Colonel Harris took the elevator down to the gentlemen's cafe, adjoining
the beautiful Garden Court. For a moment he stood admiring the massive
fire-place and the many artistic effects, mural and otherwise. The cafe
was furnished with round tables and inviting chairs. Guests of the hotel,
members of city clubs, and strangers, came and went, but the colonel's
mind was in an anxious mood, so he sought a quiet corner, lighted a
cigar, and accidently picked up the _Evening Post_. Almost the first
thing he read was an item of shipping news:
"No word yet from the overdue steamship 'Majestic;' she is already
forty-eight hours late, and very likely has experienced bad weather."
The "Majestic" is one of the largest and best of the famous White Star
Line fleet. Colonel Harris expected an English gentleman to arrive by
this boat, and he had come on to New York to meet him, as the two had
business of great importance to talk over. "I wonder," thought the
colonel, "if such a thing could happen, that my cherished plan of
retiring with millions, might possibly be frustrated by ship-wreck or any
unlooked-for event?" Whereupon he pulled from his pocket a cablegram, to
make himself doubly sure that his was not a fool's errand, and again read
it in audible tones:
London, May 24, 18--.
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