Books: The Pursuit of the House Boat
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John Kendrick Bangs >> The Pursuit of the House Boat
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"Weren't there?" cried Conrad.
"Yes, they was there," sighed Hawkins, "but every bloomin' million
was represented by a certified check, an' payable in London!"
"By Jingo!" cried Morgan. "What fearful luck! But you had the prima
donna's jewels."
"Yes," said Hawkins, with a moan. "But they was like all other prima
donna's jewels--for advertisin' purposes only, an' made o' gum-
arabic!"
"Horrible!" said Abeuchapeta. "And the crew, what did they say?"
"They was a crew of a few words," sighed Hawkins. "Werry few words,
an' not a civil word in the lot--mostly adjectives of a profane kind.
When I told 'em what had happened, they got mad at Fortune for a-
jiltin' of 'em, an'--well, I came here. I was 'sas'inated that werry
night!"
"They killed you?" cried Morgan.
"A dozen times," nodded Hawkins. "They always was a lavish lot. I
met death in all its most horrid forms. First they stabbed me, then
they shot me, then they clubbed me, and so on, endin' up with a
lynchin'--but I didn't mind much after the first, which hurt a bit.
But now that I'm here I'm glad it happened. This life is sort of
less responsible than that other. You can't hurt a ghost by shooting
him, because there ain't nothing to hurt, an' I must say I like bein'
a mere vision what everybody can see through."
"All of which interesting tale proves what?" queried Abeuchapeta.
"That piracy on the sea is not profitable in these days of the check
banking system," said Kidd. "If you can get a chance at real gold
it's all right, but it's of no earthly use to steal checks that
people can stop payment on. Therefore it was my plan to visit the
cities and do a little freebooting there, where solid material wealth
is to be found."
"Well? Can't we do it now?" asked Abeuchapeta.
"Not with these women tagging after us," returned Kidd. "If we went
to London and lifted the whole Bank of England, these women would
have it spent on Regent Street inside of twenty-four hours."
"Then leave them on board," said Abeuchapeta.
"And have them steal the ship!" retorted Kidd. "No. There are but
two things to do. Take 'em back, or land them in Paris. Tell them
to spend a week on shore while we are provisioning. Tell 'em to shop
to their hearts' content, and while they are doing it we can sneak
off and leave them stranded."
"Splendid!" cried Morgan.
"But will they consent?" asked Abeuchapeta.
"Consent! To shop? In Paris? For a week?" cried Morgan.
"Ha, ha!" laughed Hawkins. "Will they consent! Will a duck swim?"
And so it was decided, which was the first incident in the career of
the House-boat upon which the astute Mr. Sherlock Holmes had failed
to count.
CHAPTER VI: A CONFERENCE BELOW-STAIRS
When, with a resounding slam, the door to the upper deck of the
House-boat was shut in the faces of queens Elizabeth and Cleopatra by
the unmannerly Kidd, these ladies turned and gazed at those who
thronged the stairs behind them in blank amazement, and the heart of
Xanthippe, had one chosen to gaze through that diaphanous person's
ribs, could have been seen to beat angrily.
Queen Elizabeth was so excited at this wholly novel attitude towards
her regal self that, having turned, she sat down plump upon the floor
in the most unroyal fashion.
"Well!" she ejaculated. "If this does not surpass everything! The
idea of it! Oh for one hour of my olden power, one hour of the axe,
one hour of the block!"
"Get up," retorted Cleopatra, "and let us all return to the billiard-
room and discuss this matter calmly. It is quite evident that
something has happened of which we wotted little when we came aboard
this craft."
"That is a good idea," said Calpurnia, retreating below. "I can see
through the window that we are in motion. The vessel has left her
moorings, and is making considerable headway down the stream, and the
distinctly masculine voices we have heard are indications to my mind
that the ship is manned, and that this is the result of design rather
than of accident. Let us below."
Elizabeth rose up and readjusted her ruff, which in the excitement of
the moment had been forced to assume a position about her forehead
which gave one the impression that its royal wearer had suddenly
donned a sombrero.
"Very well," she said. "Let us below; but oh, for the axe!"
"Bring the lady an axe," cried Xanthippe, sarcastically. "She wants
to cut somebody."
The sally was not greeted with applause. The situation was regarded
as being too serious to admit of humor, and in silence they filed
back into the billiard-room, and, arranging themselves in groups,
stood about anxiously discussing the situation.
