"All right, I'll do it," growled Harry Marvin, with the air of a martyr going to the stake. "I'll do it for your sake, Polly."
"Well, you'd better begin to get ready," said Pauline blithely.
"I'll climb into a frock coat and endure an hour or two of this afternoon tea chatter," promised Harry, "but first you must talk sense with me for a few minutes."
"Oh, Harry," spoke Pauline, softly, "I know what 'talking sense' means. You want to argue about my year of adventure. Now, lets not argue. Let's just be happy. You know I love you and I know you love me, and that ought to be enough. This year will be gone before you know it. I'm going to begin it right away just to please you. The sooner it starts the sooner it will be over."
"Begin it?" said Harry. "Why, a month of it is gone now. But it's all nonsense. Polly, if you love me you are going to give up this crazy idea."
A maid, bringing the card of Miss Lucille Hamlin, interrupted Harry. She was the first of the afternoon tea party. Polly hurried Harry off to dress, and, of course, he had no further chance to "talk sense" until the door had closed on the last guest. Then he pounced upon her. But Pauline, sweetly stubborn, cheerfully unyielding, insisted on carrying out her father's promise to the letter.
Raymond Owen, the secretary of the late Mr. Marvin, had thought it important to overhear this argument, and finally to walk into the library where the debate was going on. If the adventures were to start he had an idea for a beginning. The words of Hicks, the blackmailer, had been in his mind for some thirty days and were beginning to bear fruit. He had soon reached the point of hoping, almost praying, something would happen to Pauline that he might be left in control of her, estate. During the last few days Owen had progressed, from merely hoping to readiness to help his wish to come true.
Harry instantly appealed to the secretary to dissuade Pauline. There was no doubt that Owen had some influence over the girl. In years gone by, before Owen had taken to the drug, Pauline had sought him out in many a time of perplexity and learned to rely on his tactful, well-considered advice.
To the surprise of the young master of the house, Owen made no attempt to dissuade. Very unobtrusively he pointed out that for many years he had been accustomed to carry out the wishes of Harry's father, and that he was bound to fulfill his last wish in the same way.
"Raymond, you're a dear," laughed Pauline; "let's think of something thrilling to do right off. Have you any idea?"
"No," lied Owen, "I hadn't given the matter any thought. We might look at a newspaper and see what's happening."
Owen had a paper with him and the three examined it together.
Owen pretended to discover that an aviation meet was about to be held. His idea, for which Harry promptly hated him, was to induce some aviator to take Pauline as a passenger. Many of the races called for carrying a passenger. Harry made a few objections, but the speed with which they were overruled showed that he had no standing in this court. So Harry subsided, but he thought very hard.
Several things were becoming evident to Harry.
One was that this year to see life and have adventures was actually going to take place and no opposition on his part would stop it. It was also clear that if he hoped to control Pauline's adventures in any way it would be by the use of his wits, matching them against Pauline and the secretary.
When Pauline and Owen decided upon the aeroplane ride, Harry contented himself with remarking that he would have to see about it. Both chuckled when he said it, Pauline outwardly and Owen inwardly.
Then they had dinner under the round glassy eye of Aunt Cornelia. Aunt Cornelia was an elderly maiden relative of Harry, who had arrived with others for the funeral and made the brilliant discovery that since Mr. Marvin's death the "social situation," as she termed it, at the Marvin house had become impossible.
It seemed, according to Aunt Cornelia, that a young man and a young woman of impressionable age living in the same house unchaperoned constituted an "impossible social situation," Either Pauline or Harry must move out or someone must be installed as chaperon. Of course, the chaperon was the least of the three evils and Aunt Cornelia, being the discoverer of the job, was elected to fill it.
Harry ordered a bottle of wine with his dinner. Though he actually drank very little, this unusual event created no little consternation.
"Harry, I didn't know you drank?" said Pauline.
"I am just beginning. You see, now that I must take over father's affairs and mix with men of the world I ought to get a little experience in things. See life and know what's what."
After dinner Harry casually asked if Pauline thought her adventures would lead her to Paris. Pauline thought it likely, whereat Harry remarked that he might see her over there.
"I haven't been to Paris since I was a kid, and I really ought to see it, don't you think?"
"Yes," agreed Pauline, without enthusiasm, "but wait until we are married and we'll do Paris together."
"No, Polly, that won't do. I'm sorry, but as you say, you can't see life after you're married and settled down, so I'll have to do Paris alone."
"Harry, are you sure you love me?" Pauline whispered.
"Polly, I know it, and everybody else knows it except you. Get Owen, he's a notary public, and I'll take an oath before him that you have been the only girl in all the world, are now and ever will be, world without end, amen."
"And I love you, Harry," said Pauline, lowering her eyes until he saw only the silky lashes.
"Why, Polly, that's the first time you ever volunteered that information."
"Yes, Harry, I love you too much to let you go to Paris."
"Paris can't hurt me unless I let it hurt me."
"Harry, you won't be quite the same sort of boy when you come back fromParis. Will you promise not to go until we are married?"
"Will you promise not to go on this trip of adventure?"
"Why should I?" demanded Pauline.
"Because you won't ever be quite the same sort of girl when you come back."
After breakfast the next morning when the big touring car rolled up to the front door to got Pauline and Owen, Harry was hurt that he had not been consulted. Pauline's belated invitation to go with them to the aviation field in the automobile was declined. Away went the big car to the fine stretch of roads, where it made short work of the distance to the aviation grounds.
Owen made a complete canvass of the "hangars" and soon accounted for every machine entered in the race for the next day. From all but one of the aviators he obtained a flat refusal. Not for money or any other consideration would they take a strange woman as a passenger. The only exception was a Frenchman, whose hesitation in declining led Owen to further argument. At the last moment Pauline, impatient at the suspense, entered the Frenchman's "hangar" and added her blandishments to Owen's financial inducements. The gallant foreigner succumbed and a bargain was struck. He exhibited his tame bird of steel and wood and cloth with the utter pride of a mother showing off her only child.
