Alias the Lone Wolf

by Louis Joseph Vance

He retained, however, sufficient presence of mind neatly to disarm Phinuit before that one guessed what he was about.

After that second blow, the Sybarite remained at a standstill, but the continued beating of her engines caused her to quiver painfully from trucks to keelson, as if in agonies of death such as those which had marked the end of Popinot. Of a sudden the engines ceased, and there was no more movement of any sort, only an appalling repose with silence more dreadful still.

Lanyard had no means to measure how long that dumb suspense lasted which was imposed by the stunned faculties of all on board. It seemed interminable. Eventually he saw Monk pick himself up and, making strange moaning noises, like a wounded animal, throw himself upon the door, jerk it open, and dash out.

As if he had only needed that vision of action to animate him, Lanyard threw Phinuit off, so that he staggered across the slanting floor toward the door. When he brought himself up by catching hold of its frame, he was under the threat of his own pistol in Lanyard's hands. He lingered for a moment, showing Lanyard a distraught and vacant face, then apparently realising his danger faded away into the saloon.

With a roughness dictated by the desperate extremity, Lanyard strode over to Liane Delorme, where she still crouched in her corner, staring witlessly, caught her by one arm, fairly jerked her to her feet, and thrust her stumbling out into the saloon. Closing the door behind her, he shot its bolts.

He went to work swiftly then, in a fever of haste. In his ears the clamour of the shipwrecked men upon the decks was only a distant droning, hardly recognised for what it was by him who had not one thought other than to make all possible advantage of every precious instant; and so with the roar of steam from the escape-valves.

Stripping off coat and waistcoat, he took from the pocket of the latter the wallet that held his papers, then ripped open his shirt and unbuckled the money belt round his waist. Its pockets were ample and fitted with trustworthy fastenings; and all but one, that held a few English sovereigns, were empty. The jewels of Madame de Montalais went into them as rapidly as his fingers could move.

Thus engaged, he heard a pistol explode in the saloon, and saw the polished writing-bed of the captain's desk scored by a bullet. His gaze shifting to the door, he discovered a neat round hole in one of its rosewood panels. At the same time, to the tune of another report, a second hole appeared, and the bullet, winging above the desk, buried itself in the after-bulkhead, between the dead-lights. A stream of bullets followed, one after another boring the stout panels as if their consistency had been that of cheese.

Lanyard stepped out of their path and hugged the partition while he finished stuffing the jewels into the belt and, placing the thin wallet beneath it, strapped it tightly round him once more....

That would be Phinuit out there, no doubt, disdaining to waste time breaking in the door, or perhaps fearing his reception once it was down. An innocent and harmless amusement, if he enjoyed it, that it seemed a pity to interrupt. At the same time it grew annoying. The door was taking on the look of a sieve, and the neighbourhood of the deadlights, Lanyard's sole avenue of escape, was being well peppered. Something would have to be done about it...