“Where do you come from, great God! in such a state?” exclaimed his comrades when they saw him.
“What has happened to you?”
And, when he had told them all he had gone through since they parted, they said,—
“Certainly, my dear Champcey, you are a lucky fellow. This is the second accident from which you escape as by a miracle. Mind the third!”
“Mind the third!” that was exactly what Daniel thought.
For, in the midst of all the frightful sufferings he had undergone during the past night, he had reflected deeply. That block which had fallen on his head, no one knew whence; this boat sinking suddenly, and without apparent cause—were they the work of chance alone?
The awkwardness of the boatman who had so unexpectedly turned up to offer him his services had filled his mind with strange doubts. This man, a wretched sailor, might be a first-class swimmer; and, having taken all his measures before upsetting the boat, he might easily have reached land after the accident.
“This boatman,” Daniel thought, “evidently wanted me to perish. Why, and what purpose? Evidently not for his sake. But who is interested in my death? Sarah Brandon? No, that cannot be!”
What was still less likely was, that a wretch in Sarah Brandon’s pay should have found his way on board “The Conquest,” and should then have been precisely at the right moment at the wharf, the first time Daniel went on shore. Still his suspicions troubled him to such a degree, that he determined to make every effort to solve the mystery.
To begin, he asked for a list of all the men who had been allowed to go on shore the night before. He learned in reply, that only the crews of the different boats had been at Saigon, but that all the emigrants having been allowed to land, several of these men had also gone on shore. With this information, and in spite of his great weakness, Daniel went to the chief of police at Saigon, and asked him for an officer. With this agent he went to the wharf, to the spot where the boat of “The Conquest” had been lying the night before, and asked him to make inquiries there as to any boatman that might have disappeared during the night.