Chap. 1: Death and the Missing Light! 

Under a clear blue sky dotted with white puffs of clouds, an Andover Seagull flew at a thousand feet above a gray-green sea.  A license-built Supermarine Walrus Mk. I, the pusher biplane amphibian was cruising in a southeasterly direction over small whitecaps kicked up on the waves below.

Seated at the control yoke was a young rabbit fem dressed in a khaki flightsuit, canvas shoes, and leather flight helmet through which poked her long ears.  Her gaze shifted between the view ahead and the scene below.  They were passing the southern most island of the Kanim group, its verdant canopy ending on a long strip of white sand.  The pilot lifted the canvas mouth cover up to her muzzle and switched on the microphone.

“Ben, notify the Ida Lewis that we should be coming up on Marker Light #34 shortly.”

Behind the pilot’s seat sat a Cairn terrier male, similarly dressed as the rabbit fem, his position making him face to the rear of the aircraft.  Before him was a panel that contained the instruments monitoring the thundering Corvis-White radial engine overhead as well as the plane’s radio gear.

“Roger, Jenny,” came the reply as the terrier pulled out the Morse key and began tapping out the message to the buoy tender that was their home at sea. 
Jennifer Monroe – Jenny to her crew – smiled as she eased the amphibian over to lose altitude and work their way closer to the coast line.  Through the windscreen before her she could see the figure of Karl Mueller, the third member of the Seagull.  He was standing up out of the bow hatch, the ends of the silk scarf that muffled his face fluttering in the wind.  His attention was on the passing scenery below, looking for the unmanned marker light that stood on a spindly steel tower at the edge of the water.

“Yenny?” Karl’s accented voice sounded in her ears.

“What, Karl?” she replied.

“Ve should be zeeing natives fishing from their boats, ya?”

“Yeah, we should.  Why?”

Leaning over the bow the feline studied the waters below.

“Vell, there are none to be zeen.”

Not understanding the statement, Jenny slid open the side window the canopy for a better look.  Coconut palms raised green heads to the early morning light, bowing to the white beach washed over by the tides.  And that was all she could see.  Karl was right, there were no locals casting nets from their outrigger canoes.  The ocean was clear of any such activity; no one to spot and wave at the flying boat with the light gray hull and chrome yellow wings, stabilizer, and rudder.  And just about everybody among the Nimitz Islands would recognize the aircraft belonging to the Spontoon Island Navigational Aid Service.  It was their job to see to it that the marker buoys and unmanned light towers guiding the shipping among the islands were in top shape and fully charged with acetylene.

Jenny spoke into the microphone again.  “Ben, we should be seeing #34 soon, right?”

Ben Fraiser, the plane’s wireless operator and engineer, consulted his charts again.

“We should be on top of it now, love.”

But before the rabbit fem could say another word a shout beat at their ears.  Karl was waving at the windscreen and jabbing his other hand downwards.

“Ship aground!” the German feline called out.  “Off our port bow!”

Looking out the open side window, Jenny saw a long cabin cruiser hard aground on the spit of coral that stuck out away from the beach like a curled finger.  And at the tip of the finger should have been the steel tower of Marker Light #34, to warn away shipping from that danger.  But where was the tower? 

Jenny eased the yoke to the right while applying left rudder, banking the aircraft around for another pass over the site.

“See any survivors, Karl?”

“Nein,” was the terse answer as the feline slid the goggles up off his eyes and brought up a pair of binoculars to them.  He quickly scanned the treeline, the boat, and the coral spit.  Then he stiffened as he peered closely at where the light tower should have been.  There had been a mound of coral rising slightly out of the water at the end of the spit.  And it was on this mound that the Navigational Aid Service had augured screw pilings into for the rest of the tower to stand on.  Now all that remained was a deep hole blasted into the coral.

“The tower’s gone!” called Karl over the wind.  “Looks to have blown up!”

“Blown up?” interjected Ben; his gaze fixed on the side window set in the fuselage beside his position.  “But how?”  And yet he knew the answer just as Jenny Monroe growled it out.

“Ship wreckers!  They knew this boat was coming so they dynamited the tower!  Ben, let Ida Lewis know the situation here and that we’re going down to search for survivors.  Karl, get things ready in case we get unwanted guests.” 

