THE STRANGE MARRIAGE.

In the course of little over an hour, the carriage stopped at the inlet, where Fritz was told to get out and take a small boat and row across the water to the other shore, where he would find another carriage to complete his journey in.

He accordingly did as directed, and had soon crossed the inlet, found the second carriage, and was once more rolling northward, along the sandy beach.

It seemed hours to him ere his conductor drew rein in front of a jutting bluff which interrupted their further progress along the beach, from the fact that it reached to the water's edge; for another hour he followed the driver, a grim, uncommunicative fisherman, on foot up a jagged path, which finally led into a lonely ocean cave which the high tides of many centuries had washed out to about the size of an ordinary room. A torch thrust in a crevice in the rocky wall, lit up the scene in rather a ghostly way.

About in the center of the cave stood three parties—Madge, a clerical-looking party, and another well-dressed man, with black hair and full beard.

He stepped forward as Fritz and the fisherman entered the cave, and said:

"Ah! I am glad you have come. Was fearing that you would not accommodate us, sir."

"Vel, I didn't vas know vedder to come or not," Fritz answered, "but ash I am here, vot you want off me?"

"I will tell you. The young lady yonder and myself are about to be married, and, to make things legal, we prefer to have a couple of witnesses to the ceremony. You will only be required to attach your signature to the marriage certificate, and will then be taken back to Atlantic City."

"Vel, off dot ish all, go ahead mit der pizness," Fritz said, perching himself on a rock. "I don'd know off id is a legal dransaction or not, but I'll do vot ish right by der lady."

"Then let's have the ceremony," the prospective bridegroom said. "Are you ready, Madge?"

"Quite ready," the young lady replied, smilingly.

Then they clasped hands, and the aged clerical-looking gentleman read a marriage-service, asked the usual questions, and pronounced them man and wife.

The parties to the consummation were announced as Miss Madge Thurston and Major Paul Atkins.

At the conclusion of the ceremony the clergyman filled out a certificate, signed it himself, and then requested Fritz to come forward and do likewise, and also the old fisherman.

His request being obeyed, Major Atkins said:

"Your favor is duly appreciated, Mr. Snyder, and, if an opportunity offers, I shall be happy to be of service to you. You may now return to town in the manner you came."

Accordingly, Fritz did so, not a little puzzled at his adventure and the strange wedding in the coast cave.

Day was just beginning to lighten the eastern horizon when he arrived back at Atlantic City, and went to his room for a nap.

But he found that sleep would not come to his relief, and so he was among the early fashionable bathers at the beach.

After a good, refreshing bath he went back to the Brighton and took a seat on the veranda.

He had not been seated long when a rapidly driven carriage whirled up before the hotel, and an elderly, portly man leaped out and hurried into the hotel, his face flushed with excitement.

He was well-dressed, wore a little bunch of gray side-whiskers on either cheek, and was evidently all of sixty years of age.

Fritz surveyed him closely with the short glimpse he got of him, and then scratched his head as if in quest of an idea.

"I'll bet a half-dollar I see into der whole pizness now," he muttered, with a chuckle. "Id vas plainer ash mud to me. Dot couple vot got married vas elopers mit each odder, und dis pe der old man on der war-path after 'em, madder ash a hornet. Der next t'ing is, who vas der bully veller, vot ish honest und haff der rocks to support dot virtue?"

After a few minutes the old gentleman came out of the hotel, and stood looking out upon the ocean, with rather a savage expression of countenance—and his was a face that could be very stern, when occasion required it.

"I don'd know vedder I better poke mine nose inder dis pizness, or not," Fritz muttered, taking a second survey of him. "He looks like ash if he might swaller a veller off he got mad, und I don'd vas care apoud imitadin' Jonah."

As if interpreting his thoughts, the old gent turned rather gruffly, and took a searching glance at the young man.

"Well?" he said, "I suppose I look as if I wanted to cut some one's throat, don't I?"

Fritz laughed lightly.

"Vel, I vas t'inking somedings like dot," he admitted.

"I thought so. I ain't a fool; I know when I am mad, I look mad. Do you know of any party around here who's particularly anxious to end his career, and ain't got the grit to do the job?—I would like to operate on such a chap."

"You feels like ash off you could pulverize some one, eh?"

"Humph! I'll contract to lay out the first man that durst look cross-eyed at me. I'm mad, I am—mad as thunder, and I come from Leadville, too, where they raise thunder occasionally. Bah! I wish some one would step up and kick me!"

"Well, I'm your man, if you really want a bona fide job done!" Fritz caused a pompous-looking man to say, who stood near—ventriloquially, of course. "I'm the champion patent kicker from Kalamazoo!"

The old gent from Leadville turned and gazed at the pompous-looking man a moment, his dander rising several degrees.

"Oh! so you're anxious to kick me, are you, my Christian friend? You want to kick me, do you?" he ejaculated.

"Who has said anything about kicking you, sir?" the pompous party demanded, in haughty surprise. "You'd evidently better go to bed and sleep off your 'cups,' my friend."

"I haven't drank a drop, sir, in ten years. And for you to deny expressing a desire to boot me, sir—why, man, I heard you!"

"You are a liar, sir; I said nothing of the kind. Besides, I am not in the habit of picking quarrels with strangers."

And with a shrug, the pompous man turned on his heel, and walked off, indignantly.

