THE MAN THAT LOOKED THROUGH THE KEYHOLE.
Pearl Hawlinshed had not looked to see if the Goldwing was where he had
last seen her, outside of the breakwater. The water was unusually low on
the lake; and, though he saw the topmasts of several boats beyond the
breakwater, he was unable to determine whether or not any of them
belonged to the Goldwing. Captain Vesey had seen no boat go out, and
Pearl concluded that she was still at anchor.
Pearl made his trade with the acting skipper of the little steamer,
which was hardly more than a steam-launch. Mr. Button the engineer, who
was to remain in the employ of the new owner, was wiping the water off
the machinery. He was called, and informed of the arrangement with
Pearl. To the astonishment of both, he refused to move the Missisquoi
from the wharf.
"I reckon the boat is in my care until she is delivered to the new
owner," argued Captain Vesey.
"It don't make any difference to me whose care she is in. I won't go out
with a man who don't know any more about handling a boat than you do,
Captain Vesey," replied Mr. Button warmly. "It was only by a miracle
that we got over here at all. I expected to go to the bottom every
minute of the time until we got inside of the breakwater."
"I reckon I know how to handle a steamboat as well as the next man,"
returned Captain Vesey indignantly.
"That depends upon how much the next man knows about a tug-boat. If the
next man don't know any more about it than you do, I don't want to run
the engine for him."
Pearl could not help being on the engineer's side of the controversy. He
and Dory had agreed that the captain of the Missisquoi did not
understand his business. But Pearl Hawlinshed believed that he knew all
about a steamer, and all about the lake. He considered himself competent
to command one of the large steamers.
"I am going with you, Mr. Button, and it will be five dollars in your
pocket, as well as the captain's," interposed Pearl, who was disposed to
be liberal with the landlord's money.
"My life is worth something to me; or at any rate it is to my family,"
replied Mr. Button doubtfully. "Do you know about handling such a boat
as this?"
"I know all about it: I used to sail in the Au Sable," replied Pearl
confidently.
Mr. Button was doubtless a good engineer, but he was not a very shrewd
man. If he had been, he would have asked in what capacity the applicant
for the use of the Missisquoi served on board of the Au Sable. Possibly
Pearl would have evaded the question, or lied about the matter, for he
had simply been a waiter in the cabin for a few weeks. But Pearl thought
he knew all about a steamer, and all about the navigation of the lake.
"If you are a steamboat man I have no objection to taking the boat out,"
added the engineer. "It is a very rough day on the lake, and one has to
know something about handling a boat in such big waves."
"But I am the captain of this boat, and I reckon I don't want any boss
over me," interposed Captain Vesey at this point.
"We shall have no trouble," added Pearl, as he walked aft with the
captain. "I shall not meddle with your management of the boat. I only
said what I did to quiet the engineer."
But the boat had to take in a supply of fuel, for which Pearl promised
to pay out of the landlord's pocket. She could not leave for a couple of
hours. Pearl wanted to go back to the hotel, and attend to some matters
in connection with his mission which he had forgotten.
"I am to pay you five dollars, and the engineer five dollars, when you
put me on board of the Goldwing," said Pearl, as he was about to leave
the boat. "Is that the trade?"
"That's it," replied the engineer; and so answered the captain.
Pearl walked up the pier, and then went down the railroad till he could
see outside of the breakwater. He found the Goldwing lay at anchor in
the place she had chosen at first. Ten dollars would be a good sum to
pay if the Missisquoi was obliged to take him only out to the
breakwater. But, the sooner he brought Dory on shore, the sooner the
Goldwing would be put up at auction again.
He walked to the Witherill House, and informed the landlord of what he
had done, and declared that the boy who had stolen the money should be
handed over to him in a couple of hours. The hotel-keeper did not object
to the expense; but he wished his representative to be careful how he
managed the business, for it was by no means certain that the boy had
taken the money.
"I am as certain of it as I am of my own existence," replied Pearl
warmly. "I have found out something about the boy since I was here. He
has the reputation of being wild, and no one sent him over here to buy a
boat. And a fellow like him don't have forty or fifty dollars to invest
in boats."
"All that may be; but you can be careful just as well as not," added the
landlord.
"He is nothing but a young cub, and has no friends, so that nothing will
come of it if he shouldn't happen to be the thief."
"If he has no one to defend him, so much the more reason why he should
be fairly dealt with," replied the hotel-keeper,--a sentiment with
which Pearl Hawlinshed had no sympathy. "I have seen Moody since you
went out, and he says a man was looking into the keyhole of the room
next to his about ten o'clock last evening. That was your father's room.
