Jetta of the Lowlands

Jetta of the Lowlands

PART TWO OF A THREE-PART NOVEL

_By Ray Cummings_

[Illustration: We were invisible!]

[Sidenote: Into remote Lowlands, in an invisible flyer, go Grant and
Jetta--prisoners of a scientific depth bandit.]

WHAT HAS GONE BEFORE


In the year 2020 the oceans have long since drained from the surface
of the earth, leaving bared to sun and wind the one-time sea floor.
Much of it is flat, caked ooze, cracked and hardened, with, here and
there, small scum-covered lakes, bordered by slimy rocks. It is hot,
down in the depth of the great Lowland areas, and it is chiefly
adventurers and outcasts of human kind who can endure life in what
few towns there are.

Into Nareda, the capital village of the tiny Lowland Republic of
Nareda, goes Philip Grant, an operative of the United States Customs
Department, on a dangerous assignment--to ferret out the men who are
smuggling mercury into the United States from that place.

Grant falls in love with Jetta, the daughter of Jacob Spawn, a big
mercury mine owner of Nareda, only to learn that Spawn has promised
her in marriage to Greko Perona, the country's Minister of Internal
Affairs.

Grant follows Perona to a midnight Lowland rendezvous with mysterious
strangers and eavesdrops on them, sending their indistinct voice
murmurs to his chief, Hanley, in Washington, who relays them back to
him, amplified. He learns several important things: that Spawn and
Perona and a depth bandit named De Boer are together involved in the
smuggling; that they have planned a fake robbery of a fortune in
radiumized mercury stored at Spawn's mine, to collect the insurance on
it and escape paying the Government export fee: and that they, plan
to kidnap Grant for ransom.

The plotters learn of Grant's absence from Nareda, and suspect that he
may be nearby. They start to search for him. Grant barely escapes,
with the bandits and conspirators in hot pursuit. He flees to Jetta,
hoping that they will be able to get away together: but he finds her
tied hand and foot in her room.

The door is tightly sealed.

And close behind him are his pursuers!


CHAPTER VIII

_Jetta's Defiance_

I must go back now to picture what befell Jetta that afternoon while I
was at Spawn's mine. It is not my purpose to becloud this narrative
with mystery. There was very little mystery about it to Jetta, and I
can reconstruct her viewpoint of the events from what she afterward
told me.

Jetta's room was in a wing of the house on the side near the pergola.
Her window and door looked out upon the patio. When I had
retired--that first night in Nareda--Spawn had gone to his daughter
and upbraided her for showing herself while he was giving me that
first midnight meal.

"You stay in your room: you have nothing to do with him. Hear me?"

"Yes, Father."

From her infancy he had dominated her; it never occurred to either of
them that she could disobey. And yet, this time she did; for no sooner
was he asleep that night than she came to my window as I have told.

This next day Jetta dutifully had kept herself secluded. She cooked
her own breakfast while I was at the Government House, and was again
out of sight by noon.

Jetta was nearly always alone. I can picture her sitting there within
the narrow walls of her little room. Boy's ragged garb. All possible
femininity stripped from her. Yet, within her, the woman's instincts
were struggling. She sewed a great deal, she since has told me, there
in the cloistered dimness. Making little dresses of silk and bits of
finery given her surreptitiously by the neighbor women. Gazing at
herself in them with the aid of a tiny mirror. Hiding them away, never
daring to wear them openly; until at intervals her father would raid
the room, find them and burn them in the kitchen incinerator.

"Instincts of Satan! By damn but I will get these woman's instincts
out of you, Jetta!"

* * * * *

And there were hours when she would try to read hidden books, and look
at pictures of the strange fairy world of the Highlands. She could
read and write a little: she had gone for a few years to the small
Nareda government school, and then been snatched from it by her
father.

When Spawn and I had finished that noonday meal, I recall that he left
me for a moment. He had gone to Jetta.

"I am taking that young American to the mine. I will return presently.
Stay close, Jetta."

"Yes, Father."

He left with me. Jetta remained in her room, her thoughts upon the
coming night. She trembled at them. She would meet me again, this
evening in the moonlit garden....

The sound of a man walking the garden path aroused her from her
reverie. Then came a soft ingratiating voice:

"Jetta, _chica Mia_!"

It was Perona, standing by the pergola preening his effeminate
mustache.

"Jetta, little love bird, come out and talk to me."

Jetta slammed the window slide and sat quiet.

"Jetta, it is your Greko."

"Well do I know it," she muttered.

"Jetta!" He strode down the path and back. "Jetta." His voice began
rising into a strident, peevish anger.

"Jetta, are you in there? _Chica_, answer me."

No answer.

"Jetta, _por Dios_--" He fumed, then fell to pleading. "Are you in
there? Please, little love bird, answer your Greko. Are you in there?"

"Yes."

"Come out then. Come to Greko."

* * * * *

She said sweetly. "My father does not want me to talk to men. You know
that is so, Senor Perona."

It grounded him. "Why--"

"Is it not so?"

"Y-yes, but I am not--"

"A man?" Little imp! She relished impaling him upon the shafts of her
ridicule. Her sport was interrupted by the arrival of Spawn. He had
left me at the mine and come directly back home. Jetta heard his heavy
tread on the garden path, then his voice:

"Ah, Perona."

And Perona: "Jetta will not come out and talk to me." The waxen
mustached Minister of Nareda's Internal Affairs was like a sulky
child. But Spawn was unimpressed. Spawn said:

"Well, let her alone. We have more important things to engage us. I
have the American occupied at the mine. You heard from De Boer?"

"I went last night. All is ready as we planned. But Spawn, this fool
of an American, this Grant--"

"Hush! Not so loud, Perona!"

"I am telling you--!" Perona was excited. His voice rose shrilly, but
Spawn checked him.

"Shut up: you waste time. Tell me exactly the arrangements with De
Boer. _Le grand coup_! now; to-night most important of nights--and you
rant of your troubles with a girl!"

* * * * *

They were standing by the pergola, quite near Jetta's shaded window.
She crouched there, listening to them. None of this was entirely new
to Jetta. She had always been aware more or less of her father's
secret business activities. As a child she had not understood them.
Nor did she now, with any clarity. Spawn, had always talked freely
within her hearing, ignoring her, though occasionally he threatened
her to keep her mouth shut.

She heard now fragments of this discussion between her father and
Perona. They moved away from the pergola and sat by the fountain,
speaking too low for her to hear. And then they paced the path, coming
nearer, and she caught their voices again. And occasionally they grew
excited, or vehement, and then their raised tones were plainly audible
to her.

And this that she heard, with what the knew already, and with what
subsequently transpired, enables me now to piece together the facts
into a connected explanation.

In the establishment of his cinnabar mine some years before, Spawn was
originally financed by Perona. The South American was then newly made
Minister of Nareda's Internal Affairs. He became Spawn's business
partner. They kept the connection secret. Spawn falsified his
production records; and Perona with his governmental position was
enabled to pass these false accounts of the mine's production. Nareda
was systematically cheated of a portion of its legal share.

But this, after a time, did not satisfy the ambitious Perona and
Spawn. They began to plan how they might engage in smuggling some of
their quicksilver into the United States.

Perona, during these years, had had ambitions of his own in other
directions. President Markes, of Nareda, was an honest official. He
handicapped Perona considerably. There were many ways by which Perona
could have grown rich through a dishonest handling of the government
affairs. It was done almost universally in all the small Latin
governments. But Markes as President made it dangerous in Nareda. Even
the duplicity with the mine was a precarious affair.

* * * * *

There was at this time in Nareda a young adventurer named De Boer. A
handsome, swaggering fellow in his late twenties. He was a good
talker; he spoke many languages; he could orate with fluency and
skilful guile. His smile, his colorful personality, and his gift for
oratory, made it easy for him to stir up dissatisfaction among the
people.

De Boer became known as a patriot. A revolution in Nareda was brewing.
Perona, as Nareda's Minister, was De Boer's political enemy. The
Nareda Government ran De Boer out, ending the potential revolution.
But Perona and Spawn had always secretly been friends with De Boer. It
would have been very handy to have this unscrupulous young scoundrel
as President.

When De Boer was banished with some of his most loyal followers, he
began a career of petty banditry in the Lowland's depths. Spawn and
Perona kept in communication with him, and, by a method which was
presently made startlingly clear to Jetta and me, De Boer smuggled the
quicksilver for Perona and Spawn. It was this activity which had
finally aroused my department and caused Hanley to send me to Nareda.

