The Black Bag - Louis Joseph Vance (best reads of all time txt) 📗

settling his forefinger on

the trigger, Kirkwood beamed with pure enjoyment. He found the deference

of the older man, tempered though it was by his indomitable swagger,

refreshing in the extreme.

 

“A little appreciation isn’t exactly out of place, come to think of it,”

he commented, adding, with an eye for the captain: “Stryker, you bold, bad

butterfly, have you got a gun concealed about your unclean person?”

 

The captain shook visibly with contrition. “No, Mr. Kirkwood,” he managed

to reply in a voice singularly lacking in his wonted bluster.

 

“Say ‘sir’!” suggested Kirkwood.

 

“No, Mr. Kirkwood, sir,” amended Stryker eagerly.

 

“Now come round here and let’s have a look at you. Please stay where you

are, Calendar…. Why, Captain, you’re shivering from head to foot! Not ill

are you, you wag? Step over to the table there, Stryker, and turn out your

pockets; turn ‘em inside out and let’s see what you carry in the way of

offensive artillery. And, Stryker, don’t be rash; don’t do anything you’d

be sorry for afterwards.”

 

“No fear of that,” mumbled the captain, meekly shambling toward the table,

and, in his anxiety to give no cause for unpleasantness, beginning to empty

his pockets on the way.

 

“Don’t forget the ‘sir,’ Stryker. And, Stryker, if you happen to think of

anything in the line of one of your merry quips or jests, don’t strain

yourself holding in; get it right off your chest, and you’ll feel better.”

 

Kirkwood chuckled, in high conceit with himself, watching Calendar out of

the corner of his eye, but with his attention centered on the infinitely

diverting spectacle afforded by Stryker, whose predacious hands were

trembling violently as, one by one, they brought to light the articles of

which he had despoiled his erstwhile victim.

 

“Come, come, Stryker! Surely you can think of something witty, surely you

haven’t exhausted the possibilities of that almanac joke! Couldn’t you

ring another variation on the lunatic wheeze? Don’t hesitate out of

consideration for me, Captain; I’m joke proof—perhaps you’ve noticed?”

 

Stryker turned upon him an expression at once ludicrous, piteous and

hateful. “That’s all, sir,” he snarled, displaying his empty palms in token

of his absolute tractability.

 

“Good enough. Now right about face—quick! Your back’s prettier than your

face, and besides, I want to know whether your hip-pockets are empty. I’ve

heard it’s the habit of you gentry to pack guns in your clothes…. None?

That’s all right, then. Now roost on the transom, over there in the corner,

Stryker, and don’t move. Don’t let me hear a word from you. Understand?”

 

Submissively the captain retired to the indicated spot. Kirkwood turned

to Calendar; of whose attitude, however, he had not been for an instant

unmindful.

 

“Won’t you sit down, Mr. Calendar?” he suggested pleasantly. “Forgive me

for keeping you waiting.”

 

For his own part, as the adventurer dropped passively into his chair,

Kirkwood stepped over Mulready and advanced to the middle of the cabin, at

the same time thrusting Calendar’s revolver into his own coat pocket. The

other, Mulready’s, he nursed significantly with both hands, while he stood

temporarily quiet, surveying the fleshy face of the prime factor in the

intrigue.

 

A quaint, grim smile played about the American’s lips, a smile a little

contemptuous, more than a little inscrutable. In its light Calendar grew

restive and lost something of his assurance. His feet shifted uneasily

beneath the table and his dark eyes wavered, evading Kirkwood’s. At length

he seemed to find the suspense unendurable.

 

“Well?” he demanded testily. “What d’you want of me?”

 

“I was just wondering at you, Calendar. In the last few days you’ve given

me enough cause to wonder, as you’ll admit.”

