In a few minutes they reached the vessel, and the boat was quickly made
fast, and very soon they were on board. When he saw his old friends and
associates upon the deck, Inkspot retired a little distance and fell upon
his knees.

"You black rascal!" roared Burke, "you brought these cut-throat
scoundrels down upon us! You--"

"That will do," said the captain. "There is no time for that sort of
thing now. We will talk to him afterwards. Mr. Shirley, call all hands
and get up sail. I am going to take this schooner inside the headland.
We can find safe anchorage in the bay. We can sail over the same course
we went on with the _Miranda_, and she drew more water than this vessel."

In an hour the _Arato_, moored by her spare anchor, lay in the little
bay, less than two hundred yards from shore. It gave the shipwrecked men
a wild delight to find themselves again upon the decks of a seaworthy
vessel, and everybody worked with a will, especially the prisoner and
Inkspot. And when the last sail had been furled, it became evident to all
hands on board that they wanted their breakfast, and this need was
speedily supplied by Maka and Inkspot from the _Arato's_ stores.

That afternoon the captain went on shore with the negroes and the Chilian
prisoner, and the bodies of the nine men who had fallen in the attack
upon the wall of gold were buried where they lay. This was a very
different climate from that of the Peruvian coast, where the desiccating
air speedily makes a mummy of any dead body upon its arid sands.

When this work had been accomplished, the party returned to the _Arato_,
and the captain ordered Inkspot and the prisoner to be brought aft to be
tried by court martial. The big negro had been wildly and vociferously
received by his fellow-countrymen, who, upon every possible occasion, had
jabbered together in their native tongue, but Captain Horn had, so far,
said nothing to him.

The captain had been greatly excited from the moment he had seen the sail
in the offing. In his dire distress, on this almost desolate shore, he
had beheld what might prove to be speedy relief, and, much as he had
needed it, he had hoped that it might not come so soon. He had been
apprehensive and anxious when he supposed friendly aid might be
approaching, and he had been utterly astounded when he was forced to
believe that they were armed men who were rowing to shore, and must be
enemies. He had fought a terrible fight. He had conquered the scoundrels
who had come for his life and his treasure, and, best of all, he had
secured a vessel which would carry him and his men and his fortune to
France. He had endeavored to keep cool and think only of the work that
was immediately in hand, and he had no wish to ask anybody why or how
things had happened. They had happened, and that was all in all to him.
But now he was ready to make all necessary inquiries, and he began with
Inkspot. Maka being interpreter, the examination was easily carried on.

The story of the negro was a very interesting one. He told of his
adventures on shore, and how kind the men had been to him until they went
on board the _Arato_, and how then they treated him as if he had been a
dog--how he had been made to do double duty in all sorts of disagreeable
work, and how, after they had seen the light on the beach, he had been
put into the hold and tied hand and foot. While down there in the dark he
had heard the firing on shore, and, after a long while, the firing from
the deck, and other shots near by. All this had so excited him that he
managed to get one hand loose from his cords, and then had speedily
unfastened the rest, and had quietly crept to a hatchway, where he could
watch what was going on without showing himself. He had seen the two men
on deck, ready to fire on the approaching boat. He had recognized Captain
Horn and the people of the _Miranda_ in the boat. And then, when there
was but one man left on deck, and the boat was afraid to come nearer, he
had rushed up behind him and tumbled him overboard.

One thing only did Inkspot omit: he did not say that it was Mr. Burke's
example that had prompted him to go ashore for refreshments. When the
story had been told, and all questions asked and answered, the captain
turned to Burke and Shirley and asked their opinions upon the case.
Shirley was in favor of putting the negro in irons. He had deserted them,
and had nearly cost them their lives by the stories he had told on shore.
Burke, to the captain's surprise,--for the second mate generally dealt
severely with nautical transgressions,--was in favor of clemency.

"To be sure," said he, "the black scoundrel did get us into trouble. But
then, don't you see, he has got us out of it. If these beastly fellows
hadn't been led by him to come after our money, we would not have had
this schooner, and how we should have got those bags away without
her,--to say nothing of ourselves,--is more than I can fathom. It is my
belief that no craft ever comes within twenty miles of this coast, if she
can help it. So I vote for letting him off. He didn't intend to do us any
harm, and he didn't intend to do us any good, but it seems to me that the
good he did do rises higher above the water-line than the harm. So I say,
let him off. We need another hand about as much as we need anything."

"And so say I," said the captain. "Maka, you can tell him we forgive him,
because we believe that he is really a good fellow and didn't intend any
harm, and he can turn in with the rest of you on his old watch. And now
bring up that Chilian fellow."

The prisoner, who gave his name as Anton Garta, was now examined in
regard to the schooner _Arato_, her extraordinary cruise, and the people
who had devised it. Garta was a fellow of moderate intelligence, and
still very much frightened, and having little wit with which to concoct
lies, and no reason for telling them, he answered the questions put to
him as correctly as his knowledge permitted. He said that about two
months before he had been one of the crew of the _Arato_, and Manuel
Cardatas was second mate, and he had been very glad to join her on this
last cruise because he was out of a job. He thought she was going to
Callao for a cargo, and so did the rest of the crew. They did not even
know there were guns on board until they were out at sea. Then, when they
had turned southward, their captain and SeГ±or Nunez told them that they
were going in pursuit of a treasure ship commanded by a Yankee captain,
who had run away with ever so much money from California, and that they
were sure to overhaul this ship, and that they would all be rich.

