The Million Dollar Mystery Part 31

Norton knew very well that if need said must they would not hesitate to execute a melodramatic plan of this character. It was the way of the Slav; they had to make crime abnormal in order to enjoy it. They could very well have knocked him on the head then and there and have done with him. But the time used in conveying him to the railroad might prove his salvation. Nearly four hours had pa.s.sed since the sending of the telegram to Jones.

They bound Florence and left her seated in the chair. As soon as they were gone she rolled to the floor. She was able to right herself to her knees, and after a torturous five minutes reached the fireplace.

She burnt her hands and wrists, but the blaze was the only knife obtainable. She was free.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THEY BOUND FLORENCE AND LEFT HER SEATED IN THE CHAIR]

Jones arrived with half a dozen policemen. Vroon alone escaped.

The butler caught Florence in his arms and nearly crushed the breath out of her. And she was so glad to see him that she kissed him half a dozen times. What if he was her father's butler? He was brave and loyal and kind.

"They tied him to the track," she cried. "Look at my wrists!" The butler did so, and kissed them tenderly. "And I saved him."

Jones stretched out a hand over Florence's shoulder. "When the time comes," he said; "when the right time comes and my master's enemies are confounded. But always the rooks, never the hawks, do we catch. G.o.d bless you, Norton! I don't know what I should have done without you."

"When a chap's in love," began Norton, embarra.s.sedly.

"I know, I know," interrupted Jones. "The second relief train is waiting. Let us hurry back. I shan't feel secure till we are once more in the house."

So, arm in arm, the three of them went down the tracks to the hand-car which had brought the police.

And now for the iron-bound chest at the bottom of the sea.

CHAPTER XII

A dipsy-chanty, if you please; of sailormen in jerseys and tarry caps, of rolling gaits, strong tobacco and diverse profanity; of cutters, and blunt-nosed schooners, and tramps, canvas and steam, some of them honest, some of them shady, and some of them pirates of the first water who did not find it necessary to hoist aloft the skull and bones. The seas are dotted with them. They remind you of the once prosperous merchant, run down at the heel, who slinks along the side streets, ashamed to meet those he knew in the past. You never hear them mentioned in the maritime news, which is the society column of the s.h.i.+ps; you know of their existence only by the bleached bones of them, strewn along the coast.

You who crave adventures on high seas, you purchase a ticket, a steamer chair, and a couple of popular novels, go on board to the blare of a very indifferent bra.s.s band, and believe you are adventuring; when, as a matter of fact, you are about to spend a dull week or a fortnight on a water hotel, where the most exciting thing is the bugle's call to meals or the discovery of a card sharp in the smoking-room. Take a real s.h.i.+p, go as supercargo, to the South Seas; take the side streets of the ocean, and learn what it can do with hurricanes, typhoons, blistering calms, and men's souls. There will be adventure enough then. If you are a weakling, either you are made strong, or you die.

An honest s.h.i.+p, but run down at the heel, rode at anchor in the sound, a fourth-rater of the hooker breed; that is, her princ.i.p.al line of business was hauling barges up and down the coast. When she could not pick up enough barges to make it pay, why she'd go gallivanting down to Cuba for bales of tobacco or even to the Bermudas for the heaven-smelling onion. To-day she was an onion s.h.i.+p; which precludes any idea of adventure. She was about four thousand tons, and her engines were sternward and not amids.h.i.+p. She carried two masts and a half-dozen hoist booms, and the only visible sign of anything new on her was her bowsprit. This was new doubtless because she had poked her nose too far into her last slip.

Her crew was orderly and tractable. There were sh.o.r.e drunks, to be sure, because they were sailors; but they were at work. They moved about briskly, for they were on the point of sailing for the Bahamas--perhaps for more onions. Presently the windla.s.s creaked and shrilled, and the blobby links, much in need of tar paint, red as fish gills, clattered down into the bow. Sometimes they painted the chain as it came over; but paint was costly, and this was done only when the anchor threatened to stay on the bottom.

