A door was opened before him, and he entered Edna's salon. For a moment
he stopped in the doorway. He did not see the woman he had come to meet.
He saw before him a lady handsomely and richly dressed in a Parisian
morning costume--a lady with waving masses of dark hair above a lovely
face, a lady with a beautiful white hand, which was half raised as he
appeared in the doorway.

She stood with her hand half raised. She had never seen the man before
her. He was a tall, imposing gentleman, in a dark suit, over which he
wore a light-colored overcoat. One hand was gloved, and in the other he
held a hat. His slightly curling brown beard and hair were trimmed after
the fashion of the day, and his face, though darkened by the sun, showed
no trace of toil, or storm, or anxious danger. He was a tall,
broad-shouldered gentleman, with an air of courtesy, an air of dignity,
an air of forbearance, which were as utterly unknown to her as everything
else about him, except his eyes--those were the same eyes she had seen on
board the _Castor_ and on the desert sands.

Had it not been for the dark eyes which looked so steadfastly at him,
Captain Horn, would have thought that he had been shown into the wrong
room. But he now knew there was no mistake, and he entered. Edna raised
her hand and advanced to meet him.

He shook hands with her exactly as he had written to her, and she shook
hands with him just as she had telegraphed to him. Much of her natural
color had left her face. As he had never seen this natural color, under
the sun-brown of the Pacific voyage, he did not miss it.

Instantly she began to speak. How glad she was that she had prepared
herself to speak as she would have spoken to any other good friend! So
she expressed her joy at seeing him again, well and successful after
all these months of peril, toil, and anxiety, and they sat down near
each other.

He looked at her steadfastly, and asked her many things about Ralph, Mrs.
Cliff, and the negroes, and what had happened since he left San
Francisco. He listened with a questioning intentness as she spoke. She
spoke rapidly and concisely as she answered his questions and asked him
about himself. She said little about the gold. One might have supposed
that he had arrived at Marseilles with a cargo of coffee. At the same
time, there seemed to be, on Edna's part, a desire to lengthen out her
recital of unimportant matters. She now saw that the captain knew she did
not care to talk of these things. She knew that he was waiting for an
opportunity to turn the conversation into another channel,--waiting with
an earnestness that was growing more and more apparent,--and as she
perceived this, and as she steadily talked to him, she assured herself,
with all the vehemence of which her nature was capable, that she and this
man were two people connected by business interests, and that she was
ready to discuss that business in a business way as soon as he could
speak. But still she did not yet give him the chance to speak.

The captain sat there, with his blue eyes fixed upon her, and, as she
looked at him, she knew him to be the personification of honor and
magnanimity, waiting until he could see that she was ready for him to
speak, ready to listen if she should speak, ready to meet her on any
ground--a gentleman, she thought, above all the gentlemen in the world.
And still she went on talking about Mrs. Cliff and Ralph.

Suddenly the captain rose. Whether or not he interrupted her in the
middle of a sentence, he did not know, nor did she know. He put his hat
upon a table and came toward her. He stood in front of her and looked
down at her. She looked up at him, but he did not immediately speak. She
could not help standing silently and looking up at him when he stood and
looked down upon her in that way. Then he spoke.

"Are you my wife?" said he.

"By all that is good and blessed in heaven or earth, I am," she answered.

Standing there, and looking up into his eyes, there was no other answer
for her to make.

       *       *       *       *       *

Seldom has a poor, worn, tired, agitated woman kept what was to her a
longer or more anxious watch upon a closed door than Mrs. Cliff kept that
day. If even Ralph had appeared, she would have decoyed him into her own
room, and locked him up there, if necessary.

In about an hour after Mrs. Cliff began her watch, a tall man walked
rapidly out of the salon and went down the stairs, and then a woman came
running across the hall and into Mrs. Cliff's room, closing the door
behind her. Mrs. Cliff scarcely recognized this woman. She had Edna's
hair and face, but there was a glow and a glory on her countenance such
as Mrs. Cliff had never seen, or expected to see until, in the hereafter,
she should see it on the face of an angel.

"He has loved me," said Edna, with her arms around her old friend's neck,
"ever since we had been a week on the _Castor_."

Mrs. Cliff shivered and quivered with joy. She could not say anything,
but over and over again she kissed the burning cheeks of her friend.
At last they stood apart, and, when Mrs. Cliff was calm enough to
speak, she said:

"Ever since we were on the _Castor!_ Well, Edna, you must admit that
Captain Horn is uncommonly good at keeping things to himself."

"Yes," said the other, "and he always kept it to himself. He never let it
go away from him. He had intended to speak to me, but he wanted to wait
until I knew him better, and until we were in a position where he
wouldn't seem to be taking advantage of me by speaking. And when you
proposed that marriage by Cheditafa, he was very much troubled and
annoyed. It was something so rough and jarring, and so discordant with
what he had hoped, that at first he could not bear to think of it. But he
afterwards saw the sense of your reasoning, and agreed simply because it
would be to my advantage in case he should lose his life in his
undertaking. And we will be married to-morrow at the embassy."

"To-morrow!" cried Mrs. Cliff. "So soon?"

