He was rapidly becoming worn out by these plans, doubts, and problems, and half-poisoned with the number of secrets and difficulties which he had to keep locked up in his own breast, when a sudden recollection came to him with relief. Bennett was in the city.
Or, at least, he should be here. According to the arrangement he was to go to San Francisco as soon as he could leave the hospital in St. Louis, and surely his broken bones must have mended long ago. He was to have wired his address to Henninger, and probably he had done so, but Henninger was far away, and the fact would not help Elliott to find his former travelling companion.
He dropped a note to Bennett, however, in the city general delivery, and also wrote to him in care of the hospital, on the chance that the letter would be forwarded. Two days passed; it was evident that the former letter had not reached him, and it would be necessary to wait till an answer could arrive from St. Louis.
Elliott waited, feeling that he had merely added another uncertainty to his already plentiful store of them. He waited for ten days, and then as he entered the lobby of his hotel he saw a man leaning over the desk to speak to the clerk, and his back looked somehow familiar.
Elliott stepped up to the man, and touched his shoulder.
“Bennett! Is this you?”
The man turned with a start. It was indeed the adventurer, but dressed in a style indicating almost unrecognizable prosperity. He stared at Elliott for a moment, and then gripped him with both hands, emitting an explosively inarticulate ejaculation.
“By thunder!” he cried. “I couldn’t place you. I never saw you in a boiled shirt before. Let’s get out of this. I never was so glad to see a man in my life.”
He stepped out of the line and they left the hotel. As soon as they were in the street he clutched Elliott’s arm.
“Have you got it?” he demanded, under his breath.