Phantom Wires: A Novel

by Arthur Stringer

  CHAPTER XV

  WIRELESS MESSAGES

  "What are we to do?" asked Frances Durkin, turning from the masthead toher husband's studious face.

  "We've got to jump at our chance, and get on board the _Slavonia_ overthere!"

  "In the face of those messages?"

  "It's the messages that simplify things for us. All we now have to dois to get on board in such a manner that the ship's officers will haveno suspicions. They mustn't dream of linking us with the runawaycouple who are being looked for. That means that we must not, in thefirst place, appear together, and, in the second, of course, that wemust travel and appear as utter strangers!"

  "But supposing Keenan himself is on board that steamer?" parried Frank.

  "It is obvious that he isn't, for then it would be quite unnecessary tosend out any such messages by wireless."

  "But supposing it's Pobloff?"

  "Didn't you say that Pobloff would never follow us out of Europe?"

  "But even if it's Keenan?" she persisted.

  "Then you must remember that you are Miss Allen, at your old trade ofpicking up little art relics for wealthy families in England andAmerica. You will have yourself rowed directly over to the_Slavonia's_ landing ladder--you can see it there, not two hundred feetaway--and go on board and secure a stateroom from the purser. Theclearing papers can be attended to later. I'll have the _Laminian_dingey take me ashore, somewhere down near Barcola, if it can possiblybe done in this wind. Then I'll come out to the _Slavonia_ later,having, you see, just arrived on the train from Venice!"

  She shook her head doubtfully. An inapposite and irrational dread ofseeing him return to the dangers of land took possession of her. Sheknew it would be impossible for her to put this untimely feeling intowords, so that he would see and understand it; and, such being thecase, she argued with him stubbornly to alter his plan, and to allowher to be the one to go ashore, while he went immediately to the liner.

  He consented to this at last, a little reluctantly, but the thoughtthat he was safely installed in his cabin, as she made her wayshoreward through the dusk, in the pitching and dripping little dingey,consoled her for the sense of loneliness and desertion which herposition brought to her. The wind had increased, by this time, and therain was coming down in slanting and stinging sheets. But her spiritdid not fail her.

  From the water-front, deserted and rain-swept, she called a passingstreet carriage, and drove to the Hotel Bristol. There she sent thedriver to ask if any luggage had arrived from Venice for Miss Allen.None had arrived, and Miss Allen, naturally, appeared in greatperturbation before the sympathetic but helpless hotel manager. Shenext inquired if it was possible to ascertain when the Cunard steamersailed.

  "The _Slavonia_, madam, leaves the harbor at daybreak!"

  "At daybreak! Then I must go on board tonight, at once!"

  "I fear it is impossible, madam. The _bora_ is blowing, as you see,and the harbor is empty!"

  "But I _must_ get on board!" she cried, and this time her dismay anddespair were not mere dissimulation.

  The landlord shrugged his shoulders, while Frank, calling out aperemptory order, in Italian, to her driver, left him at the curblooking after her through the driving rain, in bewilderment.

  She went first to the steamship offices. They were closed. Then shesought out the Cunard tender--it was lightless and deserted. Then shehurried to the water-front, driving up and down along that lonelystretch of deserted quays, back and forth, coaxing, wheedling, tryingto bribe indifferent and placid-eyed boatmen to row her out to hersteamer. It was useless. It could not be done. It was not worthwhile to risk either their boats or their lives, even in the face ofthe fifty, one hundred, two hundred _lira_ which she flaunted in theirunperturbed faces.

  Grating and rocking against the quayside, above the heads of the groupabout her, she caught sight of a white-painted steam launch, with ahigh-standing bow, and on it a uniformed officer, smoking in the rain.

  She approached him without hesitation. Could he, in any way, carry herout to her steamer? She pointed to where the lights of the _Slavonia_shone and glimmered through the gray darkness. They lookedindescribably warm and homelike to her peering eyes.

  The officer looked her up and down in stolid Austrian amazement, tryingto catch a glimpse of her face through her wet and flattened travelingveil. Could he take her out to her steamer? No; he was afraid not.Yes, it was true he had steam up, and that his crew were aboard, butthis was the official patrol of the Captain of the Port--it was not tocarry passengers--it was solely for the imperial service of theAustrian Government.