This however, was a dangerous, precarious occupation. De Boer did not
seem to think so, or care. But Perona and Spawn, with their
established positions in Nareda, were always fearful of exposure. Even
without my coming, they had planned to disconnect from De Boer.

"And for more than that," as Jetta had one day heard Perona remark to
her father. "I'll tell to you that this De Boer is not very straight
with us, Spawn." De Boer would, upon occasion, fail to make proper
return for the smuggled product.

* * * * *

So now they had planned a last coup in which De Boer was to help, and
then they would be done with him: the two of them, Spawn and Perona,
would remain as honest citizens of Nareda, and De Boer had agreed to
take himself away and pursue his banditry elsewhere.

It was a simple plan; it promised to yield a high stake quickly. A
final fling at illicit activity; then virtuous reformation, with
Perona marrying the little Jetta.

* * * * *

Beneath the strong room at the mine, Perona and Spawn had secretly
built a cleverly concealed little vault. De Boer, this night just
before the midnight hour, was to attack the mine. Spawn and Perona had
bribed the police guards to submit to this attack. The guards did not
know the details: they only knew that De Boer and his men would make a
sham attack, careful to harm none of them--and then De Boer would
withdraw. The guards would report that they had been driven away by a
large force. And when the excitement was over, the ingots of
radiumized quicksilver would have vanished!

De Boer, making away into distant Lowland fastnesses, would obviously
be supposed to have taken the treasure. But Perona, hidden alone in
the strong-room, would merely carry the ingots down into the secret
vault, to be disposed of at some future date. The ingots were well
insured, by an international company, against theft. The Nareda
government would receive one-third of that insurance as recompense for
the loss of its share. Perona and Spawn would get two-thirds--and have
the treasure as well.

* * * * *

Such was the present plan, into which, all unknown to me, I had been
plunged. And my presence complicated things considerably. So much so
that Perona grew vehement, this afternoon in the garden, explaining
why. His shrill voice carried clearly to Jetta, in spite of Spawn's
efforts to shut him up.

"I tell to you that Americano agent will undo us."

"How?" demanded the calmer Spawn.

"Already he has made Markes suspicious."

"Chut! You can befool Markes, Perona. You have for years been doing
it."

"This meddling fellow, he has met Jetta!"

"I do not believe it." There was a sudden grimness to Spawn's tone at
the thought. "I do not believe it. Jetta would not dare."

"You should have seen him flush when Markes mentioned at the
conference this morning that I am to marry Jetta. No one could miss
it. He has met her--I tell it to you--and it must have been last
night."

"So, you say?" Jetta could see her father's face, white with
suppressed rage. "You think that? And it is that this Grant might be
your rival, that worries you? Not our plans for to-night, which have
real importance--but worrying over a girl."

"She would not talk to me. She would not come out. He has no doubt put
wild ideas into her head. Spawn, you listen to me. I have always been
more clever than you at scheming. Is it not so? You have always said
it. I have a plan now, it fits our arrangements with De Boer, but it
will rid us of this Americano. When all is done and I have married
Jetta--"

* * * * *

Spawn interrupted impatiently. "You will marry Jetta, never fear. I
have promised her to you."

And because, as Jetta well knew, Perona had made it part of his
bargaining in financing Spawn. But this they did not now mention.

"To get rid of this Grant--well, that sounds meritorious. He is
dangerous around here. To that I agree."

"And with Jetta--"

"Have done, Perona!" With sudden decision Spawn leaped to his feet. "I
do not believe she would have dared talk to Grant. We'll have her out
and ask her. If she has, by the gods--"

It fell upon Jetta before she had time to gather her wits. Spawn
strode to her door, and found it fastened on the inside.

"Jetta, open at once!"

He thumped with his heavy fists. Confused and trembling she unsealed
it, and he dragged her out into the sunlight of the garden.

"Now then, Jetta, you have heard some of what we have been saying,
perhaps?"

"Father--"

"About this young American? This Grant?"

She stood cringing in his grasp. Spawn had never used physical
violence with Jetta. But he was white with fury now.

"Father, you--you are hurting me."

Perona interposed. "Wait Spawn! Not so rough! Let me talk to her.
Jetta, _chica mia_, your Greko is worried--"

"To the hell with that!" Spawn shouted. But he released the girl and
she sank trembling to the little seat by the pergola.

Spawn stood over her. "Jetta, look at me! Did you meet--did you talk
to Grant last night?"

She wanted to deny it. She clung to his angry gaze. But the habit of
all her life of truthfulness with him prevailed.

"Y-yes," she admitted.


CHAPTER IX

_Trapped_

"Spawn! Hold!"

There was an instant when it seemed that Spawn would strike the girl.
The blood drained from his face, leaving his dark eyes blazing like
torches. His hamlike fist went back, but Perona sprang for him and
clutched him.

"Hold, Spawn: I will talk to her. Jetta, so you did--"

The torrent of emotion swept Spawn; weakened him so that instead of
striking Jetta, he yielded to Perona's clutch and dropped his arm. For
a moment he stood gazing at his daughter.

"Is it so? And all my efforts, going for nothing, just like your
mother!" He no more than murmured it, and as Perona pushed him, he
sank to the bench beside Jetta. But did not touch her, just sat
staring. And she stared back, both of then aghast at the enormity of
this, her first disobedience.

I never had opportunity to know Spawn, except for the few times which
I have mentioned. Perhaps he was at heart a pathetic figure. I think,
looking back on it now that Spawn is dead, that there was a pathos to
him. Spawn had loved his wife, Jetta's mother. As a young man he had
brought her to the Lowlands to seek his fortune. And when Jetta was an
infant, his wife had left him. Run away, abandoning him and their
child.

* * * * *

Perhaps Spawn was never mentally normal after that. He had reared
Jetta with the belief that sin was inherent in all females. It
obsessed him. Warped and twisted all his outlook as he brooded on it
through the years. Woman's instincts; woman's love of pleasure, pretty
clothes--all could lead only to sin.

And so he had kept Jetta secluded. He had fought what he seemed to see
in her as she grew and flowered into girlhood, and denied her
everything which he thought might make her like her mother.

Spawn met his death within a few hours of this afternoon I am
describing. Perhaps he was no more than a scheming scoundrel. We are
instinctively lenient with our appraisal of the dead. I do not know.

"Jetta," Perona said to her accusingly, "that is true, then: you did
talk with that miserable Americano last night? You sinful, lying
girl."

The contrition within Jetta at disobeying her father faded before this
attack.

"I am not sinful." The trembling left her and she sat up and faced the
accusing Perona. "I did but talk to him. You speak lies when you say I
am sinful."

"You hear, Spawn? Defiant: already changed from the little Jetta I--"

"Yes, I am changed. I do not love you, Senor Perona. I think I hate
you." Her tears were very close, but she finished: "I--I won't marry
you. I won't!"

It stung Spawn. He leaped to his feet. "So you talk like that! It has
gone so far as this, has it? Get to your room! We will see what you
will and what you won't!"

* * * * *

Again the crafty Perona was calmest of them all. He thrust himself in
front of Spawn.

"Jetta, to-night you plan to see him again, no? To-night?--here?"

"No," she stammered.

"You lie!"

"No."

"You lie! Spawn look at her! Lying! She has planned to meet him
to-night! That is all we want to know." He broke into a cackling
chuckle. "That fits my new plan, Spawn. A tryst with Jetta, here in
the garden."

"Get to your room," Spawn growled. He dragged her back, and Perona
followed them.

"You lie there." Spawn flung her to her couch. "After this night's
work is done, we'll see whether you will or you won't."

"She may not stay in here." Perona suggested.

"She will stay."

"You seal her in?"

"I will seal her in."

Perona's eyes roved the little bedroom. One window oval and a door,
both overlooking the patio.

"But suppose she should get out? There is no way to seal that window
properly from outside. A cord!"

A long stout silken tassel-cord had been draped by Jetta at the window
curtain. Perona snatched it down.

"If her ankles and wrists were tied with this--"

"No!" burst out Jetta. And then a fear for me rushed over her. A
realization, forgotten in the stress of this conflict with her
father, now swept over her. They were planning harm to me.

"No, do not bind me."

* * * * *

A sudden caution came to her. She was making it worse for me. Already
she had done me immense harm.

She said suddenly, "Do what you like with me. I was wrong. I have no
interest in that American. It is you, Greko, I--I love."

Spawn did not heed her. Perona insisted, "I would tie her with care."

He helped Spawn rope her ankles, and then her wrists, crossed behind
her.

