The submarine officers were interested. Their vessels, equipped with radar, had submerged at the approach of the plane. The radar, effective at far more than eye range, had given them time to get down safely, and they had lain on the bottom until the signal, four explosions, a pause and another blast, indicated there was no longer danger. That was all they knew about the situation.

  The launch pilot grinned at them.

  "Doc Savage just paid us a visit," he said, blowing their hats off.

  The conference aboard the steamer was a grim matter. One of the sub captains, whom they called Blackman, demanded to know the background of the whole thing.

  "You remember Willie Colton?"

  Blackman said sure he remembered Willie, the thieving so-and-so. What had he done, cut his own mother's throat?

  "Nah, just sold out his pals again. You see Willie got himself in with a gang that was planning to seize a Nazi submarine from the U. S. Navy and go into the same business we're in. When the scheme got far enough along that Willie knew it would probably come off, he got word, indirectly, to Govern. The next time Govern was in New York, he looked up Willie, and Willie gave him the dope. So right away, plans were laid. Govern was to contact these new pirates and offer a merger, and get them down here where we could knock them off and grab us another submarine, plus whatever in the way of gravy they had aboard the sub at the time."

  "Where does Doc Savage come in?"

  "Right where he was least expected. He's the leader of this pirate gang."

  "Oh, hell! I don't believe it!" Blackman's eyes narrowed speculatively. "Say, if Savage has turned pirate, he would be a damned good man to tie up with!"

  "He ain't so don't start licking your lips, brother. Savage and some of his men are on the sub. Govern doesn't know how many of Savage's men, and neither does Willie Colton. Willie hadn't dreamed this pirate—they call him Whitey—was Doc Savage."

  Blackman was skeptical. "You meanta tell me the rest of the crew on the sub don't know Savage is their stud duck?"

  "That's right. They're all genuine pirates but Savage, some of his men—Govern doesn't think it can be more than three or four aboard—and a newspaper or magazine writer, a girl, and some guy with her, and another guy they've got for ransom."

  "Well, for God's sake! How did Govern get wise?"

  "Govern," the other said, "used to be a college professor. You knew that, didn't you? He taught speech, and like some speech professors, he learned to read lips. Okay, he reads lips still. So he saw, saw mind you, a big guy they call Colorado Jones address this Whitey as Doc. That might have been all right—a lot of guys call other guys by the nickname Doc. But Whitey and this Colorado Jones said something about Pete somebody now having a gun, and Pete somebody is the magazine guy with the girl. That, and using his bean, tipped Govern off."

  The explanations out of the way, the plan for trapping the submarine was laid. Govern, it was explained, was to convince Doc Savage that the other two submarines belonging to the pirates were absent on forays and would not return, the first one, for at least a week.

  Returning for the conference, Doc's sub was to be induced to enter the anchorage within the reefs.

  "Once inside, they're cornered. One of our subs takes up a position near the mouth of the channel to block escape. The other sub will be lying in position, and all it has to do is raise its periscope for a signal, and let fly a torpedo when Savage's sub is in target position. Then it will surface and help shoot any survivors."

  "What about Govern?"

  "He won't be on Savage's sub then."

  "How come?"

  "He'll be in the launch, going ahead, showing the way into the channel. That way, he'll be in the clear."

  "Think they'll fall for that?"

  "Why not? It's a pipe. A pushover."

  "Hell, he might just lie off the reef and keep us penned up in here until the Navy shows up."

  "No, no, he can't. Because he's got a crew of genuine pirates. Govern figured out his whole plan. It must have been to turn pirate to get trace of us, then notify the Navy. That's what he'll try to do—play along until he can notify the Navy."

  "Yeah, but what if—"

  "Radio them before he gets here? Govern is gonna take care of that."

  Blackman said, "It sounds okay to me, except the part about coming inside the anchorage with the subs. I don't like that entrance channel. It's pretty narrow, and not too deep."

  "You've been in before, haven't you?"

  "Sure, sure." Blackman consulted his watch. "What if they get here during daylight and see us? You'll never get them inside then."

