possession of his reason, quite as sane as he himself. In former years
he had been intimately acquainted with Dick Lawrence; the story of the
“mysterious disappearance” was familiar to him; and he thought that at
last the mystery was to be solved.
He seized Lawrence’s hand and shook it heartily.
“Don’t you remember me, old friend?” he said. “Don’t you remember when
you beat me in that race, so long ago? And besides, we are almost related
to each other; for, as you surely remember, your brother and I married
sisters.”
A long conversation followed between the two reunited friends. The events
of other years were spoken of with peculiar pleasure, and Mr. Mortimer
told his friend what had been taking place in the world of late years.
“Well, now, I had almost forgotten!” Mr. Mortimer suddenly exclaimed.
“Your nephew Will is in this very house! You will remember him as a very
little boy; and now he is a--a--now he is a great big boy. I must bring
him in immediately.”
He hurried out of the room and soon returned with Will, saying
apologetically, “You must excuse me, Will, but when two old friends meet,
they forget that there are boys still in the world, and remember only
that they were once boys themselves.” Then to his guest: “Mr. Lawrence, I
have the pleasure of introducing your nephew Will, who is on a visit to
my son. I think it is safe to say that you owe your deliverance to these
hare-brained youths. You will hear graphic particulars of it afterwards.”
A happy meeting took place between uncle and nephew, the former being
highly pleased with his new-found kinsman.
“Yes,” Mr. Mortimer resumed, “this is your nephew Will; a fine little
fellow, who had a strange interview with you last night. Have you any
recollection of it?”
“Not the slightest; so far as I know, I have not seen the boy since,
since--when?”
“Ten years, uncle.”
“Then you know nothing about your life in the cave?” Mr. Mortimer asked.
“You are speaking in riddles, Mr. Mortimer.”
“My son, Will’s cousin, is ill to-day, or I should present him; for he,
dear boy, was instrumental in your release,” the fond father observed,
wishing that his son should receive due honor for his good deeds.
Mr. Lawrence was impatient to see his brother, but there were several
matters to attend to before this could be done.
“There is a strange tale yet to be unfolded, Mr. Mortimer,” he said
musingly. “I must visit the town where insanity first took hold of me.
There are many things not clear to me; but I believe that by going there,
I shall be enabled to unriddle the mystery. A foul wrong was done to me
in that place, and I will have justice. As I intimated, I know absolutely
nothing of what took place while I was insane; but I believe all that can
be made clear by making diligent inquiries of people living in R----.
Yes, I shall go to this place in a day or so; then take a run down to my
brother’s; and come back just in time to go home with Will. But first of
all, I shall visit the cave where I spent so many years; and you and my
nephew must accompany me. I am full of curiosity to see the place, but I
suppose I shall have to be piloted through it.”
A day or so afterwards Mr. Lawrence felt stronger, and the three set out
to explore the cave. Will thought that he was going to the Demon’s Cave
under very different circumstances, and sighed because Henry was unable
to accompany them. But Henry was destined never to enter that cave.
When they arrived at the place, they perceived that some one was there
before them, as the door stood open. As they passed in they heard
a confused murmur of voices, together with whistling, singing, and
hallooing. Evidently, the intruders were trying to keep up their spirits
and intimidate any goblins that might be hovering near. A great fire was
blazing in the old place, but the explorers seemed to be in the largest
cave.
Suddenly the new-comers were heard, and a howl of horror came from the
explorers.
“Oh, golly! It’s the demon or somethin’ else!” wailed one.
Then two wild and fearful eyes peered out through the concealed door, and
a voice quavered: “N-o-o, it ain’t the demon; but I guess we’d better
clear!”
Seven gaunt youths stole through the concealed door; glanced fearfully
at the new-comers; and then broke and fled tumultuously out of the front
entrance.
The two men smiled; the boy laughed.
“A boy is the same creature that he was when I was young,” Mr. Lawrence
observed.
“They’re the very fellow’s that cheered us the other night,” said Will.
“I guess they wanted to be ‘bouncers’ too.”
“Now, why in this world did the little rogues make a fire?” Mr. Mortimer
queried.
“That question is easily answered,” said Mr. Lawrence. “When a boy comes
upon a heap of wood, the temptation to kindle a fire, if he has any means
of doing so, is too great for him to resist.”
