CHAPTER III
CAPTAIN FOUNTAIN
He had a suite of rooms at the Palace Hotel, and he lived the life ofany other rich man who is not addicted to pleasure. He knew some of thebest people in the city, and conducted himself so sanely in allrespects that a casual stranger would never have guessed his reputationfor madness; but when you knew him better, you would find sometimes inthe middle of a conversation that his mind was away from the subject;and were you to follow him in the street, you would hear him inconversation with himself. Once at a dinner-party he rose and left theroom, and did not return. Trifles, but sufficient to establish areputation of a sort.
One morning—to be precise, it was the second day of May, exactly eightyears and five months after the wreck of the _Northumberland_—Lestrangewas in his sitting-room reading, when the bell of the telephone, whichstood in the corner of the room, rang. He went to the instrument.
“Are you there?” came a high American voice. “Lestrange—right—comedown and see me—Wannamaker—I have news for you.”
Lestrange held the receiver for a moment, then he put it back in therest. He went to a chair and sat down, holding his head between hishands, then he rose and went to the telephone again; but he dared notuse it, he dare not shatter the newborn hope.
“News!” What a world lies in that word.
In Kearney Street he stood before the door of Wannamaker’s officecollecting himself and watching the crowd drifting by, then he enteredand went up the stairs. He pushed open a swing-door and entered a greatroom. The clink and rattle of a dozen typewriters filled the place, andall the hurry of business; clerks passed and came with sheaves ofcorrespondence in their hands; and Wannamaker himself, rising frombending over a message which he was correcting on one of thetypewriters’ tables, saw the newcomer and led him to the private office.
“What is it?” said Lestrange.
“Only this,” said the other, taking up a slip of paper with a name andaddress on it. “Simon J. Fountain, of 45 Rathray Street, West—that’sdown near the wharves—says he has seen your ad. in an old number of apaper, and he thinks he can tell you something. He did not specify thenature of the intelligence, but it might be worth finding out.”
“I will go there,” said Lestrange.
“Do you know Rathray Street?”
“No.”
Wannamaker went out and called a boy and gave him some directions; thenLestrange and the boy started.
Lestrange left the office without saying “Thank you,” or taking leavein any way of the advertising agent—who did not feel in the leastaffronted, for he knew his customer.
Rathray Street is, or was before the earthquake, a street of smallclean houses. It had a seafaring look that was accentuated by themarine perfumes from the wharves close by and the sound of steamwinches loading or discharging cargo—a sound that ceased not nightor day as the work went on beneath the sun or the sizzling arc lamps.
No. 45 was almost exactly like its fellows, neither better nor worse;and the door was opened by a neat, prim woman, small, and of middleage. Commonplace she was, no doubt, but not commonplace to Lestrange.
“Is Mr Fountain in?” he asked. “I have come about the advertisement.”
“Oh, have you, sir?” she replied, making way for him to enter, andshowing him into a little sitting-room on the left of the passage.“The Captain is in bed; he is a great invalid, but he was expecting,perhaps, some one would call, and he will be able to see you in aminute, if you don’t mind waiting.”
“Thanks,” said Lestrange; “I can wait.”
He had waited eight years, what mattered a few minutes now? But at notime in the eight years had he suffered such suspense, for his heartknew that now, just now in this commonplace little house, from the lipsof, perhaps, the husband of that commonplace woman, he was going tolearn either what he feared to hear, or what he hoped.
It was a depressing little room; it was so clean, and looked as thoughit were never used. A ship imprisoned in a glass bottle stood upon themantelpiece, and there were shells from far-away places, pictures ofships in sand—all the things one finds as a rule adorning an oldsailor’s home.
Lestrange, as he sat waiting, could hear movements from the nextroom—probably the invalid’s, which they were preparing for hisreception. The distant sounds of the derricks and winches came muffledthrough the tightly-shut window that looked as though it never had beenopened. A square of sunlight lit the upper part of the cheap lacecurtain on the right of the window, and repeated its pattern vaguely onthe lower part of the wall opposite. Then a bluebottle fly awokesuddenly into life and began to buzz and drum against the window pane,and Lestrange wished that they would come.
A man of his temperament must necessarily, even under the happiestcircumstances, suffer in going through the world; the fine fibre alwayssuffers when brought into contact with the coarse. These people were askindly disposed as any one else. The advertisement and the face andmanners of the visitor might have told them that it was not the timefor delay, yet they kept him waiting whilst they arranged bed-quiltsand put medicine bottles straight—as if he could see!
