A Splendid Hazard, Harold MacGrath [websites to read books for free txt] 📗

hand. "Your father wasn't a good business man, nor was he in the navy, but he could draw charts of the Atlantic coast with his eyes shut. Laura, you get the whisky and sugar and hot water. You haven't brought me a secretary, but you have brought under my roof the son of an old friend."

She laughed. It was rich and free-toned laughter, good for any man to hear. As she went to prepare the toddy, the music echoed again through the hall.

"Sometimes I wake up in the morning with a new gray hair," sighed the admiral. "What would you do with a girl like that?"

"I'd hang on to her as long as I could," earnestly.

"I shall," grimly. "Your father and I were old friends. There wasn't a yacht on these waters that could show him her heels, not even my own. You don't mean to tell me you're no yachtsman! Why, it ought to be in the blood."

"Oh, I can handle small craft, but I don't know much about the engine-room. What time does the next train return to New York?"

"For you there'll be no train under a week. You're going to stay here, since you've been the victim of a hoax."

"Disabuse your mind there, sir. I don't know when I've enjoyed anything so thoroughly."

"But you'll stay? Oh, yes!" as Fitzgerald shook his head. "The secretary can do the work here while you and I can take care of the rats in the hold. Laura's just imagining things, but we'll humor her. If there's any trouble with the chimney, why, we'll get a bricklayer and pull it down."

"Miss Killigrew may have some real cause for alarm. I saw a man, or rather, I heard him, running, as I came up the road from the gates. I called to him, but he did not answer."

"Is that so? Wasn't the porter at the gates when you came in?"

"No. The footpath was free."

"This begins to look serious. If the porter isn't there the gate bell rings, I can open it myself by wire. I never bother about it at night, unless I am expecting some one. But in the daytime I can see from here whether or not I wish to open the gate. A man running in the park, eh? Little good it will do him. The house is a network of burglar alarms."

"Wires can be cut and quickly repaired."

"But this is no house to rob. All my valuables, excepting these books, are in New York. The average burglar isn't of a literary turn of mind. Still, if Laura has really heard something, all the more reason why you should make us a visit. Wait a moment. I've an idea." The admiral set the burglar alarm and tried it. The expression on his face was blank. "Am I getting deafer?"

"No bell rang," said Fitzgerald quickly.

"By cracky, if Laura is right! But not a word to her, mind. When she goes up-stairs we'll take a trip into the cellar and have a look at the main wire. You've got to stay; that's all there is about it. This is serious. I hadn't tested the wires in a week."

"Perhaps it's only a fuse."

"We can soon find out about that. Sh! Not a word to her!"

She entered with a tray and two steaming toddies, as graceful a being as Hebe before she spilled the precious drop. The two men could not keep their eyes off her, the one with loving possession, the other with admiration not wholly free from unrest. The daring manner in which she had lured him here would never be forgetable. And she had known him at the start? And that merry Mrs. Coldfield in the plot!

"I hope this will cheer you, father."

"It always does," replied the admiral, as he took the second glass. "I have asked Mr. Fitzgerald to spend a week with us."

"Thank you, father. It was thoughtful of you. If you had not asked him, the pleasure of doing so would have been mine. Mrs. Coldfield pointed you out to me as a most ungrateful fellow, because you never called on your father's or mother's friends any more, but preferred to gallivant round the world. You will stay? We are very unconventional here."

"It is all very good of you. I am rather a lonesome chap. The newspapers and magazines have spoiled me. There's never a moment so happy to me as when I am ordered to some strange country, thousands of miles away. It is in the blood. Thanks, very much; I shall be very happy to stay. My hand-bag, however, is at Swan's Hotel, and there's very little in it."

"A trifling matter to send to New York for what you need," said the admiral, mightily pleased to have a man to talk to who was not paid to reply. "I'll have William bring the cart round and take you down."

"No, no; I had much rather walk. I'll turn up some time in the morning, say luncheon, if that will be agreeable to you."

"As you please. Only, I should like to save you an unpleasant walk in the dark."

"I don't mind. A dark street in a country village this side of the Atlantic holds little or no danger."

"I offered to build a first-class lighting plant if the town would agree to pay the running expenses; but the council threw it over. They want me to build a library. Not much! Hold on," as Fitzgerald was rising. "You are not going right away. I shan't permit that. Just a little visit first."

Fitzgerald resumed his chair.

