A LUCKY MEETING
Half a dozen men had come out to the _Columbia_ with Holmes and Bates,
and now, while Holmes himself disappeared for a minute, beckoning to
Trenwith to go with him, the other men watched Eleanor and the three
girls. They drew off to a little distance, but they kept their eyes on
them.
"They don't look as if they could run very fast," said Dolly, hopefully.
"Don't you think we might be able to make a break and get away?"
"Where to, Dolly? This is an island, remember, and we don't know
anything about it at all. We wouldn't know where to run, if we did have
luck enough to get a good start--and we wouldn't get very far."
"I suppose that's so," said Dolly, her face falling. "Oh, what a horrid
shame! Just when everything seemed so nice and peaceful!"
"There's one thing," said Eleanor, her face set and stern. "They can't
hold me forever--or, at least, I don't suppose they can. And someone is
going to be sorry for this or my name's not Eleanor Mercer!"
"I don't understand it yet," said Bessie, who, although the capture
meant more to her than it did to any of the others, had not given way to
her emotions, and seemed as cool and calm as if she had been safely back
on Plum Beach.
"It's only too easy to understand," said Eleanor, bitterly. "Charlie was
deceived in his friend, Mr. Trenwith. He's just as easy to bribe as Jake
Hoover. That's all. He cares more for money and success than he does for
his reputation as an honorable man. I'm disappointed in him--but I
suppose I ought not to be surprised."
"Well, I _am_ surprised," said Dolly, defiantly. "And I'm sure, somehow,
that he's all right. I think he was just as badly fooled as the rest of
us. Mr. Holmes probably wants us to think as badly of him as possible,
so that, if he should try to help us, we wouldn't trust him."
"I wish I could believe that, Dolly. But the evidence against him is too
strong, I'm afraid. Hush, we musn't talk. Here is Mr. Holmes coming
back. I don't want him to think that we're afraid--it would please him
too much."
With Mr. Holmes, as he came toward them, was a woman in servant's garb,
middle aged, and sour in her appearance.
"This woman will attend to you, Miss Mercer," he said. "She will do
whatever you tell her--unless it should happen to conflict with the
orders she has from me. But she won't talk to you about me, or about
this place because she knows that if she does I will find out about it,
and she will have reason to regret it."
"I'm very much pleased by one thing, Mr. Holmes," said Eleanor. "You've
shown yourself in your true colors at last. I suppose you understand
that when I get back to the city I shall see to it that everyone knows
the truth about you. I don't think you will find yourself welcome in the
homes of any decent people after I tell what I know."
"I'm sorry, Miss Mercer," he said. "Of course you must do what you think
best. But it really won't do any good. I could do things a great deal
worse than this, and still, with the money I happen to have, people
would keep on fawning on me, and pestering me with their attentions and
their invitations as much as ever."
"Perhaps you're right, but I intend to find out. May I ask how long you
intend to keep me here as a prisoner?"
"You are my guest, Miss Mercer, not my prisoner. Please don't act as if
I were as great a villain as that. Losing your temper will not improve
matters in any way, you know--really it won't. As for your question, I
think Bessie and Zara will be in the quite competent care of their old
friend Silas Weeks by noon to-morrow and then there will be no further
reason for keeping you here."
"Then, unless you are remarkably quick in getting out of the country,
Mr. Holmes, you ought to be under arrest for kidnapping by to-morrow
night."
Holmes laughed.
"Oh, do let's be friends!" he said. "You and your friends have really
given me a lot of trouble. But do I bear you any malice? Not I! If you
hadn't taken care of those misguided girls after they ran away from
Hedgeville, none of this would have come about."
"I suppose you think you have some excuse for acting in this fashion?"
"I certainly have, Miss Mercer. The very best. After all, why shouldn't
I tell you? It's too late for you to do me any harm now--I have won the
game."
"But there will be a return match. Don't forget that! My father is as
rich as you are, Mr. Holmes, and when he hears of the way I have been
treated, he will spend his last cent, if necessary, to get his revenge
on you."
