Merlin Kaggs

Merlin Kaggs is a fictional character in Willard Price's Adventure Series.

Character overview

Merlin Kaggs worked along the Australian coast as a pearl smuggler and thief while maintaining his image as a legitimate businessman. His motivation shifted in later novels from profit to an obsessive desire for revenge against Hal and Roger Hunt over perceived slights, some real, some imagined. He posed a serious threat; he was clever and surprisingly courageous, always attempting to pull off audacious Coup d'état.

Fictional character biography

Early life

Although the details change subtly with each novel, the basic outline of Kaggs' early life is as follows. He was born in San Francisco, the only son of a clergyman. His father tried to get him to follow his footsteps into the church but Kaggs refused and eventually ran off to join the local street gangs.

Kaggs worked his way up the ranks. One night, however, he killed a drunken sailor who had got in his way, and was forced to flee San Francisco for the Muir Woods while the heat died down.

Kaggs later committed two more murders, but was caught and imprisoned in San Quentin. He was able to convince people he killed the two men in self-defense, however, and soon got out on good behavior. This ability to disguise himself as an innocent gentleman, usually as a reverend using the skills his father taught him, quickly became his modus operandi.

He later left San Francisco and began setting up his own crime syndicate centered on pearl smuggling. He quickly became an accomplished criminal, acting under the noses of the Navy and becoming adept at the use of espionage. When Kagg’s criminal empire was at its top, he was a force to be reckoned with.

South Sea Adventure

He tracked down a famous scientist and zoologist who had set up a secret pearl colony on an island in the South Seas. Despite spying on him and having is apartment bugged, Kaggs was unable to discover the location of the secret island. He did, however, discover that two young naturalists, Hal and Roger Hunt, were employed to check up on the progress of the experiment.

Kaggs hired a thug known as Crab to gain access to the Hunts' boat and steal the location of the island. Crab failed in his mission, forcing Kaggs to take action himself after removing Crab from the picture.

Masquerading as a missionary, he quickly warmed up to the Hunts, who invited him along on their ship. However, Hal quickly developed doubts about his credentials and secretly altered the bearings in their log book. This was to have disastrous results for both Kaggs and the Hunts themselves.

Once on the island, Kaggs revealed his true nature. After holding the Hunts at gun point he tried to bribe Omo into diving into the island's lagoon and recovering the pearls for him. Negotiations failed and, during the resulting melee, Omo was shot by Kaggs.

Kaggs took advantage of the chaos he had created and slipped away on the boat, leaving the Hunts and the wounded Omo to die while he rounded up some of his thugs and pillaged the island himself. He got lost on the way back, however, due to the bearings being altered, and was forced to drink sea water when his supplies ran out. Kaggs went insane, and was consigned to an asylum.

Diving Adventure

After his escape from the asylum, Kaggs decided to keep a low profile until he could rebuild his life of crime. During this time he killed a diver on Thursday Island. The perfect location for him to lie low was the Undersea City built on the Australian Great Barrier Reef. Once again posing as a reverend, Kaggs soon found employment in the relatively unknown community.

However, Hal and Roger Hunt once again entered into his life. Not only did they also come to the Undersea City but, through sheer bad luck on Kagg’s part, were asked to share a room with him.

Thinking quickly, Kaggs convinced Hal, to Roger's amazement, that he had been let out and had reformed. However, far from reformed, he plotted his revenge. He almost got his chance when Hal was wounded by a Portuguese Man o' War, but was denied by Roger who stood guard over his brother. He later tried again by starting an avalanche down the side of the Great Barrier Reef, hoping to crush the Hunts, but again his plan failed.

Kaggs discovered a ship full of gold and convinced the Hunts to let him help them recover it after they saved his life. It appears that he was genuinely grateful and was going to let the Hunts off the hook for their past actions. Soon after, however, one of Omo's relatives arrived in town and recognized him. Forced to flee, and believing the Hunts had sold him out to the authorities, he once again swore vengeance.

He kidnapped their captain and stole their ship, which was full of gold and valuable animals. He tried to escape, but he quickly run aground on the reef. The Hunts saved his life as the ship began to sink. Kaggs was imprisoned for murder, kidnapping and smuggling when the authorities arrived to take him into custody.

Cannibal Adventure

While in prison, Kaggs plotted revenge. His cellmate, Butcher, quickly became friends with the big man and soon let him into their escape plot. What happened next demonstrates the depths of Kagg’s evil. He sold out his friend to the prison warden and sat back while Butcher and the other would be escapees were gunned down during the attempt.

Kaggs was made a trustee due to his apparent assistance; in reality, however, Kaggs had deduced that the escape plan would have failed anyway and had decided to help the warden in order to gain his trust and make his own escape when the security became lax. His plan worked, and the unsuspecting warden let him literally walk out the prison door.

Kaggs pursued the Hunts to Papua New Guinea. He quickly became allies with a witch doctor who also had a grudge against the Hunts. He anonymously stabbed Hal in the back with a spear, but the young man survived. He planned and constructed a log trap for Roger but was again defeated, only managing to bruise Roger's foot. He tried to poison the cannibal chief, Pavo, who had taken it upon himself to guard the boys, but his attempt was also unsuccessful.

He returned to the witch doctor for backup, and he was given a bag full of King Cobras, which he would release aboard the boys' ship at night. However, his greed got the better of him, and he threw the cobras through the cabin window rather than release them aboard the ship, as they would kill all the rare and exotic animals he hoped to sell. The boys and Captain Ike woke up and captured all the snakes - Kaggs had unwittingly helped them.

Death

Kaggs' luck went sour when he was attacked by a Great White shark and badly wounded. He was found by the natives and brought to Hal for treatment. This time his reform act didn’t work and once again he was locked in the brig awaiting the authorities. He used a fork to pick the lock and escaped again, setting fire to the ship and disabling the engines, leaving the Hunts and their captain to die.

His motorboat was attacked by a crocodile, however, and Kaggs was thrown into the water. Although his body was never recovered, his failure to return in subsequent novels suggests that the author did intend this to be Kaggs' death scene.