CHAPTER XXXV

All eyes are directed towards the secretary, and his attempt to prolong the enquiry is greeted with no very good humour. In fact, he has made himself suddenly very unpopular with his "one moment, sir, if you please"--which of course means a good many moments and a corresponding postponement of lunch.

Nor is this general feeling the only ground of resentment against him. The poor man is once more made to feel the lash of Mrs. Shaw's tongue.

"Oh, it is you again, Mr. Dimsdale?" she upbraids him--"are you not tired yet of bullying these poor creatures? It was your fault from the start, I remember, that they were ever brought here. A nice, manly action, is it not, to subject two poor sick girls to such treatment."

"I--I am very sorry, Mrs. Shaw, very sorry indeed," stammers the poor man. And indeed he speaks sincerely, since he has conceived something more than a liking for one of these two girls, both of whom he considers as victims rather than organisers of the diabolical plot; for he is thoroughly convinced--he is the only member amongst the whole court who is convinced--of the reality of the plot, and he not only knows it to be his duty to expose it, but feels that this is his only chance of so doing.

So he says, "I am very sorry, Mrs. Shaw. But I do not wish to question these ladies at all. It is Mr. Sheridan to whom I would like to address a few brief questions, with the permission of the President."

"Go on then, Dimsdale," grudgingly assents the admiral; "but be as quick as you can."

"I will, sir. In fact, if Mr. Sheridan can satisfy me on the very few points I wish to put to him, I shall not delay the court more than a very few minutes."

The man thus referred to looks darkly at the secretary, and a shade of perplexity creeps over his face. He was beginning to feel quite cheerful and almost to look so, at the happy turn which events were taking for him. But now the affair is apparently going to be re-opened--and Sheridan does not like it at all!

What fresh questions are going to be put to him? What details are there that he has not already supplied? _What new trap is now being laid to ensnare him?_

Yes, that last doubt really accounts for the sudden spasm of fear that clutches at his heart; there is a trap, he knows it, and it is going to be one which will take him all his wits to avoid.

How he hates the smooth-faced secretary with the piercing eyes! How he hates him, and--fears him!

Really, this will not do--this cold dread is making him feel quite unnerved; he must pull himself together, or else he will never be able to reply convincingly, and his hopeless condition will become evident to the whole court--almost sufficient of itself to condemn him in their eyes!

In the midst of his bewilderment the secretary's first question breaks in upon his ears through the buzzing, humming noise like the sound of many waters which has quite unaccountably been filling them these last few moments.

"Will you please tell me, Mr. Sheridan--what colour was the _Botopi_ painted?"

The blow has fallen!--oh, fool that he was, not to have thought of a thing like this before! How _could_ he have omitted to make certain of such a simple detail?

There is only one thing to do--to hazard a guess and hope that it may chance to be a lucky one.

Foolishly, he discounts his credibility by not answering boldly at once. Instead, he hesitates, and speaks only after a pause; this would be almost enough to make him appear to be guessing, even if he were really speaking from knowledge; but he is off his balance altogether.

"Black," he replies.

"Are you quite certain?"

The question is evidently intended to nail him down to his statement; but it suggests to him an opportunity for hedging a little.

"Yes," he replies, feeling his way as he speaks; "but it was an indistinct sort of black--it might have appeared a kind of grey in some lights; or even a very dark green."

"Thank you."

Dimsdale gives no indication whether he is satisfied with the reply or not. But at least it is something to the good that he does not deny its correctness. Perhaps it is correct, then! Sheridan begins to feel a little hope.

"And how many funnels had she?"

This second question comes without any comment on the former one. Sheridan feels himself on firmer ground here. Of all the passenger ships he has ever seen, and he has seen a good many in his time, the vast majority have had two funnels. Cargo tramps, of course, generally have one funnel only, and some of the gigantic liners have three or four; but the _Botopi_ was neither cargo-tramp nor first-class liner, and so he has much less hesitation than before in making his reply:

"Two."

"Quite sure?" says the persuasive voice of the secretary--"are you certain they didn't look as if they might be three, or even four, in some lights?"

This man is mocking him! With his smooth sarcastic tongue and his calm emotionless face he is simply playing with him!

"There were two, I'm after tellin' ye," suddenly growls the baited man.

"Thank you." Again the quiet and unquestioning acceptance of his reply. This time, however, Sheridan does not feel quite so happy about it; the absence of comment on Dimsdale's part has now become ominous rather than assuring.

A tense silence settles upon the room; everyone from the President of the court downwards looks expectantly towards the two men fencing with question and answer; it is somewhat brought home quite clearly to everyone that these two are fighting a duel to the death.

Netta looks on with grave anxiety and seems to have given away to utter despair, as if she knows that the catastrophe hanging over them cannot be warded off for long now. As for Norah, more than once she opens her lips to speak, and half rises from her chair; but Mrs. Shaw checks her by a motion of the hand--as though she too feels that the ring should be kept clear for the two antagonists.