There was a sailor among this crew, and he went by the name of Steve Blossom; and he was one of his kind. A grimy dime novel protruded rakishly from his hip pocket, and his right cheek was swollen as with the toothache, due, probably, to a generous "chaw" of Seaman's Delight.

He was a real tobacco chewer, for he rarely spat. He was as peaceful as a backwater bay in summer; non-argumentative and pa.s.sive, he stood his watch in fair weather and foul.

No one gave the anchor any more attention after it came to rest. The great city over the way was fairy-like in its haziness and softened lines. It was the poetry of angles, of shafts and spars of stone; and Steve Blossom, having a moment to himself, leaned against the rail and stared regretfully. He had been generously drunk the night before, and it was a pleasant recollection. Chance led his glance to trail down the cut.w.a.ter. His neck stretched from his collar like a turtle's from its sh.e.l.l.

"Well, I'll be hornswoggled!" he murmured, s.h.i.+fting his cud from starboard to port.

Caught on the fluke of the anchor was the strangest looking box he had ever laid eyes on. There were leather and steel bands and diamond-shaped ivory and mother of pearl, and it hung jauntily on the point of the rusty fluke. Anybody would be hornswoggled to glimpse such a droll jest of fate. On the fluke of the old mudhook, by a hair, you might say. In all the wild sea yarns he had ever read or heard there was nothing to match this.

Treasure!

And Steve was destined never to be pa.s.sive again. His first impulse was to call his companions; his second impulse was to say nothing at all, and wait for an opportunity to get the box to his bunk without being detected. Treasure! Diamonds and rubies and pearls and old Spanish gold; and all hanging to the fluke of the anchor.

"Hornswoggled!" in a kind of awesome whisper this time. "An' we a-headin' for th' Bahamas!" For under his feet he could hear the rhythm of engines. "What'll I do? If I leave it, some one else'll see it." He scratched his chin perplexedly; and the cud went back to starboard. "I got it!"

He took off his coat and carefully dropped it down over the mysterious box. It was growing darker and darker all the time, and shortly neither coat nor anchor would be visible without close scrutiny.

Treasure: greed, cupidity, crime. Steve saw only the treasure and not its camp followers. What did they call them?--doubloons and pieces-of-eight?

He ate his supper with his messmates, and he ate heartily as usual. It would have taken something more vital than mere treasure to disturb Steve Blossom's appet.i.te. He was one of those enviable individuals whose imagination and gastric juices work at the same time. And while he ate he planned. In the first place, he would buy that home at Bedford; then he would take over the Gilson House and live like a lord.

If he wanted a drink, all he would have to do would be to turn the spigot or tip a bottle; and more than that, he'd have a bartender to do it. Onions! He swore he would not have an onion within a mile of the Gilson House. "Onions!" Quite unconsciously he spoke the words aloud.

"Huh? Well, if ye don't like onions, find a hooker that packs violets in her hold," was the cheerful advice of the man at Steve's elbow.

"Who's talkin' t' you?" grunted Steve. "Wha' did I say?"

"Onions, ye lubber! Don't we know whut onions is? Ain't we smelt 'em so long that ye could stick yer nose in th' starboard light an' never smell no kerosene? Onions! Pa.s.s th' cawffy."

Steve helped himself first. The man who spoke bunked over him, and they were not on the best of terms. There was no real reason for this frank antagonism; simply, they did not splice any more effectually than cotton rope and hemp splice. Sailors are moody and superst.i.tious; at least they generally are on hookers of the _Captain Manners_ breed.

Steve was superst.i.tious and Jim Dunkers was moody and had no thumb on his left hand. Steve hated the sight of that red nubbin. He was quite certain that it had been a whole thumb once, on the way to gouge out somebody's eye, and had inadvertently connected with somebody's teeth.