The guns were given to them, and they had had some practice with them,
and thought that Cardatas intended, should the _Miranda_ be overhauled,
to run alongside of her as near as was safe, and begin operations by
shooting everybody that could be seen on deck. He was not sure that this
was his plan, but they all had thought it was. After the storm the men
had become dissatisfied, and said they did not believe it was possible to
overhaul any vessel after so much delay, and when they had gone so far
out of their course; and SeГ±or Nunez, who had hired the vessel, was in
doubt as to whether it would be of any use to continue the cruise. But
when Cardatas had talked to him, SeГ±or Nunez had come among them and
promised them good rewards, whether they sighted their prize or not, if
they would work faithfully for ten days more. The men had agreed to do
this, but when they had seen the light on shore, they had made an
agreement among themselves that, if this should be nothing but a fire
built by savages or shipwrecked people of no account, they would not work
the schooner any farther south. They would put Cardatas and Nunez in
irons, if necessary, and take the _Arato_ back to Valparaiso. There were
men among them who could navigate. But when they got near enough to shore
to see that the stranded vessel was the _Miranda_, there was no more
insubordination.

As for himself, Garta said he was a plain, common sailor, who went on
board the _Arato_ because he wanted a job. If he had known the errand on
which she was bound, he would never have approached within a league of
her. This he vowed, by all the saints. As to the ownership of the vessel
Garta could tell but little. He had heard that Cardatas had a share in
her, and thought that probably the other owners lived in Valparaiso, but
he could give no positive information on this subject. He said that every
man of the boat's crew was in a state of wild excitement when they saw
that long pile of bags, which they knew must contain treasure of some
sort, and it was because of this state of mind, most likely, that
Cardatas lost his temper and got himself shot, and so opened the fight.
Cardatas was a cunning fellow, and, if he had not been upset by the sight
of those bags, Garta believed that he would have regularly besieged
Captain Horn's party, and must have overcome them in the end. He was
anxious to have the captain believe that, when he had said there were
only two men on board, he had totally forgotten the negro, who had been
left below.

When Garta's examination had been finished, the captain sent him
forward, and then repeated his story in brief to Shirley and Burke,
for, as the prisoner had spoken in Spanish, they had understood but
little of it.

"I don't see that it makes much difference," said Burke, "as to what his
story is. We've got to get rid of him in some way. We don't want to
carry him about with us. We might leave him here, with a lot of grub and
a tent. That would be all he deserves."

"I should put him in irons, to begin with," said Shirley, "and then we
can consider what to do with him when we have time."

"I shall not leave him on shore," said the captain, "for that would
simply be condemning him to starvation; and as for putting him in irons,
that would deprive us of an able seaman. I suppose, if we took him to
France, he would have to be sent to Chili for trial, and that would be of
no use, unless we went there as witnesses. It is a puzzling question to
know what to do with him."

"It is that," said Burke, "and it is a great pity he wasn't shot with
the others."

"Well," said the captain, "we've got a lot of work before us, and we want
hands, so I think it will be best to let him turn in with the rest, and
make him pay for his passage, wherever we take him. The worst he can do
is to desert, and if he does that, he will settle his own business, and
we shall have no more trouble with him."

"I don't like him," said Shirley. "I don't think we ought to have such a
fellow going about freely on board."

"I am not afraid he will hurt any of us," said the captain, "and I
am sure he will not corrupt the negroes. They hate him. It is easy to
see that."

"Yes," said Burke, with a laugh. "They think he is a Rackbird, and it is
just as well to let them keep on thinking so."

"Perhaps he is," thought the captain, but he did not speak this
thought aloud.




CHAPTER XLII

INKSPOT HAS A DREAM OF HEAVEN


The next day the work of loading the _Arato_ with the bags of gold was
begun, and it was a much slower and more difficult business than the
unloading of the _Miranda_, for the schooner lay much farther out from
the beach. But there were two men more than on the former occasion, and
the captain did not push the work. There was no need now for
extraordinary haste, and although they all labored steadily, regular
hours of work and rest were adhered to. The men had carried so many bags
filled with hard and uneven lumps that the shoulders of some of them were
tender, and they had to use cushions of canvas under their loads. But the
boats went backward and forward, and the bags were hoisted on board and
lowered into the hold, and the wall of gold grew smaller and smaller.

"Captain," said Burke, one day, as they were standing by a pile of bags
waiting for the boat to come ashore, "do you think it is worth it! By
George! we have loaded and unloaded these blessed bags all down the
western coast of South America, and if we've got to unload and load them
all up the east coast, I say, let's take what we really need, and leave
the rest."

"I've been at the business a good deal longer than you have," said the
captain, "and I'm not tired of it yet. When I took away my first cargo,
you must remember that I carried each bag on my own shoulders, and it
took me more than a month to do it, and even all that is only a drop in
the bucket compared to what most men who call themselves rich have to do
before they make their money."

