The insurance companies held up the claim. I hurried to the consul's office, and told of the episode of the trunk, and how I was hit over the nut by a certain French gentleman during the fracas. The description answered to the man of machinery, and when I told of that last little crack I had heard below, the consul waited not on the order of his going, but ordered a cab and fairly threw me into it. We tore to the office of the underwriters, and I told my tale. Then I began to see the light, at last.
It was the old game tried under a new guise—and it had nearly cost the lives of a half thousand human beings. The horror of it appalled me, and I found myself wondering if I were to be trusted about without a nurse again. However, I was not censured severely. The crook was well known to the police, and since then the police of many countries have been trying to locate a gentleman who answers to the description of the Vicomte Raoul de Amadoun.
CAPTAIN JUNARD
Captain Junard awoke suddenly from a sound sleep. He listened intently for a few moments. The steady vibrations of the ship's engines told of the unchecked motion, the unhindered rush of the ship through the sea. Yet something had awakened him, something had given him a start from a dreamless sleep, the sleep of a tired man. He knew that something was wrong, felt it, and wondered at it, while his heart began to sound the alarm by its increasing pulsations. He wondered if he were sick, had eaten something that might produce nightmare; but he felt very well, and knew he never started at trifles. His hand reached for the revolver at the head of his bunk. He always kept it there for emergencies. It was a heavy forty-five, with a long, blue barrel—a strong weapon that had stood him handily in several affairs aboard the steamer. The light in his room was dim, but there was enough of it to show him that his room was empty. His hand reached the spot where the weapon usually hung, but failed to reach it. He groped softly for several moments. There was nothing upon the bulkhead; the gun was gone.
This fact made a peculiar impression upon him. He felt now that his instinct was correct, that he was indeed in danger. His mind cleared quickly from the stupor of sound sleep, and he remembered. He was carrying papers of peculiar importance in his strong box, or safe—papers relating to a deal in shipping connected with a revolution in a Central American state. A rival line had tried to stop the affair, which grew into political importance when secret agents of the United States tried to find out how deeply it might affect the Panama Canal. The concession had not been granted. The Canal Zone was not yet in existence, and the United States was sure to get it if this deal went through. The president had watched the affair with hungry eyes. Now the papers were in his—Junard's—possession, aboard his ship, bound for the state department in Washington.
Junard started up when he found his hand missing the butt of that revolver. It had been a pleasant fancy to him when he remembered its solid grip and deadly accuracy, a dependable friend in the hours of darkness and distress. Now it was gone, and could not have gone without some one having taken it. If they took it, they took it to keep him from using it. The idea of its loss awakened him more than anything else, and sent his heart beating fast as with sudden quickness and energy he sprang from his bed. There was nothing in his room, nothing at all. The lamp burned low. The electrics had been switched off, as they gave too much light for him to sleep in. Junard stood wondering, studying, and gazing at his safe, which lay bolted to the deck in a corner of his room.
The captain's room was just abaft the pilot house, as is usual in ships of that class. A stairway, or companion, of five steps led to the pilot house, but these were cut flush with his room and into the floor of the house above, so that he could shut the door. The door was shut now as he looked, but the sound of the steering gear told him that the man at the wheel, within a dozen feet of him, was steering and attending apparently to his business. The room ran clear across the superstructure, opening with a door upon either side. To starboard was his bathroom, to port was a closet, which adjoined the room of the chief officer, being separated from it by the bulkhead. Both these rooms led aft and opened into his room by doors in the bulkhead. This made his room a complete section of the superstructure about twelve feet deep and running clear through. There was nothing in it that could hide any one. A table, a couch with leather cushions, several chairs, and a large desk completed the furniture. His bed was a large double bunk let in to port and hung with curtains. It somewhat resembled an old four-poster bed.
Junard walked quickly to the safe. It was locked. He smiled at himself. The absurdity of the thing almost made him laugh. And yet he was as nervous as a ship's cat when watching a strange dog. He opened the door leading to the pilot house. The man in there was standing in regulation pose, with his hands upon the spokes of the steam steering gear. The sudden rattle and clank told Junard the fellow was awake and alert. The dim light from the binnacle made his outline plainly discernible, and Junard recognized him as Swan, a quartermaster of long service and excellent ability.