CHAPTER XXI.
FINDING A FATHER.
Smithers returned to the room.
"I'll have to break with you," exclaimed the major, "if you go on this way."
"What for?" asked Smithers.
"Didn't you hear that fellow say that he had saved my life? See here," continued the major, "I want you to understand that you can't play fast and loose with me. Capt. Jordan will think I put up a job on him."
The major continued to grumble, but Smithers took no notice either of him or Tommy.
In an hour's time it grew dark, and while the partners were preparing for the business of the evening, Tommy being very tired, stole off to a bed which had been prepared for him in the house.
It was some time, however, before he could get to sleep.
He was haunted by the face of Capt. Jordan, and in vain tried to remember where he had seen it before. That it was familiar to him he was certain.
"I know him, I know him," he muttered, "but to savemy life I can't place him. However, I'll go to the cavern in the Snake Canyon to-morrow, and then——"
He broke off abruptly.
What would happen then, he could not tell, but he felt assured that important events were about to take place, which would influence his future career.
Early in the morning he descended from his bedroom. No one was about. The major and Smithers had kept the gaming room open till four o'clock, and then went to bed.
Passing through the city he walked over the prairie until he came within sight of the Dead Snake Canyon.
Scarcely had he entered the valley than he was surprised to hear the voice of Capt. Jordan.
"Welcome, my lad," he cried. "Your mother is waiting to see you. Follow me."
A winding path conducted them to the entrance to the cavern in which the robber lived.
In a rude vault, illuminated by the rays of the sun, Tommy saw Mrs. Smithers seated on a roughly made chair, with Alice by her side.
She rose hastily, and embraced him with every demonstration of fondness.
"My dear, dear child, I am so glad to see you oncemore," she cried. "How much you must have gone through since we last met."
Tommy returned her caresses, and replied:
"I am happy now, mamma, because I have found you. But why do you stay here?"
"I have my reasons," she replied.
"You would go if you could?" he asked.
"No, my child. I am happy and contented. Soon we shall leave here and——"
"We?" interrupted Tommy. "Do you include Capt. Jordan?"
"I do."
"But he is a robber."
"He will give up this life, and we shall live happily. It is not his fault, he has told me all. With me to guide him he will reform."
"What is he to you, mother?" said Tommy, in perplexity.
Capt. Jordan was standing close by. Looking at him, she exclaimed:
"Shall I tell him?"
"Yes," was the laconic reply.
"He is my husband—the man I loved before I met Smithers, whom I married, thinking my first love dead."
A new light now burst upon Tommy.
"He your husband, mamma?" he exclaimed.
"Yes, my dear, and your father," she said.
Now Tommy knew why the face had haunted him so.
Capt. Jordan was no other than the man Thompson, who had taken him from Jersey City, and so nearly got him into trouble in New York.
"Do you love him, mamma?" he asked.
"I do," she replied.
"Then I will give him my hand," said Tommy, "and if you are not ashamed to be called his wife, I am proud to be his son."
Capt. Jordan, or Thompson, took the boy's hand and imprinted a kiss on his forehead.
"You shall never have cause to regret calling me father," he exclaimed.
For the first time in many months Tommy felt a sense of dreamy happiness stealing over him.
He had found his mother, and, what was more, he had met his father under circumstances which induced him to like him better than he had done at their first interview.
The result of Tommy's venturing into the cave was certainly such as to surprise him greatly, for he was far from thinking that Capt. Jordan, the famous freebooter, was his father, and that his mother was living with himof her own choice instead of being confined as a prisoner, which all supposed.
Thompson, or Jordan, was very anxious to quit the life he was leading and had promised to do so shortly, at the solicitations of his wife, and he wished to go further west. Tommy's mother added her entreaties to those of his father that he would accompany them, and having no tie to bind him to Smithers, he consented.
Little Alice had quite lost all her haughtiness, and, removed from the influence of Smithers, she found much to love in the character of her mother, and though she felt some repulsion toward Thompson, she grew to like him a little in time.
Thompson was only waiting in the cave to make one more venture before he left it forever.
He had received notice that a wagon containing bars of silver would leave Silver City on a certain day, and he intended to attack it as it passed through the canyon.
With this amount of valuable property he thought he could do well as a farmer, and live a life of peace and contentment, but he forgot that ill-gained wealth rarely if ever does its possessor any good.
It was early one morning when a shot was heard in the valley.
Tommy sprang to his feet, he having been engaged in conversation with his mother.
"What is that?" he cried.
"Oh," replied his mother, with a heavy sigh, "it's an attack on some poor traveler. I wish all this work was over."
"So do I," said Tommy. "Why do you stay here, mother, when you could go away so easily?"
"I don't know what to do, my dear," replied she, in her usual weak-minded and undecided way. "Thompson is your father and legally my husband. I am afraid he would kill me if I thwarted him. As for Smithers, I despise him for his pride and his trickery. I wish I had never married."
"Don't say that, mamma, for my sake," exclaimed Tommy.
She pressed her lips to his face and kissed him tenderly.
"They call you the fool of the family," she replied. "But to me you were always bright and amiable."
This conversation was interrupted by the entrance of Thompson, who held some papers in his hand, which he was examining with apparent interest. Suddenly he uttered a loud cry of rage.
"A thousand curses!" he exclaimed. "This is bad luck!"
"What is?" inquired his wife.
"If we had only known who this fellow was he would not have got off so easily."
"And who is he?"
"Who? The famous detective Berghausen, and here in my hand is a warrant for the arrest of Smithers for robbing his employers in New York."
Thompson bit his lips and frowned darkly, as if his mind was ill at ease.
"I ought to kill Berghausen," he said, as if talking to himself. "It is the only way to play a safe game, but if I ride after him I may miss the silver, and not have a chance of such a stake again."
Setting his broad-brimmed hat jauntily on one side of his head, he quitted the cavern.
Tommy looked anxiously at his mother.
"It is my opinion," he exclaimed, "that you would be better without either, of such men as Thompson or Smithers."
"Remember, Tommy, that he is your father."
"I know it, and cannot help feeling sorry for it. He is a bold, bad man, and although he says he will leada good life in future, I am sure he'll never be anything but a thief, and a low one at that."
The unhappy woman shook her head sadly.
"I fear," she said, "that there is no rest for me this side of the grave. I must fulfill my destiny."
Covering her face with her hands she wept bitterly.
Tommy went outside and walked up and down in deep thought, for he was in the midst of plenty now, which seemed to make a man of him.
He felt restless and excited. Coming events cast their shadows before, and he had that remarkable silent admonition that something of great importance was about to happen.
He was roused from his meditation by his mother's voice.
"Tommy!" she cried.
"Well, mamma?" he replied.
"Have you seen Alice?"
"No."
"She is not in the cave, and I notice that her hat and little cloak are missing. Where can she have gone?"
Tommy reflected a moment.
"I think I know, mamma," he said.
"If you can guess, you are smarter than I am," she replied.
"I remarked," continued Tommy, "that she listened with peculiar attention when she heard a man had gone to Silver City to arrest Mr. Smithers. He is her father, and she always had a great affection for him."
"I am aware of that."
"Then it is my opinion that she has gone to Silver City in order to put Mr. Smithers on his guard, and enable him to flee from the officers of justice."
"It is possible, but what danger may she not encounter on the way! If she gets benighted the wolves will kill her. Poor child, she is unarmed, and I should break my heart if anything happened to her."
"Mother!" exclaimed Tommy, "I know what you would say. You wish me to go and find Alice."
"Oh! yes, if it is not asking too much."
"I will set off at once."