"Yes," replied Edna. "The captain has to go away, and I am going
with him."

"That is all right," said Mrs. Cliff. "Of course I was a little surprised
at first. But how about the gold? How much was there of it? And what is
he going to do with it?"

"He scarcely mentioned the gold," replied Edna. "We had more precious
things to talk about. When he sees us all together, you and I and Ralph,
he will tell us what he has done, and what he is going to do, and--"

"And we can say what we please?" cried Mrs. Cliff.

"Yes," said Edna,--"to whomever we please."

"Thank the Lord!" exclaimed Mrs. Cliff. "That is almost as good as
being married."

       *       *       *       *       *

On his arrival in Paris the night before, Captain Horn had taken
lodgings at a hotel not far from the Hotel Grenade, and the first thing
he did the next morning was to visit Edna. He had supposed, of course,
that she was at the same hotel in which Mrs. Cliff resided, which
address he had got from Wraxton, in Marseilles, and he had expected to
see the elderly lady first, and to get some idea of how matters stood
before meeting Edna. He was in Paris alone. He had left Shirley and
Burke, with the negroes, in Marseilles. He had wished to do nothing, to
make no arrangements for any one, until he had seen Edna, and had found
out what his future life was to be.

Now, as he walked back to his hotel, that future life lay before him
radiant and resplendent. No avenue in Paris, or in any part of the world,
blazing with the lights of some grand festival, ever shone with such
glowing splendor as the future life of Captain Horn now shone and
sparkled before him, as he walked and walked, on and on, and crossed the
river into the Latin Quarter, before he perceived that his hotel was a
mile or more behind him.

From the moment that the _Arato_ had left the Straits of Magellan, and
Captain Horn had had reason to believe that he had left his dangers
behind him, the prow of his vessel had been set toward the Strait of
Gibraltar, and every thought of his heart toward Edna. Burke and Shirley
both noticed a change in him. After he left the Rackbirds' cove, until he
had sailed into the South Atlantic, his manner had been quiet, alert,
generally anxious, and sometimes stern. But now, day by day, he appeared
to be growing into a different man. He was not nervous, nor apparently
impatient, but it was easy to see that within him there burned a steady
purpose to get on as fast as the wind would blow them northward.

Day by day, as he walked the deck of his little vessel, one might have
thought him undergoing a transformation from the skipper of a schooner
into the master of a great ship, into the captain of a swift Atlantic
liner, into the commander of a man-of-war, into the commodore on board a
line-of-battle ship. It was not an air of pride or assumed superiority
that he wore, it was nothing assumed, it was nothing of which he was not
entirely aware. It was the gradual growth within him, as health grows
into a man recovering from a sickness, of the consciousness of power.
The source of that consciousness lay beneath him, as he trod the deck of
the _Arato_.

This consciousness, involuntary, and impossible to resist, had nothing
definite about it. It had nothing which could wholly satisfy the soul of
this man, who kept his eyes and his thoughts so steadfastly toward the
north. He knew that there were but few things in the world that his power
could not give him, but there was one thing upon which it might have no
influence whatever, and that one thing was far more to him than all other
things in this world.

Sometimes, as he sat smoking beneath the stars, he tried to picture to
himself the person who might be waiting and watching for him in Paris,
and to try to look upon her as she must really be; for, after her life in
San Francisco and Paris, she could not remain the woman she had been at
the caves on the coast of Peru. But, do what he would, he could make no
transformation in the picture which was imprinted on the retina of his
soul. There he saw a woman still young, tall, and too thin, in a suit of
blue flannel faded and worn, with her hair bound tightly around her head
and covered by a straw hat with a faded ribbon. But it was toward this
figure that he was sailing, sailing, sailing, as fast as the winds of
heaven would blow his vessel onward.




CHAPTER XLIX

A GOLDEN AFTERNOON


When Ralph met Captain Horn that afternoon, there rose within him a
sudden, involuntary appreciation of the captain's worthiness to possess a
ship-load of gold and his sister Edna. Before that meeting there had been
doubts in the boy's mind in regard to this worthiness. He believed that
he had thoroughly weighed and judged the character and capacities of the
captain of the _Castor_, and he had said to himself, in his moments of
reflection, that although Captain Horn was a good man, and a brave man,
and an able man in many ways, there were other men in the world who were
better fitted for the glorious double position into which this fortunate
mariner had fallen.

But now, as Ralph sat and gazed upon his sister's lover and heard him
talk, and as he turned from him to Edna's glowing eyes, he acknowledged,
without knowing it, the transforming power of those two great
alchemists,--gold and love,--and from the bottom of his heart he approved
the match.

Upon Mrs. Cliff the first sight of Captain Horn had been a little
startling, and had she not hastened to assure herself that the compact
with Edna was a thing fixed and settled, she might have been possessed
with the fear that perhaps this gentleman might have views for his
future life very different from those upon which she had set her heart.
But even if she had not known of the compact of the morning, all danger
of that fear would have passed in the moment that the captain took her
by the hand.