At last the door opened, and the woman said:
“Will you step this way, sir?”
She showed him into a bedroom opening off the passage. The room wasneat and clean, and had that indescribable appearance which marks thebedroom of the invalid.
In the bed, making a mountain under the counterpane with an enormouslydistended stomach, lay a man, black-bearded, and with his large,capable, useless hands spread out on the coverlet—hands ready andwilling, but debarred from work. Without moving his body, he turned hishead slowly and looked at the newcomer. This slow movement was notfrom weakness or disease, it was the slow, emotionless nature of theman speaking.
“This is the gentleman, Silas,” said the woman, speaking overLestrange’s shoulder. Then she withdrew and closed the door.
“Take a chair, sir,” said the sea captain, flapping one of his hands onthe counterpane as if in wearied protest against his own helplessness.“I haven’t the pleasure of your name, but the missus tells me you’recome about the advertisement I lit on yester-even.”
He took a paper, folded small, that lay beside him, and held it out tohis visitor. It was a _Sidney Bulletin_ three years old.
“Yes,” said Lestrange, looking at the paper; “that is my advertisement.”
“Well, it’s strange—very strange,” said Captain Fountain, “that Ishould have lit on it only yesterday. I’ve had it all three years in mychest, the way old papers get lying at the bottom with odds and ends.Mightn’t a’ seen it now, only the missus cleared the raffle out of thechest, and, ‘Give me that paper,’ I says, seeing it in her hand; and Ifell to reading it, for a man’ll read anything bar tracts lying in bedeight months, as I’ve been with the dropsy. I’ve been whaler man andboy forty year, and my last ship was the _Sea-Horse_. Over seven yearsago one of my men picked up something on a beach of one of them islandseast of the Marquesas—we’d put in to water——”
“Yes, yes,” said Lestrange. “What was it he found?”
“Missus!” roared the captain in a voice that shook the walls of theroom.
The door opened, and the woman appeared.
“Fetch me my keys out of my trousers pocket.”
The trousers were hanging up on the back of the door, as if onlywaiting to be put on. The woman fetched the keys, and he fumbled overthem and found one. He handed it to her, and pointed to the drawer of abureau opposite the bed.
She knew evidently what was wanted, for she opened the drawer andproduced a box, which she handed to him. It was a small cardboard boxtied round with a bit of string. He undid the string, and disclosed achild’s tea service: a teapot, cream jug, six little plates—all paintedwith a pansy.
It was the box which Emmeline had always been losing—lost again.
Lestrange buried his face in his hands. He knew the things. Emmelinehad shown them to him in a burst of confidence. Ou
t of all that vastocean he had searched unavailingly: they had come to him like amessage, and the awe and mystery of it bowed him down and crushed him.
The captain had placed the things on the newspaper spread out by hisside, and he was unrolling the little spoons from their tissue-papercovering. He counted them as if entering up the tale of some trust, andplaced them on the newspaper.
“When did you find them?” asked Lestrange, speaking with his face stillcovered.
“A matter of over seven years ago,” replied the captain, “we’d put into water at a place south of the line—Palm Tree Island we whalemencall it, because of the tree at the break of the lagoon. One of my menbrought it aboard, found it in a shanty built of sugar-canes which themen bust up for devilment.”
“Good God!” said Lestrange. “Was there no one there—nothing but thisbox?”
“Not a sight or sound, so the men said; just the shanty abandonedseemingly. I had no time to land and hunt for castaways, I was afterwhales.”
“How big is the island?”
“Oh, a fairish middle-sized island—no natives. I’ve heard tell it’s_tabu_; why, the Lord only knows—some crank of the Kanakas, I s’pose.Anyhow, there’s the findings—you recognise them?”
“I do.”
“Seems strange,” said the captain, “that I should pick ’em up; seemsstrange your advertisement out, and the answer to it lying amongst mygear, but that’s the way things go.”
“Strange!” said the other. “It’s more than strange.”
“Of course,” continued the captain, “they might have been on the islandhid away som’ere, there’s no saying; only appearances are against it.Of course they might be there now unbeknownst to you or me.”
“They _are_ there now,” answered Lestrange, who was sitting up andlooking at the playthings as though he read in them some hiddenmessage. “They _are_ there now. Have you the position of the island?”
“I have. Missus, hand me my private log.”