The aviator's fingers touched one of the wires and the easy smile left his face. He turned to his mechanics and sharp words followed. A moment later one of his assistants was at work tightening the wire. Owen's eyes scarcely left the wire, and when the opportunity arose he questioned the mechanic as, to what would happen if that particular steel strand should fail during flight. The foreigner explained frankly that the aeroplane would capsize and plunge to the earth. But he assured Owen that no such thing would happen, as he had just tightened the wire in question and would make another inspection after the practice flight that afternoon.
All the way home Owen's thoughts were of that wire and what it would mean to him. In the meanwhile Harry, after watching the car depart toward Hempstead, concluded to follow. He went to the picturesque private garage behind the Marvin mansion and soon was, following in the tracks of the bigger car.
Arrived on the field, he recognized Pauline's car and awaited patiently until he saw it drive away. Then he interviewed the aviator and learned of the proposed trip on the morrow. Harry's French was nothing to boast of, nor was the Frenchman's English. But they managed to have a long and in the end a heated argument. The birdman said he had given his word to a beautiful lady, and that settled it. Besides, there was no danger in his wonderful machine. Had he not flown upside down and done all the things the great Pegoud himself had done?
"As you Americans say—let's see, what is your idiom?"
One of his mechanics prompted him:
"Ah, yes," he said, with a smile. "I believe the proper expression is,'I should worry.'"
Harry threw up his hands and went home. As he buzzed his horn outside the garage the door was opened by the Marvin chauffeur with a telegram in his hand. The chauffeur's wife was sick and he wanted a couple of days' leave of absence. Harry granted it instantly. That evening he made no mention of either the chauffeur's absence or his trip to the field. Pauline thought she was teasing Harry by saying nothing of her plans. She was sure he was eaten up with curiosity to know the result of her visit and admired his ability, as she thought, to conceal it.
Owen spent a nervous evening. He walked out soon after dinner and from a drug-store telephone booth called up a friend in the insurance business. To the secretary's surprise and disappointment he learned that the percentage of accidents to aviators had become comparatively small. Passengers were particularly fortunate. The friend even agreed to obtain accident insurance for any one at a reasonable premium.
If aeroplanes had become reasonably safe the chance of Pauline's being killed during the flight on the following day was insignificant. He must give up all hope of wealth from the permanent control of her estate. As the evening wore on Owen began to feel how he had unconsciously relied on this hope. He doubled his evening dose of morphine, but it neither soothed his disappointment nor brought him sleep.
Hour after hour, during the night, his sleepless eyes seemed to see that loose wire which the mechanic had explained to be so vitally important. He could see in imagination the machine flying off into the clouds with Pauline in it. He could see it suddenly waver, dip and plunge to the earth. In his mind's eye he saw himself rushing to, the wreck, lifting out the girl's crushed form, wildly calling for a doctor, and exulting all the time that she was beyond human aid.
About two o'clock Owen fell into a doze, and in that doze came one of his vivid opium dreams. He beheld Hicks enter his bedroom. It was not Hicks, the blackmailer, but Hicks, the counselor, who had told Owen how he might become rich. Hicks was speaking to him in a sort of noiseless voice, very different from his usual tones. He spoke in a sort of shells or husks of words. The consonants were there, but the vowels were lacking. Yet he heard as plainly as if the red-faced man had shouted. Hicks advised him to be a man, to show courage for once, to risk something, and then reap the reward forever afterward. "Take your motorcycle, ride to the aviation field before daylight, file that wire half through, and fate will take care of the rest."
But Owen lacked the nerve. He feared that he would be seen sneaking onto the field at night or at daybreak. Hicks replied that the field was deserted at this hour. Owen then insisted that the aeroplane would be guarded, and even if it were not locked in its hangar the first rasp of a file on the wire would call the attention of some one on guard. No, it was too much, Owen could not do it. Instead, he made a counter suggestion that Hicks should undertake the task, since he was so certain of its success. For his part the secretary agreed to divide all that the estate might be made to yield him.
Owen, like everybody else, had seen many strange things in dreams, but never had he known of any character in a dream admitting or even suggesting that he was a dream. Yet this was just what Hicks did.
"I would, Owen. I would do it in a minute if I were talking to you. But this isn't me at all. I'm only a dream, in, reality I'm sound asleep in a hotel on upper Broadway, where I am dreaming that I am talking to you. Tomorrow morning I'll remember enough of this dream to make me go down to the aviation field with a sort of premonition that Pauline is going to be killed in an aeroplane."
"How did you know about that wire and that she is going to fly tomorrow," asked Owen.
"I don't know that," said the phantom Hicks frankly in his empty voice. "There is a third party in this and I don't know who he is or much about him, except that he is not a living being. He seems to be somebody from the past, a priest of some old religion I ought to have studied about when I was at school. I don't know what his motive is, but he is with us. He wants her killed for some reason. He brought this dream of me to you so I could explain.
"You needn't worry about the man on guard over the aeroplanes. That man won't wake up, no matter how much noise you make."
"How do you know?" Owen asked.
"He knows," replied Hicks, "because he has transferred the effects of your morphine from your astral body to his. That's how he knows. You ought to know, too, because you have taken almost enough of the drug to kill you tonight, and yet this is the first time you have even closed your eyes. You'd better let him help us and file that wire as he advises. I'm going now, you will wake up in a moment. This priest man told me after I had given you the message to drop this out of my hand and the dream would end. So here goes. Goodbye."
