Part 2

"Yes, sir, I did see a big foreigner go on board at the last minute," said the policeman of whom Burton inquired ten minutes later. "He was carrying a small brown leather hand-bag. I took particular note of him, because he blowed like a grampus, and took off his hat to wipe his head, he was that hot."

"Was he bald?"

"As bald as the palm of your hand. A friend of yours, sir?"

"No," said Burton emphatically. "He's got away with a secret worth thousands of pounds--millions perhaps, to a foreign navy."

The policeman whistled.

IV

Burton stood looking at the diminishing form of the steamboat. The constable touched his sleeve.

"You see that gentleman there, sir?" he said.

Following his glance, Burton saw a slim youthful figure, clad in a light tweed suit and a soft hat, leaning over the rail.

"Well?" he asked.

The constable murmured a name honoured at Scotland Yard.

"Put the case to him, sir," he added; "he can see through most brick walls." Burton hastened to the side of the detective.

"A man on that boat has stolen the secret of the new explosive for the British Navy," he said without preamble. "Can you stop him?"

The detective turned his keen eyes on his questioner and looked hard at him for a moment or two.

"Tell me all about it, sir," he said.

Burton hurriedly related all that had happened. "A cable to Ostend would be enough, wouldn't it?" he asked in conclusion.

"I'm afraid it would hardly do, sir," replied the detective. "Your description is too vague. Tall man about forty, bald, with a hand-bag--there may be dozens on the boat. It would be too risky. We have to be careful. I saw a notorious diamond thief go on board, but I couldn't arrest him, not having a warrant, and nothing certain to go upon. You had better go to the police station, tell the superintendent all you know, and leave him to communicate with the Belgian police in due course."

"And give the thief time to get rid of the stuff! If it once passes from his hands the secret will be lost to us, and any foreign Power may be able to fill its shells with Dr. Micklewright's explosive. It's too bad!"

He looked with bitter disappointment at the steamer, now a mere speck on the surface of the sea. Suddenly he had an idea.

"If I got to Ostend first," he said, "I could have the man arrested as he lands?"

The detective smiled.

"I don't think the Belgian police would make an arrest on the strength of your story, sir," he said. "Why, you can't even be sure your man is aboard. Arresting the wrong party might be precious awkward for you and everybody."

"I'll risk that," cried Burton. "It's my funeral, any way."

"That little machine of yours is safe, I suppose, sir? It won't come down and bury you at sea?"

"No fear!" said Burton with a smile. "Still, in case of accidents, here's my card. All I ask is, don't give anything away to newspaper men for a couple of days, at any rate. It's to a newspaper man we owe the whole botheration."

"All right, sir; I'll give you a couple of days. I wish you luck."

Burton hurried to one of the small boats lying for hire alongside the pier, and was put on board his own vessel. He started the motor, but in his haste he failed to pull the lever with just that knack that jerks the floats from the surface. At the second attempt he succeeded, and the water-plane rose into the air as smoothly as a gull. The steamer was now out of sight, but he had a general idea of her direction, and hoped by rising to a good altitude soon to get a glimpse of her. The wind had freshened, and time being of the utmost importance, Burton congratulated himself on the possession of a Clift compass, by means of which he could allow for drift, and avoid fatal error in setting his course. The steamer had nearly an hour's start, but as he travelled at least twice as fast, he expected to overhaul her in about an hour if he did not mistake her direction.

His mind was busy as he flew. He had to admit the force of what the detective had said. It would almost certainly be difficult to induce the Belgian police to act on such slight information as he could give them; and in the bustle of landing, the criminal, of whose identity he could not be sure, might easily get away. Burton was beginning to feel that he had started on a wild-goose chase when, catching sight of the smoke of the vessel some miles ahead, he suddenly, without conscious reasoning, determined on his line of action. Such flashes sometimes occur at critical moments.

Waiting for a few minutes to make sure that the distant vessel was that in which he was interested, he bore away to the east, instead of following directly the track of the steamer. It was scarcely probable that the flying-boat had already been noticed from the deck. He described a half-circle of many miles, so calculated that when he approached the vessel it was from the east, at an angle with her course.

