The Project Gutenberg EBook of Dialstone Lane, Part 1., by W.W. Jacobs

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Title: Dialstone Lane, Part 1.

Author: W.W. Jacobs

Release Date: April 9, 2004 [EBook #11971]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DIALSTONE LANE, PART 1. ***




Produced by David Widger




DIALSTONE LANE

By  W.W. Jacobs

Part I.



CHAPTER I

Mr. Edward Tredgold sat in the private office of Tredgold and Son, land
and estate agents, gazing through the prim wire blinds at the peaceful
High Street of Binchester.  Tredgold senior, who believed in work for the
young, had left early.  Tredgold junior, glad at an opportunity of
sharing his father's views, had passed most of the work on to a clerk who
had arrived in the world exactly three weeks after himself.

"Binchester gets duller and duller," said Mr. Tredgold to himself,
wearily.  "Two skittish octogenarians, one gloomy baby, one gloomier
nursemaid, and three dogs in the last five minutes.  If it wasn't for the
dogs--Halloa!"

He put down his pen and, rising, looked over the top of the blind at a
girl who was glancing from side to side of the road as though in search
of an address.

"A visitor," continued Mr. Tredgold, critically.  "Girls like that only
visit Binchester, and then take the first train back, never to return."

The girl turned at that moment and, encountering the forehead and eyes,
gazed at them until they sank slowly behind the protection of the blind.

"She's coming here," said Mr. Tredgold, watching through the wire.
"Wants to see our time-table, I expect."

He sat down at the table again, and taking up his pen took some papers
from a pigeon-hole and eyed them with severe thoughtfulness.

"A lady to see you, sir," said a clerk, opening the door.

Mr. Tredgold rose and placed a chair.

"I have called for the key of the cottage in Dialstone Lane," said the
girl, still standing.  "My uncle, Captain Bowers, has not arrived yet,
and I am told that you are the landlord."

Mr. Tredgold bowed.  "The next train is due at six," he observed, with a
glance at the time-table hanging on the wall;  "I expect he'll come by
that.  He was here on Monday seeing the last of the furniture in.  Are
you Miss Drewitt?"

"Yes," said the girl.  "If you'll kindly give me the key, I can go in and
wait for him."

Mr. Tredgold took it from a drawer.  "If you will allow me, I will go
down with you," he said, slowly; "the lock is rather awkward for anybody
who doesn't understand it."

The girl murmured something about not troubling him.

"It's no trouble," said Mr. Tredgold, taking up his hat.  "It is our duty
to do all we can for the comfort of our tenants.  That lock--"

He held the door open and followed her into the street, pointing out
various objects of interest as they went along.

"I'm afraid you'll find Binchester very quiet," he remarked.

"I like quiet," said his companion.

Mr. Tredgold glanced at her shrewdly, and, pausing only at the jubilee
horse-trough to point out beauties which might easily escape any but a
trained observation, walked on in silence until they reached their
destination.

Except in the matter of window-blinds, Dialstone Lane had not changed for
generations, and Mr. Tredgold noted with pleasure the interest of his
companion as she gazed at the crumbling roofs, the red-brick doorsteps,
and the tiny lattice windows of the cottages.  At the last house, a
cottage larger than the rest, one side of which bordered the old
churchyard, Mr. Tredgold paused and, inserting his key in the lock,
turned it with thoughtless ease.

"The lock seems all right; I need not have bothered you," said Miss
Drewitt, regarding him gravely.

"Ah, it seems easy," said Mr. Tredgold, shaking his head, "but it wants
knack."

The girl closed the door smartly, and, turning the key, opened it again
without any difficulty.  To satisfy herself--on more points than one--she
repeated the performance.

"You've got the knack," said Mr. Tredgold, meeting her gaze with great
calmness.  "It's extraordinary what a lot of character there is in locks;
they let some people open them without any trouble, while others may
fumble at them till they're tired."

The girl pushed the door open and stood just inside the room.

"Thank you," she said, and gave him a little bow of dismissal.

A vein of obstinacy in Mr. Tredgold's disposition, which its owner
mistook for firmness, asserted itself.  It was plain that the girl had
estimated his services at their true value and was quite willing to
apprise him of the fact.  He tried the lock again, and with more
bitterness than the occasion seemed to warrant said that somebody had
been oiling it.

"I promised Captain Bowers to come in this afternoon and see that a few
odd things had been done," he added.  "May I come in now?"

The girl withdrew into the room, and, seating herself in a large
arm-chair by the fireplace, watched his inspection of door-knobs and
window-fastenings with an air of grave amusement, which he found somewhat
trying.

"Captain Bowers had the walls panelled and these lockers made to make the
room look as much like a ship's cabin as possible," he said, pausing in
his labours.  "He was quite pleased to find the staircase opening out of
the room--he calls it the companion-ladder.  And he calls the kitchen the
pantry, which led to a lot of confusion with the workmen.  Did he tell
you of the crow's-nest in the garden?"

"No," said the girl.

"It's a fine piece of work," said Mr. Tredgold.

He opened the door leading into the kitchen and stepped out into the
garden.  Miss Drewitt, after a moment's hesitation, followed, and after
one delighted glance at the trim old garden gazed curiously at a mast
with a barrel fixed near the top, which stood at the end.

"There's a fine view from up there," said Mr. Tredgold.  "With the
captain's glass one can see the sea distinctly.  I spent nearly all last
Friday afternoon up there, keeping an eye on things.  Do you like the
garden?  Do you think these old creepers ought to be torn down from the
house?"

"Certainly not," said Miss Drewitt, with emphasis.

"Just what I said," remarked Mr. Tredgold.

"Captain Bowers wanted to have them pulled down, but I dissuaded him.
I advised him to consult you first."

"I don't suppose he really intended to," said the girl.

