HONORABLE WILLIE SAUNDERS BECOMES THOROUGHLY MAD.
Two hours later, when the cracker-merchant reached the place of
rendezvous, convulsively pressing the enormous six-shot revolver in his
pocket, he espied Mr. Robertson, Jr.
“You see,” said the latter, “that with the house of Robertson Brothers
& Co., you have only to express the wish.”
“And a check,” Willie Saunders might have answered.
But silently he proceeded to the little steamer which was under steam,
alongside the wharf. It was a screw propeller, small at the bow, and of
elegant shape, which could easily make her twelve miles an hour.
“The Firefly was just manned and free,” resumed the agent, joining Miss
Ada’s poor lover. “Her owner was exacting, but I did not hesitate.”
“Let us embark, then; let us embark,” said Saunders, who acted like a
madman.
“Let us go on board,” repeated Mr. Robertson, Jr., and, pointing out
the way to his victim, he quietly crossed the planking, the boards of
which groaned under the infinitely great weight of the heavy Yankee.
The Firefly was immediately unmoored. Two moments later, it was sailing
out in the harbor in order to double the point at Brooklyn.
“Three o’clock,” said the agent of the lavish client, after having
consulted a superb chronometer which was fastened to his waistcoat by a
massive guard-chain.
“So much the better,” answered Saunders; “we can anchor nearer the
Gleam without being recognized. There will be the devil to pay if,
during the evening or night, the wretch does not betray her presence on
board her lover’s boat. Then, tomorrow morning, I swear, this doomed
colonel must exchange a few pistol shots with me, or I will kill him
like a dog, and her afterwards.”
“Dear sir, don’t commit any act of violence in my presence, at least.
I should not like to be accused of complicity in such an affair. Come,
calm yourself a little. In the first place, if you will take my advice,
be less expressive, and don’t talk so loud about your business. It is
not necessary for my crew to know the cause of this little trip.”
“Yes, you are right; but, truly, I am beside myself. To have been duped
in this manner--”
It was while walking the deck of the Firefly that these gentlemen
exchanged these thoughts. They remained on deck until the steward
announced that dinner was ready.
Saunders’ first impulse was to refuse to go to the dining-room, but
Robertson, Jr., proved so convincingly that dieting was injurious to
mind and body, that the unfortunate merchant finally placed himself at
the table, and ate with a very good appetite.
The dinner was just ended, when the captain of the steamboat notified
his passengers that they were nearing Staten Island, and that the Gleam
was in the harbor.
The stout New Yorker made but one bound from the room to the deck.
It was night, and the sky indicated that it was to be dark and stormy.
Nevertheless, one could see plainly enough to distinguish Colonel
Forster’s yacht, which was at anchor near the shore.
After taking time to wrap himself in his overcoat, Mr. Robertson, Jr.,
with a cigar in his mouth, cool, calculating, and methodical as usual,
joined the irascible Saunders.
“Suppose we cross the bows of the Gleam at once,” proposed the latter.
“Don’t think of such a thing, dear sir,” answered the agent. “In the
first place, I think that our captain would refuse, the maritime law
having foreseen this kind of collision on the part of a boat in motion
with a ship at anchor; besides, how would it help you? You do not wish,
I suppose, to rejoin Miss Ada Ricard by such a dangerous movement?”
“I must see her,” was the answer.
“Have patience. Besides, I do not think she is on board at this moment.
You will observe that the porthole of the main cabin does not show any
light. I should not be surprised if Colonel Forster was at this moment
in his country house at Staten Island, yonder, a hundred steps from
shore.”
“We must assure ourselves of it.”
“That is why we are going to anchor here.”
Without consulting his unhappy client any further, Mr. Robinson, Jr.,
ran to give his instructions to the commander of the Firefly, who stood
in the stern near the helm. Two minutes had hardly elapsed before the
chain was payed out through the hawse-hole, and the anchor of the yacht
lay at the bottom of the bay. They were only about half a cable’s
length, that is a hundred metres, from the Gleam.
“Then you believe that Colonel Forster is not on board?” asked Saunders
of the agent.
