A pleasant sense of motion came over me that suggested cradling waves, and I was sleepily wondering why we had gone out on a day that portended storms, when a tapping at my stateroom door was followed by someone whispering:
"Aren't you ever going to get up, you lazy old dear?"
It was a girl's voice.
Gradually and cautiously I drew the sheet about my chin, feeling no little confused to have a girl five feet away whispering pet names at me through a thin partition.
"Aren't you?" she repeated, more sweetly imperious.
"You bet," I stammered.
"Then do hurry! It's almost ten, and I've been waiting such a long time!"
Whereupon I heard her moving off, pressing her hands against the panels for steadiness, and there struck me as having been an endearing pathos in the way she said: "such a long time!"
This was, no doubt, some of Tommy's doing. He had invited friends aboard for luncheon, and was now daring one of them to play this joke. But my glance turned to the room, to its equipment and toilette articles which were large and curiously shaped, and the numbing truth crept into my brain that the stupid boatman had put me on the wrong yacht.
I had known some tight places in France, but this one simply squeezed me all over. There was nothing for it, of course, but go out and explain—yet how could a chap appear at noon draped in a sheet! The situation confused me, but I decided to search the wardrobe, of my unknown host, to borrow his razor, appropriate a new toothbrush that should be found in a box somewhere, and select flannels and linens in keeping with the hour. Still balanced between confusion and panic I must have done these things because, fittingly attired though with no very good fit, I opened my door, stepped softly along the passageway, and entered the cabin.
On a wide couch built in at one side a girl lay reading. Her head was toward me, but as I advanced she arose with a low cry of gladness, saying:
"So you're here at last——!" then with a little gasp drew back, facing me in the most entrancing attitude of bewilderment.
It was the girl who had left that ball of paper!
The sea, always my friend, at this moment did a rather decent thing; it gave the yacht a firm but gentle lurch and sent us into each other's arms. Perhaps nothing else in all the world of chances could so effectively have broken the ice between us, for we were laughing as I helped her back to the couch; and, as our eyes met, again we laughed.
"I didn't know," she said, "that Father brought a guest aboard last night!"
"Awkward of him, wasn't it?" I stammered, sparring for time.
"One is apt to be awkward in weather like this," she graciously admitted.
"You don't know how profoundly aware I am of—of how terribly true that is," I stumbled along. "Is heon deck?" For, oh, if I could only get to see him five minutes alone!
"No, he's unusually lazy this morning; but I've called, him, the old dear!"
A chill crept up my spine—crept up, crept down, and then criss-crossed. But she must know of her mistake before we had gone so far that putting me ashore would be a serious inconvenience—for I knew he would put me ashore at the nearest point, if not, indeed, set me adrift in an open boat. Therefore I suggested:
"Wouldn't it be a good idea to call him again? It's rather important!"
"Oh, you think we shouldn't have gone out in a storm like this? I've been dreadfully uneasy!"
"No danger at all," I declared, with affected indifference, adding: "The weather isn't half as rough as 'the old dear' will be, take my word for it!"
A shadow of mystification passed over her wonderful face, yet she smiled with well-bred tolerance, saying:
"You are quite droll."
"Drollery is the brother of good fellowship," I replied, helping her across the reeling cabin. As I had feared, she went directly to my room where the door had swung back showing an empty bunk.
"Why, he's up, after all," she glanced over her shoulder at me.
"I believe he is," I idiotically affirmed.
"But where?"—this more to herself.
"Hiding, maybe," I ventured, taking a facetious squint about.
"Hiding?" she asked, in mild surprise.
"Er—playing a trick on us! He's a funny old dog at tricks!"
"Funny old dog?" She drew slightly away from me. "Do you mean my father, Mr.—er?"
"Jack," I prompted, more than ever embarrassed and wishing the ocean would come up and swallow me; for I realized, alas, that my gods, by whom I was reasonably well remembered in so far as concerned physique, had been shamelessly remiss in their bestowal of brains.
"Jack?" she slowly repeated. "What an odd name!"
This made me feel queer.
"Where do you live," I asked, "that you think it's an odd name? The States are crawling with Jacks! It's even the Democratic emblem!"
Her perplexity was fast approaching alarm when we heard a muffled report above, followed by a trembling of the yacht. Someone called an order that sounded far away in the wind.
"Hold tight," I said, "while I see if anything's wrong!"
But I did not leave her side, knowing exactly what had happened. We had snapped our mainsheet, that was all; letting the boom swing out and putting us in the trough of the waves where we might expect a few wobbly minutes until the sailors could work in a new line. There was no danger and I reassured her at once, but she merely asked:
"Was my father on deck?"
"I didn't look," I answered, wondering why she thought I knew.
"Won't you see?" Her patience was becoming exhausted.
"I'm crazy to. But first let me help you back—you can't make it alone!"
"Oh, yes, I can," she murmured. "I always make things alone!"
I tried to fathom the meaning of this, but gave it up and started to go on deck. If I could take her father off to one side and explain, well and good. He would perhaps sympathize with my mistake when he understood that it was partially the result of a desire to fill Monsieur with spirits. Considering this, I spoiled everything by asking:
"What does he look like?"
"My father?" she gasped, in a wondering way.
"No—yes—certainly not! I mean—oh, this is intolerable! I don't know your father, never saw him in my life—unless he was the one with you last night when you drove me frantic with that ball of paper trick! But what you did has nothing to do with my being here. I've not wilfully followed. A stupid boatman mistook your yacht for my own when I was—I mean to say, when I was too engrossed with the memory of you to notice his mistake."
From alarm her look gave way to wonderment, then almost to mirth. It was a hard place for a girl to be in, and I expected her to leave me now, find the old chap and promptly have me hanged to a yard-arm. The fact that there are no yard-arms on schooner yachts made no difference. And I do believe she was considering that when a sailor passed us, looking enough like Tommy to have been his twin brother.
