Chapter LVI: Harvey Hale and Laffin

From the lower promenade deck he saw the ship come to an anchor, watched the lowering of a boat and the skin-coated crew pull towards the liner. A gangway had been lowered, and presently a man staggered inboard and went clumping up the steps on to the deck, being received by Hale, who took him straight away to the bridge.

The consultation was a long one, and it was nearly nine o’clock before the captain of the _Thomas Inland_ went back to his ship, and such passengers whose portholes faced that way saw her get up her anchor and sidle in towards the liner. She was made fast by midnight, and Bill waited to see whether his fears were well-founded. If the tanker passed a pipe aboard to replenish the nearly empty tanks of the _Escorial_, then Laffin’s plan was something different from that which he anticipated. But no attempt was made to oil the ship, and, watching them, Bill saw the forward derricks in action. They were lowering on to the deck of the tanker the boxes which had been taken from the purser’s strong-room. Bill waited only long enough to see this, then went back to Stone.

The American was sitting despondently on a settee, a rug over his legs, his hands thrust into his greatcoat pockets.

“Where is Betty?” asked Bill. It was not the moment for conventionality.

“She’s in her cabin--why?”

“I want her to come with me.”

He knocked on the door and Betty came out.

“Put on your coat,” ordered Bill, and, when she had obeyed, he led her along the alleyway to his own cabin.

He had spent the previous night with an axe and a screwdriver. The brackets which fastened the wash-stand to the wall had been removed. He pulled at the piece of furniture and dragged it aside, disclosing a small, irregularly shaped aperture, heading apparently into a large linen cupboard, though it was now empty and had not been used that voyage.

“Stay in this cabin until I tell you to come out. I will lock the door on you and bring you food. It is absolutely vital that you should not make your presence known. Should anybody try the door, get into the linen cupboard and pull the wash-stand to you.”

Before Betty could reply, somebody in the alleyway called Bill by his assumed name. He hurried out, locking the door and putting the key in his pocket.

“Where’s Mr. Stone?” It was the purser. “He is wanted at once on the bridge, and Miss Stone also.”

“I haven’t seen him,” lied Bill. “Maybe he’s down in the saloon or the drawing-room.”

“Go find him,” said the purser impatiently. “That devil up above is raising Cain.”

Bill remained in the library long enough to satisfy the purser, and returned with the message that neither Stone nor his niece could be seen.

“Go up and tell him yourself,” groaned the purser, and without the slightest trepidation Bill interviewed the raging Harvey Hale.

He was dumbfounded to discover that at least one member of the party was a prisoner. Clive Lowbridge sat in the chart-house, a dejected man, his wrists fastened with a pair of ship’s irons.

“Go down and tell that purser of yours that if he doesn’t produce the Stones I’ll cut his heart out of him!” yelled Hale.

He had been drinking heavily, and in spite of his boast that liquor had no effect upon him, his voice was thick and his step unsteady.

“What is this, what is this?” asked a testy voice, and, looking round, Bill saw Laffin entering the chart-house. He still wore his gaudy uniform, and though it was mainly covered by a naval greatcoat he contrived to show the hilt of his sword through a slit in the side of the garment.

“That is not the way, my friend. I will have these matters done in my own way, which is naturally the best way. You are speaking of my wife and her respected relation. Let me send a message to her, a polite message, and an escort befitting her dignity. You understand, Hale?”

“I don’t understand anything,” growled the man, “except that I want those people on this bridge and I’m going to get ’em here!”

Dr. Laffin waved a dignified hand.

“You are no longer in control. I, your Commodore, your Grand Master, the supreme authority of the Twenty-Third Degree.…”

Bill saw Hale bend forward, as though in the act of bowing. Then came the quick, bright flash of a knife. Twice the man struck, and with a cough Joshua Laffin, doctor of medicine, fell on to his knees, swayed for a second, and Hale struck for the third time. The old man went down, and did not move again.

Thus passed Joshua Laffin, in his sin and his madness.