To find his three companions of the wreck and desert in such high state
and flourishing condition so cheered and uplifted the soul of the captain
that he could talk of nothing else. And now he called for Cheditafa and
Mok--those two good fellows whose faithfulness he should never forget.
But when they entered, bending low, with eyes upturned toward the lofty
presence to which they had been summoned, the captain looked inquiringly
at Edna. As he came in that afternoon, he had seen both the negroes in
the courtyard, and, in the passing thought he had given to them, had
supposed them to be attendants of some foreign potentate from Barbary or
Morocco. Cheditafa and Mok! The ragged, half-clad negroes of the
sea-beach--a parson-butler of sublimated respectability, a liveried
lackey of rainbow and gold! It required minutes to harmonize these
presentments in the mind of Captain Horn.

When the audience of the two Africans--for such it seemed to be--had
lasted long enough, Edna was thinking of dismissing them, when it became
plain to her that there was something which Cheditafa wished to say or
do. She looked at him inquiringly, and he came forward.

For a long time the mind of the good African had been exercised upon the
subject of the great deed he had done just before the captain had sailed
away from the Peruvian coast. In San Francisco and Paris he had asked
many questions quietly, and apparently without purpose, concerning the
marriage ceremonies of America and other civilized countries. He had not
learned enough to enable him, upon an emergency, to personate an orthodox
clergyman, but he had found out this and that--little things, perhaps,
but things which made a great impression upon him--which had convinced
him that in the ceremony he had performed there had been much
remissness--how much, he did not clearly know. But about one thing that
had been wanting he had no doubts.

Advancing toward Edna and the captain, who sat near each other, Cheditafa
took from his pocket a large gold ring, which he had purchased with his
savings. "There was a thing we didn't do," he said, glancing from one to
the other. "It was the ring part--nobody thinked of that. Will captain
take it now, and put it on the lady?"

Edna and the captain looked at each other. For a moment no one spoke.
Then Edna said, "Take it." The captain rose and took the ring from the
hand of Cheditafa, and Edna stood beside him. Then he took her hand, and
reverently placed the ring upon her fourth finger. Fortunately, it
fitted. It had not been without avail that Cheditafa had so often scanned
with a measuring eye the rings upon the hands of his mistress.

A light of pleasure shone in the eyes of the old negro. Now he had done
his full duty--now all things had been made right. As he had seen the
priests stand in the churches of Paris, he now stood for a moment with
his hands outspread. "Very good," he said, "that will do." Then, followed
by Mok, he bowed himself out of the room.

For some moments there was silence in the salon. Nobody thought of
laughing, or even smiling. In the eyes of Mrs. Cliff there were a few
tears. She was the first to speak. "He is a good man," said she, "and he
now believes that he has done everything that ought to be done. But you
will be married to-morrow, all the same, of course."

"Yes," said Edna. "But it will be with this ring."

"Yes," said the captain, "with that ring. You must always wear it."

"And now," said Mrs. Cliff, when they had all reseated themselves,
"you must really tell us your story, captain. You know I have heard
nothing yet."

And so he told his story--much that Edna had heard before, a great deal
she had not heard. About the treasure, almost everything he said was new
to her. Mrs. Cliff was very eager on this point. She wanted every detail.

"How about the ownership of it?" she said. "After all, that is the
great point. What do people here think of your right to use that gold
as your own?"

The captain smiled. "That is not an easy question to answer, but I think
we shall settle it very satisfactorily. Of course, the first thing to do
is to get it safely entered and stored away in the great money centres
over here. A good portion of it, in fact, is to be shipped to
Philadelphia to be coined. Of course, all that business is in the hands
of my bankers. The fact that I originally sailed from California was a
great help to us. To ascertain my legal rights in the case was the main
object of my visit to London. There Wraxton and I put the matter before
three leading lawyers in that line of business, and although their
opinions differed somewhat, and although we have not yet come to a final
conclusion as to what should be done, the matter is pretty well
straightened out as far as we are concerned. Of course, the affair is
greatly simplified by the fact that there is no one on the other side to
be a claimant of the treasure, but we consider it as if there were a
claimant, or two of them, in fact. These can be no other than the present
government of Peru, and that portion of the population of the country
which is native to the soil, and the latter, if our suppositions are
correct, are the only real heirs to the treasure which I discovered. But
what are the laws of Peru in regard to treasure-trove, or what may be the
disposition of the government toward the native population and their
rights, of course we cannot find out now. That will take time. But of one
thing we are certain: I am entitled to a fair remuneration for the
discovery of this treasure, just the same as if I claimed salvage for
having brought a wrecked steamer into port. On this point the lawyers are
all agreed. I have, therefore, made my claim, and shall stand by it with
enough legal force behind me to support me in any emergency.

"But it is not believed that either the Peruvian government, or the
natives acting as a body, if it shall be possible for them to act in that
way, will give us any trouble. We have the matter entirely in our own
hands. They do not know of the existence of this treasure, or that they
have any rights to it, until we inform them of the fact, and without our
assistance it will be almost impossible for them to claim anything or
prove anything. Therefore, it will be good policy and common sense for
them to acknowledge that we are acting honestly, and, more than that,
generously, and to agree to take what we offer them, and that we shall
keep what is considered by the best legal authorities to be our rights.