"It's getting rougher every minute," sobbed Ophelia. "Look at those
pool-balls!" These were in very truth chasing each other about the
table in an extraordinary fashion. "And I wish I'd never followed
you horrid new creatures on board!" the poor girl added, in an agony
of despair.
"I believe we've crossed the bar already!" said Cleopatra, gazing out
of the window at a nasty choppy sea that was adding somewhat to the
disquietude of the fair gathering. "If this is merely a joke on the
part of the Associated Shades, it is a mighty poor one, and I think
it is time it should cease."
"Oh, for an axe!" moaned Elizabeth, again.
"Excuse me, your Majesty," put in Xanthippe. "You said that before,
and I must say it is getting tiresome. You couldn't do anything with
an axe. Suppose you had one. What earthly good would it do you, who
were accustomed to doing all your killing by proxy? I don't believe,
if you had the unmannerly person who slammed the door in your face
lying prostrate upon the billiard-table here, you could hit him a
square blow in the neck if you had a hundred axes. Delilah might as
well cry for her scissors, for all the good it would do us in our
predicament. If Cleopatra had her asp with her it might be more to
the purpose. One deadly little snake like that let loose on the
upper deck would doubtless drive these boors into the sea, and even
then our condition would not be bettered, for there isn't any of us
that can sail a boat. There isn't an old salt among us."
"Too bad Mrs. Lot isn't along," giggled Marguerite de Valois, whose
Gallic spirits were by no means overshadowed by the unhappy
predicament in which she found herself.
"I'm here," piped up Mrs. Lot. "But I'm not that kind of a salt."
"I am present," said Mrs. Noah. "Though why I ever came I don't
know, for I vowed the minute I set my foot on Ararat that dry land
was good enough for me, and that I'd never step aboard another boat
as long as I lived. If, however, now that I am here, I can give you
the benefit of my nautical experience, you are all perfectly welcome
to it."
"I'm sure we're very much obliged for the offer," said Portia, "but
in the emergency which has arisen we cannot say how much obliged we
are until we know what your experience amounted to. Before relying
upon you we ought to know how far that reliance can go--not that I
lack confidence in you, my dear madam, but that in an hour of peril
one must take care, to rely upon the oak, not upon the reed."
"The point is properly taken," said Elizabeth, "and I wish to say
here that I am easier in my mind when I realize that we have with us
so level-headed a person as the lady who has just spoken. She has
spoken truly and to the point. If I were to become queen again, I
should make her my attorney-general. We must not go ahead
impulsively, but look at all things in a calm, judicial manner."
"Which is pretty hard work with a sea like this on," remarked
Ophelia, faintly, for she was getting a trifle sallow, as indeed she
might, for the House-boat was beginning to roll tremendously with no
alleviation save an occasional pitch, which was an alleviation only
in the sense that it gave variety to their discomfort. "I don't
believe a chief-justice could look at things calmly and in a judicial
manner if he felt as I do."
"Poor dear!" said the matronly Mrs. Noah, sympathetically. "I know
exactly how you feel. I have been there myself. The fourth day out
I and my whole family were in the same condition, except that Noah,
my husband, was so very far gone that I could not afford to yield. I
nursed him for six days before he got his sea-legs on, and then
succumbed myself."
"But," gasped Ophelia, "that doesn't help me -
"It did my husband," said Mrs. Noah.
"When he heard that the boys were seasick too, he actually laughed
and began to get better right away. There is really only one cure
for the mal de mer, and that is the fun of knowing that somebody else
is suffering too. If some of you ladies would kindly yield to the
seductions of the sea, I think we could get this poor girl on her
feet in an instant."
Unfortunately for poor Ophelia, there was no immediate response to
this appeal, and the unhappy young woman was forced to suffer in
solitude.
"We have no time for untimely diversions of this sort," snapped
Xanthippe, with a scornful glance at the suffering Ophelia, who,
having retired to a comfortable lounge at an end of the room, was
evidently improving. "I have no sympathy with this habit some of my
sex seem to have acquired of succumbing to an immediate sensation of
this nature."
"I hope to be pardoned for interrupting," said Mrs. Noah, with a
great deal of firmness, "but I wish Mrs. Socrates to understand that
it is rather early in the voyage for her to lay down any such broad
principle as that, and for her own sake to-morrow, I think it would
be well if she withdrew the sentiment. There are certain things
about a sea-voyage that are more or less beyond the control of man or
woman, and any one who chides that poor suffering child on yonder
sofa ought to be more confident than Mrs. Socrates can possibly be
that within an hour she will not be as badly off. People who live in
glass houses should not throw dice."
