Sword in Sheath (6 page)

“As far as it lies within my power to do so I shall follow where he led, yes.”

“And you, my friends.” Hakroun addressed Kane. “You, too, are dealers in gems?”

The American shook his head. “No. We are hunting for a lost countryman of ours. He was the pilot on one of the bombers sent to raid this island. He and his plane never returned. There may be a chance that some survivor is still alive on an uncharted island — ”

Now the brown fingers were still for a second before they were hidden again in the soft curls of hair.

“An adventurous quest surely, and one which will occupy you for long. In these seas are many, many islands — some not on any map.”

“That is why we asked Mr. van Norreys to bring us to you,” Kane returned boldly. “We heard that you have,
sir, many business contacts in the islands and we had hopes that you might be able to aid us with some clue — ”

Abdul was giving the younger man his full attention now. But when Kane finished Hakroun was only sorrowful to give disappointment.

“It is true that the House of Hakroun has many contacts and sources of information through the southern seas. Only this dawn did one of my grandsons return from a protracted voyage to Amboina. But among the many tales he heard there were none concerning an American castaway. Land which may not be marked on your western-made maps is fully known to the Sea-Dykes and to my men also. And nowhere is there an unacccounted-for American. I fear your quest to be a fruitless one. Lost airplanes have plunged into the sea many times and, in their passing, left no mark upon the waters. I would that I could help you in this search, but I believe that no man living has the information that will aid you.”

“Thank you, sir, for your advice.” Kane was polite enough.

“You expect to follow it?” Were those eyes laughing at him?

“We cannot abandon our search so soon. There is always hope — ”

“Always hope, yes. How could we mortals live if it were not for hope — which is also sometimes a deadly demon leading men to full destruction.”

Kane put down his goblet. Was that a hint of threat? But Abdul had lost interest in him. The old Moro was turning now to Lorens, and something in the set of the Netherlander's shoulders argued that van Norreys had been waiting for just that.

“You have had a successful trip so far?” was Hakroun's opening move.

“As good as can be hoped for in the unsettled state of
the islands. The Japanese swept the strongboxes bare where they could I sail now to attempt to re-fasten old ties.”

“And did you tighten such a one when you visited the honorable Lao in Jolo?”

“He had some black coral — of fine quality. It is a novelty which may catch the favor of the American market where it is not yet widely known.”

“Black coral. But do you not find coral less of interest than say — rubies?” prodded AbduL

“I am a designer as well as a merchant. Much can be done with stones of lesser value. But have you rubies to sell, sir?”

Abdul appeared lost in thought for a moment, then he clicked his fingers at Kuran. From somewhere within his loose robes the man produced a lacquer box which he handed to his father. Hakroun twisted off the top and dipped out a long chain which supported a gem-set medallion. He handed it over to Lorens and settled back to await the Netherlander's reaction.

“Where did this come from?” Van Norreys’ voice was colorless and even.

“In times of war many treasures come to light from old hiding places. This was given to me for sale. Would the House of Norreys be interested? The stones are good — ”

“They are of oriental cut and would have to be re-cut for our western market. Also the Mani Mala and the Nararatna have no value abroad. Perhaps in India you could drive a good bargain.” Lorens handed back the flashing chain

Whether this firm refusal of his offering displeased Abdul or not, Kane could not guess. But within a very short time they were ushered out, suavely enough. When they stood in the road again Lorens kicked at a stone viciously.

“The old devil!” he snorted. “Trying to catch me like that! Did he think that I was so green in the trade? But I’d give quite a lot from a none too full purse to know where he lifted that — fourteenth- century work, every bit of it!”

“You mean that you think that necklace thing was stolen?” demanded Kane.

“I don't see how he could have gotten it any other way. Those things are guarded better than some kings’ lives — they mean the good or bad fortune of a whole house or dynasty. And suppose I had bought it, or even accepted it to sell on commission, and the real owner appeared. Phew!” He snapped thumb and finger together. “That would be the end of Norreys right there.”

Sam looked back at the wall of Abdul Hakroun's stronghold and spat out a sentence in a dialect which Kane had never heard. But Lorens answered with a curt laugh.

