Lighted Windows, page 17
“Away! Where?” She was on her feet, swaying as she stood. Harcourt pressed her back into the chair.
“Take it easy, Millicent. Jimmy went off in a plane.”
“Where, Bruce, where?”
“In just one hour he will be on his way to find out. We won’t trouble you any more now, Mrs. Hale. Good afternoon. See you in the morning. Come on, Harcourt.”
Ignoring Millicent Hale’s frenzied appeal to him to stay with her, Harcourt followed the Commissioner out of the cabin. He stopped at the Waffle Shop door to speak to Mary Samp before he joined the official. A drowsy sun was hanging on to a crater-top, like a sleepy child protesting against bed. Overhead spread a limpidly cloudless sky. A faint star or two pricked palely through. Unearthly light flickered above a distant volcano. Far, far to the east stretched fields of Arctic moss palely pink. Against the horizon glittered white mountain-tops girdled by purple valleys. The tide swished softly on the shingle. A little wind whispered along the copper wires of the antennae. Men were sitting outside the dormitories, heads together, talking excitedly. In the centre of another group a bear was being put through his paces; from another came the click of poker chips. The aroma of coffee, the appetizing smell of waffles and bacon scented the air. Out of earshot of the Samp cabin, the Commissioner stopped.
“That woman knows more than she’s telling, a whole lot more. We’ll let her think we’re as dumb as she thinks we are, while we go after Chester.”
“Then you really meant that I was to hunt for him?”
“Of course we are going for him.”
“We?”
“Sure. I have every confidence that you really want to find the murderer, but you like and trust Jimmy Chester. I’m convinced that he’s our man. Meanwhile, have the clerk keep tabs on native expenditures at the Company store. You didn’t tell me that Hale’s wad was gone when you found him.”
“I told you that after lifting him to the couch no one touched him till you got here. We thought you would want everything left undisturbed.”
“That’s right! That’s right! We’ll let the robbery theory cool while we go for Chester. You lead the way in your plane. I’ll follow in mine with my pilot. Ought always to fly in pairs in this country anyway. Twilight till almost ten, light again soon after two a.m. You must know every field where a plane can land.”
“I do. We have three large camps stocked with provisions for two years. They have good fields. Unless Chester had an accident, he must have come down in one of those. He wouldn’t go to a city or town of any size. If he is running away, he would know that you would have his description broadcast. Have you forgotten Hale? What is to be done with the body?”
“I’ll radio for the expert Parks set out for. After he gets here, and has the information I want, tell Grant to bury it here. It isn’t to be taken away—yet. We’ll start in an hour. Leave someone in charge with instructions to let Mrs. Hale have her head. Get her out and about if possible. There will be no boat for the States for two weeks. No one will take her by plane. Business as usual. Get ’em all feeling secure, that’s the idea. Going to eat at the Waffle Shop?”
“No. At my cabin. I want to talk with Pasca, my houseboy, and leave Grant in charge.”
Tubby Grant was strumming a mournful ditty on his ukulele as Harcourt entered his cabin. He flung the instrument to the cot and got precipitately to his feet.
“Ba-gosh, you’re white, Bruce. What’s up?”
“The Commissioner and I are starting in an hour to trail Jimmy Chester.”
“Get that clue from Mrs. Hale?”
“Not from what she said, from what she didn’t say. I will take the Tanager. May have to come down in cramped quarters. I’m leaving you in charge, Tubby. Business as usual. And except that she is not to go out on the steamer or in a plane, encourage Millicent to take up her life again. The Commissioner suspects that she knows more than she is telling. She can keep busy packing.”
“Shall I have Joe put up on the hill beside Harper?”
“Yes. After the expert gets through. You know what to do. Keep your eye on Janice, will you?”
“What a heck of a honeymoon!”
“Honeymoon! Was it only yesterday that that fat little notary pronounced us man and wife?”
“Suppose the boy friend appears?”
“Paxton? Good Lord, I haven’t thought of him since Millicent burst into the H house last night. If he comes, appear as though you took it for granted that he would drop down to see Janice. She must meet him sometime and get over her fear of him. I wish that I were to be here—but keep your eye on her.”
