CHAPTER XXXIV

Patrick Sheridan had a disquieting fear of this Court of Enquiry ever since he first heard that it was about to be held, and that he himself would be required to be present at it, and give evidence.

"Ye never can tell," his anxiety prompts him to reflect, "what may slip from your tongue without thinking, the way they bother you with their cunning questions till ye're in the divil's own danger of letting fall the truth whether ye will or no! 'Tis the mean, underhand way to treat a man! What chance does it give him to keep cool, and tell lies with an honest face?"

He resents the prospect of this unfair treatment very bitterly.

One hope alone buoys him up--that the girls will not be present to contradict his story, and so spoil his chances of deceiving the court. Alone, he should not find this task a very difficult one; he only has to repeat the story he has already told and refrain as far as possible from overloading it with details which may not bear investigation. And so far as he knows, there is not likely to be any doubt cast upon his narrative by the officers of the court.

So far as he knows! His anxiety would be considerably greater than it already is if he only knew how far his story has been brought into suspicion even before he has told it!

The first blow to his sense of security is when he enters the court-room and perceives Norah and Netta seated opposite to him. A flush of fear and anger wells up over his dark visage--anger, because he thinks that this secretary-fellow has betrayed him by failing to deliver his letter to Norah telling her not to appear at the court, nor to allow Netta to come. A dirty trick! If a man cannot trust another to perform an important errand like this, what is there left in the world of honour and loyalty, and the obligations of duty between gentlemen, and what faith can any longer be placed in human nature?

Yes, the girls are here, worse luck, so there can be no doubt that his note was never delivered!

One does not like to imagine how deeply wounded would be Patrick's sense of outraged honour, if only he knew that his letter had indeed been delivered, but had first been opened and read clandestinely! His hopes for the future of humanity would probably have dwindled into utter despair!

Up to the moment of his entering the room Patrick has felt, on the whole, that matters have gone fairly well, and he has every cause for self-congratulation: with any luck, he and the girls should be able to get away from this vicinity very soon, perhaps this same afternoon, and hide themselves in some place where they can pursue their plans for another attempt of the same sort.

But, next time, the plans will have to be laid very much more carefully, he can see that! A first experiment always reveals many little details that have been overlooked in spite of the belief that every care has been taken; another time, the experience gained in this first endeavour will teach many a useful lesson.

Still, however faulty the first plan may have been, there is this to be said--that the _Marathon_ has undoubtedly been blown up, and now lies where Patrick would like to have the remainder of the British Navy lie, at the bottom of the sea. The news of it was not long in reaching his ears; scarcely had he been an hour on board the Depôt ship when he heard of it, and he had great difficulty at the time in checking the grin of delight that involuntarily expressed his real feelings; once he had obtained the mastery over his features it was an easier matter to frame the suitable words to signify his horror and grief at the dreadful catastrophe.

Patrick Sheridan does not present a very attractive appearance as he glares around the room where the court is assembled. His face is livid and his eyes are bloodshot. The hours he has been spending alone shut up in his almost hermetically-sealed cabin have not tended to give him a healthy look; and the continual whisky-drinking in which those hours have been mostly spent has added the last touch to the brutalising of a face already darkened and distorted by the evil workings of his mind added to the natural moroseness of his disposition.

He throws a look of anger and contempt at Norah, who meets his glance fearlessly; another glare of still more bitter hatred he turns upon the secretary.

A chair is brought for him, and he is politely requested to be seated. The admiral greets him with a courteous, if somewhat cool, good-morning.

Such politeness is in itself quite enough to arouse Sheridan's suspicions. He does not like the look of things at all; this behaviour savours too much of the unnatural kindness which gaolers show to a man about to be executed, when there is no point of denying a little to one who is shortly going to lose all.

This very uncomfortable sensation is not without its effect upon Patrick's excited mind. He ignores the steps taken for his personal comfort, waving angrily aside the man who has politely brought a chair for him, and shouting to the court at large:

"I protest against this unwarrantable treatment! I'd have ye to understand that I consider ye a set of bullyin' tyrants, iv'ry wan o' ye! Haven't I already given ye all the information within my power about the shipwreck? An' for why have I been kept shut up in a room by myself, and then brought here like a prisoner in a dock? I protest against it, I say!"

This fellow doth protest too much, thinks Dimsdale; but he discreetly keeps his thoughts to himself, and attempts no interference with the routine of the enquiry.

"I am very sorry indeed if you have been put to any annoyance or inconvenience," says the suave voice of the admiral; "and I hope you will quite understand that the only object in requesting you to be present here this morning is that we may obtain your kind assistance in our attempts to clear up the mystery of the _Marathon_. We shall not keep you very long, if you will be good enough to answer a few questions which I wish to put to you."

Patrick is to a certain extent soothed by this friendly speech. He begins to realise, too, that he has made a mistake in openly showing his suspicious fears. So, endeavouring to rectify this initial error, he replies:

"I'll answer anything ye like to ask--though, mind you, I still consider you are treating me very unhandsomely."

"I wish for nothing better than to be able to make you an apology, presently, Mr. Sheridan. It is only fair to tell you, to begin with, that a very extraordinary charge has been made here in this court against yourself and the two ladies of your party--no less than a charge of conspiracy to destroy one of His Majesty's ships of war. In other words, to put the matter plainly, one of the _Marathon's_ officers has stated that you all contrived to get taken on board for this exact purpose; and one of the young ladies, at any rate, makes no attempt to deny the story, but as a matter of fact confesses the truth of it."