He was still at a considerable height, and as he passed over the vessel his view of the deck was obscured by the cloud of black smoke from her funnels. In a few seconds he wheeled as if to return on his track; but soon after recrossing the steamer he wheeled again, and making a steep volplane, alighted on the sea about half a mile ahead. Then with his handkerchief he began to make signals of distress. There was a considerable swell on the surface, and it might well have seemed to those on board the steamer who did not distinguish the flying-boat from an aeroplane that the frail vessel was in imminent danger.

The steamer's helm was instantly ported; she slowed down and was soon alongside. A rope was let down by which Burton swung himself to the deck; and while he struggled through the crowd of excited passengers who clustered about him, the flying-boat was hoisted by a derrick, and the vessel resumed its course.

Burton made his way to the bridge to interview the captain.

"I'm very much obliged to you, sir," he said. "And I'm very sorry to have delayed you. My engine stopped."

"So did mine," returned the captain, with a rather grim look about the mouth, "or rather, I stopped them." Burton did not feel called upon to explain that his stoppage also had been voluntary. "And I shall have to push them to make up for the twenty minutes we have lost. You would not have drowned; I see your machine floats; but you might have drifted for days if I hadn't picked you up."

"It was very good of you," said Burton, feeling sorry at having had to practise a deception. "It's my first voyage across Channel. I started from Folkestone; better luck next time. I must pay my passage, captain."

"Certainly not," said the captain. "I won't take money from a gallant airman in distress. I have a great admiration for airmen; they run double risks. I wouldn't trust myself in an aeroplane on any account whatever."

Burton remained for some minutes chatting with the captain, then descended to the deck in search of his quarry, to be at once surrounded by a group of first-class passengers, who plied him with eager questions about his starting-point, his destination, and the nature of the accident that had brought him down. He answered them somewhat abstractedly, so preoccupied was he with his quest. His eyes roamed around, and presently he felt an electric thrill as he caught sight, on the edge of the crowd, of a tall portly figure that corresponded, he thought, to Micklewright's brief description. The man had a round red face, with a thick stiff moustache upturned at the ends. His prominent blue eyes were fixed intently on Burton. He wore a soft hat, and Burton, while replying to a lady who wanted to know whether air-flight made one sea-sick, was all the time wondering if the head under the hat was bald.

Disengaging himself by and by from those immediately around him, he edged his way towards this stalwart passenger. It gave him another thrill to see that the man held a small brown leather hand-bag. He felt that he was "getting warm." No other passenger carried luggage; this bag must surely contain something precious or its owner would have set it down. Burton determined to get into conversation with him, though he felt much embarrassed as to how to begin. The blue eyes were scanning him curiously.

"I congratulate you, sir," said the foreigner in English, politely lifting his hat. Burton almost jumped when he saw that the uncovered crown was hairless.

"Thank you, sir," he replied, in some confusion. "It was lucky I caught the boat."

As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he thought, "What an idiotic thing to say!" and his cheeks grew red.

"Zat ze boat caught you, you vould say?" said the foreigner, smiling. "But your vessel is a hydro-aeroplane, I zink so? Zere vas no danger zat you sink?"

"Well, I don't know. With a swell on, like this, it wouldn't be any safer than a cock-boat; and in any case, it wouldn't be too pleasant to drift about, perhaps for days, without food."

"Zat is quite right; ven ze sea is choppy, you feed ze fishes; ven it is calm, you have no chops. Ha! ha! zat is quite right. You do not understand ze choke?" he added, seeing that Burton did not smile.

"Oh yes! yes!" cried Burton, making an effort. "You speak English well, sir."

"Zank you, yes. I have practised a lot. I ask questions--yes, and ven zey ask you chust now vat accident bring you down, I do not quite understand all about it."

"It was quite an ordinary thing," said Burton, rather uncomfortably. The explanation he had given to the questioners was vague; he was loth to tell a deliberate lie. "Do you know anything about petrol engines, sir?"

"Oh yes, certainly. I ride on a motor-bicycle. One has often trouble viz ze compression."