"Jack," she said to him, "tell Mr. Graham to come below!"
The fellow saluted and left, and I stared at her in surprise, saying:
"Then my name can't seem very odd to you, Miss Graham!"
She was regarding me as though trying to discover what kind of a species I was that had got on her father's yacht, when the sailor came back followed by a husky brute in uniform. Intuitively I stiffened to meet the crisis, but even at this eleventh hour a respite came.
"He ain't aboard," the other Jack whispered, and the captain—for the burly one was only the captain, after all—saluted, saying:
"I've just now found out, ma'am, he ain't aboard!"
"Not aboard? What do you mean?"
"After bringing you on last night he went ashore again to get a little ball of paper, but told me to sail the minute he returned. I don't understand it, ma'am, for later the watch woke me to say Mr. Graham had come."
"Good Lord," I groaned. "It was I, and not your father, who answered the watch."
For several minutes we stared blankly into each other's faces, but it was she who broke the deadly silence.
"We must hurry back," she calmly told him, adding with a nervous catch in her breath: "What a joke on Daddy!"
"A scream of a joke," I muttered, "——one he'll roar over till God-knows-when!"
"We can't go back, Miss Sylvia," the captain now said. "When our mainsheet parted the boom gybed so hard that it opened a seam. It may hold on this tack, and it may not, but we'd sink if the weather hit us on the other side. So I'm making for Key West."
A suspicious quiver played over her lips as the big fellow turned and went upstairs, and I began to hate myself rather cordially.
"Do you happen to have that—that ball of paper?" she asked, when the threatened storm of tears had been controlled.
"No, I threw it down."
A look of terror came into her eyes as she gasped:
"Then he'll find it!"
"It won't matter if he does! You hadn't written anything on it!"
"Did you look on both sides of it?"
"I—I think so; of course, I must have. Did you write on the other side?"
"I don't know which the other side is that you refer to," she answered with some show of anger. "There were two sides, you know. Still, it can't much matter now whether it had any sides or not."
This was very perplexing, the words no more so than the way she looked at me while pronouncing them. Yet I hardly thought it should give her as much concern as our leaky boat. The storm had grown worse, and more than once she glanced anxiously at the portholes whose glass, over half the time, were submerged by swirls of greenish water.
"It'll turn out all right," I said, gently. "And you mustn't be afraid of this storm."
"I'm not afraid!"
"Yes, you are," I tenderly persisted, "but your skipper looks like a man who'll bring us through."
"Your concern is most flattering," she frigidly replied. "But fear of storms, and distress over the unhappiness one may be causing others, are quite different phases of emotion."
"I stand corrected and rebuked," I humbly acknowledged. "Yet I want you to know that my concernsprings from a deeper source than flattery. I want honestly to assure you——"
"Of course, there's less danger here than in port," she continued in the same icy tone, utterly ignoring me, "for here, at least, we can't be boarded at night by irresponsible people."
I winced.
"By people who drink," she added.
I winced again, for I seemed to be getting the winces now, and couldn't stop.
"That isn't fair, Miss Graham! Circumstances are against me, but you might suspend judgment till you know me better!"
"The circumstances require no further evidence," she said, with supreme indifference.
"But circumstantial evidence," I felt pleased at turning her phrase, "often wears the cap and bells, instead of the wig and gown!"
"I'm discovering that," she murmured, and added with a touch of sarcasm: "The knack of making a catch phrase is often very agreeable, but presupposes no presence of an idea."
Now I thought this most unkind of her, because I had been quite set up by my retort; so, arising with as much dignity as the waves would permit, I buttoned my coat, remarking:
"Then I'll go on deck, and leave you."
The coat was tight and, while fastening it, I felt something in an inner pocket press against my side. There are few impulses more natural than to investigate anything that has a curious feel in one's pocket, so thrusting in my hand I brought forth a small round frame of brass, made in the imitation of a porthole, encircling her photograph. This would not have happenedhad I remembered being in her father's clothes, but it was done, and I stood looking first at the picture and then at her.
"Give it to me," she cried.
"I don't see why," I temporized, not at all loath at having this chance for revenge.
"It's mine," she imperiously announced.
"It may be a picture of you, but, as you perceive, not at this moment your picture," and my eyes lowered again and lingered on it, for it was indeed a wonderful likeness, moving me strangely by its amazing beauty. The frame, too, gave it added charm, as she seemed really to be looking out of a porthole.
"Give that to me this instant," she said, with such a show of passion that I passively surrendered it, and started to walk away. Yet some cruel power held my feet. I tried again to move, but could not.
Overhead the men were working desperately at the pumps to keep us afloat. One of them left his place and passed us, whispering:
"It's no use—we're gone!"
The cabin was in twilight as I again turned to her. She had crawled to the far corner of the couch, and lay staring at the ceiling—waiting. Here in this dismal room, alone and facing death with a courage amazing to behold, she made a picture which so stirred me that despite earlier wounded feelings I went to her side. The little hands were cold and inert when I took them, but her fingers tightened ever so gently.
"Did he say we're going down?" she quietly asked, without turning her head.
"Yes," I answered—though both of us spoke in whispers.
"I'm sorry to have been unkind," she said, withdrawing one of her hands and laying it on the back of my own—for Death is a great leveler of conventions.
The pathetic resignation in her voice brought hot tears to my eyes and, raising her fingers to my lips, I murmured:
"You're the sweetest angel I ever knew!"
For a long time we sat in the gathering darkness, holding to each other as two little children lost in the night. Finally I heard her whisper:
"Why am I not afraid—now?"
I turned and looked down at her; down into those eyes gazing back at me through a magnetizing moisture that drew my face nearer, nearer.
"Because," I said, "we've found something which outlives death!"
"Yes," she whispered, as her arms moved sweetly up around my neck—but the next instant they held me off, as she gasped: "Look! Look! The end is here!"