"Have a cigar. Laura is used to it."

"But does Miss Killigrew like it?" laughing.

"Cigars, and pipes, and cigarettes," she returned. "I am really fond of the aroma. I have tried to acquire the cigarette habit, but I have yet to learn what satisfaction you men get out of it."

Conversation veered in various directions, and finally rested upon the subject of piracy; and here the admiral proved himself a rare scholar. By some peculiar inadvertency, as he was in the middle of one of his own adventures, his finger touched the burglar alarm. Clang! Brrrr! From top to bottom of the house came the shock of differently voiced bells. The two men gazed at each other dumfounded. But the girl laughed merrily.

"You touched the alarm, father."

"I rather believe I did. And a few minutes before you came in with the toddies I tried it and it didn't work."

It took some time to quiet the servants; and when that was done Fitzgerald determined to go down to the village.

"Good night, Mr. Fitzgerald," said the girl. "Better beware; this house is haunted."

"We'll see if we can't lay that ghost, as they say," he responded.

The admiral came to the door. "What do you make of it?" he whispered.

"You possibly did not press the button squarely the first time." And that was Fitzgerald's genuine belief.

"By the way, will you take a note for me to Swan's? It will not take me a moment to scribble it."

"Certainly."

Finally the young man found himself in the park, heading quickly toward the gates. He searched the night keenly, but this time he neither heard nor saw any one. Then he permitted his fancy to take short flights. Interesting situation! To find himself a guest here, when he had come keyed up for something strenuous! Pirates and jolly-rogers and mysterious trespassers and silent bells, to say nothing of a beautiful young woman with a leaning toward adventure! But the most surprising turn was yet to come.

In the office of Swan's hotel the landlord sat snoozing peacefully behind the desk. There was only one customer. He was a gray-haired, ruddy-visaged old salt in white duck-at this time of year!-and a blue sack-coat dotted with shining brass buttons, the whole five-foot-four topped by a gold-braided officer's cap. He was drinking what is jocularly called a "schooner" of beer, and finishing this he lurched from the room with a rolling, hiccoughing gait, due entirely to a wooden peg which extended from his right knee down to a highly polished brass ferrule.

Fitzgerald awakened the landlord and gave him the admiral's note.

"You will be sure and give this to the gentleman in the morning?"

"Certainly, sir. Mr. Karl Breitmann," reading the superscription aloud. "Yes, sir; first thing in the morning."


CHAPTER VI

SOME EXPLANATIONS

Karl Breitmann! Fitzgerald pulled off a shoe, and carefully deposited it on the floor beside his chair. Private secretary to Rear Admiral Killigrew, retired; Karl Breitmann! He drew off the second shoe, and placed it, with military preciseness, close to the first. Absently, he rose, with the intention of putting the pair in the hall, but remembered before he got as far as the door that it was not customary in America to put one's shoes outside in the halls. Ultimately, they would have been stolen or have remained there till the trump of doom.

Could there be two Breitmanns by the name of Karl? Here and there, across the world, he had heard of Breitmann, but never had he seen him since that meeting in Paris. And, simply because he had proved to be an enthusiastic student of Napoleon, like himself, he had taken the man to dinner. But that was nothing. Under the same circumstances he would have done the same thing again. There had been something fascinating about the fellow, either his voice or his manner. And there could be no doubting that he had been at ebb tide; the shiny coat, the white, but ragged linen, the cracked patent leathers.

A baron, and to reach the humble grade of private secretary to an eccentric millionaire-for the admiral, with all his kindliness and common sense, was eccentric-this was a fall. Where were his newspapers? There was a dignity to foreign work, even though in Europe the pay is small. There was trouble going on here and there, petty wars and political squabbles. Yes, where were his newspapers? Had he tried New York? If not, in that case, he-Fitzgerald-could be of some solid assistance. And Cathewe knew him, or had met him.

Fitzgerald had buffeted the high and low places; he seldom made mistakes in judging men offhand, an art acquired only after many initial blunders. This man Breitmann was no sham; he was a scholar, a gentleman, a fine linguist, versed in politics and war. Well, the little mystery would be brushed aside in the morning. Breitmann would certainly recognize him.

But to have forgotten the girl! To have permitted a course of events to discover her! Shameful! He jumped into bed, and pulled the coverlet close to his nose, and was soon asleep, sleep broken by fantastic dreams, in which the past and present mixed with the improbable chances of