He had not dared to send a longer message, and, of necessity, it had left a good deal to Ted’s imagination. But of all the men who had followed him unhesitatingly in the past, Ted Jerningham had been always the quickest on the uptake, and he soon saw that his confidence had not been misplaced. Ted had evidently realised that to follow steadily would arouse suspicion, and was laying his plans accordingly. He overhauled them like an express train, passed forty yards to starboard, circled across their bow, and came dashing back. Then away at a tangent for half a mile or so, only to shoot back and stop apparently with engine trouble.
The sea was like a millpond, and as the Gadfly passed the now silent motorboat the sounds of a gramophone were plainly audible from it. Obviously someone with a racing motorboat joyriding with a girl, reflected the skipper as he paced the bridge; and forthwith dismissed the matter from his mind. He had other more important things to think of, and the first was the exact object of this trip. That the benevolent Mr. Robinson had hired the Gadfly from its owner to take two invalids to Madeira he knew, but he wasn’t quite satisfied. The method of bringing the invalids on board had seemed so unnecessarily secretive. However, as is the way of men who go down to the sea in ships, his nature was not curious. He was there to carry out orders, and mind his own business—not other people’s. Still, he couldn’t help wondering. And had he seen the occupation of one of those invalids at the moment he would have wondered still more. For Drummond, having found a cake of soap on the basin beside his bunk, was carefully cutting it into small cubes with the blade of a safety-razor. Though perhaps that is what one would expect from a madman.
A sudden hoarse scream of fear some five minutes later made the Captain jump to the side of the bridge. Two sailors were rushing along the deck as if pursued by the devil, and he roared an order at them. But they took no notice of him, and dashed below. For a moment the worthy skipper stood there dumbfounded; then, cursing fluently, he dashed after them, only to stop with a strange pricking feeling in his scalp as a huge and ghastly figure confronted him. A great mass of foam was round its mouth, and it was brandishing a marline spike and bellowing. A terrifying spectacle in the half-light of dusk—a spectacle to put the fear of God into any man. And then as suddenly as it appeared it was gone.
Terror is an infectious thing, and the infection spread in the good ship Gadfly. Within two minutes men were running in all directions, shouting that a homicidal maniac was loose on board. Below an appalling crash of breaking crockery and the sudden appearance on deck of a terrified steward told its own tale. The Captain was powerless; things had gone beyond him. He roared a futile order or two: no one paid the slightest attention to him. And then, quite suddenly, the pandemonium ceased—and men held their breath. How he had got there no one could say—but they all saw him outlined against the darkening sky.
The madman was in the stern, and in his arms he held the body of a man.
“At last,” they heard him shout, “at last I’ve got you, Peterson. We die together—you devil …”
“Stop them,” howled Mr. Robinson, who had just dashed on deck, holding a limp right arm; but no man moved. Only a loud splash broke the silence, and the stern was empty.
“Man overboard. Lower a boat. Stop the yacht, you cursed fool,” snarled Mr. Robinson to the Captain, and then he rushed to the stern. Dimly in the failing light he thought he could see two heads in the water, but it was a couple of minutes before a boat was lowered, and in that couple of minutes he heard the roar of an engine coming nearer. Then the engine ceased, and he saw the outline of a motorboat.
“That boat may have picked ’em up, sir,” said the Captain, as Mr. Robinson ran down the gangway into the waiting cutter.
“Give way all,” came the second officer’s curt order. “With a will, boys.”
The motorboat, still motionless, loomed rapidly up, and Mr. Robinson stood up.
“Ahoy there! Did you pick up those two men who fell overboard?”
“Two!” Ted Jerningham, a conspicuous figure in white flannels, stood up also. “I heard the most infernal shindy on board your yacht and then a splash. Do you mean to say two men have fallen overboard?”
The yacht’s boat was close to, the sailors resting on their oars.
“Yes. Have you seen ’em?” asked the second officer.
“Not a sign. And the water’s like a duck-pond too.”
The girl with him shuddered.
“How dreadful! You don’t mean the poor fellows are drowned?”
“Afraid it looks like it, miss,” said the officer, staring round the water. “Even in this light we’d see them with the sea as calm as it is.”
Mr. Robinson whispered something in his ear, which he seemed to resent.
“Do what you’re told,” snarled his master, and with a shrug he gave an order.
“Give way.”
The oars dipped into the water, and they passed astern of the motor boat. And had Mr. Robinson been watching Ted Jerningham instead of the water he might have seen a sudden strained look appear on that young gentleman’s face, and his hand move instinctively towards the starting-switch. He might even have wondered why the girl, who had seemed