“I am sure of it,” answered the latter. “If your rival were on the
Gleam it would not be so still, for he would be anxious about our
arrival and anchoring so near him.”
“I have an idea, my dear sir.”
“What is it?”
“Do you know where the colonel’s villa is?”
“Perfectly well; if the fog were not so dense we could see the lighted
windows from here.”
“What do you think of taking a little walk on land? If Forster is at
home it would be easier for me to meet him than on board ship.”
“That is true; but you will observe that the night is very dark and the
sea quite rough.”
“If you are afraid, I will go alone.”
“The heads of the house of Robertson & Co. are afraid of nothing or
nobody, Mr. Saunders. I will have a boat manned for you and will not
leave you;” and immediately giving the necessary orders, the young man
preceded the stout Yankee on the ladder, to the foot of which a boat
came instantly. It was a graceful, solid fishing boat, in which the
worst weather might have been braved. Four vigorous sailors manned it.
Robertson, Junior, and Saunders placed themselves in the stern, and
the latter, who had been a seaman in his youth, took hold of the helm,
ordering the men to push off. The boat moved off, heading toward land.
The agent, guiding himself by the lights on the island, indicated the
route to his companion; but the fog soon became so thick that just as
they were about to enter the channel which leads to the harbor, the
boatmen had to rest their oars.
“Listen!” said Saunders, suddenly leaning over on a level with the
water in order to try to pierce the fog; and Robertson listened. They
heard distinctly, coming from the land, a regular sound of the oars of
a boat vigorously worked.
“Ah,” said the agent, “there are fine fellows who know their route
better than we do ours.”
The boat, in fact, was rapidly approaching. Suddenly a metallic,
silvery laugh echoed by the sonorous waves, made Mr. Saunders give a
bound.
“It is she, the cheat!” he growled. “Row, boys, row. Let us reach the
entrance of the channel before them. A hundred dollars to you if we go
in first.”
Stimulated by this promise, the sailors of the Firefly bent over their
oars and the boat sped along like an arrow.
But Colonel Forster’s boat--for it was really he who was returning to
his yacht--was not so far away as the cracker-merchant thought. Lost to
sight in the bank of fog, he did not see it coming, or rather, perhaps,
did not wish to see it, and before the agent could avoid it, by a turn
of the rudder, a frightful collision took place between the two boats.
The shock was so severe that the fishing boat, receiving it abreast,
careened about, heading to shore, from which it was separated by a
few yards only, and on which the sea dashed heavily. As for the yawl
being driven to the other side of the channel, its situation was still
more grave. At the same instant, as if to prove it, a terrible cry was
heard--a woman’s cry--whose tone sent a chill of horror through Mr.
Saunders, who, thrown backwards from his seat, and covered with water
and spray, had been flung upon the sandy shore. Then it seemed to him
that a second cry, stifled like a sob, succeeded the first, and, with
his eyes looking haggard and his hair standing on end, he tried to leap
into the waves, but Robertson stopped him.
“It is she, it is she! I wish at least to try and save her!” he cried,
endeavoring to free himself.
“Are you mad?” answered the young man, holding him firmly. “If anything
has happened you do not know where. If Miss Ada has not been saved by
those accompanying her it is too late, for the tide is going out.”
The agent had spoken truly, the fog had become so dense that one could
not distinguish anything two steps off. Moreover, on account of the
tide going out, the sea was so rough at that place in the channel, that
the best rower could not struggle a single second against the current
and waves.
In despair at his powerlessness, and frightened at the consequences of
his angry act, the unfortunate Yankee had fallen to the ground. There,
oppressed and breathless, he listened attentively to the sounds of the
deep, in the hopes of catching some sign of life to relieve him. But
none reached him. He heard only the murmuring ripples on the shore. The
bank of fog extended around him like a winding-sheet, and the silence
of death reigned over the whole bay. Meanwhile the sailors of the
Firefly, happy at getting off with a cold bath, plugged up the hole
which the collision had made in the boat, and were setting it afloat.
They succeeded after an hour’s labor. Saunders imagined that a whole
century had passed, when Robertson, rousing him from his exhaustion,
told him to embark. The fog had lifted a little and they perceived
beyond them, like a star in the gray sky, the headlight of the Firefly.