"All right," said Burke, "I'll stop growling. But look here, captain.
How much do you suppose one of these bags is worth, and how many are
there in all? I don't want to be inquisitive, but it would be a sort of
comfort to know."

"No, it wouldn't," said the captain, quickly. "It would be anything else
but a comfort. I know how many bags there are, but as to what they are
worth, I don't know, and I don't want to know. I once set about
calculating it, but I didn't get very far with the figures. I need all my
wits to get through with this business, and I don't think anything would
be more likely to scatter them than calculating what this gold is worth.
It would be a good deal better for you--and for me, too--to consider, as
Shirley does, that these bags are all filled with good, clean, anthracite
coal. That won't keep us from sleeping."

"Shirley be hanged!" said Burke, "He and you may be able to do that, but
I can't. I've got a pretty strong mind, and if you were to tell me that
when we get to port, and you discharge this crew, I can walk off with all
the gold eagles or twenty-franc pieces I can carry, I think I could stand
it without losing my mind."

"All right," said the captain, "If we get this vessel safely to France,
I will give you a good chance to try your nerves."

Day by day the work went on, and at last the _Arato_ took the place of
the _Miranda_ as a modern _Argo_.

During the reГ«mbarkation of the treasure, the captain, as well as Shirley
and Burke, had kept a sharp eye on Garta. The two mates were afraid he
might run away, but, had he done so, the captain would not have regretted
it very much. He would gladly have parted with one of the bags in order
to get rid of this encumbrance. But the prisoner had no idea of running
away. He knew that the bags were filled with treasure, but as he could
now do nothing with any of it that he might steal, he did not try to
steal any. If he had thoughts of the kind, he knew this was no time for
dishonest operation. He had always been a hardworking sailor, with a good
appetite, and he worked hard now, and ate well.

The _Miranda's_ stores had not been injured by water, and when they had
been put on board, the _Arato_ was well fitted out for a long voyage.
Leaving the _Miranda_ on the beach, with nothing in her of much value,
the _Arato_, which had cleared for Callao, and afterwards set out on a
wild piratical cruise, now made a third start, and set sail for a voyage
to France. They had good weather and tolerably fair winds, and before
they entered the Straits of Magellan the captain had formulated a plan
for the disposition of Garta.

"I don't know anything better to do with him," said he to Shirley and
Burke, "than to put him ashore at the Falkland Islands. We don't want to
take him to France, for we would not know what to do with him after we
got him there, and, as likely as not, he would swear a lot of lies
against us as soon as he got on shore. We can run within a league of
Stanley harbor, and then, if the weather is good enough, we can put him
in a boat, with something to eat and drink, and let him row himself into
port. We can give him money enough to support himself until he can
procure work."

"But suppose there is a man-of-war in there," said Shirley, "he might say
things that would send her after us. He might not know where to say we
got our treasure, but he could say we had stolen a Chilian vessel."

"I had thought of that," said the captain, "but nothing such a vagrant as
he is could say ought to give any cruiser the right to interfere with us
when we are sailing under the American flag. And when I go to France,
nobody shall say that I stole a vessel, for, if the owners of the _Arato_
can be found, they shall be well paid for what use we have made of their
schooner. I'll send her back to Valparaiso and let her be claimed."

"It is a ticklish business," said Burke, "but I don't know what else can
be done. It is a great pity I didn't know he was going to surrender when
we had that fight."

They had been in the Straits less than a week when Inkspot dreamed he
was in heaven. His ecstatic visions became so strong and vivid that they
awakened him, when he was not long in discovering the cause which had
produced them. The dimly lighted and quiet forecastle was permeated by a
delightful smell of spirituous liquor. Turning his eyes from right to
left, in his endeavors to understand this unusual odor of luxury,
Inkspot perceived the man Garta standing on the other side of the
forecastle, with a bottle in one hand and a cork in the other, and, as
he looked, Garta raised the bottle to his mouth, threw back his head,
and drank.

Inkspot greatly disliked this man. He had been one of the fellows who had
ill-treated him when the _Arato_ sailed under Cardatas, and he fully
agreed with his fellow-blacks that the scoundrel should have been shot.
But now his feelings began to undergo a change. A man with a bottle of
spirits might prove to be an angel of mercy, a being of beneficence, and
if he would share with a craving fellow-being his rare good fortune, why
should not all feelings of disapprobation be set aside? Inkspot could see
no reason why they should not be, and softly slipping from his hammock,
he approached Garta.

"Give me. Give me, just little," he whispered.

Garta turned with a half-suppressed oath, and seeing who the suppliant
was, he seized the bottle in his left hand, and with his right struck
poor Inkspot a blow in the face. Without a word the negro stepped back,
and then Garta put the bottle into a high, narrow opening in the side of
the forecastle, and closed a little door upon it, which fastened with a
snap. This little locker, just large enough to hold one bottle, had been
made by one of the former crew of the _Arato_ solely for the purpose of
concealing spirits, and was very ingeniously contrived. Its door was a
portion of the side of the forecastle, and a keyhole was concealed behind
a removable knot. Garta had not opened the locker before, for the reason
that he had been unable to find the key. He knew it had been concealed
in the forecastle, but it had taken him a long time to find it. Now his
secret was discovered, and he was enraged. Going over to the hammock,
where Inkspot had again ensconced himself, he leaned over the negro and
whispered:

"If you ever say a word of that bottle to anybody, I'll put a knife into
you! No matter what they do to me, I'll settle with you."

