Top-Notch Magazine/Volume 27/Number 4/Shadows Tremendous/Chapter 9

S they approached the wharf, Darrell watched intently the group of Mexicans who were moving slowly out upon it with an appearance of languid interest, as if the arrival of a steamer was a matter of little moment. Surely they did not behave like men who had not set eyes on a strange face in months. This did not surprise the secret-service agent, however; past experience had taught him the nature of these indolent people.

On the wharf the Mexicans drew around them, offering to carry their bags, provide supper, a bed, transportation to wherever they were going, or anything else, in fact, which would bring in a few centavos. It was all the humdrum scene; yet Darrell had a curious feeling that it was overdone.

For a few seconds he stood as if undecided, his eyes taking in everything which went on about him. He saw Carmen pick out one of the natives and start off toward a house at the end of the row. He beheld the genial Billy Boote fiercely wave other greasers aside, and presently pursue his lurching way in the same general direction. Lastly he noticed that the little Jap had collapsed in a helpless heap at the end of the dock, as if too utterly exhausted to move another step. The fact that not one of the Mexicans so much as noticed him seemed more than significant to Darrell.

An instant later, Bellamy plucked his arm. “Carmen and Boote are together, Dal,” he whispered swiftly. “They're friends. Did you see Carmen shut up the old pirate in the boat? And look at them now. I tell you they're here for one and the same purpose.”

“Of course they are,” returned Darrell. “Didn't you get wise to that before?”

Without waiting for a reply, he turned abruptly to the lingering crowd. “Who is the owner of that house?” he asked, in good Spanish, pointing to one which faced the wharf and seemed a trifle superior to the others.

“It is I, señor,” spoke up a little man, bowing his way forward. “Will the señores have supper, perhaps, and a bed?”

“Yes,” said Darrell. “And let us have the supper, please, as soon as possible.”

Taking up the two bags, the Mexican led the way down the wharf and into the building. The door opened directly into a small room which was a trifle more tidy than a pigsty, but Darrell was not thinking of dirt just then. With a swift, casual movement, he stepped toward a window and glanced out. The knot of natives was languidly dispersing, but Sudo was not among them. Neither was he crouching on the wharf, or anywhere in sight. In that brief space he had vanished as if the earth or sea had swallowed him, and the discovery brought a faint, enigmatic smile twisting the corners of Darrell's mouth.

“How long will it take you to get supper?” he asked abruptly, turning to the Mexican.

“But a little while, señor,” the man replied. “A scant half hour, and all will be in readiness.”

“Very well; make what speed you can. Meanwhile, my friend and I will stroll outside. We have been long aboard ship.”

He was watching the man intently, and did not miss the flash of uneasiness which rose into the black eyes.

“The sun sets, señor,” protested the Mexican, after a second's hesitation, “and the fever mists arise.”

“We shall not be gone long enough to harm us,” Darrell answered. “Be sure you have the meal ready within a half hour.”

Without waiting for a reply, he stepped through the doorway, followed by Bellamy, and turned to the left along the fronts of the row of houses.

“Curious how the mists rise the minute the sun is down,” he remarked casually, as they walked slowly on over the sand, trodden hard by the constant passing of the Mexicans.

Though the glowing sphere had barely dropped below the line of the islands, faint eddies and spirals of mist were already swirling shoreward in swiftly increasing volume, obscuring the flaunting splendor of blue and gold which tinged the western sky. Through the gathering mists they saw the Golden Horn, headed again for the open sea, and trailing a black smudge against the heavens. The sight engulfed them both with a sudden sense of loneliness that was almost sickening; a feeling of being deserted at the desolate ends of the earth; and, though neither spoke the thought, they wondered if the departing steamer was not bearing away their only hope of ever returning to the world from which they had marooned themselves by their own voluntary action.

They strolled on to the end of the row, and stood leaning against the frame wall of the last house, conversing idly and watching the odd effect of the swirling, thickening mist. A great cloud of it would roll up over the lapping surf, for all the world like some monstrous, bulging wave, only to be seized by a puff of wind and swept aside, or torn into ragged fragments, giving the two mena fleeting glimpse of the curving yellow beach beyond.

“Everything seems quiet along the Potomac,” Bellamy remarked presently, in a low tone.

“Too quiet,” returned Darrell crisply. “If only Ives' yacht were somewhere about the harbor, I might be inclined to think the whole business a false alarm. It's the total absence of anything suspicious that looks queer. Besides, where has Sudo gone?”

Bellamy had no answer to the question, and for a moment or two the secret-service agent stared thoughtfully at the fog. Suddenly his eyes brightened, and he pointed swiftly. The mist, which had been torn aside by the breeze, revealed two figures striding briskly over the sand close to the water along the hard, sloping beach. One was tall and slim, the other squat, with a certain familiar grotesqueness of outline. That much they saw, and then the obliterating curtain fell again.

“By Jove!” Bellamy exclaimed. “There go”

He stopped abruptly as the sound of a voice was borne faintly back to them out of the fog:

The last word was cut off with a suddenness which suggested a hand hastily clapped over the singer's mouth. A second later, before the Californian had time to speak, Darrell gripped him tightly by the arm.

“Look!” he whispered.

Again the cloud of mist was swept aside, and as they stared another figure—short and slim almost as a boy's—slipped suddenly from behind a hummock of sand in the near foreground. For a second it crouched there, bent almost double. Then, without changing its position, it took to the beach, running swiftly, noiselessly, and in an instant had vanished.

“Sudo!” Bellamy said, in a tense undertone.

Darrell nodded, his forehead slightly puckered. The glimpse of that slim, wiry, resolute figure speeding through the mist in pursuit of the two men whose very presence in this desolate spot was a mystery stirred to new life the vague suspicions which had for a little while been quieted.

What it meant Darrell did not know. What he suspected was as vague and cloudy as the swirling mist about them. But as he turned slowly back toward the Mexican's house, he felt somehow that, calm and undisturbed as the surface appeared, deep down underneath subtle and powerful currents were at work which threatened to alter the destiny of nations.