  "You'll be submerged inside the anchorage. There's plenty of water to cover you. And they'll come in at night. Govern will see to that. They won't notice you."

  "Then we better get active," Blackman said.

  XI

  The seaplane, veering suddenly, rammed its float into the hull of the submarine. There was a crunching as the tip of the left wing was mangled by the deck stanchions. Mr. Govern, looking as sorry as he could, yelled, "Hell, that was my fault! I tripped on the rudder by accident!" He was not sorry. He thought: boy, that fixes it so they won't be taking no other looks at the anchorage from the air right away. They won't find the subs.

  There was some profanity and shoving, and a pirate fell overboard and was hauled back again, before the hoist gear was made fast and the plane lifted aboard and, wings folded, was inserted in the deck hangar. Doc and Govern had gone below.

  "One thing more, I forgot to tell you. Radio silence. You keep radio silence," Govern said.

  "Haven't we been?" Doc scowled. "What is this, anyway?"

  Govern shrugged. "That's Cavu's orders, not mine. I told him I didn't think there was a chance of you having pals you would call in after you got us located. He said it wouldn't hurt anyway."

  "Pals?"

  Mr. Govern grinned. "You'd be surprised how many million bucks there are on that old tramp steamer."

  "Yeah? We weren't going to use the radio anyway. But that don't apply to radar."

  "Not to radar," Mr. Govern said. "But I'm gonna fritz the radio, if you don't mind."

  "The hell you are! I'm not going to have that set disabled!"

  Mr. Govern said it wouldn't be disabled. He would merely take out some tubes. He said he was quite familiar with radio apparatus, and this seemed to be true, because he did nothing but remove the tubes, the strategic ones. Doc watched him.

  They marked out the course on the chart, and turned it over to Eli Stanley, who was in charge of the current watch. After he had fiddled with a computer, Eli said, "We'll probably get there before midnight."

  Doc Savage and Govern, enroute to the galley to get something to eat, stopped to look in at the millionaire who was being held for ransom, Mr. Calvin R. Ingraham. A slender, tired, bruised and frightened figure, Mr. Ingraham scowled at them from the bunk. He cursed them bitterly. Govern laughed. Doc said, "You're on thin ice, brother." They re-fastened the door.

  "My advice," said Govern when they were walking on to the galley, "is to tap that guy on the head and drop him overboard."

  "You speak too lightly," Doc said, "of a hundred thousand dollars."

  "Think we'll get that much out of him?"

  "Why not?"

  They had corned beef hash and biscuits and fruit, all from cans, in the galley. Mr. Govern said he thought he would get some sleep.

  Doc Savage made sure Govern was, if not asleep, at least in his bunk, after which he collected Renny Renwick, alias Colorado Jones, and they got Pete Idle. They held a conference in Brenda Linahan's cabin.

  "We're in a jam," Doc said bluntly. "They know I'm Doc Savage."

  The cigarette Pete Idle held between his lips split and broke as his lips tightened and terror seemed to make his eyes go out of focus for a few moments, then cross, the left eye remaining fixed, the right one moving inward slowly until Pete had a vacuous, imbecile-like expression. Foolishly, he removed the wreck of the cigarette and pulled shreds of tobacco off his lip.

  Brenda's reaction, more inward, hence probably more violent, was curtained quickly by an instinctive rush of disbelief.

  "I don't like the time you pick for jokes," she said.

  Doc shook his head. "No joke. I wish it were."

  "But how . . . ?"

  "I don't know. We slipped somewhere. I'm sure Govern didn't know it when he came aboard, but I'm also positive he knows it now."

  Renny Renwick was examining his large fists bitterly. "Holy cow! I wonder—you say you're sure? What gave you the tip-off?"

  "It was largely, I think, the way they're doing this," Doc explained. He described with considerable exactness the flight, the landing, the interview—he was quite detailed about the interview, repeating much of it word for word—and the return. "Notice anything phony about the interview?" he asked Renny.

  Renny stirred doubtfully. "Was that all that was said?"

  "Yes."

  "It seems to me this guy who talked to you when you were blindfolded, Cavu or whoever he was, might have shown more interest in practical details like how many men we've got, what kind of equipment, our contacts ashore, and such. You had a lot of such detail prepared, didn't you, stuff that was phony, but would check out as being true if they investigated it?"

