey. Soot on theexhaust stacks proved that the motors had been tried, at least.Everything seemed trim and new and glistening in the cabin. The fueltanks showed the barest trace of fuel. The oil tanks were full totheir filling-plugs.
He swung back up.
"Taking a chance, of course," he said curtly. "If the motors were allright when they were tried, they probably are all right now. They mayhave been tuned up, and may not. I tried the controls, and they seemto work. For a new ship, of course, a man would like to go over itcarefully, but if we've got to hurry...."
"I think," said Ortiz, and laughed, "that haste would be desirable.Herr Wiedkind--No! _Amigo mio_, it was that damned Antonio Calles wholistened to us last night. I found pencil marks beside the listeninginstrument. He must have sat there and eavesdropped upon me many wearyhours, and scribbled as men do to pass the time. He had a pretty tastein monograms.... I gave all the orders that were needful for you totake off from the flying field. I even went there myself and gaveadditional orders. And Calles was there. Also others of The Master'ssubjects. My treason would provoke a terrible revenge from The Master,so they thought to prove their loyalty by permitting me to disclose myplan and foil it at its beginning.
"I would have made the journey with you to The Master, but as aprisoner with the tale of my treason written out. So I returned andchanged the orders to the chauffeur, when all the Master's loyalsubjects were waiting at the flying field. But soon it will occur tothem what I have done. They will come here. Therefore, hasten!"
"We want food," said Bell evenly, "and arms, but mostly we want fuel.We'll get busy."
* * * * *
He shed his coat and picked up a hand-truck. He rammed it under a drumof gasoline and ran it to the walkway nearest to the floating plane.Coiled against the wall there was a long hose with a funnel at itsupper end. In seconds he had the hose end in one of the wingfuel-tanks. In seconds more he had propped the funnel into place andwas watching the gasoline gurgling down the hose.
"Paula," he said curtly, "watch this. When it's empty roll the drumaway so I can put another in its place."
She moved quickly beside it, throwing him a little smile. She setabsorbedly about her task.
Jamison arrived with another drum of gas before the first was emptied,and Bell was there with a third while the second still gurgled. Theyheaped the full drums in place, and Jamison suddenly abandoned histruck to swear wrathfully and tear off his spectacles and fling themagainst the wall. The bushy eyebrows and beard peeled off. His coatwent down. He began to rush loads of foodstuffs, arms, and otherobjects to a point from which they could be loaded on the plane. Ortizpointed out the things he pantingly demanded.
In minutes, it seemed, he was demanding: "How much can we take? Anymore than that?"
"No more," said Bell. "All the weight we can spare goes for fuel. Seeif you can find another hose and funnel and get to work on the othertank. I'm going to rustle oil."
He came staggering back with heavy drums of it. A thought struck him.
"How do we get out? What works the harbor door?"
* * * * *
Ortiz pointed, smiling.
"A button, Senor, and a motor does the rest." He looked at his watch."I had better see if my fellow subjects have come."
He vanished, smiling his same queer smile. Bell worked frantically. Hesaw Ortiz coming back, pausing to light a cigarette, and taking up ahatchet, with which he attacked a packing case.
"They are outside, Senor," he called. "They have found the signs ofthe car entering, and now are discussing."
He plucked something carefully from the packing box and went leisurelyback toward the door. Bell began to load the food and stores into thecabin, with sweat streaming down his face.
There was the sound of a terrific explosion, and Bell jumped savagelyto solid ground.
"Keep loading! I'll hold them back!" he snapped to Jamison.
But when he went pounding to the back of the warehouse he found Ortizlaughing.
"A hand grenade, Senor," he said in wholly unnatural levity. "Amongthe subjects of The Master. I believe that I am going mad, to takesuch pleasure in destruction. But since I am to die so shortly, whynot go mad, if it gives me pleasure?"
* * * * *
He peered out a tiny hole and aimed his automatic carefully. Itspurted out all the seven shots that were left.
"The man who poisoned me," he said pleasantly. "I think he is dead. Goback and make ready to leave, Senor Bell, because they will probablytry to storm this place soon, and then the police will come, andthen.... It is amusing that I am the one man to whom
those enslavedamong the city authorities would look for The Master's orders."
Bell stared out. He saw a small horde of people, frantically agitated,milling in the cramped and unattractive little street of Buenos Aires'waterfront. Sheer desperation seemed to impel them, desperation and afrantic fear. They surged forward--and Ortiz flung a hand grenade. Itsexplosion was terrific, but he had perhaps purposely flung it short.Bell suddenly saw police uniforms, fighting a way through to the frontof the crowd and the source of all this disturbance.
"Go back," said Ortiz seriously. "I shall die, Senor Bell. There isnothing else for me to do. But I wish to die with Latin melodrama." Hemanaged a smile. "I will give you ten minutes more. I can hold off thepolice themselves for so long. But you must hasten, because there arepolice launches."
* * * * *
He held out his hand. Bell took it.
"Good luck," said Ortiz.
"You can come--" began Bell, wrenched by the gaiety on Ortiz's face.
"Absurd," said Ortiz, smiling. "I should be murder mad within threedays. This is a preferable death, I assure you. Ten minutes, no more!"
And Bell went racing back and found Jamison rolling away the last ofthe fuel drums and Paula looking anxiously for him.
"Tanks full," said Jamison curtly. "Everything set. What next?"
"Engines," said Bell.
He swung down and jerked a prop over. Again, and again.... The motorcaught. He went plunging to the other. Minutes.... They caught. Hethrottled them down to the proper warming up roaring, while the air inthe enclosed space grew foul.
* * * * *
Once more to the warehouse. Ortiz shouted and waved his hand. He wasfilling his pockets with hand grenades. Bell made a gesture offarewell and Ortiz seemed to smile as he went back to hold theentrance for a little longer.
"We're going," said Bell grimly. "Get your guns ready, Jamison, forwhen the door goes up."
He pressed on the button Ortiz had pointed out. There were moreexplosions and the rattle of firearms from the front of the warehouse.There was a sudden rumble of machinery and the blank front of thelittle covered dock rose suddenly. The sunlit waters of Buenos Airesharbor spread out before them. To Bell, who had not looked on sunlightthat day, the effect was dazzling. He blinked, and then saw a fastlittle launch approaching. There were uniformed figures crowded aboutits bows.
"All set!" he snapped. "I'm going to give her the gun."
"Go to it," said Jamison. "We're--"
The motors bellowed and drowned out the rest. The plane shuddered andbegan to move. The sound of explosions from the back of the warehousewas loud and continuous, now. Out into the bright sunlight the planemoved, at first heavily, then swiftly....
Bell saw arms waving wildly in the launch with the uniformed men.Sunlight glittered suddenly on rifle barrels. Puffs of vapor shot out.Something spat through the wall beside Bell. But the roaring of themotors kept up, and the pounding of the waves against the curved bowof the boat-body grew more and more violent.... Sweat came out onBell's face. The ship was not lifting....
* * * * *
But it did lift. Slowly, very slowly, carrying every pound with whichit could have risen from the water. It swept past the police launch atninety miles an hour, but no more than five feet above the waves. Abig, clumsy tramp flying the Norwegian flag splashed up river with itspropeller half out of water. Bell dared to rise a little so he couldbank and dodge it. He could not rise above it.
He had one glimpse of blonde, astonished beards staring over the sternof the tramp as he swept by it, his wing tips level with its rail andbarely twenty feet away. And then he went on and on, out to sea.
He began to spiral for height fully four miles offshore, and lookedback at the sprawling city. Down by the waterfront a thick, curlingmass of smoke was rising from one spot abutting on the water. Itswayed aside and Bell saw the rectangular opening out of which theplane had come.
"Ortiz's in there," he said, sick at heart. "Dying as he planned."
But there was a sudden upheaval of timbers and roof. A colossal burstof smoke. A long time later the concussion of a vast explosion. Therewas nothing left where the warehouse had been.
Bell looked, and swore softly to himself, and felt a fresh surge ofthe hatred he bore to The Master and all his works. And then filmyclouds loomed up but a little above the rising plane, and Bell shotinto them and straightened out for the south.
