CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THREE days after Florence’s adventure at the church, that young woman sat on the quarter-deck of theSea Spume, gazing with unseeing eyes over the lapping water which the descending sun had turned into a golden river stretching away to the west. Upon this yellow flood two boats were moving, and on these Miss Lee’s eyes were fixed.
But her thoughts were far away. Not once since Baron Demidroff had told his amazing tale had its substance been out of her ears. Again and again she had gone over the details, wondering if by any chance she could make the fairy tale come true.
In time she almost persuaded herself that she could. She was sure that she understood at last why the Professor had not wanted to bring his daughter to Russia. He had been afraid of this very thing—afraid lest Olga’s relatives should find her and reclaim her. More than ever now, he would want to keep the substitution secret. And no one else knew of it.
Florence’s heart leaped within her as the possibilities danced before her mind’s eye. Let her only dare to go ahead and she would have money and wealth. Why not?
A princess! Sharply she drew her breath at thethought. A princess! She! Florence Lee! She who had faced beggary a few short weeks before! Princess Yves Napraxine! Princess Yves Napraxine! Again and again she wrote the words on the flyleaf of a book that lay in her lap. Princess Yves Napraxine! If it could be! If it could be!
A step on the deck aroused her. Hastily she closed the book, with its tell-tale writing, and looked up to see Wilkins close at hand.
Rapidly he strode to the rail and gazed toward the boats; then he turned abruptly back and sat down beside the girl.
“They’re getting mighty contiguous,” he declared. “I reckon they’ll oscillate on it to-night. Well, it don’t matter; everything’s ready.”
Curiously Miss Lee gazed at him. “What in the world are you talking about?” she demanded.
Wilkins withdrew his eyes from the dancing water and fixed them on the girl. For a moment he looked her in the face; then he deliberately winked.
Miss Lee struck at him. “Don’t get fresh,” she ordered severely. “I don’t allow gentlemen to wink at me except over a cold bottle. Speak out and quit making signs.”
Wilkins chuckled. “Say! You’re all to the good,” he remarked. “I’m ready if you are.”
“Ready for what?”
“To foreclose on that there promissory note of yourn—that one about the gold. I’m ready to start for New York if you are. Fact is, I’m off to-night!”
“To-night!”
“Sure thing! It’s me for the broad Atlantic by the light of the moon this very night. Say, don’t you want to shake this gang and come along?”
The girl paled slightly. “Tell me what you mean right away,” she ordered crisply.
Wilkins pointed over the water. “You see that right-hand boat pronouncin’ around yonder?” he questioned. “Well, near’s my specification goes, theOrkneylies just about under her. Unless they’re too terrible promiscuous, they’ll find her mighty soon, and then there’ll be goings on worse’n a locoed bronco.”
“How do you know?” The girl was leaning over him, every muscle tense with excitement. “How do you know where theOrkneyis, and why will there be trouble when it is found?” she demanded.
“Because—say, I guess you didn’t see a slim, limpy fellow with a black hirsute adornment on his chin up in the village the day we was up there, did you? Well, that fellow was Bill, my brother Bill, the one that wrote the epizootle that brung us here. He wasn’t drowned in theOrkney—Bill wasn’t born to be drowned. Everybody else was, but he got on terra cotta, and he’s been hibernating here ever since, waiting his chance to get away with the gold.”
“The gold!”
“Yes! Bill’s got it. How he done it, I don’t know. But he’s got it. Bill’s a man of his hands, Bill is! He’s got all them nuggets out of the shipand cached ’em ashore. There ain’t a speck of dust left on theOrkney. Bill’s got it all!”
Amazement gripped Florence and held her dumb. The gold whose capture was to be the price of proofs of her princesshood had passed into other hands. What was she to do? There was no time to lose. Should she betray Wilkins to Caruth or to the Baron? How could she betray him to the Baron even if she wanted to? Should she grasp at the money and let the visionary rank go. She did not question whether she should be true to Professor Shishkin. Long before, she had decided that question.
Abruptly she spoke. “Well, what are you going to do?” she demanded.
“Going to run the gold off, of course,” returned the plainsman. “Bill’s got a boat of sorts—a schooner or pergola or something—and he’s got the gold on board by now. I’ve staked him to buy provisions, and we’re off to-night. Bill would have gone before, but he’s been crippled up since the wreck, and couldn’t manage the boat alone. But it’s all skeeky now. The scow’s lying up here a ways, just a-waiting for dark and for you and me to join her. If it coincides with your sentiments, we’ll do the fly away act to-night. Will you come?”
Miss Lee considered. Of course it would be delightful to be a princess, but, after all, there might be a string tied to Demidroff’s offer, while there was something substantial about five million dollars in gold. It might be well to pass up the fairy tale and close with Wilkins. She must consider.
“You can’t cross the Atlantic in a sloop,” she objected.
“Ain’t going to try. We’ll just run over the way to Stockholm to a place Bill knows of, and go home from there by steamer. Oh, we’ve got it all diagnosed out proper. It’s a cinch.”
“But”—Florence was thinking aloud—“how are you goin’ to get away from the yacht?”
“That’s fixed, too. Bill will float down under the cabin windows about ten o’clock, just before the moon gets on the job, and we’ll drop in on him.”
“But when they find we’re gone——”
“Let ’em find. What difference does it make? They may aspirate to get this here gold, but that don’t make it theirs. Bill and me’s got it, and I guess we’ll keep it. Why, say, there ain’t one of ’em’ll dare to baa even if they find us, which they won’t. Oh, it’s a cinch.”
“Perhaps! And yet—say, Mr. Wilkins, you’ve been on the level with me, and I’m going to treat you likewise. Don’t you be too sure you’ve got a cinch! There’s others besides the folks on this yacht that’s after that gold.”
Wilkins did not speak, but he looked the girl in the eye and waited for her to go on.
“The Russian cops are onto their jobs all right. They know what we’re after, and they’re watching us all the time. They’re ready to swoop down on us the minute we get the gold on board. I guess they’ve got a dozen boats lying around here.”
Wilkins looked thoughtful. “Humph!” he said.“You’re all to the good, you are. You ain’t been wasting no time, have you? How’d you find out?”
“The priest! That day at the church. He wanted me to help him.”
“And you strung him along, all right, didn’t you? You would, of course!” He paused, then went on. “Well,” he remarked; “I don’t reckon it makes no difference. They won’t be suspecting a fishing schooner of any allusions, and they won’t be aggravatin’ us none. They’ll be keepin’ their optics trained on the yacht circumspectious. We can slip out easy. Is it a go?”
Florence held out her hand. “It’s a go,” she agreed. “More! I’ll help you to get away. I’ll fix things so that the yacht won’t have any time to bother us. Yes, it’s a go. And now——”
Swiftly Florence opened the book that lay in her lap and ripped out the flyleaf with its princely inscription. Swiftly she tore it into tiny fragments and tossed it to the breeze that sang through the rigging. “There!” she cried, as the bits besprinkled the water. “That’s the end of the Princess Yves Napraxine. It’s a go.”
“The Princess which?”
“Somebody you never heard of. A bird in the bush. A dream of the impossible. A romance from theChambermaid’s Own. Let her go. I’ll be ready when you are.”