of Europe
could bring the ruffian crew to book with little difficulty. That,
without a doubt was the question Black would put to me. He would wish
to know all I knew; but, if I refused to tell him, he would proceed to
extremes, and I shuddered when I remembered what his extremes had been
in the case of Hall. The man undoubtedly had conceived a scheme daring
beyond any known in the nineteenth century. The knowledge of his
hiding-place was the key to his safety. If Roderick had it, then,
indeed, I might have looked for life; but I knew that Hall had never
discovered it, and what hope had Roderick where the greater skill had
failed?

This consideration led me to one conclusion. I would pretend that I had
some knowledge, and that my friends had it too. If that did not save my
life, God alone could help me, and the home of Captain Black would be
my grave. Nor did I know in any case that I had much expectation of
life in such surroundings or in such company.

CHAPTER XVI.

NORTHWARD HO!

During some days I saw no more of the doctor, or of anyone about the
ship save an old negro, who became my servant. He was not an
unkindly-looking man, being of a great age, and somewhat feeble in his
actions; but he never opened his lips when I questioned him, and gave a
plain "Yes" or "No" to any demand. Those days would have been
monotonous, had it not been for the ever-present sense of coming
danger, of a future dark and threatening, likely to be fruitful in
trial and in peril. Each morning at an early hour the age-worn black
entered my cabin and told me that my bath was ready. When I was
dressed, a breakfast, generous in quality and in quantity, was set upon
my cabin table. At one o'clock luncheon of like excellence was served;
and again at five o'clock and at eight, tea and dinner. Some thought
evidently was given to my condition, for on the second morning I found
clean linen with a neat suit of blue serge awaiting me in the bathroom,
and when I had breakfasted, the black brought a parcel of books to me;
I found amongst them, to my satisfaction, several light works by Bret
Harte, Mark Twain, and Max Adeler, as well as more solid literary food.
The books saved me from much of that foreboding which I should have
known wanting them, and after the first fears had passed I spent the
hours in reading or looking through the port-hole over the deserted
waste of a fretful sea. I had hoped to learn something of our
destination from