* * * * *
For many long hours the plane floated on to southward, high above agray ocean which seemed deceptively placid beneath a canopy of thinclouds. The motors roared steadily in the main, though once Bellinstructed Jamison briefly in the maintenance of a proper course andheight, and swung out into the terrific blast of air that swept pastthe wings. He clung to struts and handholds and made his way out onthe catwalk to make some fine adjustment in one motor, with sixthousand feet of empty space below the swaying wing.
"Carburetter wrong," he explained when he had closed the cabin windowbehind him again and the motors' roar was once more dulled. "It waslikely to make a lot of carbon in the cylinders. O.K., now."
Paula's hand touched his shyly. He smiled abstractedly at her and wentback to the controls.
And then the plane kept on steadily. Time and space have become purelyrelative in these days, in startling verification of Mr. Einstein, andthe distance between Buenos Aires and Magellan Strait is great orsmall, a perilous journey or a mere day's travel, according to themind and the transportation facilities of the voyager. Before fouro'clock in the afternoon the coast was low and sandy to the westward,and it continued sterile and bare for long hours while the plane hunghigh against the sky with a following wind driving it on vastly moreswiftly than its own engines could have contrived.
* * * * *
It was little before sunset when the character of the shore changedyet again, and the sun was low behind a bank of angry clouds when thestubby forefinger of rock that Magellan optimistically named the Capeof the Eleven Thousand Virgins reached upward from the seeminglyplacid water. Bell swept lower, then, much lower, looking for alanding place. He found it eight or nine miles farther on, on a widesandy beach some three miles from a lighthouse. The little planesplashed down into tumbling sea and, half supported by the waves andhalf by the lift remaining to its wings, ran for yards up upon thehard packed sand.
The landing had been made at late twilight, and Bell moved stifflywhen he rose from the pilot's seat.
"I'm going over to that lighthouse," he said curtly. "There won't beenough men there to be dangerous and they probably haven't frequentcommunication with the town. I'll learn something, anyway. You twostay with the plane."
Jamison lifted his eyebrows and was about to speak, but looked atBell's expression and stopped. Leadership is everywhere a matter ofemotion and brains together, and though Jamison had his share ofbrains, he had not Bell's corroding, withering passion of hatredagainst The Master and all who served him gladly. All the way down thecoast Bell had been remembering things he had seen of The Master'sdoing. His power was solely that of fear, and the deputies of hisselection had necessarily been men who would spread that terror withan unholy zest. The nature of his hold upon his subjects was such thatno honorable man would ever serve him willingly, and for deputies hehad need of men even of enthusiasm. His deputies, then, were men whofound in the assigned authority of The Master full scope for thesatisfaction of their own passions. And Bell had seen what thosepassions brought about, and there was a dull flame of hatred burningin his eyes that would never quite leave them until those men werepowerless and The Master dead.
* * * * *
"You'll look after the ship and Paula," said Bell impatiently. "Allright?"
Jamison nodded. Paula looked appealingly at Bell, but he had become aman with an obsession. Perhaps the death of Ortiz had cemented it,
butcertainly he was unable to think of anything, now, but the necessityof smashing the ghastly hold of The Master upon all the folk he hadentrapped. Subconsciously, perhaps, Bell saw in the triumph of TheMaster a blow to all civilization. Less vaguely, he foresaw an attemptat the extension of The Master's rule to his own nation. But when Bellthought of The Master, mainly he remembered certain disconnectedincidents. The girl at Ribiera's luxurious _fazenda_ outside of Rio,who had been ordered to persuade him to be her lover, on penalty of ahorrible madness for her infant son if she failed. Of a pale andstricken _fazendiero_ on the Rio Laurenco who thought him a deputy andhumbly implored the grace of The Master for a moody twelve year oldgirl. Of a young man who kept his father, murder mad, in a barred roomin his house and waited despairingly for that madness to be meted outupon himself and on his wife and children. Of a white man who had beenkept in a cage in Cuyaba, with other men....
* * * * *
Bell trudged on through the deepening night with his soul a burningflame of hatred. He clambered amid boulders, guided by the talllighthouse of Cape Possession with the little white dwelling he hadseen at its base before nightfall. He fell, and rose, and forced hisway on and upward, and at last was knocking heavily at a trim andneatly painted door.
He was so absorbed in his rage that his talk with the lighthousekeeper seemed vague in his memory, afterward. The keeper was a wizenedlittle Welshman from the Chibut who spoke English with anextraordinary mixture of a Spanish intonation and a Cimbrian accent.Bell listened heavily and spoke more heavily still. At the end he wentback to the plane with a spindle-shanked boy with a lanternaccompanying him.
"All settled," he said grimly, when Jamison came out into the darknesswith a ready revolver to investigate the approaching light. "We get aboat from the lighthouse keeper to go to Punta Arenas in. He's adevout member of some peculiar sect, and he's seen enough of the hellPunta Arenas amounts to, to believe what I told him of its cause. Hiswife will look after Paula, and this boy will hitch a team to theplane and haul it out of sight early in the morning. With the help ofGod, we'll kill Ribiera and The Master before sunset to-morrow."
CHAPTER XVI
But they did not kill The Master before nightfall. It was not quitepracticable. Bell and Jamison started out well before dawn with afavorable wind and tide, in the small launch the wizened Welshmanplaced at their disposal. His air was one of dour piety, but heaccepted Bell's offer of money with an obvious relief, and criticizedhis Paraguayan currency with an acid frankness until Jamison producedArgentine pesos sufficient to pay for the boat three times over.
"I think," said Jamison dryly, "that Pau--that Miss Canalejas is safeenough until we come back. The keeper is a godly man and knows wehave money. She'll be in no danger, except of her soul. They may tryto save that."
Bell did not answer. He could think of nothing but the mission he hadset himself. He tinkered with the engine to make it speed up, and setthe sails with infinite care to take every possible advantage of thestiff breeze that blew. During the day, those sails proved almost asmuch of a nuisance as a help. The fiendish, sullen williwaws that blowfuriously and without warning about the Strait required watching, andmore than once it was necessary to reef everything and depend on themotor alone.
Bell watched the horizon ahead with smouldering eyes. Jamison watchedhim almost worriedly.
"Look here, Bell," he said at last, "you'll get nowhere feeling likeyou do. I know you've done The Master more damage than I have, butyou'll just run your head into a trap unless you use your brains. Forinstance, you didn't ask about communications. There's a directtelegraph wire from Cape Virgins to Buenos Aires, and there'stelephonic communication between the Cape and Punta Arenas. Do youimagine that the plane wasn't seen when it came in the Cape? And doyou imagine The Master doesn't know we're here?"
* * * * *
Bell turned, then, and frowned blackly.
"I hadn't thought of it," he said grimly, "but I put some handgrenades in the locker, there."
"You damned fool!" said Jamison angrily. "Stop being bloodthirsty anduse your head! You haven't even asked what I've done! I've donesomething, anyhow. That bundle I chucked in the bow has a couple ofsheepmen's outfits in it. Lots of sheep raised around here. We'll put'em on before we land. And like a good general, I arranged a method ofretreat before we left B. A. There'll be a naval vessel here in two orthree days. She's carrying a party of Government scientists. She'llanchor in Punta Arenas harbor and announce a case of some infectiousdisease on board. No shore leave, you see, and nobody from shorepermitted on board her. And she has one or two damned good analyticalchemists with a damned good laboratory on board her, too. It's a longgamble, but if we can get hold of some of The Master's poison.... Doyou see?"
"Yes," said Bell heavily. "I see. But you haven't been through whatI've been through. What I've done, fighting that devil, has caused mento be deserted after being enslaved. There's one place, Cuyaba...."
His face twitched. That place was in his dreams, now. That place andothers where human beings had watched their bodies go mad, and hadbeen carried about screaming with horror at the crimes those bodiescommitted....
"I'm going to kill The Master," he rasped. "That's all."
He settled down to his grim watch for the city. All during the cloudy,overcast day he strained his eyes ahead. Jamison could make nothing ofhim. In the end he had to leave Bell to his moody waiting.
