THE MYSTERIOUS MEN
As the machine drove away several street urchins came running toward the
girls, begging the privilege of carrying their bags. Nan would have
refused, the bags being not at all heavy and the walk to the end of the
dock from the entrance not very far, but Bess nudged her sharply.
"Go ahead," she urged. "I have a quarter to pay for it. Don't be a
silly."
So Nan obeyed and reluctantly handed over to one of the eager street
urchins the handsome bag which contained, among other things, Mrs.
Bragley's papers. Bess had already loaded the small boy with her own
belongings, and it seemed impossible to Nan that the lad could be able
to carry it all.
Yet he sauntered ahead quite cheerfully while the other boys turned away
disappointed to wait for the next arrival.
As the girls emerged from the long, tunnel-like entrance into the bright
sunshine of the dock they quickened their steps instinctively. The
steamship _Dorian_, which was to carry them to Florida, was already
waiting for the passengers.
Nan had never seen a harbor like this before, and she gazed with
fascinated eyes out over the glistening water, dotted thickly with craft
of all sizes and descriptions.
There were a great many docks like the kind upon which she and Bess were
standing, and they stretched out into the harbor like so many legs of an
octopus, cleaving the brilliant water with dark ugly gashes.
Over all the bustling harbor was a sense of feverish activity, of
mystery and romance, of adventuring in far, fair lands that set Nan's
blood atingle and made her breath come quickly.
"What are you waiting for?" Bess asked impatiently, and Nan roused from
her reverie with a start.
"I wasn't waiting, I was just looking," said Nan in a soft voice, as
they started up the gangplank that led to the deck of the _Dorian_. "I
never saw anything so wonderful."
"Beg pardon, Miss," said a voice in her ear, and a small hand was laid
upon her arm.
Nan turned quickly and saw that it was their small luggage carrier. In
their preoccupation the girls had both of them forgotten about their
precious bags.
With quick fingers Nan fished in her purse for the necessary quarter,
gave it to the boy and received her bag in return.
"Oh, Bess!" she cried as the boy tipped his cap and started on, "how
could I ever have done such a thing? Why, if I had lost this bag I never
would have dared face Mrs. Bragley again. Never in this wide world!"
"I wish Mrs. Bragley were in Guinea," said Bess crossly. "She and her
old papers are just about going to spoil our trip. They are making you
as nervous as a cat."
"Sh-h, Bess, not so loud," cautioned Nan, as they stepped upon the deck
of the _Dorian_ and handed over the tickets which Papa Sherwood had
secured for them.
It was perhaps fortunate for the girls' peace of mind that they did not
notice two men who were closely behind them. One of the men was fat and
short and had little eyes and a bald head, which he was now mopping
vigorously with a rather soiled handkerchief.
His companion was his complete opposite. He was tall and thin, with a
severe, straight line for a mouth and long, nervous hands, and had a
habit of caressing his beardless chin as though a beard had once grown
there.
As the tall thin man, whom his companion called Jensen, overheard Nan's
startled reference to Mrs. Bragley's papers, he put a hand upon the fat
man's arm and nodded once with a sort of jerk of satisfaction.
"What did I say, Davis?" he asked, in a carefully guarded voice. "I tell
you, I am never wrong." And his eyes followed the girls as they started
down the deck in the direction of their cabin.
As they, in turn, stepped upon the deck, the short man looked up at his
tall companion and said rather enigmatically: "Sometimes I wonder,
Jensen, whether you are a great man, or a great fool. It's certainly
great to have them on this trip to Florida with us."
Although the girls knew nothing of this strange conversation, Nan was
extremely careful to stow her bag away in a corner of their stateroom
and piled several things on it and about it so that it could not be
easily seen by curious eyes.
"Nan, if you don't leave that old thing alone I'm going to throw it
overboard," Bess finally said complainingly. "You act as if it contained
diamonds and rubies instead of----"
"Oh, please hush," said Nan, rising quickly from her knees and coming
over to Bess. "I don't know what has gotten into me lately, Bess dear,"
she said, speaking so earnestly that her chum regarded her in surprise;
"but ever since I took charge of those papers I have had the strangest
impression that I am being watched."
"Nan!" cried Bess, looking uneasily over her shoulder, "what a terrible
thing. But, of course, it's only imagination," she added easily, for it
was instinct with Bess to cast aside anything that threatened to worry
her or interfere with her fun. "I told you the old papers were getting
on your nerves."
"You're right," said Nan, with a little sigh as she rose to take off her
coat and hat and straighten her hair before the tiny mirror. "They
certainly are getting on my nerves."
"Well, for goodness' sake get them off then," commanded Bess, bouncing
impatiently on a berth. "I never saw such a girl to take everybody
else's troubles on her own shoulders. I'll be glad when you turn the
papers over to Mr. Mason."
Nan smiled a resigned little smile at her reflection in the mirror. Then
she came over and put an arm about her pouting chum.
"All right," she promised gaily, "I won't ever do it again. Only come on
and smile, honey. If you knew how pretty you look when you do, you would
never do anything else."
There are very few girls who can withstand an appeal like that, and Bess
was not one of them. A smile replaced the frown immediately and the next
minute she was chatting merrily about their crowded little stateroom and
the two narrow berths, one above the other, wondering with a grimace
whether they would be seasick or not, and so, on and on, till Nan's
momentary depression forsook her and she felt again the thrill that had
quickened her blood as they had stood on the dock, gazing out over the
harbor.
Yet, almost unknown to Nan herself, there lingered in the back of her
mind a strange, uneasy premonition of trouble to come, and again and
again her eyes sought the spot where the bag with Mrs. Bragley's papers
stowed safely inside lay hidden.
"I wonder which one of us is going to take the upper berth," Bess
chattered gaily on. "You had better, Nan, because you're thinner than I.
And then if the berth should cave in it wouldn't hurt you so much
because there would be something soft to fall on. It's a snug little
place, isn't it?"
"Snug is right," said Nan, with a giggle. "You can't turn around without
running in to something."
"That's Linda's fault. She shouldn't have wrecked the heating system at
school in the Palm Beach season. If it had been in December now, or
March, there wouldn't have been such a crowd and we could have had a
real honest to goodness stateroom, instead of this two-by-one hole in
the wall."
"Elizabeth, how shocking," laughed Nan. "You must have been taking
lessons from Walter." And then, for no apparent reason at all, or
perhaps because of the expression in her chum's eyes as they rested
upon her, Nan became suddenly confused and hurriedly changed the
subject.
"Let's go outside," she suggested, rising and making toward the door of
the stateroom, which opened directly out upon the deck. "It--it's
awfully hot in here."
Bess laughed tantalizingly and stretched lazily as she prepared to
follow her chum.
"Nan, honey," she drawled, irrelevantly, or so it seemed to Nan, "you
are a darling, but, oh, you're awfully foolish."