MR. GREEN HAT'S NEW ROLE
Mr. Green Hat, on this occasion, had discarded the article of headwear
that had given him that nickname with the young ensigns.
Instead, Gortchky wore an opera hat, with evening dress of the most
fashionable description. On his broad white expanse of vest there
glittered a foreign decoration.
Though he walked alone, and affected an air of indifference to his
surroundings, Darrin was of the impression that the spy was looking
alertly for some one.
"Of course it may happen," said Dave to his friend, "that the fellow
is foolish enough to come here for the purpose of throwing away at the
gaming tables the money he earns by his questionable services to some
plotting international ring. Yet that seems hardly likely, either, for
Gortchky must be a man of tremendous energy, to render the thrilling
services that are demanded of a spy or an international trouble-maker."
Now the two chums left the place where they had been standing behind
the bush, to stroll along slowly, all the while keeping Gortchky in
sight.
Dave nudged his chum as, at a turn in the path, the spy came face to
face with a woman clad in a beautiful evening gown.
Raising his hat, and making a courteous bow to the woman, who returned
the greeting, Gortchky exchanged half a dozen sentences with her. Then
the pair separated, though not before Dave and Dan had obtained, under
the electric light, a good view of the young woman's face. Her dark
beauty, her height and grace, gave her a queenly air.
Stepping into another path, Dave and Dan were soon on the trail of
Gortchky once more, without having been obliged to pass the young
woman face to face.
"I wonder if she's a 'spy-ess'?" murmured Dan.
"It is just as well to be suspicious of any one whom Gortchky appears
to know well," Dave answered, slowly, in a low voice.
"I beg pardon, sir," broke in a sailor from the "Hudson," stepping
forward and saluting the officers. "May I speak with you, sir?"
It was Dan to whom he spoke, and it was Dan who answered:
"Certainly, Martin."
[Illustration: "The spy came face to face with a woman."]
Martin was one of the gun-pointers in Dalzell's division.
"Linton, one of our men, has been hurt, and rather badly, by falling
off a boulder that he climbed not far from here, sir. I thought I
would ask the ensign what to do with Linton."
"How badly is he hurt?" asked Ensign Dalzell.
"I think his right leg is broken, sir. Colby is with him, and I came
in search of you, sir, as I was certain I saw you here."
"Is Linton far from here?" asked Dalzell.
"Less than a quarter of a mile, sir."
"Lead the way, Martin, and I'll follow you. Dave, you'll excuse me for
a little while, won't you?"
"Certainly," nodded Ensign Darrin. Dave wished to remain where he was,
in order to keep an eye over Gortchky's movements, and Dan knew it. So
the chums parted for the present.
"Now, I'll see if I can pick up Gortchky again," reflected Ensign
Darrin. "He appears to have given me the slip."
Dave went ahead, more briskly than he had been moving before, in the
hope of sighting the spy.
Out of the Casino had staggered a young man, despair written on his
face, hopelessness in his very air. Plunging into the garden this
stranger made his way hastily through it, keeping on until he came to
the field where pigeon shoots are held from time to time.
Dave, at the edge of the garden, saw the young man step past the
shrubbery and go on into the darkness beyond. Under the last rays of
light Ensign Darrin saw something glitter in the stranger's hand.
"That fellow has just drawn a revolver!" flashed through Darrin's
mind. "Now, what mischief can he be up to?"
Led onward by some fascination that he did not understand, the young
naval officer followed.
In his excitement and desperation the man did not notice that he was
being followed.
Halting under the heavy foliage of a tree, the stranger glanced down
at the weapon in his hand and shuddered. This foolish young man,
haunting the gambling tables until he had ruined himself, and seeing
nothing now ahead of him in life, was bent upon self-destruction.
Sometimes there are several such suicides at Monte Carlo in a single
week. If unprovided with other means for ending his life, the suicide
sometimes hurls himself over the edge of one of the steep cliffs.
Suicides, of course, have a depressing effect on other players, so
those in authority at the Casino take every means of hushing up these
tragedies as effectively as possible.
"There is really nothing left in life," muttered the young man
huskily, as he stared at the weapon in his hand. He spoke in French,
but Darrin heard and understood him.
Then the desperate one raised the weapon, pointing the muzzle at his
head.
At that instant there was a quick step out of the darkness, and Dave
reached the stranger. The latter, startled, drew back, but not in time
to prevent Darrin's grip of steel from resting on his right wrist.
Wrench! Dave had the pistol in his own hands, at the same time
murmuring:
"You will pardon me, I trust."
