The Steel Horse/Chapter 5
CHAPTER V.
ROY IN TROUBLE.
YOU will remember that it was during the crush which occurred at the Academy of Music when the "gallery gods" came pouring down into the main hall from both sides, that Roy Sheldon became separated from his friends Joe and Arthur. While he was making his way slowly toward the door, he felt a hand laid upon his arm, and without turning his head to see who it was, supposing, of course, that one of his companions was close at his side, Roy took hold of the hand and drew it through his arm. When he reached the sidewalk he looked around to say something uncomplimentary regarding the rough fellow who had elbowed him rather too sharply in his haste to get out, and then he found that it was not a boy who had hold of him, but a man whom he had never seen before—a brown-whiskered man dressed in gray clothes. Thinking of the swindler whom he and his friends had encountered during the early part of the evening, Roy made an effort to twist himself out of the stranger's grasp, but found that he could not do it. The man had a grip like a vise.
"Softly, softly," said he, in a low tone. "The game's up, and you might as well give in. You know me, and you know, too, that I wouldn't see you harmed. The carriage is ready and waiting."
"I don't know you, either," said Roy, greatly astonished. "Let go my arm, or I'll black your eye for you."
"If you strike me," said the man, who seemed rather surprised at this display of spirit, "I shall have to put the irons on you right here, and you don't want to make a scene before all these people. It wouldn't look well for a young fellow of your standing."
Roy, too amazed to speak again, looked around for his friends; but they seemed to have disappeared very mysteriously. He was surrounded by strange people, the majority of whom seemed to be paying no sort of attention to him, while others looked on in wonder, and the rest laughed at him. An arrest in the crowded streets of New London was too common an occurrence to attract more than a passing notice.
All this while Roy was being led slowly but surely toward a carriage, whose door was held invitingly open by a rather genteel-looking man who carried a heavy cane in his hand. When Roy saw that preparations had been made to convey him away secretly, he recovered his power of action and the use of his tongue at the same instant. He resisted with all his strength, and finally appealed to a policeman who, for a wonder, chanced to appear at that opportune moment.
"What do you mean, anyway?" he exclaimed, giving his arm a sudden wrench, but with no other effect than to cause the man in gray to tighten his grasp until Roy could scarcely endure the pain. "Mr. Officer, do you see what this villain is doing? I ask you to interfere for my protection."
Roy, in his simplicity, supposed that the guardian of the city's peace would rush up and 
"I suppose it is all right, Bab?"
"Of course it is," replied the man in gray, "or I wouldn't be in it. I am too old a dog to bark up the wrong tree."
"It's all right, sonny," said the policeman, soothingly. "Go along quiet and peaceable and you won' t get into trouble with Bab. He'll take good care of you."
"But who is he, and by what authority does he commit this outrage?" demanded Roy, who was so angry and astonished that he hardly knew what he was saying.
But his indignant words met with no verbal response. The policeman, who, according to Roy's way of thinking, ought to have helped him, lent effective assistance to his assailant by taking the boy by the other arm and gently pushing him into the carriage. The minute the two men released their hold of him, Roy jumped for the other side of the vehicle, intending to open the door and take to his heels, but the man who carried the heavy cane was there before him.
"What's the use of cutting up like this?" said he, with a cunning smile that exasperated the prisoner to the highest degree. "One would think, from your actions, that you were going to prison, instead of to the pleasantest home that any boy of your size ever had. Why can't you stay there and be contented? There's many a youngster in this city who would be glad to be in your boots."
As the man said this he mounted to a seat on the box beside the driver, and at the same moment his companion, who had got into the carriage and closed the door behind him, seized Roy by the arm and drew him away from the window."
"Sit down and take it easy," said he, pleasantly. The game is up, as I told you, and you might as well give in and wait until you see another chance to run away."
"Run away!" repeated Roy. "Where from?"
"Oh, come now. What's the use of playing off in that way? I know it's quite a while since I saw you, but I knew you the minute I put eyes on you. That chap didn't fool you, did he?"
"What chap?"
"Why, the fellow who tried to play the pocket-book game on you and those two wheelmen you picked up somewhere."
"Did you see that operation?" exclaimed Roy, forgetting for the moment that he was being taken somewhere against his will, and that there might be disagreeable things in store for him.
"I saw it all. I followed you from the Lafayette House—say, Rowe, don't you think you were foolish to go to that hotel where all the wheelmen stop? That was the very first place I went to find you when Willis told me that you had skipped again. What made you go there?"
"Who is Willis?" asked Roy, in reply.
"Oh, get out!" exclaimed his companion, in a tone of disgust. "If you want me to talk to you, you must talk sense."
"Well, then, where are you going to take me?"
