The Green Mummy

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But in De Gayangos he found a foeman worthy of his steel.

"I think not," said Don Pedro quietly, and facing the
pseudo-American bravely. "I never forget faces, and yours is a
noticeable one. When you first spoke I fancied that I remembered
your voice. All that business with the chair was to get close to
you, so that I could see the scar on your right temple. It is
still there, I notice. Also, I dropped my cigarette case and
forced you to pick it up, so that, when you stretched your arm, I
might see what mark was on your left wrist. It is a serpent
encircling the sun, which Lola Farjados induced you to have
tattooed when you were in Lima thirty years ago. Your eyes are
blue and full of light, and as you were twenty when I knew you,
the lapse of years has made you fifty--your present age."

"Shucks!" said Hervey coolly, and sat down to smoke.

Don Pedro turned to Archie and Braddock.

"Mr. Hope! Professor!" he remarked, "if you remember the
description I gave of Gustav Vasa, I appeal to you to see if it
does not exactly fit this man?"

"It does," said Archie unhesitatingly, "although I cannot see
the tattooed left wrist to which you refer."

Hervey, still smoking, made no offer to show the symbol, but
Braddock unexpectedly came to the assistance of Don Pedro.

"The man is Vasa right enough," he remarked abruptly. "Whether
he is Swedish or American I cannot say. But he is the same man I
met when I was in Lima thirty years ago, after the war."

Hervey slowly turned his blue eyes on the scientist with a
twinkle in their depths.

"So you recognized me?" he observed, with his Yankee drawl.

"I recognized you at the moment I hired you to take The Diver to
Malta to bring back that mummy," retorted Braddock, "but it
didn't suit my book to let on. Didn't you recognize me?"

"Wal, no," said Hervey, his drawl more pronounced than ever. "I
haven't got the memory for faces that you and the Don here seem
to possess. Huh!" He wheeled his chair and faced Braddock
squarely. "I'd have thought you wiser not to back up the Don,
sir."

Braddock's little eyes sparkled.

"I am not afraid of you," said he with great contempt. "I never
did anything for which you could get money out of me for, Captain
Hervey or Gustav Vasa, or whatever your name might be."

"You were always a mighty spry man," assented the skipper coolly,
"but spry men, I take it, make mistakes from being too almighty
smart."

Braddock shrugged his shoulders, and Don Pedro intervened.

"This is all beside the point," he remarked angrily. "Captain
Hervey, do you deny that you are Gustav Vasa in the face of this
evidence?"

Hervey drew up the left sleeve of his reefer jacket, and showed
on his bared wrist the symbol of the sun and the encircling
serpent.

"Is that enough?" he drawled, "or do you want to look at this?"
and he turned his head to reveal his scarred right temple.

"Then you admit that you are Vasa?"

"Wal," drawled the captain again, "that's one of my names, I
guess, though I haven't used it since I traded that blamed mummy
in Paris, thirty years ago. There's nothing like owning up."

"Are you not Swedish?" asked Lucy timidly.

"I am a citizen of the world, I guess," replied Hervey with great
politeness for him, "and America suits me for headquarters as
well as any other nation. I might be Swedish or Danish or a Dago
for choice. Vasa may be my name, or Hervey, or anything you
like. But I guess I'm a man all through."

"And a thief!" cried Don Pedro, who had resumed his seat, but
was keeping quiet with difficulty.

"Not of those emeralds," rejoined the skipper coolly: "Lord, to
think of the chance I missed! Thirty years ago I could have
looted them, and again the other day. But I never knew--I never
knew," cried Hervey regretfully, with his vividly blue eyes on
the mummy. "I could jes' kick myself, gentlemen, when I think of
the miss."

"Then you didn't steal the manuscript along with the emeralds?"

"Wal, I did," cried Hervey, turning to Archie, who had spoken,
"but it was in a furren lingo, to which I didn't catch on. If
I'd known I'd have learned about those blamed emeralds."

"What did you do with the copy of the manuscript you stole?"
asked Don Pedro sharply. "I know there was a copy, as my father
told me so. I have the original myself, but the transcript--and
not a translation, as I fancied--appeared in Sir Frank Random's
room to-day, hidden behind some books."

Hervey made no move, but smoked steadily, with his eyes on the
carpet. However, Archie, who was observing keenly, saw that he
was more startled than he would admit. The explanation had taken
him by surprise.

"Explain!" cried the Peruvian sharply.

Hervey looked up and fixed a pair of very evil eyes on the Don.

"See here," he remarked, "if the lady wasn't present, I'd show
you that I take no orders from any yellow--that is, from any
low-down Don."