"As soon as possible, an agent will be sent to Peru to attend to the
matter. But this matter is in the hands of my lawyers, although, of
course, I shall not keep out of the negotiations."

"And how much percentage, captain?" asked Mrs. Cliff. "What part do they
think you ought to keep?"

"We have agreed," said he, "upon twenty per cent. of the whole. After
careful consideration and advice, I made that claim. I shall retain it.
Indeed, it is already secured to me, no matter what may happen to the
rest of the treasure."

"Twenty per cent.!" exclaimed Mrs. Cliff. "And that is all that you get?"

"Yes," said the captain, "it is what I get--and by that is meant what is
to be divided among us all. I make the claim, but I make it for every one
who was on the _Castor_ when she was wrecked, and for the families of
those who are not alive--for every one, in fact, who was concerned in
this matter."

The countenance of Mrs. Cliff had been falling, and now it went down,
down, again. After all the waiting, after all the anxiety, it had come to
this: barely twenty per cent., to be divided among ever so many
people--twenty-five or thirty, for all she knew. Only this, after the
dreams she had had, after the castles she had built! Of course, she had
money now, and she would have some more, and she had a great many useful
and beautiful things which she had bought, and she could go back to
Plainton in very good circumstances. But that was not what she had been
waiting for, and hoping for, and anxiously trembling for, ever since she
had found that the captain had really reached France with the treasure.

"Captain," she said, and her voice was as husky as if she had been
sitting in a draught, "I have had so many ups and so many downs, and have
been turned so often this way and that, I cannot stand this state of
uncertainty any longer. It may seem childish and weak, but I must know
something. Can you give me any idea how much you are to have, or, at
least, how much I shall have, and let me make myself satisfied with
whatever it is? Do you think that I shall be able to go back to Plainton
and take my place as a leading citizen there? I don't mind in the least
asking that before you three. I thought I was justified in making that my
object in life, and I have made it my object. Now, if I have been
mistaken all this time, I would like to know it. Don't find fault with
me. I have waited, and waited, and waited--"

"Well," interrupted the captain, "you need not wait any longer. The sum
that I have retained shall be divided as soon as possible, and I shall
divide it in as just a manner as I can, and I am ready to hear appeals
from any one who is not satisfied. Of course, I shall keep the largest
share of it--that is my right. I found it, and I secured it. And this
lady here," pointing to Edna, "is to have the next largest share in her
own right, because she was the main object which made me work so hard and
brave everything to get that treasure here. And then the rest will share
according to rank, as we say on board ship."

"Oh, dear! Oh, dear!" murmured Mrs. Cliff, "he never comes to any
point. We never know anything clear and distinct. This is not any
answer at all."

"The amount I claim," continued the captain, who did not notice that Mrs.
Cliff was making remarks to herself, "is forty million dollars."

Everybody started, and Mrs. Cliff sprang up as if a torpedo had been
fired beneath her.

"Forty million dollars!" she exclaimed. "I thought you said you would
only have twenty per cent.?"

"That is just what it is," remarked the captain, "as nearly as we can
calculate. Forty million dollars is about one fifth of the value of the
cargo I brought to France in the _Arato_. And as to your share, Mrs.
Cliff, I think, if you feel like it, you will be able to buy the town of
Plainton; and if that doesn't make you a leading citizen in it, I don't
know what else you can do."




CHAPTER L

A CASE OF RECOGNITION


Every one in our party at the Hotel Grenade rose very early the next
morning. That day was to be one of activity and event. Mrs. Cliff, who
had not slept one wink during the night, but who appeared almost
rejuvenated by the ideas which had come to her during her sleeplessness,
now entered a protest against the proposed marriage at the American
legation. She believed that people of the position which Edna and the
captain should now assume ought to be married in a church, with all
proper ceremony and impressiveness, and urged that the wedding be
postponed for a few days, until suitable arrangements could be made.

But Edna would not listen to this. The captain was obliged, by
appointment, to be in London on the morrow, and he could not know how
long he might be detained there, and now, wherever he went, she wished to
go with him. He wanted her to be with him, and she was going. Moreover,
she fancied a wedding at the legation. There were all sorts of
regulations concerning marriage in France, and to these neither she nor
the captain cared to conform, even if they had time enough for the
purpose. At the American legation they would be in point of law upon
American soil, and there they could be married as Americans, by an
American minister.

After that Mrs. Cliff gave up. She was so happy she was ready to agree to
anything, or to believe in anything, and she went to work with heart and
hand to assist Edna in getting ready for the great event.

Mrs. Sylvester, the wife of the secretary, received a note from Edna
which brought her to the hotel as fast as horses were allowed to travel
in the streets of Paris, and arrangements were easily made for the
ceremony to take place at four o'clock that afternoon.

The marriage was to be entirely private. No one was to be present but
Mrs. Cliff, Ralph, and Mrs. Sylvester. Nothing was said to Cheditafa of
the intended ceremony. After what had happened, they all felt that it
would be right to respect the old negro's feelings and sensibilities.
Mrs. Cliff undertook, after a few days had elapsed, to explain the whole
matter to Cheditafa, and to tell him that what he had done had not been
without importance and real utility, but that it had actually united his
master and mistress by a solemn promise before witnesses, which in some
places, and under certain circumstances, would be as good a marriage as
any that could be performed, but that a second ceremony had taken place
in order that the two might be considered man and wife in all places and
under all circumstances.

