Part 36 (1/2)

I deserve no credit for the solution of the Ella's mystery. I have a certain quality of force, perhaps, and I am not lacking in physical courage; but I have no finesse of intellect. McWhirter, a foot shorter than I, round of face, jovial and stocky, has as much subtlety in his little finger as I have in my six feet and a fraction of body.

All the way to the river, therefore, he was poring over the drawing. He named the paper at once.

”Ought to know it,” he said, in reply to my surprise. ”Sold enough paper at the drugstore to qualify as a stationery engineer.” He writhed as was his habit over his jokes, and then fell to work at the drawing again. ”A book,” he said, ”and an axe, and a gibbet or gallows. B-a-g--that makes 'bag.' Doesn't go far, does it? Humorous duck, isn't he? Any one who can write 'ha! ha!' under a gallows has real humor. G-a-b, b-a-g!”

The Ella still lay in the Delaware, half a mile or so from her original moorings. She carried the usual riding-lights--a white one in the bow, another at the stern, and the two vertical red lights which showed her not under command. In reply to repeated signals, we were unable to rouse the watchman. I had brought an electric flash with me, and by its aid we found a rope ladder over the side, with a small boat at its foot.

Although the boat indicated the presence of the watchman on board, we made our way to the deck without challenge. Here McWhirter suggested that the situation might be disagreeable, were the man to waken and get at us with a gun.

We stood by the top of the ladder, therefore, and made another effort to rouse him. ”Hey, watchman!” I called. And McWhirter, in a deep ba.s.s, sang l.u.s.tily: ”Watchman, what of the night?” Neither of us made, any perceptible impression on the silence and gloom of the Ella.

McWhirter grew less gay. The deserted decks of the s.h.i.+p, her tragic history, her isolation, the darkness, which my small flash seemed only to intensify, all had their effect on him.

”It's got my goat,” he admitted. ”It smells like a tomb.”

”Don't be an a.s.s.”

”Turn the light over the side, and see if we fastened that boat. We don't want to be left here indefinitely.”

”That's folly, Mac,” I said, but I obeyed him. ”The watchman's boat is there, so we--”

But he caught me suddenly by the arm and shook me.

”My G.o.d!” he said. ”What is that over there?”

It was a moment before my eyes, after the flashlight, could discern anything in the darkness. Mac was pointing forward. When I could see, Mac was ready to laugh at himself.

”I told you the place had my goat!” he said sheepishly. ”I thought I saw something duck around the corner of that building; but I think it was a ray from a searchlight on one of those boats.”

”The watchman, probably,” I said quietly. But my heart beat a little faster. ”The watchman taking a look at us and gone for his gun.”

I thought rapidly. If Mac had seen anything, I did not believe it was the watchman. But there should be a watchman on board--in the forward house, probably. I gave Mac my revolver and put the light in my pocket. I might want both hands that night. I saw better without the flash, and, guided partly by the bow light, partly by my knowledge of the yacht, I led the way across the deck. The forward house was closed and locked, and no knocking produced any indication of life. The after house we found not only locked, but barred across with strips of wood nailed into place. The forecastle was likewise closed. It was a dead s.h.i.+p.

No figure reappearing to alarm him, Mac took the drawing out of his pocket and focused the flashlight on it.

”This cross by the mainmast,” he said ”that would be where?”

”Right behind you, there.”

He walked to the mast, and examined carefully around its base. There was nothing there, and even now I do not know to what that cross alluded, unless poor Schwartz--!

”Then this other one--forward, you call it, don't you? Suppose we locate that.”

All expectation of the watchman having now died, we went forward on the port side to the approximate location of the cross. This being in the neighborhood where Mac had thought he saw something move, we approached with extreme caution. But nothing more ominous was discovered than the port lifeboat, nothing more ghostly heard than the occasional creak with which it rocked in its davits.

The lifeboat seemed to be indicated by the cross. It swung almost shoulder-high on McWhirter. We looked under and around it, with a growing feeling that we had misread the significance of the crosses, or that the sinister record extended to a time before the ”she devil” of the Turner line was dressed in white and turned into a lady.

I was feeling underneath the boat, with a sense of absurdity that McWhirter put into words. ”I only hope,” he said, ”that the watchman does not wake up now and see us. He'd be justified in filling us with lead, or putting us in straitjackets.”

But I had discovered something.

”Mac,” I said, ”some one has been at this boat within the last few minutes.”