Leadville's angered delegate gazed after him a moment, with unutterable contempt—then turned to Fritz:

"Poor fool. He's no sand, or he'd not cut and run, after calling a man a liar. Up in Leadville things are supremely different, but here alas! is a lack of back-bone. I say, young fellow, have you ever cherished dreams of becoming rich?—a man of millions, as it were?"

"Vel, I don'd know but I haff some off dose anxiety to get rich, vonce in a vile," Fritz admitted.

"Well, sir, I can tell you just how you can do it the easiest, if you will stroll upon the beach with me."

Accordingly Fritz arose, and sauntered down to the beach with this eccentric Leadvillian, whoever he might prove to be.

"Now, I suppose you'd like to know what I'm mad at," the old gent began, pushing his gold-headed cane into the sand, as they strolled along. "Well, before I tell you, I want to know who you are, and what your business is?"

"My name vos Fritz Snyder, und I vas vot you might call a detective—or, dot is, I vas trying my luck at der pizness."

"Indeed? Then perhaps it is well I have met you, for I have a case, and if you can win that case, you can also win five thousand dollars. How does that strike you?"

"It hits me right vere I liff, ven I ish at home," Fritz grinned. "Yoost you give me der p'ints, und I'm your bologna, you can bet a half-dollar on dot five t'ousand-dollar job. Vot's der lay—suicides, murder, sdole somedings, or run avay mit anodder vife's veller?"

"Neither. A girl has run away from her home, and is wanted—five thousand dollars' worth. She is my daughter, and is a somnambulist, and consequently of unsound mind, at times. She frequently goes into a trance, and remains thus for weeks at a time, eating and drinking naturally enough, but knowing nothing what she has been doing, when she awakens—though to outward appearance, she is awake, when in this trance, but not in her right mind. I have consulted eminent physicians, but they pronounce her case incurable, and say she will some day die in one of these trances."

Here the man from Leadville grew pathetic in his story, and wiped a tear from his eye; but finally went on:

"Well, as you may imagine, I have had a deal of trouble with her, for in her state of trance she has often robbed me of sums of money. And wandered off, too, sometimes; but this last blow has been the most severe. It came to my knowledge that she had become the prey of an unprincipled Eastern rascal. He had met her during her somnambulistic wanderings, and prejudiced her against me, and caused her to rob not only me but others, and surrender the stolen booty to him. On learning this, myself and neighbors formed into a vigilance committee to hunt the rascal down, but he took to his heels, and fled Eastward. A few days later, my poor child turned up missing, and with her the sum of twenty thousand dollars, which had been paid me from the sale of a mine, and which I had lodged in my safe for safe keeping until I could deposit it, the next day!"

"Twenty t'ousand—so much ash dot?"

"Yes—a big sum, and likewise nearly all the money I then possessed. I immediately took up the trail, but egad! 'twas no use. The girl is sharper than lightning, and eluded me at every turn. I found that her destination was Eastward—doubtless to join her evil genius—and so I telegraphed to Chicago and St. Louis for the detectives to look out, and intercept her, if possible. But all to no avail. She was seen in those places, but owing to some irregularity beyond my comprehension, was not captured. When I arrived in Chicago, I found that she had two days before left the city, Eastward bound. I trailed her to Philadelphia, and there lost all track of her. Thinking quite likely she would come to this summer resort, I came on, to-day, in hopes of striking the trail, but all to no avail. I have as yet heard of no clew to her whereabouts."

"Vel, dot ish purdy bad," Fritz assented. "Vot ish your name?"

"My name is Thornton—I am a mining speculator from Leadville, Colorado."

"Und your daughter's name vos—?"

"Madge. She is a pretty young maiden, aged eighteen, and left her home very well dressed."

"Und der feller vot vas pocketing der money—vot vos his name?"

"It is hard to guess what his true name was. At Leadville he was called Pirate Johnson—at Pueblo he was known as Griffith Gregg."

"Gregg—Gregg?" Fritz said, meditatively. "I am on the look-out for a man by that name. But my man is a smuggler."

"This villain may be connected with any nefarious piece of rascality. If I only had him here one or the other of us would get laid out—that is as good as sworn to. God only knows what perils my poor child will pass through before I succeed in finding her, if I ever do."

"Vel, I reckon ve can find her, uff der ish such a t'ing in der dictionary," Fritz asserted.

He then went on to relate the particulars of his assisting the lady on the boat, and of the marriage in the cave, which excited Mr. Thornton greatly.

"By Heaven! I see through it all! Madge Thurston is no more or less than my daughter, and she has wedded this rascal, Atkins, who is one and the same person who was the Gregg or Johnson out West. God forbid that my child is married to such a wretch. Describe him."

Fritz obeyed, giving a description according as he remembered the bridegroom—also of the man who took Madge Thurston from the hotel.

"The latter was undoubtedly Gregg," the speculator declared, "and the other also, was, it is likely, disguised for the occasion, with a false beard. Now, Fritz, I want you to help me find my child, and break the neck of this rascal, and you shall have for reward the sum I promised you. We'll search this world high and dry but what we'll recover my child. Come, let's seek a conveyance to take us to the cave."

They accordingly went back to the Hotel Brighton, ate dinner, and afterward secured a carriage and set out for the scene of the strange wedding the night before.

And thus Fritz entered into a five-thousand-dollar chase, which was destined to lead him into more adventures than he had yet experienced.