"I shall never yield to anything so undignified as seasickness, let
me tell you that," retorted Xanthippe. "Furthermore, the proverb is
not as the lady has quoted it. 'People who live in glass houses
should not throw stones' is the proper version."
"I was not quoting," returned Mrs. Noah, calmly. "When I said that
people who live in glass houses should not throw dice, I meant
precisely what I said. People who live in glass houses should not
take chances. In assuming with such vainglorious positiveness that
she will not be seasick, the lady who has just spoken is giving
tremendous odds, as the boys used to say on the Ark when we gathered
about the table at night and began to make small wagers on the day's
run."
"I think we had better suspend this discussion," suggested Cleopatra.
"It is of no immediate interest to any one but Ophelia, and I fancy
she does not care to dwell upon it at any great length. It is more
important that we should decide upon our future course of action. In
the first place, the question is who these people up on deck are. If
they are the members of the club, we are all right. They will give
us our scare, and land us safely again at the pier. In that event it
is our womanly duty to manifest no concern, and to seem to be aware
of nothing unusual in the proceeding. It would never do to let them
think that their joke has been a good one. If, on the other hand, as
I fear, we are the victims of some horde of ruffians, who have
pounced upon us unawares, and are going into the business of
abduction on a wholesale basis, we must meet treachery with
treachery, strategy with strategy. I, for one, am perfectly willing
to make every man on board walk the plank; having confidence in the
seawomanship of Mrs. Noah and her ability to steer us into port."
"I am quite in accord with these views," put in Madame Recamier, "and
I move you, Mrs. President, that we organize a series of sub-
committees--one on treachery, with Lucretia Borgia and Delilah as
members; one on strategy, consisting of Portia and Queen Elizabeth;
one on navigation, headed by Mrs. Noah; with a final sub-committee on
reconnoitre, with Cassandra to look forward, and Mrs. Lot to look
aft--all of these subordinated to a central committee of safety
headed by Cleopatra and Calpurnia. The rest of us can then commit
ourselves and our interests unreservedly to these ladies, and proceed
to enjoy ourselves without thought of the morrow."
"I second the motion," said Ophelia, "with the amendment that Madame
Recamier be appointed chair-lady of another sub-committee, on
entertainment."
The amendment was accepted, and the motion put. It was carried with
an enthusiastic aye, and the organization was complete.
The various committees retired to the several corners of the room to
discuss their individual lines of action, when a shadow was observed
to obscure the moonlight which had been streaming in through the
window. The faces of Calpurnia and Cleopatra blanched for an
instant, as, immediately following upon this apparition, a large
bundle was hurled through the open port into the middle of the room,
and the shadow vanished.
"Is it a bomb?" cried several of the ladies at once.
"Nonsense!" said Madame Recamier, jumping lightly forward. "A man
doesn't mind blowing a woman up, but he'll never blow himself up.
We're safe enough in that respect. The thing looks to me like a
bundle of illustrated papers."
"That's what it is," said Cleopatra who had been investigating.
"It's rather a discourteous bit of courtesy, tossing them in through
the window that way, I think, but I presume they mean well. Dear
me," she added, as, having untied the bundle, she held one of the
open papers up before her, "how interesting! All the latest Paris
fashions. Humph! Look at those sleeves, Elizabeth. What an
impregnable fortress you would have been with those sleeves added to
your ruffs!"
"I should think they'd be very becoming," put in Cassandra, standing
on her tip-toes and looking over Cleopatra's shoulder. "That Watteau
isn't bad, either, is it, now?"
"No," remarked Calpurnia. "I wonder how a Watteau back like that
would go on my blue alpaca?"
"Very nicely," said Elizabeth. "How many gores has it?"
"Five," observed Calpurnia. "One more than Caesar's toga. We had to
have our costumes distinct in some way."
"A remarkable hat, that," nodded Mrs. Lot, her eye catching sight of
a Virot creation at the top of the page.
"Reminds me of Eve's description of an autumn scene in the garden,"
smiled Mrs. Noah. "Gorgeous in its foliage, beautiful thing; though
I shouldn't have dared wear one in the Ark, with all those hungry
animals browsing about the upper and lower decks."
"I wonder," remarked Cleopatra, as she cocked her head to one side to
take in the full effect of an attractive summer gown--"I wonder how
that waist would make up in blue crepon, with a yoke of lace and a
stylishly contrasting stock of satin ribbon?"
