Chapter XV: A New Man Takes a Hand

It was midnight when the automobile and its passengers from Bayou Yamousa rolled into New Orleans. Matt's first call was at police headquarters. Here Jurgens was left, and a bit of a surprise was sprung.

The assistant chief, Fetterman by name, was on duty, and the arrival of Jurgens created a mild sensation. Detectives were even then prowling about the city looking for Lattimer Jurgens, Whistler, Bangs, and a young man, name unknown, wearing a slouch hat, sweater and frayed corduroy trousers. The detectives had not met with the slightest success, and the bringing in of Jurgens, by Motor Matt and his chums, naturally created a mild degree of excitement.

The surprise was in the nature of a question by Fetterman.

"Where are you going, King, from here?"

Matt gave him the number of the house in Prytania Street where Townsend had taken up his quarters.

"Ah," said Fetterman, with a peculiar glance, "that's the place where the diamonds were stolen. A new man is taking a hand in the game. I'll get him at once and bring him to the place in Prytania Street, but I'd like to have you and your friends stay there until we arrive. What this man has to say will be of interest to all of you."

"Who is he?" inquired Matt, curiously.

"I have promised to let him do his own talking," was the vague response.

Vastly puzzled, Matt went out to the car, told his chums what Fetterman had said, and all three of them wondered and guessed clear to Prytania Street and the house of Mrs. Thomas.

This time Matt entered by the front way. There was a light in Townsend's room. The shade was drawn, but a glow could be seen through it.

Matt was announced by a sleepy domestic, and he and his chums were shown up the stairs to the sick chamber. Cassidy was on duty as usual, and Townsend was wide awake and sitting up in his bed.

"What luck?" he asked, quaveringly.

"The very best, Mr. Townsend," answered Matt, cheerily, and drew the bag from his coat and laid it in Townsend's hands.

"Are--are these the diamonds?" he asked.

"Yes."

"And where is Jurgens, Whistler, Bangs and the others who helped them commit the robbery?"

"They have all escaped--with the exception of Jurgens and the young fellow, Dashington, who impersonated me. Jurgens is in jail, and I allowed Dashington to go."

"You allowed him to go?" asked Townsend, nonplused.

"Yes," answered Matt, "for the reason that, if he had not helped us I never could have kept my promise to you."

"Nothing much matters," said Townsend, with a long sigh of content, "now that I have the diamonds back. I don't care who helped you, or how it happened, Motor Matt always accomplishes the thing he sets out to do. I have been better ever since you left here, last night. Now I shall get well, and get well quick. Give me your hand, my boy! And the rest of you--come here and let me thank you."

After Carl and Dick had crowded up to the bed and shaken hands with Townsend, the latter would have returned the bag to Matt and had him take the stones at once to the address on St. Charles Avenue; but, even as the request was being made, there was another ring at the gate bell, and then at the door, and the servant came up to announce "two men from headquarters."

"Two men from headquarters," muttered Townsend, bewildered. "Who can they be and what do they want?"

"I don't know what they want," said Matt, "but one of them is the assistant chief, Mr. Fetterman."

"Something else is going wrong," fretted Townsend, "and I know it. These diamonds seem to carry a curse with them."

"D'you feel strong enough, cap'n, to have more visitors?" asked Cassidy.

"I should be badly worried if I couldn't hear, without delay, what Fetterman and this other man have to tell me."

The assistant chief came in accompanied by a blond, stoutly built person whom he introduced as Mr. Shirley, of Scotland Yard.

Mr. Shirley was genial and made friends for himself right away.

"You're a sick man, I'm told, Mr. Townsend," said he, "and I'm going to begin at once what I have to say and come to an end as briefly as possible. I had best begin in South Africa where----"

"South Africa?" echoed Townsend.

Shirley nodded.

"A man named Hobart, an American," he went on, "worked in the Bloemfontein diamond mine. He was a clever scoundrel and accomplished what many another man had tried in vain to do, and that was to steal diamonds out of the workings. How he got them to the place where he lived is a mystery that has not yet been solved, for Hobart kept his plan strictly to himself and did not even let his confederate in the enterprise know how the thieving was done.

"In the house where Hobart had his rooms the diamonds were carefully secreted in the head of a particularly vicious-looking idol. Hobart used to show the idol to his friends, taking it from an iron chest where it was carefully packed in sawdust, and to which, after a few moments of exhibiting, he was always careful to return it.

"Hobart declared that the head was a fragment of the malefic Obboney, a deity of the Koromantyn, or Gold Coast, negroes. This was entirely fiction, for, it afterward developed, he had had the head carved by a man in the Portuguese settlements, and then steeped in a deadly liquor which caused it to give off a poisonous effluvia. This was intended as a protection for the stolen diamonds.

"In due course, Hobart and his confederate, Sharpe, an Australian, quit the diamond mines and prepared to leave for the States with their booty. They sailed for England, and from there took a West Indian trader for the Bahamas. When near the Bahamas, Sharpe demanded a division of the treasure. Hobart put him off with some excuse, and then, that night, mysteriously vanished with a whale boat and his iron chest, leaving Sharpe behind.