Owen saw Hicks hold his hand over a table and drop a small black shiny object upon it. As it dropped Hicks vanished and Owen awoke. He heard a sharp snap and saw something black and shiny on the table. For a moment the secretary sat quietly in his chair staring at the table and making sure that he was no longer dreaming. Then he examined the black object. It was the scarab which old Mr. Marvin had removed from the folds of the mummy. An image of the beetle which Egypt held sacred, carved in black stone. Owen had not noticed the scarab before his short nap and he could not account for its presence in his room anyway.
A little later he donned his motor-cycling suit, tip-toed downstairs, noiselessly went out by a back door and was soon trundling his big two-cylinder motorcycle from the garage. He was careful to push it out of the Marvin premises onto the highway before lighting his lamp and starting.
Arriving at the field just at dawn Owen found it as deserted as the spectral Hicks had promised. From the tool kit of his motor-cycle he took two files of different shapes and a pair of pliers and walked briskly and fearlessly over the uneven ground to the hangars. All were closed except one, and that one contained the French machine in which Pauline was to ascend. The secretary knew that this hangar would be open. He knew in advance that he would find a mechanic on guard and sound asleep.
Whether real or unreal, awake or asleep, the business of the moment was the filing of that wire. Owen recognized it readily and found it not to be a single wire, as he supposed, but a slender cable composed of many strands. These strands resisted his file and even the clipper attached to his pliers. After what seemed an hour's work he had weakened or broken enough of the metal threads so that the cable stretched perceptibly at that point to do more might cause the cable to break at once and betray what had been done.
Owen hurriedly, returned to his machine had dashed back through the beautiful morning air to the Marvin home. Servants were stirring in their rooms and the gardener was engaged in shaking some sort of powder from a can onto a bare spot on the front lawn. He glanced up at Owen without surprise, for these early rides were known to be an old habit of the secretary.
Owen took the machine to the garage, satisfied that there was nothing guilty in his appearance or the gardener would have noted it. Stepping out of the garage he met Harry and could not help starting perceptibly. Harry looked him in the eye, and there was nothing for Owen to do but stare steadily back.
"You are up very early, Owen," said Harry, looking at the dust on the motor.
"Yes, I've been for a long ride. I think the morning air does me good."
"You don't look well, Owen. Why don't you go to bed today. I'll takePolly to the meet."
"No, thanks. I wouldn't miss seeing Miss Pauline fly," said Owen firmly.
Harry Marvin entered the little private garage back of the Marvin mansion, locked the door and drew the shades of the small windows. There were only two automobiles in the garage. One was the big six cylinder touring car in which Pauline and Owen had made their trip the day before to the aviation field. The other was the two-seated runabout that Harry had driven over the same ground just behind them.
Having made sure that nobody was about, Harry lifted up the hood of the touring car and without the slightest provocation attacked it with a wrench. He removed the carburetor, took it to pieces, lifted out the hollow metal float and deliberately made two punctures in it. Then he tossed the dismembered parts upon a work bench and was about to operate on the runabout when he heard voices outside.
He was barely in time to unlock the door and be found busily working on the car when Pauline entered. She had just learned of the chauffeur's absence. Harry volunteered the additional bad news that the big car was out of order. Like every disappointed woman, she insisted on knowing exactly what was wrong. Harry told her, with many long technical details, and, not knowing at all what he was talking about, she had to be satisfied.
Could he fix it in time to get her to the aviation field before the race?
Well, that depended partly on whether she would go away and not bother him until breakfast.
Pauline could, and she certainly would refrain from bothering him. Never before had Harry found her a bother, nor, for that matter, had any other man in her recollection. Out she went, with more color than usual in her pink cheeks and the light of battle in her eyes.
"By George, I've got to play my cards carefully," thought Harry, as he contemplated the runabout. It was evident that he had designs on the health of the two-seater also. But he felt the necessity of subtlety in this case. He could not assassinate it boldly by tearing out a vital organ as he had done to the bigger car. This runabout must die a slow, lingering death. How was he to do it? His first idea was to weaken the tires and invite "blowouts" on the road. But this could not be done with certainty, and some kind friend might supply him with new tires.
A more promising idea was to drain the engine of its oil, knowing that sooner or later the pistons would run dry and stick. Such a proceeding would ruin the engine, and Harry was too good a mechanic to spoil a first rate engine, especially one built by his father. He would as soon think of hamstringing a faithful horse. A better plan soon came to him and put him into action. It soon had him flat on his back under the car, boring a hole in the bottom of the gasoline tank. When the life-blood of the car began to trickle out in a stream he stopped the hole with a small wooden peg.
The young man now frowned at the only remaining vehicle which had, not received his attention, Owen's motorcycle.
Harry went to the hose used for washing down the cards and collected a little water in the palm of his hand. With the other hand he removed the cap from the motorcycle's tank and allowed two or three drops of water to mingle with the gasoline.
This done, Harry let down his sleeves, washed his hands, and sauntered in to breakfast, with the unwelcome announcement that the big car was, for the day at least, beyond human aid.
There was a flicker of suspicion in Owen's sallow face at the news. He wondered if Harry had disabled the touring car that he might ride alone with Pauline.
"I am afraid," said Harry, quietly, "that you will have to ride in the runabout alone with me, Polly. It's rather hard on Raymond, but I guess he must go on his motorcycle or by train."
"Oh, I think you wrecked it on purpose," said Pauline, without the slightest suspicion that she was stating the truth.
Owen, worried by vague misgivings about Harry, looked into the tank of the runabout to make sure that it was full, and then scurried away on his two wheeled mount. He considered waiting until the runabout was ready to start and keeping the machine in sight, but it seemed wiser to be on the field where he could make sure the Frenchman would not forget his bargain nor start before Pauline arrived.
Pauline was ready with such record-breaking suddenness that it gave her the novel experience of waiting for Harry.