"A little gag, Spawn? She might cry out: we want no interference
to-night." He was ready with a large silken handkerchief. They thrust
it into her mouth and tied it behind her neck.

"There," growled Spawn. "You will and you won't: we shall see about
that. Lie still, Jetta. If I have need to come again to you--"

They left her. And this time she heard them less clearly. But there
were fragments:

Perona: "I will meet him again. After dark, to-night. Yes, he expects
me. For his money, Spawn, his pay in advance. This De Boer works not
for nothing."

Spawn: "You will arrange about your police on the streets? He can get
here to my house safely?"

"Oh yes, at the tri-evening hour, certainly before midnight, before
the attack on the mine. You must stay here, Spawn. Pretend to be
asleep: it will lure the fool Americano out in to the moonlight."

* * * * *

Jetta could piece it together fairly well. They would have De Boer
come and abduct me. Not tell him I was a government agent, with the
micro-safety alarm which they suspected I carried, but just tell De
Boer that I was a rich American, who could be abducted and held for a
big ransom.

Perona's voice rose with a fragment: "If he springs his alarm, here in
the moonlight, you can be here, Spawn, and pretend to try and rescue
him. A radio-image of that flashed to Hanley's office will exonerate
us of suspicion."

Perona would promise De Boer that the Nareda government would pay the
ransom quickly, collecting it later from the United States.

Spawn said, "You think De Boer will believe that?"

"Why should he not? I am skilful at persuasion, no? Let him find out
later that the United States Government trackers are after him!"
Perona cackled at the thought of it. "What of that? Let him kill this
Grant. All the better."

Spawn said abruptly: "The United States may catch De Boer. Have you
thought of that, Perona? The fellow would not shield us, but would
tell everything."

"And who will believe him? The wild tale of a trapped bandit! Against
your word, Spawn? You, an honest and wealthy mine owner? And I--I,
Greko Perona, Minister of Internal Affairs of the Sovereign Power of
Nareda! Who will dare to give me the lie because a bandit tells a wild
tale with no real facts to prop it?"

"Those police guards at the mine to-night?"

"Admit that they took your bribes? You are witless, Spawn! Let them
but admit it to me and of a surety I will fling them into
imprisonment! Now listen with care, for the after noon is going...."

Their voices lowered, then faded, and Jetta was left alone and
helpless. Spawn went back to the mine to meet me. We returned and had
supper, Jetta could dimly hear us.

* * * * *

There was silence about the house during the mid-evening. I had
slipped out and followed Perona to his meeting with De Boer. Then
Spawn had discovered my absence and had rushed to join Perona and
tell him.

But Jetta knew nothing of this. The hour of her tryst with me was
approaching. In the darkness of her room as she lay bound and gagged
on her couch, she could see the fitful moonlight rising to illumine
the window oval.

She squirmed at the cords holding her, but could not loosen them. They
cut into her flesh; her limbs were numb.

The evening wore on. Would I come to the garden tryst?

Jetta could not break her bonds. But gradually she had mouthed the gag
loose. Then she heard my hurried footsteps in the patio; then my tense
voice.

And at her answer I was pounding on her door. But it had been stoutly
sealed by Spawn. I flung my shoulder against it, raging, thumping. But
the heavy metal panels would not yield; the seal held intact.

"Jetta!"

"Philip, run away! They want to catch you! De Boer, the bandit, is
coming!"

"I know it!"

Fool that I was, to pause with talk! There was no time: I must get
Jetta out of here. Break down this door.

But it would not yield. A gas torch would melt this outer seal. Was
there a torch here at Spawn's? But I had no time to search for a
torch! Or a bar with which to ram this door--

A panic seized me, with the fresh realization that any instant De Boer
and his men would arrive. I beat with futile fists on the door, and
Jetta from within, calling to me to get away before I was caught.

This accursed door between us!

* * * * *

And then--after no more than half a minute, doubtless--I thought of
the window. My momentary panic left me. I dashed to the window oval.
Sealed. But the shutter curtain, and the glassite pane behind it, were
fragile.

"Jetta, are you near the window?"

"No. On the bed. They have tied me."

"Look out; I'm breaking through!"

There were loose rocks, as large as my head, set to mark the garden
path. I seized one and hurled it. With a crash it went through the
window and fell to the floor of the room. A jagged hole showed.

"All right, Jetta?"

"Yes! Yes, Philip."

I squirmed through the oval and dropped to the floor. My arms were cut
from the jagged glassite, though I did not know it then. It was dim
inside the room, but I could see the outline of the bed with her lying
on it.

Her ankles and wrists were tied. I cut the cords with my knife.

She was gasping. "They're planning to capture you. Philip! You should
not be here! Get away!"

"Yes. But I'm going to take you with me. Can you stand up?"

* * * * *

I set her on her feet in the center of the room. A shaft of moonlight
was coming through the hole in the window.

"Philip! You're bleeding!"

"It is nothing. Cut myself on the glassite. Can you stand alone?"

"Yes."

But her legs, stiffened and numb from having been bound so many hours,
bent under her. I caught her as she was falling.

"I'll be--all right in a minute. But Philip, if you stay here--"

"You're going with me!"

"Oh!"

I could carry her, if she could not run. But it would be slow; and it
would be difficult to get her through the window. And on the street we
would attract too much attention.

"Jetta, try to stand. Stamp your feet. I'll hold you."

I steadied her. Then I bent down, chafing her legs with my hands. Her
arms had been limp, but the blood was in them now. She murmured with
the tingling pain, and then bent over, frantically helping me rub the
circulation back into her legs.

"Better?"

"Yes." She took a weak and trembling step.

"Wait. Let me rub them more, Jetta."

Precious minutes!

"I'll knock out the rest of the window with that rock! We'll run;
we'll be out of here in a moment."

"Run where?"

"Away. Into hiding--out of all this. The United States patrol-ship is
coming from Porto Rico. It will take us from here."

"Where?"

"Away. To Great New York, maybe. Away from all this; from that old
fossil, Perona."

I was stooping beside her.

"I'm all right now, Philip."

I rose up, and suddenly found myself clasping her in my arms; her
slight body in the boy's ragged garb pressed against me.

"Jetta, dear, do you trust me? Will you come?"

"Yes. Oh, yes--anywhere, Philip, with you."

* * * * *

For only a breathless instant I lingered, holding her. Then I cast her
off and seized the rock from the floor. The jagged glassite fell away
under my blows.

"Now, Jetta. I'll go first--"

But it was too late! I stopped, stricken by the sound of a voice
outside!

"He's there! In the girl's room! That's her window!"

Cautious voices in the garden! The thud of approaching footsteps.

I shoved Jetta back and rushed to the broken window oval. The figures
of De Boer and his men showed in the moonlight across the patio. They
had heard me breaking the glassite. And they saw me, now.

"There he is, De Boer!"

We were trapped!


CHAPTER X

_The Murder in the Garden_

"Hans, keep back! I will go!"

"But Commander--"

"Armed? The hell he is not! Spawn said no. Spawn! Where is Spawn? He
was here."

I had dropped back from the window, and, gripping Jetta, stood in the
center of the room.

"Jetta, dear."

"Oh. Philip!"

"There's no other way out of here?"

"No! No!"

Only the heavy sealed door, and this broken window. The bandits in the
garden had paused at sight of me. Someone had called.

"He may be armed, De Boer."

They had stopped their forward rush and darted into the shelter of the
pergola. I might be armed!

We could hear their low voices not ten feet from us. But I was not
armed, except for my knife. Futile weapon, indeed.

"Jetta, keep back. If they should fire--"

* * * * *

I got a look through the oval. De Boer was advancing upon it, with his
barreled projector half levelled. He saw me again. He called:

"You American, come out!"

I crouched on the floor, pushing Jetta back to where the shadows of
the bed hid her.

"You American!"

He was close outside the window. "Come out--or I am coming in!"

I said abruptly, "Come!"

My blade was in my hand. If he showed himself I could slash his
throat, doubtless. But what about Jetta? My thoughts flashed upon the
heels of my defiant invitation. Suppose, as De Boer climbed in the
window, I killed him? I could not escape, and his infuriated fellows
would rush us, firing through the oval, sweeping the room, killing us
both. But Jetta now was in no danger. Her father was outside, and
these bandits were her father's friends. I would have to yield.

I called, louder, "Why don't you come in?"

Could I hold them off? Frighten them off, for a time, and make enough
noise so that perhaps someone passing in the nearby street would give
the alarm and bring help?