"Sharpe never found out where his treacherous comrade had gone, nor what he had done with the iron chest. Moved by a spirit of vengeance, he sailed for England and told the entire story of the theft of the diamonds to the head of the syndicate that had charge of the diamond mines. The case was placed in my hands, and I traced Hobart to Philadelphia and found that he had lived there in poverty and had finally died and been buried in the Potters Field.

"I also learned that Hobart had had a friend, a wealthy inventor named Townsend. Having reached the end of my quest, so far as Hobart was concerned, I turned my attention to finding Townsend, in the hope that he could tell me something about the iron chest.

"But Townsend seemed every whit as hard to locate as Hobart had been. He had invented a submarine and was trying it out somewhere on a long-distance cruise. I bided my time and, at last, saw an account in a daily paper of the theft of a submarine belonging to one Captain Nemo, Jr., from the Inlet at Atlantic City, and of the pursuit of the submarine by a flying machine.

"I was a little mixed by the name of Captain Nemo, Jr., but I started out to follow the flying machine. This was comparatively easy, for wherever the machine was seen it was reported to the daily press, and all I had to do was to read the newspapers. Well, to be brief, I finally reached New Orleans last night. My coming was most opportune--a stroke of luck that does not come a detective's way more than once in a lifetime.

"A big diamond robbery had occurred here. The victim was one Archibald Townsend, and there were strong rumors flying about of a head carved from wood, of an iron chest, and of the thieves mixed up in the robbery having given their nefarious attentions to Mr. Townsend before. I talked with the authorities, and they told me that they were on the trail of the robbers and were doing their utmost to apprehend them. So, I had perforce to continue my waiting game, although more than certain that I was finally on the right track.

"Imagine my surprise and satisfaction when Mr. Fetterman, here, came to my hotel, a few minutes ago, with the information that the ringleader of the thieving gang had been captured, and that the diamonds had been recovered. We came on here at once, I to explain my mission to Mr. Townsend, and Mr. Fetterman to vouch for my story."

Shirley, of Scotland Yard, sank back in his chair, his mild blue eyes roving whimsically about over the astounded faces of his listeners.

"Merciful powers!" gasped Townsend. "Can it be possible that I have been so terribly deceived in that fellow who called himself the Man from Cape Town? I was positive of his honesty, although I had not the remotest idea, at the time, of what the treasure consisted. I first met the Man from Cape Town in Philadelphia, and befriended him. He seemed grateful, and, just before he died, called me to his bedside and gave me a chart of an island in the Bahamas. The island was said to have a cave, and an iron chest was said to be in the cave. I looked upon the whole story as a fairy tale, but, as I wanted to test my submarine with a long sea cruise, promised the man I would go and look for his iron chest.

"The chest, when found, was to be brought to New Orleans and opened in the presence of a lady living in St. Charles Avenue, who, Hobart told me, was his daughter. The treasure was to be equally divided between the lady and myself.

"That iron chest seemed to draw upon me all manner of unfortunate adventures, and I regretted continually that I had ever had anything to do with it. But I had given my promise to this Man from Cape Town, and felt myself bound to carry it out to the letter. I have held strictly to that policy, and Motor Matt and his friends have stood loyally by through everything that has happened."

Shirley turned an approving glance on Motor Matt.

"I hear nothing but most excellent reports of Motor Matt," said he, "and I should like to hear from him, in detail, all that has happened while he and his friends were working to recover the diamonds for the last time."

"It will be worth listening to, I can promise you that," said Cassidy. "Whenever he does a thing, he has a way o' his own of getting at it."

All eyes were turned on Matt. He saw that he was in for it, and began at the beginning and went through with every detail of the adventures recently encountered by him and his friends.

Every one followed him closely, particularly Shirley.

"From all this it appears," said the Scotland Yard man, as soon as Matt had finished, "that in getting back these diamonds for the South African syndicate, you have lost a ten-thousand-dollar air ship----"

"It didn't cost us that," interposed Matt.

"And have endangered your life and the lives of your friends," continued the detective, without seeming to notice the interruption. "I shall include that in my report when I return the diamonds. Meanwhile, until Mr. Townsend is satisfied that I have secured stolen property, the diamonds will remain in the custody of the New Orleans police department."

Shirley reached for his hat and got up.

"I fear I have tired you, Mr. Townsend," said he, regretfully, "but it was necessary for me to see you at once and explain the mistake which, under the circumstances, it was a perfectly natural one to make. You have experienced much trouble and worry, and this can never be made up to you. As for the diamonds----"

"Take them," cried Townsend, stretching out the bag to Fetterman; "I am delighted to get rid of them and have them off my mind. And I am doubly glad that, being stolen property, a wrong is to be righted and the stones returned to their rightful owners. I don't wish to have anything done for me, Mr. Shirley. I have sufficient of this world's goods, and you have already done me the greatest favor possible by taking the diamonds off my hands. But Motor Matt and his friends, they----"

"I give you my word that they shall be looked after," finished Shirley.

Thereupon he shook hands all around, wished everybody luck and departed with Fetterman.

The fateful treasure, of course, went with them.