"It would depend upon how you finished the sleeves," remarked Madame
Recamier. "If you had a few puffs of rich brocaded satin set in with
deeply folded pleats it wouldn't be bad."
"I think it would be very effective," observed Mrs. Noah, "but a
trifle too light for general wear. I should want some kind of a wrap
with it."
"It does need that," assented Elizabeth. "A wrap made of
passementerie and jet, with a mousseline de soie ruche about the neck
held by a chou, would make it fascinating."
"The committee on treachery is ready to report," said Delilah, rising
from her corner, where she and Lucretia Borgia had been having so
animated a discussion that they had failed to observe the others
crowding about Cleopatra and the papers.
"A little sombre," said Cleopatra. "The corsage is effective, but I
don't like those basque terminations. I've never approved of those
full godets--"
"The committee on treachery," remarked Delilah again, raising her
voice, "has a suggestion to make."
"I can't get over those sleeves, though," laughed Helen of Troy.
"What is the use of them?"
"They might be used to get Greeks into Troy," suggested Madame
Recamier.
"The committee on treachery," roared Delilah, thoroughly angered by
the absorption of the chairman and others, "has a suggestion to make.
This is the third and last call."
"Oh, I beg pardon," cried Cleopatra, rapping for order. "I had
forgotten all about our committees. Excuse me, Delilah. I--ah--was
absorbed in other matters. Will you kindly lay your pattern--I
should say your plan--before us?"
"It is briefly this," said Delilah. "It has been suggested that we
invite the crew of this vessel to a chafing-dish party, under the
supervision of Lucretia Borgia, and that she--"
The balance of the plan was not outlined, for at this point the
speaker was interrupted by a loud knocking at the door, its instant
opening, and the appearance in the doorway of that ill-visaged
ruffian Captain Kidd.
"Ladies," he began, "I have come here to explain to you the situation
in which you find yourselves. Have I your permission to speak?"
The ladies started back, but the chairman was equal to the occasion.
"Go on," said Cleopatra, with queenly dignity, turning to the
interloper; and the pirate proceeded to take the second step in the
nefarious plan upon which he and his brother ruffians had agreed, of
which the tossing in through the window of the bundle of fashion
papers was the first.
CHAPTER VII: THE "GEHENNA" IS CHARTERED
It was about twenty-four hours after the events narrated in the
preceding chapters that Mr. Sherlock Holmes assumed command of the
Gehenna, which was nothing more nor less than the shadow of the ill-
starred ocean steamship City of Chicago, which tried some years ago
to reach Liverpool by taking the overland route through Ireland,
fortunately without detriment to her passengers and crew, who had the
pleasure of the experience of shipwreck without any of the
discomforts of drowning. As will be remembered, the obstructionist
nature of the Irish soil prevented the City of Chicago from
proceeding farther inland than was necessary to keep her well
balanced amidships upon a convenient and not too stony bed; and that
after a brief sojourn on the rocks she was finally disposed of to the
Styx Navigation Company, under which title Charon had had himself
incorporated, is a matter of nautical history. The change of name to
the Gehenna was the act of Charon himself, and was prompted, no
doubt, by a desire to soften the jealous prejudices of the residents
of the Stygian capital against the flourishing and ever-growing
metropolis of Illinois.
The Associated Shades had had some trouble in getting this craft.
Charon, through his constant association with life on both sides of
the dark river, had gained a knowledge, more or less intimate, of
modern business methods, and while as janitor of the club he was
subject to the will of the House-boat Committee, and sympathized
deeply with the members of the association in their trouble, as
president of the Styx Navigation Company he was bound up in certain
newly attained commercial ideas which were embarrassing to those
members of the association to whose hands the chartering of a vessel
had been committed.
"See here, Charon," Sir Walter Raleigh had said, after Charon had
expressed himself as deeply sympathetic, but unable to shave the
terms upon which the vessel could be had, "you are an infernal old
hypocrite. You go about wringing your hands over our misfortunes
until they've got as dry and flabby as a pair of kid gloves, and yet
when we ask you for a ship of suitable size and speed to go out after
those pirates, you become a sort of twin brother to Shylock, without
his excuse. His instincts are accidents of birth. Yours are
cultivated, and you know it."
"You are very much mistaken, Sir Walter," Charon had answered to
this. "You don't understand my position. It is a very hard one. As
janitor of your club I am really prostrated over the events of the
past twenty-four hours. My occupation is gone, and my despair over
your loss is correspondingly greater, for I have time on my hands to
brood over it. I was hysterical as a woman yesterday afternoon--so
hysterical that I came near upsetting one of the Furies who engaged
me to row her down to Madame Medusa's villa last evening; and right
at the sluice of the vitriol reservoir at that."