There was a sudden silence in the patio. The bandits had so far made
as little commotion as possible. Presently I could hear their low
voices.

* * * * *

I heard an oath. De Boer's head and shoulders appeared in the window
oval! His levelled projector came through. Perhaps he would not have
fired, but I did not dare take the chance. I was crouching almost
under the muzzle, so I straightened, gripped it, and flung it up. I
then slashed at his face with my knife, but he gripped my wrist with
powerful fingers. My knife fell as he twisted my wrist. His projector
had not fired. It was jammed between us. One of his huge arms reached
in and encircled me.

"Damn you!"

He muttered it, but I shouted, "Fool! De Boer, the bandit!"

I was aware of a commotion out in the garden.

"... Bring all Nareda on our ears? De Boer, shut him up!"

I was gripping the projector, struggling to keep its muzzle pointed
upwards. With a heave of his giant arms De Boer lifted me and jerked
me bodily through the window. I fell on my feet, still fighting. But
other hands seized me. It was no use. I yielded suddenly. I panted:

"Enough!"

They held me. One of them growled. "Another shout and we will leave
you here dead. Commander, _look_!"

My shirt was torn open. The electrode band about my chest was exposed!
De Boer towered head and shoulders over me. I gazed up, passive in the
grip of two or three of his men, and saw his face. His heavy jaw
dropped as he gazed at my little diaphragms, the electrode.

He knew now for the first time that this was no private citizen he had
assaulted. This official apparatus meant that I was a Government
agent.

* * * * *

There was an instant of shocked silence. An expression grim and
furious crossed the giant bandit's face.

"So this is it? Hans, careful--hold him!"

Jetta was still in her room, silent now. I heard Spawn's voice, close
at hand in the patio.

"De Boer! Careful!" It was the most cautious of half-whispers.

Abruptly someone reached for my chest; jerked at the electrode; tore
its fragile wires--the tiny grids and thumbnail amplifiers; jerked and
ripped and flung the whole little apparatus to the garden path. But it
sang its warning note as the wires broke. Up in Great New York Hanley
knew then that catastrophe had fallen upon me.

For a brief instant the crestfallen bandit mumbled at what he had
done. Then came Spawn's voice:

"Got him, De Boer? Good!"

Triumphant Spawn! He advanced across the garden with his heavy tread.
And to me, and I am sure to De Boer as well, there came the swift
realization that Spawn had been hiding safely in the background. But
my detector was smashed now. It might have imaged De Boer assailing
me: but now that it was smashed, Spawn could act freely.

"Good! So you have him! Make away to the mine!"

I did not see De Boer's face at that instant. But I saw his weapon
come up--an act wholly impulsive, no doubt. A flash of fury!

He levelled the projector, not at me, but at the on-coming Spawn.

"You damn liar!"

"De Boer--" It was a scream of terror from Spawn. But it came too
late. The projector hissed; spat its tiny blue puff. The needle
drilled Spawn through the heart. He toppled, flung up his arms, and
went down, silently, to sprawl on his face across the garden path.

* * * * *

De Boer was cursing, startled at his own action. The men holding me
tightened their grip. I heard Jetta cry out, but not at what had
happened in the garden: she was unaware of that. One of the bandits
had left the group and climbed into her room. Her cry now was
suppressed, as though the man's hand went over her mouth. And in the
silence came his mumbled voice:

"Shut up, you!"

There was the sound of a scuffle in there. I tore at the men holding
me.

"Let me go! Jetta! Come out!"

De Boer dashed for the window. I was still struggling. A hand cuffed
me in the face. A projector rammed into my side.

"Stop it, fool American!"

De Boer came back with a chastened bandit ahead of him. The man was
muttering and rubbing his shoulder, and De Boer said:

"Try anything like that again, Cartner, and I won't be so easy on
you."

De Boer was dragging Jetta, holding her by a wrist. She looked like a
terrified, half-grown boy, so small was she beside this giant. But the
woman's lines of her, and the long dark hair streaming about her white
face and over her shoulders, were unmistakable.

"His daughter." De Boer was chuckling. "The little Jetta."

* * * * *

All this had happened in certainly no more than five minutes. I
realized that no alarm had been raised: the bandits had managed it all
with reasonable quiet.

There were six of the bandits here, and De Boer, who towered over us
all. I saw him now as a swaggering giant of thirty-odd, with a
heavy-set smooth-shaved, handsome face.

He held Jetta off. "Damn, how you have grown, Jetta."

Someone said, "She knows too much."

And someone else, "We will take her with us. If you leave her here, De
Boer--"

"Why should I leave her? Why? Leave her--for Perona?"

Then I think that for the first time Jetta saw her father's body lying
sprawled on the path. She cried, "Philip!" Then she half turned and
murmured: "Father!"

She wavered, almost falling. "Father--" She went down, fainting,
falling half against me and against De Boer, who caught her slight
body in his arms.

"Come, we'll get back. Drag him!"

"But you can't carry that girl out like that, De Boer."

"Into the house: there is an open door. Hans, go out and bring the car
around to this side. Give me the cloaks. There is no alarm yet."

De Boer chuckled again. "Perona was nice to keep the police off this
street to-night!"

We went into the kitchen. An auto-car, which to the village people
might have been there on Spawn's mining business, slid quietly up to
the side entrance. A cloak was thrown over Jetta. She was carried like
a sack and put into the car.

I suddenly found an opportunity to break loose. I leaped and struck
one of the men. But the others were too quickly on me. The kitchen
table went over with a crash.

Then something struck me on the back of the head: I think it was the
handle of De Boer's great knife. The kitchen and the men struggling
with me faded. I went into a roaring blackness.


CHAPTER XI

_Aboard the Bandit Flyer_

I was dimly conscious of being inside the cubby of the car, with
bandits sitting over me. The car was rolling through the village
streets. Ascending. We must be heading for Spawn's mine. I thought of
Jetta. Then I heard her voice and felt her stir beside me.

The roaring in my head made everything dreamlike. I sank half into
unconsciousness again. It seemed an endless interval, with only the
muttering hiss of the car's mechanism and the confused murmurs of the
bandits' voices.

Then my strength came. The cold sweat on me was drying in the night
breeze that swept through the car as it climbed the winding ascent. I
could see through its side oval a vista of bloated Lowland crags with
moonlight on them.

It seemed that we should be nearly to the mine. We stopped. The men in
the car began climbing out.

De Boer's voice: "Is he conscious now? I'll take the girl."

Someone bent over me. "You hear me?"

"Yes," I said.

I found myself outside the car. They held me on my feet. Someone
gratuitously cuffed me, but De Boer's voice issued a sharp, low-toned
rebuke.

"Stop it! Get him and the girl aboard."

* * * * *

There seemed thirty or forty men gathered here. Silent dark figures in
black robes. The moonlight showed them, and occasionally one flashed a
hand search-beam. It was De Boer's main party gathered to attack the
mine.

I stood wavering on my feet. I was still weak and dizzy, with a lump
on the back of my head where I had been struck. The scene about me was
at first unfamiliar. We were in a rocky gully. Rounded broken walls.
Caves and crevices. Dried ooze piled like a ramp up one side. The
moonlight struggled down through a gathering mist overhead.

I saw, presently, where we were. Above the mine, not below it: and I
realized that the car had encircled the mine's cauldron and climbed
to a height beyond it. Down the small gully I could see where it
opened into the cauldron about a hundred feet below us. The lights of
the mine winked in the blurred moonlight shadows.

The bandits led me up the gully. The car was left standing against the
gully side where it had halted. De Boer, or one of his men, was
carrying Jetta.

The flyer was here. We came upon it suddenly around a bend in the
gully. Although I had only seen the nose if it earlier in the evening.
I recognized this to be the same. It was in truth a strange looking
flyer: I had never seen one quite like it. Barrel-winged, like a
Jantzen: multi-propellored: and with folding helicopters for the
vertical lifts and descent. And a great spreading fan-tail, in the
British fashion. It rested on the rocks like a fat-winged bird with
its long cylindrical body puffed out underneath. A seventy-foot cabin:
fifteen feet wide, possibly. A line of small window-portes; a circular
glassite front to the forward control-observatory cubby, with the
propellors just above it, and the pilot cubby up there behind them.
And underneath the whole, a landing gear of the Fraser-Mood
springed-cushion type: and an expanding, air-coil pontoon-bladder for
landing upon water.