Quite a foot of water was swashing back and forth over the cabin floor, while a steady stream poured down the companionway stairs. Yes, the end was here!
"Take this," she hurriedly pressed into my hand the round brass frame that held her picture—the frame fashioned after a porthole. "Keep it—then come to me! Swear!"
"I swear," I gasped. "But where shall I find you? In what strange land will you be?"
Her eyes were wide with a frightened look that even in our extremity gave the lie to fear. Through parted, expectant lips a trembling sigh of inexpressible sweetness seemed to carry her answer; it was brought by the mystery of her look, by the clasp of our senses—for I know she did not speak a word:
"I'll wait beneath the palms on one of many, many islands,Set as emerald jewels in an ever-changing sea;My hammock swings beside a pool of purling, crystal waterWhisp'ring to the shadows of a lonely Arcady;The Spanish moss hangs solemn in long streamers from the cypress,The paths are soft and noiseless with dead needles of the pine,The nights are still and fragrant, and I'll wait——
"I'll wait beneath the palms on one of many, many islands,Set as emerald jewels in an ever-changing sea;My hammock swings beside a pool of purling, crystal waterWhisp'ring to the shadows of a lonely Arcady;The Spanish moss hangs solemn in long streamers from the cypress,The paths are soft and noiseless with dead needles of the pine,The nights are still and fragrant, and I'll wait——
Ah!" she broke the measure with a despairing cry and struggled to get from my arms, as another voice, far away but familiar, began to call my name. Then slowly my eyes opened and beheld Bilkins looking down at me, in my own stateroom, where my clothes were lying as I had thrown them off the night before.
"I've called you twice, sir," he was saying. "It's almost ten o'clock, and I'm afraid your bath is cold."
"I want it cold," I murmured, staring up at him. "God, Bilkins, I've had a most extraordinary dream!"
"If it's bad don't tell it before breakfast, sir, whatever you do! Just hold on a minute, and I'll bring your tray right in!"
I dressed hurriedly, wanting to be on deck and get a more searching view of the yacht near which we had anchored. Stepping out into the cockpit, therefore, I looked hungrily toward her mooring place, but it was vacant.
"Where has she gone?" I asked Tommy, who was the only one about.
"The etiquette of this yacht requires its owner first to say 'good morning' when he comes up at break of day," he grinned at me accusingly. "The little professor won eight hundred dollars from the proud Castilian last night—I hope Dame Fortune was as kind to you!"
"She was diverting," I admitted. "Where's Monsieur now?"
"'Sleep. We didn't turn in till an unholy hour. He got up at seven from force of habit, fussed around a while, took some pictures of the neighborhood and developed them, but by that time the poor old door-mat couldn't keep his eyes open. Do you know he wept all the way home last night, telling me how good we were to him?"
We laughed.
"But, Tommy, where's the yacht that was over there yesterday?"
"Her? Oh, she cleared this morning—and listen to me, boy, if you want to see a dream just cast your eye on that last film of Monsieur's!"
See a dream! Great heavens, if I wanted to see a dream!
He led the way aft to a ribbon of freshly developed film hanging from the boom to dry and, as I gingerly raised it to the light, he went on to explain:
"It was boorish of him, but I'm to blame. We were standing forward after breakfast snapping the harbor when that yacht weighed anchor and swung across our bow less than thirty feet off; and, Jack, with the prettiest girl I ever saw—barring Nell—looking out at us through a porthole. 'Shoot her,' I whispered. So he swung his camera and shot, and she gave a darling little gasp and ducked."
I had come to the last negative and there, with the porthole in exact imitation of the round brass frame, was the same beautiful face of the same beautiful girl I'd left in that wondrous dream!
"Sylvia Graham," I cried.
"The devil," Tommy straightened up. "Graham's the chap who owns that boat! Gates found it out this morning, but how did you know?"
My eyes were glued to the negative.
"They cleared for Key West, Tommy?"
"So Gates said. Has he told you?"
"I haven't seen him since yesterday," I murmured, still unable to look away from that strip of gelatine which held the image of my world.
"He didn't know anything about it yesterday, either," Tommy announced, and I felt him regarding me in some slight amusement, as though he thought I had a secret up my sleeve that I was trying to keepfrom him. "What's the cute little idea, son? I've told you where she cleared for, now clear me up!"
"Tommy," I let the film swing back and caught him by the shoulders, "Miss Graham's father carries a photograph like that in the inside pocket of a white flannel coat which hangs behind his stateroom door!"
He looked me up and down, this time more seriously, and murmured:
"Whiz-bang!—but you must have been heroically decorated last night! Still, I can't see that it hurt you much, for you look about twice as fit as when we left Miami."
"I'll bet I didn't drink an ounce more than you, or Monsieur," I declared. "The facts of the matter are, Tommy, that there's a lot mighty curious about this picture!"
"Really?" he grinned. "You go below and take something with a dash of bitters in it."
"Dry up," I snapped. "I tell you I'm going to catch up with that yacht if we have to follow her around the world!"
He gave a low whistle, saying with good-natured tolerance:
"Looks like the big adventure's on the wing, doesn't it! Well, I don't mind chasing the old tub, or doing any other damphule thing in reason, but what's the game? Put me next! When was this earthquake that loosened all your little rivets? Speak up, son—I'm yourpadre!"
"It's hard to explain," I turned again to the negative, feeling too serious for his asinine humor. "But I'll honestly try to before night. This girl needs me. I don't know why or how, but she does. What's more,I'm going to find her. It's the most unheard-of situation, old man."
"I'd be ashamed to belittle a situation like this by the mere term 'unheard-of,'" he now laughed outright. "Anyhow, she doesn't need you at present quite as much as you need scientific attention—and I hear the professor moving around!"
Stepping to the companionway door he bawled some nonsense to our guest about bringing up his medicine chest and a rope, then turned back to me.
