"I shall see that you are comfortably settled there and then I shall be with you as much as possible--but I cannot involve the office in these wild capers. Come, or we shall be scolded. Wouldn't it be fine, mother, if we could tame father? But cheer up, mother; we may laugh last about this. Let us see the bright side which is--Come! You hear him."

Mother and daughter descended the one flight of stairs arm in arm, preceded by the impatient guide, who was calculating on every circ.u.mstance that might arise between Ninety-sixth Street and the Hoboken ferry. Katie trailed behind with bags and shawl-strap bundles. A small steamer trunk that Katie had filled with things easy to find had been placed on the front of the coach by the driver, who evidently regarded the job as the early departure of a European party.

When the three women were stowed in the coach after less than an hour's preparation, with their sleep rudely disturbed and without even a cup of coffee to vanquish the chill of the early morn, it may be a.s.sumed that they were not more cheerful than the dismal gray of the town. The man of the inside party had been awake all night; he was feverish and fretful, but he had nothing to say in the presence of the servant. Katie probably believed there had been a death in the family, and they were hastily driving to the home of some relative. Most of the conversation was between Mrs. Tescheron and Katie, and was carried on in whispers. Mrs.

Tescheron drew forth the information that about a dozen things she would not need were in the trunk, and several score of necessities had been left at home.

"I remember the Stuffer House," said Mrs. Tescheron, making bold to address her daughter. "Don't you remember four years ago we stopped there overnight? It's named, I suppose, for the proprietor, who told me he was of the same family as the Stevenses of Hoboken. Yes, I remember, he said Stevens, Steffens, Stuffens and Stuffers all came from the same family."

"I remember the stuffed birds everywhere," said Gabrielle; "many of them exceedingly rare specimens, I believe some one said. Somehow, I have always connected stuffed birds with the Stuffer House. It did not occur to me that Stuffer was the name of the proprietor. How odd!"

But conversation did not flow freely, for the tension of the occasion had been too tightly wound by the impulsive guardian of the family's honor. It was well that Katie was present to check his temper, through pride, or the poor women might have been scolded again for their dangerous delay, as coroners go forth early with their guns loaded for game hiding in coaches.

It was even more dismal, cold and damp in the ferryboat. Mrs. Tescheron fell quietly into tears there. This overflow of her emotions was not noticed by Mr. Tescheron, who looked steadily out of the window at the moving engines. Gabrielle saw her mother crying, and was at once overcome with pity; to Katie it seemed as if she was on the point of sharing her mother's grief for the loved one now mourned. Katie could see that Mrs. Tescheron had thought a good deal of the person, whoever it might be, and that Miss Tescheron had shared in this regard. Mr.

Tescheron, on the other hand, seemed to be provoked that it had happened until the boat struck the Hoboken pier, and then he looked out of the coach window with a smile, indicating a change of opinion. The smile was that of the conquering hero, outgeneraling in retreat allied forces outnumbering his small army a thousand times. A great head, thought Mr.

Tescheron, may beat the law, especially if it keeps awake all night to be on the field early in the morning.

The Stuffer House, founded by the great-grandfather of the present proprietor, August Stuffer, was situated not far from the ferry and steamship piers. Its Colonial front and three stories of red brick, and windows with small panes, gave it the air of a Washington's headquarters, which Mr. Stuffer could undoubtedly prove it had been, for his tales were the most convincing arguments that the hostelry had been named by a whimsical fate not too dignified to stoop to punning. There were times when the hungry boarders thought the name facetious, but they conceded it to be quite exact in a descriptive sense, if its brick and mortar were intended to honor monumentally the tales of the host.

His first name, August, was not an adjective of limitation as to time, for the proprietor was A. Stuffer every month and day in the year; and his son Emil, a quiet, inoffensive student of birds, a taxidermist, ornithologist and mechanical engineer, and a graduate of the neighboring Stevens Inst.i.tute, world-famed for the breadth and thoroughness of its training, was a worthy son in practically applying to birds abundant science and all the art employed by his father to hold and encourage trade among the guests.

It was about 6 o'clock when the Tescheron coach drew up at the old port-cochere, and no one but the night clerk was about. He swung the great door open and welcomed them to the hotel office, a large living-room, with a wide brick and rubble fireplace in one corner, dimly lighted by a log fitfully blazing, fed by scant draughts, so deeply was it choked by the pile of ashes from the logs that had served to brighten the busy room the night before. It is important to note this fireplace, for long afterward, when I went forth to gather impressions at first hand, and there heard Mr. Stuffer and his guests warm to the discussion of every topic under the sun, I decided that the glow of inspiration and the stimulating incense of resinous knots, arising from that corner, cast the witchery which wrought conviction in the minds of men less wary than Mr. Tescheron, who might, indeed, have renounced all his worldly possessions had he remained more than six weeks under its spell to escape the horrors of an entanglement in the meshes of foul crime across the river. I see now how it must have affected him--this fireplace talk.

