The Tremendous Event Part 13

"Do you know nothing of the contents of the letter?"

"From some words exchanged by Lord Bakefield and his daughter the maid gathered that they were discussing the wreck of the _Queen Mary_, the steamer on which Miss Bakefield had been shipwrecked the other day and which must be lying high and dry by now. Miss Bakefield appears to have lost a miniature."

"Yes," said Simon, thoughtfully, "yes, I dare say. But it is most distressing that this letter was not placed in my own hands. The maid ought never to have given it up."

"Why should she have been suspicious?"

"What! Of the first person she met?"

"But she knew him."

"She knew this man?"

"Certainly. She had often seen him at Lord Bakefield's; he is a frequent visitor to the house."

"Then she was able to give you his name?"

"She told me his name."

"Well?"

"His name's Rolleston."

Simon gave a start.

"Rolleston!" he exclaimed. "But that's impossible! . . . Rolleston!

What madness! . . . What's the fellow like? Give me a description of him."

"The man whom the maid and I saw is very tall, which enables him to bend over his victims and stab them from above between the shoulders.

He is thin . . . stoops a little . . . and he's very pale. . . ."

"Stop!" ordered Simon, impressed by this description, which was that of Edward. "Stop! . . . The man is a friend of mine and I'll answer for him as I would for myself. Rolleston a murderer! What nonsense!"

And Simon broke into a nervous laugh, while the Indian, still impa.s.sive, resumed:

"Among other matters, the maid told me of a public-house, frequented by rather doubtful people, where Rolleston, a great whiskey-drinker, was a familiar customer. This information was found to be correct.

The barman, whom I tipped lavishly, told me that Rolleston had just been there, at about twelve o'clock, that he had enlisted half-a-dozen rascals who were game for anything and that the object of the expedition was the wreck of the _Queen Mary_. I was now fully informed. The whole complicated business was beginning to have a meaning; and I at once made the necessary preparations, though I made a point of coming back here constantly, so that I might be present when you awoke and tell you the news. Moreover, I took care that your friend, Mr. Sandstone, should watch over you; and I locked your pocketbook, which was lying there for anybody to help himself from, in this drawer. I took ten thousand francs out of it to finance our common business."

Simon was past being astonished by the doings of this strange individual. He could have taken all the notes with which the pocketbook was crammed; he had taken only ten. He was at least an honest man.

"Our business?" said Simon. "What do you mean by that?"

"It will not take long to explain, M. Dubosc," replied the Indian, speaking as a man who knows beforehand that he has won his cause.

"It's this. Miss Bakefield lost, in the wreck of the _Queen Mary_, a miniature of the greatest value; and her letter was asking you to go and look for it. The letter was intercepted by Rolleston, who was thus informed of the existence of this precious object and at the same time, no doubt, became acquainted with Miss Bakefield's feelings towards you. If we admit that Rolleston, as the maid declares, is in love with Miss Bakefield, this in itself explains his pleasant intention of stabbing you. At any rate, after recruiting half-a-dozen blackguards of the worst kind, he set out for the wreck of the _Queen Mary_. Are you going to leave the road clear for him, M. Dubosc?"

Simon did not at once reply. He was thinking. How could he fail to be struck by the logic of the facts that had come to his notice? Nor could he forget Rolleston's habits, his way of living, his love of whisky and his general extravagance. Nevertheless, he once more a.s.serted;

"Rolleston is incapable of such a thing."

"All right," said the Indian. "But certain men have set out to seize the _Queen Mary_. Are you going to leave the road clear for them? I'm not. I have the death of my friend Badiarinos to avenge. You have Miss Bakefield's letter to bear in mind. We will make a start then.

Everything is arranged. Four of my comrades have been notified. I have bought arms, horses and enough provisions to last us. I repeat, everything is ready. What are you going to do?"

Simon threw off his dressing-gown and s.n.a.t.c.hed at his clothes:

"I shall come with you."

"Oh, well," said the Indian smiling, "if you imagine that we can venture on the new land in the middle of the night! What about the water-courses? And the quicksands? And all the rest of it? To say nothing of the devil's own fog! No, no, we shall start to-morrow morning, at four o'clock. In the meantime, eat, M. Dubosc, and sleep."

Simon protested:

"Sleep! Why, I've done nothing else since yesterday!"

"That's not enough. You have undergone the most terrible exertions; and this will be a trying expedition, very trying and very dangerous.

You can take Lynx-Eye's word for it."

"Lynx-Eye?"

"Antonio or Lynx-Eye: those are my names," explained the Indian.

"Then to-morrow morning, M. Dubosc!"

Simon obeyed like a child. Since they had been living for the past few days in such a topsy-turvy world, could he do better than follow the advice of a man whom he had never seen, who was a Red Indian and who was called Lynx-Eye?

When he had had his meal, he glanced through an evening paper. There was an abundance of news, serious and contradictory. It was stated that Southampton and Le Havre were blocked. It was said that the British fleet was immobilized at Portsmouth. The rivers, choked at their mouths, were overflowing their banks. Everywhere all was disorder and confusion; communications were broken, harbours were filled with sand, ships were lying on their sides, trade was interrupted; everywhere devastation reigned and famine and despair; the local authorities were impotent and the governments distraught.

It was late when Simon at last fell into a troubled sleep.

It seemed to him that after an hour or two some one opened the door of his room; and he remembered that he had not bolted it. Light footsteps crossed the carpet. Then he had the impression that some one bent over him and that this some one was a woman. A cool breath caressed his face and in the darkness he divined a shadow moving quickly away.

He tried to switch on the light, but there was no current.

The shadow left the room. Was it the young woman whom he had released, who had come? But why should she have come?

CHAPTER VIII

ON THE WAR-PATH

At four o'clock in the morning, the streets were almost empty. A few fruit and vegetable-carts were making their way between the demolished houses and the shattered pavements. But from a neighbouring avenue there emerged a little cavalcade in which Simon immediately recognized, at the head of the party, astride a monstrous big horse, Old Sandstone, wearing his rusty top-hat, with the skirts of his black frock-coat overflowing either side of a saddle with bulging saddle-bags.

Next came Antonio, _alias_ Lynx-Eye, likewise mounted; then a third horseman, perched like the others behind heavy saddle-bags; and lastly three persons on foot, one of whom held the bridle of a fourth horse.

The three pedestrians had brick-red faces and long hair and were dressed in the same style as Lynx-Eye, in soft leggings with leather fringes, velveteen breeches, flannel girdles, wide-brimmed felt hats, with gaudy ribbons: in short, a heterogeneous, picturesque band, with many-coloured accoutrements, in which the adornments dear to circus cow-boys were displayed side by side with those of one of Fenimore Cooper's Redskins, or one of Gustave Aymard's scouts. They carried rifles slung across their shoulders and revolvers and daggers in their belts.

"What the deuce!" exclaimed Simon. "Why, this is a martial progress!

Are we going among savages?"