[Illustration]
MR. PRENWOOD’S launch carried Allan and McConnell, with the _Arabella_
astern, swiftly southeast to Hazenfield.
Blickens was very talkative on the journey. It was evident that he
wished to atone for that which had happened at Stonyshore; and Allan
felt so little resentment for what had happened that he earnestly urged
Blickens to come to the Hartel house for dinner. “Then,” said Allan, “I
can send back these clothes by you.”
But Blickens could not be persuaded to stay. “I’ll wait here for the
clothes, if you want me to,” said Blickens at Detective Dobbs’s landing;
“though I don’t believe Mr. Prenwood expects you to bother sending them
back.”
Since Blickens did not seem to be willing to accept the invitation,
Allan said that he himself would return the clothes later, so that
Blickens need not feel compelled to wait. Blickens said he hoped there
would be no hard feelings, and shook hands good-by.
The boys were mooring the _Arabella_ when Detective Dobbs came down the
path with Sporty.
“Ship ahoy!” he called. “How many whales did you catch?”
“We caught a very unexpected fish,” said Allan. “There’s his skin,” and
he tossed ashore the convict’s clothes.
“What do you mean?” demanded Dobbs, picking up the clothes. “This is a
Sing Sing suit.”
Allan hurried ashore and as quickly as he could outlined to Dobbs the
meeting with the Ghost and what followed.
Dobbs uttered an exclamation of astonishment. “Of course, you don’t know
in what direction he went—everybody has been after him for three days.”
“We left him behind in the fog; but he said he wanted to get to New
York.”
“But he only had one oar.”
“Your other oar.”
“What color was your jacket—and the sweater?” Allan described the
clothes the convict had taken, and Dobbs waited to hear no more. In six
minutes Dobbs was at the station talking to police headquarters in New
York. In twenty minutes every police station near the Hudson, from the
Battery to Sing Sing, had a description of the clothes the Ghost wore,
with information as to the skiff and the single oar. The police
everywhere already had a full description of the man.
“I almost hope they don’t catch him,” said Allan, as he and McConnell
hurried inland from the river.
“I don’t know what I hope,” confessed McConnell. “When I think of his
knocking your head against the centre-board, I want to have him caught.
When I think of how hungry he looked, and how thin his hands were, I
want him to get away.”
“I wonder how Owen will get home?” Allan queried. “It almost seems as if
we should have tried to find him; though I’m quite sure he has walked
south and will get across the river somehow.”
Both McConnell and Allan found an anxious welcome awaiting them at home.
The Doctor had assured Mrs. Hartel and Edith that the boys had prudently
anchored when the storm came up, and that they would be home as soon as
the fog lifted; yet both mother and cousin had worried greatly, and even
little Ellen had made many inquiries as to why Allan did not come home.
It may be supposed that Allan’s recital found highly interested
listeners; that a hundred questions were asked; that some of them were
answered; that Allan did not eat much dinner.
Allan insisted that he only was worrying about Owen. In the afternoon,
at about three o’clock, Owen walked in to say that he had been home for
a couple of hours. It appeared that after calling hopelessly into the
fog, and waiting in the vicinity of the anchorage for half an hour, Owen
made up his mind that the _Arabella_ would have no chance of making the
same point again while the fog lasted. He then turned back, and finding
his way to Alexander Hamilton made inquiry of him as to the nearest way
to the highroad, and was about making his way inland when a freight
train on the West Shore road hove in sight. The train halted at a
near-by switch, and Owen so successfully made friends with a man in the
caboose that he was invited to get aboard. Three miles south he slipped
off the train at Boughton, got a boat from a man he knew at the landing,
and rowed across to Hazenfield.
“And so you see,” said Owen, “I got out of the scrape easier than you
did.”
Despite the Doctor’s questions, Allan continued to insist that he felt
all right, that he would be all right in a little while—or the next day
anyway. Yet his confidence was not justified. On the following day the
Doctor betrayed by his looks that he did not find Allan to be very well.
