Top-Notch Magazine/Volume 57/Number 5/Hatching a Volcano/Chapter 6
CHAPTER VI.
IN A WEB OF MYSTERY.
TO oblige the charming young lady who had intrusted him with the letter, Brant set about to speed its delivery. The accident he had come upon, and the identification of the taxi victim as the man who had so nearly thwarted his plans, did not long delay him. It was an odd coincidence, he reflected; that was all.
Later, he wondered if the stalwart individual in a linen suit, who had ridden off in the ambulance, might have been a friend of the injured man. If so, he must be concerned in the affair of the pink-tinted message. That theory aroused Brant and stirred his imagination.
Subconsciously he found himself drafting a thrill-spiced scenario; and throughout the continuity he figured as the resourceful hero. All the essential ingredients were at hand. The thought of being cast to play opposite a particularly winsome leading lady, rescuing her from unknown dangers and foiling the workers of iniquity, was not unattractive.
Twice in the course of the next few minutes, Brant stopped to make inquiries, for the street he sought was in a strange part of the city, a mile of more from the business section. He never before had ventured into the picturesque maze of narrow streets, far remote from the haunts of inquisitive tourists. The winding, alleylike thoroughfares were dirty, ill-lighted, and swarming with life.
When the street was found, the number corresponding to that on the envelope revealed a squat, stucco building with huge shutters, railed balcony, and a bolted door that opened into a patio.
The house was dark and apparently untenanted. Brant thumped loudly upon the door, and repeated the summons again and again before it was unlocked and opened slightly.
“Hello! what's wanted?” It was a pleasant, though cautions, American voice that reached Brant's ears and dispelled whatever fears he might have entertained.
“I've a message here for James Dixon,” Brant answered.
“Come in,” was the instant response.
The door opened wide, as if the announcement had been a magic password, and Brant stepped inside. The wide patio beyond was dimly lighted, and the man who had admitted him was concealed in the shadows.
Once the door was shut and bolted, the man spoke again: “Go straight ahead. I'll be with you in a minute.”
A spacious room with a wide-beamed ceiling, sparingly but comfortably furnished, opened at the end of the patio. The floor was of the conventional Spanish tile, over which rugs were scattered. The windows were high and wide and shuttered. The room was lighted with wall candelabras. On a broad mahogany table a small, shaded reading lamp cast a circle of peculiar bluish light.
After entering the room, Brant looked back, wondering at the delay of his host. He could make out the dim form of the man, still at the street door, peering through a narrow, barred opening in the upper panel.
“Just wanted to make sure you weren't followed,” the man. explained when he came into the room.
Brant found himself in the presence of a tall, good-looking individual, clad in shirt sleeves, slippers, and linen trousers, who favored him with an openly appraising scrutiny.
“Are you Dixon?” Brant inquired.
The man nodded, his cold gray eyes probing the countenance of the newcomer. “Yes. Where's the message?”
Brant produced the envelope. “A young lady asked me to deliver it to you. I wasn't privileged to learn her name.”
Dixon betrayed an immediate interest and at once plucked the letter from Brant's hand. Apparently ignoring the fact that the envelope was torn and unsealed, Dixon drew forth the inclosure and held it under the shaded lamp on the table.
Brant watched the man curiously, wondering what effect, if any, the blank sheet of paper would have upon the reader. He saw Dixon scowl as his eyes scanned something which to Brant was unrevealed.
“Just as I thought!” Dixon broke out, apparently forgetting his visitor.
The thing was beyond Brant, but he did not feel that he was entitled to demand an explanation.
“Sure you weren't followed?” Dixon asked, tossing the envelope and its inclosure upon the table.
“Pretty sure; yes.”
“No one saw the young lady give you this letter?”
“Yes; some one did,” Brant answered. “I suppose you noticed the condition of it. The young lady dropped the letter back of the bench upon which I was sitting. I was to recover it and deliver it. When she had gone, and I went to reach for it, a man concealed in the hedge already had the thing. I chased him a few blocks, but before I overtook him he had torn open the envelope and evidently read the message.”
“Then what?” Dixon demanded suddenly.
“I got the letter and”
“The man got away from you?” Dixon broke in.
“I didn't see any use in detaining him,” Brant answered. “Didn't think it advisable to turn him over to the police. However, he didn't get far. He and a taxi disputed the right of way, and an ambulance carted him off.”
“Badly hurt, was he?”
“Looked to be; yes. A husky chap with a black mustache seemed to be greatly disturbed over the accident and went along in the ambulance.”
“Good Lord!” Dixon broke into a swift exclamation. “If that could have been” He broke off sharply, turned to a cabinet, and drew from a drawer a handful of photographs.
From among the assortment he selected one and held it toward Brant. “Recognize this chap, do you?”
