The other navy planes rose higher. One of them swept down over the ship. Something black dropped through the air. It struck the sea close by. There was an explosion, a geyser of water. The Malays howled in fear. “X” heard the machine gun chattering again. Now was the time he had waited for.
He crept back to the cabin door, unlocked it. The arrival of the planes had taken the Malays out on deck. Ito was with them, urging them to fight.
The Agent charged across the deck, a bounding, leaping streak. Before Ito knew what was happening, Agent “X” had caught him in his arms. His swift charge carried them both over the rail. Thay went tumbling head over heels down into the sea. Malays lined the deck above, blowpipes in their hands, sinister darts ready. But they dared not shoot for fear of hitting their master.
The two below were locked together, but Ito fought like a trapped animal. In a frenzy at being defeated he scratched, kicked, and bit. His eyes behind the mask glared with inhuman hate. His fingers were like clutching talons as he sought for “X’s” throat. But Agent “X,” spurred on by the great cause for which he fought and with victory close at hand, battled with every nerve and muscle in him, battled — and finally won.
As in a daze he saw the swooping gray planes overhead. A bomb struck the vessel’s stern. Flame leaped out.
Then one of the big planes landed on the water and taxied over to the spot where “X” held the furious Ito, now subdued. “X” pulled the green mask from Ito’s face — and was not wholly surprised at what he saw. The face before him was that of Sam Barkley — supposed American sportsman — the man who had pretended to be an ardent suitor of Suzanne Blackwell’s. It was from her no doubt in some indirect way that he had finally guessed the truth about Ferris.
The Agent’s hand reached into Barkley’s coat, drew out the Browning plans and transferred them to his own pocket. They were wet; but the water-proof ink wouldn’t run. The plane came up and stopped. It was a big naval amphibian.
“Ahoy there!” cried a voice.
THE plane carried a crew of four. Strong hands reached down for Agent “X” and Barkley; but, as they did so, one of Barkley’s arms moved suddenly. A gleaming vial was in his fingers. Before “X” could stop him he put it to his lips, pulling out the cork with his white teeth. With a movement swift as lightning he swallowed the vial’s contents, made a choking sound, then gave a strange, harsh laugh.
“X” smelted the fumes of bitter almonds — prussic acid.
The scared men in the plane swore fiercely and yanked Ito up. But they were too late. Barkley’s face was changing color. He coughed, writhed a moment, and lay still.
“What in hell does this mean?” one of the navy men asked.
“It means a master spy and murderer has committed suicide,” said “X.”
“And who are you?”
“That can wait until later.”
“We were told to go out and halt this ship, the Kelantan. She wouldn’t stop. She fired on us — brought down one of our planes. What were you doing then? How do we know you’re not a spy, too?”
“You don’t,” said the Agent quietly. He knew that, in spite of his army uniform, nothing he could say would convince them. There would be questions asked when he arrived on shore. They’d want to see his papers, find out how it happened that an army officer knew the secret naval code that had brought the planes out. He couldn’t afford to reveal his identity even though he now had the Browning plans. His career wasn’t ended yet. He was still Secret Agent “X.”
He watched breathlessly as the gray planes stopped the Kelantan with another well-placed bomb. The Malays ran for cover, their machine gun abandoned, but the ship was sinking by the stern, its bow reared up. It listed, water pouring through a gapping hole in its plates that the bomb had made — and suddenly it slid bottomward, air bursting through bulkheads and whistling up through the waves above. The Kelantan and its murderous crew were gone forever.
The plane “X” was on rose from the water, heading back toward land. There was a cabin in it. Two pilots sat up front. The flight commander began questioning “X” in the cabin. A member of the crew stood by. Sam Barkley’s body rolled grotesquely as the big plane lurched and dipped.
The gray shore line came out of the landward mist, then the plane sailed over Chesapeake Bay. But, to the navy man’s questioning, Agent “X” answered only in monosyllables. Then, as the plane began to glide downward, he did a strange and sudden thing. He whipped his harmless gas gun out, sent a puif of vapor into the faces of the two men in the cabin.
As they collapsed, Agent “X” reached above him and pulled a ’chute pack from a rack. He slipped quickly into the harness, thrust the side door open against the wind blast.
An instant he poised, then leaped, his tumbling body forming a black receding dot. It was a delayed jump. He didn’t want the other planes to see him, or, if they did, he wanted to be too far down for them to catch. He didn’t pull the rip cord till he had fallen nearly two thousand feet and the water was a thousand feet below him. Then his ’chute blossomed out. He had figured carefully, and the high wind off the sea bore him toward land.
Later that same morning a mysterious message reached the high Government official known in the secret files as “K9.” The message was in code. It was brief and to the point, and it came from a town near Baltimore.
“Browning plans recovered,” the message said. “All is well. On way.”
There was another sentence telling Department of Justice agents to go to a certain address in Washington. Fast cars filled with armed operatives hurried to the spot. There they found a notorious spy named Michael Renfew, a man the D.C.I. had long been wanting to catch because of his subversive espionage activities. They also found a dead Malay whose presence Renfew could not or would not explain.
At almost the same moment Senator Blackwell received a telegram which helped to lift the gray pallor of fear from his face.
“Don’t worry,” it said. “All is safe — and secret.” It was signed “Black.”
The senator had his daughter back now. She had arrived by auto; brought from Baltimore by friends of the family.
Silently, devoutly, Senator Blackwell blessed the name of Captain Stewart Black, the dapper officer from General Staff who seemed to be a clairvoyant and the very soul of discretion, all in one. He did not know that the man behind it all, the man he had to thank, was Secret Agent “X”—master of mystery, and man of destiny.