out ten dollars," suggested the colonel.
"I don't believe Cornwood did, for I found other money in his pockets,
which I did not touch," added Captain Blastblow.
"Count it over again, Captain Alick," said the colonel.
I did so, laying off the bills in hundreds, as they amounted to this
sum. My last lot came out right, and I had twenty piles. It made just
two thousand dollars. It was clear now, if it had not been before, that
Cornwood's visit to Key West related to Nick Boomsby, and not to the
detention of the Islander when she arrived there. The equal division of
the money explained the long and rather stormy conversations between
the passengers of the Islander. Cornwood was smart, if he was nothing
else in the way of honesty and uprightness. He had bullied and
persuaded poor Nick Boomsby to give him half the money, and would
probably have stolen the other half before the vessel got to New
Orleans, if we had not captured her on the way.
I was sorry for Nick Boomsby, for he had been the playmate of my early
years; not so sorry that he had been found out as that he could commit
a crime. But I could hardly wonder at his guilt when I thought of what
his father had done, and what an example he had given his son. I
thought the father was almost, if not quite, as much to blame as the
son.
"What shall be done with this money?" asked Colonel Shepard, when he
had wrapped up both divisions of the money and the money-belt in one
package.
"What shall we do with our two prisoners?" I inquired, in answer to the
question.
"We can hand them over to the police in New Orleans," replied the
colonel.
"Then we can hand the money also over to them," I added. "Probably the
news of the robbery of the messenger has been in half the newspapers in
the country, and the police of all the large cities will know all about
the case."
It was finally agreed that my father should keep the money till we
arrived at New Orleans, as he would be in another steamer from the
robbers. Colonel Shepard decided to go on board of the Islander at
once, and his family were assisted to their new quarters.
CHAPTER XXI.
UP THE MISSISSIPPI.
As soon as we had transferred the family of Colonel Shepard to the
Islander, we unlashed the two vessels, and each stemmed the swift
current of the Mississippi on its own account. I stopped the screw to
allow the other steamer to go clear of the Sylvania, and she went ahead
several lengths before we
|