* * * * *
The morning passed, and midday, and a long afternoon. Three times Bellcame restlessly back to the engine and tried to coax more speed out ofit. But when darkness fell the town was still not in sight. They kepton, then, steering by the stars with the motor putt-putt-puttingsturdily away in the stern. The water splashed and washed all aboutthem. The little boat rose, and fell, and rose and fell again.
"That's the town," said Bell grimly.
It was eleven at night, or later. Lights began to appear, very faraway, dancing miragelike on the edge of the water. They grew nearerwith almost infinite slowness. Two wide bands of many lights, with adarker space in which a few much brighter lights showed clearly.Presently a single red light appeared, the Punta Arenas harbor light,twenty-five feet up on an iron pole. They passed it.
"Bell," said Jamison curtly, "it's time you showed some sense, now.We're going to find out some things before we get reckless. This townisn't a big one, but it always was a hell on earth. No extraditionfrom here. It's full of wanted men. It's dying, now, from the old dayswhen all ships passed the Straits before the Panama Canal opened up,but it ought to be still a hell on earth. And we're going to put onthese sheepmen outfits, and put up at some low caste sailors' andsheepmen's hotel on shore, and find out what is what. In the morning,if you like--"
"In the morning," said Bell coldly, "I'm going to settle with TheMaster."
* * * * *
They found a small and filthy hotel, in a still filthier street wherethe houses were alternately black and silent and empty, and filledwith the squalid hilarity most seaport towns can somehow manage tosupport. The street lamps were white and cold. The dirt and squalorshowed the more plainly by their light. There were sailors from thefew ships in harbor, and women so haggard and bedraggled that shrilllaughter and lavish endearments remained their only allure. And Belland Jamison plodded to the reeking place in which a half-drunksheepman pointed, and there Bell sat grimly in the vermin infestedroom while Jamison, swearing wryly, went out.
He came back later, much later. His breath was strong of bad whiskeyand he looked like a man who feels that a bath would be verydesirable. He looked like a man who feels unclean.
"Give me a cigarette," he said shortly. "I found out most of what wewant to know."
* * * * *
Bell gave him a cigarette and waited.
"Good thing you stayed behind," said Jamison. "I want to vomit. Whypeople go in hell ho
les for fun.... But I was very drunk and veryamorous. Picked up a woman and fed her liquor. Young, too. Damnation!She got crying drunk and told me everything she knew. I gave her moneyand left. Punta Arenas is The Master's, body and soul."
"One could have guessed it," said Bell grimly.
"Nothing like it is," said Jamison. "Every living creature, man,woman, and child, has been fed that devilish poison of his. Thekeepers of the dives go fawning to the local officials for theantidote. The _jefe politico_ is driven in his carriage to be curedwhen red spots form before his eyes. The damned place is full ofsuicides, and women, and--oh, my God! It's horrible!"
A humming, buzzing noise set up off in the night somewhere. It kept upfor a long time, throttled down. Suddenly it seemed to grow louder,changed in pitch, and dwindled as if into the far, far distance.
"That's one of The Master's planes now, no doubt," said Jamisonsavagely, "going off on some errand for him. He uses this placepractically as an experiment station. The human beings here are hisguinea pigs. The deputies get a standardized form of the stuff, buthe's got it worked out in different doses so he can make a man go madin hours, if he chooses, instead of after a delay. I don't know how.And The Master--"
* * * * *
He checked himself sharply. There were shuffling footsteps in the halloutside. A timid tap on the door. Jamison opened it, while Belldropped one hand inconspicuously to a weapon inside his shapelessclothing.
The toothless and filthy old man who kept the hotel beamed in at them.
"_Senores_," he cackled. "_Vdes son de Porvenir, no es verdad?_"
Jamison hiccoughed, as one who has been out and been drunken ought todo.
"_No, viejo_," he rumbled tipsily, "_somos de la estancia del SenorRubio. Vaya._"
The old man seemed to mourn that they did not come from the sheepranches about Porvenir Bay. But he produced a bottle with a shakinghand, still beaming.
"_Tengo muchos amigos en Porvenir_," he chirped amiably. "_Y questabotella--_"
"_Demela_," rumbled Jamison. He reached out his hand.
"_No mas que poquito!_" said the old man, beaming but anxious asJamison tilted it to his lips. "_Es visky de gentes...._"
He beamed upon Bell, and Bell swallowed a spoonful and seemed toswallow vastly more. He lay back lazily while Jamison in the part of atipsy sheepherder bullied the old man amiably and eventually chasedhim out.
"You're amused?" asked Jamison sardonically, when there were no moresounds outside. "Because I said you didn't want to meet the youngsenorita who loved you when she saw you downstairs? Well, Bell, if youused your brain you didn't swallow any of that stuff."
Bell started up. Jamison caught him by the shoulder.
"I'm not sure," he said sharply. "Of course not. But it's damned funnyfor a Spanish hotel keeper to give something for nothing, even when heseemed just to want to gossip about his friends. Here. Drink thiswater. It looks vile enough to take the place of mustard...."
* * * * *
Next morning the hotel keeper beamed upon them both as they went outof the place. A slatternly, dark haired girl who leaned on hisshoulder smiled invitingly at Bell. And Bell, in his character of aloutish sheepman from one of the ranches that dot the shores of theStrait, grinned awkwardly back. But he went on with Jamison.
"We separate," said Jamison under his breath. "We want to find whereThe Master lives, mostly, and then we want to find the laboratorywhere his stuff is mixed. We don't want to do any killing until that'ssettled. After all, the Trade has something to say!"
Bell codded indifferently and began to wander idly about the streets,turning here and there as if moved by nothing more than the vaguestcuriosity. But gradually he was working through the sections in whichthe larger buildings stood. Concrete structures, astonishingly modern,dotted the business section. But none of them had the air that wouldsurround a place where a man with power of life or death would be. Ina town the size of Punta Arenas there would be unmistakable evidencesabout The Master's residence, even if it were only that those whopassed it did so hurriedly and with a twinge of fear.
* * * * *
There were prosperous men in plenty on the streets, mingled withdeserting sailors, stockmen and farmers from the villages along theStrait, and even a few grimy men who looked like miners. But there isa lignite mine not far from the city, and a narrow gauge railroadrunning to it. Of the prosperous-seeming men, however, Bell picked outone here and there toward whom all passersby adopted a manner ofcringing respect. Bell lounged against a pole and studied themthoughtfully. Men with an air of amused and careless scorn which onlymen with unlimited power may adopt. He saw one grossly fat man withhard and cruel eyes. The uniformed policemen drove all trafficabjectly out of the way of his carriage, and stood with lifted hatuntil he had passed. The fat man gave no faintest sign ofacknowledgment.
"I wonder," said Bell slowly, and very grimly, "if that's The Master?"
And then a passerby dodged quickly past his shoulder, brushing againsthim, and waited humbly in the street. Bell turned. A party of men weretaking up nearly all the sidewalk. There were half a dozen of them inall. And nearly in the middle was the bulky, immaculate, pigmentedRibiera.
Bell stiffened. But to move, beyond clearing the way, would be toattract attention. He backed clumsily off the curbing as if makingway....
And Ribiera looked at his face.
* * * * *
Bell's hand drifted near his hidden weapon. But Ribiera looked neithersurprised nor alarmed. He halted and chuckled.
"Ah, the Senhor Bell!"
Bell said nothing, looking as stupid as possible, merely because therewas nothing else to do.
"Ah, do not deny my acquaintance!" said Ribiera. He laughed. "I adviseyou to go and look at the view, over the harbor. Good day, SenhorBell."
Laughing, he went off along the street. And Bell felt a cold horrorcreeping over him as he realized what Ribiera might mean. Ribiera hadentirely too much against him to greet him only, in a town where eventhe dogs dared not bark without The Master's express command. He hadguards with him, men who would have shot Bell down at a nod fromRibiera.
Bell burst into a mad run for the waterfront. When the bay spread outbefore his eyes he saw what Ribiera meant, and something seemed tosnap in his brain.
