The Mystery

THE DEATH SHIP

Billy Edwards came on deck with a line of irritation right-angling the furrows between his eyes.

“Go ahead,” the quarter-deck bade him, seeing him aflush with information.

“The captain won’t believe me,” blurted out Edwards.

“Is it as bad as that?” asked Barnett, smiling.

“It certainly is,” replied the younger man seriously.  “I don’t know that I blame him.  I’d hardly believe it myself if I hadn’t——­”

“Oh, go on.  Out with it.  Give us the facts.  Never mind your credibility.”

“The facts are that there lies the Laughing Lass, a little weather-worn, but sound as a dollar, and not a living being aboard of her.  Her boats are all there.  Everything’s in good condition, though none too orderly.  Pitcher half full of fresh water in the rack.  Sails all O. K. Ashes of the galley fire still warm.  I tell you, gentlemen, that ship hasn’t been deserted more than a couple of days at the outside.”

“Are you sure all the boats are there?” asked Ives.

“Dory, dingy, and two surf boats.  Isn’t that enough?”

“Plenty.”

“Been over her, inside and out.  No sign of collision.  No leak.  No anything, except that the starboard side is blistered a bit.  No evidence of fire anywhere else.  I tell you,” said Billy Edwards pathetically, “it’s given me a headache.”

“Perhaps it’s one of those cases of panic that Forsythe spoke of the other night,” said Ives.  “The crew got frightened at something and ran away, with the devil after them.”

“But crews don’t just step out and run around the corner and hide, when they’re scared,” objected Barnett.

“That’s true, too,” assented Ives.  “Well, perhaps that volcanic eruption jarred them so that they jumped for it.”

“Pretty wild theory, that,” said Edwards.

“No wilder than the facts, as you give them,” was the retort.

“That’s so,” admitted the ensign gloomily.

“But how about pestilence?” suggested Barnett.

“Maybe they died fast and the last survivor, after the bodies of the rest were overboard, got delirious and jumped after them.”

“Not if the galley fire was hot,” said Dr. Trendon, briefly.  “No; pestilence doesn’t work that way.”

“Did you look at the wheel, Billy?” asked Ives.

“Did I!  There’s another thing.  Wheel’s all right, but compass is no good at all.  It’s regularly bewitched.”

“What about the log, then?”

“Couldn’t find it anywhere.  Hunted high, low, jack, and the game; everywhere except in the big, brass-bound chest I found in the captain’s cabin.  Couldn’t break into that.”

“Dr. Schermerhorn’s chest!” exclaimed Barnett.  “Then he was aboard.”

“Well, he isn’t aboard now,” said the ensign grimly.  “Not in the flesh.  And that’s all,” he added suddenly.

“No; it isn’t all,” said Barnett gently.  “There’s something else.  Captain’s orders?”

“Oh, no.  Captain Parkinson doesn’t take enough stock in my report to tell me to withhold anything,” said Edwards, with a trace of bitterness in his voice.  “It’s nothing that I believe myself, anyhow.”

“Give us a chance to believe it,” said Ives.

“Well,” said the ensign hesitantly, “there’s a sort of atmosphere about that schooner that’s almost uncanny.”

“Oh, you had the shudders before you were ordered to board,” bantered Ives.

“I know it.  I’d have thought it was one of those fool presentiments if I were the only one to feel it.  But the men were affected, too.  They kept together like frightened sheep.  And I heard one say to another:  ’Hey, Boney, d’you feel like someone was a-buzzin’ your nerves like a fiddle-string?’ Now,” demanded Edwards plaintively, “what right has a jackie to have nerves?”

“That’s strange enough about the compass,” said Barnett slowly.  “Ours is all right again.  The schooner must have been so near the electric disturbance that her instruments were permanently deranged.”

“That would lend weight to the volcanic theory,” said Carter.

“So the captain didn’t take kindly to your go-look-see?” questioned Ives of Edwards.

“As good as told me I’d missed the point of the thing,” said the ensign, flushing.  “Perhaps he can make more of it himself.  At any rate, he’s going to try.  Here he is now.”

“Dr. Trendon,” said the captain, appearing.  “You will please to go with me to the schooner.”

“Yes, sir,” said the surgeon, rising from his chair with such alacrity as to draw from Ives the sardonic comment: 

“Why, I actually believe old Trendon is excited.”

For two hours after the departure of the captain and Trendon there were dull times on the quarter-deck of the Wolverine.  Then the surgeon came back to them.

“Billy was right,” he said.

“But he didn’t tell us anything,” cried Ives.  “He didn’t clear up the mystery.”

“That’s what,” said Trendon.  “One thing Billy said,” he added, waxing unusually prolix for him, “was truer than maybe he knew.”

“Thanks,” murmured the ensign.  “What was that?”

“You said ‘Not a living being aboard.’  Exact words, hey?”

“Well, what of it?” exclaimed the ensign excitedly.  “You don’t mean you found dead——?”

“Keep your temperature down, my boy.  No.  You were exactly right.  Not a living being aboard.”

“Thanks for nothing,” retorted the ensign.

“Neither human nor other,” pursued Trendon.

“What!”

“Food scattered around the galley.  Crumbs on the mess table.  Ever see a wooden ship without cockroaches?”

“Never particularly investigated the matter.”

“Don’t believe such a thing exists,” said Ives.

“Not a cockroach on the Laughing Lass.  Ever know of an old hooker that wasn’t overrun with rats?”

“No; nor anyone else.  Not above water.”

“Found a dozen dead rats.  No sound or sign of a live one on the Laughing Lass.  No rats, no mice.  No bugs.  Gentlemen, the Laughing Lass is a charnel ship.”

“No wonder Billy’s tender nerves went wrong.” said Ives, with irrepressible flippancy.  “She’s probably haunted by cockroach wraiths.”

“He’ll have a chance to see,” said Trendon.  “Captain’s going to put him in charge.”

“By way of apology, then,” said Barnett.  “That’s pretty square.”

“Captain Parkinson wishes to see you in his cabin, Mr. Edwards,” said an orderly, coming in.

“A pleasant voyage, Captain Billy,” said Ives.  “Sing out if the goblins git yer.”

Fifteen minutes later Ensign Edwards, with a quartermaster, Timmins, the bo’s’n’s mate, and a crew, was heading a straight course toward his first command, with instructions to “keep company and watch for signals”; and intention to break into the brass-bound chest and ferret out what clue lay there, if it took dynamite.  As he boarded, Barnett and Trendon, with both of whom the lad was a favourite, came to a sinister conclusion.

“It’s poison, I suppose,” said the first officer.

“And a mighty subtle sort,” agreed Trendon.  “Don’t like the looks of it.”  He shook a solemn head.  “Don’t like it for a damn.”