Patrick has managed with the utmost difficulty to keep his features under control during this speech of the president; fortunately for him, his general expression is so malevolent that a slight additional shade of angry terror makes scarcely any perceptible difference.

"How can ye give heed to such crazy fancies, sir?" he asks with assumed nonchalance--"sure, the terrible experience they have been through has turned their brains! Ye haven't brought me here, I trust, to question me on such fool's talk as this?"

He speaks in an assured tone of half angry, half amused, contempt; hoping by sheer audacity to avoid this terribly dangerous pitfall which has yawned before his feet. And succeeds better than he has dared to hope, not knowing how well his words attune with the sentiments of the court.

"Exactly," says the president; "our sincere hope--and I think I may say, our expectation--is, that it may prove to be, as you say, an invention of overheated imaginations; and in that case, we shall be very ready to make allowance for the very natural mental distress resulting from all these shocking events."

Sheridan nods in acquiescence, thinking it best to say as little as possible and hoping devoutly that the incident may be regarded as closed.

And in fact the president goes on to talk of other matters.

"Now, the first question I wish to put to you is--did you sail from Galveston, Texas, in the S.S. _Botopi_?"

"I did." This is fairly safe ground, and Patrick feels very little anxiety in replying to questions of this nature; he has already told the same story in other ears, and is well up in all its details; they won't catch him out here!

"And were these young ladies in your company?"

"They were."

"What relation are they to yourself?"

"One of them is my sister--or to be more correct, my half-sister; and the other is my cousin."

"Had you been long in America before you came across in the _Botopi_?"

"We had been settled there for about three years."

"Then there is no truth whatever in the statement made to this court by an officer now present, that you did not really come from America at all?"

"No truth whatever. I cannot imagine how such an idea can have entered the mind of anyone. I have letters on me to prove that I was in Texas up to the time of the _Botopi's_ sailing, and can give you as many references as you require, in America, testifying to my living there for three years previously."

All of which is perfectly true. Patrick has taken these obvious precautions, and is well supplied with witnesses and testimony of all kinds.

"And you say that your steamer was torpedoed and sunk in the early morning of the day before yesterday by a German submarine?"

"She was that."

"Do you happen to have a passenger-list with you?"

"No. I had one, as all the saloon passengers did, but we were obliged to leave in such a divil of a hurry that I left all my papers behind with the rest of my gear. Everything is lost now, of course."

The court accepts without question this most natural explanation. Dimsdale is alone in noting that it was a little inconsistent of the man to have the forethought to bring along with him letters by which he might be identified.

"But," remarks the president, "I must inform you that the _Botopi's_ agents in Galveston have been cabled, and have replied that your names were not in the passenger-list."

"That, sir, is easily explained," Sheridan replies. "We did not decide to leave until the last minute, when all the berths were taken. Fortunately three of the intending passengers cancelled their departure, and I was able to buy from them the berths which were booked in their names."

"H'm! And what were the names of these people, Mr. Sheridan? Can you remember?"

"Indeed, then, I can. They were a maiden lady, a Miss Pearson, and two brothers by the name of Newman."

"I suppose there is no means of verifying this statement, since you do not happen to possess a passenger-list?"

The secretary comes to the rescue here. "The Company have sent another cable since the first one, sir," he informs the admiral, "giving a complete list of the _Botopi's_ passengers."

"Good! Have you got it here?"

"Yes, sir."

"And do you find any mention in it of these names which Mr. Sheridan has quoted?"

The secretary runs rapidly through the list, consulting a cablegram which he has picked from the pile of papers on the table before him.

"Miss Pearson--yes, that name's here; and--what did you say were the other names, Mr. Sheridan?"

"Newman. There were two of them, brothers, and they were to have shared the same cabin, the cabin which the girls afterwards had."

"Mr. James Newman; Mr. Robert Newman," reads the secretary from his list. "Yes, they are both mentioned."

"Really, Admiral, if you will permit me to say one word," breaks in once more the protesting voice of Mrs. Shaw. "It seems very ridiculous to go on with these absurd and unnecessary enquiries. Mr. Sheridan's explanation is obviously true, and you can go into the matter of his proofs any time you wish. And by that time, I hope, these young people's nerves will have got a little stronger, and they will have forgotten all their bad dreams."

"I am more than half inclined to think you are right, Mrs. Shaw."

"Of course I am right! Am I ever anything else?"

"In this present instance at any rate I must admit I think you have been right all along. Of course, if it had not been for that very important evidence about the _Marathon's_ defective ammunition, we might have been obliged to admit our inability to assign a reasonable cause for the disaster. As for this other matter, I think we have all of us come to the same conclusion. I shall of course have to ask you, Mr. Sheridan, for those proofs of your statements which you say you possess or can procure, and I have little doubt that they will prove satisfactory. For the present, we can consider this enquiry closed."

There is a sigh of relief throughout the room--and a most heartfelt one from Patrick Sheridan. And all of those present make their preparations for leaving--when they are interrupted by the sharply insistent voice of the secretary:

"One moment, sir, if you please!"

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