EFORE he went off watch at four in the morning, Venable passed the word to Garrity and Stormalong, also to the two Chinese quartermasters—the word that trouble was on the way, and that they must stand by to obey his orders when the time came. Certain of the crew whom Li John and Li Ho could trust were to be told also. Others, however, a number of the stokers and the two stewards, were known to have been won over by Hewson and Boris Kryalpin. How far they would follow Boris was questionable.
The parcel wrapped in burlap Venable had placed under the tarpaulin of the after starboard boat, lacing up the covering again.
Venable slept untroubled, wakening in time for breakfast when the bell was rung at seven-twenty, after shipboard custom. He messed with Garrity.
“If trouble is brewin’,” said the latter, “’tis a bad mornin’ for the same! I seen that chap Deardorf down the passage, and green he was; I’ll be seasick me own self if this holds!”
There was no storm, but the Kum Chao was wallowing and bucking into a stiff wind and bad sea. On his way to the bridge, Venable saw that her foredeck was being continually swept by the seas, and she was laboring hard. Jason, looking very haggard and unkempt, hailed the relief with joy.
“I’m keepin’ her off two points,” he said, “to hit the seas easier. She’s goin’ to drop her screw yet, the old tinpot! Hear the blade race when she lifts up her hind end? Wish ye luck with her! You’ll have to shoot the sun this noon; now that skipper’s gone, you an’ me got to hang together.”
Venable found himself alone, except for the two men at the wheel, with vast relief. He did not like Jason or trust him, and he found himself on a tension this morning, waiting for Mrs. Ivanoff’s prediction to be fulfilled. But nothing happened. Garrity informed him by tube that all was quiet below.
Shortly before four bells, or ten o’clock, Venable looked down at what had been the well-deck, and saw Shinski and Boris walking there and talking. As he gazed idly upon them, he saw the woman Marie appear.
Instantly Venable knew from the repressed excitement of her face, her manner, that something had happened. He turned and spoke through the open window to Li John, at the wheel behind him.
“Send another man up here to mind the wheel. Summon your brother, the second engineer, and the others. The time is at hand.”
“Aye, aye, sah,” responded the British-trained Li John. “Number one piecee bobbery come quick, huh?”
ENABLE gave his attention to the three below him. Marie had halted the two men, and now the uplift of the wind carried her words clearly to the bridge.
“It’s gone!” Her voice was tensely shrill. “It’s gone, I say I”
“What’s gone?” demanded Shinski, who was livid with seasickness.
“Everything!” Marie’s voice rose in hot anger. “Some one has been in my room,—it was in my trunk,—and it’s been stolen! The jewels—”
The two men broke into oaths of amazement. Then, his eyes blazing, Boris Kryalpin whirled on Shinski, and his hand went to his coat.
“You, you rat!” snarled his voice. “You’ve—”
Shinski swerved away with a bleat of fright; but Kryalpin’s pocket vomited a splash of smoke, and a revolver cracked. Shinski flung up his arms and pitched down the deck as the ship rolled.
Marie had whipped out an automatic as Boris turned to her—but from some point aft, outside the range of vision of the paralyzed Venable, came another shot, thin against the wind. Boris dropped his weapon, put one hand to his head and fell.
Another shot, a third, cracked. Marie threw up her automatic and answered it, shooting aft; then she leaped aside and was gone. Below him, Venable saw Shinski’s body rolling in the scuppers, while Boris Kryalpin was half kneeling amid a rush of green water and holding to the rail-chains.
Venable turned to the helmsman. “Steady as she is!” he ordered, his voice quiet. Then he took out his automatic and went to the ladder, descending.
He wondered why nothing more had happened—why Garrity and the others had not appeared. But it had all chanced in the fraction of a minute, that scene of murder. When Venable came to the deck, he saw Li John just at the hood of the forecastle hatch, leaning over and calling to his mates below.
Venable faced aft, along the port rail. He had no intention of going below to the cabins, for with murder afoot that narrow passage would be a shambles. Everybody seemed to be shooting at everything in sight. Hell had broken loose with a vengeance!