"You see, Jack, I consider this to be serious. As long as I've known you that lady in the porthole is the first female you've ever thought of with any sign of, what I might call,ardeur. Where you met her is your business, but how you're going to get her must naturally concern us all. Hence Monsieur to consult with!"
We could hear Monsieur's grunts and wheezes before he appeared, and on catching sight of me he actually skipped to us. It was a grotesque exhibition that made me burst out laughing. His hair was tousled, his eyes were half closed, and he looked about as much like a scrambled egg as anything I could think of.
"We lost you last night," he cried. "You ran away from us?"
"He was poisoned," Tommy blandly answered, "and now his heart's kind of upside-down and twisty."
"Upside-down and twisty?" he gasped.
"Tommy doesn't mean it's anything dangerous, just an affection; a kind of—a kind of——"
"A kind of affectionate affection," Tommy put in. "You see, he was stung there, and it itches, and he can't scratch it."
"Stung on the heart?Sacré nomme!" The old fellow clasped his head in both hands and stared at us.
"You fascinating little ass," Tommy murmured, "did you ever hear of love?"
"Love?" the professor's face beamed into twice its usual breadth. "You, my boy Jack? Is she a Spanish mademoiselle?"
"Good Lord, whoever heard of a Spanish mademoiselle! No, Jack says that she's a lady in need, who lives in the pocket of her father's white serge coat that hangs behind his stateroom door; and she's in a helluva lot of trouble, but Jack doesn't know where else she is, so we're going to comb out the universe and find her! Get the idea?"
"I will drink some coffee," he stammered, and disappeared.
Tommy and I decided that we must be after theOrchidwithout losing a minute, as there was still a chance of drawing in sight of her before she could leave Key West. Yet I first had a mission to fulfill at the café, nor did I confide this at once to him lest he brand me a total wreck. I knew that he was delighted at the prospect of this bizarre chase, however chimeric it might seem to him, for he possessed the faculty of "playing-true" even in the veriest of fairy-tales. So for the moment I let the other matter rest, not realizing at the time that he had read more of it in my face than I meant to show.
Gates, also, had caught the excitement and was waiting with the launch to push off; and thus, while he concluded official duties at the port, I entered the café—in the present unfriendly light a changed place from the night before. As luck would have it, my own waiter was the first man I saw.
"Do you remember finding a small piece of crumpled paper on my table last night?" I asked.
"Si, Señor; the madcaballerocame for it."
"Did he get it?"
"But, no, Señor," the waiter lowered his voice. "Yet he came near to, being much angry, and calling you—pardon me!"
"Well, what? What, man?"
He still hesitated, so I carelessly took out my wallet. It's amazing, the power of a wallet!
"He demanded the paper of ourmaître d'hôtel, saying you, Señor, were a pig of a detective—and as we admire the detective not at all, everyone searched for it. But I had seen other things, Señor," he smiled knowingly.
"You have it?"
"Si, si,—but not so loud! Could I give it to the old one? Even a poor waiter may sometimes observe!Mas vale saber que haber, Señor," he shrugged and smiled as the ancient proverb slipped from his tongue.
"You've a mighty level head on you, kid," I agreed; a metaphor he may or may not have understood. There was no doubt in my mind that his words, "wisdom is better than wealth," were never more aptly spoken.
"I saw it after you left, Señor, and put it away—so! The madcaballerosoon came—he was not happy. We searched the floor, and all the time he was shaking his head and mumbling that Mademoiselle had confessed to writing it—and to a detective! He was quite crazy. Ah, with what care and sympathy did I help him, Señor, and how generously did he reward my careful search!"
He shrugged and smiled, then drew the paper from his pocket, and I slipped it into mine—passing him back another kind of paper that he slipped into his with a grateful bow.
"Do you know who the man is, or if that was his daughter?"
"No, Señor. I have seen them, but can not remember where. Carlos served their table—but Carlos is stupid," he shrugged compassionately.
The moment my cab turned the first corner I feverishly took out that precious paper. Sure enough, on one side were marksIhad not seen, but the pencilling was very faint—having had the soft tablecloth for a desk, perhaps—and showed only a meandering line, curving in and out through a group of dots. From every angle I studied it, coming to two conclusions: first, that it could mean nothing; and second, that I must have imbibed more freely than I thought to have overlooked this.
But now I saw, fainter than the dots, something that resembled written words. They were so obscure, indeed, that although the light was excellent my jostling cab made it impossible for me to decipher them. Telling the driver to stop, I bent over again, and laboriously read:
"I am on Mr. Graham's yacht in great da——"
At this place, as I looked back upon last night, the old chap had indicated his wish to leave, and she, tearing off a corner, had let the wine card slip to the floor. It explained the broken word, the sudden interruption; and this much was not a dream, neither was the disturbing message in my hands—for what else but "danger" could the "da" mean?
All was ready to weigh anchor when I stepped aboard, and when we were outside the harbor, drawing nicely toward the north, Tommy came up grumbling.
"This mystery's getting heavy," he said. "Put us wise!"
So I pushed him into a chair, and called the professor and Gates; then when the four of us were comfortably settled, the cushions fitting our shoulders, our pipes alight, our spirits glowing with that exhilaration which a yacht can bring as she lays over and cuts the waves, I told the story from beginning to end—sparing Sylvia where I should.
For some minutes they smoked with their eyes downcast. Then Monsieur looked up in his mild way, asking:
"May I see the paper?"
I passed it to him and we drew together, studying it.
"This is the most singular part of the affair," he said, leaning back, "because it first came to you in fact, although the man's returning for it was told in the dream—and later verified. The dots and line mean nothing, perhaps, but that interrupted message!—ah, truly it spells danger! What danger? She spoke of no danger in the dream?"