“And you see nothing here that is familiar to you?” asked Mr. Mortimer.
“No; everything is strange to me; and I must apply to Will to lead the
way.”
“Uncle, how queer it is that I should know more about your cave than you
do!” said Will, grinning foolishly. “It doesn’t seem that you are the
same man that picked me up and carried me off.”
“That’s because I’ve visited the tailor and the barber, Will.”
“Well, uncle, if I hadn’t been through the cave that night, we shouldn’t
know anything about the money.”
“Money!” cried both men, in a breath.
“Yes,” Will replied. “I found a little pile of money, but so many queer
things happened since that I forgot all about it. Come this way, uncle;
it is in this room.”
“Your lost fortune!” Mr. Mortimer exclaimed.
“Perhaps,” sighed Uncle Dick.
“If those explorers have not enriched themselves with it!”
But the treasure was found untouched.
“Is _this_ what you found?” cried Mr. Mortimer, with disgust. “_This_ is
intolerable--monstrous--outrageous! This--this--”
“No, I think it’s all right,” said Mr. Lawrence. “There is a mystery
behind it, but when that mystery is cleared up, I think we shall find
that this is all there is left.”
“I guess the boys didn’t see it,” Will observed, “or else they were
afraid to meddle with it.”
“No,” said Uncle Dick, “a boy has more honesty than most people imagine.
Well, Will, what there is, is yours. Take it, Will; it won’t fill more
than one pocket; but I wish, for your sake, it were a fortune indeed.”
“If I hadn’t left these inside doors open, the boys wouldn’t have been
able to explore these two rooms,” Will presently remarked. “Now, I wonder
whether they found those hens and chickens! _I_ didn’t, but I didn’t look
for them.”
“‘Hens and chickens!’” growled Mr. Mortimer. “What’s the matter now,
Will?”
“Why, Henry said the demon--I--I mean my _uncle_--had lots of hens and
chickens here, and I heard them clucking several times while I was in the
cave; but I never saw’ a scratch of them.”
“Perhaps the young explorers made away with _them_,” Uncle Dick suggested.
“No, uncle, they found their way here only because I had left the
concealed doors open,” Will said. “I guess the hens are some place else.”
“We don’t know how many hidden chambers there may be here, nor what
secrets they may hold,” Mr. Mortimer sighed despairingly.
“There can’t be many more,” Uncle Dick replied. “We’ll say there is one
more apartment, in which my nephew’s hens are cooped up. Now, unless
they set up a cackling, how are we to know where to look for them? I
think we had better leave them to their fate. No! Will, listen! When we
get back to town, speak about these hens incidentally to some little
tobacco-chewer, and within an hour a force of would-be desperadoes will
troop down to this cave, and liberate these hens or perish in the ruins
of the general demolition!”
To economize time and space, to ease the reader’s anxiety, and to
maintain the reputation of this history for exactness and solidity, it
may here be stated that although Will set a band of street Arabs on the
track of those miserable hens and chickens, they were never found, and
the probability is that they are slowly becoming fossils.
The three then made a burning stave serve for a torch, and marched
through the cavern in which Will had found the water. Then they returned
and went into the “best bedroom.”
“I have a fancy that there is money buried here,--buried, or concealed in
some article of furniture,” Mr. Mortimer observed.
“I doubt that,” said Uncle Dick. “Now, if your son were well, he and Will
might come here and ransack every cavern. What a pity we interrupted
those boys! They would have amused themselves here all day, and would
certainly have found whatever there may be to find! Poor little fellows,
their fun had just begun! Well, they will be back again, and then they
are welcome to all the spoil they can carry away.”
Having fastened the outer door, the party returned to the city.
_Chapter XXII._
UNCLE DICK EVOLVES HIS STORY.
The next day Mr. Lawrence, leaving his nephew still with Henry, went to
the town of which he had spoken. Here insanity had taken hold of him, and
here he expected to unravel his mysteries.
The two boys laid their heads together, and arrived at the conclusion
that the world is not hollow, after all; and that if they were not heroes
yet, a few years would make them so.
“The stuff is in us, Will; all we have to do is to work it up.”
“Yes, Henry; and when you come to see me, the people in our neighborhood
had better be prepared. There are no captives for us to rescue, but I
guess you can hit on something good.”
