The Collected Short Stories of Louis L'Amour, Volume Four (62 page)

Suddenly there was a shout from Arseniev. Turk looked up, wondering. Powell had somehow broken his bonds, and had leaped from the plane. Turk went for his gun, but his hands, numbed by cold, fumbled, and before he could draw it the man had leaped to a hummock of grass, dodged behind a clump of reeds, and when they next saw him he was running at full tilt over the marsh. Once he fell waist deep in water, then scrambled out, and trotted on.

“Let him go,” Turk said. “Maybe it’s better than a firing squad, at that.”

“What do you mean? You think—” Arseniev began.

Turk shrugged. “He’s partly wet, he has no shelter, no weapons. What do you think? He’ll die before this night is out. Feel that wind, and imagine yourself wet—in that.”

Arseniev shivered. “I can’t.” He looked around. “What now?”

“Crawl in between the canvas,” Turk said. “I’ll join you in a minute.” He walked back and forth, piling the reeds over the canvas and feathering them against the wind. Then he trampled the snow down, and after a while, lifted the canvas and joined Arseniev.

The instant he was inside it felt warmer; over them they could hear the lonely snarl of the wind, and out on the lake the lashing of the waves, but over their covering of reeds the snow sifted down, gathering over them in a thick, warm blanket.

I
T WAS MORNING
when he awakened. He turned over slowly, warm and comfortable. No wind was blowing, but he knew that it was cold outside. He touched Arseniev on the shoulder, then crawled out.

The world was white with snow everywhere. The lake was crusted with ice, and even the reeds bent heavily under the weight of the snow. The plane was almost covered with it.

“We’ve got to make a fire,” Turk said, “and then uncover the ship. The way it is, a searching plane couldn’t find us.”

Sweeping the snow from a place on the ground, Turk went back to the shelter and brought out a handful of dry reeds. Arseniev collected some driftwood from the edge of the lake, and soon a fire was ablaze. Then they went to work, clearing the snow from the ship. It was a job, but it kept them warm.

Arseniev stopped once, looking over the white, empty expanse. “I wonder what his real name was?” he said.

“I don’t know,” Turk said. “I never heard.”

It was an hour later when they heard the mutter of a plane. Soon it was circling above them, and then it leveled off and landed on solid earth not far away from the island where they’d spent the night.

Two men came running to them over the frozen marsh. “Marchenko!” Arseniev yelled. “It is good to see you, believe me!” The other man was Bochkarev, a flyer noted for his Polar exploits. They shook hands all around.

Two hours later, the Grumman was towed to solid earth and repaired. The big Russian ship took off, then the Grumman. Turk headed the ship south, toward Khabarovsk. They were flying low over the snow when Arseniev suddenly caught his arm.

Powell.

They knew him by the green scarf that trailed from his neck, a bright spot of color on a piece of ground swept clear by the driving wind. The man lay where he had fallen, frozen and still.

Turk Madden eased back on the stick and climbed higher. Ahead of them, the sky was blue, and the sun was coming out from the clouds. In the clear cold air the sound of the motors was pleasant, a drumming roar of strength and beauty.

Coast Patrol

D
ense fog blanketed the Siberian coast. It was cold, damp, and miserable. Turk Madden banked the Grumman steeply and strained his eyes toward the fogbound earth.

He could not see anything but the gray cottony thickness. Occasionally a jagged peak of the Sihoti Alins loomed through the clouds, black and ugly where the wind had swept the snow away.

It was warm in the cabin of the plane, and glancing over his shoulder, Turk smiled to see Diakov asleep. The Ussuri Cossack gunner possessed an amazing ability to sleep at any time or place. And he never dozed. He was either instantly asleep or wide-awake. Well, a few more miles of patrol and they could return to Khabarovsk, to food and a warm bed.

Turk swung the ship lazily, detecting a rift in the fog. Then, quite suddenly, he saw the freighter.

