The Greatest Works of Earl Derr Biggers (Illustrated Edition). Earl Derr Biggers

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      When they reached the police station, Hallet and the prosecutor seemed in high good humor. Kaohla sat in a corner, hopeless and defeated; John Quincy saw at a glance that the boy's secret was his no longer.

      "Introducing Mr. Brade," said Chan.

      "Ah," cried Hallet, "we're glad to see you, Mr. Brade. We'd been getting pretty worried about you."

      "Really, sir," said Brade, "I am completely at a loss—"

      "Sit down," ordered Hallet. The man sank into a chair. He too had a hopeless, defeated air. No one can appear more humble and beaten than a British civil servant, and this man had known thirty-six years of baking under the Indian sun, looked down on by the military, respected by none. Not only his mustache but his whole figure drooped "in saddened mood." Yet now and then, John Quincy noted, he flashed into life, a moment of self-assertion and defiance.

      "Where have you been, Mr. Brade?" Hallet inquired.

      "I have visited one of the other islands. Maui."

      "You went last Tuesday morning?"

      "Yes. On the same steamer that brought me back."

      "Your name was not on the sailing list," Hallet said.

      "No. I went under another name. I had—reasons."

      "Indeed?"

      The flash of life. "Just why am I here, sir?" He turned to the prosecutor. "Perhaps you will tell me that?"

      Greene nodded toward the detective. "Captain Hallet will enlighten you," he said.

      "You bet I will," Hallet announced. "As perhaps you know, Mr. Brade, Mr. Dan Winterslip has been murdered."

      Brade's washed-out eyes turned to John Quincy. "Yes," he said. "I read about it in a Hilo newspaper."

      "You didn't know it when you left last Tuesday morning?" Hallet asked.

      "I did not. I sailed without seeing a paper here."

      "Ah, yes. When did you see Mr. Dan Winterslip last?"

      "I never saw him."

      "What! Be careful, sir."

      "I never saw Dan Winterslip in my life."

      "All right. Where were you last Tuesday morning at twenty minutes past one?"

      "I was asleep in my room at the Reef and Palm Hotel. I'd retired at nine-thirty, as I had to rise early in order to board my boat. My wife can verify that."

      "A wife's testimony, Mr. Brade, is not of great value—"

      Brade leaped to his feet. "Look here, sir! Do you mean to insinuate—"

      "Take it easy," said Hallet smoothly. "I have a few matters to call to your attention, Mr. Brade. Mr. Dan Winterslip was murdered at one-twenty or thereabouts last Tuesday morning. We happen to know that in his youth he served as first officer aboard the Maid of Shiloh, a blackbirder. The master of that vessel had the same name as yourself. An investigation of your room at the Reef and Palm—"

      "How dare you!" cried Brade. "By what right—"

      "I am hunting the murderer of Dan Winterslip," broke in Hallet coolly. "And I follow the trail wherever it leads. In your room I found a letter from the British Consul here addressed to you, and informing you that Winterslip was alive and in Honolulu. I also found this tin of Corsican cigarettes. Just outside the living-room door of Winterslip's house, we picked up the stub of a Corsican cigarette. It's a brand not on sale in Honolulu."

      Brade had dropped back into his chair, and was staring in a dazed way at the tin box in Hallet's hand. Hallet indicated the Hawaiian boy in the corner. "Ever see this lad before, Mr. Brade?" Brade nodded.

      "You had a talk with him last Sunday night on the beach?"

      "Yes."

      "The boy's told us all about it. He read in the paper that you were coming to Honolulu. His father was a confidential servant in Dan Winterslip's employ and he himself was brought up in the Winterslip household. He could make a pretty good guess at your business with Winterslip, and he figured you'd be pleased to lay hands on this ohia wood box. In his boyhood he'd seen it in a trunk in the attic of Winterslip's San Francisco house. He went down to the President Tyler and arranged with a friend aboard that boat, the quartermaster, to break into the house and steal the box. When he saw you last Sunday night he told you he'd have the box as soon as the President Tyler got in, and he arranged to sell it to you for a good sum. Am I right so far, Mr. Brade?"

      "You are quite right," said Brade.

      "The initials on the box are T. M. B." Hallet persisted. "They are your initials, are they not?"

      "They happen to be," said Brade. "But they were also the initials of my father. My father died aboard ship in the South Seas many years ago, and that box was stolen from his cabin after his death. It was stolen by the first officer of the Maid of Shiloh—by Mr. Dan Winterslip."

      For a moment no one spoke. A cold shiver ran down the spine of John Quincy Winterslip and a hot flush suffused his cheek. Why, oh, why, had he strayed so far from home? In Boston he traveled in a rut, perhaps, but ruts were safe, secure. There no one had ever brought a charge such as this against a Winterslip, no whisper of scandal had ever sullied the name. But here Winterslips had run amuck, and there was no telling what would next be dragged into the light.

      "I think, Mr. Brade," said the prosecutor slowly, "you had better make a full statement."

      Brade nodded. "I intend to do so. My case against Winterslip is not complete and I should have preferred to remain silent for a time. But under the circumstances, of course I must speak out. I'll smoke, if you don't mind." He took a cigarette from his case and lighted it. "I'm a bit puzzled just how to begin. My father disappeared from England in the 'seventies, leaving my mother and me to shift for ourselves. For a time we heard nothing of him, then letters began to arrive from various points in Australia and the South Seas. Letters with money in them, money we badly needed. I have since learned that he had gone into the blackbirding trade; it is nothing to be proud of, God knows, but I like to recall in his favor that he did not entirely abandon his wife and boy.

      "In the 'eighties we got word of his death. He died aboard the Maid of Shiloh and was buried on the island of Apiang in the Gilbert Group—buried by Dan Winterslip, his first officer. We accepted the fact of his death, the fact of no more letters with remittances, and took up our struggle again. Six months later we received, from a friend of my father in Sydney, a brother captain, a most amazing letter.

      "This letter said that, to the writer's certain knowledge, my father had carried a great deal of money in his cabin on the Maid of Shiloh. He had done no business with banks, instead he had had this strong box made of ohia wood. The man who wrote us said that he had seen the inside of it, and that it contained jewelry and a large quantity of gold. My father had also shown him several bags of green hide, containing gold coins from many countries. He estimated that there must have been close to twenty thousand pounds, in all. Dan Winterslip, the letter said, had brought the Maid of Shiloh back to Sydney and turned over to the proper authorities my father's clothing and personal effects, and a scant ten pounds in money. He СКАЧАТЬ