"He did," said the other, grimly; "said they were untidy.  How do you
like the way the house is furnished?"

The girl gazed at him for a few moments before replying.  "I like it very
much," she said, coldly.

"That's right," said Mr. Tredgold, with an air of relief.  "You see, I
advised the captain what to buy.  I went with him to Tollminster and
helped him choose.  Your room gave me the most anxiety, I think."

"My room?" said the girl, starting.

"It's a dream in the best shades of pink and green," said Mr. Tredgold,
modestly.  "Pink on the walls, and carpets and hangings green; three or
four bits of old furniture--the captain objected, but I stood firm; and
for pictures I had two or three little things out of an art journal
framed."

"Is furnishing part of your business?" inquired the girl, eyeing him in
bewilderment.

"Business?" said the other.  "Oh, no.  I did it for amusement.  I chose
and the captain paid.  It was a delightful experience.  The sordid
question of price was waived; for once expense was nothing to me.  I wish
you'd just step up to your room and see how you like it.  It's the one
over the kitchen."

Miss Drewitt hesitated, and then curiosity, combined with a cheerful idea
of probably being able to disapprove of the lauded decorations, took her
indoors and upstairs.  In a few minutes she came down again.

"I suppose it's all right," she said, ungraciously, "but I don't
understand why you should have selected it."

"I had to," said Mr. Tredgold, confidentially.  "I happened to go to
Tollminster the same day as the captain and went into a shop with him.
If you could only see the things he wanted to buy, you would understand."

The girl was silent.

"The paper the captain selected for your room," continued Mr. Tredgold,
severely, "was decorated with branches of an unknown flowering shrub, on
the top twig of which a humming-bird sat eating a dragonfly.  A rough
calculation showed me that every time you opened your eyes in the morning
you would see fifty-seven humming-birds-all made in the same
pattern-eating fifty-seven ditto dragon-flies.  The captain said it was
cheerful."

"I have no doubt that my uncle's selection would have satisfied me," said
Miss Drewitt, coldly.

"The curtains he fancied were red, with small yellow tigers crouching all
over them," pursued Mr. Tredgold.  "The captain seemed fond of animals."

"I think that you were rather--venturesome," said the girl.  "Suppose
that I had not liked the things you selected?"

Mr. Tredgold deliberated.  "I felt sure that you would like them," he
said, at last.  "It was a hard struggle not to keep some of the things
for myself.  I've had my eye on those two Chippendale chairs for years.
They belonged to an old woman in Mint Street, but she always refused to
part with them.  I shouldn't have got them, only one of them let her down
the other day."

"Let her down?" repeated Miss Drewitt, sharply.  "Do you mean one of the
chairs in my bedroom?"

Mr. Tredgold nodded.  "Gave her rather a nasty fall," he said.  "I struck
while the iron was hot, and went and made her an offer while she was
still laid up from the effects of it.  It's the one standing against the
wall; the other's all right, with proper care."

Miss Drewitt, after a somewhat long interval, thanked him.

"You must have been very useful to my uncle," she said, slowly.  "I feel
sure that he would never have bought chairs like those of his own
accord."

"He has been at sea all his life," said Mr. Tredgold, in extenuation.
You haven't seen him for a long time, have you?"

"Ten years," was the reply.

"He is delightful company," said Mr. Tredgold.  "His life has been one
long series of adventures in every quarter of the globe.  His stock of
yarns is like the widow's cruse.  And here he comes," he added, as a
dilapidated fly drew up at the house and an elderly man, with a red,
weatherbeaten face, partly hidden in a cloud of grey beard, stepped out
and stood in the doorway, regarding the girl with something almost akin
to embarrassment.

"It's not--not Prudence?" he said at length, holding out his hand and
staring at her.

[Illustration: Prudence]

"Yes, uncle," said the girl.

They shook hands, and Captain Bowers, reaching up for a cage containing a
parrot, which had been noisily entreating the cabman for a kiss all the
way from the station, handed that flustered person his fare and entered
the house again.

"Glad to see you, my lad," he said, shaking hands with Mr. Tredgold and
glancing covertly at his niece.  "I hope you haven't been waiting long,"
he added, turning to the latter.

"No," said Miss Drewitt, regarding him with a puzzled air.

"I missed the train," said the captain.  "We must try and manage better
next time.  I0-I hope you'll be comfortable."

"Thank you," said the girl.

"You--you are very like your poor mother," said the captain.

"I hope so," said Prudence.

She stole up to the captain and, after a moment's hesitation, kissed his
cheek.  The next moment she was caught up and crushed in the arms of a
powerful and affectionate bear.

"Blest if I hardly knew how to take you at first," said the captain, his
red face shining with gratification.  "Little girls are one thing, but
when they grow up into"--he held her away and looked at her  proudly--
"into handsome and dignified-looking  young women, a man doesn't quite
know where he is."  He took her in his arms again and, kissing her
forehead, winked delightedly in the direction of Mr. Tredgold, who was
affecting to look out of the window.

"My man'll be in soon," he said, releasing the girl, "and then we'll see
about some tea.  He met me at the station and I sent him straight off for
things to eat."

"Your man?" said Miss Drewitt.

"Yes; I thought a man would be easier to manage than a girl," said the
captain, knowingly.  "You can be freer with 'em in the matter of language,
and then there's no followers or anything of that kind.  I got him to
sign articles ship-shape and proper.  Mr. Tredgold recommended him."

"No, no," said that gentleman, hastily.

"I asked you before he signed on with me," said the captain, pointing a
stumpy forefinger at him.  "I made a point of it, and you told me that
you had never heard anything against him."

"I don't call that a recommendation," said Mr. Tredgold.

"It's good enough in these days," retorted the captain, gloomily.  "A man
that has got a character like that is hard to find."

"He might be artful and keep his faults to himself," suggested Tredgold.