She was moored fore and aft, just inside the river mouth. A freighter of no less than four thousand tons tied up at a rocky shelf in the mouth of a lonely stream on a coast that rarely saw anything bigger than a fishing smack or occasional whaler. Since the war had begun, even the few Udehe fishermen had gone back up the coast to colder but safer waters.

Glancing back, he saw Diakov was awake. The big Cossack’s black eyes were alert. “You see something? What is it?”

“A ship,” Madden said. “A big freighter, tied up in the river.”

“No Russian ship would be here,” Diakov said. “I think not.”

“I’m going down and have a look-see,” Turk said. He rolled the plane around in a tight circle, heading upstream. His sense of direction had always been his greatest asset. He remembered that river, too. For two weeks he had been flying over it every day, and before that at odd times. Upstream there was a wide bend with a little backwater where he could land…with luck.

He landed.

Fog was around them like a shroud. Diakov straightened, his face pale under the tan. “Well,” he shrugged, “I tell myself it is your life, too, so why should I be afraid? Nevertheless, I am afraid.”

He leaped ashore and took a turn around a tree with a line, making the plane fast, then another tree, lashing it bow and stern. Then he got out skis and checked his rifle. “How far you think?” he asked.

“About three miles.” Turk grinned at him, the smile making his lean brown face suddenly boyish. “You stay here, Muscovite. If I don’t come back, you go over the mountains to Sidatun.”

The Cossack lifted an eyebrow. “Even a ghost couldn’t cross the Sihoti Alins now,” he said. “We fly out, or die.”

It would have been simpler to have flown to Khabarovsk to report the ship, but finding a thread of river on that coast in a fog like this would be harder now than finding a Jap in Chungking. This way he could investigate first and have something definite to report.

A snow-covered forest trail followed the river. An expert on skis, Turk made good time and in only a matter of minutes stood on the edge of the forest, not a hundred yards from the ship.

The ladder was down, but the name of the ship was invisible in the fast-falling snow. Vladivostok, the nearest Siberian port, was miles away to the south, almost four hundred miles, in fact. Across the narrow Sea of Japan, however, were the Japanese islands.

Could it be a raiding party from Japan? It didn’t seem likely. In any case, it was his job to find out. It was a chance he had to take.

Already, falling snow had covered him with a thin sifting of flakes. Moving carefully, taking every advantage of flurries of wind that veiled his movement, Turk crossed to the ship. He had abandoned his skis in the brush, so when he reached the ladder, he did not hesitate, but mounted swiftly.

There was no challenge, only the whisper of snow. The deck was white and still, unbroken by a footprint. Hesitating, flattened against the bulkhead, he studied the situation. Something here was radically wrong. It was almost an hour since he left the plane, and the snow had begun then, yet there had been no movement on the deck in that time. Every sense in his body was alert, and he hesitated, dreading to move, aware that his steps would be revealed in the snow.

Turk slid his hand inside his leather coat and loosened his Colt. Then he moved swiftly to the passage that led to the saloon and the officers’ quarters.

The door opened easily under his hand, and he stepped into the warm passage. The door of the mate’s cabin was on his left, but a glance showed it to be empty.

Before him was the door of the saloon. He opened the door, pushed it wide with his left hand as his right gripped the butt of his automatic.

A man lay with his cheek on the table, face toward the door, arms dangling. Between his shoulder blades was the protruding haft of a knife. His cap, bearing a second mate’s insignia, lay on the table.

On most freighters the second mate had the twelve-to-four watch. The man had been murdered while eating, so apparently he had been killed just before taking over his watch. It was now nearly four.

Turk stepped back and closed the door gently, then mounted to the bridge. The wheelhouse was empty, except for a man lying sprawled on the deck. Even before he knelt over the body, Turk could see from the way the head lay that the man’s neck was broken. There was a large welt on his head, and over him, a broken shelf.

Another cap lay nearby. Turk picked it up and glanced at it.
Third Mate.
He sized up the situation. “Nine bucks to a dime,” he muttered thoughtfully, “somebody came in the port door. This guy rushed him, and the guy used judo on him. Threw him into that shelf.”