"That's true," said Burton, feeling "warmer" than ever. The foreigner was evidently quite unsuspicious, or he would not have mentioned the motor-cycle. "We have excellent roads in England," he added, with a fishing intention.

"Zat is quite right; but zey are perhaps not so good as our roads in France, eh?"

"Your roads are magnificent, it's true; still--what do you say to the Dover Road?"

"Ah! Ze Dover Road; yes, it is very good, ever since ze Roman times, eh? Yes; I have travelled often on ze Dover Road, from Dover to Chatham, and vice versa. Viz zis bag!"

Burton looked hard at the bag. He wished it would open. One peep, he was sure, would be enough to convict this amiable Frenchman.

"I have somezink in zis bag," the Frenchman went on in a confidential tone--"somezink great, somezink magnificent,--_eclatant_ as we say; somezink vat make a noise in ze vorld."

He tapped the bag affectionately. Burton tingled; he would have liked to take the man by the throat and denounce him as a scoundrel. But perhaps if he were patient the confiding foreigner would open the bag.

"Indeed!" he said.

"Yes; a noise zat shall make ze hair stand on end. Ha! ha! Ah! you English. You are ze great inventors. Your Sims, your Edvards, your Rowland--ah! zey are great, zey are honoured by all ze crowned heads in ze vorld. Zat is quite right! I tell you! ... No; it is late. You shall be in Ostend, sir?"

"Yes."

"Zen you shall see, you shall hear, vat a great sensation I shall make. Now it gets dark; if you shall pardon me, I vill take a little sleep until ve arrive. Zen!..."

He lifted his hat again, and withdrew to a deck chair, where he propped the bag carefully under his head and was soon asleep.

V

Burton strolled up and down the deck, impatient for the boat to make the port. He was convinced: the man was French; he was tall, urbane, and bald; he rode a motor-cycle; he knew the Dover Road; he guarded his bag as something precious, and it contained something that was going to make a noise in the world. What so likely to do that as Micklewright's explosive!

One thing puzzled Burton; the man's allusion to English inventors--Sims, Edwards, Rowland--who were they? Burton subscribed to a good many scientific magazines, and kept closely in touch with recent inventions; but he did not recall any of these names. It flashed upon him that the Frenchman, rendered suspicious by his fishing questions, had mentioned the names as a blind; he had spoken of Sims, Edwards and Rowland when his mind was really full of Micklewright.

"If that's your game, it won't wash," he thought.

He determined, as soon as the vessel reached port, to hurry ashore, interview the Customs officers, and warn them in general terms of the dangerous nature of what the Frenchman carried. If only the bag had been opened and its contents revealed, he would not have hesitated to inform the captain, and have the villain detained. But the Customs officers, primed with his information, would insist on opening the bag, and then!--yes, there would undoubtedly be "a noise in the world," when it became known that so audacious a scheme had been detected and foiled.

The sun went down, the steamer plugged her way onward, and through the darkness the lamps of Ostend by and by gleamed faintly in the distance. Burton made his way to the bridge again, and asked the captain to allow the flying-boat to remain on the vessel till the morning; then he returned to the deck, and leant on the rail near the gangway.

All was bustle as the steamer drew near to the harbour. The passengers collected their belongings, and congregated. Some spoke to Burton; he hardly heeded them. He had his eye on the Frenchman, still slumbering peacefully.

The bells clanged; the vessel slowed; a rope was thrown to the pier; and two of the sailors stood ready to launch the gangway as soon as the boat came to rest. The moment it clattered on to the planks of the pier Burton was across, and hurried to the shed where the Customs officers, like spiders in wait for unwary flies, were lined up behind their counter, cool, keen, alert. He accosted the chief douanier, described the Frenchman in a few rapid sentences, suggested that the brown bag would repay examination, and receiving assurance that the proper inquiries should be made, posted himself outside at the corner of the shed in the dark, to watch the scene.

The passengers came by one by one, and answering the formal question, had their luggage franked by the mystic chalk mark and passed on. Burton's pulse throbbed as he saw the tall Frenchman come briskly into the light of the lamps.

