The Wireless Officer Part 42

"What's in that chest, Mr. Mostyn?" inquired the official, pointing to the box containing the money, the lid of which Peter had nailed up.

"Coin, eh? All right, we won't open it yet. I'll wait till we get it ash.o.r.e, but I'll put a seal on it for our mutual safeguard.'"

In fact he affixed three seals bearing the impression of the arms of the Protectorate of Kilba.

"One more thing," continued the port official. "You'll have to make a declaration before the Head Commissioner. I'll come along with you.

We may catch him before dinner."

"Not in these trousers," objected Mostyn, indicating his disreputable garments. "And I must go to the post office."

"Right-o," agreed the official cheerfully. "Nothing like killing three birds with one stone. You and I are about the same build. Let me fit you up. Comyn is my tally."

In a very short time obvious deficiencies in Peter's wardrobe were made good. Then, accompanied by his newly found friend and benefactor, he called in at the post office and dispatched a cablegram to his parents.

The message was characteristic of Mostyn. He did not believe in paying for two words when one would do, especially at the rates charged by the cable company. It was simply: "O.K. Peter".

Having discharged this act of filial duty, Mostyn suffered himself to be led into the presence of the Head Commissioner of the Kilba Protectorate, who happened to be on official duty at Pangawani.

With the Commissioner was the Director of Contracts. Both were under thirty-five years of age--Britons of the forceful and energetic type to which colonial development owes so much.

They were sitting at a large teak table littered with papers and doc.u.ments. The Director of Contracts was reading a typed cablegram.

"Infernal cheek, Carr," he exclaimed to his colleague. "We've no use for cheap German stuff in the Protectorate. We'll turn it down."

The subject of his righteous wrath was a tender from the Pfieldorf Company offering to supply steelwork "exactly according to the plans and specifications of a contract that has unfortunately failed to be executed", delivering the material at Pangawani within thirty-six days of receipt of telegraphic order, for the sum of 55,000.

"Good!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the Commissioner. "Tick the blighters off while you are about it. I'd rather see the Kilembonga Gorge unbridged till the crack of doom than have the place disfigured--yes, dishonoured, if you like--by a Hun-made structure. It was a bad stroke of luck when the Brocklington people's stuff went to the bottom of the sea."

The walls and doors of the official buildings were far from soundproof.

Peter, standing with Comyn outside the door, heard the words distinctly. To him they conveyed only one explanation: that in transport from Bulonga to Pangawani the vessel chartered for the conveyance of the steelwork had met with disaster.

Comyn tapped at the door and was bidden to enter.

"I've brought Mr. Mostyn to report to you, sir," he explained. "Mr.

Mostyn was in charge of the dhow that landed seven survivors of the _West Barbican_ this morning."

"We've just been talking of the _West Barbican_, Mr. Mostyn," said the Commissioner. "We were saying how unfortunate it was that an important consignment for us was lost in the s.h.i.+p. By the by, are you any relation of Captain Mostyn, one of the managing directors of the Brocklington Ironworks Company?"

"He's my father, sir," replied Peter. "I'm afraid, though, that I fail to understand your reference to the loss of the steelwork."

"Hang it, man," interposed the Director of Contracts, "surely you ought to know. You were on the s.h.i.+p when she went down."

"And I know it," agreed Peter grimly. "That she went down, I mean. As for the steelwork, that was landed at Bulonga a day or so before the disaster occurred."

"What?" demanded the Commissioner and Director of Contracts in one breath.

Peter repeated his a.s.sertion.

"Glorious news!" exclaimed the Commissioner. "Bless my soul, what possessed them to dump the stuff in a miserable backwater in Portuguese territory?"

"That's for you to say, sir," replied Mostyn. "I took in the wireless message when we were a few hours out from Durban. It came from the Company's agent, and obviously must have emanated from here."

"Obviously fiddlesticks!" interrupted the Director of Contracts. "If it had I would have been responsible for it. Fire away, let's have the whole yarn."

For the best part of an hour Mostyn kept his listeners deeply engrossed. The Commissioner completely forgot that there was a meal waiting for him. Here was an enthralling narrative with an unsolved mystery attached.

"Have you any available funds, Mr. Mostyn," he demanded bluntly, when Peter had brought his story to a close.

"Precious little, sir."

"Then let me make an offer. If you accept you will be rendering a public service and doing your father's firm a thundering good turn.

You are in no immediate hurry, I take it, to be sent home?"

Peter thought not.

"Good," continued the Commissioner. "In that case you can act as representative to the Brocklington Ironworks Company, and deliver the goods before the contract date. You've a good sixteen days clear.

I'll give you a credit note for a thousand pounds, and you can make your arrangements for chartering a vessel to bring the consignment round from Bulonga. As a matter of fact there's the _Quilboma_ lying in harbour at the present time, waiting for cargo. She'd do admirably, and you can get quite reasonable terms. Once the jolly old stuff is planked down on the wharf here your father's firm has carried out its obligation, you know."

It did not take long for Peter to accept the offer. He metaphorically jumped at it.

"Right-o," said the Commissioner, as he dismissed his newly accredited agent of the Brocklington Ironworks Company. "Get a move on. Over you go and the best of luck."

Still feeling considerably mystified, Mostyn left the building.

Outside he parted with Comyn, the latter impressing on him that he would be only too pleased to be of a.s.sistance to him in any matter and at any time during his stay at Pangawani.

Peter went to the post office a second time. Again he cabled to his father, but with a reckless disregard of the money he was putting into the cable company's exchequer. He did not even wait to put the message into code, but stated that the consignment of steel-work had not been lost in the _West Barbican_, but had been landed at Bulonga. He proposed chartering a tramp and bringing the consignment to Pangawani.

"That'll buck the governor up, I reckon," he soliloquized, as he handed in the cablegram.

His next move was to interview the master of the S.S. _Quilboma_, who, as luck would have it, was also part owner, and being badly in want of a cargo agreed to undertake the run to Bulonga and back at a very reasonable figure.

"When can you get under way?" inquired Peter.

"Tide time to-morrow night," was the reply. "Say about six o'clock."

Peter's peregrinations that day were by no means finished. After being held up and interviewed by the local representative of the _Kilba Protectorate Gazette_, who was also a correspondent to one of the princ.i.p.al London dailies, he found out Olive and told her of his latest plans.

"It won't take much more than a week--perhaps less," he explained. "I don't think that in any case you will be able to find a homeward-bound vessel by that time."

"I won't trouble to do so," declared the girl. "Mr. Davis and his wife are no end of good sorts."

Preston received the news of Peter's venture with considerable envy.

"Wish I were fit enough," he remarked; "I'd come along and help you through with it. Keep your eyes open, old man, and see if you can find out anything about the _West Barbican_. It seems to me that somebody in Bulonga might be able to throw out a good hint as to the cause of the explosion. I may be wrong, but those are my sentiments. When do you sail?"

Peter told him.

"That's unfortunate, my lad," rejoined the Acting Chief. "These people here are giving us a lush-up to-morrow evening. Couldn't wait, I suppose?"

Mostyn shook his head.