The plane in which he and Jamison and Paula had escaped in wasfloating out in the harbor. It was unmistakable. A larger, bulkierseaplane floated beside it. The buzzing in the air the nightbefore.... The arrival of the plane had been telephoned from CapeVirgins. Through a glass, perhaps, even its alighting had beenwatched. And a big seaplane had gone out to bring it back. Footprintsin the sand would lead toward the lighthouse. There would be plenty ofmen to storm that, if necessary, to take the three fugitives. But theywould have found only Paula. It was quite possible that the plane hadonly been sent for after Bell and Jamison had been seen to land inPunta Arenas. And Paula in The Master's hands would explain Ribiera'samusement perfectly.
* * * * *
Bell found Jamison looking unhurriedly for him. And Jamison glanced athis utterly white face and said softly:
"We want to get where we can't be seen, to talk. There's the devil topay."
"No use hiding," said Bell. His lips seemed stiff. "Paula--"
"Hide anyway," snapped Jamison. He fairly thrust Bell into an alleywaybetween two houses and thrust two rounded objects beneath his loosefitting coat. "Two grenades. I have two more. The boat we came in istaken--"
"So is the plane," said Bell emotionlessly.
"And there is a sign, in English, posted where we tied it up. The signsays, '_The Senores Bell and Jamison may recover their boat onapplication to The Master, and may also receive news of a latetraveling companion from him._"
"We're known," Bell told him--and amazingly found it possible to smilefaintly--"Ribiera met me on the street and spoke to me a
nd laughed andwent on."
Jamison stared. Bell's manner was almost entirely normal again. ThenJamison shrugged.
"The sense of what you're saying," he observed wryly, "is that we'relicked. Let us, then, go to see The Master. I confess I feel somecuriosity to know just what he's like."
* * * * *
Bell was smiling. Being in an entirely abnormal state, he had acurious certitude of the proper course to adopt. He went up to apoliceman and said politely, in Spanish:
"I am desired to report to The Master, himself. Will you direct me?"
The policeman abased himself instantly and trotted with them as aguide. And Bell walked naturally, now, with his head up and hisshoulders back, and smoked leisurely as he went, and the policeman'sabasement became abject. All who walked with that air of amusedsuperiority in Punta Arenas were high in the service of The Master.Obviously, the two men in these dejected clothes must also be high inthe service of The Master, and had adopted their disguise for purposesinto which a mere policeman and a slave of The Master should not dareenquire.
Jamison was rather grim and still. Jamison thought he was walking tohis death. But Bell smiled peculiarly and talked almost gaily and--asJamison thought--almost irrationally.
* * * * *
They came to a house set in a fairly spacious lawn behind a ratherhigh wall. There were greenhouses behind it, and there were flowersgrowing as well as any flowers can be expected to grow in such highaltitudes. It was an extraordinarily cheerful dwelling to be found inPunta Arenas, but the shuddering fear with which the little policemanremoved his hat as he entered the gateway was instructive.
They were confronted by four other policemen, on guard inside thegate.
"_Estos Senores_--" began the abject one.
"Take us to The Master," commanded Bell in a species of amused andsuperior scorn.
"It is required, Senor," said the leader of the four on guard, veryrespectfully, "it is required that none enter without being searchedfor weapons."
Bell laughed.
"Does The Master manage things so?" he asked scornfully. "Now, where Iam deputy no man would dare to think of a weapon to be used againstme! If it is The Master's rule, though...."
The policeman cringed. Bell scornfully thrust an automatic out.
"Take it," he snapped. "And go and tell The Master that the SenoresBell and Jamison await his pleasure, and that they have given uptheir weapons."
The policeman scuttled toward the house. Bell smiled at his cigarette.
"Do you know, Bell," said Jamison dryly, in English, "I'd hate to playpoker with you."
"I'm not bluffing," said Bell. "Not altogether. I've a four cardflush, with the draw to come."
* * * * *
Almost instantly the policeman returned, more abject still. He hadstammered out Bell's message, just as it was given him. And the slavesof The Master did not usually disobey orders, especially ordersdesigned to prevent any danger of a doomed man or woman trying toassassinate The Master before madness was complete. Bell and Jamisonwere received by liveried servants in utter silence and conductedthrough a long passageway, too long to have been contained entirely inthe house as seen from the front. Indeed, they came out into a greatopen greenhouse, in which the smell of flowers was heavy. There wereflowers everywhere, and a benign, small old man with a snowy beard andhair, sat at a desk as if chatting of amiable trivialities with thefrock-coated men who stood about him. The white haired old man lifteda blossom delicately to his nostrils and inhaled its perfume with asensitive delight. He looked up and smiled benignly upon the two.
It was then that Jamison got a shock surpassing all the rest. Bell'shands were writhing at the ends of his wrists, writhing as if theywere utterly beyond his control and as if they were longing to rendand tear....
And Bell suddenly looked down at them, and his expression was that ofa man who sees cobras at the ends of his arms.
CHAPTER XVII
There was a long pause. Bell was very calm. He seemed to tear his eyesfrom the writhing hands that were peculiarly sensate, as if under thecontrol of in intelligence alien to his own.
"I believe," said Bell steadily, "that The Master wishes to speak tome."
With an apparent tremendous effort of will, he thrust his hands intohis pockets. Jamison cursed softly. Bell had taken the direction ofthings entirely out of his hands. It only remained to play up.
"To be sure," said a mild, benevolent voice. The man with the snowybeard regarded Bell exactly in the fashion of an elderlyphilanthropist. "I am The Master, Senor Bell. You have interested megreatly. I have grown to have a great admiration for you. Will you beseated? Your companion also pleases me. I would like"--and the mildbrown eyes beamed at him--"I would like to have your friendship, SenorBell."
"Pull out a chair for me, Jamison," said Bell in a strained voice."And--I'd like to have a cigarette."
Jamison, cursing under his breath, put a chair behind Bell and stuck acigarette between his lips. He held a match, though his hands shook.
"You might sit down, too," said Bell steadily. "From the manner of TheMaster, I imagine that the conversation will take some time."
* * * * *
He inhaled deeply of his cigarette, and faced the little man again.And The Master looked so benevolent that he seemed absolutelycherubic, and there was absolutely no sign of anything but the utmostsaintliness about him. His eyes were clear and mild. His complexionwas fresh and translucent. The wrinkles that showed upon his face werethose of an amiable and a serene soul filled with benevolence andcharity. He looked like one of those irritatingly optimistic oldgentlemen who habitually carry small coins and stray bits of candy intheir pockets for such small children as they may converse with underthe smiling eyes of nurses.
"Ah, Senor Bell," he said gently. "You do cause me to admire you. MayI see your hands again?"
Bell held them out. He seemed to have conquered their writhing to someextent. But he could not hold them quite still. Sweat stood out on hisforehead. He thrust them abruptly out of sight again.
"Sad," said The Master gently. "Very sad." He sighed faintly and laiddown the rose he had been toying with. His fingers caressed the softpetals delicately. "Fortunately," he said benevolently, "it is not yettoo late for me to relieve the strain under which you labor, Senor.May I send for a certain medicine which will dispose of those symptomsin a very short time?"
"We'll talk first," said Bell harshly. "I want to hear what you haveto say."
* * * * *
The Master nodded, his fingers touching the rose petals as if in asensitive pleasure in their texture.
"Always courageous," he said benignly. "I admire it while I combat it.But the Senor Jamison...."
Jamison had been looking fascinatedly at his own hands, opening andclosing the fingers with a savage abruptness. They obeyed him, thoughthey trembled.
"I didn't drink the damned stuff that hotel keeper brought us lastnight," he growled. "Bell did. And I--"
"Wait a minute, Jamison," said Bell evenly. "Let's talk to The Masterfor a while. I swore, sir," he said grimly, "that I'd kill you. I'veseen what your devilish poison does, in the hands of the men you'vechosen to distribute it. I've seen"--he swallowed and saidharshly--"I've seen enough to make me desire nothing so much as to seeyou roast in hell! But you wanted to talk to me. Go ahead!"
