The Clique of Gold, Emile Gaboriau [if you liked this book .txt] 📗

rough treatment, if the “gentleman” had not come running up, and covered him with his own body, exclaiming,—

“Let that poor boy go! I am the only one to blame!”

The captain, in a great rage, pushed him back, and, looking at him savagely, said,—

“Ah! so it is you who have dared”—

“Yes, I did it. But I had my reasons. This is surely ‘The Saint Louis,’ eh, coming from Saigon?”

“Yes. What next?”

“You have on board Lieut. Champcey of the navy?”

Daniel, who had been a silent witness of the scene, now stepped forward, very much puzzled.

“I am Lieut. Champcey, sir,” he said. “What do you desire?”

But, instead of replying, the “gentleman” raised his hands to heaven in a perfect ecstasy of joy, and said in an undertone,—

“We triumph at last!”

Then, turning to Daniel and the captain, he said,—

“But come, gentlemen, come! I must explain my conduct; and we must be alone for what I have to tell you.”

Pale, and with every sign of seasickness in his face, when he had first appeared on deck, the man now seemed to have recovered, and, in spite of the rolling of the vessel, followed the captain and Daniel with a firm step to the quarter-deck. As soon as they were alone, he said,—

“Could I be here, if I had not used a stratagem? Evidently not. And yet I had the most powerful interest in boarding ‘The Saint Louis’ before she should enter port; therefore I did not hesitate.”

He drew from his pocket a sheet of paper, simply folded twice, and said,—

“Here is my apology, Lieut. Champcey; see if it is sufficient.”

Utterly amazed, the young officer read,—

“I am saved, Daniel; and I owe my life to the man who will hand you this. I shall owe to him the pleasure of seeing you again. Confide in him as you would in your best and most devoted friend; and, I beseech you, do not hesitate to follow his advice literally.

“Henrietta.”

Daniel turned deadly pale, and tottered. This unexpected, intense happiness overcame him.

“Then—it is true—she is alive?” he stammered.

“She is at my sister’s house, safe from all danger.”

“And you, sir, you have rescued her?”

“I did!”

Prompt like thought, Daniel seized the man’s hands, and, pressing them vehemently, exclaimed with a penetrating voice,—

“Never, sir, never, whatever may happen, can I thank you enough. But remember, I pray you, under all circumstances, and for all times, you can count upon Lieut. Champcey.”

A strange smile played on the man’s lips; and, shaking his head, he said, “I shall before long remind you of your promise, lieutenant.”

Standing between the two men, the captain of “The Saint Louis” was looking alternately at the one and the other with an astonished air, listening without comprehending, and imagining marvellous things. The only point he understood was this, that his presence was, to say the least, not useful.

“If that is so,” he said to Daniel, “we cannot blame this gentleman for the ugly trick he has played us.”

“Blame him? Oh, certainly not!”

“Then I’ll leave you. I believe I have treated the sailor who brought him on board a little roughly; but I am going to order him a glass of brandy, which will set him right again.”

Thereupon the captain discreetly withdrew; while Papa Ravinet continued,—

“You will tell me, M. Champcey, that it would have been simpler to wait for you in port, and hand you my letter of introduction there. That would have been grievous imprudence. If I heard at the navy department of your arrival, others may have learned it as well. As soon, therefore, as ‘The Saint Louis’ was telegraphed in town, you may be sure a spy was sent to the wharf, who is going to follow you, never losing sight of you, and who will report all your goings and your doings.”

“What does it matter?”

“Ah! do not say so, sir! If our enemies hear of our meeting, you see, if they only find out that we have conversed together, all is lost. They would see the danger that threatens them, and they would escape.”

Daniel could hardly trust his ears.

“Our enemies?” he asked, emphasizing the word “our.”

“Yes: I mean our enemies,—Sarah Brandon, Countess Ville-Handry, Maxime de Brevan, Thomas Elgin, and Mrs. Brian.”

“You hate them?”

“If I hate them! I tell you for five years I have lived only on the hope of being able to avenge myself on them. Yes, it is five years now, that, lost in the crowd, I have followed them with the perseverance of an Indian,—five years that I have patiently, incessantly, inch by inch, undermined the ground beneath their steps. And they suspect nothing. I doubt whether they are aware of my existence. No, not even—What would it be to them, besides? They have pushed me so far down into the mud, that they cannot imagine my ever rising again up to their level. They triumph with impunity; they boast of their unpunished wickedness, and think they are strong, and safe from all attacks, because they have the prestige and the power of gold. And yet their hour is coming. I, the wretched man, who have been compelled to hide, and to live on my daily labor,—I have attained my end. Every thing is ready; and I have only to touch the proud fabric of their crimes to make it come down upon them, and crush them all under the ruins. Ah! if I could see them only suffer one-fourth of what they have made me suffer, I should die content.”

Papa Ravinet seemed to have grown a foot; his hatred convulsed his placid face; his voice trembled with rage; and his yellow eyes shone with ill-subdued passion.

Daniel wondered, and asked himself what the people who had sworn to ruin him and Henrietta could have done to this man, who looked so inoffensive with his bright-flowered waistcoat and his coat with the high collar.

“But who are you, sir?” he asked.

“Who am I?” exclaimed the man,—“who am I?”

But he paused; and, after waiting a little while, he sunk his head, and said,—

“I am Anthony Ravinet, dealer in curiosities.”

The clipper was in the meantime making way rapidly. Already the white country houses appeared on the high bluffs amid the pine-groves; and the outlines of the