Jack Harkaway's Boy Tinker Among The Turks Part 8

"And he has proved himself utterly unworthy?"

"Utterly."

"All of that is known to me," said the notary, craftily. "Now you must pay no heed to this Chivey."

"I will not," returned Herbert Murray, significantly, "though there is little fear of further molestation from him, senor."

Young Murray little dreamt of the cause of the notary's peculiar smile.

"Your sole danger, as I take it, Senor Murray, is from your fellow countryman, Jack Harkaway."

"Yes."

"Then to him you must direct your attention. Where is he?"

"Gone."

"Where to?"

"Don't know."

"I do then," returned the notary, quietly: "and it is to tell you that that I am here. I have all the necessary information; you must follow him."

"Why?"

"To make sure of him," coldly replied the Spaniard.

"How?"

Velasquez spoke not.

But his meaning was just as clear as if he had put it into words.

A vicious dig with his stiletto at the air.

Nothing more.

And so they began to understand each other.

Senor Velasquez, the notary, was playing a double game.

From Herbert Murray he carefully kept the knowledge that Chivey still lived.

And why?

That knowledge would have lessened his hold.

The cunning way in which he let Herbert Murray understand that he knew all, even to the attempt upon Chivey's life at the gravel pits, completed the mastery in which he meant to hold the young rascal.

He arranged everything for young Murray.

He discovered from him the destination of the s.h.i.+p in which Jack Harkaway and his friends had escaped, and he procured him a berth on a vessel sailing in the same direction.

"Once you get within arm's length of this young Harkaway," he said; "you must be firm and let your blow be sure."

"I will," returned his pupil.

"Once Harkaway is removed from your path, you may sleep in peace, for he alone can now punish you for forgery."

"I hope so."

"I know it," said Velasquez.

So well were the notary's plans laid, and so luckily did fortune play into his hands, that forty-eight hours after his interview with Murray, he had that young gentleman safely on board a s.h.i.+p outward bound.

Now Herbert Murray had pa.s.sed but one night after that fearful scene by the gravel pit, but the remembrance of it haunted his pillow from the moment he went to bed to the moment he arose unrefreshed and full of fever.

And yet he was setting out with the intention of securing his future peace and immunity from peril by the commission of a fresh crime.

The s.h.i.+p was setting sail at a little after daybreak, and it had been arranged that Senor Velasquez was to come and see him off.

But much to his surprise, the notary did not put in an appearance.

Eagerly he waited for the s.h.i.+p to start, lest any thing should occur at the eleventh hour, and he should find himself laid by the heels to answer for his crimes.

Chivey was supposed to be hiding.

In reality he was a prisoner in the house of Senor Velasquez, and he knew it.

The notary was an old man, and he suffered from sundry ailments which belong to age--notably to rheumatism.

An acute attack prostrated the old man, and held him down when he was most anxious to be up and doing.

And the night before Herbert Murray was to set sail, he lay groaning and moaning with racking pains.

His cries reached Chivey, who lay in the next room, and he came to the sick man's door to ask if he could be of any a.s.sistance.

He peered warily in.

In spite of his groans and anguish, the old notary was insensible under the influence of an opiate.

Chivey crept in.

On a low table beside the bed was a lamp flickering fearfully, and a gla.s.s containing some medicine.