Inkspot did not understand all this, but he knew it was a threat, and he
well understood the language of a blow in the face. After a while he went
to sleep, but, if he smelt again the odor of the contents of the bottle,
he had no more heavenly dreams.

The next day Captain Horn found himself off the convict settlement of
Punta Arenas, belonging to the Chilian government. This was the first
port he had approached since he had taken command of the _Arato_, but he
felt no desire nor need to touch at it. In fact, the vicinity of Punta
Arenas seemed of no importance whatever, until Shirley came to him and
reported that the man Garta was nowhere to be found. Captain Horn
immediately ordered a search and inquiry to be made, but no traces of the
prisoner could be discovered, nor could anybody tell anything about him.
Burke and Inkspot had been on watch with him from four to eight, but they
could give no information whatever concerning him. No splash nor cries
for help had been heard, so that he could not have fallen overboard, and
it was generally believed that, when he knew himself to be in the
vicinity of a settlement, he had quietly slipped into the water and had
swum for Punta Arenas. Burke suggested that most likely he had formerly
been a resident of the place, and liked it better than being taken off
to unknown regions in the schooner. And Shirley considered this very
probable, for he said the man had always looked like a convict to him.

At all events, Garta was gone, and there was no one to say how long he
had been gone. So, under full sail, the _Arato_ went on her way. It was a
relief to get rid of the prisoner, and the only harm which could come of
his disappearance was that he might report that his ship had been stolen
by the men who were sailing her, and that some sort of a vessel might be
sent in pursuit of the _Arato_, and, if this should be the case, the
situation would be awkward. But days passed on, the schooner sailed out
of the Straits, and no vessel was seen pursuing her.

To the northeast Captain Horn set his course. He would not stop at Rio
Janeiro, for the _Arato_ had no papers for that port. He would not lie to
off Stanley harbor, for he had now nobody to send ashore. But he would
sail boldly for France, where he would make no pretensions that his
auriferous cargo was merely ballast. He was known at Marseilles. He had
business relations with bankers in Paris. He was a Californian and an
American citizen, and he would merely be bringing to France a vessel
freighted with gold, which, by the aid of his financial advisers, would
be legitimately cared for and disposed of.

One night, before the _Arato_ reached the Falkland Islands, Maka, who was
on watch, heard a queer sound in the forecastle, and looking down the
companionway, he saw, by the dim light of the swinging lantern, a man
with a hatchet, endeavoring to force the blade of it into the side of the
vessel. Maka quickly perceived that the man was Inkspot, and as he could
not imagine what he was doing, he quietly watched him. Inkspot worked
with as little noise as possible, but he was evidently bent upon forcing
off one of the boards on the side of the forecastle. At first Maka
thought that his fellow-African was trying to sink the ship by opening a
seam, but he soon realized that this notion was absurd, and so he let
Inkspot go on, being very curious to know what he was doing. In a few
minutes he knew. With a slight noise, not enough to waken a sound
sleeper, a little door flew open, and almost immediately Inkspot held a
bottle in his hand.

Maka slipped swiftly and softly to the side of the big negro, but he was
not quick enough. Inkspot had the neck of the bottle in his mouth and the
bottom raised high in the air. But, before Maka could seize him by the
arm, the bottle had come down from its elevated position, and a doleful
expression crept over the face of Inkspot. There had been scarcely a
teaspoonful of liquor left in the bottle. Inkspot looked at Maka, and
Maka looked at him. In an African whisper, the former now ordered the
disappointed negro to put the bottle back, to shut up the locker, and
then to get into his hammock and go to sleep as quickly as he could, for
if Mr. Shirley, who was on watch on deck, found out what he had been
doing, Inkspot would wish he had never been born.

The next day, when they had an opportunity for an African conversation,
Inkspot assured his countryman that he had discovered the little locker
by smelling the whiskey through the boards, and that, having no key, he
had determined to force it open with a hatchet. Maka could not help
thinking that Inkspot had a wonderful nose for an empty bottle, and
could scarcely restrain from a shudder at the thought of what might
have happened had the bottle been full. But he did not report the
occurrence. Inkspot was a fellow-African, and he had barely escaped
punishment for his former misdeed. It would be better to keep his mouth
shut, and he did.

Against the north winds, before the south winds, and on the winds from
the east and the west, through fair weather and through foul, the _Arato_
sailed up the South Atlantic. It was a long, long voyage, but the
schooner was skilfully navigated and sailed well. Sometimes she sighted
great merchant-steamers plying between Europe and South America,
freighted with rich cargoes, and proudly steaming away from the little
schooner, whose dark-green hull could scarcely be distinguished from the
color of the waves. And why should not the captain of this humble little
vessel sometimes have said to himself, as he passed a big three-master or
a steamer:

"What would they think if they knew that, if I chose to do it, I could
buy every ship, and its cargo, that I shall meet between here and
Gibraltar!"

"Captain," said Shirley, one day, "what do you think about the right and
wrong of this?"

"What do you mean?" asked Captain Horn.