“That is to the point! ‘He is a tiger among young goats.’ Only today I do not wear either horns or hooves, no matter how brightly Hadji Abdul's stripes gleam!”

6

“HE WAS FROM THE FORBIDDEN LAND, TUAN!”

With the uneasy feeling that the old Moro trader had had the best of their encounter, the three from the
Sumba
trudged back toward the European quarter of Manado. Lorens suggested that it might be well to look up van Bleeker at the Harmonie Club, but Kane disagreed.

“Sam and I are only tourists. We'll have a reason for poking around in the native town. Hakroun can't be the only pebble on this beach. Maybe we can contact one of those famous turtle hunters who are supposed to know so much about out-of-the-way islands. I’d like to ask some leading questions — and some about the pious Hadji too!”

“That is my mission also. But I shall do the asking among my own countrymen. We may meet later at the club if you wish.” Lorens turned aside, and the Americans strolled on alone.

“Cigaretten?”

The thin pipe came from somewhere about their knees. Kane mechanically felt for the pack in his pocket, and a very small and very thin native boy watched that gesture with hungry and hopeful eyes.

“Cigarettes, is it? Okay.” Kane flipped a couple from the package into the dirty little paw.

Both the boy and his loot vanished as Sam shook his head reprovingly. “Will you never learn, Dutch? In about a half a second that kid'll be back with most of the town mooching for handouts, and they'll hound us the rest of the afternoon Cigarettes are treasures they're not going to allow to escape them.”

Fearing just such a development they quickened their pace and slid into a narrow lane between two nipathatched huts. Kane almost jostled a man hesitating there in the shadow, a man who dared to touch Sam's coat sleeve, a singularly bold move for a native.

Only this was no Malay, Moro, or ex-head-hunting Toradja from the interior. At his first hissed word Sam stopped short to face a Japanese.

“This is a small trader — on his beam ends,” Marusaki translated rapidly for Kane. “Wants to get out of here if he can manage to raise the price of a passage. He wants to show us what he has left for sale — ”

“What about it? Story ring true to you?”

Sam eyed the cringing man “Maybe eighty percent of it's okay. He's scared, clean through. I’d trust him as far as I could keep an eye on him. Says he just got in from the south and wants to get out of here — but quick. He's got the right idea at that — these islands are no place for his sort now — not if they want to keep their heads and their skins.”

“Let's see what he's got to offer then.”

The Japanese ducked into the least attractive of the two huts as if he had little liking for the open air of
Manado. Once inside he made a great show of hospitality, tugging out two boxes to serve as seats, then opening up a wicker hamper.

What he had to see was mostly worthless trash, odds and ends of island goods, tawdry and useless. But Sam made a sudden swoop into a muddle of small bits and came up with a large silver coin. He went to the doorway of the hut to inspect his find in the light.

“Hey, what year was it that our American tea clippers first blew into these islands, Dutch?”

“I don't know — back in the 1820s or ‘30s, I think Why?”

“Looks like I'm holding a little memento of those days. U.S. silver dollar — date 1840. Wonder where our friend picked this up?” The Nisei loosed a flood of Japanese on the trader while Kane took the coin.

Sam was right, it was a silver dollar from their own country, and fairly unworn too. How long had it been knocking around the islands? Ever since some Yankee skipper had parted with it perhaps a hundred years before?

“Where'd he say he got it?”

“He doesn't know. Was passed to him in trade somewhere south. He may be lying.” Sam shrugged. “It'd make a good lucky piece. I'm buying it.”

“Did you ask him about the southern islands?”

“That's a thought!” Again Sam launched into the hissing crackle of his ancestors’ native tongue, and his questions loosed a floodgate in reply. Kane caught the name ‘Hakroun’ repeated several times and never with either reverence or liking. Sam listened intently, interrupting now and again with other questions which acted upon the trader as might goads upon a maddened bull. But when the man seemed to be actually talked out, Sam took his wallet and counted out several bills. So in the end they left the little man bowing and hissing as if he had been
wound up by clockwork to perform only those two functions.

“What did he have to say?”

“Plenty. This Hakroun gent is practically running the trading hereabouts. Our friend back there did fairly well as long as the Japs were in power. But when they pulled out the old Moro took over — but good. The Hadji's frozen out most of the small traders now and has everything pretty much his own way. For one thing, he doesn't encourage any exploring expeditions to nose around south of Besi in the Soelas — ”

“Now I wonder why?”