"So long as he does that, it's all right," said Captain Bowers.  "I can't
find fault if there's no faults to find fault with.  The best steward I
ever had, I found out afterwards, had escaped from gaol.  He never wanted
to go ashore, and when the ship was in port almost lived in his pantry."

"I never heard of Tasker having been in gaol," said Mr. Tredgold.
"Anyhow, I'm certain that he never broke out of one; he's far too
stupid."

As he paid this tribute the young man referred to entered laden with
parcels, and, gazing awkwardly at the company, passed through the room on
tiptoe and began to busy himself in the pantry.  Mr. Tredgold, refusing
the captain's invitation to stay for a cup of tea, took his departure.

"Very nice youngster that," said the captain, looking after him.  "A
little bit light-hearted in his ways, perhaps, but none the worse for
that."

He sat down and looked round at his possessions.  "The first real home
I've had for nearly fifty years," he said, with great content.  "I hope
you'll be as happy here as I intend to be.  It sha'n't be my fault if
you're not."

Mr. Tredgold walked home deep in thought, and by the time he had arrived
there had come to the conclusion that if Miss Drewitt favoured her
mother, that lady must have been singularly unlike Captain Bowers in
features.




CHAPTER II

In less than a week Captain Bowers had settled down comfortably in his
new command.  A set of rules and regulations by which Mr. Joseph Tasker
was to order his life was framed and hung in the pantry.  He studied it
with care, and, anxious that there should be no possible chance of a
misunderstanding, questioned the spelling in three instances.  The
captain's explanation that he had spelt those words in the American style
was an untruthful reflection upon a great and friendly nation.

Dialstone Lane was at first disposed to look askance at Mr. Tasker.
Old-fashioned matrons clustered round to watch him cleaning the doorstep,
and, surprised at its whiteness, withdrew discomfited.  Rumour had it
that he liked work, and scandal said that he had wept because he was not
allowed to do the washing.

[Illustration: "Old-fashioned matrons clustered round to watch him
cleaning the doorstep."]

The captain attributed this satisfactory condition of affairs to the
rules and regulations, though a slight indiscretion on the part of Mr.
Tasker, necessitating the unframing of the document to add to the latter,
caused him a little annoyance.

The first intimation he had of it was a loud knocking at the front door
as he sat dozing one afternoon in his easy-chair.  In response to his
startled cry of  "Come in!" the door opened and a small man, in a state
of considerable agitation, burst into the room and confronted him.

"My name is Chalk," he said, breathlessly.

"A friend of Mr. Tredgold's?" said the captain.  "I've heard of you,
sir."

The visitor paid no heed.

"My wife wishes to know whether she has got to dress in the dark every
afternoon for the rest of her life," he said, in fierce but trembling
tones.

"Got to dress in the dark?" repeated the astonished captain.

"With the blind down," explained the other.

Captain Bowers looked him up and down.  He saw a man of about fifty
nervously fingering the little bits of fluffy red whisker which grew at
the sides of his face, and trying to still the agitation of his tremulous
mouth.

"How would you like it yourself?" demanded the visitor, whose manner was
gradually becoming milder and milder.  "How would you like a telescope a
yard long pointing--"

He broke off abruptly as the captain, with a smothered oath, dashed out
of his chair into the garden and stood shaking his fist at the
crow's-nest at the bottom.

"Joseph!" he bawled.

"Yes, sir," said Mr. Tasker, removing the telescope described by Mr.
Chalk from his eye, and leaning over.

"What are you doing with that spy-glass?" demanded his master, beckoning
to the visitor, who had drawn near.  "How dare you stare in at people's
windows?"

"I wasn't, sir," replied Mr. Tasker, in an injured voice.  "I wouldn't
think o' such a thing--I couldn't, not if I tried."

"You'd got it pointed straight at my bedroom window," cried Mr. Chalk, as
he accompanied the captain down the garden.  "And it ain't the first
time."

"I wasn't, sir," said the steward, addressing his master.  "I was
watching the martins under the eaves."

"You'd got it pointed at my window," persisted the visitor.

"That's where the nests are," said Mr. Tasker, "but I wasn't looking in
at the window.  Besides, I noticed you always pulled the blind down when
you saw me looking, so I thought it didn't matter."

"We can't do anything without being followed about by that telescope,"
said Mr. Chalk, turning to the captain.  "My wife had our house built
where it is on purpose, so that we shouldn't be overlooked.  We didn't
bargain for a thing like that sprouting up in a back-garden."

"I'm very sorry," said the captain.  "I wish you'd told me of it before.
If I catch you up there again," he cried, shaking his fist at Mr. Tasker,
"you'll remember it.  Come down!"

Mr. Tasker, placing the glass under his arm, came slowly and reluctantly
down the ratlines.

"I wasn't looking in at the window, Mr. Chalk," he said, earnestly.  "I
was watching the birds.  O' course, I couldn't help seeing in a bit, but
I always shifted the spy-glass at once if there was anything that I
thought I oughtn't--"

"That'll do," broke in the captain, hastily.  "Go in and get the tea
ready.  If I so much as see you looking at that glass again we part, my
lad, mind that."

"I don't suppose he meant any harm," said the mollified Mr. Chalk, after
the crestfallen Joseph had gone into the house.  "I hope I haven't been
and said too much, but my wife insisted on me coming round and speaking
about it."

"You did quite right," said the captain, "and I thank you for coming.  I
told him he might go up there occasionally, but I particularly warned him
against giving any annoyance to the neighbours."

"I suppose," said Mr. Chalk, gazing at the erection with interest--
"I suppose there's a good view from up there?  It's like having a ship in
the garden, and it seems to remind you of the North Pole, and whales, and
Northern Lights."