Now, it may seem strange or not, but I had begun to lose track of the places where the dream came in and where they left off. The actual was so woven with the unreal that I had to stop and consider this question. The paper episode, the vividness with which Sylvia had appeared to me, the brass frame made in the imitation of a porthole, and the camera's film, all contributed to a confusion not unshared by my three friends.
"It's a darned funny coincidence," said Tommy, in an awed voice. "But, Jack, you don't think more seriously of it, do you?"
"Would we be chasing these people if I didn't?" I temporized with another question.
He seemed to be troubled, glancing toward thethoughtful professor as if expecting him to speak, and when this was not forthcoming he asked again:
"Well, friend gezabo, what do you think?"
The little scientist lowered his pipe, sighed and impressively answered:
"It is not given to all men to see this invisible agency at work."
The profoundly solemn way he said this made Tommy's eyes grow round. Ghost and mystery tales imparted during his childhood by black mammies and other negro servants had endowed him with a considerable amount of superstition that not infrequently prevailed against his better judgment. So now, when the erudite Monsieur treated my experience with reverence, even introducing an element of mysticism, Tommy wavered.
"Whiz-bang! You don't really believe that spooky stuff, do you?"
"To my knowledge," Monsieur answered, "I have seen one case. You have heard me speak of Azuria. Well, many years ago a friend of mine, daughter of our King Christopher, fell to worrying about her cousin, a profligate who divided his time between the palace and Paris. As a punishment for various escapades the King had curtailed his allowance to a mere pittance, yet he seemed in spite of this to have as much money as before. It was this fact that worried my friend—the fear of a scandal.
"One night she dreamed that her child, a girl of nearly three, was being kidnaped. She arose in her sleep to follow, walking the length of the palace, and awoke to find herself in the cousin's room—standing, indeed, behind his chair as he bent beneath a shadedlamp earnestly working on a plate for spurious money. Instantly she threatened to expose him to the King.
"Well, to shorten a long story, that night he did actually kidnap the child, leaving a note to my friend in which he suggested a compromise. But there was no compromise with villainy in her make-up. The old King was much affected. Yet there were things in the air at that time, delicate situations of state, which demanded consideration. The kidnaping, if made public, would have produced a most disquieting effect in certain quarters. Our treaty with a powerful state had just been signed, based on the little princess' betrothal—you see? Therefore, her disappearance must be kept a secret for a while, so the police of the world were not notified. But that night ten men—a few of them loyal subjects and the others paid agents—left the capital. Thus a relentless search began, being carried to the ends of the world. A noted rogue, that fellow was—yet, strange to say, in earlier life a man of parts, an esthetic, an artist and musician of great ability; butmon Dieu, what a scoundrel!"
"Where did they find the little princess?" Tommy asked, after a pause.
"She was never found," he answered softly. "Word once came that she had died; again that she lived—but this I begin to doubt. So her mother reigns as regent, and in sorrow. Old Christopher had two daughters, the younger of whom——" but he stopped in confusion, his face turning very red. Later I remembered this.
We fell into a silence, a mutual sympathy for the bereaved lady who had been so wronged. At last Tommy asked:
"Do you cross your heart that Jack's dream was anything like the one she had?"
"Dream?" Monsieur ran his fingers through his shock of hair. "Who can say? Was she dreaming, or did she see a vision? If a vision, why did it mislead by urging her into the very step that brought disaster? That scoundrel might never have considered kidnaping the child had the mother remained unsuspicious of his occupation! Yet visions are sent to warn against, not to court dangers. Again, some hold that he happened to be contemplating this step as a means of escape should discovery come, and so it was his thought transmitted to her."
"For goodness sake talk sense," I cried. "What difference does it make whether they were dreams or nightmares, or how much the cousin was thinking! What we want to know is where does my dream come in!"
He looked so hurt that I apologized by saying his fairy talk had sent me off my head. Small wonder, for when our guest attempted to explain a theory he proceeded on the assumption that we were as well versed in it as himself. Anyway, we smoothed him down and now, looking at us solemnly, he said:
"Latter-day English-speaking psychologists to the contrary notwithstanding, we know in the East that souls do travel abroad; that they will speak, one to another, while our bodies sleep—while we are steeped in that mysterious period of mimic death which leads us so uncannily near their twilight zone! Some men hold that our dreams are vagaries, as a puff of air or a passing breeze; others that they are unfulfilled desires; still others that they are the impress made by another soul upon the subliminal part of us, that leaves to our active senses but imperfectly translatable hieroglyphics. Does that show you nothing?"
"Well," I temporized, "I can't say it shows me much. How about you, Tommy?"
"Smell a little smoke, but don't see any bright light yet. Elucidate, professor!"
He sighed, giving us a look of pity, I thought.
"If I call to a man, and the space is great, my voice may fail before reaching him. Yet if it hangs its vibrations on a puff of air, a passing breeze that blows in his direction, he hears me! So does the soul employ the passing breeze—by which I mean the capricious thing called dreaming—to enter our consciousness that might not otherwise be reached. The impossibility is to say which is which—that is, which is the unfulfilled desire, which is but the capricious passing breeze, and which is the message from another! If in the dark an uneducated fellow sits at a piano he might play several lovely chords, yet while they sounded well there would be no intelligence behind them. Such is the chance dream! But a master-player could produce a rhapsody, expressing to one who listened hope, love, desire, warning—everything. Such is the harmonious blending of soul and soul in sleep! And how can we tell which is which?"
He paused and gazed out at the water, and I saw in his face the peculiarly wistful expression that so often accompanies thoughts which are both elusive and far away. The index finger of his right hand was slightly raised, indicating a subconscious impulse to point upward. Slowly turning back to us, he said in a tone of solemnity that lingers with me even now, a year later, as I write of it:
"In the Psalms we find these merciful words: 'He giveth His beloved sleep.' Yet they are but an imperfect translation of the original, which reads: 'HegivethtoHis belovedinsleep.' Do you not see here a greater meaning? Do your minds not at once grasp the corollary?"