  "That's it."

  Brenda was skeptical. "It seems to me you've based a terrible conclusion on awfully little."

  "Well, add a little guesswork and hunching," Doc said.

  "That's what I thought! You don't really know."

  "I'm going to act as if I did," Doc assured her.

  Pete, who was impressed by Doc Savage, asked Brenda, "Want to put a little bet on it? I'll lay you he's right. This thing was too good, and maybe too complicated, to last."

  "Damn both your hunches! I wish I were back in New York," Brenda said bitterly. "I'm scared. I don't care who knows it. I've been scared for days. When Govern pointed that gun at me on the Poinsettia, I thought I was as frightened as I was capable of becoming. Every day since I've thought the same thing, and I keep being wrong."

  Renny wished to know what Doc thought they should do about it. "We could, as a last resort, circulate a rumor in our crew and get them to thinking this other gang of pirates is going to hi-jack them out of their loot." He frowned, added, "But that wouldn't be too good. The tramp steamer would haul out of that anchorage, and probably be hard to find, no more identification than we've got. There was no name on it, you say?"

  "No name. And it was exactly like most of the other Liberty ships that were turned out early in the war. Likewise, I think you're right about it slapping out. Probably if we're not there by midnight, the steamer will be gone by daylight."

  "But surely Navy planes could find it," Brenda exclaimed.

  "Might. But maybe not. And if they did, could they prove anything? As cunning as these fellows are, I'll bet you that by the time a boarding party went aboard, there wouldn't be a shred of evidence."

  Renny thought so too. "They would find an innocent tramp steamer engaged in trading in the islands."

  "Exactly what," Pete Idle wanted to know, "have they ordered you to do?"

  "Enter the anchorage."

  "The lagoon."

  "It's not a lagoon. Just an anchorage. It's a horse-shoe shaped coral reef formation, partly exposed at low tide in a few places. But it won't be a coral island and a lagoon for a few thousand more years."

  "Then what?"

  "I don't know. And I don't intend to find out," Doc said.

  "But—"

  "We can't wait until they spring their trap." Doc was emphatic on that point. "If we do, we'll have to fight our own crew as well as theirs. Too big odds."

  "Have you got a plan?"

  Doc nodded. He got a paper out of the former Nazi skipper's desk and proceeded to sketch, with remarkable accuracy considering the brief time he'd had to study it, the anchorage. "This is fairly close to scale," he said. He marked figures here and there. "These are the approximate soundings in feet, as nearly as I could guess the depth." He sketched in the tramp steamer. "The old Liberty was there, but they may move it." He added some more soundings around the inlet.

  Renny, who had been watching, grunted suddenly. "Holy cow! We can block the inlet!"

  Pete leaned over his shoulder to look. "How?"

  "With this sub."

  Pete quickly turned the color of white lead. "Oh, cripes! Is that safe?"

  "We'll be glad to have you come up with a better idea," Renny told him grimly.

  XII

  At twenty minutes past eleven, standard time, Mr. Govern said, "They see us." He whipped a flashlight across the conning tower rail, aimed it carefully, and gave four rapid blinks of light, a pause, then another blink. From the distant steamer in the anchorage came a single answering wink. "Good." Govern thrust the flashlight in his coat pocket. "Now we go in. The launch will pick us up outside and lead us in through the channel."

  Doc Savage concluded that Mr. Govern had missed his calling in not having been an actor. He had said as much to Renny earlier, and Renny agreed, except that he added this could have been the next best thing to Mr. Govern not having been born at all. Renny now stood at Doc's elbow.

  "Colorado," Doc said.

  "Yeah?" Renny grunted.

  "Go below. Check to make sure everyone is at emergency stations. No leaving posts because of curiosity. Impress that on them."

  "Okay." Renny slouched away.

  Mr. Govern did not approve of Renny. "That fellow," he said, "should serve a hitch in the Navy. Teach him discipline."

  "The only discipline Colorado understands is a hard fist."