"Here he is!" whispered the officers one to another.

"Have you anything to declare, monsieur?" asked one of them, with formal courtesy.

"No, no, monsieur," replied the man; "you see I have only a hand-bag."

He laid it on the counter to be chalked.

"Be so good as to open the bag, monsieur," said the officer.

The Frenchman stared; the passengers behind him pricked up their ears as he began to expostulate in a torrent of French too rapid for Burton to follow. The officer shrugged, and firmly repeated his demand. Still loudly protesting, the Frenchman drew a bunch of keys from his pocket, selected one, and with a gesture of despair laid open the bag to the officer's inspection.

Burton drew a little nearer and watched feverishly. The officer put his hand into the bag, and drew forth a bundle of what appeared to be striped wool. Exclaiming at its weight, he laid it on the counter, and began to unroll it. His colleagues smiled as he held aloft the pantaloons of a suit of pyjamas. He threw them down, and took up the object round which the garment had been wrapped. It was a large glass bottle, filled with a viscid yellowish liquid, and bearing a label.

"Voila!" shouted its owner. "Je vous l'avais bien dit."

The officer took up the bottle, eyeing it suspiciously. He examined the label; he took out the stopper and sniffed, then held the bottle to the noses of his colleagues, who sniffed in turn.

"It will not explode?" he said to the Frenchman.

"Explode!" snorted the man scornfully. "It is harmless; it is perfect; it contains no petroleum; look, there is the warranty on the label. Bah!"

He struck a match and held it to the mouth of the open bottle, which the officer extended at arm's length. The flame flickered and went out.

"Voila!" said the Frenchman with a triumphant snort.

Then fumbling in his pocket he drew out a sheaf of flimsy papers. One of these he handed to the officer, who glanced at it, smiled, said, "Ah! oui! oui!" and replacing the stopper, rolled the bottle in the pyjamas again.

"But it is not yet certain," he exclaimed. "Monsieur will permit me."

He plunged his hand again into the bag, whose owner made a comical gesture of outraged modesty as the officer brought out, first the companion jacket of the pantaloons, then a somewhat ancient tooth-brush. He rummaged further, turned the bag upside down. It contained nothing else.

"A thousand excuses, monsieur," he said, replacing the articles, and chalking the bag.

"Ah! It is your duty," said the passenger magnanimously. "Good-night, monsieur."

Catching sight of Burton as he was passing on, he stopped.

"Ah! my friend, here you are," he said. "I give you vun of my announce. It has ze address. I see you to-morrow? Zat is quite right!"

Then he lifted his hat and went his way.

Burton thrust the slip of paper into his pocket without looking at it. He felt horribly disconcerted. The fluid in the bottle was certainly not Micklewright's explosive; that was a crystalline solid. He had made an egregious mistake. It was more than disappointing; it was humiliating. He had been engaged in a wild-goose chase indeed. His stratagem was wasted; his suspicions were unfounded; his deductions utterly fallacious. While he was dogging this innocent Frenchman, the real villain was no doubt on the other side of the sea, waiting for the night boat from Dover or perhaps Newhaven. He had made a fool of himself.

Despondent and irritated, he was about to find his way to the nearest hotel for the night, when he suddenly noticed a second portly figure approaching the shed among the file of passengers. The man was hatless; he was bald; he carried a brown leather hand-bag. His collar was limp; his face was clammy, and of that pallid greenish hue which betokens beyond possibility of doubt a severe attack of sea-sickness.

At the first glance Burton started; at the second he flushed; then, on the impulse of the moment, he sprang forward, and reaching the side of the flabby passenger at the moment when he placed his bag upon the counter, he laid his hand upon it, and cried--

"My bag, monsieur!"

The bald-headed passenger glanced round in mere amazement, clutching his bag.

"Excuse me, monsieur," he said quietly, "it is mine."

The Customs officer looked from one to the other: the pallid foreigner, limp and nerveless; the ruddy Englishman, eager, strenuous and determined.

