CHAPTER XXXII
THE FLUORISCINE TEST
Our trip over to the other borough was uneventful except for thetoilsome time we had to get to the docks where South and CentralAmerican ships were moored. We boarded the _Haytien_ at last and Burkeled us along the deck toward a cabin. I looked about curiously. Thereseemed to be the greatest air of suppressed excitement. Everyone wastalking, in French, too, which seemed strange to me in people of theircolor. Yet everything seemed to be in whispers as if they were in fear.
We entered the cabin after our guide. There in the dim light lay thebody of Leon in a bunk. There were several people in the room, already,among them the beautiful Mademoiselle Collette. She pretended not torecognize Kennedy until we were introduced, but I fancied I saw herstart at finding him in company with Burke. Yet she did not exhibitanything more than surprise, which was quite natural.
Burke turned the sheet down from the face of the figure in the bunk.Leon had been a fine-looking specimen of his race, with good features,strong, and well groomed. Kennedy bent over and examined the bodycarefully.
"A very strange case," remarked the ship's surgeon, whom Burke beckonedover a moment later.
"Quite," agreed Craig absently, as he drew the vial and the hypodermicfrom his pocket, dipped the needle in and shot a dose of the stuff intothe side of the body.
"I can't find out that there is any definite cause of death," resumedthe surgeon.
Before Craig could reply someone else entered the darkened cabin. Weturned and saw Collette run over to him and take his hand.
"My guardian, Monsieur Aux Cayes," she introduced, then turned to himwith a voluble explanation of something in French.
Aux Cayes was a rather distinguished looking Haytian, darker thanCollette, but evidently of the better class and one who commandedrespect among the natives.
"It is quite extraordinary," he said with a marked accent, taking up thesurgeon's remark. "As for these people--" he threw out his hands in adeprecating gesture--"one cannot blame them for being perplexed whenyour doctors disagree."
Kennedy had covered up Leon's face again and Collette was crying softly.
"Don't, my dear child," soothed Aux Cayes, patting her shoulder gently."Please, try to calm thyself."
It was evident that he adored his beautiful ward and would have doneanything to relieve her grief. Kennedy evidently thought it best toleave the two together, as Aux Cayes continued to talk to her indiminutives and familiar phrases from the French.
"Were there any other people on the boat who might be worth watching?"he asked as we rejoined Burke, who was looking about at the gapingcrowd.
Burke indicated a group. "Well, there was an old man, Castine, and thewoman he calls his wife," he replied. "They were the ones who reallykept the rest from throwing the body overboard."
"Oh, yes," assented Kennedy. "She told me about them. Are they herenow?"
Burke moved over to the group and beckoned someone aside toward us.Castine was an old man with gray hair, and a beard which gave him quitean appearance of wisdom, besides being a matter of distinction amongthose who were beardless. With him was Madame Castine, much younger andnot unattractive for a negress.
"You knew Monsieur Leon well?" asked Kennedy.
"We knew him in Port au Prince, like everybody," replied Castine,without committing himself to undue familiarity.
"Do you know of any enemies of his on the boat?" cut in Burke. "You werepresent when they were demanding that his body be thrown over, were younot? Who was foremost in that?"
Castine shrugged his shoulders in a deprecatory manner. "I do not speakEnglish very well," he replied. "It was only those who fear the dead."
There was evidently nothing to be gained by trying on him any of Burke'sthird degree methods. He had always that refuge that he did notunderstand very well.
I turned and saw that Collette and Aux Cayes had come out of the cabinto the deck together, he holding her arm while she dabbed the tears awayfrom her wonderful eyes.
At the sight of us talking to Castine and the other woman, she seemedto catch her breath. She did not speak to us, but I saw the two womenexchange a glance of appraisal, and I determined that "Madame" Castinewas at least worth observing.
By the attitude of the group from which we had drawn them, Castine, itseemed, exercised some kind of influence over all, rich and poor,revolutionist and government supporter.
The appearance of Collette occasioned a buzz of conversation andglances, and it was only a moment before she retreated into the cabinagain. Apparently she did not wish to lose anything, as long as Kennedyand Burke were about.
Kennedy did not seem to be so much interested in quizzing Castine justyet, now that he had seen him, as he was in passing the time profitablyfor a few minutes. He looked at his watch, snapped it back into hispocket, and walked deliberately into the cabin again.
There he drew back the cover over Leon's face, bent over it, raised thelids of the eyes, and gazed into them.
Collette, who had been standing near him, watching every motion, drewback with an exclamation of horror and surprise.
"The voodoo sign is on him!" she cried. "It must be that!"
Almost in panic she fled, dragging her guardian with her.
I, too, looked. The man's eyes were actually green, now. What did itmean?
"Burke," remarked Kennedy decisively, "I shall take the responsibilityof having the body transferred to my laboratory where I can observe it.I'll leave you to attend to the formalities with the coroner. Then Iwant you to get in touch with Forsythe & Co. Watch them without lettingthem know you are doing so--and watch their visitors, particularly."
A private ambulance was called and, with much wagging of heads andtongues, the body of Leon was carried on a stretcher, covered by asheet, down the gangplank and placed in it. We followed closely in ataxicab, across the bridge and uptown.
For some days, I may say, Kennedy had been at work in his laboratory ina little anteroom, where he was installing some new apparatus for whichhe had received an appropriation from the trustees of the University.
It was a very complicated affair, one part of which seemed to be averitable room within the room. Into this chamber, as it were, he nowdirected the men to carry Leon's body and lay it on a sort of bed orpallet that was let down from the side wall of the compartment.