“So do a lot of other people apparently. The consensus of opinion at present is that the old gentleman is onto something pretty big and intends to keep it in his own pocket.”

“Any suggestion as to what that something big might be?”

“Oh, there are several different ones, ranging from buried treasure to oil. But everyone is certain it is a rich find. Hakroun doesn't trouble to deal in anything less than millions. Anyway, he and his agents discourage southern travel. Where does that leave us?”

“If I know van Bleeker it leaves us preparing for a fight. I don't think the captain is going to honor any ‘No Trespassing’ signs if they interfere with his own plans — he's as much as said that already. But what about our own little problem of the missing man? That trader have any bright ideas on the subject?”

“He said that hundreds could be hiding out down there, there's room enough — ”

“Hiding out voluntarily, yes. But marooned involuntarily, I wonder. Hiding out — Does that expression give you any ideas now? Did he use just that term?”

“He did!”

Kane grinned. “Ironjaw might be amused atthat. ‘Hiding
out’, a very thought-provoking term. We had better do a little poking around down south too.”

“Haven't you always intended to?”

“Naturally. And now we have such a good excuse for being stubborn about it too!”

Beaming contentedly upon the world, as represented by the dust, smells and heat of Manado, they turned back toward the Harmonie Club and the company of Lorens, whom they discovered seated by himself at a table in the bar.

“Where's all the population?” Kane surveyed the somewhat bare room.

“Most of them are not back from captivity yet, I gather.” The Netherlander shut the notebook in which he had been scribbling. “The plantations have not begun to produce again, and the
Sumba
is one of the first privately owned vessels to touch this port since the war ended. Did you get a good look at the town?”

“We did some shopping. Show him your new luck piece, Sam.”

The Nisei rang the dollar on the table, and Lorens picked it up.

“We think it's a remainder from the clipper ship days — when the tea trade was on with China — lots of our ships in these waters then,” Kane explained.

But the Netherlander had taken out a jeweler's glass and was now examining one side of the coin closely.

“What is it? Secret writing or something?” asked Sam.

To their surprise Lorens was sober enough when he answered. “Almost that. In the first place this has been someone else's lucky piece. See this tiny hole — that was made for a ring — perhaps to suspend the coin from a watch chain. And there
is
something scratched on it — ”

“What?”

“The letters ‘R’ and ‘S’ and the numerals ‘1944’.”

“R and S — Rodney Safield!”

“Or maybe Rudolph Schmidt,” returned Sam to his companion's jubilation. “More than one man in this world has those two initials. Did his father say anything about his having such a luck charm?”

Kane tried to remember the details on that sheet of identification particulars they had received from Col. Thurston. But he was sure there had been no mention of such a coin.

“Coincidence is a strange thing,” commented Lorens. “You may not be right about this dollar — and then again it may be a real clue. Where did you get it?”

But Sam was already on his feet. “Clue or not, I’m going back and have another talk with that trader. If he thinks we mean business about this he may open up — ”

With Kane and Lorens at his heels, the ex-sergeant wove back through the hut maze to the shelter which had been a squatting place for the Japanese merchant. But now no one came in answer to Sam's hail, and when the three crowded into the dusky room it was to find it empty of both occupant and trade goods.

“Hi!” Kane jumped through the door and clamped hands on a small naked figure who wriggled as desperately as a fish for an instant, then hung limp and shivering in the American's grip. “He was peeking around the corner at us,” explained the captor. “Where has the trader gone?” he asked his captive in Coast-Malay.

Yellow-white half moons showed in the corners of wide frightened eyes as the small boy kept his attention on Kane's face. But he remained steadfastly dumb to all the urging of both Americans and even to the less excited coaxing of the Netherlander.

“Please — you wish to know something? I might help — ”

Braced by one hand against the wall of the deserted hut stood a straight-backed native. He wore drill
trousers as white and spotless as their own, but the side arch of his brown chest and the breadth of his shoulders were bare. There was no turban covering his close-clipped black hair, and he spoke in English, clearly but slowly, as if dragging the necessary words from the depths of memory.