Brant did not hesitate. A glance convinced him. “Sure! That's the man who rode off in the ambulance.”
Dixon's lips tightened. “Good enough! Look through these prints and see if you can identify the other chap—the one you took the letter from and who was hit by the taxi.”
Obligingly, Brant glanced at the photos; but the taxi victim was not among the number. He told Dixon so.
“Well, no matter,” the other returned. “My gallery of prize beauties is far from complete. You've identified the choicest one. He is known as Captain Koffry. Ever hear of him?”
Brant shook his head. “Never. What's he captain of—a boat?”
“Yes. A speedy one.”
“Didn't think he looked like the captain of a ball team or the local police,” said Brant, wondering when explanations would be in order and some of the mystery dispelled.
“Any idea what this collection of rare photos represents?” Dixon queried.
“I have my suspicions. A pocket-edition rogue's gallery, isn't it? The bevy of handsome creatures you've shown me don't resemble movie heroes or retired missionaries.”
A smile twitched at Dixon's lips. After a turn across the floor, apparently deep in contemplation of recent developments, he wheeled to face his visitor. “If you've been spotted,” he said, “you may find yourself in trouble.”
“You mean because I've obliged a lady and delivered a message to you?”
“Yes. The young lady in the case did not stop to think of the consequences. If Miss Newberry”
“So that's her name, is it?” Brant interrupted. “Thanks! She would not divulge that much to me. Well, I'm not prostrated with apprehension,” he went on. “Trouble's been at my heels ever since I landed on this Pearl of the west Indies. Don't expect to shake it until I'm leaving footprints in the asphalt around Forty-second and Broadway, if you happen to know where that is.”
Dixon began to evince a new interest in his cheerful, candid-spoken visitor. Perhaps some of his earlier suspicions were routed. He plied Brant with questions; and because the latter scented a bit of excitement, and took an instant liking to the man himself, he rendered a graphic account of his Cuban calamities.
Dixon did not interrupt until Brant reached that point in his narrative dealing with his assault and imprisonment. Dixon insisted upon a thorough account of the affair; then he smiled significantly.
“You must have blundered in where you weren't wanted,” he explained. “The monkey runners were active that night.”
“It didn't register "with me,” Brant said. “I gathered from the conversation I overheard that a smuggling job of some nature was on foot; but I failed to understand where the monkeys came in.”
Dixon laughed, apparently amused at his visitor's ignorance. “A monkey is a trade name for a Chinaman. Sometimes they're referred to as pieces of silk.”
“Chinamen?” echoed Brant, amazed. “Then the boat I saw creep out to sea the other night probably had a cargo of them aboard! Contraband, are they?”
Dixon gave a confirmative nod. “Very much so. The Chinese have been barred from the States for forty years, with the exception of properly accredited students, merchants, and tourists; but they're coming in all the time—hundreds of them—thanks to the daring monkey runners. The smuggling of liquor and dope is small fry in comparison.”
“That's news to me,” admitted Brant.
“There are no bars against Orientals here, and Cuba has become a vast storehouse for the smuggling tong. Chinks are dumped here by the boatload, their passage financed by friends or relatives in the States. Around twelve hundred dollars is the usual price. When that's paid in full, John Chinaman embarks on the last lap of his journey from the Far East—Florida. Until the cash is forthcoming, the pigtail is the property of the tong and leased to the sugar-cane growers.”
Listening to Dixon, Brant's nimble mind operated at high speed. He eyed his host speculatively. “One of those great lights you read about is slowly breaking upon me. I'll wager Uncle Sam is paying your salary; and those mugs you displayed in the picture gallery are chink runners!”
“Barely possible,” was Dixon's noncommittal reply.
Brant grinned. “Give me time enough, and I'll fit together this jig-saw puzzle,” he returned. “I've placed you and the chap whose photo I've identified. Where does Miss Newberry fit in? Hold on, now!” he exclaimed, as Dixon seemed on the point of interrupting. “Let me demonstrate my keen analytical powers. Didn't I see an item in the Havana Post a few days ago about the Newberry yacht putting in here?”
“Probably. The Flamingo is at the Almandares Slip, awaiting Miss Newberry's orders to sail for Tampa.”
“Well, that's that. Say,” Brant spoke out, after a moment of reflection, “you don't want me to think the girl and her yacht are mixed up with chink running, do you?”
“You've a vivid imagination, Brant,” Dixon returned with continued evasiveness. “A brilliant scenario writer was lost when you decided to caper behind the footlights.”
“Why beat about the bush?” Brant queried, all eagerness. “There's dirty Work at the crossroads. I can see that without half trying. Why not let me in on it? I'm free, white, and twenty-one. I'll turn my hand at anything short of murder, if Miss Newberry requests it; and I may even rise to that in an emergency.”
