Adventure stories; Detective and mystery stories; Missing persons -- Fiction; New York (N.Y.) -- Fiction
I sat up on the edge of my cot and stared at the tray he held. I did
not much relish the thought of being in the hands of the police, after
what Peters had said about not being able to prevent my arrest
earlier. If some of the police were in the Emperor’s pay, the food on
the tray might finish me and my work once and for all. Then I
remembered who had brought me here and confidence returned. Captain
Peters would have been sure of the men he left in charge of me.
So I took the tray and fell to on the breakfast, and finding the
policeman of a talkative turn of mind, I encouraged him with an
occasional affirmative or a nod if my mouth was full, for I was in a
hurry. The food was all cut up, which was a good thing, as my left arm
was bound tight against my side. But I could make shift with the right
hand all right.
“The captain should be here directly, sir. He had a gray-haired
gentleman with him when he came before. Would that be any one from
Washington, maybe? Would there be something doing?” He broke off and
stared at me inquiringly.
“How do I know?” I laughed.
The policeman scratched his head. “Well, sir, he said to tell you to
be ready in ten minutes if possible, if you want to go with them. But
he thought it would be better to let you sleep through and not go
wherever they’re going. Would there be any chance of going with you,
sir? Did you fall, maybe, and break your arm?” And he gazed at me
blandly, but with a twinkle in his Irish blue eyes.
“What else?” I inquired, and pushed the tray away from me, for I had
taken the edge from my appetite and anxiety had returned. “But as for
your going with us, that will be for Captain Peters and maybe the
gray-haired gentleman to decide.”
For I guessed that the latter was the Chief—my Chief.
“Well, sir——” he began, and rose suddenly to his feet, grabbed the
tray and edged toward the door.
I looked up and the next moment was shaking hands with the Chief,
while Captain Peters grinned in the background. The Chief’s big frame
and bigger personality seemed to fill the little cell, although
neither the captain nor I are small men. I was glad to see him, I can
tell you. And my anxiety died a little. Capable men had the thing in
hand now.
“Well done, Clayton!” the Chief was kind enough to say as he shook my
good hand. “Peters was all for letting you sleep, after what you have
been through. But I knew that you would want to be in at the death.
And that won’t be long now, after what you have found out. The captain
here has told me all about it.”
“I would have called the captain out if he had let me sleep!” I
answered, and the Chief laughed while the captain looked puzzled.
“We put you in here for safe keeping,” my Chief went on. “I don’t know
of any safer place. But I’d like to hear the whole story from you
again if you can tell it in five minutes. Our plans are made now, and
we are merely waiting for a couple of police cars before we start.
How’s the shoulder?”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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