"That isn't sense, either, I might be liable to make a mistake, seeing it's two years and better since I last met you, but Willis ought to know you."
"Who does he think I am?"
"Oh, quit your nonsense. I am in no humor for foolishness. I was up all last night working on a case, and now I've got to stay up till I see you safe at home. I'm cross for want of rest."
"You don't talk as if you were cross," said Roy. "I'll stop bothering you if you will tell me who you are, who you think lam, and why you kidnapped me as you have done."
"Bless your heart, you won't bother me if you will only talk sense. I didn't kidnap you. I arrested you for a runaway, and there's my authority for doing it."
As the man said this he squared around on his seat, drew back the lappel of his coat, and the light of a street lamp, which streamed in through the window at that moment, fell full upon a detective's shield.
"My name is Babcock," he continued. "Of course you remember me now. Bab, you know; the same man who arrested you when you lit out two years ago. Bab, you recollect."
"Never heard your name before, and never saw you, till you bounced me back there in the hall," said Roy, who told himself that he was learning something every minute."
"Oh, come now," replied the detective, in an injured tone. "Everybody knows Bab."
"Everybody except me, perhaps. But you never arrested me for the simple reason that I never ran away from home. It's much too pleasant a place for me to leave voluntarily, I can tell you. It is plain enough to me that you have mistaken me for somebody else."
"But there's Willis," said the detective; and if Roy could have seen his face distinctly he would have had the satisfaction of knowing that he had aroused a train of disagreeable thoughts in that official's mind.
"Who's Willis?" asked Roy, again.
"Your uncle's superintendent; the man on top with the driver. He has known you all your life, and he says you are Rowe Shelly."
"Well, I am not. I am Roy Sheldon, and my home is in Mount Airy. If you don't want to take my word for it, tell your hackman to drive us to the Lafayette House. You will find a couple of my friends there, and in an hour I can bring a hundred more from among 'New London's best businessmen."
"If you have so many acquaintances in the city, why did you put up at a hotel? That statement will hardly wash."
"It's the truth whether it will wash or not," Roy insisted. "Having just so much time at our disposal, we made all our arrangements before we left home, and we didn't want our friends to interfere with our plans in any way. You may save yourself trouble by going to my hotel."
"No; I don't guess I would," replied the detective, with a yawn. "I'd a little rather trust Willis than you, for you know that you are full of tricks, and that you came within one of giving me the slip two years ago. Remember it, don't you?"
Roy replied that it had slipped his mind entirely, and then went back to the point from which he started, hoping that by setting out on a new tack he could induce the detective to tell him who Rowe Shelly was, where he lived, and why he had run away from home.
"If you are an officer, as you pretend to be, what is the reason you did not arrest that fellow when he was trying to play the pocket-book game on my friends and me?" said he. "You say you saw it all."
"And I say so yet; but I didn't want to have anything to do with him just then, for I had bigger game in sight. That was you, and I was afraid you would recognize me if I showed you my face. So I just nodded to the swindler to let him know that I was on to his little performance, pointed down the street, and he took the hint and cleared out."
"Oh, that's the reason he went off in such a hurry, was it?" exclaimed Roy. "We thought it was because he was afraid his game was about to be exposed. Now that I think of it, I believe I did see you standing near by, but your back was turned toward us."
"No doubt. And you saw me when I took you in at Peach Grove two years ago, didn't you? Come, now, be honest."
"I don't know where Peach Grove is, and I tell you I never saw you before to-night," replied Roy. "How far do you intend to take me in this close carriage?"
"Not much farther. We're most to the pier now."
"Then I've got to go the rest of the way by water, have I?" said Roy. "Why don't you let down the windows? It's suffocating in here."
"It's pretty warm, that's a fact," assented the detective, taking off his hat and drawing his handkerchief across his forehead. "You'd holler if I put the windows down."
"No, I wouldn't," protested the boy.
"And that wouldn't be pleasant; because it would attract attention," continued the detective. "You'd be sorry enough for it after you'd had time to cool off, and, besides, your uncle wouldn't like to have so much publicity given to this matter. He wants everything done on the quiet, and I promise you it shall be, if you will do just as I say."
"Who's my uncle?" asked Roy, believing that he had got upon the right track at last.
"Why, your uncle; Colonel Shelly; the man who owns the island where you live," answered the detective. And then, as if he was angry at himself for giving his questioner this much satisfaction, he added: "I declare, if Job was here in my place he'd lose patience and be tempted to shake you. But go on with your foolishness. I've got to keep awake somehow."
"Then let down the windows so that a fellow can breathe," said Roy, prompt to take advantage of this permission. "If I speak louder than my ordinary tone of voice it will not take you long to put them up again. There, now. That's better. You say you are going to take me to an island. Are there any people on it?"
