Island Gold/Chapter 24

me in that moment the world seemed to end. I had plucked this girl from a placid, unruffled existence and plunged her into a vortex of adventure. Was she to leave her life, laid down for mine, in this desolate island, while I, the author of all the mischief, was to escape unharmed?

Lawless was at Clubfoot's throat, worrying him like a terrier with a rat. Then, of a sudden, Carstairs and Mackay were there, twisting together with a leathern thong those great hairy wrists, one of which dripped blood. I stood helpless, watching as in a dream Garth raise up his daughter and rock her still form in his arms. In her right hand she still clasped my automatic with which she had saved my life.

There was a shrill cry from the entrance of the hollow. With skirts flying Yvonne, Marjorie's French maid, darted in. “O, ''ma chérie! Ma chérie!”'' she moaned, as with the tears rolling down her face, she dropped to her knees by the girl's side. Now Garth was holding a flask to his daughter's lips. Presently, to my unspeakable relief, she stirred slightly, then opened her eyes.

“I'm all right,” she murmured, “quite all right really! Ah! Yvonne!”

And she closed her eyes again.

Garth stood up, a tall and commanding figure of a man in his spotless white drill, and looked at me, tatterdermalion that I was, with a four days' growth of beard and unkempt hair, my clothes torn and stained, my boots gashed almost to ribbons by those cruel rocks.

“Is she ... is she ... wounded?” I faltered.

The baronet shook his head and gulped.

“She's only fainted,” he replied. “My poor, poor lass...”

Then, swallowing his feelings, he demanded fiercely:

“Where is this man, Custrin?”

“Dead,” I answered. “I shot him...”

What had happened in the forest had seemed natural enough. But with the Naomi civilization had returned to Cock Island, and my admission sounded horribly cold-blooded in my ears. As briefly as might be, but without concealing any salient fact, I told Garth the story of what had supervened after his departure with Carstairs. With ill-concealed impatience and with reddening cheeks, he listened to my tale; but he grew too angry to hear me to the end. When I told him how I had come upon Marjorie in the room behind the galley, he burst out in fury:

“So this is the end of your wild-goose chase! My little girl, alone and unprotected, in the hands of these savages! By God, Major Okewood, if any harm has come to her through your doing...”

“When I asked your help to get to Cock Island, Sir Alexander,” I answered, “I had no means of knowing where this adventure would lead us. Nor had I any suspicion that I would, that I could be followed. Otherwise I should never...”

He cut me short with an angry gesture of the hand.

“I don't want to hear any more. It is no thanks to you that my poor girl has not lost her life through your reckless folly. I had my doubts all along as to how far I could trust myself to your judgment. If I had had any idea that you and that blackguardly doctor, between you, would have dragged my little girl into it...”

This was too much, even from a distraught parent.

“It was none of my doing that Miss Garth came ashore,” I retorted hotly. “And as for Custrin, it was you who unhesitatingly accepted him at face value. You even suggested that he should join our expedition...”

“But for you, Custrin would never have come on board. You'll not contest that, I suppose? I wish to Heaven the Naomi had never seen you...”

“I can only say how very deeply I regret the terrible experience Miss Garth had to undergo—” I began.

But he only snorted.

“I don't want to hear any more from you!” he retorted, and walked away.

I was keenly aware of the hostile atmosphere he radiated and it added to my utter sense of forlornness. But Lawless was speaking to me, as I stood dumbfounded, clapping me on the back, asking me if I were all right.

“The gang's hooked it,” he chuckled. “With the report of the Naomi's gun they must have just bolted off to their launch in Sturt Bay, way across the island, leaving their skipper to his fate. A dangerous man, that, Major! We saw the launch crossing the bar and heading for the open sea. Sir Alexander was all for going after 'em. But I told him it was no good. A seagoing submarine chaser like that craft of theirs has got the legs of anything the old Naomi can put up...”

Then he told me of the immense surprise which the appearance of the launch had occasioned on board the yacht as she lay off Alcedo Rock.

“When the old man found that I had let Miss Garth ashore with the doctor,” the Captain continued, “I thought he was going out of his mind. He raged like a wild man. Whew! but it was hot work for a bit. He called me every name he could lay his tongue to, and I'm damned if I know whether I'm in his service yet or no. I've been carpeted once or twice in my time and talked to rough, but I never did see such a dido as Sir Alexander raised! And he's fighting mad with you too!...”

“I have the same impression myself!” I answered.

