CHAPTER XXXI
MOON BLINDNESS
"No need to shave this off now."
Gerald was standing next morning in front of his dressing-glass, andreferred to his pointed beard.
He had intended shaving as a disguise in case of any bother with the nowdead dentist. He had not seen what could arise--what the dentist woulddare to do--but the detective's failure to go back for his prisonerwould naturally excite suspicion in the dentist's breast.
Now--well, that breast was cold.
"There is no doubt," thought Gerald, "the doctor and the dentist betweenthem did for Josh Todd. Both are now done for. So far as Josh Todd'smurder is concerned, that is avenged. A restoration of the money"--hehad the bank notes in front of him as he spoke--"to its rightful ownerwill end the whole thing.
"And," he thought, with a smile of pleasure playing round his mouth, "itwill end up like a story too, with a marriage with Tessie--and, pleaseGod, a live happy ever after."
He inserted the notes in an envelope. Then in another, and another, andultimately in a piece of brown paper, which he tied round with twine.
He went to the head of the stairs, and called out to the landlady, wouldshe lend him a needle and cotton?
The maid of all work came up with it, and Gerald set about using thesame.
He took off his coat and waistcoat, and ripped the lining of the latterfrom the cloth; pushing the envelope of money up, he sewed the liningdown again.
"That's on my left side," said Gerald, "over the heart. I put thatwaistcoat on now"--he did so--"and it shall never leave me till I handthe money over to old Depew. I'll sleep in that waistcoat, and never,night or day, shall it be out of my touch."
He looked up the trains and boat sailings, booked his passage, andarranged to step on board a liner the next day on his way to America--onhis way to the girl he loved.
The next day he settled with his landlady. Then he took an omnibus toEuston, sitting on the top of it with his bag on his knees, for hisexchequer was running low, and it did not admit of cab hire. By tram hewent to the dock, and stepped aboard the vessel which was to bear him tothe land of the free.
He had gone to the expense in town of booking both berths in his secondclass cabin. It left him almost without a pound in his pocket, but hehad too much in value about him to run any risk.
He had provided against any tampering with the bolts or locks of hiscabin door by purchasing one of the bell door alarms which fix into thefloor, and at the slightest pressure of the door rings a loud alarm.
He did not fear for a moment that any attempt to rob him would be made;he simply took no risks.
Traveling second class, no one would suppose him in possession ofnineteen thousand pounds, and as he had made up his mind that thepackage should never leave his breast, he felt quite safe.
On board the boat, after she sailed, he kept very much to his cabin. Hedid not make many acquaintances. He occasionally chatted and smoked witha poor looking, club-footed old man, who was a fellow-passenger.
He was moved to this by the extreme sensitiveness of the man; indeed, aveiled pity prompted him to take notice of the only creature on the shipwho seemed to be without an acquaintance.
He was surprised when he found from conversation what a mine ofinformation he had struck; that his companion was a well-informed,educated, and apparently wealthy man.
"Yes," the other said, "I suppose you are surprised to find me travelingsecond class. I am extremely sensitive. I know with this hideousdeformity, a hump back and a club foot, that people talk of me inpitying tones behind my back.
"I don't want their pity," he continued fiercely; "I only want to be letalone, unnoticed. With you, it is different. You are the only man onthis ship who looks at me without conveying an impression that you wouldlike to pat me on the back and say, 'Poor old fellow.' Damn their pity!"
Gerald laughed heartily. The man was speaking the truth, he knew.
His almost toothless gums caused chin and nose to come together in amanner strikingly suggestive of Punch, and he spoke with a squeak.
His nose even was deformed, and a swelling on one side of it below thebridge added to the curious appearance of the face. A bald head, with afringe round it of snow white hair, completed the grotesqueness.
In the more crowded second class cabin, the man escaped notice betterthan he would have done in the saloon.
So it came about that during the voyage Gerald and the club-footedhunchback passed many hours together.
Gerald learned much, for there was scarcely a subject on which hiscompanion was not well posted.
The nights were particularly pleasant, for the moon was at the full,and, well wrapped up, they usually spent the after dinner time on deck,while the majority of the passengers were more sociably engaged in theway of games or music.
At one meal the subject of moon blindness had cropped up, and manycurious anecdotes were told anent it--anecdotes more or less truthful,after the manner of shipboard stories.
Afterwards, on deck, Gerald's companion continued the conversation. Attable he rarely spoke. He said:
"It is quite true. Moon blindness is a terrible thing. The great reliefabout it is the knowledge that the sight comes back.
"I remember, many years ago, abroad, being foolish enough to insist onsleeping on an open deck. It was, of course, terribly hot weather, oreven I--young as I was then--should never have been so foolish. I lay onmy back on the deck--on the back is the only comfortable way in which tolie on a hard couch, by the by--and when I woke I could not see my handbefore me.
"Fright! God bless me! I believe I went mad."
"Enough to make you."
"The captain reassured me by laughing at me. It seemed a cruel thing todo, but I have since thought it saved me from going mad. I have alwaysfeared blindness so--I have always had weak eyes."
"I notice that you are never without colored glasses."
"That is so. I cannot see a yard away without them.
"Well, on this occasion of which I am speaking, there was no ship'sdoctor aboard. The captain gave me an ointment to use which he told mewould restore my sight in five or six days."
"Did it?"
"In that time my sight became as good as ever it was. As to theointment--well, the captain afterwards told me that was a mere trick.That nothing but time cured moon blindness, and that he had given me thefat as an ointment merely to keep me busy."
"Smart."
"Yes. There was another effect it had on a fellow-passenger--who sleptas I had slept. He got up from the deck, felt his way to his berth, andlay there unconscious for nearly a day and a half.
"When he recovered, he had not the faintest recollection of even lyingdown on the deck, and was amazed to find himself in his clothes in hisbunk."
"Curious."
"So I thought. Don't light your pipe--try one of these cigars. They arefrom a box I have just opened. I want your opinion of them."
"Thanks--want the light?"
"No, I won't smoke any more to-night. I think"--a yawn--"I'll be gettingto bed. Good-night."
"Good-night. I shan't turn in just yet; as I've lighted this cigar, I'llsmoke it out."
"Give me your opinion of it in the morning. Good-night."
"Good-night."
Gerald sat on in the moonlight smoking, and when in the morning he foundhimself in his berth with his clothes on, he thought of the story of themoon struck man, thought he had been affected in the same way, and wasthankful that he had awakened at his regular hour with nothing worsethan a headache.
He determined never to go to sleep on deck again while the moon wasshining.