El Diablo Part 46

"That means we've got to be off," exclaimed one of the men. "How about going over in that speed-boat of yours?"

Gregory nodded. "That's what I was figuring on," he said. "I'm going to send a radio to all my boats within a thirty-mile radius of the island to reinforce the fleet and mix it with Mascola off the h.e.l.l-Hole Isthmus on the north side. While they're busy on that side, it will leave us a clear field on the other."

d.i.c.kie's eyes opened wide at his words. As they moved away together in the direction of the cannery, she cried: "I don't understand at all.

Aren't you going to help the boys out?"

Gregory shook his head and the grim lines tightened about his mouth.

"No," he answered. "Not this time. That is what Rock, Bandrist and Mascola think I am going to do. But I'm going to fool them. There's something back of all this that we can only guess at now. Diablo has a secret our fathers died to learn. I'm sure of it now. To-night I'm going to find out what it is."

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE ISLAND'S PRISONER

Diablo was steeped in moonlight. For miles about the sea gleamed like a mirror. The grim mountains which guarded the sh.o.r.e were robed in saffron and checkered with black by the dark shadows of the towering peaks as they fell athwart the hillsides and mingled with the darkness which hugged the canyons.

From a small cave high up on a rocky canyon wall the figure of a man emerged and crept silently into the shadows. Picking his way with great caution along a winding sheep-trail, he reached the summit of the hill and looked about. The damp sea air fanned his long hair and caused him to look in the direction of the fleecy white clouds which were creeping upward from the horizon. Soon there would be fog. Then he could continue on his way to the brackish spring on the bluff-side overlooking the south sh.o.r.e. From there it was only a stone's throw to the beach where the mussels and abalones clung so thickly to the rocks.

The thought of the raw sh.e.l.lfish sickened him. For days he had had nothing else to eat. Shrinking closer into the shadows of the sage and cactus, he waited for the fog. Then he could go on on his nightly journey. How many months had he been a prisoner on El Diablo? He had lost all track of time. But what did it matter? Soon he would be dead.

For warm food and a drink of pure water he would almost give himself up now.

Borne on the fog-wind came cries and shouts from the other side of the island. Perhaps help was coming at last. But no, it was only the fishermen fighting among themselves off the h.e.l.l-Hole. He had heard them many times before across the narrow isthmus. They would only go away as they had always done and leave him to starve. The faint pulsing of a motor launch directed his attention to the sea.

In the paling moonlight, a gray blot clouded the water, moved slowly among the rocks and merged with the shadows. It was the same boat he had seen so often in the past. Always it came to the island at night, running dark. Once in the bright moonlight he had seen men land on the rocks and walk up the beach to a large cave which extended far into the cliff. As he had huddled closer into the scant shadows of the rock-mottled ledge, other men had come down the trail from the island and he had been forced to slide into the chilling waters of a gra.s.s-grown pool to escape detection. Mother of G.o.d, it had been a narrow escape.

The fog thickened and he continued on his way to the spring. Creeping noiselessly through the brush he reached the trail which led downward to the beach. Then he stopped and listened. The soft grating of a muted chain caused him to drop lower in the gra.s.s and draw back. Silently he retraced his steps until he reached the cover of the heavier brush which fringed the hillside.

The strange vessel was dropping anchor again in the little cove. He dared not run the risk of going farther down the trail. There were mussels and abalones around the next point. He would get them. By that time perhaps the men would be gone and he could return by the spring.

The fog settled close about him, blinding his eyes and clinging to his s.h.i.+vering body. For a moment he stopped and sucked thirstily at the wet gra.s.s. Then he crawled on.

Planing high on the glistening waves, the _Richard_ sped onward across the moonlit sea in the direction of El Diablo. At the wheel, Kenneth Gregory strove to concentrate his mind upon the quest which lay before him. But another thought obtruded with ever recurring frequency. Why had he permitted d.i.c.kie Lang to accompany the party to the island? There would be danger. There was always danger at El Diablo. Landing upon the island would be an added risk if Hawkins' suspicions had any grounds for fact. The girl's threat that she would withdraw her support from the cannery if not permitted to go with the expedition, was only a bluff: Why had he not remained firm? He knew the answer. There was a look in the girl's eyes which he could not withstand. Something in her voice which left him powerless to refuse as she had said:

"Our fathers were not afraid. They died in one boat to learn Diablo's secret. We've fought together from the start. Don't leave me at the finish." She might have added: "If they get you, they might as well get me too."

But her eyes told him that. Well, it was too late now to change his mind. The girl was here and it was up to him to leave her in a place of safety if such could be found upon the island. While Hawkins conferred with his two friends, Gregory laid his plans.