* * * * *
The Master beamed at him, and then glanced about at the frock-coatedmen who had been attending him. Bell glanced at them. Ribiera wasthere, chuckling.
"I told you, _tio mio_," he said familiarly, "that he would not bepolite. You can do nothing with him. Better have him shot."
Francia, of Paraguay, nodded amusedly to Bell as their eyes met. ButThe Master shook his really rather beautiful head. An old man can begood to look at, and with a saintly aureole of snow-white hair
and thepatriarchal white beard, The Master was the picture of benign andbeautiful old age.
"Ah, you do not understand," he protested mildly. "The more the SenorBell shows his courage, _hijo mio_, the more we must persuade him." Heturned to Bell. "I realise," he said gently, "that there are hardshipsconnected with the administration of my power, Senor. It isinevitable. But the Latin races of the continent which is now nearlymine require strong handling. They require a strong man to lead them.They are comfortable only under despotism. The task I have chosen foryou is different, entirely. _Los Americanos del Norte_ will notrespond to the treatment which is necessary for those _del Sud_. Theirgovernments, their traditions, are entirely unlike. If you become mydeputy and viceroy for all your nation, you shall rule as you will. Abenevolent, yet strong, rule is needed for your people. It may evenbe--I will permit it--that the democratic institutions of your nationmay continue if you so desire. I am offering you, Senor, the positionof the absolute ruler of your nation. You may interfere with thepresent government not at all, if you choose, provided only that myown commands are obeyed when relayed through you. I choose you becauseyou have courage, and resource, and because you have the _Yanqui_cleverness which will understand your nation and cope with it."
* * * * *
Bell inhaled deeply.
"In other words," he said bitterly, "you're saying indirectly that youoffer me a chance to be the sort of ruler Americans will submit towithout too much fuss, because you think one of Ribiera's stamp woulddrive them to rebellion."
The fine dark eyes twinkled.
"You have much virtue, Senor. My nephew--though he is to be mysuccessor--has a weakness for a pretty face. Would you prefer that Igive him the task of subduing your nation?"
"You might try it," said Bell. His eyes gleamed. "He'd be dead withina week."
The Master laughed softly.
"I like you, Senor. I do like you indeed. I have not been so defiedsince another _Americano del Norte_ defied me in this same room. Buthe had not your resource. He had been enslaved with much lessdifficulty than yourself. I do not remember what happened to him...."
"He was taken, Master," said a fat man with hard eyes, obsequiously,"he was taken in Bolivia." It was the man whom Bell had seen earlierthat morning in a carriage. "You gave him to me. He had insulted mewhen I ordered him sent to you. I had him killed, but he was veryobstinate."
"Ah, yes," said The Master meditatively. "You told me the details." Heseemed to recall small facts in benevolent retrospection. "But you,Senor Bell, I have need of you. In fact, I shall insist upon yourfriendship. And therefore--"
He beamed upon Bell.
"I give you back the Senorita Canalejas."
* * * * *
He shook his head reproachfully at the utterly grim look in Bell'seyes.
"I shall give you one single portion of the antidote to the medicinewhich makes your hands behave so badly. You may take it when youplease. The Senor Jamison I shall keep and enslave. I do not think hewill be as obstinate as you are, but he has excellent qualities. Ifyou prove obdurate, I may yet persuade him to undertake certain tasksfor me. But you and the Senorita Canalejas are free. Your boat hasbeen reprovisioned and provided with fuel. You may go from here whereyou will."
Ribiera snarled.
"_Tio mio_," he protested angrily, "you promised me--"
"Your will in many things," said The Master gently, "but not in all.Remember that you have much to learn, _hijo mio_. I have taught you toprepare my little medicine, it is true. That is so you can take myplace if age infirmity shall carry me away." The Master folded hishands with an air of pious resignation. "But you must learn policy.The Senorita Canalejas belongs to the Senor Bell."
Jamison was staring, now, but Bell's eyes had narrowed to mere slits.
"You see," said The Master gently, to him, "I desire your friendship.You may go where you will. You may take the Senorita Canalejas withyou. You will have enough of the antidote to my little medicine tokeep you sane for perhaps a week. In one week you may go far, withher. You may do many things. But you cannot find a place of safety forher. I still have a little power, Senor. If you take her with you,your hands will writhe again. Your body will become uncontrollable.Your eyes, staring and horror-struck, will observe your own handsrending her. While your brain is yet sane you will see this body ofyours which now desires her so ardently, tearing at and crushing thatdelicate figure, gouging out her eyes, battering her tender flesh,destroying her.... Have you ever seen what a man who has taken mylittle medicine does to a human being at his mercy?"
* * * * *
The figures about The Master were peculiarly tense. The fat man withthe hard eyes laughed suddenly. It was a horrible laugh. Francia ofParaguay took out his handkerchief and delicately wiped his lips. Hewas smiling. Ribiera looked at Bell's face and chuckled. His wholegross figure shook with his amusement.
"And of course," said The Master benignly, "if you prefer to commitsuicide, if you prefer to leave her here--well, my nephew knows littleexpedients to reduce her will to compliance. You recall _Yague_, amongothers."
Bell's face was a white mask of horror and fury. He tried to speak,and failed. He raised his hand to his throat--and it tore at theflesh, insanely.
"Let--let me see her," croaked Bell, as if strangling.
Jamison stiffened. Bell seemed to be trying to get his hands into hispockets. They were apparently uncontrollable. He thrust them under hiscoat as there was a stirring at the door.
* * * * *
And Paula was brought in, as if she had been waiting. She was entirelycolorless, but she smiled at Bell. She came quickly to his side.
"I heard," she said in a clear and even little voice. "We will gotogether, Charles. If there is a week in which we can be together, itwill be so much of happiness. And when you are--The Master's victim,we will let the little boat sink, and sink with it. I do not wish tolive without you, Charles, and you do not wish to live as his slave."
Bell gave utterance to a sudden laugh that was like a bark. His handscame out from under his coat. Dangling from each one was a small,pear-shaped globule of metal. A staff projected upward from each one,and he held those staffs in his writhing hands. About each wrist was atiny loop of cord that went down to a pin at the base of the staffs.
"Close to me, Paula," he said coldly. She clung to his arm. He movedforward, with half-a-dozen revolver muzzles pointed at his breast.
"If one of you damned fools fires," he said harshly, "I'll let go.When I let go--these are Mills grenades, and they go off in threeseconds after they leave the hand. Stand still!"
* * * * *
There was a terrible, frozen silence. Then a movement from behindBell. Jamison was rising with a grunt.
"Some day, Bell," he observed coolly, "I'll be on to all of yourcurves. This is the best one yet. But you're likely to let go at anysecond, aren't you?"
"Like hell!" raged Bell. "I drank some of your poison," he snarled atThe Master. "Yes! I was fool enough to do it! But I took what measuresany man will take who finds he's swallowed poison. I got it out of mystomach at once. And if you or one of these deputies tries tomove...."
Ribiera had blanched to a pasty gray. The Master was frozen. But Bellsaw Ribiera's eyes move in swift calculation. There was a solid wallbehind The Master. It seemed as if the greenhouse were a sort ofpassageway between two larger structures. And there was a door almostimmediately behind Ribiera. Ribiera glanced right--left--
He flung himself through that door. He knew the secret of The Master'spower. He was The Master's appointed successor. If The Master and allhis deputies died, Ribiera....
But Bell snapped into action like a bent spring released. His arm shotforward. A grenade went hurtling through the door through whichRibiera had fled. There was an instantaneous, terrific explosion. Thesolid wall shook and shivered and, with a vast d
eliberation,collapsed. The greenhouse was full of crushed plaster dust. Panes ofglass shivered....
But Bell was upon The Master. He had struck the little man down andstood over him, his remaining automatic replacing the grenade he hadthrown.
"Ribiera's dead," he snapped, "and if I'm shot The Master dies too andyou all go mad! Stand back!"
The deputies stood frozen.
"I think," said Jamison composedly, "I take a hand now. I'll pick himup, Bell.... Right. I've got him. With a grenade hanging down hisback. If he jerks away from me, or I from him, it will blow his spineto bits."
