"All right; I have him here," replied the engineer. "What does all this mean, Paul?" asked the astonished father, turning to his son.
Paul related all the events in the family history since the assault upon Lily at the point; and the returned wanderer fully understood the feud between Paul and the magnate. His blood boiled at the insult to his daughter, and the persecution to which his son had been subjected. He had put his hand on the wheel to shut off the steam, when Paul asked him where he had been for two years, and why he had not written to his family.
The engineer did not turn the wheel, for the wanting letters were an imputation upon him. He was not a scholar, but he had written a score of letters and had never had a reply to one of them. Before he left, something had been said between himself and his wife about her going to the home of an uncle in Iowa. He had invited them to visit him and take care of him, for he was a bachelor. He would support them, and they could do work enough to earn their living. They had expected to hear from him every day at the time Peter Bristol left home.
The father had no doubt they would go there, and had directed his letters after the first one to their new home. A few days after his departure for New York, where he hoped to find work, the letter came from the West to Mrs. Bristol, but it brought no hope. The writer had bought a ranch in Texas, had married, and could do nothing for the family of his brother. This clearly explained the miscarriage of the letters.
Peter Bristol had worked as a fireman on a railroad. When he got to New York he found a situation as an oiler on a steamer bound to Havana. In Cuba he soon secured a good situation to run an engine on a plantation. He saved his money, and did his best to find what had become of his family. At last it occurred to him to write to the postmaster of his brother's late residence in Iowa. Nothing was known of his family, his brother had gone to Texas, and a score of letters for his wife had gone to the dead-letter office.
Then he had written to a friend in Westport, and learned that his family were still at Sandy Point, and were very poor. When this last letter came, nearly two years after he had left home, he was filled with sorrow and anxiety. He wrote no more letters, but started for home with all the money he had saved. About the first person he met when he landed in New York was Wheeler, whom he had known as a pilot on Lake Champlain. He had been sent by Major Billcord to take his steamer, just purchased, up to the lake by the way of the Hudson and the canal. He wanted an engineer, and, after a deal of talk, employed Peter Bristol.
Wheeler had his doubts about the competency of Bristol. The magnate wanted a suitable engineer, and would give him good wages. He might object to a man who had been known on the lake as nothing but a boatman. Peter wanted the place, and had been running an engine for two years. Wheeler agreed to do what he could for him with the magnate; but he thought it best for him not to say who he was for the present. Time and the tropical sun had so changed him that he was not likely to recognize him if he was careful.
Peter Bristol had served as engineer on the way up, and Major Billcord and Walk had joined the vessel at Whitehall in the morning. The steamer was on trial, and the major wanted her run at her highest speed a part of the time. The magnate had hardly looked at the engineer, he was so interested in the machinery and the craft, and Bristol had had no trouble in concealing his identity so far. This was the story he told Paul, and repeated to his wife and Lily in the evening.