  "Yes. . . . I heard you had a fight with him the night you took the sub."

  Doc made no comment. He put a pair of night glasses on the distant steamer, and observed the launch just leaving the landing stage. "They're coming," he remarked. He passed the glasses to Govern who, Doc noted, scanned the entire lagoon with them. A grim suspicion hit Doc. He thought: the man's not interested in the launch or steamer. He's searching the surface inside the anchorage. Why?

  Doc became convinced that one or more of the pirate submarines was inside the anchorage.

  The sub moved forward lazily under surface-engine power. Govern was still peering at the anchorage, but presently he handed the glasses back, and Doc, wary lest his attention was being cunningly misdirected, made a slow turn, covering the whole horizon with the lenses. He saw nothing, but the night was hazy, almost foggy, so not seeing anything did not necessarily mean there was nothing there.

  He could hear the launch engine now, It was quite noisy, and he wondered suddenly why they had taken off the muffler, then he remembered that on the other occasion he had heard the launch he had been deafened slightly by riding in the plane, so the launch exhaust might be no louder now than it had been.

  Eli Stanley and Colton were on the outside bridge with Doc and Govern. "Maybe we oughta get the gratings off the boat islands," Eli suggested.

  "What good could you do against them floating around in a lifeboat?" Doc asked.

  Renny came up from below. "Everything okay," he said.

  Govern, on edge, easily irritated, snarled at him, "Why don't you phrase it the proper way! Say, 'Everything secure, sir.'"

  Renny looked at him coldly. "Nuts to you."

  Doc Savage stepped close to Mr. Govern and swung his right fist against Govern's jaw. Govern saw the blow coming too late, and there was a bare instant when surprise and horror contorted his whole face. He fell heavily, and Renny caught him, lowered him to the deck.

  "His hat and coat," Doc said. "Take them off. They're the same ones he was wearing this afternoon."

  Eli and Colton gaped, mouths widely and roundly open, not, for the moment, able to breathe, they were so taken by astonishment.

  Doc gave them as evil a look as he could put on over excitement and said, "We're not going into this like sheep. But don't alarm the guys below."

  Renny had Govern's coat and hat. Doc said, "Put them on."

  Renny was reluctant. He knew the launch would be the safest spot when hell broke loose. "Hadn't you better—"

  "No, you'll go in the launch."

  The launch was close now. There were two men in it. If they were armed, the weapons were not in sight. The small boat made a circle, came in astern, and put-putted alongside. Doc gave orders. Eli and Colton, with boathooks, laid hold of the launch, and it laid heavily against the hull.

  Doc jumped aboard the launch.

  The pirates stared at him. "Hell, thought you were—where's Govern?" one muttered.

  "Govern's indisposed. He's not coming."

  The two men froze. It did them no good. Eli and Colton held the launch. Renny had a gun in his hand.

  Doc also produced a gun. "Sit down. Act natural. And after you're down, take your guns out and drop them overboard. You're going to pilot us through the channel, and no funny business."

  The two pirates stared at the menacing guns, at each other. Their eyes were wide, glittering in the darkness. "Better do it, Ken," one said. And Ken nodded, then cursed bitterly. He shut up when Doc ordered him to do so.

  "Get aboard," Doc told Renny. When Renny was in the launch, Doc himself climbed on deck. "Cast off."

  As the launch eased forward, they heard Renny order, "Take us through the inlet. And if the sub goes aground, I'm going to shoot both of you immediately."

  The two pirates seemed somewhat relieved.

  "So that's what's eating you," one exclaimed.

  Doc wheeled on Eli and Colton. "Get out on the bow, clear out. Use sounding leads, and use them fast. One of you on port and one on starboard. We don't want to take any chances of running out of water."

  The pair moved with willing alacrity. Now they probably thought they understood the reasons for the violence and surprise. Doc was merely afraid the sub was going to be led aground. That was what they must think.

  Doc took over the steering control. He called down, "Speed six knots ahead." And, a moment later, he also ordered, "Blow safety. Blow all tanks." That was a natural command, because they would know that the submarine should ride as high as possible while passing through the gap in the reef into the anchorage.

 

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