Five minutes later Mr. Tasker, peering through the pantry window, was
surprised to see Mr. Chalk ascending with infinite caution to the
crow's-nest.  His high hat was jammed firmly over his brows and the
telescope was gripped tightly under his right arm.  The journey was
evidently regarded as one of extreme peril by the climber; but he held on
gallantly and, arrived at the top, turned a tremulous telescope on to the
horizon.

Mr. Tasker took a deep breath and resumed his labours.  He set the table,
and when the water boiled made the tea, and went down the garden to
announce the fact.  Mr. Chalk was still up aloft, and even at that height
the pallor of his face was clearly discernible.  It was evident to the
couple below that the terrors of the descent were too much for him, but
that he was too proud to say so.

"Nice view up there," called the captain.

"B--b--beautiful," cried Mr. Chalk, with an attempt at enthusiasm.

The captain paced up and down impatiently; his tea was getting cold, but
the forlorn figure aloft made no sign.  The captain waited a little
longer, and then, laying hold of the shrouds, slowly mounted until his
head was above the platform.

"Shall I take the glass for you?" he inquired.

Mr. Chalk, clutching the edge of the cask, leaned over and handed it
down.

"My--my foot's gone to sleep," he stammered.

"Ho!  Well, you must be careful how you get down," said the captain,
climbing on to the platform.  "Now, gently."

He put the telescope back into the cask, and, beckoning Mr. Tasker to
ascend, took Mr. Chalk in a firm grasp and lowered him until he was able
to reach Mr. Tasker's face with his foot.  After that the descent was
easy, and Mr. Chalk, reaching ground once more, spent two or three
minutes in slapping and rubing, and other remedies prescribed for sleepy
feet.

[Illustration: "He took Mr. Chalk in a firm grasp and lowered him."]

"There's few gentlemen that would have come down at all with their foot
asleep," remarked Mr. Tasker, pocketing a shilling, when the captain's
back was turned.

Mr. Chalk, still pale and shaking somewhat, smiled feebly and followed
the captain into the house.  The latter offered a cup of tea, which the
visitor, after a faint protest, accepted, and taking a seat at the table
gazed in undisguised admiration at the nautical appearance of the room.

"I could fancy myself aboard ship," he declared.

"Are you fond of the sea?" inquired the captain.

"I love it," said Mr. Chalk, fervently.  "It was always my idea from a
boy to go to sea, but somehow I didn't.  I went into my father's business
instead, but I never liked it.  Some people are fond of a stay-at-home
life, but I always had a hankering after adventures."

The captain shook his head.  "Ha!" he said, impressively.

"You've had a few in your time," said Mr. Chalk, looking at him,
grudgingly; "Edward Tredgold was telling me so."

"Man and boy, I was at sea forty-nine years," remarked the captain.
"Naturally things happened in that time; it would have been odd if they
hadn't.  It's all in a lifetime."

"Some lifetimes," said Mr. Chalk, gloomily.  "I'm fifty-one next year,
and the only thing I ever had happen to me was seeing a man stop a
runaway horse and cart."

He shook his head solemnly over his monotonous career, and, gazing at a
war-club from Samoa which hung over the fireplace, put a few leading
questions to the captain concerning the manner in which it came into his
possession.  When Prudence came in half an hour later he was still
sitting there, listening with rapt attention to his host's tales of
distant seas.

It was the first of many visits.  Sometimes he brought Mr. Tredgold and
sometimes Mr. Tredgold brought him.  The terrors of the crow's-nest
vanished before his persevering attacks, and perched there with the
captain's glass he swept the landscape with the air of an explorer
surveying a strange and hostile country.

It was a fitting prelude to the captain's tales afterwards, and Mr.
Chalk, with the stem of his long pipe withdrawn from his open mouth,
would sit enthralled as his host narrated picturesque incidents of
hairbreadth escapes, or, drawing his chair to the table, made rough maps
for his listener's clearer understanding.  Sometimes the captain took him
to palm-studded islands in the Southern Seas; sometimes to the ancient
worlds of China and Japan.  He became an expert in nautical terms.  He
walked in knots, and even ordered a new carpet in fathoms--after the
shop-keeper had demonstrated, by means of his little boy's arithmetic
book, the difference between that measurement and a furlong.

[Illustration: "Sometimes the captain took him to palm-studded islands in
the Southern Seas."]

"I'll have a voyage before I'm much older," he remarked one afternoon, as
he sat in the captain's sitting-room.  "Since I retired from business
time hangs very heavy sometimes.  I've got a fancy for a small yacht, but
I suppose I couldn't go a long voyage in a small one?"

"Smaller the better," said Edward Tredgold, who was sitting by the window
watching Miss Drewitt sewing.

Mr. Chalk took his pipe from his mouth and eyed him inquiringly.

"Less to lose," explained Mr. Tredgold, with a scarcely perceptible
glance at the captain.  "Look at the dangers you'd be dragging your craft
into, Chalk; there would be no satisfying you with a quiet cruise in the
Mediterranean."

"I shouldn't run into unnecessary danger," said Mr. Chalk, seriously.
"I'm a married man, and there's my wife to think of.  What would become
of her if anything happened to me?"

"Why, you've got plenty of money to leave, haven't you?" inquired Mr.
Tredgold.

"I was thinking of her losing me," replied Mr. Chalk, with a touch of
acerbity.

"Oh, I didn't think of that," said the other.  "Yes, to be sure."

"Captain Bowers was telling me the other day of a woman who wore widow's
weeds for thirty-five years," said Mr. Chalk, impressively.  "And all the
time her husband was married again and got a big family in Australia.
There's nothing in the world so faithful as a woman's heart."

"Well, if you're lost on a cruise, I shall know where to look for you,"
said Mr. Tredgold.  "But I don't think the captain ought to put such
ideas into your head."

Mr. Chalk looked bewildered.  Then he scratched his left whisker with the
stem of his churchwarden pipe and looked severely over at Mr. Tredgold.