* * * * *

All this was usual enough. Yet, with the brief glimpses I had as my
captors hurried me toward the landing incline, I was aware of
something very strange about this flyer. It was all dead black, a
bloated-bellied black bird. The moonlight struck it, but did not gleam
or shimmer on its black metal surface. The cabin window-portes glowed
with a dim blue-gray light from inside. But as I chanced to gaze at
one a green film seemed to cross it like a shade, so that it winked
and its light was gone. Yet a hole was there, like an eye-socket. An
empty green hole.

We were close to the plane now, approaching the bottom of the small
landing-incline. The wing over my head was like a huge fat barrel cut
length-wise in half. I stared up; and suddenly it seemed that the wing
was melting. Fading. Its inner portion, where it joined the body, was
clear in the moonlight. But the tips blurred and faded. An aspect
curiously leprous. Uncanny. Gruesome.

They took me up the landing-incline. A narrow vaulted corridor ran
length-wise of the interior, along one side of the cabin body. To my
left as we headed for the bow control room, the corridor window-portes
showed the rocks outside. To the right of the corridor, the ship's
small rooms lay in a string. A metal interior. I saw almost nothing
save metal in various forms. Grid floor and ceiling. Sheet metal walls
and partitions. Furnishings and fabrics, all of spun metal. And all
dead black.

We entered the control room. The two men holding me flung me in a
chair. I had been searched. They had taken from me the tiny, colored
magnesium light-flashes. How easy for the plans of men to go astray!
Hanley and I had arranged that I was to signal the Porto Rican
patrol-ship with those flares.

"Sit quiet!" commanded my guard.

I retorted, "If you hit me again, I won't."

* * * * *

De Boer came in, carrying Jetta. He put her in a chair near me, and
she sat huddled tense. In the dim gray light of the control room her
white face with its big staring dark eyes was turned toward me. But
she did not speak, nor did I.

The bandits ignored us. De Boer moved about the room, examining a bank
of instruments. Familiar instruments, most of them. The usual
aero-controls and navigational devices. A radio audiphone transmitter
and receiver, with its attendant eavesdropping cut-offs. And there was
an ether-wave mirror-grid. De Boer bent over it. And then I saw him
fastening upon his forehead an image-lens. He said:

"You stay here, Hans. You and Gutierrez. Take care of the girl and
this fellow Grant. Don't hurt them."

Gutierrez was a swarthy Latin American. He smiled. "For why would I
hurt him? You say he is worth much money to us, De Boer. And the girl,
ah--"

De Boer towered over him. "Just lay a finger on her and you will
regret it, Gutierrez! You stay at your controls. Be ready. This affair
it will take no more than half an hour."

A man came to the control room entrance. "You come, Commander?"

"Yes. Right at once."

"The men are ready. From the mine we might almost be seen here. This
delay--"

"Coming, Rausch."

* * * * *

But he lingered a moment more. "Hans, my finder will show you what I
do. Keep watch. When we come back, have all ready for flight. This
Grant had an alarm-detector. Heaven only knows what eavesdropping and
relaying he has done. And for sure there is hell now in Spawn's
garden. The Nareda police are there, of course. They might track us up
here."

He paused before me. "I think I would not cause trouble, Grant."

"I'm not a fool."

"Perhaps not." He turned to Jetta. "No harm will come to you. Fear
nothing."

He wound his dark cloak about his giant figure and left the control
room. In a moment, through the rounded observing pane beside me, I saw
him outside on the moonlit rocks. His men gathered about him. There
were forty of them, possibly, with ten or so left here aboard to guard
the flyer.

And in another moment the group of dark-cloaked figures outside crept
off in single file like a slithering serpent, moving down the rock
defile toward where in the cauldron pit the lights of the mine shone
on its dark silent buildings.


CHAPTER XII

_The Attack on the Mine_

There was a moment when I had an opportunity to speak with Jetta.
Gutierrez sat watchfully by the archway corridor entrance with a
needle projector across his knees. The fellow Hans, a big, heavy-set
half-breed Dutchman with a wide-collared leather jerkin and wide,
knee-length pantaloons, laid his weapon carefully aside and busied
himself with his image mirror. There would soon be images upon it, I
knew: De Boer had the lens-finder on his forehead, and the scenes at
the mine, as De Boer saw them would be flashed back to us here.

This Gutierrez was very watchful. A move on my part and I knew he
would fling a needle through me.

My thoughts flew. Hanley had notified Porto Rico. The patrol-ship had
almost enough time to get here by now.

I felt Jetta plucking at me. She whispered:

"They have gone to attack the mine."

"Yes."

"I heard it planned. Senor Perona--"

Her hurried whispers told me further details of Perona's scheme. So
this was a pseudo attack! Perona would take advantage of it and hide
the quicksilver. De Boer would return presently and escape. And hold
me for ransom. I chuckled grimly. Not so easy for a bandit, even one
as clever as De Boer at hiding in the Lowland depths to arrange a
ransom for an agent of she United States. Our entire Lowland patrol
would be after him in a day.

* * * * *

Jetta's swift whispers made it all clear to me. It was Perona's
scheme.

She ended, "And my father--" Her voice broke; her eyes flooded
suddenly with tears "Oh, Philip, he was good to me, my poor father."

I saw that the mirror before Hans was glowing with its coming image. I
pressed Jetta's hand.

"Yes, Jetta."

One does not disparage the dead. I could not exactly subscribe to
Jetta's appraisal of her parent, but I did not say so.

"Jetta, the mirror is on."

I turned away from her toward the instrument table. Gutierrez at the
door raised his weapon. I said hastily, "Nothing. I--we just want to
see the mirror."

I stood beside Hans. He glanced at me and I tried to smile
ingratiatingly.

"This attack will be successful, eh, Hans?"

"Damn. I hope so."

The mirror was glowing. Hans turned a switch to dim the tube-lights of
the room so that we might see the images better. It brought a protest
from Gutierrez.

I swung around. "I'm not a fool! You can see me perfectly well: kill
me if I make trouble. I want to see the attack."

"_Por Dios_, if you try anything--"

"I won't!"

"Shut!" growled Hans. "The audiphone is on. The big adventure--and the
commander--leaves me here just to watch!"

* * * * *

A slit in the observatory pane was open. The dark figure of one of the
bandits on guard outside came and called softly up to us.

"Started. Hans?"

"Starting."

"Should it go wrong, call out."

"Yes. But it will not."

"There was an alarm, relayed probably to Great New York, the commander
said, from Spawn's garden. These cursed prisoners--"

"Shut! You keep watch out there. It is starting."

The guard slunk away. My attention went back to the mirror. An image
was formed there now, coming from the eye of the lens upon De Boer's
forehead. It swayed with his walking. He was evidently leading his
men, for none of them were in the scene. The dark rocks were moving
past. The lights of the mine were ahead and below, but coming nearer.

The audiphone hummed and crackled. And through it, De Boer's
low-voiced command sounded:

"To the left Is the better path. Keep working to the left."

The image of the rocks and the mine swung with a dizzying sweep as De
Boer turned about. Then again he was creeping forward.

The mine lights came closer. De Beer's whispered voice said: "There
they are!"

* * * * *

I could see the lights of the mine's guards flash on. A group of
Spawn's men gathered before the smelter building. The challenge
sounded.

"Who are you? Stop!"

And De Boer's murmur: "That is correct, as Perona said. They expect
us. Well," he ended with a sardonic laugh, "expect us."

His projector went up. He fired. In the silence of the control room we
could hear the audiphoned hiss of it, and see the flash in the
mirror-scene. He had fired into the air.

Again his low voice to his men: "Hold steady. They will run."

The group of figures at the smelter separated, waved and scattered
back into the deeper shadows. Their hand-lights were extinguished, but
the moonlight caught and showed them. They were running away; hiding
in the crags. They fired a shot or two, high in the air.

De Boer was advancing swiftly now. The image swayed and shifted,
raised and lowered rhythmically as he ran. And the dark shape of the
smelter building loomed large as he neared it.

I felt Jetta beside me: heard her whisper: "Why, he should attack and
then come back! Greko told my father--"

But De Boer was not coming back! He was dashing for the smelter
entrance. Spawn's guards must have known then that there was something
wrong. Their shots hissed, still fired high, and our grid sounded
their startled shouts. Then as De Boer momentarily turned his head, I
saw what was taking place to the side of him. A detachment of the
bandits had followed the retreating guards. The bandits' shots were
levelled now. Dim stabs of light in the gloom. One of the guards
screamed as he was struck.