The captain had hoped to see Shirley and Burke before he left Paris, but
that was now impossible, and, on his way to his hotel, after breakfasting
at the Hotel Grenade, he telegraphed to them to come to him in London.
He had just sent his telegram when he was touched on the arm, and,
turning, saw standing by him two police officers. Their manner was very
civil, but they promptly informed him, the speaker using very fair
English, that he must accompany them to the presence of a police
magistrate.

The captain was astounded. The officers could or would give him no
information in regard to the charge against him, or whether it was a
charge at all. They only said that he must come with them, and that
everything would be explained at the police station. The captain's brow
grew black. What this meant he could not imagine, but he had no time to
waste in imaginations. It would be foolish to demand explanations of the
officers, or to ask to see the warrant for their action. He would not
understand French warrants, and the quicker he went to the magistrate and
found out what this thing meant, the better. He only asked time to send a
telegram to Mr. Wraxton, urging him to attend him instantly at the police
station, and then he went with the officers.

On the way, Captain Horn turned over matters in his mind. He could think
of no cause for this detention, except it might be something which had
turned up in connection with his possession of the treasure, or perhaps
the entrance of the _Arato_, without papers, at the French port. But
anything of this kind Wraxton could settle as soon as he could be made
acquainted with it. The only real trouble was that he was to be married
at four o'clock, and it was now nearly two.

At the police station, Captain Horn met with a fresh annoyance. The
magistrate was occupied with important business and could not attend to
him at present. This made the captain very impatient, and he sent
message after message to the magistrate, but to no avail. And Wraxton did
not come. In fact, it was too soon to expect him.

The magistrate had good reason for delay. He did not wish to have
anything to do with the gentleman who had been taken in custody until his
accuser, Banker by name, had been brought to this station from his place
of confinement, where he was now held under a serious charge.

Ten minutes, twenty minutes, twenty-five minutes, passed, and the
magistrate did not appear. Wraxton did not come. The captain had never
been so fiercely impatient. He did not know to whom to apply in this
serious emergency. He did not wish Edna to know of his trouble until he
found out the nature of it, and if he sent word to the legation, he was
afraid that the news would speedily reach her. Wraxton was his man,
whatever the charge might be. He would be his security for any amount
which might be named, and the business might be settled afterwards, if,
indeed, it were not all a mistake of some sort.

But Wraxton did not appear. Suddenly the captain thought of one man who
might be of service to him in this emergency. There was no time for
delay. Some one must come, and come quickly, who could identify him, and
the only man he could think of was Professor Barré, Ralph's tutor. He had
met that gentleman the evening before. He could vouch for him, and he
could certainly be trusted not to alarm Edna unnecessarily. He believed
the professor could be found at the hotel, and he instantly sent a
messenger to him with a note.

It took a good deal of time to bring the prisoner Banker to the station,
and Professor Barré arrived there before him. The professor was amazed to
find Captain Horn under arrest, and unable to give any reason for this
state of things. But it was not long before the magistrate appeared, and
it so happened that he was acquainted with Barré, who was a well-known
man in Paris, and, after glancing at the captain, he addressed himself to
the professor, speaking in French. The latter immediately inquired the
nature of the charges against Captain Horn, using the same language.

"Ah! you know him?" said the magistrate. "He has been accused of being
the leader of a band of outlaws--a man who has committed murders and
outrages without number, one who should not be suffered to go at large,
one who should be confined until the authorities of Peru, where his
crimes were committed, have been notified."

The professor stared, but could not comprehend what he had heard.

"What is it?" inquired Captain Horn. "Can you not speak English?"

No, this Parisian magistrate could not speak English, but the professor
explained the charge.

"It is the greatest absurdity!" exclaimed the captain. "Ralph told me
that a man, evidently once one of that band of outlaws in Peru, had been
arrested for assaulting Cheditafa, and this charge must be part of his
scheme of vengeance for that arrest. I could instantly prove everything
that is necessary to know about me if my banker, Mr. Wraxton, were here.
I have sent for him, but he has not come. I have not a moment to waste
discussing this matter." The captain gazed anxiously toward the door,
and for a few moments the three men stood in silence.

The situation was a peculiar one. The professor thought of sending to the
Hotel Grenade, but he hesitated. He said to himself: "The lady's
testimony would be of no avail. If he is the man the bandit says he is,
of course she does not know it. His conduct has been very strange, and
for a long time she certainly knew very little about him. I don't see how
even his banker could become surety for him if he were here, and he
doesn't seem inclined to come. Anybody may have a bank-account."

The professor stood looking on the ground. The captain looked at him,
and, by that power to read the thoughts of others which an important
emergency often gives to a man, he read, or believed he did, the thoughts
of Barré. He did not blame the man for his doubts. Any one might have
such doubts. A stranger coming to France with a cargo of gold must expect
suspicion, and here was more--a definite charge.

