I HAD been for some years in poor health, and, at length, became almost
prostrated in body and mind. Physicians advised a change of climate,
recommending the Northwest as adapted to restore the tone of my
physical system, and save my lungs from disease.
Having never visited the region designated, I wrote a letter of inquiry
to a friend who had just returned from that part of the country. Among
other things, in reply, he said, "Should you go West, beware of the
Mississippi River desperadoes. In taking a steamer, appropriate a
state-room to yourself; do not, on any consideration, share one with
a stranger. Let the money you take with you be in gold, and what you
do not at once need secure about your person, thus." Then followed an
ingenious method of secreting it. At the close of his communication,
the caution concerning the money and the state-room was repeated.
Now, it is all very well, doubtless, for the physician with a lucrative
practice to advise his patient to take a long and expensive journey,
and the well-to-do merchant, with characteristic foresight, to describe
the best way of taking care of surplus funds; but how one whose income
was "five hundred a year, and sass," as Peep at No. 5 has it, could
make such directions useful, was a question.
Nevertheless, in one such case, at least, that problem was solved; I
will not say "how," without the permission of the generous friends who
saved heart and brain that tug. So one pleasant autumn morning found
me on my way to the El Dorado of broken-down dyspeptics and pining
consumptives.
A ride of fourteen hundred miles from my sick-room, and I was at
Dubuque, weary, yet impatiently awaiting the steamer that was to take
me to the rolling prairies and bracing air of Minnesota. I had seen
"the lions," and had nothing to do but that most patience-trying of all
vocations in this railroad era to wait—for a delaying conveyance. Hour
after hour passed, and I had about given up expecting the boat, when
the porter, touching his cap, said, "The steamer is coming, sir. Shall
I take your baggage to the landing?"
What a swarming hive was that Mississippi steamer! What part of the
world was not represented in that motley, jostling throng!
My first business was to secure a state-room, for it was plain that all
on board would not have beds that night. Just then my friend's advice
recurred, and I resolved it should be followed.
"I would like a state-room entirely to myself," said I to the clerk.
"Can I be accommodated?"
"Can't tell about 'that!'" said he, crustily. Then, looking over his
book, "Yes, here's 'one' empty—'forty-nine;' and here's the key,"
handing a key to which was attached a strip of leather marked 49.
I was enough of an invalid to retire early, and, having disposed of my
valise, turned to fasten the door, when, on inserting the key, I found
that it would not fit the lock. Returning to the office, my very meek
statement of the unpleasant fact did not add to the amiability of the
clerk. He couldn't be responsible for every key on the boat; if the
wrong one had been labeled forty-nine, it wasn't "his" fault. "All is,"
said he, "that's the only state-room, and that's the only key to it 'I'
know of!"
There was no redress. I could only go back to the state-room, barricade
the door with such articles as were at hand, and make the best of it.
How welcome "nature's sweet restorer" to the sick and weary traveler,
and how "unwelcome" to have its blissful spell disturbed, thought I,
as strong-lunged voices banished my slumber. Looking from the little
window at the head of my berth, an animated scene was presented.
On an elevated stand was perched a well-dressed man, playing on a
shrill-voiced accordeon a popular air, accompanying it with a superb
voice; the swaying mass of humanity around joining in the chorus;
scores of voices in unison making stentorian melody. I was in no mood
to sympathize with their enjoyment, but felt rather like the old lady,
who, not approving of martial music, as the military pageant was
passing, stepped out, and requested the band to stop playing.
Till eleven o'clock the noisy music continued, when a tall, red-faced
man, who made it his business to tease the musician, dropped a
satirical remark in one of the pauses in the concert about a certain
duet by a cracked voice and a badly cracked accordeon. The leader of
the orchestra, with the over-sensitiveness of his class, declared,
in high wrath, he would play no more—an announcement which, very
ungratefully, was received with cheers, and the passengers separated
for the night.
Just from the sick-room, the journey and the loss of rest had so jaded
me, that at once, as soon as it was quiet, I fell into a deep sleep.
Suddenly, however, I was again aroused, by the falling of some article
to the floor, and, rising upon my elbow, saw a face peering in at the
door, as if some one was making exertions to enter.
It was a swarthy face, with shaggy eyebrows and heavy black beard, and
the reader can feel assured it did not impress me at all favorably in
the dim light and the dead silence.
"What do you want?" I asked.
"I have come to turn in!" said my visitor, stepping fully into view.
"You have mistaken the number," said I: "this is my room."
"I think 'you' are mistaken," he coolly replied: "this is forty-nine,
I believe? Yes," added he, stepping back, and reading the number on
the door, "forty-nine," then exhibiting a key on which that number was
marked.
"There is something wrong," I replied, "and I can not submit to
intrusion."
"And I can not be kept out of my berth," he rejoined, determinedly.
"The clerk sent me here not three minutes ago, with this key, and here
I intend to stay."
"We will see what the clerk says about it," said I, starting out to
find him.
My intruder followed; but the office lights were out, and save the echo
of our footsteps, and the strain and rush of the boat, silence brooded
in the vast floating palace.
"The clerk has turned in, I guess," said my new acquaintance, "the
rascal! He was here not more than three minutes ago. What's to be done?"
I reflected a moment. A short time before, a passenger, walking the
boat at night, mysteriously disappeared; his agonized family being
put ashore the next morning penniless and without a protector. I
must confess that, under the circumstances, I scarcely knew which to
choose—the state-room with the stranger, or the open boat without the
stranger, but concluded to take the former. So, returning together, and
taking the upper of the tier of berths, I resolved to keep watch for
the rest of the night, ready for any emergency. My unwelcome companion
took the berth next below me.
It was not hard to keep awake after the events of the evening; and
yet the moments moved slowly. Full two hours passed, and I was
deliberating whether or not to dismiss my suspicions and go to sleep,
when weariness overcame me, and I dropped into a restless slumber. How
long this continued I can not tell; but suddenly a hand glided across
my chest, pausing at the very spot where the gold had been secreted.
The feat was accomplished with surprising dexterity, and, glancing in
the direction from which the hand came, I found myself gazing into
the same eyes that had peered in at me from the half-opened door! But
the expression! Never had I seen any thing so fiendish—such a look
of murderous determination. The left hand was at the gold, while the
right held a gleaming knife. I felt that my hour had come. And yet it
was not the glittering blade that filled me with horror, so much as
the pitiless, demoniac expression of those eyes glaring from out their
deep sockets. The blood froze in my veins. All power of resistance
or of motion was gone. I could even feel the keen point of the knife
entering my quivering flesh, before, with one last, desperate effort,
I succeeded in throwing off the deathlike stupor. Happily, that final
effort availed, and, raising myself in the attitude of resistance, I
awoke—awoke to hear my new friend, who yet remained peaceably in bed,
make our room resound with certain nasal sounds, which, if not as
musical as one could wish, were not just then wholly unwelcome.
Morning dawned clear and beautiful, showing a more preposessing face
on the person of my suspected room-mate. He was from the good city of
Hartford, Conn., and, from motives similar to my own, had secured, as
he supposed, a state-room to himself, and having "the key to the only
empty state-room,"—"forty-nine,"—was as much astonished at finding it
occupied, as I was at being intruded upon.
"But," said he, laughing, "I had no objections to passing the night
with you!"
"Why not?" I asked.
"Because I knew you to be an honest man!"
"Ah, how did you know that?"
"From your anxiety to be alone."