A Bid for Fortune - Guy Boothby (ready player one ebook TXT) 📗

steamship company’s office, leaving the Marquis behind me at the hotel for reasons which had begun to commend themselves to me, and which will be quite apparent to you.

I found the Saratoga’s agent hard at work in his private office. He was a tall, thin man, slightly bald, wearing a pair of heavy gold pincenez, and very slow and deliberate in his speech.

“I beg your pardon,” he began, when I had taken possession of his proffered chair, “but did I understand my clerk to say that your name was Hatteras?”

“That is my name,” I answered. “I was a passenger in your boat the Saratoga for Australia three weeks ago, but had the misfortune to be left behind when she sailed.”

“Ah! I remember the circumstances thoroughly,” he said. “The young Marquis of Beckenham went ashore with you, I think, and came within an ace of being also left behind.”

“Within an ace!” I cried; “but he was left behind.”

“No, no! there you are mistaken,” was the astounding reply; “he would have been left behind had not his tutor and I gone ashore at the last moment to look for him and found him wandering about on the outskirts of Arab Town. I don’t remember ever to have seen a man more angry than the tutor was, and no wonder, for they only just got out to the boat again as the gangway was being hauled aboard.”

“Then you mean to tell me that the Marquis went on to Australia after all!” I cried. “And pray how did this interesting young gentleman explain the fact of his losing sight of me?”

“He lost you in a crowd, he said,” the agent continued. “It was a most extraordinary business altogether.”

It certainly was, and even more extraordinary than he imagined. I could hardly believe my ears. The world seemed to be turned upside down. I was so bewildered that I stumbled out a few lame enquiries about the next boat sailing for Australia, and what would be done with my baggage on its arrival at the other end, and then made my way as best I could out of the office.

Hastening back to the hotel, I told my story from beginning to end to my astonished companion, who sat on his bed listening open-mouthed. When I had finished he said feebly⁠—

“But what does it all mean? Tell me that! What does it mean?”

“It means,” I answered, “that our notion about Nikola’s abducting us in order to blackmail your father was altogether wrong, and, if you ask me, I should say not half picturesque enough. No, no! this mystery is a bigger one by a hundred times than even we expected, and there are more men in it than those we have yet seen. It remains with you to say whether you will assist in the attempt to unravel it or not.”

“What do you mean by saying it remains with me? Do I understand that you intend following it up?”

“Of course I do. Nikola and Baxter between them have completely done me⁠—now I’m going to do my best to do them. By Jove!”

“What is it now?”

“I see it all as plain as a pikestaff. I understand exactly now why Baxter came for you, why he telegraphed that the train was laid, why I was drugged in Plymouth, why you were seasick between Naples and this place, and why we were both kidnapped so mysteriously!”

“Then explain, for mercy’s sake!”

“I will. See here. In the first place, remember your father’s peculiar education of yourself. If you consider that, you will see that you are the only young nobleman of high rank whose face is not well known to his brother peers. That being so, Nikola wants to procure you for some purpose of his own in Australia. Your father advertises for a tutor; he sends one of his agents⁠—Baxter⁠—to secure the position. Baxter, at Nikola’s instruction, puts into your head a desire for travel. You pester your father for the necessary permission. Just as this is granted I come upon the scene. Baxter suspects me. He telegraphs to Nikola ‘The train is laid,’ which means that he has begun to sow the seeds of a desire for travel, when a third party steps in⁠—in other words, I am the new danger that has arisen. He arranges your sailing, and all promises to go well. Then Dr. Nikola finds out I intend going in the same boat. He tries to prevent me; and I⁠—by Jove! I see another thing. Why did Baxter suggest that you should cross the continent and join the boat at Naples? Why, simply because if you started from Plymouth you would soon have got over your sickness, if you had ever been ill at all, and in that case the passengers would have become thoroughly familiar with your face by the time you reached Port Said. That would never have done, so he takes you to Naples, drugs you next morning⁠—for you must remember you were ill after the coffee he gave you⁠—and by that means keeps you ill and confined to your cabin throughout the entire passage to Port Said. Then he persuades you to go ashore with me. You do so, with what result you know. Presently he begins to bewail your non-return, invites the agent to help in the search. They set off, and eventually find you near the Arab quarter. You must remember that neither the agent, the captain, nor the passengers have seen you, save at night, so the substitute, who is certain to have been well chosen and schooled for the part he is to play, is not detected. Then the boat goes on her way, while we are left behind languishing in durance vile.”

“Do you really think those are the facts of the case?”

“Upon my word, I do!”

“Then what do you advise me to do? Remember, Baxter has letters to the different Governors from my father.”

“I know what I should do myself!”

“Go to the consul and get him to