CHAPTER VI
_Ether-wave Eavesdropping_
I had thought it was a cavern mouth into which the men had disappeared,but it was not. I reached it without any encounter. It loomed above me,a great archway in the cliff--an opening fifty feet high and equally asbroad. And behind it was a roofless cave--a sort of irregularly circularbowl, five hundred feet across its broken, bowlder-strewn, caked-oozefloor.
I crouched in the blackness under the archway. The moon had risen andits light filtered with occasional shafts through the swift-flying blackclouds overhead. The scene was brighter. It was dark in the archway, buta glow of moonlight in the bowl beyond showed me its tumbled floor andthe precipitous, eroded walls, like a crater-rim, which encircled it.
The men whom Perona had met were across the bowl near its opposite side.I could see the group of them, five hundred feet from me, by a littlemoonlight that was on them; also by the sheen from the spots of theirhand-lights. Four or five men, and Perona. I thought I distinguished theaged Minister sitting on a rock, and before him a huge giant man'sfigure striding up and down. Perona seemed talking vehemently: the menwere listening; the giant paused occasionally in his pacing to fling aquestion.
All this I saw with my first swift glance. My attention was drawn fromthe men to an object near them. The nose of a flyer showed between twoupstanding crags on the floor of the valley. Only its forward horizontalpropellers and the tip of its cabin and landing gear were visible, but Icould guess that it was a fair-sized ship.
The men were too far away for me to hear them. Could I get across thefloor of the bowl without discovery? It did not seem so. The accursedmoonlight became stronger every moment. Then I saw a guard--a darkfigure of a man showing just inside the archway, some seventy feet fromme. He was leaning against a rock, facing my way. In his hands was athick-barreled electronic projector.
I could not advance: that was obvious. The moonlight lay in a clearclean patch beyond the archway. The guard stood at its edge.
* * * * *
A minute or two had passed. Perona was still talking vehemently. I waslosing it: not a word was audible. Yet I felt that if I could hearPerona now, much that Hanley and I wanted to learn would be made clearto us. My little microphone receiver could be adjusted for audible airvibrations. I crouched and held it cautiously above my head with itsface, like a listening ear, turned toward the distant men. Mysingle-vacuum amplification brought up the sound until their voicessounded like whispers murmured in my ear-grids.
"De Boer, listen to me--"
Perona's voice. They must have been chance words spoken loudly. It wasall I could hear, save tantalizing, unintelligible murmurs.
So this was De Boer, the bandit! The big fellow pacing before Perona. Iwanted infinitely more, now, to hear what was being said.
I thought of Hanley. There might be a way of handling this.
I had to murmur very softly. I was hidden in these shadows from theguard's sight, but he was close enough to hear my normal voice. Ichanced it. A wind was sucking through the archway with an audiblewhine: the guard might not hear me.
"X. 2. AY."
The sorter's desk. He came in. I murmured Hanley's rating. "Rush.Danger. Special."
It went swiftly through. Hanley, thank Heaven, was at his desk.
* * * * *
I plugged in my little image finder; held it over my head; turned itslowly. I whispered:
"Look around, Chief. See where I am? Near Nareda; couple of miles out.Followed Perona; he met these men.
"The big one is De Boer, the depth bandit. I can't hear what they'resaying--but I can send you their voice murmurs."
"Amplify them all you can. Relay them up," Hanley ordered.
I caught Perona's murmurs again; I swung them through my tinytransformers and off my transmitter points into the ether.
"Hear them, Chief?"
"Yes. I'll try further amplification."
It was what I had intended. Hanley's greater power might be able toamplify those murmurs into audible strength.
"I'm getting them, Phil."
He swung them back to me. Grotesquely distorted, blurred with tube-humand interference crackle, they roared in my ear-grids so loudly that Isaw the nearby guard turn his head as though startled. Listening....
But evidently he concluded it was nothing.
I cut down the volume. Hanley switched in.
"By God. Phil! This--"
"Off, Chief! Let me hear, too!"
* * * * *
He cut away. Those distorted voices! They came from Perona and thebandits to me across this five hundred foot moonlit bowl; from me,thirteen hundred miles up to Hanley's instruments; and back to me oncemore. But the words, most of them, now were distinguishable.
Perona's voice: "I tell it to you. De Boer ... and a good chance for youto make the money."
"But will they pay?"
"Of course they will pay. Big. A ransom princely."
"And why, Perona? Why princely? Who is this fellow--so important?"
"He is with rich business men, I tell to you."
"A private citizen?"