"Then you mean," Tommy asked, "that every dream is intended to express something?"
"I will not go quite that far, although there are men highly practiced in the science of psycho-analytical research who stoutly affirm it. Ah, the great difficulty is in drawing the line—in determining which dreams are but passing breezes and which are sent to us upon the wings of angels!"
"You've studied those things," I ventured. "Which was mine?"
"Study!" he cried, with a fine degree of scorn. "Yes, we study! We gather around the brink of a black well and steep ourselves in thought; we wrinkle our brows and tear our beards. Cries one: 'I know what is down there!' Another turns to him: 'You lie!' A third challenges: 'Prove yourselves!' And thus do professors, students, psychologists, churchmen, laymen, infidels, and fools, gather about the pit! This much for study," he snapped his finger. "Unless a man have faith, he is in darkness to the end of his days!"
"All the same, I believe someone tried to warn the princess," Tommy insisted. "And it couldn't have been anything less than a master-player that got off that rhapsody to Jack last night!" There was a note of teasing in this that the others did not detect.
"Well, Mr. Thomas, you're wrong, sir." Gates, who had been listening attentively, now uncrossed his legs and spoke. "There isn't a single curious thing in Mr. Jack's dream. Anyone can see how it came about—with my apologies to you, sir," he bowed to Monsieur.
We laughed, because Gates had not impressed us as being much of a psychologist, and Tommy said:
"If you explain how he knew what Graham's name was, I'll listen."
"Why, sir, he saw it on the paper the night before—for it was there, as sure as you live, and he says he looked at the paper. The only thing is, he didn't know he saw it—being a little gone in his cups, as you might say. But he did see it, and it soaked into his head, waiting till arfter he got to sleep before stirring around."
"That's my first clear idea," Tommy's face brightened; and Gates, thus encouraged, added:
"The reason he dreamed the old man went ashore for the paper was because he saw the lady being watched when she came back to her table—and I'll venture he thought right then that the old one was about to come back, too, and see what she was doing. Didn't you, sir?"
"I believe I did," I murmured.
"So that stuck in his mind and came out the wrong way, just like dreams sometimes will. As for the photograph and brass frame—why, Mr. Thomas, you and the professor took on so about that picture when he'd developed it that Mr. Jack could have heard you in his sleep, and got that part of his dream from what you said!"
"It does fit, doesn't it," Tommy cried. "And, Jack, the poetry Sylvia breathed at you—wasn't it about the same thing our little Spanish girl sang?"
"It had the same general idea," I admitted.
"There you are, sir," Gates announced, with a satisfied air. "So there isn't a thing unusual about yourdream, arfter all. It's as reasonable as the general run."
Monsieur did not relish having his big occult smoke blown away in this fashion; he looked at us with rather a sickish expression, as a boy might have if someone stuck a pin in his toy balloon. But it was such a relief to get back to practicalities that we let him sulk.
"Jack," Tommy asked, "do you think her real name is Sylvia?"
"Yes; I'm sure of that, anyhow!"
"How're you sure of it?"
"It fits her so absolutely," I answered with decision.
"But Revenge would fit her, too, wouldn't it? That's sweet," he grinned.
"Or Constancy," the professor smiled, for once becoming inspired as he threw off his grouch.
"Try Ignorance!" This again from Tommy, who made an attempt to look blissful and only succeeded in making himself ridiculous, I thought.
Old Gates now stretched, cocked an eye up at the weather and, in a drawl, asked:
"Would it be supposing a great deal, sir, to suggest that the lady might be named Much-Learning?"
Whereupon we laughed uproariously, and Tommy slapped him on the knee, exclaiming:
"Papa Gates, you've hit it! Truly, she hath made us mad!"
"All the same," I cried, arising and laughing down at them, "there's one thing you can't explain away! The big adventure's come at last!—the wildest chase——"
"Love chase," Tommy interposed.
"Chase," I repeated, "that man ever started! Are you fellows game enough to see it through—to the very end?"
"Arewe?" Tommy yelled, springing to his feet. "To the very end! What say, Gates?—Professor?"
"To the very end, sir," the old skipper's face beamed happily.
"Why, yes, my boys," Monsieur declared. "To the very end,—certainement!"
And Gates must have confided this to the crew, for later, as I passed the mate, that worthy gave his forelock a pull and whispered:
"To the very end, sir!"
It pleased me immensely.
A perfect tropical night crept down on us, with the sky a deep and velvety blue, and the stars low enough to touch. Brilliant phosphorescence dashed from our bow and a silvery streak trailed in our wake emphasizing the enchantment as theWhimrose, leaned, and dipped over the bosom of the breathing Gulf. So, also, were my hopes; now up, now down, on the breast of another fickle monster. Love and the sea! Have they not always been counterparts? Do they not span the known and unknown in each man's world, carrying some in safety—others destroying?
It must have been nine o'clock when the forward watch called and, springing to the rail, peering through the darkness, we saw down upon the horizon the fixed white eye and three red sectors of the Key West light.
"A good run, Gates."
"Nothing of our size can beat it, sir."
"You think theOrchidwill be in harbor?"
"I carn't say, sir. She had six hours' start of us, and could have left."
"How long do we lay off this burg?" Tommy asked, sauntering up.
"That depends. If the mysterious yacht's here we'll stay till something happens."
"And if she isn't," he nudged the professor, "we'll comb out the universe. You get that, don't you? Anice fat job, I'll say it is! How'll we know which way to start? Gates, couldn't you get a peep at her papers in the port?" But the skipper solemnly shook his head, saying:
"It carn't be done, sir."
"Well, Jack, when customs are finished we'll take the launch and comb out the harbor, anyhow! She'll be anchored nearby, like as not."