Transported so suddenly from his peaceful life into the most frightful
tragedy, the unhappy Saunders obeyed, tottering toward the boat. When
once embarked he fell heavily upon the locker of the stern, but he was
careful not to take hold of the helm again. Remembering with horror the
use he had made of it an hour before, he feared that it might burn his
hands.
“Great God!” cried Mr. Robertson, all at once: “the Gleam has put off.”
Roused from his dejection by these words, Saunders wildly peered across
the bay.
The Firefly alone was tossing at anchor.
“This is an ugly trip and a sad affair,” said the agent to his
companion.
“Horrible! dear sir, horrible!” repeated the latter in a choked voice.
“Evidently some misfortune has happened, and Colonel Forster, in order
not to be compromised, for he could not suppose we were there for his
sake, has gone to sea, or he would have remained in the roads. In any
case, how can the truth be known?”
“Yes; how?”
Then, seized by a sudden inspiration, Saunders continued, addressing
the sailors:
“Boys, there is a hundred dollars for each of you if you do not tell a
word about what has just happened.”
“That is understood, sir,” answered the seamen in chorus, who, however,
did not know the reason of the presence of this stout passenger on
board the steamboat, and had seen in the meeting of the two boats only
one of those accidents at sea which they almost daily witnessed or took
part in. They did not suspect that the life of a woman was at stake,
and that, perhaps, she was drowned with her other companions, excepting
through the exclamations of Saunders himself.
Ten minutes later the fishing-boat came alongside the Firefly, and
Robertson learned that the Gleam had raised anchor but half an hour
before.
The fog had not prevented them from seeing in what direction it had
gone. However, in the hope of meeting his rival at daybreak, Saunders
did not wish to leave the roads; but the next day the steamer made the
circuit of Staten Island in vain; the Gleam had wholly disappeared.
There was but one course to take, to return to New York and preserve
silence about the frightful scene, in which the cracker-merchant had
played so compromising a part. The unfortunate Yankee understood it; he
handed each of the sailors the promised one hundred dollars, and with
remorse gnawing at his heart he hid in his cabin, and did not leave
it until Robertson told him that the Firefly was again moored to the
Battery.
Night permitted him to land and reach his house without being
recognized, but when he entered his room he shut himself in as if he
had all Mr. Kelly’s agents on his tracks, and he fell into an alarming
state of nervous prostration. His night was terrible, and the next day
he strictly forbade admission, even guarding his door, and would not
read a paper or exchange a word with his household. He refused even
to hear about business. This lasted four days, and he began to grow
somewhat calm, when his valet, disobeying orders, handed him toward
three o’clock, a paper marked “personal and urgent,” and bearing the
seal of the central office of the police. The unhappy Saunders opened
the letter trembling, and, when he had glanced over five lines, he
felt himself grow pale with fear. He had read:
The chief of the metropolitan police invites Mr. William Saunders
to appear without fail at the central office to furnish all the
information within his knowledge in regard to the disappearance of
Miss Ada Ricard.
What should he say to that brutal Kelly, whose rudeness he had already
experienced? Could he preserve enough self-possession not to compromise
himself? Was the event at Staten Island discovered, or still unknown?
Why should the chief of police, who would not listen to him when he
went to beg him to seek Ada Ricard, disturb himself to-day about her
disappearance?
All these questions, which he did not know how to answer, succeeded
each other in the shattered brain of the ex-lover of Miss Ada, and he
trembled in advance at the idea of the questioning which he should have
to undergo.
However, he resigned himself to obey, and, after laying out a course
from which he promised himself he would not depart, and trying his best
to be calm, he appeared before the terrible Kelly.
The chief of police received him immediately, but five minutes later
the stout Saunders reeled out of the central office with a pale,
disturbed countenance, and his forehead bathed in a cold sweat. He
jumped into his cab and said to the coachman, in accents of terror:
“To the Bellevue Hospital.”
Forty-eight hours before an event had occurred which strangely excited
public curiosity, but of which Saunders did not know, for since his
dramatic expedition he had not left the house or read a paper.