I had been quite mystified by the apparatus which Kennedy had set up,but had had no opportunity to discuss it with him and he had been sobusy installing it that he had not taken time, often, for meals. Infact, the only way I knew that he had finished was that when Burke hadcalled he had seemed interested in the call.
Outside the small chamber I have spoken of, in the room itself, wereseveral large pieces of machinery, huge cylinders with wheels and belts,run by electric motors. No sooner had the body been placed in the littlechamber and the door carefully closed than Kennedy threw a switch,setting the apparatus in motion.
"How could Leon have been killed?" I asked, as he rejoined me in theoutside laboratory. "What did Collette mean by her frightened cry of the'voodoo sign'?"
The incident had made a marked impression on me and I had been unablequite to arrive at any sensible explanation.
"Of course, you know that voodoo means literally anything that inspiresfear," remarked Kennedy after a moment's thought. "The god of voodoo isthe snake. I cannot say now what it was that she feared. But to see theeyeballs turn green is uncanny, isn't it?"
"I should say so," I agreed. "But is that all?"
He shook his head. "No, I don't believe it is. Hayti is the hotbed ofvoodoo worship. The cult has inaugurated a sort of priesthood--often apriest and a priestess, called 'papaloi' and 'mammaloi'--papa and mamma,probably with a corruption of the French word, 'roi,' king. They are, asit were, heads of the community, father and mother, king and queen. Someof the leading men of the communities in the islands of the Caribbeanare secret voodoists and leaders. Just what is going on under thesurface in this case, I cannot e
ven hazard a guess. But there is somedeviltry afoot."
Just then the telephone rang and Craig answered it.
"It was from Burke," he said as he hung up the receiver. "Confidentialagents of his have been about. No one from the ship seems to have beendown to see Forsythe, but Forsythe has had people over at the ship.Burke says someone is sending off great bunches of messages toHayti--he thinks the powerful wireless apparatus of the _Haytien_ isbeing used."
For a moment Kennedy stood in the center of the laboratory, thinking.Then he appeared to make up his mind to something.
"Has that taxicab gone?" he asked, opening a cabinet from which he tookseveral packages.
I looked out of the window. The ambulance had gone back, but the driverof the car had evidently waited to call up his office for instructions.I beckoned to him, and together Kennedy and I placed the packages in thecar.
Thus we were able quickly to get back again to the wharf where the_Haytien_ was berthed. Instead of going aboard again, however, Kennedystopped just outside, where he was not observed and got out of the car,dismissing it.
In the office of the steamship company, he sought one of the employesand handed him a card, explaining that we were aiding Burke in the case.The result of the parley was that Kennedy succeeded in getting to theroof of the covered pier on the opposite side from that where the shiplay.
There he set to work on a strange apparatus, wires from which ran up toa flag pole on which he was constructing what looked like a hastilyimprovised wireless aerial. That part arranged, Kennedy followed hiswires down again and took them in by a window to a sort of lumber-roomback of the office. Outside everyone was too busy to watch what we weredoing there and Craig could work uninterrupted.
"What are you doing?" I asked. "Installing a wireless plant?"
"Not quite," he smiled quietly. "This is a home-made wirelessphoto-recording set. Of course, wireless aerials of amateurs don't humany more since war has caused the strict censorship of all wireless. Butthere is no reason why one can't receive messages, even if they can't besent by everybody.
"This is a fairly easy and inexpensive means by which automatic recordscan be taken. It involves no delicate instruments and the principal partof it can be made in a few hours from materials that I have in mylaboratory. The basis is the capillary electrometer."
"Sounds very simple," I volunteered, trying not to be sarcastic.
"Well, here it is," he indicated, touching what looked like an ordinarysoft glass tube of perhaps a quarter of an inch diameter, bent U-shaped,with one limb shorter than the other.
"It is filled nearly to the top of the shorter limb with chemically puremercury," he went on. "On the top of it, I have poured a little twentyper cent sulphuric acid. Dipping into the acid is a small piece ofcapillary tube drawn out to a very fine point at the lower end."
He filled the little tube with mercury also. "The point of this," heobserved, "is fine enough to prevent the mercury running through of itsown weight--about as fine as a hair."
He dipped the point and held it in the sulphuric acid and blew throughthe capillary tube. When the mercury bubbled through the point in minutedrops, he stopped blowing. It drew back for a short distance bycapillary attraction and the acid followed it up.
"You can see that connections are made to the mercury in the arm and thetube by short pieces of platinum wire," he continued. "It isn'tnecessary to go into the theory of the instrument. But the most minutedifference of potential between the two masses of mercury will cause thefine point at the junction of the liquids to move up and down.
"Connected to the aerial and the earth, with a crystal detector inseries, it is only a matter of applying an ordinary photo-recordingdrum, and the machine is made."
He had been setting up a light-tight box, inside of which was a littleelectric lamp. Opposite was a drum covered with bromide paper. Hestarted the clockwork going and after a few moments' carefulobservation, we went away, and left the thing, trusting that no one wasthe wiser.
Nothing further occurred that day, except for frequent reports fromBurke, who told us how his men were getting on in their shadowing ofForsythe & Co. Apparently, the death of Leon had put a stop torevolutionary plots, or at least had caused the plotters to change theirmethods radically.
The time was shortening, too, during which Burke could keep thepassengers of the _Haytien_ under such close surveillance, and it wasfinally decided that on the next morning they should be released, whileall those suspected were to be shadowed separately by Secret Serviceagents, in the hope that once free they would commit some overt act thatmight lead to a clew.