"A dozen, or such a matter, I should say."
"Have they been long in Colonel Shelly's employ?"
"Some have been there always, and some ain't."
"That's all I want to know on that point," said Roy, who was greatly relieved. "Of course the minute those old-timers see me they will know that you have made a mistake."
"Of course, they won't know nothing of the kind," replied the detective, angrily. "They know, and so does everybody else, that Bab understands his business and is not in the habit of making mistakes. Don't you build any hopes on that."
"Colonel Shelly will know that I am not his nephew, won't he? I can at least build some hopes on that."
"He ain't at home, and you know it as well as I do. If he was, you and I wouldn't be here in this carriage. You waited until he went off somewhere on business, and then you skipped."
"Oh, that was the way of it. The colonel must be rich if he can afford to own a whole island so near a big city like New London, mustn't he?"
"Aw! Go on now," replied the detective. "He's awful rich, and so are you. At least you will be one of these days."
"That's news to me. I've seen the time when I thought I was well off if I had fifteen cents in my pocket. What's the matter?" inquired Roy, seeing that his companion was twisting uneasily about on his seat. "Don't I talk fast enough to keep you awake?"
"You make me tired," answered the detective. "But I'll tell you one thing, young man. If Willis has made a mistake and you are not Rowe Shelly, you're a trifle the coolest customer I have seen for many a day."
"I don't deny that I was frightened at first," said Roy, "but I don't feel at all uneasy now. Of course I know that you have made a mistake, for there's nothing that you or any one else can gain by running me off in this way."
"Well, look here," said the detective earnestly. "If there's been a blunder made, you mustn't blame me for it. Blame Willis."
"What's the name of the boy you took me for—Rowe Shelly? Do I look much like him?"
"That's another question that makes me tired," answered Babcock. "Look like him! You are him, otherwise you wouldn't be here."
"But I say I am Roy Sheldon and nobody else, as I can prove if you will give me a chance. When we get to some place where we can borrow a light, I want you to take a good look at my face. You never saw a boy who looked exactly like me, and I'll bet on it."
This was just what the detective had determined to do. The boy was altogether too much at his ease to suit him; he did not act at all as a disappointed runaway ought to act, and the fear that, for once, he had committed a blunder was almost enough to drive Babcock frantic. If he had made a prisoner of the wrong boy he could look for nothing but a prompt discharge from his employer, who would not be likely to recommend him to any other private detective bureau. But then he never would have made the arrest if Willis had not urged it, and repeatedly declared that he knew Rowe Shelly when he saw him, and that there was no chance for a mistake. And besides, there was the money that Rowe was said to have stolen from his guardian! To do the detective justice he did not believe that part of the story, but told himself that the superintendent had concocted it in order to make the case against the runaway as bad as it could be.
"I don't much like this private detective business, and never did," thought Babcock. "If there is a mean piece of work to be done, something so low down that the city officers won't touch it, we are called upon to do it. I'll have a good look at this boy's face as soon as we reach the pier, and if I am not entirely satisfied with what I see there, I'll wash my hands of the whole business, and leave Willis to take him to the island and get out of the scrape afterwards as well as he can. That's what I'll do."
Seeing that his companion had suddenly grown very unsociable, Roy settled back on his seat and thought over the situation. What would Joe and Arthur think when they missed him, and what would they do about it? When they found that he had not returned to the hotel would they become frightened, report the matter at police headquarters, and write to the folks in Mount Airy about it? The bare thought of such a thing alarmed Roy, who was almost tempted to burst open the door and take to his heels.
"But that plan wouldn't work at all," said he to himself. "Babcock would have me hard and fast before I could get fairly on my feet. I must wait until we reach the pier, and then I'll make a dash, if they give me the least show. If Joe and Arthur write home about it, that will be the end of our trip, and I'll pick a quarrel with the pair of them as soon as I can find them."
But, after all, Roy did not borrow a great deal of trouble on this score. His friends had never yet "gone back on him," and Roy did not believe they would do it now, when there was so much at stake.
While these thoughts were passing through his mind, the carriage, which had been driven at as high a rate of speed as the hackman thought he could venture upon without attracting the attention of the police, turned off the main thoroughfare into a narrow street, then into another, and finally into a third, which was so dark and gloomy that the street lamps looked as though they were shining through a fog. Presently it came to a standstill.
"Here we are," said Babcock, with alacrity. "Jump out. Not that side, but this one. Aha! You'll bear watching, won't you?"
But Roy could not have made his exit through the door toward which he turned, without bringing on a useless struggle with his captors; for the minute the carriage stopped, the man Willis clambered down from the box and appeared at the window.