 

The adventurer plucked up spirit, deluded by Kirkwood’s pacific tone. “I

wonder at you, Mr. Kirkwood,” he retorted. “It was good of you to save my

life and—”

 

“I’m not so sure of that! Perhaps it had been more humane—”

 

Calendar owned the touch with a wry grimace. “But I’m damned if I

understand this high-handed attitude of yours!” he concluded heatedly.

 

“Don’t you?” Kirkwood’s humor became less apparent, the smile sobering.

“You will,” he told the man, adding abruptly: “Calendar, where’s your

daughter?”

 

The restless eyes sought the companionway.

 

“Dorothy,” the man lied spontaneously, without a tremor, “is with friends

in England. Why? Did you want to see her?”

 

“I rather expected to.”

 

“Well, I thought it best to leave her home, after all.”

 

“I’m glad to hear she’s in safe hands,” commented Kirkwood.

 

The adventurer’s glance analyzed his face. “Ah,” he said slowly, “I see.

You followed me on Dorothy’s account, Mr. Kirkwood?”

 

“Partly; partly on my own. Let me put it to you fairly. When you forced

yourself upon me, back there in London, you offered me some sort of

employment; when I rejected it, you used me to your advantage for the

furtherance of your purposes (which I confess I don’t understand), and made

me miss my steamer. Naturally, when I found myself penniless and friendless

in a strange country, I thought again of your offer; and tried to find you,

to accept it.”

 

“Despite the fact that you’re an honest man, Kirkwood?” The fat lips

twitched with premature enjoyment.

 

“I’m a desperate man to-night, whatever I may have been yesterday.” The

young man’s tone was both earnest and convincing. “I think I’ve shown that

by my pertinacity in hunting you down.”

 

“Well—yes.” Calendar’s thick fingers caressed his lips, trying to hide the

dawning smile.

 

“Is that offer still open?”

 

His nonchalance completely restored by the very na�vet� of the proposition,

Calendar laughed openly and with a trace of irony. The episode seemed to be

turning out better than he had anticipated. Gently his mottled fat fingers

played about his mouth and chins as he looked Kirkwood up and down.

 

“I’m sorry,” he replied, “that it isn’t—now. You’re too late, Kirkwood;

I’ve made other arrangements.”

 

“Too bad.” Kirkwood’s eyes narrowed. “You force me to harsher measures,

Calendar.”

 

Genuinely diverted, the adventurer laughed a second time, tipping back

in his chair, his huge frame shaking with ponderous enjoyment. “Don’t do

anything you’d be sorry for,” he parroted, sarcastical, the young man’s

recent admonition to the captain.

 

“No fear, Calendar. I’m just going to use my advantage, which you won’t

dispute,”—the pistol described an eloquent circle, gleaming in the

lamplight—“to levy on you a little legitimate blackmail. Don’t be alarmed;

I shan’t hit you any harder than I have to.”

 

“What?” stammered Calendar, astonished. “What in hell are you driving

at?”

 

“Recompense for my time and trouble. You’ve cost me a pretty penny, first

and last, with your nasty little conspiracy—whatever it’s all about. Now,

needing the money, I purpose getting some of it back. I shan’t precisely

rob you, but this is a hold-up, all right…. Stryker,” reproachfully, “I

don’t see my pearl pin.”

 

“I got it ‘ere,” responded the sailor hastily, fumbling with his tie.

 

“Give it me, then.” Kirkwood held out his hand and received the trinket.

Then, moving over to the table, the young man, while abating nothing of

his watchfulness, sorted out his belongings from the mass of odds and ends

Stryker had disgorged. The tale of them was complete; the captain had

obeyed him faithfully. Kirkwood looked up, pleased.

 

“Now see here, Calendar; this collection of truck that I was robbed of by

this resurrected Joe Miller here, cost me upwards of a hundred and fifty.

I’m going to sell it to you at a bargain—say fifty dollars, two hundred

and fifty francs.”

 

“The juice you are!” Calendar’s eyes opened wide, partly in admiration.