Steam heat is the only thing to preserve a man's common sense, and if he be shy of that desirable faculty he should be extremely careful when listening or talking, even under the weak spell of a gilt radiator. It is a fact of science that certain rays of light exert a hypnotic influence that may be employed to effect anesthesia for minor operations. Perhaps it was the influence of these rays; I know not.

Nervous persons are especially subject to their vibrations, and when sitting before an open wood fire, highly productive of this subtle chemicalization, the victims become drowsy and fall easily into the mood of the most extravagant speaker. Minor operations, under which head we may include the extraction of a tooth or a bank balance, are then simple, if the operator be calm and skillful in the handling of his instruments--often mere words, but powerful tools under these favorable conditions.

The hotel clerk was a.s.sured that the Tescherons did not intend to take a steamer or a train; that they might remain a day or two, perhaps longer, and would need four rooms and a bath on the sunny side of the house, on the second floor, away from the elevator and the noise of the kitchen.

They would take breakfast as soon as it could be served.

"No breakfast for me, thank you, papa. I am going right over to the office now. Good-bye, mother dear; Katie, look after her well. I shall return early. Good-bye--" and Gabrielle turned to kiss her father, having embraced her tearful mother. But he could not recover himself to display his affection at that time.

"Gabrielle, you surely are not going! You surely are not! Think of the consequences and accept my judgment in this awful extremity!"

"Father, you may have your own way in everything, but my business affairs must not be involved. The coach is going. I'll ride back in it."

Quickly she kissed him and darted out of the door and into the carriage and away.

CHAPTER X

What is this unerring clairvoyance that prompts devoted hearts in moments of danger, in crises demanding supernatural judgment? It is the very essence of much of our song and story, but the wise men do not grasp its origin; to them it is as elusive and incapable of isolation from its forms of manifestation as that phase of force we call electricity. An old gentleman whom I knew well, a learned man, far above all superst.i.tions, arose from the sofa in his home one afternoon and announced to the startled family that his son was in the water. He noted the time and anxiously awaited news, so firm was his belief that truth must have inspired his vivid dream. That night he learned that the very moment he had announced his fears his son had fallen into the river and was so held under by logs that he narrowly escaped drowning. This was probably the same miraculous power love employs in youth to laugh at locksmiths; it is the inherent wisdom of the pa.s.sion deeper than our philosophy can delve; it warns at times, and then again it will save without warning, strangely leading us to the post of duty.

It was too early to go to the office--then about 6:45--when Gabrielle Tescheron's coach landed on the New York side of the North River. While coming across the ferry she believed it would be wise to take the opportunity to visit Jim at his apartment in Eighteenth Street, and inform him of the action I had taken in notifying the coroner, and therefore to beware of me, for it was plain that her father had convinced me, although he was unable to restrain and sway me to accept his plan of privacy. Gabrielle had cla.s.sed me as a dull fellow, not able to see beneath the shallow case of Smith. Little did she imagine that I had laughed at her father and ridiculed his course at my interview with him. She jumped to the conclusion that I had notified the coroner, to make sure of a conviction at any cost, so thoroughly had I been convinced of Jim's guilt by the evidence her father had laid before me, and so high was my sense of honor and duty to the community. This action on my part she a.s.sumed would result in the publicity her father dreaded, but eventually would lead to Jim's vindication; she deplored my lack of faith in my companion; she marveled that I, too, should have fallen so easily a prey to the sharpers who were deceiving her hot-headed, obstinate father, whose senses were alert for every word or sign that would smirch, by even so much as a shadow, the man he would overthrow.

If it had been possible for Gabrielle Tescheron to understand that I had read her impulsive father's character aright, and that my loyalty to Jim Hosley at the time was as firm as her own, our difficulties would have been greatly simplified. My joke turned its other edge on me and cut me off from her confidence, but not from her good-will, as expressed in the beautiful flowers, in the hope that I might turn from pursuing Jim and become a staunch advocate of his cause, when I realized, as she did and as I surely must, how strong and true he was and how far above the rogues who would smirch him for gain. But it was plain to her that I had been turned against Jim by her father, and had gone far beyond the point her father intended to reach in his attack on Hosley. Jim must be quickly warned not to place any more confidence in me, for I had taken hasty action that would soon involve them all in a criminal investigation, full of unpleasant notoriety even for the innocent. Jim should also be well advised by an able criminal lawyer to protect him against these rogues and intemperate reasoners.