“Perhaps you’ll be back before he comes. Perhaps he won’t come.”
“He will come, all right. He won’t pass by the chance of showing up the crudeness of this camp, of the H house against his yacht.”
“Poisonously jealous of him, aren’t you?”
“Jealous as the devil. He is a multi-millionaire, a cosmopolite, remember, and I am an engineer dependent on my job.”
“And a wow of an engineer at that.”
The lines between Harcourt’s brows smoothed out. His eyes flashed with laughter as he mimicked Tatima.
“Who, me? Find Janice, will you, Tubby? I want to see her before I go. I will get a bite at the H house, while I give Pasca instructions. I will bring Jimmy back to clear himself. Don’t worry if the process seems unduly long. Between you and me, I think Chester’s theatrical get-away was a mere gesture. He may know something but—we must remember that he has a genius for showmanship.”
“He gets his effects.”
“He does. By the way, Millicent suggested robbery as the motive of the attack on Joe. No money was found on him or in the cabin, you remember. Kadyama will bear watching.”
“Did you get that hunch too? He said that Tatima was at the squaw-dance. She denied being there. Something fishy about that. I put his grudge down to jealousy, I hadn’t thought of money. I’ll bet that while you and the Commissioner are beating the bushes for harmless Jimmy Chester, the party who shot Hale will be sitting pretty right here.”
“Can’t take your bet, Tubby. I believe the same thing. But the Commissioner is the doctor. Look for me when you see me.”
Smoke rose from the chimney, drifted lazily into the pink afterglow, as Harcourt entered his cabin. He stopped on the threshold. The room seemed strange. It gave a curious impression of order. The pelts on the floor had been re-arranged. Books on the table desk had been slipped between book ends. Where had those come from? The couch— He shouted with laughter. A fresh, bright Yakutat blanket, taken from the wall apparently, had been spread over it, pillows had been plumped up, in the middle of the cover reposed a chair, a chair of size and weight. On his haunches in front of the couch squatted Tong, injured innocence personified. The tawny eyes he turned on his master were wells of indignant grief. Harcourt chuckled as he pulled the wide-apart ears.
“I told you that some day you wouldn’t be allowed up there, old fella, but—” Was that really an embroidered cloth and shining silver on the small table laid for two, or was he seeing things? The plates and tumblers of the warranted-to-withstand-wear-and-tear variety were his—he would swear to that. Who was humming to the accompaniment of an eggbeater? He flung open the door.
“Janice!”
The girl in her gay smock, furiously beating eggs in a bowl, bobbed a dancing-school curtsy.
“What are you doing here?”
“Here! Didn’t milord send word by Miss Martha that if I did not return to the H house pronto he would come for me?”
“I didn’t send for you because I wanted a cook.”
“Don’t bite. Miss Martha intimated that as a chef Pasca left something to be desired. ‘I seen my duty an’ I done it.’ Look at that asparagus with sauce vinaigrette. I found a basket of gulls’ eggs. I’m making an omelette, a plump, yellow omelette, not one of those thin things with a soap-sudsy filling. Something tells me that I have mortally offended your house-boy. He cares so awfully for himself as a cook. As for Tong, he looked ready to burst out crying when I ordered him off the couch. He is ruining it.”
“Jan! You wonderful girl!” He caught her hands. Dropped them. “Have I time for a shower before the banquet?”
“If you hurry.”
When he returned to the living-room she had removed her smock. Her simple blue frock had elbow sleeves which accentuated the ivory tint of her arms above her sun-tanned wrists. Pasca in a white coat was placing cups of soup. Tong sat on his haunches on the bear pelt watching surreptitiously.
Harcourt looked gravely at Janice seated across the small table.
“For the first time in my life I understand why my father always said grace at his own table. Mother was something for which to give daily thanks if he had had nothing else.” He cleared his voice. “Where did all this elegance come from?” He touched the beautiful cloth with a shining silver spoon.
“I told you that I had not realized quite into what I was adventuring. Thought I might have an occasional afternoon tea.”