"I don't think you ought to talk that way before ladies," he said,
primly.  "Of course, I know you're only in joke, but there's some people
can't see jokes as quick as others and they might get a wrong idea of
you."

"What part did you think of going to for your cruise?" interposed Captain
Bowers.

"There's nothing settled yet," said Mr. Chalk; "it's just an idea, that's
all.  I was talking to your father the other day," he added, turning to
Mr. Tredgold; "just sounding him, so to speak."

"You take him," said that dutiful son, briskly.  "It would do him a world
of good; me, too."

"He said he couldn't afford either the time or the money," said Mr.
Chalk.  "The thing to do would be to combine business with pleasure--to
take a yacht and find a sunken galleon loaded with gold pieces.  I've
heard of such things being done."

"I've heard of it," said the captain, nodding.

"Bottom of the ocean must be paved with them in places," said Mr.
Tredgold, rising, and following Miss Drewitt, who had gone into the
garden to plant seeds.

Mr. Chalk refilled his pipe and, accepting a match from the captain,
smoked slowly.  His gaze was fixed on the window, but instead of
Dialstone Lane he saw tumbling blue seas and islets far away.

"That's something you've never come across, I suppose, Captain Bowers?"
he remarked at last.

"No," said the other.

Mr. Chalk, with a vain attempt to conceal his disappointment, smoked on
for some time in silence.  The blue seas disappeared, and he saw instead
the brass knocker of the house opposite.

"Nor any other kind of craft with treasure aboard, I suppose?" he
suggested, at last.

The captain put his hands on his knees and stared at the floor.  "No," he
said, slowly,  "I can't call to mind any craft; but it's odd that you
should have got on this subject with me."

Mr. Chalk laid his pipe carefully on the table.

"Why?" he inquired.

"Well," said the captain, with a short laugh, "it is odd, that's all."

Mr. Chalk fidgeted with the stem of his pipe.  "You know of sunken
treasure somewhere?" he said, eagerly.

The captain smiled and shook his head; the other watched him narrowly.

"You know of some treasure?" he said, with conviction.

"Not what you could call sunken," said the captain, driven to bay.

Mr. Chalk's pale-blue eyes opened to their fullest extent.  "Ingots?"
he queried.

The other shook his head.  "It's a secret," he remarked; "we won't talk
about it."

"Yes, of course, naturally, I don't expect you to tell me where it is,"
said Mr. Chalk, "but I thought it might be interesting to hear about,
that's all."

"It's buried," said the captain, after a long pause.  "I don't know that
there's any harm in telling you that; buried in a small island in the
South Pacific."

"Have you seen it?" inquired Mr. Chalk.

"I buried it," rejoined the other.

Mr. Chalk sank back in his chair and regarded him with awestruck
attention; Captain Bowers, slowly ramming home a charge of tobacco with
his thumb, smiled quietly.

"Buried it," he repeated, musingly, "with the blade of an oar for a
spade.  It was a long job, but it's six foot down and the dead man it
belonged to atop of it."

The pipe fell from the listener's fingers and smashed unheeded on the
floor.

"You ought to make a book of it," he said at last.

The captain shook his head.  "I haven't got the gift of story-telling,"
he said, simply.  "Besides, you can understand I don't want it noised
about.  People might bother me."

He leaned back in his chair and bunched his beard in his hand; the other,
watching him closely, saw that his thoughts were busy with some scene in
his stirring past.

"Not a friend of yours, I hope?" said Mr. Chalk, at last.

"Who?" inquired the captain, starting from his reverie.

"The dead man atop of the treasure," replied the other.

"No," said the captain, briefly.

"Is it worth much?" asked Mr. Chalk.

"Roughly speaking, about half a million," responded the captain, calmly.

Mr. Chalk rose and walked up and down the room.  His eyes were bright and
his face pinker than usual.

"Why don't you get it?" he demanded, at last, pausing in front of his
host.

"Why, it ain't mine," said the captain, staring.  "D'ye think I'm a
thief?"

Mr. Chalk stared in his turn.  "But who does it belong to, then?" he
inquired.

"I don't know," replied the captain.  "All I know is, it isn't mine, and
that's enough for me.  Whether it was rightly come by I don't know.
There it is, and there it'll stay till the crack of doom."

"Don't you know any of his relations or friends?" persisted the other.

"I know nothing of him except his name," said the captain, "and I doubt
if even that was his right one.  Don Silvio he called himself--a
Spaniard.  It's over ten years ago since it happened.  My ship had been
bought by a firm in Sydney, and while I was waiting out there I went for
a little run on a schooner among the islands.  This Don Silvio was aboard
of her as a passenger.  She went to pieces in a gale, and we were the
only two saved.  The others were washed overboard, but we got ashore in
the boat, and I thought from the trouble he was taking over his bag that
the danger had turned his brain."

"Ah!" said the keenly interested Mr. Chalk.

"He was a sick man aboard ship," continued the captain, "and I soon saw
that he hadn't saved his life for long.  He saw it, too, and before he
died he made me promise that the bag should be buried with him and never
disturbed.  After I'd promised, he opened the bag and showed me what was
in it.  It was full of precious stones--diamonds, rubies, and the like;
some of them as large as birds' eggs.  I can see him now, propped up
against the boat and playing with them in the sunlight.  They blazed like
stars.  Half a million he put them at, or more."

"What good could they be to him when he was dead?" inquired the listener.

Captain Bowers shook his head.  "That was his business, not mine," he
replied.  "It was nothing to do with me.  When he died I dug a grave for
him, as I told you, with a bit of a broken oar, and laid him and the bag
together.  A month afterwards I was taken off by a passing schooner and
landed safe at Sydney."

Mr. Chalk stopped, and mechanically picking up the pieces of his pipe
placed them on the table.

"Suppose that you had heard afterwards that the things had been stolen?"
he remarked.

