The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Perilous Journey

wasn’t a result of indecision. I simply thought it best to time our arrival exactly. Reynie’s note said to meet you in two hours. I feared that if your pursuers hadn’t found you yet, the Shortcut’s early arrival might tip them off. As you saw for yourselves, there’s no discreet way to ground an ocean vessel. So though I hated to wait, it seemed wise to follow Reynie’s directions precisely. Of course, if we arrived too late, we intended to come ashore and fight for you.”

“Luckily it didn’t come to that,” said Mr. Benedict.

“Indeed,” agreed the captain, and here his expression grew quite serious. “I must say, Reynie, how honored I am that you trusted me to come. Deeply honored, and not a little surprised. I imagine you’ve told the others about our exchange in my cabin, the one involving the decoy diamond?”

“Sorry, I know you told me to keep it between us,” Reynie began, “but under the circumstances —”

“Never apologize to me,” Captain Noland hastily interrupted. “I’m the one who must apologize. In retrospect, you see, I’ve realized what a lubber’s move it was to give you that decoy and ask you to keep it secret. I must have seemed quite the scoundrel, especially with all that creeping about and closing doors and whatnot.”

“I did wonder about that,” Reynie admitted.

“I was nervous to have you in my cabin,” Captain Noland said. “If Mr. Pressius had seen you he would have disapproved of your wasting my time — that is how he would have viewed it, you understand. As for my asking you to keep the decoy secret, well . . . I have an explanation, though hardly an excuse. The truth is I had asked Mr. Pressius for decoys to give to all four of you. I wanted to give you keepsakes as an expression of my admiration and thanks. But Mr. Pressius refused, offering instead to sell them to me for a price — a price so exorbitant I felt I could only afford one. I’m extremely embarrassed to tell you all of this. I was far from my best during that voyage.”

“It was just a misunderstanding,” said Reynie, not wanting to point out how serious that misunderstanding had been. The captain, he realized now, had never dreamed Reynie might suspect the decoy was an actual diamond. No doubt he’d feel even worse to learn Reynie had thought him capable of swiping a precious gem.

“Thank you for saying so,” said Captain Noland, “but it’s a misunderstanding for which I take responsibility, and I can only hope you’ll all forgive me.”

With the exception of Constance — who declared that she would forgive him, since he’d asked so nicely — the children hastened to assure the captain that apologies and forgiveness were hardly necessary. After all, he had sacrificed everything dear to him on their behalf, and what more could be asked of anyone than that?

“Speaking of which,” said Constance, “shouldn’t you be miserable? There can’t be a company in the world that’ll hire you now that you’ve run a ship aground. How can you seem so cheery?”

Almost everyone had wondered about this, but it was such a sad and unfortunate situation that no one would have mentioned it. All around the table there was a general wincing at Constance’s comment, as if several people had bitten their tongues at once. Captain Noland only grinned, however, and Cannonball reached down to tousle Constance’s hair.

“Because he’s got another ship, Constance!” Cannonball boomed. “That’s why he’s so cheery! And he’s got me a post on it, too! In fact we’re to be at the harbor in an hour’s time, and by this very evening we’ll be at sea!”

Everyone cheered and exclaimed with surprise, and when Captain Noland had been offered congratulations by all, he scratched his beard and said, “It is wondrous news, isn’t it? I still can scarcely believe it. For some reason, Mr. Pressius made a public announcement saying he’d authorized me to ground the Shortcut, that I’d acted with remarkable heroism and expert seamanship in the service of humanity, and that he knew of no greater captain in the world!” Captain Noland laughed and shook his head in amazement. “As you might expect, the offers came pouring in after that. Cannonball and I had our pick of the lot.”

“But Mr. Pressius didn’t authorize you to ground the ship,” Kate said. “So why on earth did he say all that?”

“He gave me no explanation,” said Captain Noland, turning to look probingly at Mr. Benedict. “But he did let slip that he’d been in contact with you, Nicholas, and I have a sneaking suspicion I owe you my life once again. You seem determined to keep me in your debt.”

Mr. Benedict smiled. “Not at all, Phil. I actually did very little, and I risked nothing. There’s been a curious incident, you see, one of which you’re probably unaware, as it’s been kept quiet for several reasons: Mr. Pressius’s diamonds were stolen.”

“Stolen!” Cannonball cried, exchanging glances with Captain Noland, who seemed equally stunned. “You mean after all that hoop-de-doo with decoys and extra security, someone actually did steal them?”

Mr. Benedict raised an eyebrow. “It is my opinion that Mr. Pressius made such a grand show of protecting his diamonds precisely to make their theft seem legitimate. Having taken such pains to protect them, he could hardly be suspected of arranging their theft. I have reason to believe, however, that he did just that. Mr. Pressius stands to receive a fortune in insurance money for those stolen diamonds — much more money, in fact, than they were worth.”

“You mean he arranged the theft to get the insurance money?” Sticky said.

“So my source has suggested, and when I communicated this to Mr. Pressius, he was quickly swayed to my perspective that Phil should receive his enthusiastic recommendation. His only condition was that I keep my suspicions to myself. He seemed to be under the impression that I could actually prove them.”

“But you can’t?” said Kate.

“I have no proof whatsoever,” said Mr. Benedict. “But I neglected to mention this to Mr. Pressius.”

Cannonball guffawed. “You snookered him! Bravo, Mr. Benedict! Nobody deserves it more than that bullfrog, I can tell you!”

Everyone laughed at this except Miss Perumal’s mother, who seemed startled and put a hand to her ear. “What’s this about a bullfrog?”

Reynie leaned close to her. “I’ll explain later, Pati.”