"Thank you," the secretary responded. "I am sure that you will. I wish you a safe voyage, Captain Chutney, and fresh Burmese laurels, for you will no doubt take part in the Chittagong expedition."
They shake hands warmly, and in five minutes Guy is rattling cityward again through the increasing fog. Long afterward he looks back on that morning as the most memorable day of his life. At present his commission sits lightly on his mind. He attends to all his duties in London, catches the India Mail, and two days later is steaming across the Mediterranean on board the P. and O. steamship Cleopatra.
CHAPTER I.
THE STOLEN DESPATCHES.
Steadily the Cleopatra had traversed the Mediterranean, passed through the Suez Canal, plowed the burning waters of the Red Sea, and now, on this bright, sultry day, Aden was left behind, and with smoking funnels she was heading swiftly and boldly for the Indian Ocean.
A smaller steamer, a mere pigmy beside this gigantic Indian liner, had left the harbor of Aden at the same time, and was beating in a southwesterly direction across the gulf with a speed that was rapidly increasing the distance between the two vessels.
On the upper deck stood Guy Chutney, straining his eyes through a pair of field-glasses to catch a last glimpse of the Cleopatra, and to distinguish, if possible, the figures grouped under the white awnings. He had only arrived at Aden last night, and now he was bound for the dreary African coast, while all the gay friends he had made on board the Cleopatra were steaming merrily off for Calcutta without him.
It was by no means a comforting state of affairs, and Guy's spirits were at their lowest ebb as the steamer finally faded into the horizon. He put up the glasses and strode forward. From the lower deck came a confused babel of sounds, a harsh jabbering of foreign languages that grated roughly on his ear.
"This is a remarkably fine day, sir."
It was the captain who spoke, a bluff, hearty man, who looked oddly out of place in white linen and a solar topee.