“By the way, have you told Lafitte anything about this?” inquired the captain, anxiously.
“God bless me, no!” replied Mr. Atkins, hurriedly. “Lafitte musn’t know anything about this. We must keep it from him.”
“What is it you must keep from me, my dear friends?” said a smooth, courteous voice.
They both started, and turned around. There stood Mr. Lafitte, smiling a bland sardonic smile. So still—so cool—so unruffled. It almost seemed as if he had outgrown upon them from the air. But he had come softly through the outer office, and stood just within the glass door, which Jones had left open.
“Better not keep anything from me, my dear friends,” blandly continued the Southerner, smiling stilly down upon their blank and ghast faces. “Because I am the very devil for finding out things that are kept from me. Besides, frankness is a virtue—a positive virtue.”
He closed the glass door behind him, and entering, took a chair, and removed his Panama hat, smiling stilly all the while, with his tawny, blood-specked, glossy eyes slowly and almost imperceptibly roving from one to the other.
“Lafitte,” gasped the merchant, feeling as if he was about to faint, “don’t blame me. I meant it for the best.”
“Blame you, my friend!” returned the Southerner, smoothly, with an air of tender reproach which was atrocious; “blame you! Could I be so cruel? Ah, no! Bangham, my love, how are you? It is long since I have seen you. The last time I saw you, my Bangham, was at the St. Charles Hotel—and oh, my friend, how drunk you were! But you are not drunk to-day, dear captain. Ah, no! To-day we can appeal from Philip Bangham drunk to Philip Bangham sober. Let us then appeal to you to tell us what is the mystery.”
The captain reddened under this address, and looking exceedingly nonplused, fidgeted with his necktie as if it choked him.
“Lafitte, don’t joke,” said Mr. Atkins, nervously. “Don’t, I beg of you. I feel ill already, and you disturb me. Listen. Here is the trouble. One of your slaves was found in Bangham’s vessel when he was three days out, and came on here to Boston. We kept him bound in the hold, intending to have him sent back to you, and last night the infernal scoundrel of a mate let him go, and we’ve lost him.”