She took a bulky, greasy, black note-book from the bureau, and handedit to him. He opened it, thumbed the pages, and then read out thelatitude and longitude.
“I entered it on the day of finding—here’s the entry. ‘Adams broughtaboard child’s toy box out of deserted shanty, which men pulled down;traded it to me for a caulker of rum.’ The cruise lasted three yearsand eight months after that; we’d only been out three when it happened.I forgot all about it: three years scrubbing round the world afterwhales doesn’t brighten a man’s memory. Right round we went, and paidoff at Nantucket. Then, after a fortni’t on shore and a monthrepairin’, the old _Sea-Horse_ was off again, I with her. It was atHonolulu this dropsy took me, and back I come here, home. That’s theyarn. There’s not much to it, but, seein’ your advertisement, I thoughtI might answer it.”
Lestrange took Fountain’s hand and shook it.
“You see the reward I offered?” he said. “I have not my cheque bookwith me, but you shall have the cheque in an hour from now.”
“No, _sir_,” replied the captain; “if anything comes of it, I don’t sayI’m not open to some small acknowledgment, but ten thousand dollars fora five-cent box—that’s not my way of doing business.”
“I can’t make you take the money now—I can’t even thank you properlynow,” said Lestrange—“I am in a fever; but when all is settled, youand I will settle this business. My God!”
He buried his face in his hands again.
“I’m not wishing to be inquisitive,” said Captain Fountain, slowlyputting the things back in the box and tucking the paper shavings roundthem, “but may I ask how you propose to move in this business?”
“I will hire a ship at once and search.”
“Ay,” said the captain, wrapping up the little spoons in a meditativemanner; “perhaps that will be best.”
He felt certain in his own mind that the search would be fruitless, buthe did not say so. If he had been absolutely certain in his mindwithout being able to produce the proof, he would not have counselledLestrange to any other course, knowing that the man’s mind would neverbe settled until proof positive was produced.
“The question is,” said Lestrange, “what is my quickest way to getthere?”
“There I may be able to help you,” said Fountain, tying the string roundthe box. “A schooner with good heels to her is what you want; and, ifI’m not mistaken, there’s one discharging cargo at this present minitat O’Sullivan’s wharf. Missus!”
The woman answered the call. Lestrange felt like a person in a dream,and these people who were interesting themselves in his affairs seemedto him beneficent beyond the nature of human beings.
“Is Captain Stannistreet home, think you?”
“I don’t know,” replied the woman; “but I can go see.”
“Do.”
She went.
“He lives only a few doors down,” said Fountain, “and he’s the man foryou. Best schooner captain ever sailed out of ’Frisco. The _Raratonga_ isthe name of the boat I have in my mind—best boat that ever worecopper. Stannistreet is captain of her, owners are M’Vitie. She’s beenmissionary, and she’s been pigs; copra was her last cargo, and she’snearly discharged it. Oh, M’Vitie would hire her out to Satan at aprice; you needn’t be afraid of their boggling at it if you can raisethe dollars. She’s had a new suit of sails only the beginning of theyear. Oh, she’ll fix you up to a T, and you take the word of S.Fountain for that. I’ll engineer the thing from this bed if you’ll letme put my oar in your trouble; I’ll victual her, and find a crew threequarter price of any of those d--d skulking agents. Oh, I’ll take acommission right enough, but I’m half paid with doing the thing—”
He ceased, for footsteps sounded in the passage outside, and CaptainStannistreet was shown in. He was a young man of not more than thirty,alert, quick of eye, and pleasant of face. Fountain introduced him toLestrange, who had taken a fancy to him at first sight.
When he heard about the business in hand, he seemed interested at once;the affair seemed to appeal to him more than if it had been a purelycommercial matter, such as copra and pigs.
“If you’ll come with me, sir, down to the wharf, I’ll show you the boatnow,” he said, when they had discussed the matter and threshed it outthoroughly.
He rose, bid good-day to his friend Fountain, and Lestrange followedhim, carrying the brown-paper box in his hand.
O’Sullivan’s Wharf was not far away. A tall Cape Horner that lookedalmost a twin sister of the ill-fated _Northumberland_ was dischargingiron, and astern of her, graceful as a dream, with snow-white decks,lay the _Raratonga_ discharging copra.
“That’s the boat,” said Stannistreet; “cargo nearly all out. How doesshe strike your fancy?”
“I’ll take her,” said Lestrange, “cost what it will.”