75 лучших рассказов / 75 Best Short Stories. Коллектив авторов

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СКАЧАТЬ was aroused from this by a whisper behind me. ‘Here’s a quiet place,’ said the voice. ‘Sit down, and we can talk it over in safety.’

      Glancing through a chink between two colossal chests, I saw that the passengers who had joined us at the last moment were standing at the other side of the pile. They had evidently failed to see me as I crouched in the shadow of the boxes. The one who had spoken was a tall and very thin man with a blue-black beard and a colourless face. His manner was nervous and excited. His companion was a short, plethoric little fellow, with a brisk and resolute air. He had a cigar in his mouth, and a large ulster slung over his left arm. They both glanced round uneasily, as if to ascertain whether they were alone. ‘This is just the place,’ I heard the other say. They sat down on a bale of goods with their backs turned towards me, and I found myself, much against my will, playing the unpleasant part of eavesdropper to their conversation.

      ‘Well, Muller,’ said the taller of the two, ‘we’ve got it aboard right enough.’

      ‘Yes,’ assented the man whom he had addressed as Muller; ‘it’s safe aboard.’

      ‘It was rather a near go.’

      ‘It was that, Flannigan.’

      ‘It wouldn’t have done to have missed the ship.’

      ‘No; it would have put our plans out.’

      ‘Ruined them entirely,’ said the little man, and puffed furiously at his cigar for some minutes.

      ‘I’ve got it here,’ he said at last.

      ‘Let me see it.’

      ‘Is no one looking?’

      ‘No; they are nearly all below.’

      ‘We can’t be too careful where so much is at stake,’ said Muller, as he uncoiled the ulster[159] which hung over his arm, and disclosed a dark object which he laid upon the deck. One glance at it was enough to cause me to spring to my feet with an exclamation of horror. Luckily they were so engrossed in the matter on hand that neither of them observed me. Had they turned their heads they would infallibly have seen my pale face glaring at them over the pile of boxes.

      From the first moment of their conversation a horrible misgiving had come over me. It seemed more than confirmed as I gazed at what lay before me. It was a little square box made of some dark wood, and ribbed with brass. I suppose it was about the size of a cubic foot. It reminded me of a pistol-case, only it was decidedly higher. There was an appendage to it, however, on which my eyes were riveted, and which suggested the pistol itself rather than its receptacle. This was a trigger-like arrangement upon the lid, to which a coil of string was attached. Beside this trigger there was a small square aperture through the wood. The tall man, Flannigan, as his companion called him, applied his eye to this and peered in for several minutes with an expression of intense anxiety upon his face.

      ‘It seems right enough,’ he said at last.

      ‘I tried not to shake it,’ said his companion.

      ‘Such delicate things need delicate treatment. Put in some of the needful, Muller.’

      The shorter man fumbled in his pocket for some time, and then produced a small paper packet. He opened this, and took out of it half a handful of whitish granules, which he poured down through the hole. A curious clicking noise followed from the inside of the box, and both the men smiled in a satisfied way.

      ‘Nothing much wrong there,’ said Flannigan.

      ‘Right as a trivet,’ answered his companion.

      ‘Look out! here’s some one coming. Take it down to our berth. It wouldn’t do to have any one suspecting what our game is, or, worse still, have them fumbling with it, and letting it off by mistake.’

      ‘Well, it would come to the same, whoever let it off,’ said Muller.

      ‘They’d be rather astonished if they pulled the trigger,’ said the taller, with a sinister laugh. ‘Ha, ha! fancy their faces! It’s not a bad bit of workmanship, I flatter myself.’

      ‘No,’ said Muller. ‘I hear it is your own design, every bit of it, isn’t it?’

      ‘Yes, the spring and the sliding shutter are my own.’

      ‘We should take out a patent.’

      And the two men laughed again with a cold, harsh laugh, as they took up the little brass-bound package and concealed it in Muller’s voluminous overcoat.

      ‘Come down, and we’ll stow it in our berth,’ said Flannigan. ‘We won’t need it until tonight, and it will be safe there.’

      His companion assented, and the two went arm-in-arm along the deck and disappeared down the hatchway, bearing the mysterious little box away with them. The last words I heard were a muttered injunction from Flannigan to carry it carefully, and avoid knocking it against the bulwarks.

      How long I remained sitting on that coil of rope I shall never know. The horror of the conversation I had just overheard was aggravated by the first sinking qualms of sea-sickness. The long roll of the Atlantic was beginning to assert itself over both ship and passengers. I felt prostrated in mind and in body, and fell into a state of collapse, from which I was finally aroused by the hearty voice of our worthy quartermaster[160].

      ‘Do you mind moving out of that, sir?’ he said. ‘We want to get this lumber cleared off the deck.’

      His bluff manner and ruddy, healthy face seemed to be a positive insult to me in my present condition. Had I been a courageous or a muscular man I could have struck him. As it was, I treated the honest sailor to a melodramatic scowl, which seemed to cause him no small astonishment, and strode past him to the other side of the deck. Solitude was what I wanted – solitude in which I could brood over the frightful crime which was being hatched before my very eyes. One of the quarter-boats was hanging rather low down upon the davits. An idea struck me, and, climbing on the bulwarks, I stepped into the empty boat and lay down in the bottom of it. Stretched on my back, with nothing but the blue sky above me, and an occasional view of the mizzen as the vessel rolled, I was at least alone with my sickness and my thoughts.

      I tried to recall the words which had been spoken in the terrible dialogue I had overheard. Would they admit of any construction but the one which stared me in the face? My reason forced me to confess that they would not. I endeavoured to array the various facts which formed the chain of circumstantial evidence, and to find a flaw in it; but no, not a link was missing. There was the strange way in which our passengers had come aboard, enabling them to evade any examination of their luggage. The very name of ‘Flannigan’ smacked of Fenianism, while ‘Muller’ suggested nothing but Socialism and murder. Then their mysterious manner; their remark that their plans would have been ruined had they missed the ship; their fear of being observed; last, but not least, the clenching evidence in the production of the little square box with the trigger, and their grim joke about the face of the man who should let it off by mistake – could these facts lead to any conclusion other than that they were the desperate emissaries of some body, political or otherwise, and intended to sacrifice themselves, their fellow-passengers, and the ship, in one great holocaust? The whitish granules which I had СКАЧАТЬ