CHAPTER XX.
A WEIRD VOICE OF THE NIGHT.
It is not necessary to give in detail here the record of Nick Carter’s trip, accompanied as he was by Maxwell Kane, to Washington; and of his interview with the President very little need be said, save that the detective’s prophecy was fully fulfilled.
The Dolphin was placed at their disposal at once, and there was no time lost in sailing. Moreover, the state and navy departments were set in motion, and information concerning the pirate was despatched all over the world, so there could be little doubt that he could exist for a long time on the high seas without being captured.
The Château Cadillac was readily found when the detective and his friend arrived in the neighborhood.
It was an extremely old building, founded, no doubt, in the Middle Ages. It bore evidence that time after time it had sunk into ruins, only to be again reclaimed. No doubt it had been stormed and torn almost from its foundations early in its history; but now it looked merely what it was—a historic old pile of graystone, moss-grown and ivy-wreathed, with a huge, square tower at one end of it, which clung to the edge of an abrupt precipice jutting out over the sea, so that it seemed as if it must topple and fall into the rock-bound and turbulent waters.
But it had stood there through many ages, defiant of storm and time alike; and it stood there now, as the two men approached it, grim, uninviting, repellant, gloomy, almost terrible.
Nor was the approach to it more inviting than its appearance. It was situated at the apex of a neck of land which jutted out into the sea, and thus formed a treacherous-looking harbor on one side of it, while the endless water tossed and fumed, and threw spray hundreds of feet into the air on the other.
From the foundation of the old castle to the water below was a fall of a sheer hundred feet, and if you add to this ninety feet more, which was approximately the height of the tower itself, you will get some idea of its appearance.