VANDERDECKEN

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 529, 5 December 1928, Page 5

VANDERDECKEN

By

H. DE VERB STACPOOLE.

CHAPTER XVII.—THE SURPRISE. Hank, watching through the glass, reported: ‘'They're clawing on. There's only one Chink on the Junk, he's handing over parcels aud taking things aboard. You’e right, E.C., it's ho police jazz—it’s contraband, sure enough. Bend over the gunwale, you two, and pretend to be fishing. Now the launch is putting off back to the toast. Well, that settles it.” "Where are they out from?” said Hank. "Oh, Santabar Bara," said Caution, "sure swabs.” They watched the launch making hack to the coast, then they took to the oars and put back for the schooner. "Weil," said George, who was at the ffke lines, “it gets me how these sort of things are let pass by the law.” "Oh, that's nothing,” said Hank, w 'th a laugh. ‘Why, girls are disappearing every week in 'Frisco, they set inveigled into China Town and that's all. They get taken off to Cannon and sold as slaves to Mandarins or worse.” 'But how do the Chinke manage to set them out of America?” asked beorge. 'You’ve seen it.” said Candon. “You said there were two white men with those Chinese—that's how. The trafhc wouldn’t stand a minute without the help of whites. Money, that’s hat’s the mischief, money and the d capitalistic system that makes ™oney king—Lord. I want to get at fose chaps’ I'm sufferin’ to get at hose chaps." He stopped rowing, ant, equally excited, also rested on °® r till George cut in and they resumed. : came alongside the Wear Jack , hs the fires of sunset began to ,!l heyomj the peak of San Nicolas, don ° me down Below, boys," said CanA e Y followed him to the cabin, fin 6 ! 6 took their seats, while he i “ , an d lit a pipe. Then, with the j _ W in his mouth, he sat with his j rms resting on the table and his eyes ■ ®d straight before him. sn^s° Tge and ,he Rat Trap inventor j 'Poke not a word. They had come recognise B.C. as the better man in o j 1 of ways, and they had, uncon-, ously, or subconsciously chosen for their leader in this j usiness that very plainly j 2 ant life or death. They were j joout to attack a hornet’s nest, every Uni 1 Man-size and armed with a has 6 aatc het instead of a sting. They 1 a no side arms, nothing but the ! Wmfuf 3 ' ° Q th e leader everything uud depend, and thev felt they could "epend on Candon. V\eve got an hour and a-halt Rr ore „ we neet i stir,” suddenly spoke ■ "and I've got. Ihe plan of how Wor k this business all laid out in I

my head. Maybe you'll leave it at that, for I’ve taken notice that too much talking muddles things. You’re willing to take my word to go when the time comes and follow me?” “Yes,” said Hank. Candon slipped the old Waltham he wore from its chain and laid it on the table before him. ' “That being so,” he said, “I want half an hour's talk with you on something that’s got nothing to do with this business. Don't plit in any questions or say a word till I get through. For the last three days I’ve been keeping my head shut against my better feelings, and only for the fact that the whole three of us may be laid out before morning, I’d have gone on, may- ; be, keeping it shut against my will, Iso to say, for you are two of the whitest men I’ve ever fell in with. Boys, I’ve let you down cruel. I promised you the Dutchman and you shall have him, and I promised to lead you to where he’d stowed his takings, and that promise holds. All the same I’ve not been straight to you. I’ve got to make things straight, right away, or bust. That’s how I feel. Well, here’s the start. We’re after a chap by name of Vanderdecken; that’s not his name. The tom-fool newspapers put it on him. but let it hold for a minute whiles I tell you. This chap was no Dutchman; American born he was, of decent parents, but born wild, and took his hook to sea when he -wasn’t morn’ fourteen. Now seeing we’re hunting this chap, I want to give you his character ’s far as I can get it, and show you maybe he’s not such a shark as people have made out, and was born for something better than the inside of a penitentiary where he’s sure going when we have him lugged back to 'Frisco. "So. I'm telling you, he hadn't been at sea more’n a year when he saved two chaps' lives from drowning, and he hadn't been more'n three years when he got as fourth officer aboard a Cape Horner. After that he rose Steady, educating himself in sea prac-