"If I had, then I should have given information, I think," said the
other.  "It all depends."

"Ah! but how could you have found them again?" inquired Mr. Chalk, with
the air of one propounding a poser.

[Illustration: "'How could you have found them again?' inquired Mr.
Chalk, with the air of one propounding a poser."]


"With my map," said the captain, slowly.  "Before I left I made a map of
the island and got its position from the schooner that picked me up; but
I never heard a word from that day to this."

"Could you find them now?" said Mr. Chalk.

"Why not?" said the captain, with a short laugh.  "The island hasn't run
away."

He rose as he spoke and, tossing the fragments of his visitor's pipe into
the fireplace, invited him to take a turn in the garden.  Mr. Chalk,
after a feeble attempt to discuss the matter further, reluctantly obeyed.




CHAPTER III

Mr. Chalk, with his mind full of the story he had just heard, walked
homewards like a man in a dream.  The air was fragrant with spring and
the scent of lilac revived memories almost forgotten.  It took him back
forty years, and showed him a small boy treading the same road, passing
the same houses.  Nothing had changed so much as the small boy himself;
nothing had been so unlike the life he had pictured as the life he had
led.  Even the blamelessness of the latter yielded no comfort; it
savoured of a lack of spirit.

[Illustration: "A small boy treading the same road."]

His mind was still busy with the past when he reached home.  Mrs. Chalk,
a woman of imposing appearance, who was sitting by the window at
needlework, looked up sharply at his entrance.  Before she spoke he had a
dim idea that she was excited about something.

"I've got her," she said, triumphantly.

"Oh!" said Mr. Chalk.

"She didn't want to come at first," said Mrs. Chalk; "she'd half promised
to go to Mrs. Morris.  Mrs. Morris had heard of her through Harris, the
grocer, and he only knew she was out of a place by accident.  He--"

Her words fell on deaf ears.  Mr. Chalk, gazing through the window, heard
without comprehending a long account of the capture of a new housemaid,
which, slightly altered as to name and place, would have passed muster as
an exciting contest between a skilful angler and a particularly sulky
salmon.  Mrs. Chalk, noticing his inattention at last, pulled up sharply.

"You're not listening!" she cried.

"Yes, I am; go on, my dear," said Mr. Chalk.

"What did I say she left her last place for, then?" demanded the lady.

Mr. Chalk started.  He had been conscious of his wife's voice, and that
was all.  "You said you were not surprised at her leaving," he replied,
slowly; "the only wonder to you was that a decent girl should have stayed
there so long."

Mrs. Chalk started and bit her lip.  "Yes," she said, slowly.  "Ye-es.
Go on; anything else?"

"You said the house wanted cleaning from top to bottom," said the
painstaking Mr. Chalk.

"Go on," said his wife, in a smothered voice.  "What else did I say?"

"Said you pitied the husband," continued Mr. Chalk, thoughtfully.

Mrs. Chalk rose suddenly and stood over him.  Mr. Chalk tried desperately
to collect his faculties.

"How dare you?" she gasped.  "I've never said such things in my life.
Never.  And I said that she left because Mr. Wilson, her master, was dead
and the family had gone to London.  I've never been near the house; so
how could I say such things?"

Mr. Chalk remained silent.

"What made you think of such things?"  persisted Mrs. Chalk.

Mr. Chalk shook his head; no satisfactory reply was possible.  "My
thoughts were far away," he said, at last.

His wife bridled and said,  "Oh, indeed!"  Mr. Chalk's mother, dead some
ten years before, had taken a strange pride--possibly as a protest
against her only son's appearance--in hinting darkly at a stormy and
chequered past.  Pressed for details she became more mysterious still,
and, saying that "she knew what she knew," declined to be deprived of the
knowledge under any consideration.  She also informed her daughter-in-law
that "what the eye don't see the heart don't grieve," and that it was
better to "let bygones be bygones," usually winding up with the advice to
the younger woman to keep her eye on Mr. Chalk without letting him see
it.

"Peckham Rye is a long way off, certainly," added the indignant Mrs.
Chalk, after a pause.  "It's a pity you haven't got something better to
think of, at your time of life, too."

Mr. Chalk flushed.  Peckham Rye was one of the nuisances bequeathed by
his mother.

"I was thinking of the sea," he said, loftily.

Mrs. Chalk pounced.  "Oh, Yarmouth," she said, with withering scorn.

Mr. Chalk flushed deeper than before.  "I wasn't thinking of such
things," he declared.

"What things?" said his wife, swiftly.

"The--the things you're alluding to," said the harassed Mr. Chalk.

"Ah!" said his wife, with a toss of her head.  "Why you should get red in
the face and confused when I say Peckham Rye and Yarmouth are a long way
off is best known to yourself.  It's very funny that the moment either of
these places is mentioned you get uncomfortable.  People might read a
geography-book out loud in my presence and it wouldn't affect me."

She swept out of the room, and Mr. Chalk's thoughts, excited by the magic
word geography, went back to the island again.  The half-forgotten dreams
of his youth appeared to be materializing.  Sleepy Binchester ended for
him at Dialstone Lane, and once inside the captain's room the enchanted
world beyond the seas was spread before his eager gaze.  The captain,
amused at first at his enthusiasm, began to get weary of the subject of
the island, and so far the visitor had begged in vain for a glimpse of
the map.

His enthusiasm became contagious.  Prudence, entering one evening in the
middle of a conversation, heard sufficient to induce her to ask for more,
and the captain, not without some reluctance and several promptings from
Mr. Chalk when he showed signs of omitting vital points, related the
story.  Edward Tredgold heard it, and, judging by the frequency of his
visits, was almost as interested as Mr. Chalk.

"I can't see that there could be any harm in just looking at the map,"
said Mr. Chalk, one evening.  "You could keep your thumb on any part you
wanted to."