“Why, Will,” said Henry, smiling his delight, “you are almost getting to
be like any other boy! You--you talk sensibly. What has come over you?”
“Well, when I saw that good came from our journey to the cave, and that
we rescued my uncle, I concluded that I had been wrong and you right. I
guess it’s safe to play tricks with you, anyway; and----”
“‘Tricks!’” echoed Henry, scowling horribly.
“No, no!” Will hastily declared. “I--I--mean--Henry--Don’t be vexed,
Henry; I meant _stratagems_!”
The affronted patient softened. “Yes, that is the word you meant, Will,”
he said, “but you always ought to say what you mean. I always do; and so
I never have to stumble, and correct myself, and appear as though I don’t
know what I’m talking about.”
Will’s eyes expressed a mild rebuke.
Henry was not fluent in making apologies; on this occasion he simply
said, with a look of pain that spoke volumes in his behalf: “It’s in my
left knee, Will; hand me that bottle, please.”
“Next time I venture on any more stratagems,--if I ever do venture on any
more,--I’ll warn all the sailors and teamsters in the settlement, so
that I can be rescued just in the nick of time,” Will Said good humoredly.
“Yes, as long as they didn’t follow too close at your heels, and spoil
the fun. Well, Will, I knew I could cure you if you stayed with me long
enough; but I didn’t expect to do it so soon.”
When the patient was easy Will read to him. The books that pleased them
most were about mustached heroes who cruised in Polynesia, discovering
“sea-girt isles” which Captain Cook and later navigators had missed, and
which almost invariably held captive some ragged individual, who, after
divers adventures with pirates and Chinamen, had finally succeeded in
nailing $795,143 up in a mahogany coffin, only to be shipwrecked with it.
In after years Will looked back on those days spent with Henry as the
pleasantest in his boyhood. He had no haunting dreams; got into no
disgrace; and, except when he thought of poor Stephen, felt no reproaches
of conscience.
One day the mother of the girl who had given Henry a glass ink-bottle
came in to inquire personally after his health.
“I heard you were getting better, Henry, but I thought I should like to
come and see for myself,” she said pleasantly.
“I wonder now if _she_ didn’t hint to her mother to do this!” Henry
thought to himself. “I believe she did; but I wish I knew. Why can’t
folks tell the truth, anyway, and say right out how it is! How am I to
find out! I know when _she_ had a bad cold, I hinted till my mother went
there to ask about her! Botheration! I _will_ know!”
“It’s very good of you to take so much interest in me,” he ventured,
slightly emphasizing the word _you_.
“Yes, Henry, when I saw the doctor call here twice yesterday I thought I
must step in and see you.”
The boy was silenced, but not satisfied.
“I’ve brought a book for you, Henry, that I think you will like,” she
said, taking a handsomely bound volume out of her reticule and laying it
on a stand at Henry’s elbow.
He picked it up. “_Her_ book!” he thought exultingly. “I know it’s hers,
for I’ve heard her speak of it. She sent it to me! Of course she did.
_She sent it!_”
Once more his heart bounded with ecstasy; once more he was supremely
happy. The blood rushed to his face; his lips quivered; his hands
trembled.
The visitor remarked this, and turning to Mrs. Mortimer said
sympathetically, “Poor boy! How patiently he bears it!”
Then, stepping up to the bedside, she laid her hands on his head, kissed
his forehead gently and affectionately, and asked softly, “Is the pain
very bad, Henry?”
It seemed to Henry that his heart stood still.
“It is _her_ mother,” he thought, “and she has kissed me!”
Their eyes met. A woman perceives many things intuitively; Henry’s secret
was hers from that moment. For all answer she kissed him again. From that
day the two were firm and true friends.
When Henry found himself alone he examined every leaf of that book
carefully.
“_She_ sent it,” he muttered, “and perhaps there is something written in
it. She may have written, ‘I hope you will like this book, Henry;’ or,
‘This is the story we spoke of, Henry;’ or, ‘When will you be able to
start to school again, Henry?’”
The observing reader will perceive that in each of those sentences the
hero’s own name occurs. Henry was capable of strong feelings; in some
respects he was a boy; in others, a man.
At last, at the top of a useless fly-leaf, he came upon two initial
letters. They were not hers; they were not his. The writing was very bad;
he could not recognize it. He did not consider that a book-seller often
scrawls a cipher or two on the fly-leaves of his books. He was mystified.