“We put about at once,” Lawless resumed, “and ran for the island. Jock Mackay crammed on every ounce of steam he could raise. He has nightmare every night thinking of the coal-bill! We dropped anchor off the bar and took the launch ashore at once. As we came in through the lagoon, I caught through my glasses the flash of your heliograph from the cliffs in the centre of the island. So directly we landed we made for the high ground...”

“I hadn't a notion how to let you know where we were,” said I, “until I thought of the mirror. It was rather a forlorn hope, because, as you saw, things were getting a bit pressing when you arrived...”

Some one touched my elbow. Mackay stood there.

“Yon great Geairman is asking to speak with you!”

They had stretched Clubfoot out on his blankets beneath the tree. I hate to see a man trussed up, anyway, and a queer sort of misguided pity stole into my heart as I looked down on Grundt, whom I had feared so greatly, strapped hand and foot.

At my approach he opened his eyes. They were still grim and fearless.

“If my men had come,” he said truculently, “you would never have escaped. But they ran and left me—von Hagel, a German officer, with the rest. Truly, I begin to think the sun has set on my unfortunate country!”

He checked himself and seemed to reflect.

“Young man, young man, that you had known me in my prime! But the foundations of my life have been knocked away. Okewood, I am getting old!”

The perspiration was damp on his brow. I could see the sweat glisten on the bristles of his iron-grey hair.

“In my day, in the years of Germany's greatness, I was all-puissant! I had but one master—the Emperor himself! No one—no one, do you understand?—not the Imperial Chancellor or even the head of the Civil Cabinet—who was a greater man than he—dare give me, der Stelze, orders! Yet I had no official position! My name was in no Rang-Liste and I held no decorations. Der Stelze was not to be bought by those glittering crosses and stars with which so many of my fellow countrymen loved to hang themselves! No, I was the secret power of the throne, the instrument of His Majesty. And, with this one exception, the highest in the land trembled at my name!...”

His voice sounded tired; and it seemed to me that, of a sudden, he had, in truth, become an old man. His figure had relaxed; he appeared to have grown grosser of body than of yore; the flesh of his face was sagging and his cheeks had fallen in.

“This was to have been the last adventure,” he resumed, and stared at me defiantly—“the last of how many? Friends of my Master told me of this hoard and delegated me to proceed to Central America to track it down. What they would have given me for my pains would have sufficed to enable me to realize my dream of settling down on a little property I have in Baden and of passing the evening of my days in peace...”

“And what did your friends want the money for?” I asked.

“That,” retorted Grundt proudly, “is the business of my Master!”

His words gave me my answer; for I knew of the existence of secret funds destined to bring the Hohenzollerns back to the throne which they had so shamefully abandoned.

“You matched yourself against me, Okewood,” Grundt said suddenly, “at a time when already the axe was laid at the roots of the German tree. In the long seclusion which followed my wound—they found it necessary, as you know, to give out that I was dead—I used sometimes to think that our duel was a miniature reproduction of the struggle between Germany and England. And in neither case am I quite clear as to why the Engländer won!”

“Perhaps it was a case of conscience, Herr Doktor?”

The German looked up at me in surprise.

“Conscience!” he exclaimed. “But that is not a means of warfare!”

Lawless at my side uttered a loud exclamation. He was bending down over the blankets.

“The treasure!” he exclaimed; “by gum! you've found it!”

And he held up a shining gold piece.

Funny, I had forgotten all about it.

“On those blankets, Captain,” said I, “you'll find all the treasure we're ever likely to get out of Cock Island. I located the hiding-place all right. But the treasure's gone. There are fifteen gold pieces there—I counted them. That's all that's left of it...”

Then Grundt spoke.

“So you were bluffing to the end!” he said, and was silent.

“Then that was why the gang was in such a hurry to be off!” cried Lawless.

I shook my head.

“They didn't find the treasure either,” I replied. “Somewhere scattered among the rocky ravines and the valleys of this island, a hundred thousand pounds in American eagles and German twenty-mark pieces are lying. Old Man Destiny had it in for us, Captain. He sent a volcanic eruption which blew the treasure sky-high!”

“Jimini!” exclaimed Lawless in a hushed voice.

“It's an awfu' pity!” ejaculated Mackay mournfully.

Yvonne came. Marjorie was asking for me, she said. I found her sitting up, with Garth at her side. The light was slowly mellowing and the sinking sun cast long shadows across the hollow. The sky was all marbled with red and gold flecks.