  She pleaded with him, weeping. He was sorry, but the Captain of thePort would permit no such irregularity.

  "Where is the Captain of the Port, then?" she demanded.

  The officer puffed his cigar slowly, and looked her up and down oncemore. He was in his office in the Administration Building--but theofficer's shrug and smile told her that it was, in his eyes, no easything to secure admission to the Captain of the Port. The very phrase,"the Captain of the Port," that had been bandied back and forth for thelast few minutes, became odious to her; it seemed to designate thetitle of some august and supernatural and tyrannous power who held herlife and death in his hands.

  She turned on her heel and drove at once to the AdministrationBuilding. Here, at the entrance, she was confronted by a uniformedsentry, who, after questioning her, passed her on to still anotheruniformed personage, who called an orderly, and sent that somewhatbewildered messenger and his charge to the anteroom of the Captain ofthe Port's private secretary. Frank had a sense of hurrying down longand jail-like corridors, of ascending stairs and passing sentries, ofquestionings and consultations, of at last being ushered into asoftly-lighted, softly-carpeted room, where a white-bearded,benignant-browed official sat in a swivel-chair before a high walnutdesk.

  He shook his head mournfully as he listened to her story. But she didnot give up. She even amazed him a little by the sheer impetuosity ofher speech.

  "Is there much at stake, _signorina_?" he asked, at last, as she pausedfor breath.

  "_A man's soul is at stake_!" was the answering cry that rang throughthe quiet room.

  The Captain of the Port smiled a little cynically, scarcelyunderstanding.

  Yet something almost fatherly about his sad and wistful face steeledher to still further persistence, and she afterward remembered, alwaysa little shamefaced, that she had wept and clung to his arm and weptstill again, before she melted and bent him from his officialdetermination. She saw, through blurred and misty eyes, his hand goout and touch an electric button at his side. She saw him write threelines on a sheet of paper, an attendant appear, and heard an orderbriefly and succinctly given. She had gained her end.

  The Captain of the Port rose as she turned to go from the room.

  "Good night, and also good-bye, _signorina_!" he said quietly, with hisstately, old-world bow.

  She paused at the door, wordlessly demeaned, momentarily ashamed ofherself. She felt, in some way, how miserable and low and self-seekingshe stood beneath him, how high and firm he stood above her, with hiscalm and disinterested kindliness.

  She turned back to him once more.

  "Good-bye," she said inadequately, in her tearful and tremulouscontralto. "Good-bye, and thank you, again and again!"

  He bowed from where he stood in the center of his quiet and shelteredoffice, seeming, to her, a strangely old-time and courtly figure, aproud yet unpretentious student of life at peace with his own soul.The years would come and go, the years that would so age and wear andtorture _her_, but he would reign on in that quiet office unchanged,contented, still at peace with himself and all his world. "Good-bye,"she said for the third time, from the doorway.

  Then she hurried down to her waiting carriage and raced for the quay.There she took an almost malicious delight in the bustle andperturbation to which her return gave sudden rise. The sleepy andsullen crew were stirred out, sign
als were clanged, ropes were castoff; and down in her little narrow cabin, securely shut off from thedriving spray, she could feel and hear the boat lurch and pound throughthe waves. Then came shrill calls of the whistle above, the sound ofgruff voices, the rasp and scrape of heaving woodwork against woodwork,the grind of the ladder against the boat-fenders, the cry of theofficer telling her to hurry.

  She walked up the _Slavonia's_ ladder steadily, demurely, for under thelights of the promenade deck she could see the clustering, inquisitiveheads, where a dozen crowding passengers tried to ascertain just whocould be coming aboard with such ceremony.

  Leaning over the rail, with a cigar in his mouth, she caught sight ofher husband. As she passed him, at the head of the ladder, he spokeone short sentence to her, under his breath.

  It was a commonplace enough little sentence, but as the purport of itfiltered through her tired mind it stung her into both a new warinessof attitude and thought and a new gratefulness of heart.

  For as she passed him, without one betraying emotion or one glanceaside, he had whispered to her, under his breath:

  "_Keenan is here, on board. Be careful!_"