“That was lucky. But you have a curious temperament. When we began to talk of the accidents, you remembered the damage to Fuller’s property before the risk to your life.”
“Well,” said Dick, “you see I wasn’t hurt, but the damage still keeps us back.”
“How did the truck run off the line? I should have thought you’d have taken precautions against anything of the kind.”
Dick pondered. He believed Kenwardine really was surprised to hear he had nearly been crushed by the block; but the fellow was clever and had begun to talk about the accidents. He must do nothing to rouse his suspicions, and began a painstaking account of the matter, explaining that the guard-rail had got loose, but saying nothing about the clamps being tampered with. Indeed, the trouble he took about the explanation was in harmony with his character and his interest in his work, and presently Kenwardine looked bored.
“I quite understand the thing,” he said, and got up as the man Dick was waiting for came towards the table.
The merchant did not keep Dick long, and he left the café feeling satisfied. Kenwardine had probably had him watched and had had something to do with the theft of the sheet from his blotting pad, but knew nothing about the attempt upon his life. After hearing about it, he understood why the accident happened, but had no cause to think that Dick knew, and some of his fellow conspirators were responsible for this part of the plot. Dick wondered whether he would try to check them now he did know, because if they tried again, they would do so with Kenwardine’s tacit consent.
A few days later, he was sitting with Bethune and Jake one evening when Stuyvesant came in and threw a card, printed with the flag of a British steamship company, on the table.
“I’m not going, but you might like to do so,” he said.
Dick, who was nearest, picked up the card. It was an invitation to a dinner given to celebrate the first call of a large new steamship at Santa Brigida, and he imagined it had been sent to the leading citizens and merchants who imported goods by the company’s vessels. After glancing at it, he passed it on.
“I’ll go,” Bethune remarked. “After the Spartan simplicity we practise at the camp, it will be a refreshing change to eat a well-served dinner in a mailboat’s saloon, though I’ve no great admiration for British cookery.”