"Lucy, my dear, leave us," said Braddock, rising, much excited;
"we must have this matter sifted to the bottom, and if Hervey can
explain better in your absence, I think you should go."

Although Miss Kendal was very anxious to hear all that was to be
heard, she saw the advisability of taking this advice, especially
as Hope gave her arm a meaning nudge.

"I'll go," she said meekly, and was escorted by her lover to the
door. There she paused. "Tell me all that takes place," she
whispered, and when Archie nodded, she vanished promptly. The
young man closed the door and returned to his seat in time to
hear Don Pedro reiterate his request for an explanation.

"And 'spose I can't oblige," said the skipper, now more at his
ease since the lady was out of the room.

"Then I shall have you arrested," was the quick reply.

"For what?"

"For the theft of my mummy."

Hervey laughed raucously.

"I guess the law can't worry me about that after thirty years,
and in a low-down country like Peru. Your Government has shifted
fifty times since I looted the corpse."

This was quite true, and there was absolutely no chance of the
skipper being brought to book. Don Pedro looked rather
disconsolate, and his gaze dropped under the glare of Hervey's
eyes, which seemed unfair, seeing that the Don was as good as the
captain was evil.

"You can't expect me to condone the theft," he muttered.

"I reckon I don't expect anything," retorted Hervey coolly "I
looted the corpse, I don't deny, and--"

"After my father had treated you like a son," said Don Pedro
bitterly. "You were homeless and friendless, and my father took
you in, only to find that you robbed him of his most precious
possession."

The skipper had the grace to blush, and shifted uneasily in his
chair.

"You can't say truer than that," he grumbled, averting his eyes.
"I guess I'm a bad lot all through. But a friend of mine wanted
the corpse, and offered me a heap of dollars to see the business
through."

"Do you mean to say that some one asked you to steal it?"

"No," put in Braddock unexpectedly, "for I was the friend."

"You!" Don Pedro swung round in great astonishment, but the
Professor faced him with all the consciousness of innocence.

"Yes," he remarked quietly, "as I told you, I was in Peru thirty
years ago. I was then hunting for specimens of Inca mummies.
Vasa--this man now called Hervey--told me that he could obtain
a splendid specimen of a mummy, and I arranged to give him one
hundred pounds to procure what I wanted. But I swear to you, De
Gayangos," continued the little man earnestly, "that I did not
know he proposed to steal the mummy from you."

"You knew it was the green mummy?" asked Don Pedro sharply.

"No, I only knew that it was a mummy."

"Did Vasa get it for you?"

"I guess not," said the gentleman who confessed to that name.
"The Professor went to Cuzco and got into trouble--"

"I was carried off to the mountains by some Indians,"
interpolated the Professor, "and only escaped after a year's
captivity. I did not mind that, as it gave me the opportunity of
studying a decaying civilization. But when I returned a free man
to Lima, I found that Vasa had left the country with the mummy."

"That's so," assented Hervey, waving his hand. "I got a berth as
second mate on a wind-jammer sailing to Europe, and as the
country wasn't healthy for me since I'd looted the green mummy, I
took it abroad and yanked it to Paris, where I sold it for a
couple of hundred pounds. With that, I changed my name and had a
high old time. I never heard of the blamed thing again until the
Professor here turned up with Mr. Bolton at Pierside, asking me
to bring it in The Diver from Malta. It was what you'd call a
coincidence, I reckon," added Hervey lazily; "but I did cry
small when I heard the Professor here had paid nine hundred for a
thing I'd let slip for two hundred. Had I known of those
infernal emeralds, I'd have ripped open the case on board and
would have recouped myself. But I knew nothing, and Bolton never
told me."

"How could he," asked Braddock quietly, "when he did not know
that any jewels were buried with the dead? I did not know
either. And I have explained why I wanted the mummy. But it
never struck me until I hear what you say now, that this mummy,"
he nodded towards the green case, "was the one which you had
stolen at Lima from De Gayangos. But you must do me the justice,
Captain Hervey, to tell Don Pedro that I never countenanced the
theft."

"No! you were square enough, I guess. The sin is on my own
blessed shoulders, and I don't ask it to be shifted."

"What did you do with the copy of the manuscript?" asked Don
Pedro.

Hervey ruminated.

"I can't think," he mused. "I found a screed of Latin along with
the mummy, when I looted it from your Lima house, but it dropped
out of my mind as to what became of it. Maybe I passed it along
to the Paris man, and he sold it along with the corpse to the
Maltese gent."