She bad not forgotten that her lover had asked her not to bother him while he worked on the car. After that slight to her pride the young lady would rather die than go near the garage while he was in it. During the next five minutes unpleasant doubts entered her mind. What could this indifference and neglect mean? She had looked upon Harry ever since his return from college as a personal possession. Of course, technically he wasn't hers until she married him. But if he were not her property, at least she had an option on the handsome youth until such time as she saw fit to either take his name or relinquish him to some one else. In that case she wondered to whom she would like to turn him over. There was her schoolmate and chum, Miss Hamlin. How lucky any man would be to get her, and Harry—how would he feel about it? Then, like a cold draught in her brain came the recollection that Lucille and Harry had corresponded all the four years he was at college.
Could it be that she, Pauline, had been too willful and headstrong with Harry? If so, was it possible that the keen edge of his adoration was wearing dull? Pauline had just succeeded in stamping these unpleasant questions deep down into the subconscious parts of her mind when the young man whisked up in the runabout.
Pauline's wrath melted rapidly. Harry drove, as he did everything out in the open air, magnificently. His judgment of distances and openings was precise, and his skill in weaving his way through heavy traffic was startling. A good looking young man is seldom seen to better advantage, especially by a girl, than when driving a powerful car. Pauline loved to drive with Harry. Besides his spectacular tricks he had a guileless manner of getting the better of arguments with crossing policemen.
Harry was not driving as fast as usual. This fact was impressed on her by shouts and waving of hands from a car which passed them from behind.
"That's Lucille," cried Pauline, waving.
"Yes, and, confound it, that's Billy Madison taking her to the races."
"Well, why shouldn't he?" asked Pauline. "Isn't it all right?"
"Yes but it seems to me he is paying deal of attention to Lucille and —say, Polly, you don't suppose she'd be silly enough to care for him, do, you?"
That sensation of a cold wave in the back of her brain came again.
"I'm sure I don't know," she replied, a little coldly. "Why—does it matter very much to you?"
Harry hesitated, even stammered a little, in denying that it did. He stammered, as Pauline well understood, because he was not telling her his true thoughts. It did matter, and she knew it. In reality it mattered because Harry knew too much about young Madison to want him to win the affection of any friend of his, but Harry did not wish to explain.
"So Harry does care for Lucille and always has cared," thought Pauline. The sense of possession of the youth beside her faded and he seemed far away. If a man fears he is losing his grip on a girl he redoubles his attentions and racks his brains to be more interesting and attractive to her. A girl in the same situation reverses the tactics.
Just as Harry felt the absolute zero which scientists talk about settling upon him, he remembered a very important duty.
"Seems to me we don't drift the way we ought to," said Harry, pressing on his clutch pedal and trying to took concerned.
"I think we have been a long time getting to the aviation field," wasPauline's chilly answer.
Harry stopped the car, went back and pulled out the little wooden plug in the gasoline tank. Then away they went again, leaving a little wet line in the dust of the road. Pauline stared straight ahead. Harry's attempts at conversation fell on the stony ground of silence, or at best brought forth only the briefest and most colorless answers. Soon Harry's practiced ear caught the preliminary warning of waning gasoline, and a moment later, half way up a gentle hill, with a sob from all its six cylinders the car gave up the ghost.
A few miles ahead Owen also was in difficulties. He had been sailing along merrily until he stopped at a little roadhouse for a drink. The machine had been all right when he got off and he knew nobody had touched it, yet now it acted as if possessed by the evil one. With great difficulty he was able to start it, and once started it coughed, bucked and showed all the symptoms of bronchitis and pneumonia. By dint of strenuous pedaling Owen helped the asthmatic motor to the top of the next hill. It ran as smoothly as a watch all the way down the other side and then imitated a bunch of cannon crackers on the following rise.
Owen was a good motorcycle rider, but a very poor mechanic. His machine had been adjusted, cleaned and kept in repair by the Marvin chauffeur, and the secretary had seldom, cause to investigate it on the road. He had always used the carefully filtered gasoline from the garage, so that he neither understood the present alarming symptoms nor knew their simple cure. His motor was protesting at a drop of water which had entered the needle valve of his carburetor and, being heavier than gasoline, had lodged there and stopped its flow. It would have been an easy, matter to drain the carburetor, but instead Owen with nervous fingers adjusted everything he could get his hands on, and after two hours' work trundled it into a farmhouse and hired the farmer to drive him the short remaining distance to the aviation field.
Several machines were in the air, but not the Frenchman's, when the farmer drove up. The roads and the edges of the field were alive with cars and spectators as the secretary hastened to the "hangars." The French aviator welcomed Owen and inquired for the mademoiselle. This confirmed Owen's fears that something had happened to her on the way. It had troubled him a little that the runabout had not passed him on the road, but Harry might have made a detour to avoid some section of bad road.
Owen lost another hour in watching and worrying before he made up his mind to go to the rescue. There were plenty of idle cars, but it was not easy to hire one, as they were mostly guarded by chauffeurs with no right to rent or lend them. At last a man was found who was willing to pick up $10 and take a chance that his master would not know about it.
The rescue car found them just where they had stopped, half way up the hill. Pauline had run the scale of feminine annoyance, from silence to sarcasm, to tears. The tears produced almost the same effect on Harry's determination to keep Pauline from flying that the drops of water had in Owen's carburetor. The spectacle of the girl he loved weeping had almost broken up his resolve when Owen dashed by, shouted, turned around and drew up alongside.
Harry asked for help, and the chauffeur who had never had the pleasure of tinkering with a "Marvin Six," was inclined to dismount and aid at least in diagnosing the car's ailment. While he was thinking about it and surveying the parts which Harry had taken out and strewn about the running board in his pretended trouble hunt Pauline had dashed away her tears and transferred her pretty self to the new car. Pauline and Owen both knew there was barely time to reach the field before the Frenchman's ascent. So with scanty farewells Harry was left to reassemble his car. When he had set up the last nut he replaced the little plug in the tank, produced a can of gasoline from the locker behind the seats, emptied it into his tank and drove at reckless speed for the aviation grounds.