Not caring to tie up at the dock we chose a berth far enough out to escape the electric glare ashore, and had hardly swung-to when Gates was off in his gig to clear our papers. The port officials were astir and accommodatingly looked us over without loss of time, for the skipper had mentioned our wish to leave whenever the spirit moved us. Those, indeed, had been his identical words, and I wondered if they were prophetic—whenever the spirit moved us!
They were a nice pair of fellows, those American officers, and before going into business—a mere formality in our case—we gathered in the cockpit for a long straw and a bowl of ice. The occasion was more agreeable for possessing that sense of aloofness one feels at being on the edge, yet safely beyond the reach, of a little city's night diversions and excitements.
"I suppose you've nothing dutiable," one said, knowing we had left Havana unexpectedly soon.
"Nothing," Tommy volunteered.
"But, yes," Monsieur exclaimed. "I shall declare!"
"About the only thing he brought away was a wad of money from a roulette game," I laughed.
"Ah, I surprise you," he cried, in high good humor, ducking below; and was soon heard struggling up the stairs, crying: "Give me help!"
Into our hands then he began thrusting packages ofcigars; packages containing a dozen boxes each, until the cockpit looked like moving day in a tobacco shop. Behind the last of these, he came.
"Oh,là là," Tommy's jaw dropped. "Where did you tie up with this stuff? We've been together all the time!"
"Not all the time," the professor chuckled. "Before you were awake this morning I was in town for camera supplies, and brought back, also, much of that most genial and ameliorating of influences exerted upon us in life—cigars! How much do I pay?"
"How many have you?"
"Ten thousand."
"Ten thousand cigars!" We stared at him.
"That's a lot of ameliorating influence," one of the officers laughed. "But, in spite of it, I'll have to charge you on nine thousand, nine hundred—unless a hundred belong to each of your friends. Everyone's entitled to bring in a hundred free."
"A hundred are mine," Tommy spoke up at once. "I haven't won cigars so fast, ever! Jack, you for a hundred. Gates, you, too. Colonel," he turned to the officer—out of the Army he scattered the titles of Colonel, Judge, Governor and Parson with a free hand—"suppose you all take a hundred each. It'll be a whole lot cheaper for Sir Walter, here!"
The professor was giggling.
"They have cost me nothing," he cried, "for last night I have won almost a thousand dollars at that wretched place—see, here is plenty with which to pay!"
And a fortunate thing it was that he had, being called on for something in the neighborhood of three hundred dollars.
The officer—Hardwick, by name—and his associatewere good fellows, as I have said. They had greeted us as congenial spirits and, probably on this account, I noticed some embarrassment on his part when he leaned into the light and slowly looked over the money Monsieur had given him. The rest of us were conversing in a more or less distrait fashion till this unpleasant duty should be finished, when he took an electric torch from his pocket and flashed it on one of the bills; then on another, and so through the lot. Hesitatingly he touched Monsieur's arm, asking:
"Is this the money you won last night?"
"That? It is just as they paid me."
A moment of silence, then:
"I'm sorry to tell you, but these two fifty-dollar bills are counterfeits."
There ensued an absolute hush, and before my eyes arose the vision of Sylvia's father paying his supper check with a crisp fifty.
"Counterfeit," the professor mused, putting out a hand for them and moving nearer the light. "Strange! Just today I was speaking of a counterfeiter!" And Tommy, in an awed voice, asked:
"You don't think it's more dreams?"
The officials, I rather suspected, were beginning to look at us askance. Our various attitudes at this discovery were scarcely in accordance with the usually accepted actions of innocent people; on the contrary, with but a grain of imagination, we might be branded as a trio of rascals trying to stall out of a tight place. My apprehension was more confirmed when Hardwick, a shade less cordial, said:
"As a United States official, I should like to hear your views about these."
Now Tommy looked across at me and I saw that hewas awake. Monsieur, on the other hand, remained blissfully indifferent that anything might be out of the ordinary—except, of course, being loaded with a hundred dollars of bad money, which does not happen every day.
"My counterfeiter?" he smiled innocently. "Yes, he could have done these. His plates are all but perfect. And these bills—you will admit they almost fooled you!" Whereupon he laughed.
Tommy fidgeted, saying:
"Have a care, gezabo, or you'll be sending us to the rock pile!"
"My friend is cut-upping," Monsieur beamed on the official, but met with no more hearty response than the dry acquiescence:
"I've no doubt of it. But suppose you tell me more of your other friend—the counterfeiter!"
"Friend?Myfriend?" Monsieur's face now became the picture of horror. "I was telling these boys of one who disappeared years ago, and afterwards the police showed me some plates found in his rooms!Myfriend!"
Hardwick began to laugh.
"Please accept my apologies, but, really, for the moment——"
"Don't mention it," Tommy interrupted him, handing across a newly opened box of cigars. "I understand you—the professor couldn't!"
Returning to the important subject, Hardwick said:
"Whoever put these out is probably in Cuba. You got them at the café——?"
"Quite so," Monsieur exclaimed, warming up with the notion of doing detective work. "I was playing roulette—but, pardon me, you have heard."
"Do you remember any one around the table who showed new-looking bills?"
"No. We were the only ones playing, and but a few were looking on."
"The restaurant was crowded," Tommy said, "and connects with the gambling rooms. Mightn't they send money back and forth if needed?"
"Quite probable."
In the silence that followed I started twice to tell him that Sylvia's father had used a new bill of that denomination, yet the words would not come. It seemed a sneaky thing to do, after she had turned to me for help. Yet, if she were in danger, what quicker way to safety than arrest the old vulture who had her in his power? So I said:
"Mr. Hardwick, last night in that restaurant I saw a man——" but this time something stopped my words. It was a voice, a girl's voice, beautiful with an impassioned ring of protest, that cried from some place near us on the water:
"It isn't fair!"