* * * * *

The attack was real! But it was over in a moment. Spawn's men, those
who were not struck down, plunged away and vanished. Perona had
disconnected the mine's electrical safeguards. The smelter door was
sealed, but it gave before the blows of a metal bar two of De Boer's
men were carrying.

In the unguarded, open strong-room, Perona, alone, was absorbed in his
task of carrying the ingots of quicksilver down into the hidden
compartment beneath its metal floor.

Our mirror was vague and dim now with a moving interior of the main
smelter room as De Boer plunged through. At the strong-room entrance
he paused, with his men crowding behind him. The figure of Perona
showed in the vague light: he was stooping under the weight of one of
the little ingots. Beside him yawned the small trap-opening leading
downward.

He saw De Boer. He straightened, startled, and then shouted with a
terrified Spanish oath. De Boer's projector was levelled: the huge,
foreshortened muzzle of it blotted out half our image. It hissed its
puff of light--a blinding flash on our mirror--in the midst of which
the dark shape of Perona's body showed as it crumpled and fell. Like
Spawn, he met instant death.

Jetta was gripping me. "Why--" Gutierrez was with us. Hans was
bending forward, watching the mirror. He muttered, "Got him!"

I saw a chance to escape, and pulled at Jetta. But at once Gutierrez
stepped backward.

"Like him I will strike you dead!" he said.

* * * * *

No chance of escape. I had thought Gutierrez absorbed by the mirror,
but he was not. I protested vehemently:

"I haven't moved, you fool. I have no intention of moving."

And now De Boer and his men were carrying up the ingots. A man for
each bar. A confusion of blurred swaying shapes, and low-voiced,
triumphant murmurs from our disc.

Then De Boer was outside the smelter house, and we saw a little queue
of the bandits carrying the treasure up the defile. Coming back here
to the flyer. There was no pursuit; the mine guards were gone.

The triumphant bandits would be here in a few moments.

"_Ave Maria, que magnifico!_" Gutierrez had retreated to our doorway,
more alert than ever upon me and Jetta. Hans called through the
window-slit:

"All is well, Franks!"

"Got it?"

"Yes! Make ready."

There was a stir outside as several of the bandits hastened down the
defile to meet De Boer. And the tread of others, inside the flyer at
their posts, preparing for hasty departure.

Hans snapped off the audiphone and mirror. He bent over his control
panel. "All is well, Gutierrez. In a moment we start."

Through the observatory window I saw the line of De Boer's men coming:
Abruptly Hans gave a cry. "Look!"

* * * * *

A glow was in the room. A faint aura of light. And our disconnected
instruments were crackling, murmuring with interference. Eavesdropping
waves were here! Hans realised it: so did I.

But there was no need for theory. From outside came shouts.

"Patrol-ship!"

"Hurry!"

The ship, suddenly exposing its lights, was perfectly visible above
us. Five thousand feet up, possibly. A tiny silver bird in the
moonlight: but even with the naked eye I could see by its light
pattern that it was the official Porto Rican patrol-liner. It saw us
down here: recognized this bandit flyer, no doubt.

And it was coming down!

There was a confusion as the bandits rushed aboard. The patrol was
dropping in a swift spiral. I watched tensely, holding Jetta, with the
turmoil of the embarking bandits around me. Gutierrez stood with
levelled weapon.

"They have not moved, Commander."

De Boer was here. The treasure was aboard.

"Ready, Hans. Lift us."

The landing portes clanged as they closed. Hans shoved at his
switches. I heard the helicopter engines thumping. A vertical lift:
there was no space in this rocky defile for any horizontal take-away.

He was very calm, this De Boer. He sat in a chair at a control-bank of
instruments unfamiliar to me.

"Full power, Hans: I tell you. Lift us!"

* * * * *

The ship was quivering. We lifted. The rocks of the gully dropped
away. But the patrol-ship was directly over us. Was De Boer rushing
into a collision?

"Now, forward, Hans."

We poised for the level flight. Did De Boer think he could
out-distance this patrol-ship, the swiftest type of flyer in the
Service? I knew that was impossible.

The silver ship overhead was circling, watchful. And as we levelled
for forward flight it shot a warning searchlight beam down across our
bow, ordering us to land.

De Boer laughed. "They think they have us!"

I saw his hand go to a switch. A warning siren resounded through our
corridor, warning the bandits of De Boer's next move. But I did not
know it then: the thing caught me unprepared.

De Boer flung another switch. My senses reeled. I heard Jetta cry out.
My arm about her tightened.

A moment of strange whirling unreality. The control room seemed fading
about me. The tube-lights dimmed. A green glow took their place--a
lurid sheen in which the cubby and the tense faces of De Boer and Hans
showed with ghastly pallor. Everything was unreal. The voices of De
Boer and Hans sounded with a strange tonelessness. Stripped of the
timber that made one differ from the other. Hollow ghosts of human
voices. By the sound I could not tell which was De Boer and which was
Hans.

The corridor was dark; all the lights on the ship faded into this
horrible dead green. The window beside me had a film on it. A dead,
dark opening where moonlight had been. Then I realized that I was
beginning to see through it once more. Starlight. Then the moonlight.

We had soared almost level with the descending patrol-ship. We went
past it, a quarter of a mile away. Went past, and it did not follow.
It was still circling.

* * * * *

I knew then what had happened. And why this bandit ship had seemed of
so strange an aspect. We were invisible! At four hundred yards, even
in the moonlight, the patrol could not distinguish us. Only ten of
these X-flyers were in existence: they were the closest secret of the
U. S. Anti-War Department. No other government had them except in
impractical imitations. I had never even seen one before.

But this bandit ship was one. And I recalled that a year ago, a
suppressed dispatch intimated that the Service had lost one--wrecked
in the Lowlands and never found.

So this was that lost invisible flyer? De Boer, using it for
smuggling, with Perona and Spawn as partners. And now, De Boer making
away in it with Spawn's treasure!

The bandit's hollow, toneless, unreal chuckle sounded in the gruesome
lurid green of the control room.

"I think that surprised them!"

The tiny silver shape of the baffled local patrol-ship faded behind us
as we flew northward over heavy, fantastic crags; far above the tiny
twinkling lights of the village of Nareda--out over the sullen dark
surface of the Nares Sea.


CHAPTER XIII

_The Flight to the Bandit Stronghold_

During this flight of some six hours--north, and then, I think,
northeast--to the remote Lowland fastness where De Boer's base was
located, I had no opportunity to learn much of the operation of this
invisible flyer. But it was the one which had been lost. Wrecked, no
doubt, and the small crew aboard it all killed. The vessel, however,
was not greatly damaged: the crew were killed doubtless by escaping
poisonous gases when the flyer struck.

How long it lay unfound, I cannot say. Perhaps, for days, it still
maintained its invisibility, while the frantic planes of the U. S.
Anti-War Department tried in vain to locate it. And then, with its
magnetic batteries exhausting themselves, it must have become visible.
Perona, making a solo flight upon Nareda business to Great London,
came upon it. Perona, Spawn and De Boer were then in the midst of
their smuggling activities. They salvaged the vessel secretly. De
Boer, with an incongruous flair for mechanical science, was enabled in
his bandit camp, to recondition the flyer--building a workshop for the
purpose, with money which Perona freely supplied.

Some of this I learned from De Boer, some is surmise: but I am sure it
is close to the facts.

* * * * *

I have since had an opportunity--through my connection with this
adventure which I am recording--of going aboard one of the X-flyers of
the Anti-War Department, and seeing it in operation with its technical
details explained to me. But since it is so important a Government
secret, I cannot set it down here. The principles involved are
complex: the postulates employed, and the mathematical formulae
developing them in theory, are far too intricate for my understanding.
Yet the practical workings are simple indeed. Some of them were
understood as far back as 1920 and '30, when that pioneer of modern
astrophysics, Albert Einstein, first proved that a ray of light is
deflected from its normal straight path when passing through a
magnetic field.

I am sorry that I cannot give here more than this vague hint of the
workings of the fantastic invisible flyers which to-day are so often
the subject of speculation by the general public which never has seen
them, and perhaps never will. But I think, too, that a lengthy
pedantic discourse here would be out of place. And tiring. After all,
I am trying to tell only what happened to me in this adventure. And to
little Jetta.

A very strangely capable fellow, this young De Boer. A modern pirate:
no other age could have produced him. He did not spare Perona's money,
that was obvious. From his hidden camp he must have made frequent
visits to the great Highland centers, purchasing scientific equipment:
until now, when his path crossed mine. I found him surrounded by most
of the every-day devices of our modern world. The village of Nareda
was primitive: backward. Save for its modern lights, a few local
audiphones and image-finders, and its official etheric connections
with other world capitals, it might have been a primitive Latin
American village of a hundred years ago.

