Chapter 8

THE MAN THAT LOOKED THROUGH THE KEYHOLE.

Pearl Hawlinshed had not looked to see if the Goldwing was where he had last seen her, outside of the breakwater. The water was unusually low on the lake; and, though he saw the topmasts of several boats beyond the breakwater, he was unable to determine whether or not any of them belonged to the Goldwing. Captain Vesey had seen no boat go out, and Pearl concluded that she was still at anchor.

Pearl made his trade with the acting skipper of the little steamer, which was hardly more than a steam-launch. Mr. Button the engineer, who was to remain in the employ of the new owner, was wiping the water off the machinery. He was called, and informed of the arrangement with Pearl. To the astonishment of both, he refused to move the Missisquoi from the wharf.

"I reckon the boat is in my care until she is delivered to the new owner," argued Captain Vesey.

"It don't make any difference to me whose care she is in. I won't go out with a man who don't know any more about handling a boat than you do, Captain Vesey," replied Mr. Button warmly. "It was only by a miracle that we got over here at all. I expected to go to the bottom every minute of the time until we got inside of the breakwater."

"I reckon I know how to handle a steamboat as well as the next man," returned Captain Vesey indignantly.

"That depends upon how much the next man knows about a tug-boat. If the next man don't know any more about it than you do, I don't want to run the engine for him."

Pearl could not help being on the engineer's side of the controversy. He and Dory had agreed that the captain of the Missisquoi did not understand his business. But Pearl Hawlinshed believed that he knew all about a steamer, and all about the lake. He considered himself competent to command one of the large steamers.

"I am going with you, Mr. Button, and it will be five dollars in your pocket, as well as the captain's," interposed Pearl, who was disposed to be liberal with the landlord's money.

"My life is worth something to me; or at any rate it is to my family," replied Mr. Button doubtfully. "Do you know about handling such a boat as this?"

"I know all about it: I used to sail in the Au Sable," replied Pearl confidently.

Mr. Button was doubtless a good engineer, but he was not a very shrewd man. If he had been, he would have asked in what capacity the applicant for the use of the Missisquoi served on board of the Au Sable. Possibly Pearl would have evaded the question, or lied about the matter, for he had simply been a waiter in the cabin for a few weeks. But Pearl thought he knew all about a steamer, and all about the navigation of the lake.

"If you are a steamboat man I have no objection to taking the boat out," added the engineer. "It is a very rough day on the lake, and one has to know something about handling a boat in such big waves."

"But I am the captain of this boat, and I reckon I don't want any boss over me," interposed Captain Vesey at this point.

"We shall have no trouble," added Pearl, as he walked aft with the captain. "I shall not meddle with your management of the boat. I only said what I did to quiet the engineer."

But the boat had to take in a supply of fuel, for which Pearl promised to pay out of the landlord's pocket. She could not leave for a couple of hours. Pearl wanted to go back to the hotel, and attend to some matters in connection with his mission which he had forgotten.

"I am to pay you five dollars, and the engineer five dollars, when you put me on board of the Goldwing," said Pearl, as he was about to leave the boat. "Is that the trade?"

"That's it," replied the engineer; and so answered the captain.

Pearl walked up the pier, and then went down the railroad till he could see outside of the breakwater. He found the Goldwing lay at anchor in the place she had chosen at first. Ten dollars would be a good sum to pay if the Missisquoi was obliged to take him only out to the breakwater. But, the sooner he brought Dory on shore, the sooner the Goldwing would be put up at auction again.

He walked to the Witherill House, and informed the landlord of what he had done, and declared that the boy who had stolen the money should be handed over to him in a couple of hours. The hotel-keeper did not object to the expense; but he wished his representative to be careful how he managed the business, for it was by no means certain that the boy had taken the money.

"I am as certain of it as I am of my own existence," replied Pearl warmly. "I have found out something about the boy since I was here. He has the reputation of being wild, and no one sent him over here to buy a boat. And a fellow like him don't have forty or fifty dollars to invest in boats."

"All that may be; but you can be careful just as well as not," added the landlord.

"He is nothing but a young cub, and has no friends, so that nothing will come of it if he shouldn't happen to be the thief."

"If he has no one to defend him, so much the more reason why he should be fairly dealt with," replied the hotel-keeper,--a sentiment with which Pearl Hawlinshed had no sympathy. "I have seen Moody since you went out, and he says a man was looking into the keyhole of the room next to his about ten o'clock last evening. That was your father's room. Have you any idea who that man was, Hawlinshed?"