He forbade him to do any developing for a day or two longer, and kept
him away from the Academy.
At the end of a week Allan was down with a fever, and the autumn colors,
the stately river, the faces of his friends, the walls of the club
rooms, all faded away in a troubled sleep; and other weeks passed, and
there were anxious faces at his bedside, and his father would sit
holding his hand and looking fixedly at him in the dim light of the sick
chamber; and his head was very queer and heavy and hot, so that the ice
felt like an angel’s hand. And he asked them to be sure that the focus
was right and that the shutter had been set, ordered McConnell to pull
in on the sheet, and Owen to hand up the camera carefully.
“I tell you, mother,” he said one day to Mrs. Hartel, his eyes
glistening, “I’ve thought over the finest way to develop films! They
have never thought of it! Why, it’s dead easy! All you have to do is
soak the film in—in—there, I’ve—I’ve forgotten just what it was, but—oh,
it’s very easy! I’ll have great fun showing them at the club.”
It was difficult to keep him from talking about cameras and expeditions
and new developers.
One day he said, “It’s funny that Owen doesn’t get back. But I suppose
he’s living with Alexander Hamilton—poor old man! You had better send
over and get Owen. If it hadn’t been for the fog—how foggy it is again!”
Owen came every day to ask about his chum’s condition; and McConnell,
who was pitifully upset, never could understand why he was forbidden to
see Allan, or to help take care of him.
There were many inquirers,—Major Mines, Miss Manston, Mr. Thornton, Mrs.
Creigh, and other members of the Camera Club, and Detective Dobbs often
called in.
It was one afternoon in late November that Allan, lying very still and
quiet, with his eyes fixed on the wall at the foot of his bed, where
there was a picture of the monks of St. Bernard with their dogs, said,
suddenly, to his mother,—
“Did they catch the Ghost?”
At first, Mrs. Hartel thought the question was but another rambling
question incident to the abating fever, and was about to utter one of
the evasive replies that are offered to fevered invalids, when something
in Allan’s face made her understand that he was coming out of that long
dream into which his mind had fallen. Then she answered him quite
truthfully:—
“No. They have not found him, Allan.”
“Good! I believe now that I wanted him to get away.”
“But you must not worry about that.”
“How many days’ start has he had?”
“He has had just a month.”
“A month?” Allan turned his eyes to his mother. She did not seem to be
joking. “A month?”
His mother came over and stroked his hair. “Yes, a month—a long month.
And my boy has had a very long sleep.”
“Why didn’t you wake me?” Allan asked. “I see,” he said, looking into
his mother’s tired but cheerful eyes, “I see, I have been sick. Oh, I
know it now! I can remember that the queerest things were going on in my
head! One day I think it seemed to be a camera, and the lens was red
hot, somehow, and somebody—who was it?—was pulling the bellows out too
far. Great Scott! I thought they would break it.”
“But you must not talk any more, now,” urged his mother.
And he lay there for half an hour without speaking.
Then he asked: “Did Owen get back all right?”
“Yes, soon after you did.”
The next day he tried for a long time to remember the wonderful plan he
had dreamed of for developing films, but he could not recall the
particular formula upon which the superiority of the plan rested.
Perhaps, he thought, it would come back to him.
It was early in December that McConnell and Owen were permitted to come
in and see him, and McConnell came in every day after that. There had
been an early snow, and the boys had proofs of some snow scenes which
proved to be immensely entertaining to Allan. Owen’s glimpses of winter
trees and snow-silvered bushes suggested many things that he himself had
planned to make when winter came.
[Illustration:
“McConnell came in every day after that.”
]
“I shall soon be out,” he told the boys, “and then I want to begin right
away on some winter things.” McConnell came in every day after that.