Have you any idea who that man was, Hawlinshed?"
"I haven't the least idea in the world," answered Pearl; and possibly
the landlord did not notice his confusion when he replied, "Very likely
it was this same boy."
"It wasn't a boy, but a man: I asked Moody particularly about this
matter."
"I don't know any thing about the matter at all," protested Pearl. "If
the man that lost the money saw any thing of this kind, why didn't he
tell of it before?"
"I asked him this question, and he says he did not think of it before.
The fact of it is, that Moody had been drinking, though he sticks to it
that he wasn't drunk. He went into his room at about ten o'clock, and
put the money into his trunk, for he was afraid he might lose it. He saw
the man looking in at the keyhole of your father's room when he went
into his own to put the money in a safe place. He heard voices in the
next room when he opened his trunk. The boy was with your father at that
time very likely."
"If the man had been drinking, it is not probable that he knows much
about the boy or the man," added Pearl.
"He had not got very tipsy, or he would not have thought to look out for
his money. But bring the boy up, if you can get him without violence or
outrage. If he explains where he got the money to buy the boat, that is
the end of the matter so far as he is concerned. In my opinion the man
who was looking in at the keyhole of your father's room is more likely
to be the thief than the boy."
"Where did the boy get forty-two dollars to pay for the boat, then?"
demanded Pearl.
"I give it up," laughed the landlord. "But we are likely to know
something more about the case before dinner-time. I called in Peppers,
who used to be a detective in New York City; and he is at work on the
case now."
"What did you do that for?" demanded Pearl, who did not seem to relish
the information. "You set me at work on the case; and now you have
called in another person to attend to it, after I have engaged a
steamer."
"All I asked you to do was to bring the boy in to be questioned. Peppers
won't interfere with any thing that you may do," replied the landlord,
not a little surprised at the objection of Pearl.
"What is Peppers doing?" asked Pearl uneasily.
"I don't know what he is doing: at least, I don't know much about it,
and he told me not to tell what I did know."
"But you can tell me, for I am at work on the case," said Pearl in a
coaxing tone.
"No: I won't tell you any thing. You won't interfere with each other,
and it is best for each of you to work on his own hook," replied the
hotel-keeper, as he turned to attend to a guest who wished to speak to
him.
Pearl saw that it was useless to press the matter any farther; and he
was evidently very much disturbed about the turn the investigation had
taken during his absence. He was particularly anxious to know what the
detective was about, but he was unable to obtain any information from
any person. He returned to the steamboat wharf. When he came in sight of
the breakwater, he was not a little startled to see the Goldwing dart
out from behind the structure, with only a small jib and a reefed
mainsail.
He was startled; because not more than an hour had elapsed since he left
the Missisquoi, and he expected it would be another hour before she
would be ready to go in pursuit of the Goldwing. The latter could sail
like the wind if she would only keep right side up, and she would get a
long start of the steamer. Besides, Pearl did not like the looks of the
big waves on the lake any better than Mr. Button had; and he was not
altogether sure that he could manage her any better than Captain Vesey
had done.
The Goldwing was running from the end of the breakwater over towards the
main shore, and it was possible that Dory intended to make a landing at
Plattsburgh. But it was not more than a quarter of a mile from the
breakwater to the shore, and he could soon tell what she intended to do.
He hastened down the railroad to settle this point. In the furious
breeze that was blowing, the Goldwing seemed to leap over the water. If
she intended to go up to the wharf from which she had started, she would
have to tack in a moment.
Pearl ran with all his might; for it occurred to him that if he could
induce Dory to come on shore and go up to the hotel with him, he might
save the ten dollars he had agreed to give the captain and engineer, and
contrive some way to have it stick in his own pocket. The Goldwing ran
within a hundred feet of the shore, and Pearl got behind a car on a side
track to ascertain what she intended to do.
Gradually her main sheet was let off, and the Goldwing was headed to the
southward. This settled the matter. The boat was not going back to the
wharf. Her skipper had evidently run her over in that direction in order
to get her under the lee of the shore, where she would not get the full
force of the wind.
"Hallo! on board of the Goldwing!" shouted Pearl, as he ran to the
water's edge, yelling as loud as he could.
"On shore!" replied Dory, "what do you want?"
"You are wanted at the hotel," replied Pearl.
Dory discovered by this time who it was that hailed him; and he took no
further notice of Pearl, who hastened to the wharf.