“There was a trader here a little while ago,” Kane begaa He was trying to guess which island claimed this man for its own. The fellow was neither Arab nor Chinese, and with that height and build he was unlike any Filipino the American had seen so far. On the other hand he did not resemble a Moro or Solomon Islander. His wide, pleasantly smiling mouth with its unfiled white teeth was not stained the scarlet of a betel chewer, and his standard of personal cleanliness was manifestly high.

“A trader — here?” The stranger managed to suggest polite incredulity in an inoffensive fashion. “But this hut has been deserted for weeks. It has a bad name among the townspeople — they say that it has housed a demon.”

The small boy still in Kane's grasp spat out a frenzied string of words, then tore free from the American's relaxed hold, diving between the two huts and so out of reach. His screech left the tall native frowning.

“What did he say just then?” Kane wanted to know.

“That the demon returned but has gone again. So there has been someone here.” He slid into the hut, and Kane saw him making a thorough search of the one musty room.

“What was this trader, please? Moro, Arab, Chinese?” he asked as he came out with empty hands.

“He was Japanese and in a big hurry to get home,” Sam returned shortly.

Again those white teeth showed in a quick flash of smile. “If he was Japanese, it is easy to believe that he wished to return home. The islanders do not greatly love their late masters. But this man is necessary to you
now — yes?”

“Suppose you tell us first why you are so interested in our affairs.” Sam faced the taller man, his hands resting lightly on his hips, not too far from the weapon he had strapped on that morning as a matter of course.

“But certainly I will tell you. Because, sirs, I have been following you in the hope that I might be of service. I am Jasper Fortnight from American Samoa.”

“American Samoa — that's half the ocean away!” broke in Kane.

“Yes, it is indeed far from here. But in wartime many men travel to far places. I was mate of a trading schooner which was sunk by the Japanese in these waters. Now I wait for a ship to take me away again. I hold a mate's ticket, you understand.

“Meanwhile, here in Celebes I am clerk to Kasteen Lowe at the hotel. Your ship, the
Sumba,
is the first to touch this port in weeks. It is my hope to find a berth aboard her. So I followed you. I speak many island dialects, and I hoped that you might recommend me to the
Sumba
’s
captain. You will?”

“Suppose first you do us this service,” suggested Lorens. “Discover more about the present whereabouts of this Japanese trader.”

“Let me speak with his neighbors.” Fortnight started briskly toward the nearest occupied hut. “Many eyes mark all happenings in Manado, and all that passes here is known to at least a few.” He called a sentence or two through the hut doorway and after a long moment of silence was answered. But the speaker did not edge out into their sight, and it was plain that the occupants of the hut were none too well pleased to be so singled out.

Kane nudged Sam. “What dialect is he speaking?”

“I don't know — probably some local one. Quite helpful, isn't he? Just brimming over with good will and Boy Scoutishness — ”

Jasper came back in two strides. “Your trader has been here for two days. But no man bought from him or sold to him, and none saw him go — ”

“Actual or willful blindness?” asked Kane.

“That I do not know. Perhaps both. If so they will never admit it — ”

But he was interrupted by a murmur from the hut, and after listening intently, he threw out his hands in a little gesture of defeat.

“They say that that is all, that they know nothing of this man and to ask more is to arouse the wrath of the demon. They wish us to go away.”

“Well” — Lorens pushed up his helmet— “that is all. I can vouch for that. Not even torture would gain you more. Shall we go farther afield?”

“ Sure! He may have vanished in a puff of dust here but I don't believe that he'll head inland — not with the natives against him. The Toradjas were head-hunters once, and some of them may still have a hankering to try that ancestral sport The authorities wouldn't ask too many questions about a missing Jap. But if he went to sea surely someone down at the harbor saw him go.”

They started on, and Fortnight followed. Apparently he was not going to allow his chance for a berth on the
Sumba
to escape him. Kane glanced back at him once or twice, measuringly. The Samoan was friendly, and there was something likeable in that easy smile and unruffled poise. Whether he was a resourceful and energetic job hunter or a very smooth and accomplished liar was yet to be proved. Hakroun had this town in his pocket by all accounts, and this man might well be one of the old Moro's smarter operators.