"I haven't the least idea in the world," answered Pearl; and possibly the landlord did not notice his confusion when he replied, "Very likely it was this same boy."

"It wasn't a boy, but a man: I asked Moody particularly about this matter."

"I don't know any thing about the matter at all," protested Pearl. "If the man that lost the money saw any thing of this kind, why didn't he tell of it before?"

"I asked him this question, and he says he did not think of it before. The fact of it is, that Moody had been drinking, though he sticks to it that he wasn't drunk. He went into his room at about ten o'clock, and put the money into his trunk, for he was afraid he might lose it. He saw the man looking in at the keyhole of your father's room when he went into his own to put the money in a safe place. He heard voices in the next room when he opened his trunk. The boy was with your father at that time very likely."

"If the man had been drinking, it is not probable that he knows much about the boy or the man," added Pearl.

"He had not got very tipsy, or he would not have thought to look out for his money. But bring the boy up, if you can get him without violence or outrage. If he explains where he got the money to buy the boat, that is the end of the matter so far as he is concerned. In my opinion the man who was looking in at the keyhole of your father's room is more likely to be the thief than the boy."

"Where did the boy get forty-two dollars to pay for the boat, then?" demanded Pearl.

"I give it up," laughed the landlord. "But we are likely to know something more about the case before dinner-time. I called in Peppers, who used to be a detective in New York City; and he is at work on the case now."

"What did you do that for?" demanded Pearl, who did not seem to relish the information. "You set me at work on the case; and now you have called in another person to attend to it, after I have engaged a steamer."

"All I asked you to do was to bring the boy in to be questioned. Peppers won't interfere with any thing that you may do," replied the landlord, not a little surprised at the objection of Pearl.

"What is Peppers doing?" asked Pearl uneasily.

"I don't know what he is doing: at least, I don't know much about it, and he told me not to tell what I did know."

"But you can tell me, for I am at work on the case," said Pearl in a coaxing tone.

"No: I won't tell you any thing. You won't interfere with each other, and it is best for each of you to work on his own hook," replied the hotel-keeper, as he turned to attend to a guest who wished to speak to him.

Pearl saw that it was useless to press the matter any farther; and he was evidently very much disturbed about the turn the investigation had taken during his absence. He was particularly anxious to know what the detective was about, but he was unable to obtain any information from any person. He returned to the steamboat wharf. When he came in sight of the breakwater, he was not a little startled to see the Goldwing dart out from behind the structure, with only a small jib and a reefed mainsail.

He was startled; because not more than an hour had elapsed since he left the Missisquoi, and he expected it would be another hour before she would be ready to go in pursuit of the Goldwing. The latter could sail like the wind if she would only keep right side up, and she would get a long start of the steamer. Besides, Pearl did not like the looks of the big waves on the lake any better than Mr. Button had; and he was not altogether sure that he could manage her any better than Captain Vesey had done.

The Goldwing was running from the end of the breakwater over towards the main shore, and it was possible that Dory intended to make a landing at Plattsburgh. But it was not more than a quarter of a mile from the breakwater to the shore, and he could soon tell what she intended to do. He hastened down the railroad to settle this point. In the furious breeze that was blowing, the Goldwing seemed to leap over the water. If she intended to go up to the wharf from which she had started, she would have to tack in a moment.

Pearl ran with all his might; for it occurred to him that if he could induce Dory to come on shore and go up to the hotel with him, he might save the ten dollars he had agreed to give the captain and engineer, and contrive some way to have it stick in his own pocket. The Goldwing ran within a hundred feet of the shore, and Pearl got behind a car on a side track to ascertain what she intended to do.

Gradually her main sheet was let off, and the Goldwing was headed to the southward. This settled the matter. The boat was not going back to the wharf. Her skipper had evidently run her over in that direction in order to get her under the lee of the shore, where she would not get the full force of the wind.

"Hallo! on board of the Goldwing!" shouted Pearl, as he ran to the water's edge, yelling as loud as he could.

"On shore!" replied Dory, "what do you want?"

"You are wanted at the hotel," replied Pearl.

Dory discovered by this time who it was that hailed him; and he took no further notice of Pearl, who hastened to the wharf.