“I've no doubt of it, Brant,” the other replied; “but I don't see where I could cast you for a part.”
“Miss Newberry herself cast me for the part of a messenger boy,” Brant asserted. “I've made good, haven't I? Surely I can double for a part in the acts to follow. If you're the stage director of this production”
The tinkle of a bell cut short Brant's fervent appeal. Dixon turned suddenly. In the silence that fell the sound was repeated.
“A visitor,” Dixon remarked in a tone that, to Brant, conveyed a note of uneasiness. “Pardon me a moment. This is my butler's night out,” he added with a smile.
Dixon left the room and passed through the dimly lighted patio toward the street door. Brant waited, eyes and ears alert. The thought that, after stumbling headlong into adventure spiced with romance, he was to be denied a more active participation in the mystery-touched program to come was discouraging.
He awaited Dixon's return with growing impatience, firmly resolved to make a final appeal before stepping out of the picture and swallowing his disappointment. Perseverance had landed him more than one engagement when the early outlook seemed unfavorable.
The big room and the patio beyond seemed unusually quiet; and when fully a quarter of an hour had elapsed and his host had not reappeared, Brant set forth to investigate.
The dim patio, open to the stars, filled with a profusion of plants and flowers, was deserted. A tiny fountain bubbled musically. Brant peered toward the far street door. It seemed to be slightly open. He wondered if Dixon had gone out; then decided that he had until, when his eyes accustomed themselves to the dim light, he saw a huddled form on the tile floor just inside the door.
He called sharply; but only the echo of his own voice came back to him. With quickened steps and misgiving thoughts, he advanced. An instant later he was kneeling on the floor beside Dixon, calling him by name and shaking his arm. As the man made no response whatever and seemed ominously cold and inert, Brant picked him up and with difficulty managed to get him back into the lighted, room.
There, after placing Dixon upon a couch and making a swift examination, Brant smothered a horror-stricken cry. His host was dead. That instantly was determined. When Dixon's shirt, crimson-stained, was torn aside, the wound was revealed. A glance was sufficient to show that a knife blade, cunningly aimed, had reached the man's heart.
A trifle shaken by that gruesome discovery, Brant stepped back and endeavored to marshal his thoughts into orderly sequence. It was odd, he reflected, that Dixon had made no sound, no outcry. He must have opened the street door in answer to the bell, and swift and silent death had awaited him.
Who was the visitor? what had prompted him to do murder? There could not have been a struggle. Surely, Brant reasoned, he would have heard it. Dixon must have been taken unawares.
Brant's mind began to function with unwonted alacrity. The unexpected and tragic culmination of the night's adventure had surrounded him with a web of entangling mystery. A dozen vague and disturbing theories assailed him. Any one of them would have accounted for Dixon's premeditated murder.
Theories and suppositions, however promising, were not permitted to overshadow the present situation in which Brant found himself. What was to be done now? Get in touch with the police? Lose no time in trailing the assassin? Obviously, that was the thing to do; yet halfway across the room, his eyes searching for a telephone, Brant checked himself.
A new and alarming angle manifested itself, overshadowing that which was, conscientiously, his duty. For a brief time he had forgotten his own participation in the affair. How was he to explain his presence in the house? who would believe his account of the tragedy?
Brant was a stranger in Havana. He had not known Dixon. He could not render a truthful account of his actions without bringing Miss Newberry into the case; and that, above all else, was to be avoided. Doubtless the girl was deep enough in trouble without plunging her into fresh ones.
The thing for him to do, Brant reasoned, after viewing the situation from every angle, was to leave the premises and get in touch with Miss Newberry. Then, after explaining matters to the girl, they could decide upon the next move. That action seemed to be the rational thing to do in the present crisis.
Having made his decision, and with a last glance at the still form upon the couch, Brant left the room and passed through the patio. The street door was still open. Apparently the assassin, after striking down his victim, had not taken the trouble to close it behind him, but had fled into the obscurity of the dark street.
As Brant reached the door a new and alarming possibility darted into his mind. He halted abruptly. It occurred to him that the house, and particularly the door leading onto the street, might be watched. Brant did not care to be seen leaving the premises.
Confronted by that disturbing thought he decided to retrace his steps and seek a new avenue of escape. The patio walls were high and not to be readily scaled and all the windows of the house securely barred; still, he reasoned, there must be a door in the rear that would afford means of exit—probably lead him into an alleyway. He would have to take chances on that exit being unwatched.
Brant was on the point of turning back along the patio in quest of another means of escape, when the street door opened noiselessly and a shadowy form was visible on the threshold. Then, with a quick movement, the intruder stepped into the patio, and the door was closed.