"... And a private citizen, of a surety. Fool! Have you come to be acoward, De Boer?"
"Pah!"
"Well then I tell you it is a lifetime chance. All of it I havearranged. If he was a government agent, that would be very different,for they are very keen, this administration of the American government,to protect their agents. But their private citizens--it is a scandal! Doyou not ever pick the newscasters' reports, De Boer? Has it not been ascandal that this administration does very little for its citizensabroad?"
"And you want to get rid of this fellow? Why, Perona?"
"That is not your concern. The ransom is to be all yours. Make away withhim--in the depths somewhere. Demand your ransom. Fifty thousandgold-standards! Demand it of me. Of Nareda!"
"And you will pay it?"
"I promise it. Nareda will pay it--and Nareda will collect the ransomfrom the American capitalists. Very easy."
His voice fell lower. "Between us, you will get the ransom money fromNareda--and then kill your prisoner if you like. Call it an accident;what matter? And dead men are silent men, De Boer. I will see that noreal pursuit is made after you."
* * * * *
They were talking about me! It was obvious. Questions rushed at me.Perona, planning with this bandit to abduct me. Hold me for ransom. Orkill me! But Perona knew that I was not a private citizen. He was lyingto De Boer, to persuade him.
Why this attack upon me? Was Spawn in on it? Why were they so anxious toget rid of me? Because of Jetta? Or because I was dangerous, pryinginto their smuggling activities. Or both?
De Boer: "... Get up with my men through the streets to Spawn's house?You have it fixed?"
"Yes. Over the route from here as I told you, there are no policeto-night. I have ordered them off. In the garden. _Dios!_ You offer somany objections! I tell you all is fixed. In an hour, half an hour; evennow, perhaps, the Americano is in the garden. The girl has promised tomeet him there. He will be there, fear not. Will you go?"
"Yes."
"Hah! That is the De Boer I have always admired!"
I could see them in the moonlight across the pit. Perona now standingup, the giant figure of the bandit towering over him.
* * * * *
Hanley's microscopic voice cut in: "Getting it, Phil? To seize you forransom!"
"Yes. I hear it."
"This girl. Who--?"
"Wait, Chief. Off--"
De Boer: "I will do it! Fifty thousand."
Perona: "An hour now. Spawn will be at his home asleep."
"And you will go to the mine?"
"Yes. Now, from here. You seize this fellow Grant, and then attack themine. Our regular plan, De Boer. This does not change it."
Attack Spawn's mine! Half a million
of treasure was there to-night!
Perona was chuckling: "You give Spawn's guards the signal. They are allmy men--in my pay. They will run away when you appear."
Hanley cut in again. "By the gods, they're after that treasure! Phil,listen to me! you must...." His voice faded.
"Chief, I can't hear you!"
Hanley came again: "... And I will notify Porto Rico. The local patrolwill be about ready to leave."
"Or notify Nareda headquarters," I suggested. "If you can get PresidentMarkes, he can send some police to the mine--"
"And find all Nareda's police bribed by Perona? I'll get Porto Rico. Wehave an hour or two; the patrol can reach you in an hour."
The bandits were preparing to leave here. Two or three of them had goneto the flyer. Perona and De Boer were parting.
"... Well, that is all, De Boer."
"Right, Senor Perona. I will start shortly."
"On foot, by the street route to Spawn's--"
Hanley's hurried voice came back: "I've sent the call to Porto Rico."
* * * * *
The guard had moved again. He was no more than forty feet away from menow--standing up gazing directly toward where I was crouching over mytiny instruments in the shadows of the rocky arch. A footstep soundedbehind me, on the path outside the arch. Someone approaching!
A tiny light bobbing!
Then a voice calling, "Perona! De Boer!"
The guard took a step forward; stopped, with levelled weapon.
Then the voice again: it was so loud it went through my opened relay,flashed up to New York, and blew out half a dozen of Hanley's attunedvacuums.
"Perona!"
Spawn's voice! He was coming toward me! I lay prone, my little gridsswitched off. I held my breath.
Spawn's figure went past within ten feet of me. But he did not see me.
He met the guard. "Hello, Gutierrez. The damned American--"
Perona and De Boer came hastening. Spawn joined them in the moonlightjust beyond the archway, close enough for me to hear them plainly. Spawnwas out of breath, panting from his swift walk. He greeted them with aroar.
"The American--he is gone!"
"_Dios!_ Gone where, Spawn?"
"The hell--how do I know, Perona? He is gone from his room--from thehouse. Maybe he followed you here? Did he?"