Spanish doubloons and pearls and diamonds and rubies! It was mighty hard not to say these words out loud, too; blare them into the sullen faces grouped around the table. He was off watch till midnight; and he was wondering if he could get the box without attracting the attention of the lookout, who had a devilish keen eye for everything that stirred on deck or on water. Well, he would have to risk it; but he would wait till full darkness had fallen over the sea and the lookout would be compelled to keep his eyes off the deck. The boys wanted him to play cards.

"Not for me. Busted. How long d' y' think forty dollars 'll last in New York, anyhow?" And he stalked out of the forecastle and went down into the waist to enjoy his evening pipe, all the while keeping a weather eye forward, at the ratty old pilot house.

It was ten o'clock, land time, when he rammed his cutty into a pocket and resolutely walked forward. If any one watched him they would think he was only looking down the cut.w.a.ter. The thought of money and the pleasures it will buy makes cunning the stupidest of dolts; and Steve was ordinarily a dolt. But to-night his brain was keen enough for all purposes. It was a hazardous job to get the box off the fluke without letting it slip back into the sea. Steve, however, accomplished the feat, climbed back on the rail and sat down, waiting. A quarter of an hour pa.s.sed. No one had seen him. With his coat securely wrapped about his precious find he made for the forecastle. His mates, save those who were doing their watch, were all in their bunks. An oil lamp dimly illuminated the forward part.i.tion. Steve's bunk was almost in darkness. Very deftly he rolled back the bedding and secreted the box under his pillows, and then stretched himself out with the pretense of snoozing till the bell called him to duty.

He was rich; and the moment a man has money he has troubles; there is always some one who wants to take it away from you. His bunk was on the port side, and there was plenty of hiding s.p.a.ce between the iron plates and the wooden part.i.tion. He intended to loosen three or four planks, and then when the time came, slip the box behind them. Some time during the morning the forecastle would be empty, and then would be his time.

But he suffered the agonies of d.a.m.nation during the four-hours' watch.

Supposing some fool should go rummaging about his bunk and discover the box? Suppose ... But he dared not suppose. There was nothing to do but wait. If he created any curiosity on the part of his mates he was lost. He would have to divide with them all, from the captain down to the cook's boy. It was a heart-rending thought. From being the most open and frank man aboard, he became the most cunning. From being a man without enemies, he saw an enemy even in his shadow.

At four o'clock he turned in and slept like a log.

In the morning he found his opportunity. For half an hour the forecastle was empty of all save himself. Feverishly he pried back the boards, found the brace beam, and gently laid the box there. It was a mighty curious-looking box. Once he had stoked up the Chinese coast from the Philippines, and he judged it to be Chinese in origin. He tried to pry open the cover and feast his eyes upon the treasure; but under the leather and ivory and mother of pearl was impervious steel.

It would take an ax or a crowbar to stir that lid. He sighed. He replaced the boards, and became to all appearances his stolid self again.

But all the way down to the Bahamas he was moody, and when he answered any questions it was with words spoken testily and jerkily.

"I know whut's th' matter," said Dunkers. "He's in love."

"Shut your mouth!"

"Didn't I tell yuh?" laughed the tantalizer, dancing toward the companion way. "Steve's in love, 'r he didn't git drunk enough on sh.o.r.e t' satisfy his whale's belly!"

A boot thudded spitefully against the door jamb.

"You fellahs let me alone, 'r I'll bash in a couple o' heads!"

"Oh, yuh will, will yuh?" cried Dunkers from the deck. "If yuh want a little exercise, yuh can begin on me, yuh moonsick swab! Whut's th'

matter with yuh, anyhow? Where'd yuh git this grouch? Whut've we done t' yuh? Huh?"

"You keep out o' my way, that's all. I'm mindin' my watches, an' don't ask no odds of you duffers. What if I have a grouch? Is it any o'

your business? All right. When we step ash.o.r.e at th' Bahamas, Mister Jim Dunkers, I'll tear the ropes out o' your pulley blocks. But till we git there, you t' th' upper bunk an' me t' mine."