At this moment there came a message from the banking house: Mr. Wraxton
had gone to Brussels that morning. Fuguet did not live in Paris, and the
captain had never seen him. There were clerks whom he had met in
Marseilles, but, of course, they could only say that he was the man known
as Captain Horn.

The captain ground his teeth, and then, suddenly turning, he interrupted
the conversation between the magistrate and Barré. He addressed the
latter and asked, "Will you tell me what this officer has been saying
about me?"

"He says," answered Barré, "that he believes you know nobody in Paris
except the party at the Hotel Grenade, and that, of course, you may have
deceived them in regard to your identity--that they have been here a long
time, and you have been absent, and you have not been referred to by
them, which seems strange."

"Has he not found out that Wraxton knows me?"

"He says," answered Barré, "that you have not visited that banking house
since you came to Paris, and that seems strange also. Every traveller
goes to his banker as soon as he arrives."

"I did not need to go there," said the captain. "I was occupied with
other matters. I had just met my wife after a long absence."

"I don't wonder," said the professor, bowing, "that your time was
occupied. It is very unfortunate that your banker cannot come to
you or send."

The captain did not answer. This professor doubted him, and why should he
not? As the captain considered the case, it grew more and more serious.
That his marriage should be delayed on account of such a preposterous and
outrageous charge against him was bad enough. It would be a terrible blow
to Edna. For, although he knew that she would believe in him, she could
not deny, if she were questioned, that in this age of mail and telegraph
facilities she had not heard from him for nearly a year, and it would be
hard for her to prove that he had not deceived her. But the most
unfortunate thing of all was the meeting with the London lawyers the next
day. These men were engaged in settling a very important question
regarding the ownership of the treasure he had brought to France, and
his claims upon it, and if they should hear that he had been charged with
being the captain of a band of murderers and robbers, they might well
have their suspicions of the truth of his story of the treasure. In fact,
everything might be lost, and the affair might end by his being sent a
prisoner to Peru, to have the case investigated there. What might happen
then was too terrible to think of. He turned abruptly to the professor.

"I see that you don't believe in me," he said, "but I see that you are a
man, and I believe in you. You are acquainted with this magistrate. Use
your influence with him to have this matter settled quickly. Do as much
as that for me."

"What is it that you ask me to do?" said the other.

"It is this," replied the captain. "I have never seen this man who says
he was a member of the Rackbirds' band. In fact, I never saw any of those
wretches except dead ones. He has never met me. He knows nothing about
me. His charge is simply a piece of revenge. The only connection he can
make between me and the Rackbirds is that he knew two negroes were once
the servants of his band, and that they are now the servants of my wife.
Having never seen me, he cannot know me. Please ask the magistrate to
send for some other men in plain clothes to come into this room, and then
let the prisoner be brought here, and asked to point out the man he
charges with the crime of being the captain of the Rackbirds."

The professor's face brightened, and without answer he turned to the
magistrate, and laid this proposition before him. The officer shook his
head. This would be a very irregular method of procedure. There were
formalities which should not be set aside. The deposition of Banker
should be taken before witnesses. But the professor was interested in
Captain Horn's proposed plan. In an emergency of the sort, when time was
so valuable, he thought it should be tried before anything else was done.
He talked very earnestly to the magistrate, who at last yielded.

In a few minutes three respectable men were brought in from outside, and
then a policeman was sent for Banker.

When that individual entered the waiting-room, his eyes ran rapidly over
the company assembled there. After the first glance, he believed that he
had never seen one of them before. But he said nothing; he waited to hear
what would be said to him. This was said quickly. Banker spoke French,
and the magistrate addressed him directly.

"In this room," he said, "stands the man you have accused as a robber and
a murderer, as the captain of the band to which you admit you once
belonged. Point him out immediately."

Banker's heart was not in the habit of sinking, but it went down a little
now. Could it be possible that any one there had ever led him to deeds of
violence and blood? He looked again at each man in the room, very
carefully this time. Of course, that rascal Raminez would not come to
Paris without disguising himself, and no disguise could be so effectual
as the garb of a gentleman. But if Raminez were there, he should not
escape him by any such tricks. Banker half shut his eyes, and again went
over every countenance. Suddenly he smiled.

"My captain," he said presently, "is not dressed exactly as he was when
I last saw him. He is in good clothes now, and that made it a little hard
for me to recognize him at first. But there is no mistaking his nose and
his eyebrows. I know him as well as if we had been drinking together last
night. There he stands!" And, with his right arm stretched out, he
pointed directly to Professor Barré.

At these words there was a general start, and the face of the magistrate
grew scarlet with anger. As for the professor himself, he knit his brows,
and looked at Banker in amazement.

"You scoundrel! You liar! You beast!" cried the officer. "To accuse this
well-known and honorable gentleman, and say that he is a leader of a band
of robbers! You are an impostor, a villain, and if you had been
confronted with this other gentleman alone, you would have sworn that he
was a bandit chief!"

Banker made no answer, but still kept his eyes fixed upon the professor.
Now Captain Horn spoke: "That fellow had to say something, and he made a
very wild guess of it," he said to Barré. "I think the matter may now be
considered settled. Will you suggest as much to the magistrate? Truly, I
have not a moment to spare."