"I mean," replied Shirley, "taking away the gold we have on board. We've
had pretty easy times lately, and I've been doing a good deal of
thinking, and sometimes I have wondered where we got the right to clap
all this treasure into bags and sail away with it."

"So you have stopped thinking the bags are all filled with anthracite
coal," said the captain.

"Yes," said the other. "We are getting on toward the end of this voyage,
and it is about time to give up that fancy. I always imagine, when I am
near the end of a voyage, what I am going to do when I go ashore, and if
I have any real right to some of the gold down under our decks, I shall
do something very different from anything I ever did before."

"I hope you don't mean going on a spree," said Burke, who was standing
near. "That would be something entirely different."

"I thought," said the captain, "that you both understood this business,
but I don't mind going over it again. There is no doubt in my mind that
this gold originally belonged to the Incas, who then owned Peru, and they
put it into that mound to keep it from the Spaniards, whose descendants
now own Peru, and who rule it without much regard to the descendants of
the ancient Peruvians. Now, when I discovered the gold, and began to have
an idea of how valuable the find was, I knew that the first thing to do
was to get it out of that place and away from the country. Whatever is to
be done in the way of fair play and fair division must be done somewhere
else, and not there. If I had informed the government of what I had
found, this gold would have gone directly into the hands of the
descendants of the people from whom its original owners did their very
best to keep it, and nobody else would have had a dollar's worth of it.
If we had stood up for our rights to a reward for finding it, ten to one
we would all have been clapped into prison."

"I suppose by that," said Burke, "that you looked upon the stone mound in
the cave as a sort of will left by those old Peruvians, and you made
yourself an executor to carry out the intentions of the testators, as
the lawyers say."

"But we can set it down as dead certain," interrupted Shirley, "that the
testators didn't mean us to have it."

"No," said the captain, "nor do I mean that we shall have all of it. I
intend to have the question of the ownership of this gold decided by
people who are able and competent to decide such a question, and who will
be fair and honest to all parties. But whatever is agreed upon, and
whatever is done with the treasure, I intend to charge a good price--a
price which shall bear a handsome proportion to the value of the
gold--for my services, and all our services. Some of this charge I have
already taken, and I intend to have a great deal more. We have worked
hard and risked much to get this treasure--"

"Yes," thought Burke, as he remembered the trap at the bottom of the
mound. "You risked a great deal more than you ever supposed you did."

"And we are bound to be well paid for it," continued the captain. "No
matter where this gold goes, I shall have a good share of it, and this I
am going to divide among our party, according to a fair scale. How does
that strike you, Shirley?"

"If the business is going to be conducted as you say, captain," replied
the first mate, "I say it will be all fair and square, and I needn't
bother my head with any more doubts about it. But there is one thing I
wish you would tell me: how much do you think I will be likely to get out
of this cargo, when you divide?"

"Mr. Shirley," said the captain, "when I give you your share of this
cargo, you can have about four bags of anthracite coal, weighing a little
over one hundred pounds, which, at the rate of six dollars a ton, would
bring you between thirty and forty cents. Will that satisfy you? Of
course, this is only a rough guess at a division, but I want to see how
it falls in with your ideas."

Shirley laughed. "I guess you're right, captain," said he. "It will be
better for me to keep on thinking we are carrying coal. That won't
bother my head."

"That's so," said Burke. "Your brain can't stand that sort of badger. I'd
hate to go ashore with you at Marseilles with your pocket full and your
skull empty. As for me, I can stand it first-rate. I have already built
two houses on Cape Cod,--in my head, of course,--and I'll be hanged if I
know which one I am going to live in and which one I am going to put my
mother in."




CHAPTER XLIII

MOK AS A VOCALIST


It would have been very comfortable to the mind of Edna, during her
waiting days in Paris, had she known there was a letter to her from
Captain Horn, in a cottage in the town of Sidmouth, on the south coast of
Devonshire. Had she known this, she would have chartered French trains,
Channel steamers, English trains, flies, anything and everything which
would have taken her the quickest to the little town of Sidmouth. Had she
known that he had written to her the first chance he had had, all her
doubts and perplexities would have vanished in an instant. Had she read
the letter, she might have been pained to find that it was not such a
letter as she would wish to have, and she might have grieved that it
might still be a long time before she could expect to hear from him
again, or to see him, but she would have waited--have waited patiently,
without any doubts or perplexities.

This letter, with a silver coin,--much more than enough to pay any
possible postage,--had been handed by Shirley to the first mate of the
British steamer, in the harbor of Valparaiso, and that officer had given
it to a seaman, who was going on shore, with directions to take it to
the post-office, and pay for the postage out of the silver coin, and
whatever change there might be, he should keep it for his trouble. On the
way to the post-office, this sailor stopped to refresh himself, and
meeting with a fellow-mariner in the place of refreshment, he refreshed
him also. And by the time the two had refreshed themselves to their
satisfaction, there was not much left of the silver coin--not enough to
pay the necessary postage to France.

"But," said the seaman to himself, "it doesn't matter a bit. We are bound
for Liverpool, and I'll take the letter there myself, and then I'll send
it over to Paris for tuppence ha'penny, which I will have then, and
haven't now. And I bet another tuppence that it will go sooner than if I
posted it here, for it may be a month before a mail-steamer leaves the
other side of this beastly continent. Anyway, I'm doing the best I can."