He would leave d.i.c.kie with the _Richard_. She had her automatic and a rifle. They would lay in close to sh.o.r.e on the south sh.o.r.e, opposite the h.e.l.l-Hole. The island was narrowest there and it was generally in that vicinity that things had happened oftenest in the past. That was where the _Gray Ghost_ put in, the place too where his father and Bill Lang had met their death. With the fis.h.i.+ng fleet fighting Mascola's boats on the north side the opposite sh.o.r.e of the island might not be held in such rigid surveillance.

His thoughts turned again to the girl by his side. The rock-shadowed coves would afford a fair anchorage for the _Richard_, even on such a night as this. There d.i.c.kie could see without being seen. Should danger threaten while the landing party were ash.o.r.e, she must put to sea. He must make that perfectly clear to her at once.

As he expected, he encountered stubborn resistance from d.i.c.kie Lang. If there was anything to be found out, she wanted to be there to see it.

She was not afraid. She could shoot as well as a bunch of newspapermen.

What was the idea of leaving her clear out of it? Gregory smiled at her slurring reference to Hawkins' two friends. Then he reflected that what the girl did not know concerning the real object of the mission to Diablo would cause her no worry. Until the party landed at least, he was in command of the expedition. And orders must be obeyed.

"You'll have to do as I say," he concluded. "Whether you like it or not."

d.i.c.kie's lip curled and she turned her head away to hide her face. "All right," she answered. "I'll stay on the _Richard_." To herself, she added: "But I'll use my own judgment when it comes to running away."

In the silence of the fog the prisoner of El Diablo crept warily on.

Deep ravines laced his path and yawned close about the trail. A misstep would hurl him to the bottom of the rock-lined gorge which was swallowed up in the mists at his feet. Suddenly he stopped and threw himself to full length on the ground. Far above him the solid whiteness of the fog wall was broken by irregular flashes of blue. To his ears came the sound of snapping spluttering flames.

Covering his head with his arms, he crossed himself. The devil was speaking from the hilltop. On two other occasions he had heard the crackling of the flames near the old sheep-herder's shack on the crest of the hill. He had taken the wrong trail. Had gone too far. Worming his way down the path he fled from the flashes of blue light.

For some time he retraced his steps in silence, thanking his saints that the devil had spoken to warn him from the spot. Then the soft breathing of a motor-launch caused him to stop and listen. He was again at the bluff-side. Soon he would reach the rocks. The echoes of the motor-boat died suddenly away and he groped his way to the edge of the cliff and scrambled down the trail.

"You'd better take her now. The fog's getting pretty thick and I don't know the sh.o.r.e-line along here."

d.i.c.kie Lang took the wheel.

"I don't know it any too well myself," she admitted. "We'll have to go mighty slow and feel our way along."

Throttling to quarter-speed they skirted the south sh.o.r.e of the island and nosed their way along the coast. At length the girl suggested a halt.

"We ought to be nearly up to the h.e.l.l-Hole Isthmus by now," she whispered. "On the beach along here there should be a lot of tide-water caves if we're where I think. Around the next point is the goose-neck.

We'd better go ash.o.r.e and have a look. We may be too far down already."

Gregory agreed.

"I'll take Hawkins and Slade and row ash.o.r.e," he said. "Billings can stay with you on the launch."

d.i.c.kie's objections were quickly overruled and the canvas-wrapped anchor chain was lowered into the water while the dory was pulled alongside.

"Look along the base of the cliff for the caves," cautioned the girl in a low voice. "And watch out for your oars. Keep them in the water and be sure the wrappings fit tight in the locks."

Gregory nodded and took his place in the skiff.

"We'll be back in five minutes," he said. Then he shoved the dory out into the fog.

From the ledge of rock which bordered the cove, the half-starved man pulled the razor-backed mussels from the sea-gra.s.s and broke them open with his pocket-knife. For some time he ate rapidly. Then he ceased pulling at the sh.e.l.lfish and listened. A boat was coming to anchor in the cove. He could hear the soft slip of the chain through the chaulks.

Perhaps they would land on the beach. Then he would be trapped on the ledge until they had gone.

Picking his way over the barnacled rocks he started for the beach. As he climbed from the ledge, he stopped suddenly and clung to the rocks. On the beach at his feet, and only a few feet away, he heard the pebbles grate beneath the bow of a boat. The men were already landing. Staring into the opaque wall of white, he saw it clouded by three dark blots.

Followed the rattle of stones, the soft crunch of the sand dying slowly away into silence. The men had gone on up the beach.

The man who clung to the rocks climbed noiselessly to the sand, his brain burning with one great idea. While the visitors were gone from the place he would steal their boat. In the fog no one could find him. He could row about the island and be picked up at sea in the morning by some fis.h.i.+ng-boat. The great chance had come to him at last.

Perhaps the men had left another to guard the boat. The thought caused him to draw his pocket-knife. Grasping it tightly in his shaking fingers, he crawled silently over the wet sand, feeling for the sides of the dory with his extended arm.