"Then why the deuce don't you do something to help us?" pleaded
Hamlet.
"How can I do any more than I have done? I've offered you the
Gehenna," retorted Charon.
"But on what terms?" expostulated Raleigh. "If we had all the wealth
of the Indies we'd have difficulty in paying you the sums you
demand."
"But I am only president of the company," explained Charon. "I'd
like, as president, to show you some courtesy, and I'm perfectly
willing to do so; but when it comes down to giving you a vessel like
that, I'm bound by my official oath to consider the interest of the
stockholders. It isn't as it used to be when I had boats to hire in
my own behalf alone. In those days I had nobody's interest but my
own to look after. Now the ships all belong to the Styx Navigation
Company. Can't you see the difference?"
"You own all the stock, don't you?" insisted Raleigh.
"I don't know," Charon answered, blandly. "I haven't seen the
transfer-books lately.''
"But you know that you did own every share of it, and that you
haven't sold any, don't you?" put in Hamlet.
Charon was puzzled for a moment, but shortly his face cleared, and
Sir Walter's heart sank, for it was evident that the old fellow could
not be cornered.
"Well, it's this way, Sir Walter, and your Highness," he said, "I--I
can't say whether any of that stock has been transferred or not. The
fact is, I've been speculating a little on margin, and I've put up
that stock as security, and, for all I know, I may have been sold out
by my brokers. I've been so upset by this unfortunate occurrence
that I haven't seen the market reports for two days. Really you'll
have to be content with my offer or go without the Gehenna. There's
too much suspicion attached to high corporate officials lately for me
to yield a jot in the position I have taken. It would never do to
get you all ready to start, and then have an injunction clapped on
you by some unforeseen stockholder who was not satisfied with the
terms offered you; nor can I ever let it be said of me that to retain
my position as janitor of your organization I sacrificed a trust
committed to my charge. I'll gladly lend you my private launch,
though I don't think it will aid you much, because the naphtha-tank
has exploded, and the screw slipped off and went to the bottom two
weeks ago. Still, it is at your service, and I've no doubt that
either Phidias or Benvenuto Cellini will carve out a paddle for you
if you ask him to."
"Bah!" retorted Raleigh. "You might as well offer us a pair of
skates."
"I would, if I thought the river'd freeze," retorted Charon, blandly.
Raleigh and Hamlet turned away impatiently and left Charon to his own
devices, which for the time being consisted largely of winking his
other eye quietly and outwardly making a great show of grief.
"He's too canny for us, I am afraid," said Sir Walter. "We'll have
to pay him his money."
"Let us first consult Sherlock Holmes," suggested Hamlet, and this
they proceeded at once to do.
"There is but one thing to be done," observed the astute detective
after he had heard Sir Walter's statement of the case. "It is an old
saying that one should fight fire with fire. We must meet modern
business methods with modern commercial ideas. Charter his vessel at
his own price."
"But we'd never be able to pay," said Hamlet.
"Ha-ha!" laughed Holmes. "It is evident that you know nothing of the
laws of trade nowadays. Don't pay!"
"But how can we?" asked Raleigh.
"The method is simple. You haven't anything to pay with," returned
Holmes. "Let him sue. Suppose he gets a verdict. You haven't
anything he can attach--if you have, make it over to your wives or
your fiancees"
"Is that honest?" asked Hamlet, shaking his head doubtfully.
"It's business," said Holmes.
"But suppose he wants an advance payment?" queried Hamlet.
"Give him a check drawn to his own order. He'll have to endorse it
when he deposits it, and that will make him responsible," laughed
Holmes.
"What a simple thing when you understand it!" commented Raleigh.
"Very," said Holmes. "Business is getting by slow degrees to be an
exact science. It reminds me of the Brighton mystery, in which I
played a modest part some ten years ago, when I first took up
ferreting as a profession. I was sitting one night in my room at one
of the Brighton hotels, which shall be nameless. I never give the
name of any of the hotels at which I stop, because it might give
offence to the proprietors of other hotels, with the result that my
books would be excluded from sale therein. Suffice it to say that I
was spending an early summer Sunday at Brighton with my friend
Watson. We had dined well, and were enjoying our evening smoke
together upon a small balcony overlooking the water, when there came
a timid knock on the door of my room.
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