He put the letter in the pocket of his pea-jacket, and the bottom of that
pocket being ripped, the letter went down between the outside cloth and
the lining of the pea-jacket to the very bottom of the garment, where it
remained until the aforesaid seaman had reached England, and had gone
down to see his family, who lived in the cottage in Sidmouth. And there
he had hung up his pea-jacket on a nail, in a little room next to the
kitchen, and there his mother had found it, and sewed on two buttons, and
sewed up the rips in the bottoms of two pockets. Shortly after this, the
sailor, happening to pass a post-office box, remembered the letter he had
brought to England. He went to his pea-jacket and searched it, but could
find no letter. He must have lost it--he hoped after he had reached
England, and no doubt whoever found it would put a tuppence ha'penny
stamp on it and stick it into a box. Anyway, he had done all he could.

One pleasant spring evening, the negro Mok sat behind a table in the
well-known beer-shop called the "Black Cat." He had before him a
half-emptied beer-glass, and in front of him was a pile of three small
white dishes. These signified that Mok had had three glasses of beer, and
when he should finish the one in his hand, and should order another, the
waiter would bring with it another little white plate, which he would put
on the table, on the pile already there, and which would signify that the
African gentleman must pay for four glasses of beer.

Mok was enjoying himself very much. It was not often that he had such an
opportunity to sample the delights of Paris. His young master, Ralph, had
given him strict orders never to go out at night, or in his leisure
hours, unless accompanied by Cheditafa. The latter was an extremely
important and sedate personage. The combined dignity of a butler and a
clergyman were more than ever evident in his person, and he was a painful
drawback to the more volatile Mok. Mok had very fine clothes, which it
rejoiced him to display. He had a fine appetite for everything fit to eat
and drink. He had money in his pockets, and it delighted him to see
people and to see things, although he might not know who they were or
what they were. He knew nothing of French, and his power of expressing
himself in English had not progressed very far. But on this evening, in
the jolly precincts of the Black Cat, he did not care whether the people
used language or not. He did not care what they did, so that he could
sit there and enjoy himself. When he wanted more beer, the waiter
understood him, and that was enough.

The jet-black negro, gorgeously arrayed in the livery Ralph had chosen
for him, and with his teeth and eyeballs whiter than the pile of plates
before him, was an object of great interest to the company in the
beer-shop. They talked to him, and although he did not understand them,
or answer them, they knew he was enjoying himself. And when the landlord
rang a big bell, and a pale young man, wearing a high hat, and sitting at
a table opposite him, threw into his face an expression of exalted
melancholy, and sang a high-pitched song, Mok showed how he appreciated
the performance by thumping more vigorously on the table than any of the
other people who applauded the singer.

Again and again the big bell was rung, and there were other songs and
choruses, and then the company turned toward Mok and called on him to
sing. He did not understand them, but he laughed and pounded his fist
upon the table. But when the landlord came down to his table, and rang
the bell in front of him, that sent an informing idea into the African
head. He had noticed that every time the bell had been rung, somebody had
sung, and now he knew what was wanted of him. He had had four glasses of
beer, and he was an obliging fellow, so he nodded his head violently, and
everybody stopped doing what they had been doing, and prepared to listen.

Mok's repertoire of songs could not be expected to be large. In fact, he
only knew one musical composition, and that was an African hymn which
Cheditafa had taught him. This he now proceeded to execute. He threw
back his head, as some of the others had done, and emitted a succession
of grunts, groans, yelps, barks, squeaks, yells, and rattles which
utterly electrified the audience. Then, as if his breath filled his whole
body, and quivering and shaking like an angry squirrel when it chatters
and barks, Mok sang louder and more wildly, until the audience, unable to
restrain themselves, burst into laughter, and applauded with canes,
sticks, and fists. But Mok kept on. He had never imagined he could sing
so well. There was only one person in that brasserie who did not applaud
the African hymn, but no one paid so much attention to it as this man,
who had entered the Black Cat just as Mok had begun.

He was a person of medium size, with a heavy mustache, and a face
darkened by a beard of several days' growth. He was rather roughly
dressed, and wore a soft felt hat. He was a Rackbird.

This man had formerly belonged to the band of desperadoes which had been
swept away by a sudden flood on the coast of Peru. He had accompanied his
comrades on the last marauding expedition previous to that remarkable
accident, but he had not returned with them. He had devised a little
scheme of his own, which had detained him longer than he had expected,
and he was not ready to go back with them. It would have been difficult
for him to reach the camp by himself, and, after what he had done, he did
not very much desire to go, there as he would probably have been shot as
a deserter; for Captain Raminez was a savage fellow, and more than
willing to punish transgressions against his orders. This deserter,
Banker by name, was an American, who had been a gold-digger, a gambler,
a rough, and a dead shot in California, and he was very well able to take
care of himself in any part of the world.

He had made his way up to Panama, and had stayed there as long as it was
safe for him to do so, and had eventually reached Paris. He did not like
this city half so well as he liked London, but in the latter city he
happened to be wanted, and he was not wanted in Paris. It was generally
the case that he stayed where he was not wanted.