"Dear me, I hope he won't do anything so foolish, Miss Mercer! It would
be a dreadful waste of money--and he wouldn't get it, in any case.
However, I don't want you to be needlessly worried. Zara will soon be
safe with her father. She won't have to stay very long with the
estimable Farmer Weeks. You know, I really don't blame her for disliking
him."
Zara gave a little cry of joy.
"Will I see my father? Is he well?" she cried.
"Quite well--but very obstinate," said Holmes. "That's your fault, too,
Miss Mercer. I'm sorry to say that lately he has seemed to be inclined
to listen to your cousin, Mr. Jamieson. He is willing, you see, to deal
with whoever happens to be in charge of his daughter. He knows our
friend Silas very well--too well, I think. And so, when he knows that
Zara is being looked after by him, I think he will be glad to meet my
terms, and so secure his freedom."
"You brute!" said Eleanor, hotly. "What are your terms?"
"Ah, that would be telling! You will have to wait to discover that. You
see, Silas Weeks wasn't quite as stupid as the rest of the people at
Hedgeville, and when he couldn't find out what old Slavin was doing
there, he came to me--because he thought I probably could."
"Slavin!" said Eleanor, in an amazed tone. "Is that your father's name,
Zara? Why didn't you tell us?"
"He told me not to," said Zara, nervously.
"Zara's father had one bad fault; he wasn't at all ready to trust
people," Holmes went on, easily. "He didn't even trust me as he should
have done, and he's been positively insulting to Weeks. It's made a lot
of trouble for him."
He looked at his watch, then turned to the servant.
"Go upstairs and make the rooms comfortable for Miss Mercer at once," he
said. "It's getting late." Then he turned to the men who had accompanied
him to the _Columbia_. "It's all right, boys," he said. "You needn't
wait."
"These people keep their ears entirely too wide open," he explained to
Eleanor. "I have to be rather careful with them, though they probably
wouldn't understand much if they did hear. Well, that is about all I've
got to tell you, anyhow. You see, you needn't worry about your friend
Zara. As to Bessie--well, that's different."
He looked at Bessie malevolently.
"I don't think I care to tell you anything more about her," he said.
"Weeks will look after her all right--as well as she deserves to be
looked after."
Bessie seemed to be nervous as he looked at her, and edged away from
him.
"If you think you can keep Bessie in the care of that man Weeks," said
Eleanor, "you are going to find yourself decidedly mistaken. He won't
treat her properly, and if he doesn't, the courts won't compel her to
stay there. I know enough law for that, and I tell you now, that, even
though you may have some sort of law on your side just now, because you
have played this trick, you won't be able to count on the law much
longer. It will be as powerful against you, properly used, as it has
been for you, improperly used."
"Oh!" Holmes laughed, unpleasantly. There was no mirth in the laugh,
only mockery and contempt. "Really, Miss Mercer--why, where has that
little baggage gone to?"
He stared wildly about the room, and Eleanor, startled, looked about her
also. Bessie had disappeared; vanished into thin air. In a rage, Holmes
darted here and there about the great hall of the house in which they
had been standing. But, though he looked behind curtains and all the
larger pieces of furniture, and made a great fuss, he found no sign of
her. For a moment he was completely baffled, and almost beside himself
with rage.
"I always thought villains were clever," said Dolly, as he stood still.
Her voice was scornful. "Why, even a girl like Bessie can fool you!
She's done it plenty of times before now--you didn't think you could
keep her from doing it this time, too, did you?"
"What do you mean?" stormed Holmes, moving toward her, his hand raised
as if he meant to strike her. But if he thought he could frighten Dolly
he was much mistaken. She faced him calmly.
"You can't make me tell you anything, even if you do hit me," she said.
"And you won't find Bessie, either, unless she wants you to. I saw her
go--but I'm not going to tell you how she managed it."
"Oh, I'm not going to hit her," yelled Holmes. "What good would that
do?"
He sprang to a bell, and pushed it violently. In a moment two or three
of the men he had dismissed, thus giving Bessie her chance to escape,
answered his summons, and he ordered them to start in search of her at
once.
