“I’m going to get inside the place secretly, if possible.”
“But——”
“Look here, Max. We have got to work on the principle that Bessie is a prisoner inside that old pile of stones, haven’t we?”
“Yes.”
“Very well. We will start out on the proposition that that is a fact. Now, if Cadillac is there, he probably considers himself more or less safe, for a time at least. He does not suppose that we would have tracked him here quite so suddenly. You see, he will have argued that we have considered him as having returned to the pirate business for good, and will, therefore, search the seas, and, perhaps, a few islands in the seas, for him.”
“Well?”
“In the meantime he has come here with the Shadow. He has sunk her under water somewhere inside that harbor, where, by the way, she will be a good deal safer than she would on top of it, for it looks like a treacherous spot to me.”
“And what then?”
“Why, then he has taken his captive ashore. He has had her conducted to the castle. He has fastened her away in some great room, probably in the tower, given her servants to wait upon her, and, in fact, done everything on earth for her comfort, save the one thing of giving her back her liberty.”
“Humph!” said Kane. “I’m not half so sure of that as I pretended to be when we were discussing it in the presence of my wife and her mother.”