Lawson with a panacea; and there were
specialists in mental disease who, by analysis of Goliah's letters,
proved conclusively that he was a lunatic.

The yacht _Energon_ arrived in the harbour of San Francisco on the
afternoon of April 5, and Bassett came ashore. But the _Energon_ did not
sail next day, for not one of the ten summoned politicians had elected to
make the journey to Palgrave Island. The newsboys, however, called
"Extra" that day in all the cities. The ten politicians were dead. The
yacht, lying peacefully at anchor in the harbour, became the centre of
excited interest. She was surrounded by a flotilla of launches and
rowboats, and many tugs and steamboats ran excursions to her. While the
rabble was firmly kept off, the proper authorities and even reporters
were permitted to board her. The mayor of San Francisco and the chief of
police reported that nothing suspicious was to be seen upon her, and the
port authorities announced that her papers were correct and in order in
every detail. Many photographs and columns of descriptive matter were
run in the newspapers.

The crew was reported to be composed principally of
Scandinavians--fair-haired, blue-eyed Swedes, Norwegians afflicted with
the temperamental melancholy of their race, stolid Russian Finns, and a
slight sprinkling of Americans and English. It was noted that there was
nothing mercurial and flyaway about them. They seemed weighty men,
oppressed by a sad and stolid bovine-sort of integrity. A sober
seriousness and enormous certitude characterized all of them. They
appeared men without nerves and without fear, as though upheld by some
overwhelming power or carried in the hollow of some superhuman hand. The
captain, a sad-eyed, strong-featured American, was cartooned in the
papers as "Gloomy Gus" (the pessimistic hero of the comic supplement).

Some sea-captain recognized the _Energon_ as the yacht _Scud_, once owned
by Merrivale of the New York Yacht Club. With this clue it was soon
ascertained that the _Scud_ had disappeared several years before. The
agent who sold her reported the purchaser to be merely another agent, a
man he had seen neither before nor since. The yacht had been
reconstructed at Duffey's Shipyard in New Jersey. The change in her name
and registry occurred at that time and had been legally executed. Then
the _Energon_ had disappeared in the shroud of mystery.

In the meantime, Bassett was going crazy--at least h