He was just in time to see a tiny speck on the edge of the horizon. This, he learned, was the Frenchman's machine. He was told that it carried a passenger. The speck grew rapidly in size, developed the insect shape of a biplane and soon seemed to be over the other end of the aviation field. The young man's joy at seeing the aeroplane returning in safety was dampened by a little feeling of shame that by such devious means he had almost spoiled Pauline's pleasure.
"I act like an old woman worrying Polly this way," he decided. "No wonder she is cross to me lately. She must think I would be a tyrant of a—"
Harry's last words were choked by a spasm of the throat.
There were shouts and gestures from the spectators.
A light gust of wind had struck the aeroplane on the right wing. It wavered an instant, like a dragon fly about to alight, and then instead of responding to the aviator's levers turned on its left side and plunged to the ground. A cloud of dust arose, half hiding the wreck, and then the crash of impact came to his ears.
There was a second of silence, broken by a groan. Harry heard the groan and didn't even know it came from his own throat. He was in motion now, forcing people to the right and left and running down the field. It seemed miles to the other end, and he was gratefully conscious that others nearer were hurrying to the rescue, if rescue it might be called.
The aeroplane had dropped like a stone from a height that forbade hope of escape. Would she be conscious and would he be in time to give and receive a last message of love before her splendid young life was quenched in the black blot of death? Besides grief there was fury in the runner's heart, wrath against Owen for encouraging this foolish and dangerous caprice, against the unfortunate driver who had failed to preserve his precious freight, and against nature who condemns every living thing by one means or another to that same final failure and wreck death.
Gasping for breath from his exertions, he was at last within a hundred feet of the ruin, and saw people lifting up the engine and removing a limp figure. Just then two people stepped in his way. He did not turn out but rushed straight at them, rather glad to have something to burl aside in his blind anger, nor did he notice that one was a woman. Harry's plunge carried him between them and knocked both down, just as he had often bowled over the "interference" in his football games. On he lurched, wondering vaguely at hearing his name called. He heard it again and it sounded like Pauline's voice.
He turned, and it was Pauline.
After all Pauline had arrived too late—had missed that fatal adventure.
Owen watched Harry lift Pauline up and wrap her in his arms with a squeeze that hurt. But it was a hurt she loved and though she sobbed as if her heart would break they were sobs of relief and happiness.
Owen watched a moment and then slunk away; his schemes had been for nothing. Pauline was alive and happy in her lover's arms, and the secretary was no nearer his goal of permanent control of her estate than before. He walked to the entrance of' the tent and tried to learn from the nurses and doctors who were hurrying in and out whether the French aviator would live or die. Nobody would stop to give him a satisfactory answer. There was a flap in the back of the tent, and through this Owen cautiously peered. He saw a nurse with something that looked like wet absorbent cotton dabbing at a round black object.
Presently he saw that the round object was the head of a man blackened by fire. Just then the nurse looked up, saw Owen's guilty face and gave a little exclamation of dismay. At the same instant Owen felt a hand grasp his elbow. Withdrawing his head from the tent, he turned quickly and was confronted by the red face of Hicks, the blackmailer, counselor and dream messenger.
The secretary backed away from Hicks with a face of terror.
"Don't be scared," said Hicks in a hoarse whisper. "I feel as if I were in this thing as deep as you are."
"In what thing?" asked Owen.
"Don't bluff, old man," said Hicks. "Didn't you dream about me last night?"
"Well, what have my dreams to do with you?"
"Stop bluffing," replied Hicks. "Didn't you see me in a dream last night? And didn't I leave a black, shining stone on the table when I left?"
Owen did not deny these questions, and the red-visaged man went on:
"I see you took my advice—that is, his advice, whoever he is, and you fixed the wire."
"Look here, Hicks, in heaven's name, tell me what this means. I did dream about you; you told me to do the thing, and it's your fault. You admit you are in it. Now, what is it?"
"Owen," said Hicks, "you and I are a couple of pikers in a big game— bigger than we understand. We hold the cards, but somebody else is playing the hand for us. He is an old guy and a wise one, four thousand years old, he tells me, and, though it scares me out of my boots to think who I am trailing along with, I'm going to stick and you'd better stick, too, and let him play our hand to the end."
"Who is it?" asked Owen, wondering if the morphine had gotten the better of him again or if Hicks were playing some uncanny deceit on him.
"I don't know," replied Hicks. "He's somebody who has been dead 4,000 years, and he wants to have this girl Pauline killed so he can get her back. I suppose he's some kind of ghostly white slaver. It isn't our business what he is as long as he takes care of us. If we'll help him he'll help us."
"Well, he didn't manage very well today," objected Owen.
"He planned all right," rejoined Hicks. "The machine fell, and if she'd been in it she'd have been killed. But the other side played a card. I don't know what the card was, but it took the trick and she didn't go up in the machine. That's all. But don't worry, we'll have better luck some other time."
Owen shook his head. He could make nothing of this battle of unseen forces. It was clear to him that he had grasped at the one big chance to get Pauline's estate and had missed it. He told Hicks so frankly.
"That's where you're wrong again," insisted Hicks. "If that girl had been killed today it would have been a big blunder."
"A blunder?" queried Owen. "Didn't you say that Pauline must be put out of the way before we can get hold of her fortune?"
"Listen," said Hicks glancing cautiously about, "come over here away from these people."
"What do you mean by saying that it would have been a big blunder ifPauline had been killed in that flying machine?" demanded Owen.
"Yes, an almighty big blunder—that's what I said, and I can tell you why. We were pretty stupid not to think of it before. Now here's what's got to happen to Miss Pauline—"
Hicks placed his mouth close to Owen's car and whispered.