Grimly, Turk stepped out on the bridge and closed the door. Visibility was low. He’d be unable to take off in this. He descended to the captain’s deck and tried the starboard door. It was locked. Rounding the deckhouse, he tried the port door and it opened gently under his hand.

T
HE VERY PRETTY BRUNETTE
with the gun in her hand showed no surprise and no fear. “Come in,” she said, “and close the door, or I’ll kill you.”

“Thanks,” Turk said, “it’s getting cold out there.” If she had said she’d shoot him, he wouldn’t have been surprised. But she said “kill,” and he had a very good idea she meant it. “No need to hold that gun on me,” he said pleasantly, “unless you’re the one who murdered the mates.”

She stiffened. “Who…murdered?”

“Yeah,” he said. “Somebody played rough around here. Somebody who uses jujitsu and a knife. They got the second and third mates.”

“Not Richards? Aaron isn’t killed?” Her eyes were wide.

Turk frowned. “I don’t know your pal Richards. I only know that you’ve got two less mates than you had, and I want to know why. I also want to know who you are, what this ship is doing here, and where the skipper is.”

She stared at him suspiciously, making no move to put the gun down.

“It’s all right,” he said, exasperated. “I’m an American. I’ve been flying coast patrol for the Russians because of the war.”

She hesitated, then decided to believe him. “This is the
Welleston,
out of Boston. My father, Mace Reardon, was in command. We were bound for Vladivostok with aviation fuel, machine oil, and M-3 tanks when Pearl Harbor was bombed. We had trouble with our radio, and the war had been going on for several days before we heard of it. Dad took the ship north around Sakhalin Island, hoping to slip down the Siberian coast to Vladivostok.

“When we got this far, Aaron—I mean Mr. Richards, the mate—suggested we tie up here and communicate with Vladivostok to get an escort through the most dangerous water.”

Madden nodded. “Not a bad idea. Your Mr. Richards was smart. But how were you to communicate with them? Your radio would warn the Japs, and this is an American ship.”

“We didn’t use the radio. Aaron told Sparks to set out overland for Sidatun.”

“For
where
?” Turk’s eyes narrowed.

“Sidatun. It’s several miles back from the coast. Sparks was good on skis, so he went.”

“And Richards sent him?” Turk was beginning to understand…or suspect. “Where’s Richards now?”

“I don’t know.” The girl was frankly puzzled. “Mutiny broke out, just after Sparks left. My father was…” She hesitated, and for the first time her poise wavered. “…killed. Then Aaron told me to stay inside and not to let anyone in but him.”

A breath of cold air on the back of his neck warned Turk. He turned, letting his gun slide into his hand with that smooth efficiency that only comes from long familiarity and practice. He was just a little too fast for the tall, handsome man who stood in the doorway. “Hold it, buddy,” Turk said softly. “I never like to kill people I haven’t met socially.”

“Aaron!” the girl cried out sharply. “I’ve been so worried. Where have you been?”

Richards ignored her question, his eyes intent, staring at Turk. He was a bigger man than Turk, which meant that he was well over six feet and weighed more than Madden’s compact one eighty.

“Who is this man?” Richards asked coolly.

“The name is Madden,” Turk replied, studying the man keenly. “I’m an American. I run a commercial airline in the East Indies. Made a long flight up to Shanghai with a special passenger, and then went on patrol for the Soviet Army of the Far East. Come in and close that door.”

Richards complied, moving warily and keeping his hands in sight. He didn’t do anything suspicious, but something told Turk he was to be carefully watched.

Richards faced him again. “I’m afraid, Tony,” he said to the girl, “that anything this man has told you is a lie. He cannot be on patrol. No plane could possibly land in this weather.”

“I land planes in all kinds of weather,” Turk said calmly, “and what you think or do not think does not happen to matter in the least. I am an officer of the Soviet government at the moment, and the cargo of this ship is the property of that government. The ship is flying the American flag, and I am a citizen of the United States. I want to know exactly what has happened on this boat.”