But these thoughts which came to Gabrielle and seemed to her to be the impelling force that directed her to Eighteenth Street that morning, to my mind now, read in the light of the whole story, were really only the miraculous methods of that clairvoyance, operating under the veil of mystery beyond reason. My shallow joke, I insist, could not have been the cause. With an unshaken faith in Jim and no danger threatening him, I am confident she would have remained at the hotel, taken breakfast with her father and mother, and then, perhaps, have leisurely departed for her office, to tell laughingly of the early morning flight to Jim at some trysting place in the commercial section of the town later in the day. Faith, without real danger, would have meant a contented mind, whether or not, it seems to me, I had notified one coroner or a thousand, for it would have been only part of the general plan to give the widest scope to Jim's detractors, and to take no part in counter-plotting any more than she would ally herself with her father's villainous advisers. The utter absurdity of my joke, I firmly believe, would have appeared plainly to her had the real danger of the fire not been apprehended by her intuitions, far keener than she suspected, and so interpreted to her will as to lead her without fear to the very spot she was most needed in all the world.

CHAPTER XI

As the coach turned into Eighteenth Street, Gabrielle was prepared to meet the emergency, for all at once it came upon her that duty had brought her to the spot. She saw the excitement surrounding the fire and knew why she was there. The coachman, following her order, drew up to the curb, so that she might alight. She dismissed him and then pushed through the crowd, now scattering, to the fire lines, and as she proceeded she saw the building on our corner had been partly destroyed; apparently the flames had done the most damage in the upper stories. Her first question was put to a policeman on guard near the edge of the crowd:

"Officer, please tell me if there were any persons injured at the fire?"

"Yes, ma'am, two men; they were taken to Bellevue, ma'am."

With a simple word of thanks she turned away. If the officers were then in pursuit of her Jim, she would find him first and shield him with her wit as many a woman had done before under like conditions. The ambulances had gone half an hour before, but she would follow directly to the hospital and first seek out there the man whose terrible fate was foretold by her fears. Why had she not kept the coach to take her to Bellevue? It had been dismissed when she wished to avoid even the possible testimony of a coachman. Quickly she summoned a cab and a few minutes later she was in the hospital ready to shield Jim Hosley from all harm if he were there.

Gabrielle found him unconscious and quickly identified him as her brother, George Marshall.

"I should like to have him placed in a private room," she said to the hospital superintendent. "Please have it next to that of his friend, Mr.

Benjamin Hopkins. I want them to have the best care from your physicians and nurses that may be obtained. There is no sacrifice that I would not make to save the lives of these brave men who have suffered so terribly."

Several weeks afterward I learned that my name and that of George Marshall had appeared in the papers for a few days until the hospital doctors announced that we would probably recover. The public accepted that as a finality quite as agreeably as if we had died of our injuries, and so we sank below the horizon again. Our thrilling rescue by the fire department net, with a vague mention of our injuries received while falling against the useless fire escapes, was part of the news of the day; also the fact that I had been thrown from the window and that a search had been made of the ruins, but no trace of Hosley could be found. In a few days, he, too, appeared to be forgotten. My brother had not seen any of his folks up home and none of them had driven over to our place, a distance of ten miles. We boys had been away so long, the two families had rather lost track of each other, I supposed, although it did seem strange to me. I made little mention of Jim in my letters to the old home folks. The bad news, I knew, would leak out in time and my chuckle-headedness would be as much a part of the village gossip as the story of his crime.

A few days after I had regained consciousness I began to discuss with Hygeia the other man who was injured at the fire.

"What sort of a looking man is that fellow, George Marshall, who was hurt?" I asked, thinking he might be Hosley under another name and she not know it.

"He seemed rather slight in build," she answered demurely. "I should say he weighed about one hundred and fifty pounds." Jim had lost weight, but I did not think of that.

"Any of his folks been here? With whom did he live? What flat? Which house?"

"Well, now, I shan't say; really, I shan't say who has been here to see him. Look to yourself."

"Why can't I go in and talk to him? Is he awake?"

"How could you? Why are you so foolish now to worry about him? He doesn't bother his head about you. Haven't you had all you want of that fire, without talking it all over again with that man?"

"I'd like first rate to have a talk with that fellow. Maybe I know him."

"Well, I know you are a great man to talk, but we shan't let you talk him to death."

"Say, can't you tell me what sort of a looking dub he is?"

"A what? Most of the time you seem to speak Welsh."

"How are you so c.o.c.k-sure his name is George Marshall?"

"How do I? Well! well!"

"Why, look here! Isn't it natural for me to ask about him? Didn't we pa.s.s through almost the same experience? Why, I am simply bound to know that fellow, that's all there is about it."

"Tut, tut! Certainly you shall know him. But not now, when you are too weak to walk and he is suffering even more pain. Rest easy, now; be as calm as you can and soon you and the other patient may talk it all over together."