Uncharted Seas by Dennis Wheatley Read Free Book Online Page A

up.’
    ‘What sort of stores do these lifeboats carry?’
    ‘Keg of water, jar of rum, tinned beef and biscuits. That’s about the usual in most freighters where I’ve done stooard; though I’ve never had to quit ship before.’
    ‘The more I think about this party, the less I like it.’
    ‘I like it so mighty little I’m jus’ not thinking about it at all. I’m lying doggo and saving my strength for when the real trouble starts.’
    ‘You mean when the water runs short?’
    ‘Ai—an’ worse as a result of that.’
    ‘Just what are you hinting at, Hansie?’
    The barman lowered his voice. ‘Keep the soft pedal on the organ, Mister Sutherland. All these fellars understand a bit of English, knocking around in all sorts of ships as they do, an’ the stokers come from the Southern States. It’s them I’m scared of. We got a sight too big a coloured quota in this outfit. You see, we lost the Third Officer last night; besides a Quartermaster, a white seaman and an apprentice, who should be with us, bein’ dead ‘fore we quit the ship. That puts the Negroes’ odds up considerable, seein’ one of the seamen’s a mulatto too.’
    ‘Oh, come,’ Basil protested. ‘There are only five of them including the half-caste, whereas we’ve three white A.B.s, the carpenter, Mr. Luvia, Mr. Vedras, you and me. That’s eight without counting the old Colonel and poor De Brissac, who seems to have passed out. They’d be crazy to start anything when we outnumber them by practically two to one.’
    ‘Sure, Mister Sutherland, sure. They wouldn’t risk a beating-up as long as we’re awake, but we’ve got to sleep sometimes. What’s to prevent them rushing us when most of our bunch is having a shut-eye in the middle of the night?’
    ‘Have you got any grounds for the mutiny bogey you’re trying to scare me with, Hansie? Any of them say anything during the night to make you suspicious? Or were the officers having trouble with the engine-room staff before we left the ship?’
    ‘You’ve guessed it. Don’t go looking over yer shoulder now; but later on take a squint at the big buck who’s pulling bow. That’s Harlem Joe. Used ter be in the boxing racket they tell me, but got slung out because he did some bigger fellar dirt. Next heard of doing a stretch for homicide in a jail down Missouri way. Broke prison during the 1937 floods and got signed on in the stokehold of a Dutchman outward bound from St. Louis. He—’
    ‘Half a minute,’ Basil muttered. ‘How d’you know all this?’
    ‘Picked it up from the other fellars in the fo’c’sle. Harlem’s the boastful kind an’ he knows no one’d do a split.’
    ‘D’you mean to tell me, that knowing you had an escaped convict on board, none of you had the guts to report it to your officers?’
    ‘Sure, Mister Sutherland,’ Hansie’s voice was as low and even as ever. It only just reached Basil’s ear, and was drowned for the others by the constant tapping of the oars as they moved in the tholes. ‘Life’s not easy for poor sailormen. Plenty of fellars beforethe mast have records that wouldn’t show too good if they was looked into, but they may have been unlucky and be decent scouts all the same.’
    ‘Yes, I understand that; and naturally you hang together. But in a case like this … well, homicide’s murder, isn’t it?’
    ‘That’s so. All the same, the unwritten law holds and anyone who goes back on it ‘ud be asking for a knife in ‘is ribs from one of the others the next dark night he went ashore.’
    ‘D’you think he’s got the others under his thumb?’
    ‘I certainly do. He’s one of these wise guys—considers himself educated because he’s lived in Noo York. When he hands out the dope about all men being brothers and gives them the Communist angle on equality they just lap it up. Them three buddies of his, Lem Williamson, Isiah Meek, and the one they call Corncob, eat right out of his hand.’
    ‘That may be, Hansie; but what