"Then we should know where to dig," urged Mr. Tredgold.  "Properly
managed there ought to be a fortune in your innocence, Chalk."

Mr. Chalk eyed him fixedly.  "Seeing that the latitude and longitude and
all the directions are written on the back," he observed, with cold
dignity,  "I don't see the force of your remarks."

"Well, in that case, why not show it to Mr. Chalk, uncle?" said
Prudence, charitably.

Captain Bowers began to show signs of annoyance.  "Well, my dear," he
began, slowly.

"Then Miss Drewitt could see it too," said Mr. Tredgold, blandly.

Miss Drewitt reddened with indignation.  "I could see it any time I
wished," she said, sharply.

"Well, wish now," entreated Mr. Tredgold.  "As a matter of fact, I'm
dying with curiosity myself.  Bring it out and make it crackle, captain;
it's a bank-note for half a million."

The captain shook his head and a slight frown marred his usually amiable
features.  He got up and, turning his back on them, filled his pipe from
a jar on the mantelpiece.

"You never will see it, Chalk," said Edward Tredgold, in tones of much
conviction.  "I'll bet you two to one in golden sovereigns that you'll
sink into your honoured family vault with your justifiable curiosity
still unsatisfied.  And I shouldn't wonder if your perturbed spirit walks
the captain's bedroom afterwards."

Miss Drewitt looked up and eyed the speaker with scornful comprehension.
"Take the bet, Mr. Chalk," she said, slowly.

Mr. Chalk turned in hopeful amaze; then he leaned over and shook hands
solemnly with Mr. Tredgold.  "I'll take the bet," he said.

"Uncle will show it to you to please me," announced Prudence, in a clear
voice.  "Won't you, uncle?"

The captain turned and took the matches from the table.  "Certainly, my
dear, if I can find it," he said, in a hesitating fashion.  "But I'm
afraid I've mislaid it.  I haven't seen it since I unpacked."

"Mislaid it!" ejaculated the startled Mr. Chalk.  "Good heavens!  Suppose
somebody should find it?  What about your word to Don Silvio then?"

"I've got it somewhere," said the captain, brusquely; "I'll have a hunt
for it.  All the same, I don't know that it's quite fair to interfere in
a bet."

Miss Drewitt waved the objection away, remarking that people who made
bets must risk losing their money.

"I'll begin to save up," said Mr. Tredgold, with a lightness which was
not lost upon Miss Drewitt.  "The captain has got to find it before you
can see it, Chalk."

Mr. Chalk, with a satisfied smile, said that when the captain promised a
thing it was as good as done.

For the next few days he waited patiently, and, ransacking an old
lumber-room, divided his time pretty equally between a volume of
"Captain Cook's Voyages" that he found there and  "Famous Shipwrecks."
By this means and the exercise of great self-control he ceased from
troubling Dialstone Lane for a week.  Even then it was Edward Tredgold
who took him there.  The latter was in high spirits, and in explanation
informed the company, with a cheerful smile, that he had saved five and
ninepence, and was forming habits which bade fair to make him a rich man
in time.

[Illustration: "He ransacked an old lumber-room."]

"Don't you be in too much of a hurry to find that map, captain," he said.

"It's found," said Miss Drewitt, with a little note of triumph in her
voice.

"Found it this morning," said Captain Bowers.  He crossed over to an oak
bureau which stood in the corner by the fireplace, and taking a paper
from a pigeon-hole slowly unfolded it and spread it on the table before
the delighted Mr. Chalk.  Miss Drewitt and Edward Tredgold advanced to
the table and eyed it curiously.

The map, which was drawn in lead-pencil, was on a piece of ruled paper,
yellow with age and cracked in the folds.  The island was in shape a
rough oval, the coast-line being broken by small bays and headlands.  Mr.
Chalk eyed it with all the fervour usually bestowed on a holy relic, and,
breathlessly reading off such terms as  "Cape Silvio,"  "Bowers Bay," and
"Mount Lonesome," gazed with breathless interest at the discoverer.

"And is that the grave?" he inquired, in a trembling voice, pointing to a
mark in the north-east corner.

The captain removed it with his finger-nail.  "No," he said, briefly.
"For full details see the other side."

For one moment Mr. Chalk hoped; then his face fell as Captain Bowers,
displaying for a fraction of a second the writing on the other side, took
up the map and, replacing it in the bureau, turned the key in the lock
and with a low laugh resumed his seat.  Miss Drewitt, glancing over at
Edward Tredgold, saw that he looked very thoughtful.

"You've lost your bet," she said, pointedly.

"I know," was the reply.

His gaiety had vanished and he looked so dejected that Miss Drewitt was
reminded of the ruined gambler in a celebrated picture.  She tried to
quiet her conscience by hoping that it would be a lesson to him.  As she
watched, Mr. Tredgold dived into his left trouser-pocket and counted out
some coins, mostly brown.  To these he added a few small pieces of silver
gleaned from his waistcoat, and then after a few seconds' moody thought
found a few more in the other trouser-pocket.

"Eleven and tenpence," he said, mechanically.

"Any time," said Mr. Chalk, regarding him with awkward surprise.  "Any
time."

"Give him an I O U," said Captain Bowers, fidgeting.

"Yes, any time," repeated Mr. Chalk;  "I'm in no hurry."

"No; I'd sooner pay now and get it over," said the other, still fumbling
in his pockets.  "As Miss Drewitt says, people who make bets must be
prepared to lose; I thought I had more than this."

There was an embarrassing silence, during which Miss Drewitt, who had
turned very red, felt strangely uncomfortable.  She felt more
uncomfortable still when Mr. Tredgold, discovering a bank-note and a
little collection of gold coins in another pocket, artlessly expressed
his joy at the discovery.  The simple-minded captain and Mr. Chalk both
experienced a sense of relief; Miss Drewitt sat and simmered in helpless
indignation.

