The girl was silent, but deeply interested, and the one
thought that ran through her mind was the knowledge that
Spencer Vance had overheard the revelation when made to
Garcia.
The old man had just concluded his narrative when an intruder walked into the cabin.
CHAPTER XIV.
A reckless gang of men were assembled in the low tavern kept my a man named Rigby.
The latter was a remarkable man. He kept a low seashore resort, a place where fishermen and the roughest sort of men gathered, and yet he was a man of considerable education and a great deal of cunning, and coined more good money in this little seaside tavern then did other rumsellers who occupied saloons in the great city, that cost thousands to fit up and decorate.
Rigby was too cunning and careful to be a smuggler himself, but he was also cunning enough to "scoop in" the major portion of the earnings of the men engaged in the perilous trade.
It was only when the business had grown to large proportions that the Government organized a regular plan for its suppression; and at the time our story opens, the play between the smugglers and the Government agents was at its finest point. It was well known that there were parties in New York who had, and were still realizing immense sums of money by cheating the Government of its legitimate revenue.
The Collector of the Port did not care so much about the crews of the vessels, it was the owners and capitalists he was seeking to trail down.
The smugglers had given over the search for Spencer Vance, and in parties of twos and threes, had gathered at Rigby's, until at least fifteen or twenty men were assembled. They were all smugglers and members of the crew of the smuggler yacht "Nancy."
As intimated in our opening chapters, the men ostensibly were fishermen, and their boat was stated to be a fishing-boat; and to lend color to the claim, the men did go off between times on fishing expeditions, and the latter little trick had been their best "blind" and "throw off."