"But I tell you this copy was found in Sir Frank's room,"
insisted De Gayangos. "How did it come to be there?"

Captain Hervey rose and took a turn up and down the room. When
Cockatoo came in his way he calmly kicked him aside.

"What do you think, Mr. Hope?" he asked, coming to a full stop
before Archie, while Cockatoo crept away with a very dark scowl.

"I don't know what to think," replied that young gentleman
promptly, "save that Sir Frank is my very good friend, and that I
take his word that he knows nothing of how the manuscript came to
be hidden in his bookcase."

"Huh!" said Hervey scornfully, and took another turn up and down
the room in silence. "I surmise that your friend isn't a white
man."

Hope leaped to his feet.

"That's a lie," he said distinctly.

"I'd have shot you for that down Chili way," snapped the skipper.

"Possibly," retorted the artist dryly, "but I happen to be handy
with my revolver also. I say again that you lie. Random is not
the man to commit so foul a crime."

"Then how did the manuscript get into his room?" questioned
Hervey.

"He is trying to learn, and, when he does, will come here to let
us all know, Captain Hervey. But I ask you on what grounds you
accuse him? Oh I know all you said to-day," added Hope
scornfully, waving his hand; "but you can't prove that Random got
the manuscript."

"If it's in his room, as you acknowledge, I can," said Hervey,
speaking in a much more cultivated tone. "See here. As I said
before, that copy must have been passed along with the corpse to
the Maltese man. Well, then, the Professor here bought the
corpse, and with it the manuscript."

"No," contradicted the little man, prodigiously excited. "Bolton
wrote to me full particulars of the mummy, but said nothing about
any manuscript."

"Well, he wouldn't," replied Hervey calmly, "seeing that he'd
know Latin."

"He did know Latin," admitted Braddock uneasily; "I taught him
myself. But do you mean to say that he got that manuscript and
read it and intended to keep the fact of the emeralds secret?"

Hervey nodded three times, and twisted his cheroot in his mouth.

"How else can you figure the business out?" he demanded quietly,
and with his eyes fixed on the excited Professor. "Bolton must
have got that manuscript, as I can't remember what I did with it,
save pass it along with the corpse. He--as you admit--doesn't
tell you about it when he writes. Well, then, I reckon he
calculated getting this corpse to England, and intended to steal
the emeralds when safely ashore."

"But he could have done that on the boat," said Archie quickly.

"I guess not, with me about," said Hervey coolly. "I'd have
spotted his game and would have howled for shares."

"You dare to say that?" demanded De Gayangos fiercely.

"Keep your hair on. I dare to say anything that comes up my
darned back, you bet. I'm not going to knuckle down to a
yellow-stomach--"

Out flew Don Pedro's long arm, and Hervey slammed against the
wall. He slipped his hand around to his hip pocket with an ugly
smile, but before he could use the revolver he produced, Hope
dashed up his arm, and the ball went through the ceiling.
"Lucy!" cried the young man, knowing that the drawing-room was
overhead, and in a moment was out of the door, racing up the
stairs at top speed. Some sense of shame seemed to overpower
Hervey as he thought that he might have shot the girl, and he
replaced the revolver in his pocket with a shrug.

"I climb down and apologize," he said to Don Pedro, who bowed
gravely.

"Hang you, sir; you might have shot my daughter," cried Braddock.
"The drawing-room, where she is sitting, is right overhead, and-"

As he spoke the door opened, and Lucy came in on Archie's arm.
She was pale with fright, but had sustained no damage. It seemed
that the revolver bullet had passed through the floor some
distance away from where she was sitting.

"I offer my humble apologies, miss," said the cowed Hervey.

"I'll break your neck, you ruffian!" growled Hope, who looked,
and was, dangerous. "How dare you shoot here and--"

"It's all right," interposed Lucy, not wishing for further
trouble. "I am all safe. But I shall remain here for the rest
of your interview, Captain Hervey, as I am sure you will not
shoot again in the presence of a lady."

"No, miss," muttered the captain, and when again invited by the
angry Professor to speak, resumed his discourse in low tones.
"Wal, as I was saying," he remarked, sitting down with a dogged
look, "Bolton intended to clear with the emeralds, but I guess
Sir Frank got ahead of him and packed him in that blamed case,
while he annexed the emeralds. He then took the manuscript,
which he looted from Bolton's corpse, and hid it among his books,
as you say, while he left the blamed mummy in the garden of the
old lady you talked about. I guess that's what I say."

"It's all theory," said Don Pedro in vexed tones.

"And there isn't a word of truth in it," said Lucy indignantly,
standing up for Frank Random.

