The Devils Admiral | Page 8

I must not press him too hard and so make him suspicious that I knew his true character--his character, that is, as a decidedly suspicious person.
"I was told that she sails in the morning, but it was some mistake," I told him, as if I had not found anything peculiar in the error and was not the least disturbed about it.
"Oh, no! Nothing in that!" he cried, unable to conceal his delight over my admission of how much I knew. "For a minute I thought there might be something in the story, after all, when I heard you say she was delayed. That is just what I was going to tell you--there is no truth in that report. Some person, who I cannot say, also gave me misinformation regarding the Kut Sang. I feared that you might have had the same experience. That, however, is only a part of it--what I want to tell you is that it is now possible to buy a ticket in the Kut Sang."
"I already have my ticket," I said. "So we will be fellow-passengers, and I hope you will pardon my throwing you down the stairs; but I was running after a beggar or a thief."
"Indeed! Do you know the rascal, or did you see him so that you can give a comprehensive description of him to the police?"
"A little red-headed man," I said, watching him closely. "Did you see him before you started up the stairs?"
He burst out in a dry, mirthless cackle of laughter, and slapped his knees, much as if he had heard a good joke.
"If you will come in to tiffin with me, Mr. Trenholm, I will tell you about him."
Assuming affability, I accepted his invitation, and we went into the dining-room together and found a table to ourselves in the corner. I was rather pleased at having an opportunity to study him, especially at his own suggestion, and I made up my mind that before the lunch was over I would have solved the mystery of who or what the missionary was, and why he had the little red-headed man at my heels since I had arrived in Manila that morning, and why he had attempted to keep me out of the Kut Sang.
"And who is this little red-headed man?" I asked as we took our chairs.
He bowed his head and mumbled a grace before replying, and I had a sense of mental conflict between us, and knew that I would have to guard against chicane, or the suave old fellow would talk me out of my suspicions.
"It must have been Dago Red you saw," he began, grinning, and wagging his head. "I hope he did not actually steal anything, my dear Mr. Trenholm. I am quite sure you must be mistaken about his being a thief; but it is quite possible, he has deceived me."
"I found him sneaking near my door in the hall," I said. "Who is this Dago Red?"
"A worthy man," he replied getting serious. "I am afraid you have done him an injustice, for I sent him up to see if you were in your room, and after I had given him the errand the clerk informed me that you were in, and I started up myself."
"He didn't appear anxious to talk with me when he saw me open the door."
"You probably startled him by--"
"But who is he?"
"Petrak, I think his name is, although I am not sure, and my poor old memory cannot hold names long. He is a sailor who has been shipwrecked, and he became a vagrant here and was sent to Bilibid Prison. Much of my work is in prisons, and I took charge of him when he got out and sent him to the Sailors' Home, sure that he would be able to get a ship again. That was a couple of months ago, and when I arrived to-day he met me and told me that he had left the Home because the keeper was prejudiced against him, owing to his term in prison.
"He was on the verge of starvation, and I gave him some money from my charity fund, which he promptly spent on drink, for he is quite dissolute. But he took charge of my luggage and attended to some errands for me, but he fears the police and cannot get out of his habit of skulking about, and, as the detectives have hounded him, he is suspicious of everybody, and ready to go into a panic when a stranger approaches him. It is a pity that he cannot get back to sea, but he has had the fever, and no master seems to want him, and he has been forced into vagabondage."
He gave me this history of the little red-headed man in disconnected sentences while we were