"Ah! You gave me the warning. You were mistaken," he said to Burton. "The other bag contained only pyjamas, a bottle, and a toothbrush; nothing harmful. Monsieur is too full of zeal; he may be mistaken again. He accuses this gentleman of stealing his bag? Well, that is a matter for the police. I will do my duty, then you can find a policeman. Have you anything to declare?" he concluded in his official tone.

"Nothing," said the foreigner.

"A thousand cigarettes!" cried Burton at the same moment.

Each had still a hand on the bag. At Burton's words the passenger gave him a startled glance, and Burton knew by the mingled wonder and terror in his eyes that this time he had made no mistake.

"Comment! A thousand cigarettes!" repeated the officer. "Messieurs must permit me to open the bag."

He drew it from their grasp. It opened merely by a catch. The officer peeped inside, and shot a questioning look at Burton, who bent over, and at a single glance recognised the small yellowish crystals.

"That's it!" he cried in excitement.

"Monsieur will perhaps explain," said the officer to the owner of the bag, who appeared to have become quite apathetic. "There are no cigarettes; no; but what is this substance? Is it on the Customs schedule? No. Very well, I must impound it for inquiry."

The man, almost in collapse from weakness, began to mumble something. The officer's remark about impounding the stuff disturbed Burton. If it got into expert hands Micklewright's secret would be discovered.

Acting on a sudden inspiration, he took a cigarette from his case, and struck a match.

"Eh, monsieur, it is forbidden to smoke," cried the officer sternly.

At the same time he nodded his head towards the placard "_Defense de fumer_" affixed to the wall.

"Ah! Pardon! Forbidden! So it is," said Burton, who was shading the lighted match within his rounded palm from the wind. He made as if to throw it away, but with a dexterous cast dropped it flaming into the open bag. Instantly there was a puff and whizz, and a column of thick suffocating smoke spurted up to the roof. The officer started back with an execration. A lady shrieked; others of the passengers took to their heels. The air was full of pungent fumes and lurid exclamations, and in the confusion the owner of the bag quietly slipped away into the darkness. Burton stood his ground. His task was done. Every particle of Micklewright's explosive that had left the shores of England was dissipated in gas. The secret was saved.

Choking and spluttering the officer dashed forward, shaking his fist in Burton's face, mingling terms of Gallic abuse with explosive cries for the police. A gendarme came up.

"I give him in charge," shouted the officer, with gesticulations. "It is forbidden to smoke; see, the place is full of smoke! The other man; where is he? It is a conspiracy. They are anarchists. Arrest the villain!"

"Monsieur will please come with me," said the gendarme, touching Burton on the sleeve.

"All right," said Burton cheerfully. "I can smoke as we go along?"

"It is not forbidden to smoke in the streets," replied the gendarme gravely.

And with one hand on the prisoner's arm, the other carrying the empty bag, he set off towards the town.

VI

Two evenings later, Burton descended on the creek in the Luddenham Marshes, and hastened with lightsome step to Micklewright's laboratory. It was the time of day when Micklewright usually ceased work and went home to his dinner.

"Still at it!" thought Burton, as he saw that the laboratory door was open.

He went on quickly and looked in. Micklewright was bending over his bench in his customary attitude of complete absorption.

"Time for dinner, old man," said Burton, entering.

"Hullo! That you! Come and look at this."

"Upon my word, that's a cool greeting after I've been braving no end of dangers for your sake."

"What's that you say? Look at this, Teddy; isn't it magnificent!"

Burton looked into the bowl held up for his inspection, and saw nothing but a dirty-looking mixture that smelt rather badly.

"You see, it's like this," said Micklewright, and went on to describe in the utmost technical detail the experiment upon which he had been engaged. Burton listened with resignation; he knew by experience that it saved time to let his friend have his talk out.

"Magnificent! I take your word for it," he said, when Micklewright had finished his description. "But look here, old man, doesn't it occur to you to wonder where I've been?"

"Why should it?" asked Micklewright in unaffected surprise. He looked puzzled when Burton laughed; then remembrance dawned in his eyes. "Of course; I recollect now. You went after those foreigners. I had almost forgotten them."

"Forgotten the beggars who had stolen your secret?" cried Burton.