"It ain't for me to contradict you, miss," said Hervey, who was
still humble, "but I ask you, if what I say ain't true, how did
that copy of the manuscript come to be in that aristocrat's
room?"

There was no reply made to this, and although every one present,
save Hervey, believed in Random's innocence, no one could
explain. The reply came after some further conversation, by the
appearance of the soldier himself in mess kit. He walked
unexpectedly into the room with Donna Inez on his arm, and at
once apologized to De Gayangos.

"I called to see you at the inn, sir," he said, "and as you were
not there, I brought your daughter along with me to explain about
the manuscript."

"Ah, yes. We talk of that now. How did it come into your room,
sir?"

Random pointed to Hervey.

"That rascal placed it there," he said firmly.

CHAPTER XX

THE LETTER

At this second insult Archie quite expected to see the skipper
again draw his revolver and shoot. He therefore jumped up
rapidly to once more avert disaster. But perhaps the fiery
American was awed by the presence of a second lady--since men of
the adventurous type are often shy when the fair sex is at hand--
for he meekly sat where he was and did not even contradict. Don
Pedro shook hands with Sir Frank, and then Hervey smiled blandly.

"I see you don't believe in my theory," said he scoffingly.

"What theory is that?" asked Random hastily.

"Hervey declares that you murdered Bolton, stole the manuscript
from him, and concealed it in your room," said Archie succinctly.

"I can't suggest any other reason for its presence in the room,"
observed the American with a grim smile. "If I'm wrong, perhaps
this almighty aristocrat will correct me."

Random was about to do so, and with some pardonable heat, when he
was anticipated by Donna Inez. It has been mentioned before that
this young lady was of the silent order. Usually she simply
ornamented any company in which she found herself without
troubling to entertain with her tongue. But the accusation
against the baronet, whom she apparently loved, changed her into
a voluble virago. Brushing aside the little Professor, who stood
in her way, she launched herself forward and spoke at length.
Hervey, cowering in the chair, thus met with an antagonist
against whom he had no armor. He could not use force; she
dominated him with her eye and when he ventured to open his mouth
his few feeble words were speedily drowned by the torrent of
speech which flowed from the lips of the Peruvian lady. Every
one was as astonished by this outburst as though a dog had
spoken. That the hitherto silent Donna Inez de Gayangos should
speak thus freely and with such power was quite as great a
miracle.

"You--are a dog and a liar," said Donna Inez with great
distinctness, and speaking English excellently. "What you say
against Sir Frank is madness and foolish talk. In Genoa my
father did not speak of the manuscript, nor did I, who tell you
this. How, then, could Sir Frank kill this poor man, when he had
no reason to slay him--"

"For the emeralds," faltered Hervey weakly.

"For the emeralds!" echoed the lady scornfully. "Sir Frank is
rich. He does not need to steal to have much money. He is a
gentleman, who does not murder, as you have done."

Hervey started to his feet, dismayed but defiant, and saw that he
was ringed with unfriendly faces.

"As I have done. Why, I am--"

Donna Inez interrupted.

"You are a murderer. I truly believe that you--yes, that you"
she pointed a scornful finger at him "killed this poor man who
was bringing the mummy to the Professor. If you were in my own
country, I should have you lashed like the dog you are. Pig of a
Yankee, vile scum of the--"

"That will do, Inez," said De Gayangos imperiously. "We wish to
make this gentleman tell the truth, and this is not the way to go
about the matter."

"Gentleman," echoed the angry Peruvian, "he is none. Truth!
There is no truth in him, the pig of pigs!" and then, her English
failing, she took refuge in Spanish, which is a fairly
comprehensive language for swearing in a polite way. The words
fairly poured from her mouth, and she looked as fierce as
Bellona, the goddess of war.

Archie, listening to her words and watching her beautiful face
distorted out of all loveliness, secretly congratulated himself
upon the fact that he was not her prospective bridegroom. He
wondered how Sir Frank, who was a mild, good-tempered man
himself, could dare to make such a fiery female Lady Random.

Perhaps the young man thought himself that she was going a trifle
too far, for he touched her nervously on the arm. At once the
anger of Donna Inez died down, and she submitted to be led to a
chair, whispering as she went, "It was for your sake, my angel,
that I was angry," she said, and then relapsed into silence,
watching all future proceedings with flashing eyes but compressed
mouth.

"Wal," muttered Hervey with his invariable drawl, "now that the
lady has eased her mind, I should like to know why this
aristocrat says I placed that manuscript in his room."

"You shall know, and at once," said Random promptly. "Did you
not call to see me a day or so ago?"