“D’you realize that this is next door to highway robbery, my young friend?”

 

“High-seas piracy, if you prefer,” assented Kirkwood with entire

equanimity. “I’m going to have the money, and you’re going to give it up.

The transaction by any name would smell no sweeter, Calendar. Come—fork

over!”

 

“And if I refuse?”

 

“I wouldn’t refuse, if I were you.”

 

“Why not?”

 

“The consequences would be too painful.”

 

“You mean you’d puncture me with that gun?”

 

“Not unless you attack or attempt to follow me. I mean to say that the

Belgian police are notoriously a most efficient body, and that I’ll make

it my duty and pleasure to introduce ‘em to you, if you refuse. But you

won’t,” Kirkwood added soothingly, “will you, Calendar?”

 

“No.” The adventurer had become suddenly thoughtful. “No, I won’t. ‘Glad to

oblige you.”

 

He tilted his chair still farther back, straightening out his elephantine

legs, inserted one fat hand into his trouser pocket and with some

difficulty extracted a combined bill-fold and coin-purse, at once heavy

with gold and bulky with notes. Moistening thumb and forefinger, “How’ll

you have it?” he inquired with a lift of his cunning eyes; and when

Kirkwood had advised him, slowly counted out four fifty-franc notes, placed

them near the edge of the table, and weighted them with five ten-franc

pieces. And, “‘That all?” he asked, replacing the pocket-book.

 

“That will be about all. I leave you presently to your unholy devices, you

and that gay dog, over there.” The captain squirmed, reddening. “Just by

way of precaution, however, I’ll ask you to wait in here till I’m off.”

Kirkwood stepped backwards to the door of the captain’s room, opened it and

removed the key from the inside. “Please take Mulready in with you,” he

continued. “By the time you get out, I’ll be clear of Antwerp. Please don’t

think of refusing me,—I really mean it!”

 

The latter clause came sharply as Calendar seemed to hesitate, his weary,

wary eyes glimmering with doubt. Kirkwood, watching him as a cat her prey,

intercepted a lightning-swift sidelong glance that shifted from his face

to the port lockers, forward. But the fat adventurer was evidently to a

considerable degree deluded by the very child-like simplicity of Kirkwood’s

attitude. If the possibility that his altercation with Mulready had been

overheard, crossed his mind, Calendar had little choice other than to

accept the chance. Either way he moved, the risk was great; if he refused

to be locked in the captain’s room, there was the danger of the police,

to which Kirkwood had convincingly drawn attention; if he accepted the

temporary imprisonment, he took a risk with the gladstone bag. On the other

hand, he had estimated Kirkwood’s honesty as thorough-going, from their

first interview; he had appraised him as a gentleman and a man of honor.

And he did not believe the young man knew, after all … Perplexed, at

length he chose the smoother way, and with an indulgent lifting of eyebrows

and fat shoulders, rose and waddled over to Mulready.

 

“Oh, all right,” he conceded with deep toleration in his tone for the

idiosyncrasies of youth. “It’s all the same to me, beau.” He laughed a

nervous laugh. “Come along and lend us a hand, Stryker.”

 

The latter glanced timidly at Kirkwood, his eyes pleading for leave to

move; which Kirkwood accorded with an imperative nod and a fine flourish of

the revolver. Promptly the captain, sprang to Calendar’s assistance; and

between the two of them, the one taking Mulready’s head, the other his

feet, they lugged him quickly into the stuffy little state-room. Kirkwood,

watching and following to the threshold, inserted the key.

 

“One word more,” he counseled, a hand on the knob. “Don’t forget I’ve

warned you what’ll happen if you try to break even with me.”

 

“Never fear, little one!” Calendar’s laugh was nervously cheerful. “The

Lord knows you’re welcome.”

 

“Thank you ‘most to death,” responded Kirkwood politely. “Good-by—and

good-by to you, Stryker. ‘Glad to have humored your desire to meet me