* * * * *

But not so De Boer's camp, which presently I was to see. Nor this, his
flyer, with which his smuggling activities had puzzled Hanley's Office
for so many months. There was nothing primitive here.

De Boer himself was a swaggering villain. I saw him now with his cloak
discarded, in the normal tube-lights of the control room when, after a
time, the mechanism of invisibility of the flyer was shut off. A
fellow of six feet and a half at the very least, this De Boer. Heavy,
yet with his great height and strength, lean and graceful. He wore a
fabric shirt, with a wide-rolled collar. A wide belt of tanned hide,
with lighters, a little electron drink-cooler and other nick-nackeries
hanging from tasseled cords--and a naked, ugly-looking knife blade
clipped beside a holster which held an old-fashioned exploding
projector of leaden steel-tipped bullets.

His trousers were of leather, wide-flaring, ending at his brawny bare
knees, with wide-cut, limp leather boots flapping about his calves in
ancient piratical fashion. They had flaring soles, these shoes, for
walking upon the Lowland caked ooze. The uppers were useless: I rather
think he wore them because they were picturesque. He was a handsome
fellow, with rough-hewn features. A wide mouth, and very white, even
teeth. A cruel mouth, when it went grim. But the smile was intriguing:
I should think particularly so to women.

He had a way with him, this devil-may-care bandit. Strange mixture of
a pirate of old and an outlaw of our modern world. With a sash at his
waist, a red handkerchief about his forehead, and a bloody knife
between his teeth. I could have fancied him a fabled pirate of the
Spanish Main. A few hundred years ago when these dry Lowlands held the
tossing seas. But I had seen him, so far, largely seated quietly in
his chair at his instrument table, a cigarette dangling from his lips,
and, instead of a red bandanna about his forehead, merely the elastic
band holding the lens of his image-finder. It caught in the locks of
his curly black hair. He pushed it askew; and then, since he did not
need it now, discarded it altogether.

* * * * *

Where we went I could not surmise, except that we flew low over the
sullen black waters of the Nares Sea and then headed northeast. We
kept well below the zero-height, with the dark crags of the Lowlands
passing under us.

The night grew darker. Storm clouds obscured the moon; and it was then
that De Boer shut off the mechanism of invisibility. The control room,
with only the watchful Gutierrez now in it--besides De Boer, Jetta and
myself--was silent and orderly. But there were sounds of roistering
from down the ship's corridor. The bandits, with this treasure of the
radiumized quicksilver ingots aboard, were already triumphantly
celebrating.

I sat whispering with Jetta. De Boer, busy with charts and
navigational instruments, ignored us, and Gutierrez, so long as we did
not move, seemed not to object to our whispers.

The night slowly passed. De Boer served us food, calling to one of his
men to shove a slide before us. For himself, he merely drank his
coffee and an alcoholic drink at his instrument table, while absorbed
in his charts.

The roistering of the men grew louder. De Boer leaped to his feet,
cursed them roundly, then went back to his calculations. He stood once
before Jetta, regarding her with a strange, slow smile which made my
heart pound. But he turned away in a moment.

The bandits, for all De Boer's admonitions, were now ill-conditioned
for handling this flyer. But I saw, through the small grid-opening in
the control room ceiling, the pilot in his cubby upon the wing-top.
He sat alert and efficient, with his lookout beside him.

* * * * *

The night presently turned really tumultuous, with a great wind
overhead, and storm clouds of ink, shot through occasionally by
lightning flashes. We flew lower, at minus 2,000 feet, on the average.
The heavy air was sultry down here, with only a dim blurred vista of
the depths beneath us. I fancied that now we were bending eastward,
out over the great basin pit of the mid-Atlantic area. No vessels
passed us, or, if they did, I did not sight them.

De Boer had a detector on his table. Occasionally it would buzz with
calls: liners or patrols in our general neighborhood. He ignored them
with a sardonic smile. Once or twice, when our dim lights might have
been sighted, he altered our course sharply. And, when at one period
we passed over the lights of some Lowland settlement, he flung us
again into invisibility until we were beyond range.

I had, during these hours, ample opportunity to whisper with Jetta.
But there was so little for us to say. I knew all of Spawn's and
Perona's plot. Both were dead: it was De Boer with whom we were
menaced now. And as I saw his huge figure lounging at his table, and
his frowning, intent face, the vision of the aged, futile Perona, who
had previously been my adversary, seemed inoffensive indeed.

De Boer obviously was pleased with himself. He had stolen half a
million dollars of treasure, and was making off with it to his base in
the depths. He would smuggle these ingots into the world markets at
his convenience; months from now, probably. Meanwhile, what did he
intend to do with me? And Jetta? Ransom me? I wondered how he could
manage it. And the thought pounded me. What about Jetta? I felt now
that she was all the world to me. Her safety, beyond any thought of
smugglers or treasure, was all that concerned me. But what was I
going to do about it?

* * * * *

I pressed her hand. "Jetta, you're not too frightened, are you?"

"No, Philip."

Her mind, I think, was constantly on her father, lying dead back there
on his garden path. I had not spoken of him, save once. She threatened
instant tears, and I stopped.

"Do not be too frightened. We'll get out of this."

"Yes."

"He can't escape. Jetta; he can't hide. Why, in a day or so all the
patrols of the United States Lowland Service will be after us!"

But if the patrol-ships assailed De Boer, if he found things going
badly--he could so easily kill Jetta and me. He might be caught, but
we would never come through it alive.

My thoughts drifted along, arriving nowhere, just circling in the same
futile rounds. I was aware of Jetta falling asleep beside me, her face
against my shoulder, her fingers clutching mine. She looked like a
half grown, slender, ragged boy. But her woman's hair lay thick on my
arm, and one of the dark tresses fell to my hand. I turned my fingers
in it. This strange little woman. Was my love for her foredoomed to
end in tragedy? I swore then that I would not let it be so.


CHAPTER XIV

_Jetta Takes a Hand_

I came from my reverie to find De Boer before me. He was standing with
legs planted wide, arms folded across his deep chest, and on his face
an ironic smile.

"So tired! My little captives, _di mi_! You look like babes lost in a
wood."

I disengaged myself from Jetta, resting her against a cushion, and she
did not awaken. I stood up, fronting De Boer.

"What are you going to do with me?" I demanded.

He held his ironic smile. "Take you to my camp. You'll be well hidden,
no one can follow me. My X-flyer's a very handy thing to have, isn't
it?"

"So you're the smuggler I was sent after?"

That really amused him. "Er--yes. Those tricksters, Perona and
Spawn--we were what you would call partners. He had--the perfumed
Perona--what he thought was a clever scheme for us. I was to take all
the risk, and he and Spawn get most of the money. Chah! They thought I
was imbecile--pretending to attack a treasure and being such a fool
that I would not seize it for myself! Not De Boer!" He chuckled.
"Well, so very little did they know me. No treasure yet touched De
Boer's fingers without lingering!"

* * * * *

He was in a talkative mood, and drew up his chair and slouched in it.
I saw that he had been drinking some alcholite beverage, not enough to
befuddle him, but enough to take the keen edge off his wits, and make
him want to talk.

"Sit down, Grant."

"I'll stand."

"As you like."

"What are you going to do with me?" I demanded again. "Try to ransom
me for a fat price from the United States?"

He smiled sourly. "You need not be sarcastic, young lad. The better
for you if I get a ransom."

"Then I hope you get it."

"Perona's idea," he added. "I will admit it looked possible: I did not
know then you had Government protection." He went grim. "That was
Perona and Spawn's trickery. Well, they paid for it. No one plays De
Boer false and lives to tell it. Perona and Spawn wanted to get rid of
you--because you annoyed them."

"Did I?"

"With the little Jetta, I fancy." His gaze went to the sleeping Jetta
and back to me. "Perona was very sensitive where this little woman was
concerned. Why not? An oldish fool like him--"

* * * * *

I could agree with that, but I did not say so.

I said, "You'd better cast me loose, Jetta and me. I suppose you
realize, De Boer, that you'll have the patrols like a pack of hounds
after you. Jetta is a Nareda citizen: the United States will take that
up. There's the theft of the treasure. And as you say, I'm a
Government agent."

He nodded. "Your Government is over-zealous in protecting its agents.
That I know, Grant. I might have left you alone, there in the garden,
when I realized it. But that, by damn, was too late! Live men talk.
Any way, if I cannot ransom you, to kill you is very easy. And dead
men are shut-mouthed."

