Part 43 (1/2)
”Have I been ill long?”
”Yes--very long.”
”What's the matter?”
”Concussion of the brain, pneumonia and shock. You are much better now, but you mustn't talk so much or you may have a relapse.”
He asked no more, but pa.s.sed his hand over his brow in a bewildered sort of way. Presently, he began again:
”Does my wife come to see me?”
The nurse stopped in her work and looked at him curiously. In surprise, she exclaimed:
”Your wife! Have you a wife?”
It was his turn now to be surprised. In somewhat peevish tone he said:
”Of course I've a wife--everyone knows that.”
”What's her name?”
”Helen--Helen Traynor.” Enthusiastically, he added: ”Oh, you'd just love my wife if you only knew her. She's the sweetest, the most unselfish----”
The nurse looked at him curiously.
”So your name is Traynor, is it? We've tried to find out for a long time. But there were no marks on your clothes when you were picked up.
We did not know who you were and so have not been able to communicate with any of your friends. We guessed you were a man of social position by your hands and teeth, and we knew your name began with a T because of the monogram on the signet ring on your finger.”
”Pick me up?” he echoed. ”Where did they pick me up? What has happened? Was it an accident?”
”You were found unconscious, drifting in the ocean, clinging to a spar, and were brought here by a sailing vessel. You had a fracture of the skull and you were half drowned. It is supposed that you were one of the pa.s.sengers of the _Abyssinia_, which took fire and went down two days after leaving Cape Town, but as several pa.s.sengers and officers whose bodies were never found also had names beginning with T, it was impossible to identify you.”
As he listened, the vacant, stupid expression on his face gradually gave place to a more alert, intelligent look. Indistinctly, vaguely, he recalled things that had happened. Slowly his brain cells began to work.
He remembered cabling to Helen from Cape Town telling her of his sailing on the _Abyssinia_. He recalled the incidents of the first day at sea. The weather was beautiful. Everything pointed to a good voyage. Who was traveling with him? He could not remember. Oh, yes, now he knew. Francois, his valet, and that other queer fellow he had picked up at the diamond mines--his twin brother. Yes, it all came back to him now.
Why had he gone to the diamond mines? Yes, now he knew--to take back to New York the two big stones found on the Company's land. He had them safe in a belt he wore round his waist next to his skin. The second night out he went to bed about midnight and was fast asleep when suddenly he heard shouts of ”Fire! Fire!” Jumping up and looking out of his cabin he saw stewards and pa.s.sengers running excitedly about.
There was a reddish glare and a suffocating smell of smoke. Quickly he buckled on the belt with the diamonds, and, slipping on his trousers, went out. The electric lights had gone out. The s.h.i.+p was in complete darkness. From all sides came shouts of men and screams of frightened women. It was a scene of utter demoralization and horror. He was groping his way along the narrow pa.s.sage, when, suddenly, out of the gloom a man sprang upon him, and, taken entirely by surprise, he was borne to the deck before he had time to defend himself. He could not see the man's face and thought it was one of the pa.s.sengers or sailors who had gone mad, but when he felt a tug at his belt where the diamonds were, he knew he had to do with a thief. He fought back with all his strength, but he was unarmed, while the stranger had a black jack which he used unmercifully, raining fearful blows on his head. The struggle was too unequal to last. Weak from loss of blood, he relaxed his grip, and the thief, dealing one fearful parting blow, tore away the belt and disappeared. His life blood was flowing away, he felt sick and dizzy, but just as the thief turned to run he managed to get a glimpse of his face. Now he remembered that face--it was the face of his twin brother--the man he had rescued from starvation on the _veldt_.
Yes, it all came back to him now, like a horrible nightmare. What had happened since then? How could he tell, since all this time his mind had been a blank? Helen, no doubt, believed him dead. Mr. Parker and all the others thought he had gone down with the s.h.i.+p. But what of his valet, Francois, and his cowardly, murderous brother--were they saved?
If so, the thief had the diamonds, and had probably disposed of them by this time. Perhaps there might still be time to capture the would-be a.s.sa.s.sin and save the gems for the Americo-African Company. Brother or no brother, he would have no more pity on the unnatural, miserable cutthroat. The first step was to let his friends know where he was.
He must telegraph at once to Helen.
Yet, on second thought, it would not be wise to do that. If Helen really believed him dead and was now mourning his loss, it might be almost a fatal shock if suddenly she were to receive a telegram saying he was alive. Such shocks have been known to kill people. A better plan would be to get well as soon as possible, leave the hospital, and go to New York. Once there, he could go quietly to his office and learn how matters were.
The days pa.s.sed, the convalescent making speedy progress toward recovery, and in a few weeks more he was able to leave the hospital.
Making himself known quietly to a San Francis...o...b..siness acquaintance, he was quickly supplied with funds and immediately he turned his face homeward.
The long, overland journey was tedious and exhausting, especially in his present weakened condition, and even those who knew him well would hardly have recognized in the pale emaciated looking stranger with ill fitting clothes and untrimmed full growth of beard who emerged from the train at the Grand Central Station, the carefully dressed, well groomed Kenneth Traynor who, only a few months before, had sailed away from New York on the _Mauretania_.