Of course, Banker knew nothing of the destruction of his band, and the
fact that he had not heard from them since he left them gave him not the
slightest regret. But what did astonish him beyond bounds was to sit at a
table in the Black Cat, in Paris, and see before him, dressed like the
valet of a Spanish grandee, a coal-black negro who had once been his
especial and particular slave and drudge, a fellow whom he had kicked and
beaten and sworn at, and whom he no doubt would have shot had he stayed
much longer with his lawless companions, the Rackbirds. There was no
mistaking this black man. He well remembered his face, and even the tones
of his voice. He had never heard him sing, but he had heard him howl, and
it seemed almost impossible that he should meet him in Paris. And yet, he
was sure that the man who was bellowing and bawling to the delight of the
guests of the Black Cat was one of the African wretches who had been
entrapped and enslaved by the Rackbirds.

But if Banker had been astonished by Mok, he was utterly amazed and
confounded when, some five minutes later, the door of the brasserie was
suddenly opened, and another of the slaves of the Rackbirds, with whose
face he was also perfectly familiar, hurriedly entered.

Cheditafa, who had been sent on an errand that evening, had missed Mok
on his return. Ralph was away in Brussels with the professor, so that
his valet, having most of his time on his hands, had thought to take a
holiday during Cheditafa's absence, and had slipped off to the Black
Cat, whose pleasures he had surreptitiously enjoyed before, but never to
such an extent as on this occasion. Cheditafa knew he had been there,
and when he started out to look for him, it was to the Black Cat that he
went first.

Before he had quite reached the door, Cheditafa had been shocked and
angered to hear his favorite hymn sung in a beer-shop by that reprobate
and incompetent Mok, and he had rushed in, and in a minute seized the
blatant vocalist by the collar, and ordered him instantly to shut his
mouth and pay his reckoning. Then, in spite of the shouts of
disapprobation which arose on every side, he led away the negro as if he
had been a captured dog with his tail between his legs.

Mok could easily have thrown Cheditafa across the street, but his respect
and reverence for his elder and superior were so great that he obeyed his
commands without a word of remonstrance.

Now up sprang Banker, who was in such a hurry to go that he forgot to pay
for his beer, and when he performed this duty, after having been abruptly
reminded of it by a waiter, he was almost too late to follow the two
black men, but not quite too late. He was an adept in the tracking of
his fellow-beings, and it was not long before he was quietly following
Mok and Cheditafa, keeping at some distance behind them, but never
allowing them to get out of his sight.

In the course of a moderate walk he saw them enter the Hotel Grenade.
This satisfied the wandering Rackbird. If the negroes went into that
hotel at that time of night, they must live there, and he could suspend
operations until morning.




CHAPTER XLIV

MR. BANKER'S SPECULATION


That night Banker was greatly disturbed by surmises and conjectures
concerning the presence of the two negroes in the French capital. He knew
Cheditafa quite as well as he knew Mok, and it was impossible that he
should be mistaken. It is seldom that any one sees a native African in
Paris, and he was positive that the men he had seen, dressed in expensive
garments, enjoying themselves like gentlemen of leisure, and living at a
grand hotel, were the same negroes he had last seen in rags and shreds,
lodged in a cave in the side of a precipice, toiling and shuddering under
the commands of a set of desperadoes on a desert coast in South America.
There was only one way in which he could explain matters, and that was
that the band had had some great success, and that one or more of its
members had come to Paris, and had brought the two negroes with them as
servants. But of one thing he had no doubts, and that was that he would
follow up the case. He had met with no successes of late, but if any of
his former comrades had, he wanted to meet those dear old friends. In
Paris he was not afraid of anything they might say about his desertion.

Very early in the morning Banker was in front of the Hotel Grenade. He
did not loiter there; he did not wander up and down like a vagrant, or
stand about like a spy. It was part of his business to be able to be
present in various places almost at the same time, and not to attract
notice in any of them. It was not until after ten o'clock that he saw
anything worthy of his observation, and then a carriage drove up to the
front entrance, and on the seat beside the driver sat Cheditafa, erect,
solemn, and respectable. Presently the negro got down and opened the door
of the carriage. In a few moments a lady, a beautiful lady, handsomely
dressed, came out of the hotel and entered the carriage. Then Cheditafa
shut the door and got up beside the driver again. It was a fine thing to
have such a footman as this one, so utterly different from the ordinary
groom or footman, so extremely _distinguГ©_!

As the carriage rolled off, Banker walked after it, but not in such a way
as to attract attention, and then he entered a cab and told the _cocher_
to drive to the Bon MarchГ©. Of course, he did not know where the lady was
going to, but at present she was driving in the direction of that
celebrated mart, and he kept his eye upon her carriage, and if she had
turned out of the Boulevard and away from the Seine, he would have
ordered his driver to turn also and go somewhere else. He did not dare to
tell the man to follow the carriage. He was shaved, and his clothes had
been put in as good order as possible, but he knew that he did not look
like a man respectable enough to give such an order without exciting
suspicion.