Ensign Darrin broke the weapon open at the breach. From the chamber he
removed the cartridges, dropping them into his pocket. With another
swift movement Dave flung the pistol so far that it dropped over the
edge of a cliff.
"You will pardon me, I trust, sir, for throwing your property away in
that fashion," Dave apologized, in the best French he could summon.
"Since it is the very last item of my property that was left to me,
perhaps it can matter but little that I am deprived of it," said the
stranger, smiling wanly. "The cliff is still left to me, however. I
can easily follow the pistol."
"But you are not going to jump over the cliff," Darrin assured him
energetically.
"And why are you so certain of that?" demanded the stranger.
Dave looked keenly at his companion before he replied:
"Because, sir, your face is that of a man--not of a coward. Suicide is
the act of a coward. It is the resort of one who frankly admits that
his troubles are greater than he has the manhood to bear. Now, you
have, when one regards you closely, the look of a man and a
gentleman."
"Thank you for your good opinion, sir," replied the stranger, bowing.
"I will say that I was born a gentleman."
"And you still are one, and a man, as well as a gentleman," Dave
continued, gently. "Therefore, you are not afraid to face life."
"What is there left to me to make life worth living?" queried the
stranger.
"Why should you have the least desire to die?" Dave countered.
"I have lost all my money."
"That is a very slight matter," Darrin argued. "Lost all your money,
have you? Why, my dear fellow, there's a lot more in the world."
"But none of the money now in the world is mine," urged the desperate
one.
"Then make a part of the world's money yours," the young naval officer
retorted, smilingly.
"I have never worked," replied the stranger stiffly.
"Why not?" Dave pressed.
"I never had need to."
"But now you have the need, and working for money will bring some
novelty into your life," the young ensign insisted.
"Did I not tell you that I was born a gentleman?" inquired the young
man, raising his eyebrows. "A gentleman never works!"
"Some gentlemen don't," Dave admitted. "But they are the wrong kind of
gentlemen."
"If I mistake not," quizzed the stranger keenly, "you are a gentleman,
yourself."
"I trust that I am," Dave responded gravely.
"Then do you work?"
"More hours a day than any laborer does," Darrin answered promptly. "I
am a naval officer."
"Ah, but that is a career of honor--of glory!" cried the stranger.
"And so is any honest job of work that a man takes up in earnest and
carries through to the best of his ability," Dave Darrin returned with
warmth.
"But you see, sir," argued the stranger, though now he was smiling,
"you have been trained to a profession. I never was so trained."
"You are young?"
"Twenty-four."
"Then you are young enough to change your mind and recognize the
dignity of labor," Darrin continued. "You are also young enough and,
unless I mistake you, bright enough to win a very good place in life
for yourself. And you are man enough, now you have had time to think
it over, to see the wickedness of destroying yourself. Man, _make_
yourself instead."
"I'll do it! I will make myself!" promised the stranger, with a new
outburst of emotion.
"And you will never again allow yourself to become so downcast that
you will seek to destroy yourself?"
"Never!"
"I am satisfied," Dave said gravely. "You are a man of honor, and
therefore are incapable of breaking your word. Your hand!"
Their hands met in ardent clasp. Then Darrin took out his card case,
tendering his card to the stranger.
Instantly the young man produced his own card case, and extended a bit
of pasteboard, murmuring:
"I am M. le Comte de Surigny, of Lyons, France."
It was too dark to read the cards there, but Dave gave his own name,
and again the young men shook hands.
"But I am forgetting my comrade," Dave cried suddenly. "He was to
return in a few minutes, and will not know where to find me."
"And I have detained you, with my own wretched affairs!" cried the
young count reproachfully. "I must not trespass upon your time another
second."
"Why not walk along with me and meet my friend?" Dave suggested.
"With pleasure."
Dave and the young French count stepped along briskly until they came
to the spot where Dalzell had left his chum. Two or three minutes
later Dan hove into sight.
Dan and the Count of Surigny were introduced, and some chat followed.
Then the Count frankly told of the service that Darrin had just
rendered him.
"That is Dave!" glowed Dan. "He's always around in time to be of use
to some one."
In the distance a shot rang out--only one. The Count of Surigny
shuddered.
"You understand, do you not?" he asked.
"I am afraid so," Dave sadly responded.
As they stood there four men with a litter hurried past toward the
place whence the sound of the shot had come.
"The police of Monte Carlo," murmured the Count of Surigny.
Presently, at a distance, the three onlookers beheld the four men and
the litter moving stealthily along, but not toward the Casino. The
litter was occupied by a still form over which a cover had been
thrown.