Jealousy, however, soon suggested an explanation; jealousy pointed out
that those characters were written by _her_, and that they stood for “J.
J.”
Once more he was miserable.
He saw Johnny Jones in his true colors; saw all his defects, all his
emptiness, all his insignificance, all his baseness. And yet he was
jealous!
The lover very often feels his rival to be the most despicable person on
the face of the earth; and yet, at the same instant, he fears that rival,
despicable as he is, will steal away the heart of his beloved.
To a man whose thoughts never rise above the earth on which he
walks, this may seem preposterous; but it is true, and may easily be
explained--so easily, in fact, that the writer leaves it for some one who
can do so more ably and clearly than himself.
It has been said that Henry was fated never to explore the Demon’s Cave.
He never did.
The City Fathers, fearing, in their wisdom, that the cave might become
the haunt of evil characters or the lair of some wild beast, convoked a
council, and drew up a document which began and ended thus:
“Whereas, ...
“Resolved, that said cave be forthwith demolished.”
Then five men and two hundred and seventy-three or seventy-four boys fell
to work upon it, and executed this command to the letter. The Demon’s
Cave had served its purpose: it was no more.
The view from the opposite bank was marred; but the City Fathers knew
that they had done their duty, and their conscience was easy.
After an absence of a week Uncle Dick returned to Mr. Mortimer’s. He
had visited the little city; solved his mysteries; and been to see his
brother.
He made himself comfortable in an easy chair, and while those interested
in him listened attentively, he romanced as follows:--
“Several years ago, when I was still a young man, by prudent and lawful
speculations I amassed a fortune. But I was not satisfied; I still wished
for more; and one day when a stranger came to me with wonderful stories
about making colossal fortunes in a far-off part of the world, I listened
eagerly, and secretly resolved to settle my affairs and hasten away with
him. I should need every dollar I possessed to embark in this scheme,
the stranger told me; and the sooner I could get away, the sooner I
should return to my native country a rich man.
“I kept my purpose hidden from my nearest friends, and got together all
my money as secretly as possible. I was not to deposit this money in a
bank, and draw it as I needed it; oh, no! I must pack it up snugly in a
strong trunk, and take it all with me. This man, Black, advised me to
‘keep my own counsel to the very last;’ and I also knew that my people
would oppose my taking up with an entire stranger, and embarking in such
a wild-goose chase. Consequently he, and I, and the trunk of funds,
stole away like criminals, leaving only a short note of farewell and
explanation behind us. By the way, Mr. Mortimer, my brother tells me that
he received no such note, and I must infer that Black found means to
destroy it.
“I knew that I was acting dishonorably, but I excused my conduct to
myself by thinking I should soon return in triumph, worth millions. At
that date, enormous wealth was the summit of my ambitions; and it must
come suddenly and easily; petty speculation had become tiresome to me,
and I wished to wake up some morning and find myself a nabob.
“In a certain city--the place to which I went after leaving you--we
halted, ‘to complete our arrangements,’ as my betrayer put it, if I
remember rightly. Having entered a small and out-of-the-way building,
which he called his own, probably correctly, I was assaulted by him and
another villain who was unknown to me. I remember distinctly Black’s
saying to this man, ‘Now, Bill, a heavy blow on his head, and he is dead.
Then his trunk of money is ours!’ I started to my feet, but at that
instant a furious blow was struck at my head, and I, poor fool, knew no
more.
“My object in going to that city last week was to see whether I could
learn what had happened to me from the time of that attempted murder
till I appeared here as the ‘Demon of the Cave,’ In this I succeeded
very well. It seems that the police were on these men’s track, and that
they broke into the building just after I had been knocked down. The
villains, Black and his accomplice, doubtless thought me dead, or else
meant to deal another blow, but had not time. Their crime was bootless;
for they were thrown into prison, tried in due time, and sent into penal
servitude, where they are still.
“Then I was taken to an hospital; but as I had scarcely anything with
me, except my clothes and my chest of money, no clue could be found to
inform my friends of my whereabouts. So they kept me on there, within a
few hundred miles of my home, and took the greatest care of me. The cruel
blow on my head had taken away my reason, and all the doctors of the
hospital could not restore it.