A sort of false quiet, like the calm that broods between storms, kept all serene at the Marvin mansion for a week after the aeroplane catastrophe. Little had been seen of Harry, who was busy with directors' meetings and visits to the factories. Owen had read with alarm of rumors that some one had tampered with a wire of the wrecked biplane. But if the authorities were investigating he saw no signs of it, and suspicion pointed no finger at him.
What puzzled and worried Owen more than anything else was his own mind and behavior. Having no belief in the supernatural, he could not account for the dream which had thrown him into a criminal partnership with Hicks. Hicks had blackmailed him in the past, and there was nobody he had feared and hated more than this vulgar and disreputable race track man. Yet Hicks had appeared to him in a dream, and Owen had promptly done his bidding, involving himself in what would probably turn out to be murder. The newspapers reported the French aviator as barely living from day to day.
Owen suffered the torment of a lost soul, but, at least he had no more dreams, or spectral visitations. Hicks called him on the telephone once or twice, but the secretary refused to talk.
Pauline, too, had a busy week. Besides her usual social activities, she rewrote and finished her new story. It seemed to her even better than the one in the Cosmopolitan Magazine.
"This will surely be taken," Pauline thought with a little sigh of regret, "and that means the end of my year of adventures—"
She had determined on this course the night after the accident. It was after midnight, and Pauline was trying to marshal the exciting recollections of the day into the orderly mental procession that leads to sleep. Very faintly she heard what sounded like the music of a distant mandolin. Pauline knew it was Harry, went to the open window and looked down on the dark lawn. There he was playing with a bit of straw instead of a pick that his music might not disturb the sleepers in the house.
Pauline wanted to throw her arms around him and promise not to cause any more worry. But she didn't, because she couldn't reach him from the window. After Harry had gone Pauline decided to finish her story, send it to a publisher and let his decision be hers.
"If they accept it, you stay home and marry Harry," she told the pretty face under the filmy night cap which smiled at her from the mirror. "But if they dare reject it, Harry will have to worry, dear boy though he is."
So Pauline lost no time in finishing and submitting her manuscript, inclosing a special delivery stamp and a request please to let her know at once.
On Saturday Pauline received a bulky letter in the morning's mail. It was her neatly typed manuscript and a short letter declining her story. The editor thought it charming, showed wonderful imagination, gave great promise of future success, but there was a lack of experience evident throughout—a little unreal, he added. He ventured to suggest that the author would do well to travel around and see the world from different angles. During the afternoon Harvey Schieffelin dropped in for a call. He had found her story in the Cosmopolitan and complimented her then he began to laugh.
"Polly, that's a bully story of yours, but you ought to have gone down and watched some stokers do work before you described that scene."
"What was wrong in my description?" demanded the young authoress.
"Well, you told of a stoker laying his grimy hand on the fire door and pulling it open to rake the fire."
"Well, couldn't he do that?"
"Oh, yes," laughed Harvey, "he could, but he wouldn't do it more than once. Those doors are almost red hot and would bum the flesh off the stoker's hand, whether it were grimy or not. I'll show you on my yacht some time. What you need is—?"
"Harvey, don't you dare tell me I need experience," interrupted Pauline with unexpected heat. Young Schieffelin saw that tears were almost in her eyes.
"Well," thought Schieffelin, "this vein leads too close to water," and he hurried to shift the course of the conversation.
But the damage was done. Pauline took her story to the little open fireplace in her room and destroyed it. At the same time she destroyed, her resolution to give up the year of adventure. There could be no question, she needed experience. Her adopted father had admitted it, the editor had said it, and even an empty-headed young man like Schieffelin could see it. She was sorry for Harry, but it couldn't be helped. She picked up a copy of "Treasure Island" and soon wished fervently that the days of pirates were back again.
Owen gave up his fight against morphine late Friday night. Saturday he was at peace with the world. Gone were all the nerve clamorings and with them went his scruples. All day he kept a furtive watch upon Pauline, and even heard her envious remarks about pirates to Harry when he returned for a weekend at home. Owen sympathized with Pauline in her regret that pirates were extinct. A pirate would have been very useful to the secretary just then.
However, there were other cut-throats, plenty of them, and perhaps some other kind would do. There were gunmen, for instance, but, an honest District Attorney had lately made these murderous gentlemen of the underworld almost as quiet as pirates. He was still pondering when Hicks called again on the telephone. This time the secretary responded and made an immediate appointment in a cafe near Forty-second street.
Owen related the events of the week, ending with Pauline's hankering for pirates. The two men got their heads together and rapidly evolved a plan.
From the cafe they took a taxi and rode along the water front, first on one side of the island of Manhattan and then on the other. The cab stopped near the worst-looking saloons, while the two schemers entered and looked over the sailors and longshoremen refreshing themselves at the bars. After covering several miles of water front they had collected as many as a dozen abominable barroom cigars and a few equally dubious drinks, but had not yet found what they were looking for.
On Front Street they saw a man, and both cried out:
"Look, there he is."
The man was a wild-looking specimen. He had the rolling gait of the deep sea. A squinting eye gave him a villainous leer, while a bristly beard and long gray hair made him a ferocious spectacle. His age was doubtful, as the lines in his ruddy skin might have been cut by dissipation as much as age. The most prominent feature of his unlovely countenance was a nose, fiery red from prolonged exposure to sunburn, or rum-bum.
"If he isn't a pirate he ought to be one," said Owen.
The man carried the top of a ship's binnacle, as the round brass case which holds a ship's compass is called. He entered the dismal portal of a marine junk shop. The taxi was stopped discreetly a block away. As Owen and Hicks approached the shop they heard a loud argument going on inside.
"How much do you want for it?"
"Ten dollars. It's a brand-new Negus."
"Ten nothing. You stole it, you son of a sea cook. I'll give you a dime for it."
"I did not steal it, so help me —— ———! The captain of that 'lime juicer' over in the North River gave it to me for saving his little gal's life. He begged me to take anything I wanted, but I fancied this. I'll tell you about it."