Banker listened attentively to these words, and his eyes sparkled.

"You needn't try any of your tricks on me, you scoundrel Raminez," he
said, shaking his fist at the professor. "I know you. I know you better
than I did when I first spoke. If you wanted to escape me, you ought to
have shaved off your eyebrows when you trimmed your hair and your
beard. But I will be after you yet. The tales you have told here won't
help you."

"Take him away!" shouted the magistrate. "He is a fiend!"

Banker was hurried from the room by two policemen.

To the profuse apologies of the magistrate Captain Horn had no time to
listen; he accepted what he heard of them as a matter of course, and only
remarked that, as he was not the man against whom the charges had been
brought, he must hurry away to attend to a most important appointment.
The professor went with him into the street.

"Sir," said the captain, addressing Barré, "you have been of the most
important service to me, and I heartily acknowledge the obligation. Had
it not been that you were good enough to exert your influence with the
magistrate, that rascal would have sworn through thick and thin that I
had been his captain."

Then, looking at his watch, he said, "It is twenty-five minutes to four.
I shall take a cab and go directly to the legation. I was on my way to my
hotel, but there is no time for that now," and, after shaking hands with
the professor, he hailed a cab.

Captain Horn reached the legation but a little while after the party from
the Hotel Grenade had arrived, and in due time he stood up beside Edna in
one of the parlors of the mansion, and he and she were united in marriage
by the American minister. The services were very simple, but the
congratulations of the little company assembled could not have been more
earnest and heartfelt.

"Now," said Mrs. Cliff, in the ear of Edna, "if we knew that that gold
was all to be sunk in the ocean to-morrow, we still ought to be the
happiest people on earth."

She was a true woman, Mrs. Cliff, and at that moment she meant
what she said.

It had been arranged that the whole party should return to the Hotel
Grenade, and from there the newly married couple should start for the
train which would take them to Calais; and, as he left the legation
promptly, the captain had time to send to his own hotel for his effects.
The direct transition from the police station to the bridal altar had
interfered with his ante-hymeneal preparations, but the captain was
accustomed to interference with preparations, and had long learned to
dispense with them when occasion required.

"I don't believe," said the minister's wife to her husband, when
the bridal party had left, "that you ever before married such a
handsome couple."

"The fact is," said he, "that I never before saw standing together such a
fine specimen of a man and such a beautiful, glowing, radiant woman."

"I don't see why you need say that," said she, quickly. "You and I stood
up together."

"Yes," he replied, with a smile, "but I wasn't a spectator."




CHAPTER LI

BANKER DOES SOME IMPORTANT BUSINESS


When Banker went back to the prison cell, he was still firmly convinced
that he had been overreached by his former captain, Raminez; and,
although he knew it not, there were good reasons for his convictions.
Often had he noticed, in the Rackbirds' camp, a peculiar form of the
eyebrows which surmounted the slender, slightly aquiline nose of his
chief. Whenever Raminez was anxious, or beginning to be angered, his
brow would slightly knit, and the ends of his eyebrows would approach
each other, curling upward and outward as they did so. This was an
action of the eyebrows which was peculiar to the Darcias of Granada,
from which family the professor's father had taken a wife, and had
brought her to Paris. A sister of this wife had afterwards married a
Spanish gentleman named Blanquotè, whose second son, having fallen into
disgrace in Spain, had gone to America, where he changed his name to
Raminez, and performed a number of discreditable deeds, among which was
the deception of several of his discreditable comrades in regard to his
family. They could not help knowing that he came from Spain, and he made
them all believe that his real name was Raminez. There had been three
of them, besides Banker, who had made it the object of their lives to
wait for the opportunity to obtain blackmail from his family, by
threatened declarations of his deeds.

This most eminent scoundrel, whose bones now lay at the bottom of the
Pacific Ocean, had inherited from his grandfather that same trick of the
eyebrows above his thin and slightly aquiline nose which Banker had
observed upon the countenance of the professor in the police station, and
who had inherited it from the same Spanish gentleman.

The next day Banker received a visitor. It was Professor Barré. As this
gentleman entered the cell, followed by two guards, who remained near the
door, Banker looked up in amazement. He had expected a message, but had
not dreamed that he should see the man himself.

"Captain," he exclaimed, as he sprang to his feet, "this is truly good
of you. I see you are the same old trump as ever, and do not bear
malice." He spoke in Spanish, for such had been the language in common
use in camp.

The professor paid no attention to these words. "I came here," he said,
"to demand of you why you made that absurd and malicious charge against
me the other day. Such charges are not passed over in France, but I will
give you a chance to explain yourself."

Banker looked at him admiringly. "He plays the part well," he said to
himself. "He is a great gun. There is no use of my charging against him.
I will not try it, but I shall let him see where I stand."

