Dennis Wheatley - The White Witch of the South Seas

Adjusting their speeds to keep in convoy, the flotilla made its way round the point, through the channel which separated Roboumo's island from the mainland, and so to the bay in which the wreck of the Maria Amalia lay. As they approached the Pigalle, they saw that great activity was taking place about her. Fuzzy headed natives were diving from her every few minutes, then bobbing up again clutching unidentifiable objects and two men in the stern were working hard at a hand pump, which was obviously feeding air down to Lacost's professional diver, Philip Macauta.

Then there came a sudden change in these activities. There were shouted orders, the native divers scrambled back on board. Macauta's big, round helmet glinted in the evening sunlight as he surfaced and climbed a ladder on to the deck. In a matter of minutes everyone in the Pigalle had taken cover, with the one exception of Pierre Lacost, who remained standing on the bridge.

As the official leader of the expedition, Sergeant Marceau's launch was some way ahead of the others. When it was within a hundred yards of the Pigalle he stood up in the stern, put a megaphone to his mouth and shouted

`Ahoy there, Monsieur Lacost. You are committing an illegal act. In the name of the Republic I summon you to weigh anchor and accompany us back to harbour.'

For a second Gregory held his breath, as he waited to hear what the response would be. It came almost immediately. Lacost gave a shout and darted back into the bridge cabin. Then there was a spurt of flame from the stern of the Pigalle, followed by the crack of a rifle. Sergeant Marceau's kepi seemed to jump from his head, he staggered, then jack knifed and crouched among the other men in his boat.

This opening episode was immediately followed by a ragged fusillade from all the boats of the flotilla, but the attackers were handicapped by being unable to see the men aboard the Pigalle. Splinters flew from woodwork here and there, the glass of the deckhouse windows was smashed and tinkled as it fell, but no cry or scream proclaimed a hit.

`We'll have to board,' Gregory shouted to the motorman in his boat. `Get going, full speed ahead now.' But next moment a machine gun opened on them. The gendarme beside him was shot through the chest, and one of the bodyguard screeched as a bullet seared his arm.

Everyone in the flotilla was firing now and bullets by the score were thudding into the hull of the Pigalle. Within a minute a second machine gun had opened up from her. It raked one boat, killing or wounding the majority of the crew. Then it was turned on another, hit it in a dozen places below the water line and it swiftly began to sink. The first machine gun blazed off again at Sergeant Marceau's boat. This time he was not so lucky. A bullet caught him in the shoulder, spun him round, and he fell overboard, while half his crew were massacred.

By then all the other boats had shut off their engines, none daring to approach nearer, but their occupants continued to pepper the Pigalle uselessly with bullets.

Gregory, seething with rage at this senseless debacle, shouted to James, `We must board her! Don't you understand? If we can once get into her, they'll stand no chance against our numbers.'

Even as he shouted, another boat received a fusillade, mowing down half the men in her. Two of the boats had now restarted their engines, turned about and were making off.

Cupping his hands, James yelled back, `It's hopeless! I'd join you myself, but I won't see any more of my people slaughtered.' Then, raising his voice still higher, he shouted in his native tongue, `Cease fire! Cease fire and return to harbour, all of you.'

The firing from the boats fell to a dribble, but the machine guns in the Pigalle continued their ugly chatter, inflicting more casualties as the remains of the flotilla turned tail and made off.

With fury in his heart, Gregory cursed Elboeuf. If only the old fool had not prevented them from carrying out a surprise attack in the middle of the night they could easily have overcome the Colons. Now he must resign himself to defeat. The game was lost and Lacost would get away with the treasure.

19

A Fateful Evening

As darkness fell, the remaining boats of the flotilla made their way back to harbour. There they sadly counted their losses. One gendarme and four of the body guard had been killed, and fifteen members of the force, including Sergeant Marceau and another gendarme, had been wounded. Two of the boats had been sunk and the casualties would have been still higher had not all the Tujoans been excellent swimmers, so that none of those in the sunken boats had been drowned.

James was in such distress about the dead and wounded of his body guard that Gregory thought him in no state to discuss the situation with Elboeuf, so he persuaded him to go straight up to the bure while he himself went to the Residence. There he found the old Frenchman partaking of his pre dinner aperitif.

Nothing would have pleased Gregory better than to flay Elboeuf verbally, but on the way back to harbour it had occurred to him that there was still a last chance of getting the better of Lacost. He and his Colons had fired upon French gendarmes who were in the course of carrying out their duty, killing one and wounding two others; so, no reinforcements being available locally, the Resident's proper course was to call for troops to be sent in from Noumea. To get that done, and swiftly, meant that Gregory must retain the good will of the Commandant. In consequence, he confined himself to

reporting the bare facts of the disaster, and asking that aid to overcome the Colons should be asked for as a matter of urgency.

On hearing what had happened, Elboeuf expressed great indignation, although he continued to maintain that he could not possibly have permitted the attack on the Pigalle to be made at night and without warning. But he readily agreed to radio Noumea for troops to be sent in by air, then set off for the town to send the signal and see his wounded Sergeant.

Returning to the bure, Gregory found James still in very low spirits in spite of the efforts of the two girls to console him; so dinner proved a gloomy meal and, soon after it, James escorted Olinda back to the Boa Viagem. On his return they went to bed: Manon greatly relieved that Gregory had come to no harm in the affray, but secretly glad that Pierre Lacost had had the better of it; James and Gregory both now with the depressing feeling that, unless help was sent promptly from Noumea, all the danger, distress and anxiety they had suffered during the past four months would have been for nothing.

A reply was not received until eleven o'clock on the following morning. Elboeuf brought a copy of it up to the bure and, to Gregory's fury, it was anything but satisfactory. Apparently, the old man had not fully explained the situation and its urgency, but had simply asked for troops to be sent owing to his gendarmes being insufficient in numbers to arrest a gang of desperadoes. It was, therefore, hardly surprising that Noumea requested further information before acting.

In view of the way in which Gregory had, not long before, got the better of his one time colleague General Ribaud, he could still not be certain that a personal appeal from him would have the desired effect, so he wrote out a lengthy cable putting matters in a way that Ribaud, as the responsible authority, could not ignore, then made Elboeuf sign it, and sent it off himself.,

Meanwhile, James had gone down to visit the wounded and condole with the relatives of the dead, promising the latter's dependants that he would arrange for their support. This occupied him for the greater part of the day, so Gregory and Manon lunched with Olinda on the yacht and spent an anxious afternoon with her. Soon after five o'clock James came, put to them with a copy of a reply Ribaud had sent to Elboeuf second signal. It read: