Sevenoaks: A Story of Today

by J. G. Holland

This little benediction was received gratefully. It would do to start on. He felt his way down stairs, called for his reckoning, and when, after an uncomfortable and vexatious delay, he had found a sleepy, half-dressed man to receive his money, he went out upon the street, satchel in hand, and walked rapidly toward the slip where the Aladdin lay asleep.

Talbot's money had done its work well, and the fugitive had only to make himself known to the officer in charge to secure an immediate entrance into the state-room that had been purchased for him. He shut to the door and locked it; then he took off his clothes and went to bed.

Mr. Belcher's entrance upon the vessel had been observed by a policeman, but, though it was an unusual occurrence, the fact that he was received showed that he had been expected. As the policeman was soon relieved from duty, he gave the matter no farther thought, so that Mr. Belcher had practically made the passage from his library to his state-room unobserved.

After the terrible excitements of the two preceding days, and the sleeplessness of the night, Mr. Belcher with the first sense of security fell into a heavy slumber. All through the morning there were officers on the vessel who knew that he was wanted, but his state-room had been engaged for an invalid lady, and the steward assured the officers that she was in the room, and was not to be disturbed.

The first consciousness that came to the sleeper was with the first motion of the vessel as she pushed out from her dock. He rose and dressed, and found himself exceedingly hungry. There was nothing to do, however, but to wait. The steamer would go down so as to pass the bar at high tide, and lay to for the mails and the latest passengers, to be brought down the bay by a tug. He knew that he could not step from his hiding until the last policeman had left the vessel, with the casting off of its tender, and so sat and watched from the little port-hole which illuminated his room the panorama of the Jersey and the Staten Island shores.

His hard, exciting life was retiring. He was leaving his foul reputation, his wife and children, his old pursuits and his fondly cherished idol behind him. He was leaving danger behind. He was leaving Sing Sing behind! He had all Europe, with plenty of money, before him. His spirits began to rise. He even took a look into his mirror, to be a witness of his own triumph.

At four o'clock, after the steamer had lain at anchor for two or three hours, the tug arrived, and as his was the leeward side of the vessel, she unloaded her passengers upon the steamer where he could see them. There were no faces that he knew, and he was relieved. He heard a great deal of tramping about the decks, and through the cabin. Once, two men came into the little passage into which his door opened. He heard his name spoken, and the whispered assurance that his room was occupied by a sick woman; and then they went away.

At last, the orders were given to cast off the tug. He saw the anxious looks of officers as they slid by his port-hole, and then he realized that he was free.

The anchor was hoisted, the great engine lifted itself to its mighty task, and the voyage was begun. They had gone down a mile, perhaps, when Mr. Belcher came out of his state-room. Supper was not ready—would not be ready for an hour. He took a hurried survey of the passengers, none of whom he knew. They were evidently gentle-folk, mostly from inland cities, who were going to Europe for pleasure. He was glad to see that he attracted little attention. He sat down on deck, and took up a newspaper which a passenger had left behind him.

The case of "Benedict vs. Belcher" absorbed three or four columns, besides a column of editorial comment, in which the General's character and his crime were painted with a free hand and in startling colors. Then, in the financial column, he found a record of the meeting of the Crooked Valley Corporation, to which was added the statement that suspicions were abroad that the retiring President had been guilty of criminal irregularities in connection with the bonds of the Company—irregularities which would immediately become a matter of official investigation. There was also an account of his operations in Muscogee Air Line, and a rumor that he had fled from the city, by some of the numerous out-going lines of steamers, and that steps had already been taken to head him off at every possible point of landing in this country and Europe.