"I did, sir. I wished to tell you what I had discovered, so that
you might pay me to shut my mouth if you felt so inclined. I
asked where your room was, sir, and walked right in, since your
flunky was not at the door."

"Quite so. You were in my room for a few minutes--"

"Say five," interpolated the American imperturbably.

"And then came down. You met my servant, who told you that I
would not be back for five or six hours."

"That's just as you state, sir. I was sorry to miss you, but, my
time being valuable, I had to get back to Pierside. Failing you,
I later came to see the Professor here, and told him what I had
discovered."

"You merely discovered a mare's nest," said Random
contemptuously; "but this is not the point. I believe that you,
and you only, could have hidden that manuscript among my books,
intending that it should be discovered, so that I might be
implicated in this crime."

"Did your flunky tell you that much?" inquired Hervey coolly.

"My servant told me nothing, save that you had been in my room,
where you had no right to be."

"Then," said the American quietly and decisively, "I can't see,
sir, how you can place the ticket on me."

"You accuse me, so why should I not accuse you?" retorted Random.

"Because you are guilty, and I ain't," snapped the American.

"You join issue: you join issue," murmured Braddock, rubbing his
hands.

Random took no notice of the interruption.

"I have heard from Mr. Hope and Professor Braddock of the grounds
upon which you base your accusation, and I have explained to them
how I came to be on board your ship and both in and out of the
Sailor's Rest."

"And the explanation is quite satisfactory," said Hope smartly.

"I agree," Donna Inez nodded with very bright eyes. "Sir Frank
has explained to me also. He knew nothing of the manuscript."

"And you, sir," said Don Pedro quietly to Captain Hervey,
"apparently did, since you stole it along with the mummy from
Lima."

"I confess the theft, but I didn't know what the manuscript
contained," said the skipper dryly, "or I reckon you wouldn't
have to ask who stole the emeralds. No, sir, I should have
looted them."

"I believe you did, and murdered Bolton," cried Random hotly.

"Shucks!" retorted Hervey, rising with a shrug, "if I had wished
to get rid of Bolton, I'd have yanked him overboard and then
would have written `accident' in my blamed log-book."

Braddock looked at Don Pedro, and Archie at Sir Frank. What the
skipper said was plausible enough. No man would have been such a
fool as to have murdered Bolton ashore, when he could have done
so without suspicion on board the tramp. Moreover, Hervey spoke
with genuine regret, since he had missed the emeralds and
assuredly would not have hesitated to steal them even at the cost
of Bolton's life, had he known of their whereabouts. So far he
had made a good defense, and, seeing the impression produced, he
strolled to the door. There he halted.

"If you gents want to lynch me," he said leisurely, "I'll be
found at the Sailor's Rest for the next week. Then I'm going as
skipper of The Firefly steamer, Port o' London, to Algiers. You
can send the sheriff along whenever you choose. But I mean to
have my picnic first, and to-morrow I'm going to Inspector Date
with my yarn. Then I guess that almighty aristocrat wilt find
himself in quod."

"Wait a moment," cried Braddock, running to the door. "Let me
talk to you and arrange what is best to be done. If you will--"

He proceeded no further, for without vouchsafing him a reply,
Hervey, now quite master of the situation, passed through the
door, and the Professor hastily followed him. Those who remained
looked at one another, scarcely knowing what to say, or how to
act.

"They will arrest thee, my angel," cried Donna Inez, clasping
Random's arm.

"Let them," retorted the young man defiantly. "They can prove
nothing. With all my heart and soul I believe Hervey to be the
guilty person. Hope, what do you say?--and you, Miss Kendal?"

"Hervey has certainly made an excellent defense," said Archie
cautiously. "He wouldn't have been such a fool as to murder
Bolton ashore when he could have done it so easily when on the
narrow seas."

"I agree with you there," said Random quickly. "But if he is
innocent; if he did not bring the manuscript into my room, who
did?"

"I wonder if Widow Anne herself is guilty?" said Lucy in a musing
tone.

All present turned and looked at the girl.

"Who is Widow Anne?" asked Don Pedro with a puzzled air,

"She is the mother of Sidney Bolton, the man who was murdered,"
said Hope quickly. "My dear Lucy, why do you say that?"

Lucy paused before replying and then answered the question by
asking another one.

"Did you ask Sidney to get you some clothes from his mother to
clothe a model?"

"Never in my life," said Hope promptly, and, as Lucy, saw, truly.

"Well, I accidentally met Mrs. Bolton to-day, and she insisted
that her son had borrowed from her a dark shawl and a dark dress
for you."

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