“She will, Cora, against him or—herself, if it comes to that.”
Mrs. Kane shivered. Then she flung her arms around her husband’s neck and sobbed as if her heart would indeed break; but after awhile she became quieter, and presently she repeated her former question.
“What shall we do, Max?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” he replied vaguely.
“There is Nick Carter,” she sobbed. “You know how quickly he accomplished something before.”
“Yes; of course, I shall go to him at once. That goes without saying, Cora. But how will even Carter be able to pursue and catch this brute of a pirate? We have no trace of him. He leaves no track behind him on the pathless ocean. Even now he is far out of sight, and we have no idea in which direction he has gone. And besides, Cora, if we do the very best we can we cannot hope to arrive in New York in less than forty-eight hours from now. Two whole days, that is; and probably that damned vil—pardon me, dear—probably that infernal scoundrel is going faster than we are, in the opposite direction. You see, don’t you, Cora, that if we knew exactly where to find the pirate we could not hope to overtake him in much less than two weeks, could we?”
“Do you mean, Max, that we cannot—cannot hope to—to save Bessie?” sobbed his wife.
“I mean this, Cora—and we might as well look the matter squarely in the face, now that it has confronted us, don’t you think so?”
“Well? Go on, Max.”