"Hold him so," said Bell coldly.
* * * * *
He went coolly to where he could look over the heap of the collapsedwall. He saw a bundle of torn clothing that had been a man. It wasflung against a cracked and tottering chimney.
"Right," he said evenly. "Ribiera's dead, all right."
He turned to the deputies, whose revolvers were still in their hands.
"The Master's carriage, please," he said politely. "To the door. Youmay accompany us if you please, but in other carriages. I am workingfor the release of all the Master's slaves, and you among them if youchoose. But you can see very easily that there is no hope of therelease of The Master without the meeting of my terms."
The Master spoke, softly and mildly and without fear.
"It is my order that the Senor Bell is to be obeyed. I shall return.You need have no fear of my death. My carriage."
A man went stiffly, half-paralyzed with terror, to where chatteringscared servants were grouped in the awful fear that came upon theslaves of The Master at any threat to his rule.
But Bell and Paula and Jamison went slowly and cautiously--though theyheld the whip hand--to the entrance door of the house, and out to theentrance gate. A carriage was already before the door when theyreached it, and others were drawing up in a line behind it.
"Get in," said Bell briefly. "Down to the waterfront."
He turned to the group of frock-coated, stricken men who had followed.
"Some of you men," he said coldly, "had better go on ahead and warnthe police and the public generally about the certainty of TheMaster's death if any attempt is made to rescue him."
Francia, of Paraguay, summoned a swagger and raised his hand to thesecond carriage. It drew in to the curb.
"I will attend to it, Senor Bell," he said politely. "Ah, when I thinkthat I once raised my revolver to shoot you and refrained!"
He drove off swiftly.
* * * * *
Bell's eyes were glowing. He got into the carriage, and such aprocession drove through the streets of Punta Arenas as has rarelymoved through the streets of any city in the world. The long line ofcarriages moved at a funereal pace amid a surging, terrified mob. TheMaster beamed placidly as he looked out over white, starkly agonizedfaces. Some of the people groaned audibly. A few cursed The Master intheir despair. More cursed Bell, not daring to strike or fire on him.But he would have been torn to bits if he had stepped from thecarriage for an instant.
"Bell," said Jamison dryly, "considering that I'm prepared to be blownapart on three seconds notice, it is peculiar that this mob frightensme."
The Master's eyes twinkled benignly. He seemed totally insensible tofear.
"You need not be afraid," he said gently. "They will not touch youunless I order them."
Jamison stared down at the little man whose collar he held firmly,with a Mills grenade dangling down at the base of his neck.
"I wouldn't order them to attack, if I were you," he said coldly. "Ihaven't Bell's brains, but I have just as much dislike for you as hehas."
* * * * *
They came to the harbor. Bell spoke again.
"The carriage is to drive out to the end of one of the docks, and noone else is to go out on that dock."
The Master relayed the order in his mild voice, but as the coachmanobeyed him he clucked his tongue commiseratingly.
"Senor Bell," he protested gently. "You do not expect to escape! Notafter killing me! Why that is absurd!"
Bell said nothing. He alighted from the carriage, his face set grimly,and stared ashore at the long, long row of terrified faces staring outat him. The whole waterfront seemed to be lined with staring faces.Wails came from that mass of enslaved human beings.
"Hold him here, Jamison," he said drearily. "I'm going out to look atthat big plane. There's a rowboat tied to the dock, here."
He swung down the side into the dock and rowed off into the harbor,while the horses attached to The Master's carriage pawed impatientlyat the wooden flooring of the dock. Bell reached the two planesanchored on the still harbor water. The smaller one had brought themdown from Buenos Aires. The larger one had gone after the beachedamphibian and brought it and Paula on to the city. Bell, from theshore, was seen to be investigating the larger one. He came rowingback.
His head appeared above the dock edge.
"All right," he said tiredly. "The Master has a rule requiring all hisships ready for instant flight. Very useful. The big plane is fueledand full of oil. We'll go out to it and take off."
* * * * *
Jamison lifted The Master to his feet and with a surge of musclesswept him down to the flooring of the dock.
"Paula first," said Bell, "and then The Master, and then you,Jamison."
"One moment," said The Master reproachfully. "It would be cruel not tolet me reassure my subjects. I will give an order."
Bell and Jamison listened suspiciously. But he spoke gently to thecoachman.
"You will tell the deputies," said The Master in Spanish, "that amonth's supply of medicine for all my subjects will be found in mylaboratory. And you may tell them that I shall return before the endof that time."
The coachman's eyes filled with a passionate relief.
"Now," said The Master placidly, "I am ready for our little jaunt."
Paula descended the ladder and seated herself in the bow of the boat.Bell covered The Master grimly with his automatic as he descended,with surprising agility. Jamison came down last, and resumed hisformer grip on The Master's collar. Bell rowed out to the big plane.
* * * * *
Jamison kept close watch while Bell started the four huge motors andthrottled them down to warming up speed, and while he hauled up theanchor with which the huge seaplane was anchored.
The dock was covered with a swarm of panic stricken folk. Everywhere,all the inhabitants of the city who were slaves to The Master had comein awful terror to watch. And all the inhabitants of the city wereslaves to The Master. Some of them fell to their knees and held outimploring arms to Bell, begging him for mercy and the return of TheMaster. Some cursed wildly.
But, with his jaws set grimly, Bell gave the motors the gun.
The big plane moved heavily, then more swiftly through the water. Itlifted slowly, and rose, and rose, and dwindled to a speck high in theair.
And all through the streets and ways of Punta Arenas, fear stalkedalmost as a tangible thing. Panic hovered over the housetops, alwaysready to descend. Terror was in the air that every man breathed, andevery human being looked at every other human being with staring,haunted eyes. Punta Arenas was waiting for its murder madness tobegin.
CHAPTER XVIII
There were four motors to pull the big plane through the air, andtheir roaring was a vast thundering noise which the earth re-echoed.But inside the cabin that tumult was reduced to a not intolerablehumming sound.
"What'll I do with this devil, Bell?" asked Jamison. "Now that we'realoft, I confess this grenade makes me nervous. I'm holding it sotightly my fingers are getting cramped."
"Tie him up," said Bell, without looking. "He'll talk presently."
Movements. The plane flew on, swaying slightly in the way of bigsea-planes everywhere. A williwaw began in the hills ahead and sweptout and set the ship to r
eeling crazily in its erratic currents. TheStrait vanished and there were tumbled hills below them. Minutespassed.
"Got him fixed up," said Jamison coolly, "I'll guarantee he won'tbreak loose. Got any plans, Bell?"
"No time," said Bell. "I haven't had time to make any. The first thingis to get where his folk will never find us. Then we'll see what wecan do with him."
Paula looked at the now bound figure of The Master. And the little oldman beamed at her.
"He--he's smiling!" said Paula, in a voice that was full of a peculiarhorrified shock.
* * * * *
Bell shrugged. Punta Arenas was all of twenty-five miles behind, andthe earth over which they flew began to take on the shape of anisland. Water appeared beyond it, and innumerable small islands. Bellbegan to rack his brain for the infinitesimal scraps of knowledge hehad about this section of the world. It was pitifully scanty. PuntaArenas was the southernmost point of the continental mass. All aboutit was an archipelago and a maze of waterways, thinly inhabitedeverywhere and largely without any inhabitants at all. The only solidground between Cape Horn and the Antarctic ice pack was Diego Ramirezand the South Shetlands....
Nothing to go on. But any sufficiently isolated and desolate spotwould do. Almost anywhere along the southern edge of the continentalislands should serve.
The plane roared on monotonously, while Bell began to wrestle withanother and more serious problem. In three days--two, now--an Americannaval vessel would turn up, with scientists and chemists on board. Itwas to be doubted whether anything like an overt act would be riskedby that vessel. If all the governments of South America were under TheMaster's thumb, then cabled orders from his deputies would race threenavies to the spot. And the government of the United States does notlike to start war, anywhere. Certainly it would not willingly enterinto a conflict with the whole southern continent for the solution ofa problem that so far affected that continent alone. The Master'skidnapping had solved nothing, so far.
