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Show I ' WNURELEASC jP? The swift twilight of the latitude was closing sharply, but the glasses were still able to bring out every detail aboard the Diesel boat. INSTALLMENT TEN THE STORY SO FAR: Karen Water- son, convinced by her lawyer, John Colt, that she has a claim to the Island estate of her grandfather, Garrett Waterson, has come to Honolulu to attempt getting the property. In an effort to find out something about the Wayne family, now in control of Alakoa, the island, she accepts ac-cepts a date to go sailing with Richard (Tonga Dick) Wayne. Against her wishes he takes her to Alakoa. While there, James Wayne, Dick's uncle and man-ager man-ager of the property. Is found dead from overwork. While taking Karen back to Honolulu, next day, Dick tells her he loves her but they later quarrel. Dick i then sees John Colt and when a com promise offer to him fails he tells Colt that their Pacific venture will fail. He goes back to Alakoa and tells his half-brothers half-brothers that he knows Garrett Water-son Water-son to be alive. They question his word. Now continue with the story. "Granting that an ordinary man might drop out of sight that way," WiUard said, "it still would have been impossible for Garrett Water-son. Water-son. He was too big, too important impor-tant " Dick was getting disgusted again. "No, he wasn't he only imagined he was. Once he was broke, he wasn't of any importance or interest inter-est to anybody except to you, and to you only because you thought he was a skeleton in the closet. Doubtless this will surprise you, but the fact is that Alakoa is a small, obscure, and unimportant speck on the map, suitable for supporting a few hundred people, and of no other significance whatever. The fact that Garrett Waterson once had hold of it for a while would not distinguish him in the eyes of anybody, except yourselves." Both brothers looked scandalized. "If all this can be proved," Ernest Er-nest began, "I mean, if his actual identity can be proved " "Of course it can be proved! It's a plain, demonstrable fact can't you understand that?" "If Dick is to be believed," Wil-lard Wil-lard said, "our worries are over, Ernest. They can go ahead and investigate in-vestigate their heads off and it won't get 'em a thing. And Karen Water-son's Water-son's case against us falls flat as as" "As a bird in the hand," Dick suggested. Suddenly a new angle occurred to Willard Wayne. "I suppose," he said, "since you are working for Waterson, as you say, this boat of yours isn't yours at all, but his is that right?" "Certainly." "Then," said Willard, "whatever business he's in now, he must be enjoying a considerable success. That alone ought to furnish proof that he's competent." "Unfortunately, there's a catch in that, too," said Dick, "and it's a big one. "Just what business is he in?" Ernest demanded. "Where does his money come from? Or is that something some-thing else that isn't supposed to concern us?" "It concerns you very much," Dick said. "Well?" Dick Wayne grinned sardonically, even maliciously,- and stood up, preparatory to walking out. "Ask Garrett Waterson," he suggested. "If he doesn't feel like telling you, it won't do you any good to know." John Colt, aboard a Diesel boat hardly better than the sampans the Japanese fishermen used, arrived at Alakoa at sunset. Dick Wayne, watching the little vessel blunder and grope its way through the reefs she was sounding frantically with no less than three lead lines knew at once that the one-eyed Captain Ramey had managed man-aged to sell John Colt a charter at last, if only for an excursion. Ramey's boat dropped anchor five hundred yards from the Holokai. Evidently Dick's brothers had sent orders to the dock that John Colt should be brought to the house immediately im-mediately upon arrival for Alakoa's shore launch put out immediately, Hokano steering, and took off John Colt. Tonga Dick watched this maneuver ma-neuver impassively. There was no longer any danger that his brothers would be bluffed into something by Colt. The decision would rest with Waterson himself, and no one else. He got his binoculars now and focused them upon Ramey's boat. The swift twilight of the latitude was closing sharply, but the glasses were still able to bring out every detail aboard the Diesel boat The little tramp vessel sat awkwardly Dn the water, her snub nose tilted Upward inanely. She had a disorderly, disor-derly, faintly disreputable look, but Dick knew she concealed a surprising surpris-ing turn of speed. Karen Waterson was leaning over the rail, talking to Captain Ramey. Dick could see the stitching in her narrow hat brim, and the shadow of her lashes. The movement of her lips, while he could hear no' least sound of her voice, had a strange effect, making her seem immeasurably immeas-urably far away. As darkness fell, Dick saw Captain Ramey leave Karen's side, and in a moment or two a light showed in the Seal's galley. Tonga Dick smiled a little, without much humor, as he deduced from this that Ramey had been left in the lurch by his cook. I Now the shore boat put out from the dock again, this time pointing directly to the Holokai. Tonga Dick watched it approach with a mini- mum of interest. By the time it was coughing alongside, he had made up his mind that if his brothers broth-ers had sent for him he was not going go-ing to go ashore until he very well felt like it But it was Charles Wong, who, with an unexpected, lank agility, pulled himself over the Holokai's rail. "What do they want up there now?" Dick asked wearily. "Nothing, Mr. Dick, that I know." Wong was nervous; there was a flutter flut-ter in his long-boned hands as he produced a twisted slip of paper. "I came to you of my own thought. Up at our receiving station they keep hearing some ship calling the Holokai Holo-kai they can't tell what ship. Its call letters aren't listed no one ever heard them before. We think it may be some outlaw station. At any rate, the call comes in very persistently; per-sistently; and we didn't hear you answer, so I came to tell you." "What were the call letters?" "I have them written here." Tonga Dick took the paper Wong offered him and unfolded it. Even before he made out its typewritten characters in the failing light, he knew what ship it