The Shanghai Secret ( )

Position, 123 degrees, 8 minutes wet, 37 degrees, 31 minutes north. Gyrocompas, course, 237. Wind, fresh, sky, fair. Remarks, cleared the court of San Francisco at 2.30 pm. Failing delayed 19 hours due to death of first officer.

Cause of death is Shanghai's secret. I stood there on the pier that evening. The ache in my frame reminding me that the last long, hard day of loading stores was behind me. And watched the China bound freighter feeling her way out into the fog-shotted harbor.

The Scarlet Queen nudged her fenders against the dock right below me. Her bright work shining like costume jewelry even in the failing light. She was beautiful in her new white paint. And she was mine all 78 feet of her.

She rose and fell just a little delicately. Lifting the carved wood figure under her bows spread out of the shadows now. The fresh young body looking forward. Bold, teasing, dressed in only a crown and painted brilliant red.

The Scarlet Queen. The woman my own particular world revolved around. But that grey San Francisco evening wasn't cut out for romance between man and laggard wood. I didn't hear him as he walked up behind me, but it didn't take me long to pick up the odor of a jail cell after he opened his mouth.

You Phillip Carney? Yeah, that's right. I'm Kessel, San Francisco homicide. You know a man named David Armalone? Yeah, he's my chief mate. What'd he do? He died. Come on, he got a date ahead. Wait a minute. It's a little sudden on a full stomach. What happened to him?

The books are going to call it murder by a person or a person's unknown. known. I'm a sight won't know you better. And so mutual begins the voyage of the Scarlet Queen written by Gildard and Bob Talman and starring Elliot Lewis. The Scarlet Queen brought his ship to plow the seas bound for uncharted adventure.