But the carriage did go to the Bon MarchГ©, and there also went the cab,
the two vehicles arriving at almost the same time. Banker paid his fare
with great promptness, and was on the pavement in time to see the
handsomely dressed lady descend and enter the establishment. As she went
in, he took one look at the back of her bonnet. It had a little green
feather in it. Then he turned quickly upon Cheditafa, who had shut the
carriage door and was going around behind it in order to get up on the
other side.

"Look here," whispered Banker, seizing the clerical butler by the
shoulder, "who is that lady? Quick, or I'll put a knife in you."

At these words Cheditafa's heart almost stopped beating, and as he
quickly turned he saw that he looked into the face of a man, an awfully
wicked man, who had once helped to grind the soul out of him, in that
dreadful cave by the sea. The poor negro was so frightened that he
scarcely knew whether he was in Paris or Peru.

"Who is she?" whispered again the dreadful Rackbird.

"Come, come!" shouted the coachman from his seat, "we must move on."

"Quick! Who is she?" hissed Banker.

"She?" replied the quaking negro. "She is the captain's wife. She is--"
But he could say no more, for a policeman was ordering the carriage to
move on, for it stopped the way, and the coachman was calling
impatiently. Banker could not afford to meet a policeman. He released his
hold on Cheditafa and retired unnoticed. An instant afterward he entered
the Bon MarchГ©.

Cheditafa climbed up to the side of the driver, but he missed his
foothold several times, and came near falling to the ground. In all Paris
there was no footman on a carriage who looked less upright, less sedate,
and less respectable than this poor, frightened black man.

Through the corridors and passageways of the vast establishment went
Banker. But he did not have to go far. He saw at a counter a little green
feather in the back of a bonnet. Quietly he approached that counter, and
no sooner had the attendant turned aside to get something that had been
asked for than Banker stepped close to the side of the lady, and leaning
forward, said in a very low but polite voice:

"I am so glad to find the captain's wife. I have been looking for her."

He was almost certain, from her appearance, that she was an American, and
so he spoke in English.

Edna turned with a start. She saw beside her a man with his hat off, a
rough-looking man, but a polite one, and a man who looked like a sailor.

"The captain!" she stammered. "Have you--do you bring me anything!
A letter?"

"Yes, madam," said he. "I have a letter and a message for you."

"Give them to me quickly!" said she, her face burning.

"I cannot," he said. "I cannot give them to you here. I have much to say
to you, and much to tell you, and I was ordered to say it in private."

Edna was astounded. Her heart sank. Captain Horn must be in trouble, else
why such secrecy? But she must know everything, and quickly. Where could
she meet the man? He divined her thought.

"The Gardens of the Tuileries," said he. "Go there now, please. I will
meet you, no matter in what part of it you are." And so saying, he
slipped away unnoticed.

When the salesman came to her, Edna did not remember what she had asked
to see, but whatever he brought she did not want, and going out, she had
her carriage called, and ordered her coachman to take her to the Gardens
of the Tuileries. She was so excited that she did not wait for Cheditafa
to get down, but opened the door herself, and stepped in quickly, even
before the porter of the establishment could attend to her.

When she reached the Gardens, and Cheditafa opened the carriage door for
her, she thought he must have a fit of chills and fever. But she had no
time to consider this, and merely told him that she was going to walk in
the Gardens, and the carriage must wait.

It was some time before Edna met the man with whom she had made this
appointment. He had seen her alight, and although he did not lose sight
of her, he kept away from her, and let her walk on until she was entirely
out of sight of the carriage. As soon as Edna perceived Banker, she
walked directly toward him. She had endeavored to calm herself, but he
could see that she was much agitated.

"How in the devil's name," he thought to himself, "did Raminez ever come
to marry such a woman as this? She's fit for a queen. But they say he
used to be a great swell in Spain before he got into trouble, and I
expect he's put on his old airs again, and an American lady will marry
anybody that's a foreign swell. And how neatly she played into my hand!
She let me know right away that she wanted a letter, which means, of
course, that Raminez is not with her."

"Give me the letter, if you please," said Edna.

"Madam," said Banker, with a bow, "I told you I had a letter and a
message. I must deliver the message first."

"Then be quick with it," said she.

"I will," said Banker. "Our captain has had great success lately, you
know, but he is obliged to keep a little in the background for the
present, as you will see by your letter, and as it is a very particular
letter, indeed, he ordered me to bring it to you."

Edna's heart sank. "What has happened?" said she. "Why--"

"Oh, you will find all that in the letter," said Banker. "The captain has
written out everything, full and clear. He told me so himself. But I must
get through with my message. It is not from him. It is from me. As I just
said, he ordered me to bring you this letter, and it was a hard thing to
do, and a risky thing to do. But I undertook the job of giving it to you,
in private, without anybody's knowing you had received it."

"What!" exclaimed Edna. "Nobody to know!"

"Oh, that is all explained," said he, hurriedly. "I can't touch on that.
My affair is this: The captain sent me with the letter, and I have been
to a lot of trouble to get it to you. Now, he is not going to pay me for
all this,--if he thanks me, it will be more than I expect,--and I am
going to be perfectly open and honest with you, and say that as the
captain won't pay me, I expect you to do it; or, putting it in another
way, before I hand you the letter I brought you, I want you to make me a
handsome present."

"You rascal!" exclaimed Edna. "How dare you impose on me in this way?"