“And you drew this. It is all wrong, Jan, but we won’t go back to that now.” He looked at the clock. “I am taking off in just thirty minutes.”
“Where?”
“After Jimmy Chester.”
“Oh, no! Not nice Jimmy Chester! Does the Commissioner think he did it?”
He told her of the interview with Millicent Hale, while Pasca served the simple supper. Tong followed his every movement with hungry eyes. As the Eskimo set cups of coffee on the table, Harcourt smiled at the girl.
“This has the restaurant at which we dined beaten a mile. Feed Tong, Pasca. Fuel the Tanager. I will be at the field in ten minutes.”
As the door closed behind the man and dog, Janice asked:
“Why are you taking that particular plane?”
“Because I can take-off after a run of less than three hundred feet, and come to a complete stop one hundred feet from the spot where the plane first touches the ground. As I don’t know where I may have to come down, it’s the best bet.”
“Will you be away long?”
He rose and stood with his arm on the mantel. “Don’t know. If Jimmy is hiding, it may take days to find him. I have asked Miss Mary to stay here nights. Hate like the dickens to leave you alone.”
“Alone! With Tubby and Miss Mary and Argus of the Hundred Eyes and Tong? And, of course, Mrs. Hale.”
He looked at her steadily. “Do I need to tell you that Millicent’s intimation that it would matter to me if she were free is a figment of her crazed imagination?”
Janice was intent on the pattern she was etching on the cloth with the tip of a silver spoon.
“Imagination! It sounded like the real thing to me.”
He caught her shoulders. “You know better. You know that I—Good Lord, is that the Commissioner knocking? Can’t he allow me a minute with—with my family?”
He opened the door. The smiling, impeccably dressed man facing him said suavely:
“I was told that I would find—”
“Ned!”
The choked exclamation came from Janice. Harcourt glanced at the clock. Five minutes before he was due at the flying-field. Only five minutes. He looked straight at Paxton, whose eyes were on the girl.
“Come in. Jan, here is a friend from the outside world.” As she took a step forward he glanced unseeingly at his wrist-watch. “Sorry that I have to leave headquarters just as you arrive, Paxton, but Janice and Grant will show you the wonders of this north country.”
He caught the girl in his arms. “It’s like tearing my heart out to leave you, Beautiful!” He kissed her eyes, her throat, her mouth. She struggled for an instant before she relaxed against him. He pressed his lips to her hair. “Dearest!”
“Ha-ar-court!”
The Commissioner’s shout outside crashed into his husky voice. Janice caught the back of a chair as he released her. Her long lashes were a dark fringe against her colorless skin. Paxton was staring out of the window, a fighting set to his shoulders.
Harcourt picked up jumpers, helmet, rifle. His blood raced. He had intended to kiss Janice lightly, a mere gesture to impress the late fiancé with the reality of their relationship. The feel of her in his arms had set him aflame. He had kissed her as though he were starved for her—as he was. Would she forgive him?
She followed him to the door in true wifely solicitude. Said in a voice disconcertingly steady:
“Good luck to you, Bruce.”
As he stepped to the board walk she leaned forward to whisper furiously:
“Your technic is superb. You must have had heaps of practice. But why martyr yourself to impress Ned?”
He caught her hand. She twisted it free. Stepped back. He heard Paxton exult:
“I’ll say that my arrival—”
The door closed. Off shore through a blue sea, against the pink aftergow glided a white yacht. Harcourt heard the splash as she dropped anchor.
XVI
Janice’s angry protest, Paxton’s complacence, the sound of the closing door, echoed and re-echoed through Harcourt’s mind to the accompaniment of the drone of the engine, as he climbed to cruising altitude. Three hours’ flight by the compass, then he would descend to make sure that he was nearing the southernmost camp. Why hadn’t he gone back to her, held her, kissed her, until she acknowledged that she knew he loved her, knew that he had no sentimental interest in Millicent Hale? Why had he not let the Commissioner shout his head off outside till he had cleared up the misunderstanding between Jan and himself? Two selves warred within him. One scoffed, “Always put your job first, don’t you?” The other defended, “Why not? You have been made chief of this outfit. You are morally bound to consider its interests first.”