would be. "They were still calling when you left the house?" "Yes, sir." "Come here, Wong." Tonga Dick ran back along the deck and dived into the little kennel, ken-nel, abaft the galley, which served as a radio shack, and Charles Wong came pattering after him. He clamped on his earphones and carefully care-fully with micrometer delicacy, began be-gan to turn the big dial of the short wave receiver; but for minutes there was no result. "He must have shut down," Dick said at last. "If you catch it again at the Alakoa station, you'd better answer and take the " Just then the hunted signal came in, so powerfully that the effect was blasting. Somewhere, unexpectedly close at hand, Garrett Waterson was calling Dick Wayne from the sea. Dick quieted the blocked and clattering clat-tering receiver. "Good Lord He's right on top of us! Yes, he's calling us, all right." Dick's earphones were beginning to zing with the measured letters of a message that was something more than news. "SAR WIT WATERSON ABOARD QTP ALAKOA 2 HRS." Dick Wayne could not believe his own ears. Angrily he worked his key, sending out a protest "RPT ALL RPT " The message from the sea hesitated hesitat-ed and started over again. Abruptly it changed its pace, breaking into a racing chatter. "WHT IN HELL IS MTR U CANT U UNDERSTAND ENGLISH QTP 10 PM STAND OUTSIDE CORAL TO PILOT THRU SHOALS G WATERSON WA-TERSON QSL?" Tonga Dick Wayne acknowledged with a curt "QSL," and shut off his generator. "Garrett Waterson's power yacht Sarah will be in in two hours," he told Wong, "and Waterson himself is on board." Charles Wong, stumbling after him out of the radio shack, looked as if he had seen a ghost; obviously he had been able to hear, and to understand, the international code. "Do do you want your brothers to know?" "It doesn't make a particle of difference, dif-ference, either way." Charles Wong waited a moment, . and seemed about to say something more; but changed his mind, and lowered himself over the side into the waiting boat The launch chattered its way back to the dock, and presently, after its voice had died, there came across the water the sound of a racing automobile engine as Charles Wong, handling his car badly, raced through the village toward the hills. Dick stood for some minutes with his hands on the rail, staring at the darkening sea. Roughly checking known distance against the relative speeds of the Sarah and the Holokai, Holo-kai, he estimated that Garrett Waterson Wa-terson must have pointed the Sarah north no more than a few hours after Dick had set sail with the Holokai. Hurriedly Dick Wayne's eyes swept the bay. An outrigger canoe, sailed silently in the light air by a single Hawaiian spearman, was coming in across the still water from a day's fishing beyond the reefs. Dick sent a low whistle across the water, and the outrigger sheered in close to the side of the Holokai. "Take me over to that stranger boat." Tonga Dick swung over the rail and dropped into the moving canoe. "Okay, Captain Dick." Karen Waterson was still standing stand-ing by the rail, quiet and alone, as the silent outrigger sliced close. Tonga Ton-ga Dick stood up, reached the boat's low rail, and swung aboard. "Stand on and off," Dick told the Kanaka fisherman, "and wait for me." CHAPTER X The outrigger moved off a little, drifting idly. It was the girl who spoke first, her voice hushed in the quiet. "I thought you might come over here." Dick Wayne leaned close to her so that their shoulders touched, and held his voice low, hoping that Captain Cap-tain Ramey would not be brought out of his galley. "I have something to tell you," he said. "Something's happened the whole situation is changed. John Colt can't accomplish anything here. The fight is off, and if it starts again it will be on an entirely new basis." She waited, and in the rapidly thickening dark he could not see what was in her eyes. "Karen," Dick said, "you are not an heiress; and you have no claim upon Alakoa. You see, Karen your grandfather is alive." There was a long minute of uneasy un-easy silence. He didn't expect her to believe him, at least not at first. Shock, incredulity, refusal to accept the truth he supposed he would have to contend against all of these before he could go on. Karen's answer astonished him when it came. She spoke in a low I drawl. "You know, I rather thought so, Dick." Having braced himself for an uphill up-hill attempt to convince her, Dick was taken aback. "Why how on earth did you know?" "John Colt admitted that one thing might destroy our case and wouldn't tell me what it was. Then yesterday, when you told him that you could bring our claims to nothing noth-ing it seemed to me that he believed you, though he wouldn't admit it. He hardly would have come here if he hadn't feared a new development, would he? So the only thing I could think of was that my grandfather might still be alive, and that you had dug him up." "He'll be here soon, Karen very soon." She considered that, her eyes on the disappearing horizon. "It will be strange to see him. I suppose I will see him, won't I? It's going to be like meeting a ghost. He's been such a vague, misty, sort of gigantic figure, overshadowing everything for so many months ever since John Colt first convinced me that I might have a right to Alakoa. A great, legendary figure, lost in the past. And now, to actually see him, face to face it's very surprising." "Who knows what standpoint he will take? Garrett Waterson has always al-ways been a man given to extreme views. For all I know he may jump to the conclusion that he would like to recover the island, and hand it over to you." "To me? After I've tried to prove " "Why not? Garrett Waterson's later lat-er years have been bitterly lonely. It seems to me very likely that he will wish to do just that Certainly John Colt will undertake to show him exactly how it can be done; Colt will be ready to handle all details Waterson needs only -to make a decision, de-cision, and the whole thing is as good as accomplished." "You mean my grandfather could recover Alakoa?" "He's in perfectly sound mind. But he can have himself shown incompetent in-competent if he wants to God knows he's eccentric enough." "But Dick that's fraud!" "It's just what you and John Colt started to do in the first place." ' (TO BE COXT1MED) |