“There was a mutiny,” Richards said coldly, “a very minor one. I handled it. Everything is now under control. We need no help.”

The man was listening for something. Turk remembered the door behind him was locked, the ports dogged down. Yet he felt an acute sense of impending danger.

“I wonder if the second and third mates thought it was minor?” Turk demanded. “Who murdered them? Did you?”

Richards stiffened, and his eyes widened just a little, then turned cold and dangerous. “I think we might ask the crew about that, or
you.
You might be a Jap agent.”

Turk laughed. “Yeah, I’d bet a lot of dough one of us is, and it isn’t me. The second mate wasn’t murdered by a stranger or by a crew in mutiny. He was murdered by someone he knew and trusted.”

“How do you know that?” Tony asked sharply.

“Because he was stabbed in the back while eating by someone he knew was behind him. The third mate was killed by someone with a knowledge of jujitsu. But he was expecting trouble.”

“Well, Mr. Sherlock Holmes,” Richards sneered, his eyes hard, “you think you have it all figured out, don’t you? Trying to pin it all on me? Well, I think you’re a renegade, that you haven’t any plane, and have no connection with any government whatsoever.”

Tony Reardon was looking at Turk, her eyes cold. “Maybe you’d better put up that gun and leave,” she said. “Whatever you came here for won’t work. I know Mr. Richards, and now that my father is dead, he is in command. Your efforts to prejudice me against him won’t do. I’ve known him for over a year, and he is not only the captain now, but my fiancé.”

Turk grinned. “Which apparently makes him the head man around here. All right, darling, suppose you ask him why he sent Sparks out to die.”

“What do you mean?” she demanded.

“You said he sent him to Sidatun to communicate with the Soviet officials. Sidatun, baby, is not several miles away, but several hundred, and across a range of mountains. In this weather even a man who knows the country couldn’t make it.”

“I don’t believe it!” Tony said desperately.

Turk was watching Richards. The mate was half crouched, his eyes malevolent. Madden slipped his hand inside his coat and tossed a roll on the table. “Look at that map, honey.”

There was a sudden step on the deck outside, and a sound of footsteps on the ladder. Triumphant light leaped into Richards’s eyes at the sound, but Turk sprang for the door. Richards leaped to intercept him, swinging even as he sprang. Turk was lunging right into the path of the blow, and there was no way to avoid it. It struck him a smashing wallop on the chin and knocked him staggering into the wall. Even as he fell back, Richards steadied himself and lifted his gun.

Off balance and helpless, Turk was cold meat, when Tony caught Richards’s arm, jerking it aside. The shot smashed a picture an inch over Turk’s head.

Before the mate could free his gun hand, Turk sprang close and, grabbing him by the collar, literally jerked him from his feet, dragging him to the door. Throwing it open, Turk dumped Richards out at the feet of three startled Japanese sailors.

Madden drew back swiftly and slammed the door, turning the key in the lock. Tony Reardon’s face was deathly pale. “What is it?” she asked. “What’s happening? I don’t understand!”

A shout of anger came from outside, and then a pounding on the door. It was a steel door, and Turk was unworried.

Her face was strained and Turk could see she was on the verge of hysteria. She had kept her father’s death bottled up inside her, and now this.

“Hold it, kid,” Turk said kindly. “You sit down and take it easy. We’ll get out of this. The way I figure it, this Richards has sold out to someone. Now the Japs have arrived. Richards must have got in touch with them somehow.”

He checked his gun. Without doubt they would move the ship at once. Every minute they stayed was dangerous. And that meant that unless he could do something promptly, they would be out on the Sea of Japan headed for a prison camp or death.

Turk crossed the room in a stride and peered out the port. A Jap seaman was opening the valves to get steam into the winch, another had put down his rifle and was clearing a line that had become fouled with some tackle. They would be casting off in a matter of minutes.