The feline observer nodded his understanding and ducked out of sight.  Presently he reappeared with a machine gun that he fitted to the Scarff ring surrounding the hatch.  It was a Vickers Type K aircraft machine gun, a British made weapon that copied the old Lewis gun from the Great War but without the cooling sleeve over the barrel.  Next came the drum of ammunition that Karl fitted over the receiver followed by a quick pull on the charging handle. He gave Jenny a ‘thumbs up’ then locked the weapon into place as the Seagull slowly descended to alight on the choppy water.
Jockeying the throttle the rabbit pilot maneuvered the amphibian close to the cruiser before cutting the engine.  Karl got out a boat hook and fended off the plane from crashing into the boat’s hull.  By now Ben had opened the top of the canopy and was standing up in the narrow passageway to the right of the pilot’s seat, a large automatic pistol in hand.  Jenny stood up in the seat, a pistol held ready as well.

There was no sound other than the sea slapping at both boat hulls, the breeze, and the birds overhead.  Three pairs of eyes studied the cabin cruiser and didn’t like what they saw.  Bullet holes stitched the side of the boat, chewed up the wood trim, and shattered glass.  By now Karl had fitted a piece of rubber tire to the bow of the amphibian and tied the line to a cleat on the boat.  The tire piece acted as a fender to keep the two vessels from rubbing against each other.  When that was done the feline climbed to the deck above, drawing his own automatic out of his coveralls.

Cautiously Karl picked his way across the deck and into the cockpit, staring about at the destruction.  Broken glasses and bottles crunched underfoot as the feline stepped up to the wreck of the boat’s radio.  Cabinets had been opened; drawers rifled and stuff strewn about.  And there were splatters of dark blood everywhere.

“Vessel is a shambles,” Karl called out as he stepped carefully forward to the lower cabin.  The door was closed.  With his pistol held ready the feline took hold of the knob, gave it a twist, and pushed.  There was some resistance to being opened.  Putting his shoulder to the door Karl forced it opened – and wished he hadn’t!

“Gott im Himmel!” he breathed, staring at the carnage that met his eyes. 
Bodies had been packed into the narrow space; tossed into a pile like bloody ragdolls.  It appeared to be an equal mix of male and female of several species.  And a charnel house reek was beginning to grow in the confines.

“Karl?  Where are you?”  It was Ben Fraiser’s voice calling from the stern.
 Karl Mueller was vaguely aware of Ben’s approach.  “What have you got, eh?”

Swallowing hard the feline male backed out of the cabin, mechanically pulling the door closed.

“Karl?” Ben asked inquisitively.  “What’s wrong?”

But the look in other’s eyes told the Cairn terrier that something was indeed wrong.

“Der pech boot,” Karl whispered, too frightened to speak any louder.

Both Karl Mueller and Ben Fraiser had participated in the Great War; both served in their respective naval air services, German and Canadian.  It was something of a running joke between them that they had met once before in combat and had taken potshots at each other.  But neither had to experience the nightmare that was trench warfare, with its massive artillery bombardments and waves of massed infantry charging machinegun nests.

Now Karl was visibly shaken by what was beyond that door.  Ben swallowed, for he understood the other as saying this was ‘an unlucky boat.’  He said, “Let me see.”  There was no resistance to his entering, and Ben wished the other had tried to stop him.

“Sweet Mother of God,” Ben groaned, turning from the sight and sprinting for the stern where he vomited over the rail.

An inquisitive call came from the amphibian.  “Karl?  Ben?  What’s wrong?  What’s happened on board?”

“Zometing you need no zee, Yenny!” Karl shouted as he pulled the door closed once more.  He stepped up to the port railing and stared off towards the palms.  Then he looked down.  There were a couple more bodies floating on the water.  A whimper escaped his lips as he turned away.  The terrier male joined him amidships, drawing a handkerchief shakily across his muzzle.

“Ve got to let Captain Stanbridge know of this und quickly!”

Ben bobbed his head and shuffled back to the Seagull, Karl helping him down past the machine gun and into the hatch.  Jenny Monroe became frightened by the appearance of her two crewmates.