"I'm still alive, De Boer."

He eyed me. "You talk brave."

This condescending, amused giant!

I retorted. "How are you going to ransom me?"

"That," he said. "I have not yet planned it. A delicate business."

I ventured, "And Jetta?" My heart was beating fast.

"Jetta," he said with a sudden snap, "is none of your business."

Again his gaze went toward her. "I might marry her: why not? I am not
wholly a villain. I could marry her legally in Cape Town, with all the
trappings of clergy--and be immune from capture under the laws there.
If she is seventeen. I have forgotten her age, it's been so long since
I knew her. Is she seventeen? She does not look it."

I said shortly. "I don't know how old she is."

"But we can ask her when she awakens, can't we?"

* * * * *

He was amusing himself with me. And yet, looking back on it now, I
believe he was more than half serious. From his pouch he drew a small
cylinder. "Have a drink, Grant. After all I bear you no ill-will. A
man can but follow his trade: you were trying to be a good Government
agent."

"Thanks."

"And then you may make it possible for me to pick a nice ransom.
Here."

"I hope so." I declined the drink.

"Afraid for your wits?"

I said impulsively, "I want all my wits to make sure you handle this
ransom properly, De Boer. I'm as interested as you are: in that at
least, we are together."

He grinned, tipped the cylinder at his lips for a long drink.

"Quite so--a mutual interest. Let us be friends over it."

His gaze wandered back to Jetta. He added slowly:

"She is very lovely, Grant. A little woodland flower, just ready for
plucking." A sentimental tone, but there was in his expression a
ribald flippancy that sent a shudder through me. "She has quite
overcome you, Grant. Well, why not me as well? I am certainly more of
a man than you. We must admit that Perona had a good eye."

* * * * *

My thoughts were wandering. Suppose I could not find an opportunity to
escape with Jetta? De Boer might successfully ransom me and take her
to Cape Town. Or if he feared that to try for the ransom would be too
dangerous, doubtless he would kill me out of hand. An ill outcome
indeed! Nor could I forget that there was half a million of treasure
involved.

It was obvious to me that Hanley would not permit the patrol-ships to
attack De Boer with the lives of Jetta and myself at stake. Hanley
knew, or suspected, that De Boer was operating an invisible flyer, but
I did not see how that could help Hanley much. Markes, acting for
Nareda, would doubtless be willing to ransom Jetta: the United States
would ransom me. I must urge the ransom plan, because for all the
money in the world I would not endanger Jetta, nor let this bandit
carry her off.

Or could I escape with her, and still find some means to save the
treasure? It was Jetta's treasure now, two-thirds of it, for it had
legally belonged to her father. Could I save it, and her as well?

Not by any move of mine, here now on this flyer. That was impossible.
In De Boer's camp, perhaps. But that, too, I doubted. He was too
clever a scoundrel to be lax in guarding me.

But in the effecting of a ransom--the exchange of me, and perhaps
Jetta, for a sum of money--that would be a delicate transaction, and
some little thing could easily go wrong for De Boer. There would be my
chance. I would have to make something go wrong! Get in his confidence
now so that I would have some say in arranging the details of the
ransom. Make him think I was only concerned for my own safety. Appear
clever in helping plan the exchange. And then so manipulate the thing
that I could escape with Jetta and save the treasure--and the ransom
money as well. And capture De Boer, since that was what Hanley had
sent me out to accomplish.

* * * * *

Thoughts fly swiftly. All this flashed to me. I had no details as yet.
But that I must get into De Boer's confidence stood but clearly.

I said abruptly, "De Boer, since we are to be friends--"

"So you prefer to sit down now?"

"Yes." I had drawn a small settle to face him. "De Boer, do you intend
to ask a ransom for Jetta?"

"You insist with that question?"

"That is my way. Then we can understand each other. Do you?"

"No," he said shortly.

I frowned. "I think I could get you a big price."

"I think I should prefer the little Jetta, Grant."

I held myself outwardly unmoved. "I don't blame you. But you will
ransom me? It can be worked out. I have some ideas."

"Yes," he agreed. "It can be worked perhaps. I have not thought of
details yet. You are much concerned for your safety, Grant? Fear not."

An amused thought evidently struck him. He added. "It occurs to me how
easy, if I am going to ransom you, it will be for me to send you back
dead. You might, if I send you back alive, tell them a lot of things
about me."

"I will not talk."

"Not," he said, "if I close your mouth for good."

* * * * *

I had no retort. There was no answering such logic; and with his
murders of Spawn and Perona, and the deaths of some of the police
guards at the mine, the murder of me would not put him in much worse a
position.

He was laughing ironically. Suddenly he checked himself.

"Well, Jetta! So you have awakened?"

Jetta was sitting erect. How long she had been awake, what she had
heard. I could not say. Her gaze went from De Boer to me, and back
again.

"Yes, I am awake."

It seemed that the look she flashed me carried a warning. But whatever
it was, I had no chance of pondering it, for it was driven from my
mind by surprise at her next words.

"Awake, yes! And interested, hearing this Grant bargain with you for
his life."

It surprised De Boer as well. But the alcholite had dulled his wits,
and Jetta realized this, and presumed upon it.

"Ho!" exclaimed De Boer. "Our little bird is angry!"

"Not angry. It is contempt."

Her look to me now held contempt. It froze me with startled chagrin;
but only for an instant, and then the truth swept me. Strange Jetta! I
had thought of her only as a child; almost, but not quite a woman. A
frightened little woodland fawn.

"Contempt, De Boer. Is he not a contemptuous fellow, this American?"

Again I caught her look and understood it. This was a different
Jetta. No longer helplessly frightened, but a woman, fighting. She had
heard De Boer calmly saying that he might send me back dead--and she
was fighting now for me.

De Boer took another drink, and stared at her. "What is this?"

She turned away. "Nothing. But if you are going to ransom me--"

"I am not, little bird."

* * * * *

She showed no aversion for him, and it went to his head, stronger than
the drink. "Never would I ransom you!"

He reached for her, but nimbly she avoided him. Acting, but clever
enough not to overdo it. I held myself silent: I had caught again the
flash of a warning gaze from her. She had fathomed my purpose. Get his
confidence. Beguile him. And woman is so much cleverer than the
trickiest man at beguiling!

"Do not touch me, De Boer! He tried that. He held my hand in the
moonlight--to woo me with his clever words."

"Hah! Grant, you hear her?"

"And I find him now not a man, but a craven--"

"But you will find me a man, Jetta." De Boer was hugely amused. "See
Grant, we are rivals! You and Perona, then you and me. It is well for
you that I fear you not, or I would run my knife through you now."

I could not mistake Jetta's shudder. But De Boer did not see it, for
she covered it by impulsively putting her hand upon his arm.

"Did you--did you kill my father?" She stumbled over the question. But
she asked it with a childlike innocence sufficiently real to convince
him.

"I? Why--" He recovered from his surprise. "Why no, little bird. Who
told you that I did?"

"No one. I--no one has said anything about it." She added slowly, "I
hoped that it was not you, De Boer."

"Me? Oh no: it was an accident." He shot me a menacing glance. "I will
explain it all. Jetta. Your father and I were friends for years--"

"Yes. I know. Often he spoke to me of you. Many times I asked him to
let me meet you."

* * * * *

They were ignoring me. But Gutierrez, lurking in the door oval, was
not: I was well aware of that.

"I remember you from years ago, little Jetta."

"And I remember you."

I understand the rationality of her purpose. She could easily get De
Beer's confidence. She had known him when a child. Her father had been
his business partner, presumably his friend. And I saw her now
cleverly altering her status here. She had been a captive, allied with
me. She was changing that. She was now Spawn's daughter, here with her
dead father's friend.

She turned a gaze of calm aversion upon me. "Unless you want him here,
De Boer. I would rather talk to you--without him."

He leaped to his feet. "Hah! that pleases me, little Jetta! Gutierrez,
take this fellow away."

The Spanish-American came slouching forward. "The girl's an old
friend, Commander? You never told me that."

"Because it is no business of yours. Take him away. Seal him in
D-cubby."

I said sullenly. "I misjudged both of you."

Jetta's gaze avoided me. As Gutierrez shoved me roughly down the
corridor, De Boer laughed, and his voice came back: "Do not be afraid.
We will find some safe way of ransoming you--dead or alive!"

I was flung on a bunk in one of the corridor cubbies, and the door
sealed upon me.

(_To be continued._)