Stapleton, who has sunk back apathetically in a seat on finding his revelation of a conspiracy dismissed with scant attention, now finds his interest fully re-awakened, and leans forward breathlessly so that not a word shall escape him.

The atmosphere is electric. Even the fleet surgeon who came with Stapleton and has been trying for the last quarter of an hour to induce his patient to return with him now desists from his well-intentioned efforts and rivets his gaze on the two antagonists as keenly as the rest.

Yet the secretary gives no indication of having any startling surprise in store, or of being in any way dissatisfied with the replies he has so far received. Each question, as soon as it is answered, he drops entirely and goes on to another subject.

For the third time he propounds one of his quite commonplace queries:

"During the voyage home, was the _Botopi_ stopped by any British man-of-war?"

This is rather an awkward poser for Sheridan; yet he must make some sort of reply. It occurs to him that perhaps his interrogator is merely bluffing and does not know the correct reply to his own question. In that case Sheridan need not care greatly what answer he gives. But suppose Dimsdale does know? Well, then he must hazard a Yes or No, and try to find some way of explaining his mistake if he happens by ill-luck to hit upon the wrong answer.

It is pretty certain, the wretched man reflects, that the ship was stopped. The cordon has been drawn so closely that very few Transatlantic vessels succeed in escaping the meshes of the net; and every steamer that is sighted, Sheridan knows, is stopped for examination.

So, after all, there is not such a very great risk about the reply. He makes up his mind to chance it.

"Yes," he says, "we were held up by a warship and afterwards allowed to proceed."

"How many days after you had left Galveston did this happen?"

What can the fellow be driving at? Well, no matter, this question is easier to evade than the previous one.

"I think it was either on the third or the fourth day out; but I am not quite certain about it; it took place with so very little delay and fuss that it made no very distinct impression upon my memory."

"Did this take place in the daytime or during the night?"

It will be much safer to say in the night; for then Sheridan will be spared from describing things that happened during his sleep.

"It was in the night," he therefore makes answer.

Once more the secretary drops the subject but this time he does not turn to a fresh one nor renew his questions. Instead he bends over his pile of documents, searching till he finds what he wants. Turning them rapidly over he at length picks out a paper from the heap, and spreads it on the table before him.

Then, turning to the President of the court he begins!

"Sir, it was not to be expected that Mr. Sheridan should be acquainted with the conditions under which the tenth Cruiser Squadron does its work, or else he might realise that now and then, very rarely, it is true, a vessel does succeed in getting through the patrol without being sighted. Now, this report,"--holding one of his papers up to view--"is one that was received by wireless on the very morning when the _Botopi_ was sunk; it reads as follows:

"'_S.S. Botopi, Galveston to Hull, sailed on the eighth instant, should be brought in for examination if met._'--which proves clearly enough that the vessel was _not_ met by any of our patrols up to that date. Yet Mr. Sheridan, who says he was a passenger in the _Botopi_, tells us that she was met and held up on the third or fourth day out, and that this happened during the night; he is quite clear about these facts."

"An' so we _were_ met an' stopped, as I'm tellin' ye," shouts Sheridan, who sees that his only chance is to brazen it out; "'tis all a big mistake somewhere--that report ye have in your hand, sir, is not correct at all!"

"Possibly," says the Secretary drily. "It may be, of course, that the patrol ship which Mr. Sheridan declares to have met the _Botopi_ had some accident to her wireless and consequently was unable to signal the report. But let that go----"

"Indeed you may well say that! An' let _me_ go too. Can ye not take the word of a gentleman but must throw doubts upon me statements? 'Tis time we put an end to this foolishness. Come, Netta, and Norah, too. We'll not be staying any longer!"

"Not so fast, Mr. Sheridan, please," quietly insists the secretary--"They say, sir," again addressing himself to the admiral, "that even the most cunning criminals invariably overlook some important details. In this present case it would have been as well for the success of the plot to have found out something about the general appearance of the _Botopi_."

"What d'ye mean," breaks in Sheridan, trying to shout the other man down now that he sees the trap closing; "I refuse to submit to this dirty sneaking cross-questioning! 'Tis a plot to desthroy me. Keep you silent now, ye low scoundrel!"

The secretary pays not the slightest attention to this outburst, but goes on in the same calm voice:

"The report I have just been quoting from, calling for the _Botopi_ to be brought in for examination, gives, as is the usual custom, a description of the general appearance of the vessel. And I may add, that I have this morning cabled to the agents in order to make certain that this description is correct.

"Mr. Sheridan has informed us that the steamer had two funnels also, that her hull was painted black--though he qualifies this statement to the extent of saying that she might possibly appear green or grey. But the Company's own account of the vessel states that she is a one-funnelled ship, and that she is painted in accordance with the request of Germany _in broad bands of red and white_.

"Now, I think it must now become clear to this court how utterably unreliable this man Sheridan's statements are; in fact, they are nothing but a tissue of lies from beginning to end. And it will be presently seen that he was not shipwrecked--that there was a very cunning and ingenious plot to blow up the _Marathon_--and that this fellow is at the bottom of it all!"

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