tice and land ways, reading everything he could lay his claws on. Maybe it would have been better if he’d kept his eyes shut and worked along blind like most chaps. But he couldn't stop thinking. I reckon thinking ruins more men than drink. The world seemed all upside down to him with the rich bugs a-top same as the fleas on a dog’s back.” “So they are,” said Hank. “Heave ahead.” “Well,” went on the other, “he rose, not having any use for liquor and being a good practical seaman, till he got his master’s ticket and command of a full rigged packet in the Shireman line, then he lost his ship through no fault of his and got fired. The Shiremans had a down on him over stores he’d condemned as not fit for dogs, let alone able seamen, and they'd got wind he was a socialist, and they crabbed him all over the shipping companies’ offices. Y’know they’re all hand in glove with their secret reports and so on, and Vanderdecken couldn’t go into a company’s office unless it was to be shown out. Having to eat he went back to the foc’sle —that was in Liverpool, and worked his way to Frisco. From there he got to Nome and struck it rich at Klondyke and got robbed. Then he began to float up and down through more travrses than I’ve time to tell you of till the Big War came and he heard of the Lusitania. That drove him clean bughouse and he got across the pond and joined up with the Britishers in the submarine fight and got blown up in drifters till he was nearly deaf. Then back he came to ’Frisco, which was his port of choice, and more’n a year ago, he joins up with McGinnis in ■working the Heart of Ireland on all sorts of jobs down the coast, shark-fishing, sea-scraping and contraband. He was a pretty sick man, was Vanderdecken with the world and the way it had used him, but it wasn’t till prohibition came along that he rose. The hull place went dry and they chucked the liquor down the drains in Santa Barbara, all that wasn’t hid away in rich men’s cellars. Vanderdecken wasn’t a drinking man. but one day at Santa Barbara he saw a lot of mpney bugs in white ducks popping champagne corks on a yacht aud that blew him up. He went to Pat McGinnis and said he, ‘Look here, Pat, I’ve got a notion, let’s lay in wait for those fellows and throw their liquor overboard.' Pat i didn’t seem to see the use of that, nor how it would bring him profit, but he turned it over in* his thick head and the idea came to him of holding a yacht up and robbing it. He worked up the idea and put it before Vanderdecken who fell in with it like a fool, on the condition that the drink should be hove over. Vanderdecken wasn’t after plunder, but he’d gone bughouse ; on getting even with the champagne guys, and he had to fall in with the other and pretend he was. Then,; when everything was fixed up, Pat got cold feet, not from virtue but fright, and nothing would have beeu done if Vanderdecken hadn’t taken hold of the

business and gingered the chaps up. He took command of the whole business aud then the fun began, and when it began Vanderdecken found himself hs keen on taking the valuables as on dousing the drink. But there wasn’t much in it. D’you know for all the hullaballoo that’s been raised, only three yachts were raidqd. that’s a fact. It was a business that wouldn’t bear much repeating and only one yacht was really lucky, for the

fellow had his wife aboard and all her diamonds and jewels; anyhow, taking: it all together, the plunder didn’t amount to more’n ten or fifteen thousand dollars leaving the jewels aside, and they might be worth ten thousand. No knowing till they were | sold. But there was a lot of fiz.z and claret sent to hello, but you never heard of that. The yacht owners kept that dark, they didn’t want to be laughed at for one thing, and another.

the rich folk are mortally afeared of the poor folk suddenly rising and batting them over the head on the drink question, and I’ve just been thinking, boys, that when Vanderdecken’s led back to ’Frisco, there’ll be no penitentiary for him lest the rich man’s cellar business should be brought too much to notice, and the guys who are poor and dry may say, ‘Let’s do what Vanderdecken had the gjffs to do.’ However, after the last hold-up, the

Heart of Ireland made for the Bay of Whales, and Vanderdecken and McGinnis cached the takings, and Vanderdecken changed the cache unknown