Detective Dobbs on his first visit to Allan brought a batch of pictures
he had made of Sporty. “I don’t have time to develop,” said Dobbs, “so I
let them ‘do the rest’ for me now. As soon as you get well,” continued
Dobbs, “I think the club is going to have an exhibition; they have been
talking about it for some time.”
Allan thought this was a capital idea. A plan for a frame big enough to
hold some of his most successful pictures gave him something pleasant to
think about for a whole day.
But he grew impatient to get about, and as December dragged along his
resentment against the long convalescence grew deeper. It was not until
Christmas Day that he came down to dinner. There were several little
surprises for him, in addition to the Christmas morning surprises, that
had been carried up to his room.
The dinner seemed to be in his honor, for the big cake had a frosted
camera on the top, and “Captain Kodak” in fantastic letters. In the
middle of the cake was a miniature imitation of a dark-room lamp with a
candle burning inside.
Soon after dinner Mr. Thornton and McConnell came in with a large
leather portfolio and a fine magnifying glass, which the members of the
club had sent to Allan. “We all are very glad you are getting well,”
said Mr. Thornton. “The club will be happy to greet its President
again.”
“Speech!” cried McConnell.
But Allan could only say, “Thank you, Mr. Thornton,” and sit down again
quickly. His head was not very strong yet, he afterward confessed.
They had a great night at the club when Allan did get back, and plans
for an exhibition were talked over in earnest. There was so large an
attendance of members that there was talk, too, of new club rooms,
though Major Mines and Mrs. Creigh said they wouldn’t give up the
present quarters for the most sumptuous club outfit that could be
devised.
The club exhibition took place in January, and it proved an exceedingly
interesting affair. Several of the members had surprises to
present—pictures which no one had been permitted to see. Among these
were amusing trophies of the Central Park trip, and of the first country
walk of the club. There were enlargements, beautiful bits in toned
bromide paper, platinum prints, one or two gems in carbon, and to show
what could be done with simple materials, Mr. Thornton had a series of
“blue prints” daintily mounted.
Allan was not exactly satisfied with the framing of his prints, and
wished he had had time to give more attention to that. Owen and
McConnell also made a good impression. McConnell’s “Water-melon Party”
contained many familiar faces. Then there was Big McConnell’s remarkable
picture of his younger brother. Detective Dobbs exhibited his first
attempts at printing. Six out of the eight prints he had framed with
great pride in a gorgeous gold frame (picked out by Mrs. Dobbs) revealed
the countenance of Sporty. Major Mines had some snapshots from St.
Augustine and elsewhere. Miss Illwin had sent in a little landscape,
which had no sooner been hung than it began to cause her great misery.
“For I can see now,” she said, “that I should have sent the other one.”
[Illustration:
“Big McConnell’s remarkable picture of his younger brother.”
]
[Illustration:
“The club exhibition took place in January.”
]
The pictures, which filled all the available space in the club rooms,
were displayed for a week. And almost every night during the week there
was an unusually large gathering at the rooms. On Saturday night Major
Mines hung a sheet at the head of the front room, and with the aid of a
small stereopticon gave an exhibition of lantern slides.
Very few of the members had tried lantern slides, but the Major’s
exhibition resulted in many resolutions to make slides from “pet”
plates. Another result was that a few months later the club bought a
stereopticon, and two nights in every month were given up to the display
of lantern pictures. Allan found great enjoyment in his lantern-slide
work. A device which he rigged up in the back room was soon in general
use by those members who went in for slide making.
[Illustration:
“McConnell’s ‘Water-melon Party.’”
]
Nothing looked more beautiful on the screen than the snow pictures. The
silvery tracings in the trees, the sunlight in footprints, the icicles
in the summer house, the river ice pushed into pyramids in the
coves,—these and a score of other themes shone with peculiar naturalness
in the light of a lantern.
Allan did not go back to the Academy until February, and he had not been
long at his school work again when news came that the battle ship
_Maine_ had been destroyed in the harbor of Havana.
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