Rather shyly Marjorie thrust a slim white hand into mine. It may have been my fancy; but I think I saw Garth wince.

“So you did come out on top after all?” she said. “Sit down there beside Daddy and tell me all about it from the beginning. You found the treasure, then?”

“I found where it had been hid,” I replied. “But it had vanished...”

“Vanished?” cried Marjorie, and I swear there was dismay in her voice.

“Vanished?” echoed Garth.

“But the gold pieces you threw to Grundt?” queried the girl. “I don't understand...”

“That was part of one box which had survived the volcanic eruption which scattered Ulrich von Hagel's hoard to the four winds. You remember that wisp of smoke we saw rising from the hillside in front of the great image? Well, I discovered that it came from a deep fissure in the mountain-side at the foot of the idol. From the little cairn of stones which still stands on the edge of the cliff, it was clear that the treasure had been stored in a cave which appears to have been hollowed out of the rock in front of the idol.

“Where that cave was is now a yawning hole belching forth smoke and streams of lava. In fact, as far as I can judge, the treasure was blown clean out of the mountain-side. That this surmise is correct is shown, I think, by my discovery of the remains of a wooden box in which were still a few gold pieces. Other fragments of charred wood were scattered around. For the rest the treasure is gone and will never be recovered!”

Marjorie's eyes rested mournfully on my face; but I could not meet her gaze.

“But how did you discover all this?”

“The passage by which I escaped from the burial chamber brought me out within a hundred yards of the image. The sulphur fumes from the fresh cone of the volcano caught me by the throat directly I emerged into the open. My one idea was to find you. So I crammed the gold pieces in my pocket and made for Horseshoe Bay to see if the yacht had returned. Finding no sign of her or you, I started to reconnoitre. I guessed that Clubfoot and his party would be watching somewhere near the terraced rock, and, sure enough, as I was prowling in the undergrowth near here, I saw the whole gang file out towards the rock. I watched where they had come from and creeping up saw you and Grundt in conversation. The only thing that mattered then was to get you out of Grundt's clutches. I saw no sign of any guards, but I made sure that Clubfoot would have help within easy reach. As I was turning things over in my mind, I heard the Naomi's gun. So I decided to risk everything on a final bluff and I acted at once...”

“When they told me you were not in the cave,” said Marjorie, “I couldn't believe my ears. How on earth did you manage to escape?”

“Well,” I replied, “you remember that stone table on which the mummies lay? Under one of them I found, let into the table, a flat stone carved with a turtle. I don't know whether you realize the significance of that sign. The turtle was the mark of that celebrated buccaneer, Captain Roberts, who, in the old days, was a great man in these waters. The buccaneers are known to have used Cock Island for obtaining fresh meat and water—you can read about it in the 'Sailing Directions'—so the sign of the turtle set me thinking.

“I tried to get the stone up, but it was firmly cemented in the table. However, in my pushing and thrusting I leant against the table edge and suddenly the whole top swung round outwards into the cave leaving a hole about five feet deep. That hole was the opening of a passage several hundred yards long which led into the open air...

“But how did you manage to close the opening behind you?”

“Quite simply. I arranged the mummies as they were before, covering the turtle stone, then, standing in the hole, I drew the table-top back into place again. It is quite solid and does not ring hollow—it is the simplest and neatest device of its kind I ever saw. Roberts and his men must have used the burial chamber for some sort of secret meetings, I imagine. Perhaps in their day Cock Island was inhabited...”

There was so much I had to ask, so much I would have said. But the presence of her father, dour and intractable, threw an invisible bar between us. I felt embarrassed and miserable—because I realized, I suppose, that our island dream was at an end.

“It is getting dark,” said Garth, standing up. “Come, Marjie, it's time we were back on board!”

He did not include me in the summons. Yet I should have to sail with him again. He could not maroon me there.

“You're coming with us?” said my dear Marjorie with her ready tact.

“Only as far as the beach,” I replied. “We have to decide what's to be done with our friend yonder...”

In truth the problem of Grundt was beginning to obtrude itself in my mind.

“I'll come on board later,” I said, “if Sir Alexander will allow me...”

“We must, of course, take Major Okewood back with us to Rodriguez,” Garth observed stiffly.

At that Marjorie flared up.

“Daddy!” she cried indignantly.

We went down to the shore in silence. As we emerged from the woods, John Bard came striding up the beach.