What was the use analyzing motives? It was like turning a knife in his heart. He had not kept his agreement, a gentleman’s agreement, with Jan. He had assured her that living in his cabin would be like living with her brother, then he had seized her as though he were about to eat her. Would she think it nothing more nor less than a raid upon her sympathy?
His will steeled. He had not changed, really. The sight of her across the table, the sweetness of her, the intimacy, the thought of leaving her had been getting in its work before Paxton appeared. Then he had decided swiftly that it wouldn’t do for Jan and him to part as mere friends, he had caught her in his arms and—had lost his head. The memory set the blood humming in his ears. He would not keep her in this wilderness through a winter if he could. If he really meant that, he would better keep away from her as much as possible when he returned. The invisible wall between them was down. He had sent it crumbling. She had been a sport to return to the H house after Millicent’s frantic: “I’m free! If you’d only waited!” Most girls—and justly—would have demanded an explanation of that. She would have, had she loved him. His first big mistake had been to let her remain ignorant of the fact that he loved her. How tragic life could be made by things half said.
He looked at the western sky still ruddy from the pomp of the sun. He was making 105 miles an hour against a light wind. He descended in search of a landmark. The faint sound of a bugle floated up. Taps! He was flying over barracks built around a parade ground. He could make out smudges which were the officers’ houses, a white patch which was a cement tennis court. He knew that it was a good one, he had played there. He caught a pin-point of green light in a company window, a spot of red. That would be a lamp in front of the infirmary. In two hours he would make the southernmost camp. He had little hope of finding Jimmy Chester there. He would fill up with oil and gas, talk things over with the section boss, sleep till sun-up and fly on. As he climbed again he heard the far, faint throb of an engine. The Commissioner was following close. Would they find Jimmy Chester, and if they did, would they find him alive? If he had intended to shoot Hale, why borrow a revolver with which to do it? He could have used one of his own and chucked it into the water. But Jimmy had not done it, he would be willing to bet his job he had not. Then why the melodramatic get-away? The more he thought of the robbery motive, the more probable it seemed. Yet the native laborers would know that they couldn’t put it across. Would they reason? Many of them had the mentality of children.
He was still stubbornly clinging to the conviction of Jimmy Chester’s innocence when on the third day of the search he left the northernmost camp. Not one of the three he had visited had yielded a clue. The Commissioner was irritated and air-worn. He had ordered a return to headquarters, had radioed Grant to expect them that afternoon. As Harcourt climbed to cruising altitude the first uneasiness as to Chester’s safety seized him. Suppose he had cracked-up somewhere, had nothing for food but emergency rations?
He gave his entire attention to his surroundings as he piloted through a sea of clouds. They raced by him, weird white phantoms, blotting out the sunshine. Clouds overhead cast shadows on clouds below. He would shoot for a bright spot, only to find himself in a shower of raindrops which pricked like needles. For an hour he flew in an area of magnetic variations, hampered by the storm. Once he thought he heard the vibration of an engine ahead. It couldn’t be the Commissioner, must be a sound mirage. He sent the plane up again and came out into the sun. The altimeter registered a mile.
He kept above the clouds till he came into clear sky. Descended to get his bearings. Was that a camp below? Men, looking no bigger than beetles, moving. Digging? Probably archaeologists in search of the first Americans. He looked at the compass. His heart stood still. It had gone dead. Some electric current in that prickling rain storm had done the trick. Where was he? He descended as far as he dared. The water was dotted with bergs, emerald green with snowy tops. Whole colonies of gulls perched on the floating ice drifting swiftly toward the open sea. A black oyster-catcher with long orange beak cackled raucously and took wing. Colder. He had been too absorbed in locating himself to realize it before. The glow, the gleam, the glimmer of sun on ice almost blinded him. On the shore were the low crumbling mounds of what had once been an Eskimo colony. Where was he? He thought he knew every relic on the coast. He dropped even lower to make sure that there was no sign of a plane. Jimmy might have come down here for any one of a dozen reasons. The silence of emptiness brooded over the village.
