CHAPTER XXII.
HAPPY JACK!
Thus he bows himself out, this strange Sheriff Bob. For once at least he has made a serious blunder, and almost precipitated a most unseemly disturbance. No wonder he iswrathy over the blunder of the Denver clerk who could so carelessly send a photograph without examining it, and almost cause the arrest of his own employer.
After he has gone the little party in the library draw together again. John is good-natured, as he can well afford to be. Conscious of his innocence, he has at no time felt anything beyond mere annoyance.
As for Aleck, he has a feeling of positive relief that amounts to delight. The heaviness of spirits is gone. Not only is John what he has professed to be, but the load that has weighed the old speculator down is gone. Dorothy smiles through her tears, Dorothy is happy, and this raises the mercury of Aleck’s thermometer several degrees.
Samson Cereal is quickly becoming his old self, though perhaps an inquiring eye might discover that something has occurred to upset the usually stern and self-possessed king of the wheat pit.
The dramatic scene has shifted the setting of the stage, and the actors too appear to have a different look. Instead of tears and woe there are smiles and rejoicing. No one missesColonel Bob, since his mission was to uphold the majesty of the law, and they can put him away from their minds without trouble.
Again they speak of mingling with the guests, as the absence of all belonging to the household may be noticed and commented upon, but it seems as though some peculiar fortune persists in interfering with these plans.
They hear voices outside the door, and Aleck finds his attention riveted when someone mentions his name.
“I must see Aleck Craig! It is very important.”
“Wait,” says another voice.
Then there is a knock at the door—not a timid rap, but one that means business. Aleck is closer than any of the others, so he takes upon himself to open it.
It is Wycherley. Another figure stands behind him which has a familiar look.
“Ah! my dear boy, here’s a party who wants to see you. Nothing I could do would put him off. He says it’s very, very particular. The easiest way to get rid of him was to bring him in, and here he is.”
With that he stands aside, and the man who has kept in the background steps briskly up. Aleck can hardly believe his eyes.
“Happy Jack!” he exclaims.
Of all the singular happenings of this night it surely takes the lead. Where did he come from, and what does he want with Craig?
The Canadian recovers himself quickly, as he sees an outstretched hand before him and hears the young roysterer say:
“Bound to find you, Craig. Heard at the Sherman you were here. Obstacles no object in my way, and here I am.”
“Come into the library. Such a weighty secret as you carry should not be bruited around into the curious ears of the public. Closed doors would be more in keeping for it,” says Aleck.
He has not the remotest idea what the other may be at, but discretion is a part of his character, and it strikes him that under the circumstances he had better get the defaulter into the library.
If he has business of importance with him, then the precaution will be well taken. On the other hand, it may prove that he has followedout some hair-brained scheme, and considers it a joke to return a pocket knife or some such article, which Aleck may have lost, and which he is determined to deliver to the owner. Such jokes appear smart to men who have looked upon the wine when it is red. They make much capital out of them.
Under such circumstances as these the Canadian athlete believes he has a trump card to play. Once the door is shut Happy Jack may not find it so easy to get out again.
He manages to give Wycherley a wink and a nod which that individual rightly interprets, and he also enters the room, remaining with his back against the door, thus serving as a barrier to ingress or escape.
One thing Aleck notes. John has turned his back upon them the very instant he heard the name of Happy Jack mentioned; so when that individual enters the room he does not know, after his sweeping glance around, who is present.
Happy Jack has one trait that in times past has served him well. This is assurance that would well become a New York alderman. Nothing appears to daunt him. Put himdown at Her Majesty’s reception, and he would do his little part after his own way, if not quite to the Queen’s taste.
He is not clad in a dress suit, but this fact has no weight with him. Happy Jack Phœnix in his business Scotch cheviot is perfectly at home even amid the satins and diamonds of the finest reception Chicago has seen during the season.
“Mr. Craig, you will, I know, pardon my boldness in hunting you down, when you learn the reason for such a move. Singular man at all times. When I get my mind set on anything all earth and the lower regions—beg pardon, young lady—can’t persuade me otherwise,” he says, as placing both hands on the back of a chair he faces the Canadian, beyond whom are Cereal and his daughter, both looking in open-eyed wonder at this uninvited guest.
“That’s so!” mutters John, and he has had good reason in the past to lament this trait which Jack mentions.