It isn't fair! Oh, the just and pleading accusation of that cry! I sprang up, loudly calling her name:
"Sylvia!"
There was not a breath of sound. Those with whom I had been conversing were as mute as graven images, but in the black pall just beyond our taffrail drifted the magnetic presence toward which every nerve and fiber of my body pointed;—pointed, aye, tugged and wrestled with my poor flesh to be free! Yet, silence; all silence. No sound, no vision, no anything to guide me, other than my flashing brain and thumping heart which spoke of her.
I saw one of our sailors staring at the water with strange owlish eyes, and yelled at him:
"Into the gig, man!"
But this was frustrated before he moved, for some black shadow, showing vaguely, glided out from beneath our rail and disappeared. I could not be sure that I saw it, but the sailor did because he crossed himself.
"It ain't no use—now, sir," he managed to say.
My own eyes were trying to follow the eerie, silent thing which had passed so spookily into the night, leaving the merest suggestion of phosphorescence after it. Then an arm slipped affectionately about my shoulders, and I felt that Tommy was also standing by, looking along the trail of deadened sound. His face showed excitement, but he whispered steadily enough:
"Come and sit down."
Indeed, now that the thing had disappeared, I felt like an ass; and, resuming my seat, attempted to make the best of it.
"Really," I laughed, "you fellows mustn't judge a man too critically. There was something in the voice of that young lady which took me off my guard, and recalled—well, it recalled what you've all probably had recalled by one means or another, at some time or other, during your—er—lives." And I gave a weakish smile, waving my hand toward any old thing in sight by way of saying: "You know, old chaps, how just that one girl plays the devil with a fellow, sometimes!"
But the government officials received this in a different spirit than that which I had hoped to arouse. They looked at me with a gravity most disquieting, and Hardwick, suspicion written in every line of his face, asked:
"Is the young lady a member of your party?"
"Heavens, no," I answered quickly. "Oh, no," Ivigorously repeated. "We don't know her, at all—none of us!"
An ominous silence followed this emphatic denial, and I could actuallyfeelhim making up his mind about us. It was an awful moment. At last Tommy flecked the ash from his cigar and, with great deliberation, asked:
"Colonel, do you believe in ghosts?"
"If you're serious," Hardwick snapped, "I certainly do not!"
"I'm serious, all right," Tommy purred, and I knew, from the unusually soft quality of his voice, that, indeed, he was—"for, if you don't believe in ghosts, you believe we're a bunch of damn crooks—oh, yes you do!—and I may say that if you don't, you're a damn fool.Nowyou see how serious I am, and how serious this affair is! This man was telling the exact truth when he said that none of us have ever heard that voice. If we actually did hear it just now, the coincidence that brought a small boat past us at this time of night, and prompted some woman in it to speak when and what she did, is more inexplicable to me than you think it is to you—because you've made up your mind to understand it. I can, however, understand how any sweet voice on a night like this might make my friend skid off his usually sane and normal track, because——" he hesitated, adding slowly: "Hardwick, I can't go into my friend's private affairs, but I wish to tell you that he's had a hell of a jolt, and on account of a memory—a memory, Hardwick—we're at Key West tonight. I trust, sir, that you won't misjudge, but rather fit these fragments and supply the needed others; for I know that your appreciation of—er—things is too delicate to allow me to proceed."
Be it noted that Tommy did tell but the simple truth;and, what is more, he told it with such sincerity that, in a large measure, our embarrassment became shifted over to our guests. Personally, I felt like a howling ass to be staked out and exhibited as somebody's jilted Romeo, but this was a welcome compromise; thrice welcome, since Hardwick's next words showed that he had forgotten, or dismissed, the prelude to my burst of confidence about "a man in the restaurant," for arising he said:
"Well, we've kept you longer than we should. If this gentleman will give my government good money for its revenue we'll bid youbon voyage. I suppose there's no objection to my keeping those?" He pointed to the spurious bills.
"I have paid dearly for them," the professor remonstrated.
"I'm sorry, but you won't lose any more than you've already lost—nor gain more, as you won't think of using them!"
"Why should I not use them? I will use them—certainement!"
"Be explicit, or forever hold your peace," Tommy laughed. "Can't you see the man reaching for his handcuffs?"
But Monsieur, thoroughly aroused, waved the crisp bills with a great show of indignation, crying:
"If there is a way to run this cheat to earth I, alone, will know it! Then you will want me to be telling you! For my own pleasure I have made a study of counterfeiters and their methods. Perhaps it may surprise you to learn that the police of Europe come to Bucharest and consult with me, eh? Thus, if I may also help you, I must retain my bills!"
We laughed, although I felt tremendously proud ofthe professor, having had no idea he was such a wonder; and Hardwick said, bowing:
"Then help yourself so I, also, may be helped. But let me take one for my government and, when you finish with the other, mail it to me with your report. I shall appreciate your assistance, really."
Monsieur was delighted.
They left us then, and again we settled about the cockpit; each waiting for one of the others to begin. My own thoughts were like a whirlwind, and my ears strained with listening toward the black Gulf—listening for a voice, or the unnamable noise of the gods knew what, that might float to me across the water. I think Tommy half expected me to suggest that we take one of the small boats, and went to his room to put on darker clothes. In a few minutes Monsieur yawned and followed him—though I rather suspected that his yawn was caused more by nervousness than the want of sleep. A moment later Gates, standing near the wheel, softly called my name, so I arose and went to him.
It must be remembered that Gates was absolutely dependable. There were no frills about the old skipper, he shared not one superstitious sentiment in common with Tommy, and it is extremely doubtful if he knew the sensation of fear; therefore, when I saw his face, I was astonished, and in alarm asked:
"Are you ill?"
"No, sir, but I'm sore upset. Please come a bit more aft, sir."
Taking a few steps till we were abaft the traveler, he turned and whispered:
"Mr. Jack, someone's been trying to blow us up!"