"You have shown me the way of true courage!" murmured the Count of
Surigny, laying an affectionate hand on Ensign Darrin's shoulder.
The chums and their new acquaintance strolled along for a few moments.
Then the Count suddenly exclaimed:
"But I am intruding, and must leave you."
"You surely are not intruding," Dave told him. "We are delighted with
your company."
"Wholly so," Dan added.
But the Count felt himself to be an interloper, and so insisted on
shaking hands again and taking his departure.
"I shall see or write you presently," said the Count. He had already
obtained the fleet address, and knew, in addition, that he could write
at any time through the Navy Department at Washington.
"Will he make good?" asked Danny Grin wistfully, as he peered after
the departing form.
"It's an even chance," Dave replied. "Either that young man will go
steadily up, or else he will go rapidly down. It is sometimes a
terrible thing to be born a gentleman--in the European sense. Few of
the Count's friends will appreciate him if he starts in upon a career
of effort. But, even though he goes down, he will struggle bravely at
the outset. Of that I feel certain."
"I wonder what has become of Gortchky?" remarked Ensign Dalzell.
That industrious spy, however, was no longer the pursued; he had
become the pursuer.
From a little distance Gortchky had espied Dave and the Count
chatting, and had witnessed the introduction to Dalzell. A man of Mr.
Green Hat's experience with the world did not need many glances to
assure himself that the Count had lost his last franc at the gambling
table.
Gortchky was not at Monte Carlo without abundant assistance. So, as
the Count, head down, and reflecting hard, strolled along one of the
paths, a man bumped into him violently.
"Ten thousand pardons, Monsieur!" cried the bumper, in a tone of great
embarrassment. "It was stupid of me. I--"
"Have no uneasiness, my friend," smiled the Count. "It was I who was
stupid. I should have looked where I was going."
Courteous bows were exchanged, and the two separated. But the man who
had bumped into the Count now carried inside his sleeve the Count's
empty wallet, which was adorned with the crest of Surigny.
This wallet was promptly delivered to another. Five minutes later, as
the Count strolled along, Emil Gortchky called out behind him:
"Monsieur! Pardon me, but I think you must have dropped your wallet."
"If I have, the loss is trifling indeed," smiled the Count, turning.
Gortchky held out the wallet, then struck a match. By the flame the
Count beheld his own crest.
"Yes, it is mine," replied the Count, "and I thank you for your
kindness."
"Will Monsieur do me the kindness, before I leave him, to make sure
that the contents of the wallet are intact?" urged Gortchky.
"It will take but an instant," laughed the Count of Surigny. "See! I
will show you that the contents are intact!"
As he spoke he opened the wallet. A packet of paper dropped to the
ground. In astonishment the Count bent over to pick up the packet. M.
Gortchky struck another match.
"Let us go nearer to an electric light, that you may count your money
at your ease, Monsieur," suggested Gortchky.
Like one in a daze the Count moved along with Gortchky. When
sufficiently in the light, Surigny, with an expression of
astonishment, found that he was the possessor of thirty twenty-franc
notes.
"I did not know that I had this!" cried the Count. "How did I come to
overlook it?"
"It is but a trifle to a man of your fortune," cried M. Gortchky
gayly.
"It is all I have in the world!" sighed the young man. "And I am still
amazed that I possess so much."
"Poor?" asked Gortchky, in a voice vibrating with sympathy. "And you
so young, and a gentleman of old family! Monsieur, it may be that this
is a happy meeting. Perhaps I may be able to offer you the employment
that befits a gentleman."
Then Gortchky lowered his voice, almost whispering:
"For I am in the diplomatic service, and have need of just such an
attache as you would make. Young, a gentleman, and of charming
manners! Your intellect, too, I am sure, is one that would fit you for
eminence in the diplomatic service."
"The mere mention of the diplomatic service attracts me," confessed M.
le Comte wistfully.
"Then you shall have your fling at it!" promised M. Gortchky. "But
enough of this. You shall talk it over with me to-morrow. Diplomacy,
you know, is all gamble, and the gambler makes the best diplomat in
the world. For to-night, Monsieur, you shall enjoy yourself! If I know
anything of gaming fate, then you are due to reap a harvest of
thousands with your few francs to-night. I can see it in your face
that your luck is about to turn. An evening of calm, quiet play,
Monsieur, and in the morning you and I will arrange for your entrance
into the diplomatic world. _Faites votre jeux!_ (Make your wagers.)
Wealth to-night, and a career to-morrow! Come! To the Casino!"