"Captain," said he, "I have nothing to explain, except that I was
stirred up a good deal and lost my temper. I oughtn't to have made that
charge against you. Of course, it could not be of any good to me, and I
am perfectly ready to meet you on level ground. I will take back
everything I have already said, and, if necessary, I will prove that I
made a mistake and never saw you before, and I only ask in return that
you get me out of this and give me enough to make me comfortable. That
won't take much, you know, and you seem to be in first-class condition
these days. There! I have put it to you fair and square, and saved you
the trouble of making me any offers. You stand by me, and I'll stand by
you. I am ready to swear until I am black in the face that you never were
in Peru, and that I never saw you until the other day, when I made that
mistake about you on account of the queer fashion of your eyebrows, which
looked just like those of a man who really had been my captain, and that
I now see you are two entirely different men. I will make a good tale of
it, captain, and I will stick to it--you can rely on that. By all the
saints, I hope those two fellows at the door don't understand Spanish!"

The professor had made himself sure that the guards who accompanied him
spoke nothing but French. Without referring to Banker's proposed bargain,
he said to him, "Was the captain of the bandits under whom you served a
Spaniard?"

"Yes, you were a Spaniard," said Banker.

"From what part of Spain did he come?"

"You let out several times that you once lived in Granada."

"What was that captain's real name?" asked the professor.

"Your name was Raminez--unless, indeed," and here his face clouded a
little, "unless, indeed, you tricked us. But I have pumped you well on
that point, and, drunk or sober, it was always Raminez."

"Raminez, then, a Spaniard of my appearance," said the professor, "was
your captain when you were in a band called the Rackbirds, which had its
rendezvous on the coast of Peru?"

"Yes, you were all that," said Banker.

"Very well, then," said Barré. "I have nothing more to say to you at
present," and he turned and left the cell. The guards followed, and the
door was closed.

Banker remained dumb with amazement. When he had regained his power of
thought and speech, he fell into a state of savage fury, which could be
equalled by nothing living, except, perhaps, by a trapped wildcat, and
among his objurgations, as he strode up and down his cell, the most
prominent referred to the new and incomprehensible trick which this
prince of human devils had just played upon him. That he had been talking
to his old captain he did not doubt for a moment, and that that captain
had again got the better of him he doubted no less.

It may be stated here that, the evening before, the professor had had a
long talk with Ralph regarding the Rackbirds and their camp. Professor
Barré had heard something of the matter before, but many of the details
were new to him.

When Ralph left him, the professor gave himself up to reflections upon
what he had heard, and he gradually came to believe that there might
be some reason for his identification as the bandit captain by the
man Banker.

For five or six years there had been inquiries on foot concerning the
second son of Señor Blanquotè of Granada, whose elder brother had died
without heirs, and who, if now living, would inherit Blanquotè's estates.
It was known that this man had led a wild and disgraceful career, and it
was also ascertained that he had gone to America, and had been known on
the Isthmus of Panama and elsewhere by the name of Raminez. Furthermore,
Professor Barré had been frequently told by his mother that when he was a
boy she had noticed, while on a visit to Spain, that he and this cousin
very much resembled each other.

It is not necessary to follow out the legal steps and inquiries, based
upon the information which he had had from Ralph and from Banker, which
were now made by the professor. It is sufficient to state that he was
ultimately able to prove that the Rackbird chief known as Raminez was, in
reality, Tomaso Blanquotè, that he had perished on the coast of Peru, and
that he, the professor, was legal heir to the Blanquotè estates.

Barré had not been able to lead his pupil to as high a place in the
temple of knowledge as he had hoped, but, through his acquaintance with
that pupil, he himself had become possessed of a castle in Spain.




CHAPTER LII

THE CAPTAIN TAKES HIS STAND


It was now July, and the captain and Edna had returned to Paris. The
world had been very beautiful during their travels in England, and
although the weather was beginning to be warm, the world was very
beautiful in Paris. In fact, to these two it would have been beautiful
almost anywhere. Even the desolate and arid coast of Peru would have been
to them as though it were green with herbage and bright with flowers.

The captain's affairs were not yet definitely arranged, for the final
settlement would depend upon negotiations which would require time, but
there was never in the world a man more thoroughly satisfied than he. And
whatever happened, he had enough; and he had Edna. His lawyers had made a
thorough investigation into the matter of his rights to the treasure he
had discovered and brought to Europe, and they had come to a conclusion
which satisfied them. This decision was based upon equity and upon the
laws and usages regarding treasure-trove.

The old Roman law upon the subject, still adhered to by some of the Latin
countries of Europe, gave half of a discovered treasure to the finder,
and half to the crown or state, and it was considered that a good legal
stand could be taken in the present instance upon the application of this
ancient law to a country now governed by the descendants of Spaniards.

Whether or not the present government of Peru, if the matter should be
submitted to it, would take this view of the case, was a subject of
conjecture, of course, but the captain's counsel strongly advised him to
take position upon the ground that he was entitled to half the treasure.
Under present circumstances, when Captain Horn was so well prepared to
maintain his rights, it was thought that the Peruvian authorities might
easily be made to see the advisability of accepting a great advantage
freely offered, instead of endeavoring to obtain a greater advantage, in
regard to which it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to legally
prove anything or to claim anything.

Therefore, it was advised that a commission should be sent to Lima to
open negotiations upon the subject, with instructions to make no
admissions in regard to the amount of the treasure, its present places of
deposit, or other particulars, until the Peruvian government should
consent to a satisfactory arrangement.