* * * * *
Jamison tapped his shoulder.
"No pursuit, so far," he observed coolly. "I've looked." Bell nodded.
"They don't dare. Not yet, anyhow. They're depending on The Master.How is he?"
"Smiling peacefully to himself, damn him!" snarled Jamison. "Do youknow what we're up against?"
"Ourselves," said Bell coldly. "But I'm nearly licked. He's got totalk!"
Jamison moved away again. The earth below looked as if it had beentorn to shreds in some titanic convulsion of ages past. The sea waseverywhere, and so was land! There were little threads of silverinterlacing and crossing and wavering erratically in every conceivabledirection. And there were specks of islands--rocks only yards inextent--and islands of every imaginable size and shape, with theirsurfaces in every possible state of upheaval and distortion. A broadermass of land appeared ahead and to the left.
"Tierra del Fuego again," muttered Bell. "If we cross it...."
For fifteen minutes the plane thundered across desolate, rocky hills.Then the maze of islets again. Bell scanned them keenly, and saw atiny steamer traveling smokily, for no conceivable reason, among thescattered bits of stone. The sea appeared, stretching out towardinfinity.
Bell rose, to survey a wider space. He swung to the left, so that hewas heading nearly southeast, and went on down toward that desolationof desolations, the stormy cape which faces the eternal ice of theantarctic. He was five thousand feet up, then, and scanning sea andearth and sky....
And suddenly he swung sharply to the right and headed out toward theopen sea. He felt a small figure pressing against his shoulder.Presently fingers closed tightly upon his sleeve. He glanced down atPaula and managed to smile.
"There are some rocks out there," he told her quietly. "Islands, Ithink, and Diego Ramirez, at a guess."
* * * * *
They were specks, no more, but they were vastly more distinct from theplane than from Mount Beaufoy. That is on Henderson Island in New YearSound, and its seventeen-hundred-foot peak was almost below Bell whenhe sighted the islands. But the islands have been seen full fiftymiles from there.
It took the plane nearly forty minutes to cover the space, but longbefore that the islands had become distinct. Two tiny groups ofscattered rocks, the whole group hardly five miles in length and byfar the greater number no more than boulders surrounded by sheets offoam from breakers. Two of them merited the name of islands. Thenearer was high and bare and precipitous. No trace of vegetationshowed upon it. The farther was smaller, and at its northern corner alittle cove showed, nearly land-locked.
Bell descended steeply. The big plane plunged wildly in the air eddiesabout the taller island at five hundred feet, but steadied and wentwinging on down lower, and lower.... The waves between the twoislands were not high, but the seaplane alighted with a mighty, atremendous splashing, and Bell navigated it grimly though clumsilyinto the mouth of the cove. There a small beach showed. He went veryslowly toward it. Presently he swung abruptly about. A wing tip floatgrounded close to the shore.
The motors cut off and left a thunderous silence. Bell climbed atopthe cabin and let go the anchor.
"We're here," he said shortly. "Bring The Master and we'll go ashore."
* * * * *
The catwalk painted on the lower wing guided them. Bell jumped to therocks first, and stumbled, and then rose to lift Paula down and takeThe Master's small, frail body from Jamison's arms.
"You looked for a gun?" asked Bell
"He'd nothing to fight with," said Jamison heavily. He had been facingthe same problem Bell had worked on desperately, and had found noanswer. But he shuddered a little as he looked about the island.
There was nothing in sight but rock. No moss. No lichens. Not evenstringy grass or the tufty scrub bushes that seemed able to growanywhere.
Bell untied The Master, carefully but without solicitude. The littleman sat up, and brushed himself off carefully, and arranged himself ina comfortable position.
"I am an old man," said The Master in mild reproach. "You might atleast have given me a cushion to sit upon."
Bell sat down and lighted a cigarette with fingers that did nottremble in the least.
"Suppose," he said hardly, "you talk. First, of what your poison ismade. Second, of what the antidote is made. Third, how we may be sureyou tell the truth."
* * * * *
The Master looked at him with bright, shrewd, and apparently kindlyold eyes.
"_Hijo mio_," he said mildly, "I am an old man. But I am obstinate. Iwill tell you nothing."
Bell's eyes glowed coldly.
"Does it occur to you," he asked grimly, "that it's too important amatter for us to have any scruples about? That we can--and will--makeyou talk?"
"You may kill me," said The Master benignly, "but that is all."
"And," said Bell, still more grimly, "we have only to get back in theplane yonder, and go away...."
The Master beamed at him. Presently he began to laugh softly.
"_Hijo mio_," he said gently, "let us stop this little byplay. Youwill take me back in my airplane, and you will land me at PuntaArenas. And then you will fly away. I concede you freedom, but that isall. You cannot leave me here."
"Paula," said Bell coldly, "get in the plane again. Jamison--"
Paula rose doubtfully. Jamison stood up. The Master continued tochuckle amiably.
"You see," he said cherubically, "you happen to be a gentleman, SenorBell. Every man has some weakness. That is yours. And you will notleave me here to die, because you have killed my nephew, who was theonly other man who knew how to prepare my little medicine. And youknow, Senor, that all my subjects will wish to die. Those who do, infact," he added mildly, "will be fortunate. The effect of my littlemedicine does not make for happiness without its antidote."
* * * * *
Bell
's hands clenched.
"You know," said The Master comfortably, "that there are manythousands of people whose hands will writhe, very soon. The city ofPunta Arenas will be turned into a snarling place of maniacs within avery little while--if I do not return. Would you like, Senor, to thinkin after days of that pleasant city filled with men and women tearingeach other like beasts? Of little children, even, crouching, andcrushing and rending the tender flesh of other little children? Oflisping little ones gone--"
"Stop!" snarled Bell, in a frenzy. "Damn your soul! You're right! Ican't! You win--so far!"
"Always," said The Master benevolently. "I win always. And you forget,Senor. You have seen the worst side of my rule. The revolutions, therebellions that have made men free, were they pretty things to watch?Always, _amigo_, the worst comes. But when my rule is secure, then youshall see."
* * * * *
He waved a soft, beautifully formed hand. From every possible aspectthe situation was a contradiction of all reason. The bare, black, saltencrusted rocks with no trace of vegetation showing. The gray waterrumbling and surging among the uneven rocks at the base of the shore,while gulls screamed hoarsely overhead. The white haired little manwith his benevolent face, smiling confidently at the two grim men.
"The time will come," said The Master gently, and in the tone of utterconfidence with which one states an inescapable fact, "the time willcome when all the earth will know my rule. The taking of my littlemedicine will be as commonplace a thing as the smoking of tobacco,which I abhor, Senores. You are mistaken about there being an antidoteand a poison. It is one medicine only. One little compound. Avegetable substance, Senor Bell, combined with a product of modernchemistry. It is a synthetic drug. Modern chemistry is a magnificentscience, and my little medicine is its triumph. Even my deputies havenot heard me speak so, Senores."
Bell snarled wordlessly, but if one had noticed his eyes they wouldhave been seen to be curiously cool and alert and waiting. The Masterleaned forward, and for once spoke seriously, almost reverently.
"There shall be a forward step, Senores, in the race of men. Do youknow the difference between the brain of a man and that of ananthropoid ape? It consists only of a filmy layer of cortex, a film ofgray nerve cells which the ape has not. And that little layer createsthe difference between ape and man. And I have discovered more. Mylittle medicine acts upon that film. Administered in the tinyquantities I have given to my slaves, it has no perceptible effect. Itis merely a compound of a vegetable substance and a synthetic organicbase. It is not excreted from the body. Like lead, it remains alwaysin solution in the blood. But in or out of the blood it changes,always, to the substance which causes murder madness. Fresh orchanged, my little medicine acts upon the brain."
* * * * *
He smiled brightly upon them.
"But though in tiny quantities it has but little effect, in largerquantities--when fresh it makes the functioning of the gray cells ofthe human brain as far superior to the unmedicated gray cells, asthose human gray cells are to the white cells of the ape! That is whatI have to offer to the human race! Intelligence for every man, whichshall be as the genius of the past!"