“What happened on board?” she asked of Ben as he worked his way past the pilot’s seat and to his place behind it.  He began warming up the radio as Karl dropped over the side of the cabin cruiser and into his forward position.

“Karl, what happened?  Where is everybody?  Are there any survivors?”

Pulling his leather helmet off the feline exposed sandy blond head hair and ginger tabby markings.  It was when he turned to face the pilot that the rabbit fem uttered a sharp gasp.  Fear filled his expression, and it was mirrored in his yellow eyes.

“Dead, Yenny.  All were dead.  Horribly shot to death.”

Tears welled up in dark brown eyes as the young rabbit girl dropped heavily into her seat.  She wasn't aware of the sharp tapping of the Morse key behind her as Ben Fraiser rapidly sent off his message to the Ida Lewis, an hour’s flying time to the southeast.

* * * * * *

On board the S.I.N.A.S. buoy tender, the Ida Lewis, steaming on a northwesterly course, a young fox was seated in the radio shack with three other operators.  Each one was monitoring a particular frequency assigned to them that morning.  And this ‘sparks’ was given the ship’s seaplane. 
Things were dull for a while, but ten minutes ago it looked like something was developing far to the north of their current heading.  Now the earphones crackled with another message as the todd began taking it down on his pad.  Then his pencil slowed in its scratching as his head came up with a look of disbelief etched across his face.  He stared at the radio panel before him, as if the device might have developed a problem that was scrambling the message partially written down.

There was a long pause before he snapped out of his malaise and requested a repeat.  A hesitation then the string of dots and dashed came over the air again as the fox completed the message on the pad.  He gave a quick acknowledgement before pulling off his headphones, tearing the sheet loose, and bolting from the shack to the bridge.

The radio todd took the stairs to the bridge two at a time.  He had noticed in his flight the captain of the ship standing at the railing of the starboard flying bridge.  But chain of command dictated that the message was to go to the First Officer.  And the chimpanzee that filled that position turned from his post next to the helmsman.

“Troubles, Mr. Prescott?” rumbled the simian.
The radio operator said nothing, merely handing over the torn paper.  Beetling brows knitted in question, Mr. Clements unfolded the paper and read.  Those thick brows shot up, threatening to knock his hat off.

“When did you get this?” he growled his question.

Prescott swallowed before answering.  “Not more that three minutes ago, sir.”

“And it is from the Seagull?”

“Yes, sir,” the radio fox replied while bobbing his head.

“Very well, then.  Return to your post and advise Seagull we will be on our way.”

Not waiting for the todd’s affirmation the chimp stepped out onto the flying bridge to join his captain.  The tall rangy figure didn’t visibly acknowledge the other’s presence until the chimp held out the message.  “From the Seagull, Capt’n.”

Cold blue eyes set in a long face turned to fix the First Officer as thin lips pressed into a thin line within the trimmed salt-and-pepper beard.  Captain Silas Stanbridge was one of a handful of humans working in the Nimitz Islands, populated by the myriad collection of animals and birds.  But he was also respected by that population, for his experience and dedication to the service.

Taking the slip of paper Stanbridge opened it and read:

SEAGULL to IDA LEWIS:
MARKER LIGHT #34 CONFIRMED DESTROYED. ALSO, CABIN CRUISER AGROUND ON CORAL. CREW AND PASSENGERS FOUND DEAD.  BELIEVE WORK OF SHIPWRECKERS.

“Mr. Clements, notify the Chief Engineer that we will need every pound of steam his boilers can muster.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Are we still on our current heading to rendezvous with the Seagull?”

“Yes, sir, we are.”

“Good,” said the captain as he limped past the simian and made his way into the bridge.  He paused at the chart table and consulted it.  “Let the Seagull know we are on our way at best possible speed, and they are to keep an eye peeled in case those bastards return.  And let the Spontoon Naval Sydicate know of the situation and have them render aid as well.  They can sort through the bodies and notify next of kin.”

“Anything else, sir?” queried the First Officer.

Stanbridge stood up and gave the simian a sidelong glance.
“No, Mr. Clements.  I believe we have enough on our plate at the moment.”

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