“What puzzles me is that my friends did not find me in process of time,
as the whole affair was published in the newspapers. Well, I suppose they
thought of me as being far away and that I could not possibly be the
madman in K. Hospital. I never saw the account in the newspapers, and the
description of the madman may not have tallied with the Uncle Dick of the
country village.
“And now comes the most extraordinary part of my story. I was ill in the
hospital for several weeks, and meanwhile the authorities took charge
of my chest. It seems that I was aware my money was in it, and with all
a maniac’s cunning I kept watch over it. One day, when my bodily health
and strength were quite restored, both I and my chest of treasure were
missing!
“So the story runs; but there I am bothered; there is mystery. From
that day all is dark to me; all is a blank; and I can only speculate.
I am left to suppose, then, that I made off with my chest of money;
roamed over the country in search of a home; came upon the cave in this
neighborhood; and established myself in it!
“Now, that is contrary to reason--in fact, it would require a powerful
imagination to put any faith in such a cock-and-bull story.
“I have a notion that a great deal of my money was taken either by
dishonest servants while in the hospital, or else by thieves after I left
it; and I think even that I was robbed of the whole amount, and came upon
some money in the cave. How could a lunatic make his way through the
country with a chest of money, and not be molested? It is impossible. In
fact, Mr. Mortimer, from the moment I left the hospital till I took up
my abode in the cave, it is all a muddle to me. It may be explained some
day; but it is all a muddle to me now.
“From inquiries I made in this place, I found that a dealer brought me
supplies while I lived in the cave, and that I paid him for them. I
hunted him out, and he told me he made my acquaintance through another
man, when I first came here. He is a simple, honest, old man, incapable
of cheating even a madman; and I am satisfied that he acted fairly with
me, and had no hand in my coming to the cave.
“But who is the other? I believe the whole question hinges on that; and
if we could meet with him, I would force the secret from him. The dealer
affirms that he knows nothing about this man; he saw him only once; and
then he told him (the dealer) to send supplies to an eccentric man who
intended to live for a short time in what was then called simply, ‘The
Cave.’ But, alas! it continued through ten years!
“While living in the cave, I am told that I was continually on the watch
against robbers; which proves conclusively, I think, that people of that
calling preyed upon me either before or after I left the hospital.
“Mr. Mortimer, as far as I can make it out, this is my story. It is not
much, but I have made the best of it.” The next day Mr. Lawrence and
his nephew set out for home. The long-lost man had, at length, after an
absence of ten years, returned.
He lived with his brother, and for a few weeks, did nothing. Ten years
in a cave had undermined his health, but as soon as his constitution
regained its natural vigor, he went into business on his own account. At
forty he found himself penniless, and obliged to begin life anew; ten
years were as though they had not been, and he had summarily got rid of a
fortune.
He was of a cheerful and hopeful disposition, and did not grieve about
this; still, he could not help thinking what misery would have been
spared if he had not trusted himself implicitly to a villain.
For the present Uncle Dick must sink into oblivion. He will be
resuscitated, however, at the proper time.
Will was received by his parents with open arms. He had behaved nobly;
he was a little hero. All the praise must be given to him, of course.
Had he not rescued his uncle, alone and unaided? Had he not done all in
his power to help that uncle when he lay helpless in his cave? Had he
not stayed by him and tended him? Had he not explored the horrible place
known as the Demons Cave? He had; he had done all this; and yet come off
without a scratch!
Of course, Henry meant well, but he had no hand in rescuing Uncle
Dick--he had not even entered the cave. Henry was a good, a manly little
fellow, but in that affair he had been only a figure-head.
Will found that Stephen was recovering fast. His school-fellows crowded
round him and listened eagerly while he dilated on his cousin’s and
his own exploits. Now that the affair was happily over, he delighted
in telling them about his “adventures” in the cave, and Marmaduke,
especially, delighted in hearing them. To him, Henry was a mighty hero.
The affair with Stephen sobered the others for a time, and when the poor
boy again appeared among them, nothing they could do for him was left
undone. He was a martyr in their eyes, and they willingly left off their
own sports to talk to him. Under these kind attentions, what wonder is it
that the boy soon recovered his health, strength, and spirits?
The whole tribe of heroes kept clear of tricks and misdeeds till the
following summer; but Will, of course, committed his diverting little
blunders daily. But it would be foolish to chronicle them.