"Rowe Shelly must be a slippery fellow," thought Roy, as he faced about and followed the detective, "and no doubt he has given these two men a lesson that they will not soon forget. They won't let me have the ghost of a chance to run."
When Roy got out of the carriage he saw that it had stopped at the end of a pier which jutted out into the harbor for a hundred feet or more. There was no possible chance for escape, unless he were reckless enough to jump into the water and trust himself to the tide, which was running out at a rapid rate, but his captors were so very much afraid of him, that they kept fast hold of both his arms while they marched him to the farther end of the pier, where they found a natty little yacht with steam up, ready for a start.
"Do you intend to take me away on this thing?" inquired Roy. "Well, before you do it, hadn't you better get a lantern and satisfy yourselves that you have made no mistake in the boy? I tell you I am not Rowe Shelly. If he has any good reason for running away from his uncle, I hope he is a thousand miles from here at this moment, and that you will never catch him. But if you don't quit fooling with me here and now, I'll make trouble for you as sure as I live to get ashore."
"I'm used to such talk as that," said Willis, with a laugh. "Yes," he added, in reply to a low question from a man on the forecastle who proved to be the captain of the yacht, "we've found him already. Had no trouble at all in tracking him. Are you ready? Then cast off and—"
"Hold on," interrupted the detective. "I want to say a few words to you in private, Willis. Captain, can this boy be locked in the cabin with any certainty that we shall find him there when we want him?"
The man appealed to said he was sure of it; whereupon Roy was conducted down the companion ladder, and into an elegantly furnished little room in the stern of the yacht. The hanging lamp gave out a brilliant light, and Roy, believing that the detective would never have a better opportunity to take a good look at his face, placed his hands on his hips and stood in such a position that the rays from the reflector fell full upon him.
"Now what do you think?" said he. "Can you truthfully say that you ever saw me before?"
"Why, what's the matter?" inquired Willis, while Roy was sure he looked somewhat concerned and anxious. "What are you talking about, Rowe? You don't pretend to deny yourself, do you? If that's your scheme, it won't work."
"Of course I do not mean to deny my identity," replied Roy. "But I do say I am not Rowe Shelly."
"What nonsense!" exclaimed Willis. "Shove off, captain. We are wasting time here. Mr. Babcock will go to the island with us, as he did before."
"Don't be in a hurry, captain," interposed the detective. "It is possible that I shall want to stay ashore. Now, Willis, come on deck and tell me who is to pay me for this night's work."
Willis knew, and so did Roy Sheldon, that this was simply a ruse on Babcock's part to take the superintendent out of the prisoner's hearing so that he could speak his mind to him without fear of being overheard. I afterward learned all about that rather stormy interview, and so I will tell of it here in its proper place.
"Look here," said Babcock, as soon as he and Willis had gained the deck. "You have brought me into a pretty mess, and I am going to get out of it with the least possible delay. I am as near the island as I am going to-night."
"You—you don't suppose—" began Willis.
"Yes; I mean to say that you have made me arrest the wrong boy," exclaimed the detective, as if he read the thoughts that were passing in his companion's mind; "and if you don't know it, too, your face belies you. What do you say, captain? Who is that boy we just left in the cabin?"
"Why, it's Rowe Shelly, of course. Who else should it be?"
"Did you take a good look at him?"
"I did. I would know him if I had met him in Europe."
"There, now," said Willis, angrily, "I hope you're satisfied. I've heard that boy talk. He can almost make one believe that black is white, and I can see plain enough that he tried his blarney on you while you were in the carriage with him. You wouldn't have made the arrest if it hadn't been for me."
"You're right, I wouldn't. I believed you when you said you knew the boy, and now I've got into a nice pickle by it. I hope the colonel will give you your walking-papers the minute he hears of it."
"Oh, he dassent do that. I know too much about—" began Willis, and then he stopped, frightened at what he had said.
"You know too much about him and his affairs, do you?" exclaimed Babcock, finishing the sentence for him. "That's what I have thought for a long time."
"I didn't say so," replied Willis, hastily, at the same time taking the detective by the arm and leading him out of earshot of the captain of the yacht. "You ought not to have spoken so plainly in the presence of a third party. I tell you it's all right."
"And I tell you I am sure it isn't. If you will take my advice, you will bring that boy out of the cabin and show him the way to his hotel at once. If he is a stranger in town he could not find his way there alone on a dark night like this."
"I wouldn't do that for no money," said Willis, alarmed at the mere mention of such a thing. "Just see the trouble I'd get into."
"You'll get into more if you don't do as I say. Well, good-by. I'm off."
"Won't you see Rowe safe to the island?"
"Not by a great sight. I'll have no more to do with the case."
So saying the detective jumped ashore, and Willis was left to his own discretion.