Then Owen and Hicks, listening just outside, heard a fearful and wonderful tale. To relate it in the sailor's own words, stripped of the long deep-sea oaths, would be as impossible as to pick the green specks out of a sage cheese.
In brief, the gentleman with the binnacle, sauntering innocently along the docks Friday night, had heard a commotion on the British tramp which he referred to as a "lime juicer." Some fifteen or more long-shoremen had invaded the ship, overcome the captain, tied him down and were about to kidnap his daughter. The teller of the story had walked in and thrashed them all single-handed, driven them off into the darkness, rescued the little girl and released the captain. In gratitude the commander had made him a present of the binnacle head.
At the conclusion of the story there was a pause, then the other voice answered:
"You're a wonder. As I said before, I'll give you ten cents for the binnacle and ninety cents for the story. Now you can take it or I'll have you pinched for swiping it."
"Gimme the dollar," said the hero of the tale, and a moment later he passed down the street with the two eavesdroppers at his heels.
The sailor man, proceeding at a rapid pace, suddenly turned a comer like a yacht jibing around a buoy and plunged into a dingy saloon. Owen and Hicks went in after him.
Owen ordered and invited the sailor to join them. They learned that his name was Nelson Cromwell Boyd, that he had deserted from the British navy at a tender age, and since then had been through a series of incredible adventures and injustices, which disproved the old adage that you can't keep a good man down.
At last Owen intimated that he had a business proposition to discuss, and they adjourned to the sidewalk.
"Do you want to earn some money?" asked Hicks.
"Well, that depends," said Boyd, doubtfully.
"Easy money," suggested Owen.
"That's the only kind worth going after," commented the sailor.
"That's where we agree with you, my friend," said Hicks. "We are after easy money and plenty of it. Plenty for us and plenty for you, too, if you can keep quiet about it."
"That's the kind of talk I like to hear. But as honest man to honest man, I want to warn you that there mustn't be too much work to it. I don't believe in the nobility of labor. I believe that work is the crowning shame and humiliation of the human race. It's all right for a horse or a dog or an ox to work, but a man ought to be above it. It's degrading, interferes with his pleasures and wastes his time."
"I feel the same way," agreed Owen, "but somebody has got to work to make shoes and food for us."
"Yes," admitted the sailor, "regretfully there will always have to be some work done, and I'm sorry for the poor guys that must do it. But there's been too much work done."
"Those sentiments are very noble," said Owen.
"It's all very fine to worry about your fellow man. But you would like to have plenty of money even if the rest of the world is fool enough to keep on working."
"I suppose so," said the sailor, "but I'm a reformer and my business is to talk, not work."
"That's just what we want you to do," said Owen and Hicks in answer.
Then they found a table in the rear of a saloon where they could unfold their plan.
Boyd was to be introduced to a foolish young girl who had a barrel of money. He was to tell her a deep-sea yam along certain lines, and Owen and Hicks would take care of the rest.
"The question is," said Owen, "whether you can talk and act like a sort of reformed pirate."
"Leave that to me," he assured them, and led the way out of the saloon and into still another grimy and disreputable place. It was Axel Olofsen's pawnshop and second-hand general supply and clothing store.
After much pawing over ancient, worn and rusty weapons, Boyd was at last fitted out. Ole was paid about sixty per cent of what he asked and left to the enjoyment of his Scandinavian melancholy.
"You look like a pirate now, sure enough," said Owen, observing Boyd's effect on the driver of the taxicab.
"I look it, but I don't quite feel it yet," said Boyd, with deep meaning. "There is something lacking."
"What can it be?" asked Hicks.
"About three fingers of red-eye," the sailor explained, pointing to a saloon. "That will make my disguise just perfect."
In the saloon Hicks and Owen made a little map, wrinkled it and soiled it on the floor, then gave it to the pirate.
"Tell her," said Owen as he called for a taxi, "that it is only a copy of your original, which is all worn out."
The nearer they approached to the house the more talkative became the "pirate." He demanded to know more details of what was to be done, and finally assumed an air of authority.
"You say that rich girl is crazy to see something worth writin' about? Now, I know something better than pirates and buried treasure," shouted the pirate confidently.
"Yes, no doubt," Owen replied soothingly and with some alarm at the man's bravado. "But it's pirates she is interested in just now."
"Never mind, I say I know something better," insisted the pirate. "If she will go and do what I'm goin' ter tell yer she'll sure see something like she never dreamed of. Now listen to me sharp!"
It was an extraordinary proposition the "pirate" made.
Owen laughed a gentle discouragement and shook his head, but Hicks fixed his eyes keenly on the man and was evidently turning the suggestion over in his mind.
Owen's key admitted the three to the front hall without ringing, but a maid happened to cross the hall and caught sight of Boyd. With a scream and a flutter she retreated. Owen seated his two confederates in the hall and went in search of Pauline.
Owen found Pauline alone in the library. Never did a villain propose a scheme to a beautiful girl at a more favorable moment. Half the afternoon and a little while after dinner she had been absorbing "Treasure Island," and now came Owen asking her if she would like to meet a reformed pirate and go on a thrilling and adventurous expedition.
"Owen, you are a perfect angel. Bring in your pirate. I'm sorry, though, that he has reformed."
Pauline shook hands with Hicks, but hardly noticed him. She had eyes only for the "pirate," who impressed her mightily. With awe and admiration she saw his scowling and squinting eye run over her and then travel about the room. Pauline approved of the "pirate," but the "pirate" did not approve of Pauline, and he almost told her so.
But he met the warning eyes of his confederates and restrained himself. He had his story to tell and he would do it. After all, that was the best way to attack this girl and her fortune.
"Tell us about the treasure," said Pauline eagerly.
"Hush!" he shouted in a voice that made the girl jump.