He laughed softly.
"Think, Senores! Compare the estate of men with the estate of apes!Compare the civilization which will arise upon the earth when men'sbrains are as far above their present level as the present level isabove the anthropoid! The upward steps of the human race under my rulewill parallel, will surpass the advance from the brutish caveman tointellectual genius. But I have seen, Senores, the one danger in myoffering."
There was silence. Jamison shook his head despairingly. The Mastercould not see him. He formed the word with his lips.
"Crazy!"
* * * * *
But Bell said coldly:
"Go on."
"I must rule," said The Master soberly. "It is essential. If my littlesecret were known, intelligences would be magnified, but under manyflags and with many aims. Scientists, with genius beside whichNewton's pales, would seek out deadly weapons for war. The world woulddestroy itself of its own genius. But under my rule--"
"Men go mad," said Bell coldly.
The Master smiled reproachfully.
"Ah, you are trying to make me angry, so that I will betray something!You are clever, Senor Bell. With my little medicine, in suchquantities as I would administer it to you...."
"You describe it," said Bell harshly and dogmatically, "as a brainstimulant. But it drives men mad."
"To be sure," said The Master mildly. "It does. It is not excretedfrom the body save very, very slowly. But it changes in the bloodstream. As--let us say--sugar changes into alcohol in digestion. Theend-product of my little medicine is a poison which attacks the brain.But the slightest bit of unchanged medicine is an antidote. It is"--hesmiled amiably--"it is as if sugar in the body changed to alcohol, andalcohol was a poison, but sugar--unchanged--was an antidote. That isit exactly. You see that I have taken my little medicine for years,and it has not harmed me."
"Which," said Bell--and somehow his manner made utter silence fall sothat each word fell separately into a vast stillness--"which, thankGod, is the one thing that wins finally, for me!"
* * * * *
He stood up and laughed. Quite a genuine laugh.
"Paula," he said comfortably, "get on the plane. In the cabin. Jamisonand I are going to strip The Master."
Paula stared. The Master looked at him blankly. Jamison frownedbewilderedly, but stood up grimly to obey.
"But Senor," said The Master in gentle dignity, "merely to humiliateme--"
"Not for that," said Bell. He laughed again. "But all the time I'vebeen hearing about the stuff, I've noticed that nobody thought of itas a drug. It was a poison. People were poisoned. They did not becomeaddicts. But you--you are the only addict to your drug."
He turned to Jamison, his eyes gleaming.
"Jamison," he said softly, "did you ever know of a drug addict whocould bear to think of ever being without a supply of his drug--_righton his person_?"
Jamison literally jumped.
"By God! No!"
The Master was quick. He was swarming up the plane-wing tip beforeJamison reached him, and he kicked frenziedly when Jamison plucked himoff. But then it was wholly, entirely, utterly horrible that thelittle white haired man, whose face and manner had seemed so cherubicand so bland, should shriek in so complete a blind panic as theyforced his fingers open and took a fountain pen away from him.
"This is it," said Bell in a deep satisfaction. "This is his point ofweakness."
* * * * *
The Master was ghastly to look at, now. Jamison held him gentlyenough, considering everything, but The Master looked at that fountainpen as one might look at Paradise.
"I--I swear," he gasped. "I--swear I will give you the formula!"
"You might lie," said Jamison grimly.
"I swear it!" panted The Master in agony. "It--If the formula is knownit--can be duplicated! It--the excretion can be hastened! It can allbe forced from the body! Simply! So simply! If only you know! I willtell you how it is done! The medicine is the cacodylate of--"
Bell was leaning forward, now, like a runner breasting the tape at theend of a long and exhausting race.
"I'll trade," he said softly. "Half the contents of the pen for theformula. The other half we'll need for analysis. Half the stuff in thepen for the formula for freeing your slaves!"
The Master sobbed.
"A--a pencil!" he gasped. "I swear--"
Jamison gave him a pencil and a notebook. He wrote, his hands shaking.Jamison read inscrutably.
"It doesn't mean anything to me," he said soberly, "but you can readit. It's legible."
Bell smiled faintly. With steady finger he took his own fountain penfrom his pocket. He emptied it of ink, and put a scrupulous half of amilky liquid
from The Master's pen into it. He passed it over.
"Your medicine," said Bell quietly, "may taste somewhat of ink, but itwill not be poisonous. Now, what do we do with you? I give you yourchoice. If we take you with us, you will be held very secretly as aprisoner until the truth of the information you have given us can beproven. And if your slaves have all been freed, then I suppose youwill be tried...."
* * * * *
The Master was drawn and haggard. He looked very, very old and beaten.
"I--I would prefer," he said dully, "that you did not tell where I am,and that you go away and leave me here. I--I may have some subjectswho will search for me, and--they may discover me here.... But I ambeaten, Senor. You know that you have won."
Bell swung up on the wing of the plane. He explored about in thecabin. He came back.
"There are emergency supplies," he said coldly. "We will leave themwith you, with such things as may be useful to allow you to hope aslong as possible. I do not think you will ever be found here."
"I--prefer it, Senor," said The Master dully. "I--I will catchfish...."
Jamison helped put the packages ashore. The Master shivered. Bellstripped off his coat and put it on top of the heap of packages. TheMaster did not stir. Bell laid a revolver on top of his coat. He wentout to the plane and started the motors. The Master watchedapathetically as the big seaplane pulled clumsily out of the littlecove. The rumble of the engines became a mighty roar. It startedforward with a rush, skimmed the water for two hundred yards or so,and suddenly lifted clear to go floating away through the air towardthe north.
* * * * *
Paula was the only one who looked back.
"He's crying," she said uncomfortably.
"It isn't fear," said Bell quietly. "It's grief at the loss of hisambition. It may not seem so to you two, but I believe he meant allthat stuff he told me. He was probably really aiming, in his own way,for an improved world for men to live in."
The plane roared on. Presently Bell said shortly:
"That stuff he has won't last indefinitely. I'm glad I left him thatrevolver."
Jamison stirred suddenly. He dug down in his pocket and fished out acigar.
"Since I feel that I may live long enough to finish smoking this," heobserved dryly, "I think I'll light it. I haven't felt that I hadtwenty minutes of life ahead of me for a long time, now. A sense ofeconomy made me smoke cigarettes. It wouldn't be so much waste if youleft half a cigarette behind you when you were killed."
* * * * *
The tight little cabin began to reek of the tobacco. Paula pressedclose to Bell.
"But--Charles," she asked hopefully, "is--is it really all right,now?"
"I think so," said Bell, frowning. "Our job's over, anyhow. We go upthe Chilean coast and find that navy boat. We turn our stuff over tothem. They'll take over the task of seeing that every doctor,everywhere in South America, knows how to get The Master's poison outof the system of anybody who's affected. Some of them won't bereached, but most of them will. I looked at his formula. Standarddrugs, all of them. There won't be any trouble getting the newsspread. The Master's slaves will nearly go crazy with joy. And," headded grimly, "I'm going to see to it that the Rio police take backwhat they said about us. I think we'll have enough pull to demand thatmuch!"
He was silent for a moment or so, thinking.
"I do think, Jamison," he said presently, "we did a pretty good job."
Jamison grunted.
"If--if it's really over," said Paula hopefully, "Charles--"
"What?"
"You--will be able to think about me sometimes," asked Paulawistfully, "instead of about The Master always?"
Bell stared down at her.
"Good Lord!" he groaned. "I have been a brute, Paula! But I've beenloving you--" He stopped, and then said with the elaborate politenessand something of the customary idiotic air of a man making such anannouncement. "I say, Jamison, did you know Paula and I were to bemarried?"
Jamison snorted. Then he said placidly:
"No. Of course not. I never dreamed of such a thing. When did thisremarkably original idea occur to you?"
He puffed a huge cloud of smoke from his cigar. It was an unusuallyvile cigar. Bell scowled at him helplessly for a moment and then saidwrathfully:
"Oh, go to hell!"
And he bent over and kissed Paula.
(_The End._)
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