“Eh! did anyone speak? Well, as I was saying, Mr. Craig, I’m set in my way. I can’t be turned aside. If I was walking along a railroadtrack and an engine came at me, there’d be trouble, and two to one it wouldn’t be me that suffered. That’s my nature. Now, fortune threw in my way certain information. It concerned a gentleman whose acquaintance I formed last night. I said to myself, 'Happy Jack, not a wink of sleep for you until you see him and put a flea in his ear.’ That is why I am here. I have brought the flea with me.
“You wonder why I go to all this trouble for one almost a stranger. It pleases me. I’m always doing something for others—expect to become a philanthropist after sowing the last of my wild oats. Then, there’s another reason. My friend, the way you sent that rascally Turk spinning last night won my heart. Something of a gymnast myself in a small way, a believer in the manly art of self-defense, and I said to myself: 'The chap who can give a fellow such a whirl takes my heart.’
“Pardon this long but necessary digression, as the fellow in the novel says. Now, having made myself solid, I’ll come down to common horse sense, and talk business.”
“Thank Heaven!” mutters John, still keeping his back toward the newcomer.
Phœnix glances sharply toward him, as if his ears have caught this last remark, and then he throws an inquiring look at Craig, who smiles and touches his forehead in a meaning way which brings a knowing expression on the other’s face.
“A little off, eh? That’s all right—no offense taken, I assure you. Now see here, Mr. Craig, when you tossed that copper-colored Turk over to me last night on the Midway, like a bundle of rags, you thought that was the end of him—that he was out of the game. I know you did, but you never made a greater mistake in all your life, sir.
“I have made a study of these vagrants of the Midway. Was a tramp myself once and can understand their ways, you know. Queer people, the Turks, and their leading characteristic, sir, isrevenge. Even a lapse of twenty years will not make them forget.”
This may be an accidental thrust, and probably is, but it strikes home. Samson Cereal starts and looks anxious, feeling that he has some concern in this game.
“As I wandered about that entrancing region early this evening, my ear charmedwith the sweet music of the never ceasing tom-tom, or the cry of the bum-bum candy vendor, my eyes feasting on the beauties of Samoan and Lapland architecture, I chanced to catch a glimpse of the Turkish nabob. Ever since I had that whirl at him last night I have been in low spirits. I wanted to repeat it. If no one got in the way I believed I could even see your throw and go one better.
“So it entered my mind to follow the Turk and watch for a chance. Gentlemen, behold the working of fate! I dogged his steps. Presently from the gorgeous Turkish village he sought the classic shades of Cairo Street, where I was quite at home.”
“I could swear to that!” says John, but having been warned, the narrator of the Modern Arabian Nights pays no attention to this interruption beyond a shrug of the shoulders.
“It was a question with me, I assure you, whether I should hire a donkey and run Mr. Turk down, or mount a camel and chase him the length of the street, for you see my animosity was aroused. Then I began to notice that he was holding mysterious confabs. First he met two fellows just outside theTurkish barber shop and handed over some money. Then, further down the street, two more turned up.
“By this time I believed a conspiracy was on foot to loot the Midway. A man could retire for life if he did that. I resolved to save the Fair, no matter what the loss of time and money was to me; and, gentlemen, under certain existing circumstances of which you are not aware, I assure you the former weighed more with me than the latter.”
“Don’t doubt it!” from John.
“Having made up my mind to sacrifice my own interests to those of suffering humanity, I set to work eavesdropping. Now, my education as a detective has been woefully scant, but in my peregrinations before condescending to settle down in Denver I have had some rough experiences, and they taught me how this thing must be accomplished.
“Gentlemen, with me it wasveni, vidi, vici!for I came and saw and conquered. Near the group lay an old blanket used on one of the camels during the wedding procession. Under this dirty cloth of gold I hid myself, and then edged along until I was closebehind the conspirators. I happen to have remarkable ears—you notice they stick out like a rabbit’s—they give me the power of catching a whisper, and these chaps were so earnest in discussing their sweet plot that they talked right out in meeting.
“Fortune blessed the brave—their delightful conversation was carried on in English, pigeon English as we men of the border would call it. It happened that two of those present were not Turks, but Americans, and that is what saved me from listening to a jargon of heathen talk that would have been a blank to me.
“Piece by piece I put their sentences together; at first, sir, it was a puzzle, but as each section filled a gap I finally found I was handling as masterly and bold a scheme as was ever hatched on American soil.”