"I'll tell you, but, by the blood of Morgan, if one of you ever tells a living soul I'll cut his liver out," said the "pirate." Pauline gasped, and the secretary told him that it wasn't considered good manners to point with a sharp knife. But they all swore to secrecy and the "pirate" proceeded:
"I was but a slip of a lad when I ran away and sailed from Liverpool in the good brig Nancy Lee with as villainous a crew as I ever seen. Where we was bound for and why is none of your business. Them that planned that voyage has cashed in their souls to their Maker and—ah, well, as I was saying, they was a villainous crew, low and vile and bloody-minded. I was the cabin boy and slept on the transoms in the captain's cabin. The weather was awful and the grub was worse.
"But all went well till we reached the roarin' forties. The skipper knew how to handle sailors, you bet he did. When they came aft to kick about the grub he knocked 'em down before they said two words."
Pauline gave a little exclamation of dismay at this point and the "pirate" turned to her in explanation:
"You see, knockin' 'em down quick like that avoids a lot of cross words and unpleasant arguments such as makes hard feelin's on long voyages.
"Yes, as I was saying', all went well until the second mate got to knockin' 'em out with his left hand, which the same was all right, too, but he was heard to pass a remark one day that he only hit landlubbers with his left hand.
"The crew they was insulted, and that very night the second mate went overboard. Who done it nobody knows, leastways the captain couldn't find out. It made the old man peevish like and he got to arguin' with them sailors instead of wallopin' 'em the way he oughter done, and one day they turned on him.
"It was all over in a minute. They had the old man thrown and tied. The first mate came runnin'in, firin' his pistols, but they downed him, too. I took the wheel while they decided what to do. 'Bloody Mike,' their leader, had about persuaded the men to send the captain and mate to Davy Jones's locker and the carpenter was riggin' the plank for 'em to walk when I up and puts in a word.
"I pleaded for their lives and, though Mike was dead agin' the idea, they voted to let them live. The last we saw of 'em they was driftin' off in the jolly boat with a jug of water and a loaf of bread."
The mariner paused and Pauline suggested delightedly:
"And as soon as they had cooled down they were grateful to you and made you their leader?"
"They did not," answered the "pirate." "They broached a cask of rum in the forward hold, and I overheard 'em plotting to throw me to the sharks."
"How awful," said Pauline.
"Yes, miss," agreed the "pirate." It was awkward and embarrassing like for a mere slip of a lad. So I up and goes into the captain's cabin and gets all the pistols and knives and cutlasses there was and brings 'em out on deck.
"Pretty soon them drunken devils come a-tumblin' out of the fore hatch, picks up half a dozen capstan bars and some belyin' pins and a marlin spike or two and runs aft a-hollerin' and yellin'. I gives 'em one warnin' and then fires."
The "pirate" stopped, coughed and looked around.
"Oh, please go on," begged Pauline.
"Yes, miss," replied the sailor, "but this talking affects my throat.Could you possibly—?"
"Why, certainly," interrupted Owen, "I'll get you a drink."
After the sailor had swallowed the biggest drink ever poured out in that house he continued:
"Yes, that was as neat a fight as I ever was in. There was some twenty of 'em all told."
"And what happened then?" demanded Pauline.
"Well, Miss, it come on to blow, and there was the old ship staggerin' along under full sail. It was all I could do to keep the old hulk from foundering', at that, but I stuck to the wheel day after day and night after night. To keep from freezin' I had to drink a lot of grog. Oh, a powerful lot of grog. So much grog that I've been dependent on it ever since—and I'll take a little now, if it's agreeable." It wasn't exactly agreeable, but he got it and continued. "Finally we fetched up, ker-smack, on the rocks of a desert island. All the boats had been smashed and carried away by the storm, so I had to build a raft. The first two loads was all provisions, and then I took the treasure ashore—"
"What treasure?" asked Pauline.
"Oh, bless your heart, didn't I tell you about the treasure?"
"No," said Hicks, with a scowl, "and that's the part we want to hear about."
"Oh, money ain't everything," rebuked the "pirate" in a lordly manner. "There was a matter of a million dollars or so in good British gold, and what it was on the 'Nancy Lee' for is nobody's business. I took it all ashore, an' buried it on the island. Here's a copy of the chart I made, and you three is the first to lay human eyes on it."
While Pauline examined reverently the dingy bit of paper the "pirate" concluded his yarn.
"After I'd buried the last f it, I rigged a mast on the raft and fetched up on one of the Bahamas."
"And you have never been back to get the gold?" queried Pauline.
"No, miss; though I've started many's the time. But a poor seafarin' man like me finds it hard to fit out a proper expedition. If you fancy the notion and want to go along with me and pay all the expenses I'll divvy up half and half with you. What do you say?"
Pauline looked at Owen and Hicks, who nodded approvingly. She had no great faith in finding any gold. Old Mr. Marvin had said that treasure bunts rarely produce any results. But he had also remarked that they were very thrilling, and here, surely, was adventure well worth a little time and money. Pauline agreed, and the "pirate" was in the midst of imposing a blood-curdling oath of secrecy when Harry demanded admittance.
Nobody, least of all the sailor, would tell him what was in the wind, except that they were going off on a trip of adventure. The young man disapproved of both Hicks and the "pirate," and the latter showed his dislike of Harry. It was with regret that the man of the sea recollected Owen's stipulation that Harry must on no account be allowed to go with the party. Nothing would have pleased the "pirate" better than to have got these two happy and innocent representatives of "ill-gotten gains" alone with him on the high seas. Pauline, too, wished to have Harry who was frowning and suspiciously demanding information. But she had sworn the oath of a buccaneer, and far be it from her to break faith with the confiding freebooter.
So, once more Harry was kept out of Pauline's councils. He was a little provoked at her this time, for her willfulness seemed almost perverse after the lesson she should have learned from the aeroplane wreck.