"Find her, and you'll be rewarded," he shouted. "But if you don't, I'll
make you pay for it!"
Eleanor had never seen a man in such a furious rage. It was plain that
his plan, successful as it seemed to be, was still in danger of being
upset, and the knowledge gave Eleanor new hope. It had seemed to her
that, with Trenwith turned traitor, there was not one chance in a
million to foil Holmes this time. But now everything was changed. He
stayed with them only long enough to give them into the keeping of the
servant, who came down the stairs just as he finished giving his orders
to the men for the pursuit of Bessie.
"If any of them get out, I'll know it's your fault," he said to her.
"And you know what I can do to you. You wouldn't like to go to jail for
a few years, I guess. You will, if anyone else gets away from this house
to-night."
Then he followed the men he had sent out in search of Bessie.
And all the time Bessie herself had heard every word, and seen every
action of the scene that followed the discovery of her escape. While
Holmes was talking to Eleanor she had seized the chance to slip over to
a heavily curtained window, which, she guessed, must open right on the
ground.
She took the chance of it being open, and fortune favored her. Concealed
by the curtain, she was able to slip out, and then, instead of running
as fast and as far as she could, as nine people out of ten would have
done, she stayed where she was. She reasoned that there, so close to the
house, was the last place where search would be made.
And she was right. She saw Holmes dash from the room; she saw Eleanor
and the other girls being led upstairs. And then she not only heard, but
saw, the pursuit of her that was begun. Men with lanterns searched the
grounds; they looked behind every bush. But, though a single glance,
almost, would have revealed her had anything like a careful search of
the flower beds close to the house been made, no one came near her
hiding-place. Between her and the open garden was only a flimsy screen
of rose bushes, but it proved enough.
She stayed there, scarcely daring to breathe, while the men searched the
grounds and the beach. And she was still there, more than an hour later,
when they returned, tired and discouraged, to report the failure of
their search to Holmes, who was back in the room from which she had
escaped.
"Fury!" cried Holmes. "She must be on the island! There's no way that
she can have got away! Well, watch the boats! That will have to do for
to-night. She can't get away without a boat--and they are all in the
boat-house. If she wanders down to the other end, to the fort, we can
catch her in the morning. They won't believe any story she can tell
them, if she should happen to get there. And I don't want to disturb
them to-night--I'd rather wait until morning, when they will be over
with the papers. I haven't any real right to hold them to-night, except
the right of force."
Bessie thrilled at the information those few words gave her. She
remembered now that there was a fort, manned by United States soldiers,
on Humber Island. It was one of the chain of forts that guarded the
approaches to Rock Haven. And Bessie had an idea that she would be able
to find someone at the fort to believe her story, wild and improbable as
she knew it must sound. The great problem now was to get out of the
grounds unseen.
And that problem, of course, her cleverness in hiding so close to the
house had made much easier to solve. No one would suspect now that she
was there; if she waited until the house was quiet, and the men who were
to watch the boats had gone to their post, she should be able to steal
out of the garden and in the direction of the fort.
To be on the safe side, she waited nearly an hour longer. Then, as
quietly as she could, she began her solitary walk. Fortune, and her own
ability to move quietly, favored her. In five minutes she was out of the
grounds, and in woods where, though the walking was difficult, and she
stumbled more than once, she at least felt safe from the danger of
pursuit.
Soon the woods began to thin; then they grew thicker again. But, after
she had been walking, as she guessed, for more than an hour, it grew
lighter and she saw ahead of her the outlines of dark buildings--Fort
Humber, she was sure. And a minute later the sharp hail of a sentry
halted her, and at the same time made her sure that she had not lost her
way.
"Who goes there?" called the sentry.
"I've lost my way," said Bessie, trusting to her voice to make him
understand that she was not to be driven away. "Is this the fort? I'd
like to see some officer, if you please."
"Wait there! I'll pass the word," said the sentry.
And in a few minutes a young lieutenant came toward her.
"Bless my soul!" he said. "What are you doing here, young lady? Come
with me--you can explain inside."
And, once inside the fort, the first person she saw was Charlie
Jamieson!