"You're careless in money matters, my lad," said the captain,
reprovingly.

"I couldn't understand him making all that fuss over a couple o' pounds,"
said Mr. Chalk, looking round.  "He's very free, as a rule; too free."

Mr. Tredgold, sitting grave and silent, made no reply to these charges,
and the girl was the only one to notice a faint twitching at the corners
of his mouth.  She saw it distinctly, despite the fact that her clear,
grey eyes were fixed dreamily on a spot some distance above his head.

She sat in her room upstairs after the visitors had gone, thinking it
over.  The light was fading fast, and as she sat at the open window the
remembrance of Mr. Tredgold's conduct helped to mar one of the most
perfect evenings she had ever known.

Downstairs the captain was also thinking.  Dialstone Lane was in shadow,
and already one or two lamps were lit behind drawn blinds.  A little
chatter of voices at the end of the lane floated in at the open window,
mellowed by distance.  His pipe was out, and he rose to search in the
gloom for a match, when another murmur of voices reached his ears from
the kitchen.  He stood still and listened intently.  To put matters
beyond all doubt, the shrill laugh of a girl was plainly audible.  The
captain's face hardened, and, crossing to the fireplace, he rang the
bell.

"Yessir," said Joseph, as he appeared and closed the door carefully
behind him.

"What are you talking to yourself in that absurd manner for?" inquired
the captain with great dignity.

"Me, sir?" said Mr. Tasker, feebly.

"Yes, you," repeated the captain, noticing with surprise that the door
was slowly opening.

Mr. Tasker gazed at him in a troubled fashion, but made no reply.

"I won't have it," said the captain, sternly, with a side glance at the
door.  "If you want to talk to yourself go outside and do it.  I never
heard such a laugh.  What did you do it for?  It was like an old woman
with a bad cold."

He smiled grimly in the darkness, and then started slightly as a cough, a
hostile, challenging cough, sounded from the kitchen.  Before he could
speak the cough ceased and a thin voice broke carelessly into song.

"WHAT!" roared the captain, in well-feigned astonishment.  "Do you mean
to tell me you've got somebody in my pantry?  Go and get me those rules
and regulations."

Mr. Tasker backed out, and the captain smiled again as he heard a
whispered discussion.  Then a voice clear and distinct took command.
"I'll take'em in myself, I tell you," it said.  "I'll rules and
regulations him."

The smile faded from the captain's face, and he gazed in perplexity at
the door as a strange young woman bounced into the room.

"Here's your rules and regulations," said the intruder, in a somewhat
shrewish voice.  "You'd better light the lamp if you want to see'em;
though the spelling ain't so noticeable in the dark."

The impressiveness of the captain's gaze was wasted in the darkness.  For
a moment he hesitated, and then, with the dignity of a man whose spelling
has nothing to conceal, struck a match and lit the lamp.  The lamp
lighted, he lowered the blind, and then seating himself by the window
turned with a majestic air to a thin slip of a girl with tow-coloured
hair, who stood by the door.

"Who are you?"  he demanded, gruffly.

"My name's Vickers," said the young lady.  "Selina Vickers.  I heard all
what you've been saying to my Joseph, but, thank goodness, I can take my
own part.  I don't want nobody to fight my battles for me.  If you've got
anything to say about my voice you can say it to my face."

[Illustration: "Selina Vickers."]

Captain Bowers sat back and regarded her with impressive dignity.  Miss
Vickers met his gaze calmly and, with a pair of unwinking green eyes,
stared him down.

"What were you doing in my pantry?"  demanded the captain, at last.

"I was in your kitchen," replied Miss Vickers, with scornful emphasis on
the last word, "to see my young man."

"Well, I can't have you there," said the captain, with a mildness that
surprised himself.  "One of my rules--"

Miss Vickers interposed.  "I've read'em all over and over again," she
said, impatiently.

"If it occurs again," said the other,  "I shall have to speak to Joseph
very seriously about it."

"Talk to me," said Miss Vickers, sharply; "that's what I come in for.
I can talk to you better than what Joseph can, I know. What harm do you
think I was doing your old kitchen?  Don't you try and interfere between
me and my Joseph, because I won't have it.  You're not married yourself,
and you don't want other people to be.  How do you suppose the world
would get on if everybody was like you?"

Captain Bowers regarded her in open-eyed perplexity.  The door leading to
the garden had just closed behind the valiant Joseph, and he stared with
growing uneasiness at the slight figure of Miss Vickers as it stood
poised for further oratorical efforts.  Before he could speak she gave
her lips a rapid lick and started again.

"You're one of those people that don't like to see others happy, that's
what you are," she said, rapidly.  "I wasn't hurting your kitchen, and as
to talking and laughing there--what do you think my tongue was given to
me for?  Show?  P'r'aps if you'd been doing a day's hard work you'd--"

"Look here, my girl--" began the captain, desperately.

"Don't you my girl me, please," interrupted Miss Vickers.  "I'm not your
girl, thank goodness.  If I was you'd be a bit different, I can tell you.
If you had any girls you'd know better than to try and come between them
and their young men.  Besides, they wouldn't let you.  When a girl's got
a young man--"

The captain rose and went through the form of ringing the bell.  Miss
Vickers watched him calmly.

"I thought I'd just have it out with you for once and for all," she
continued.  "I told Joseph that I'd no doubt your bark was worse than
your bite.  And what he can see to be afraid of in you I can't think.
Nervous disposition, I s'pose.  Good evening."

She gave her head a little toss and, returning to the pantry, closed the
door after her.  Captain Bowers, still somewhat dazed, returned to his
chair and, gazing at the  "Rules," which still lay on the table, grinned
feebly in his beard.




CHAPTER IV

To keep such a romance to himself was beyond the powers of Mr. Chalk.
The captain had made no conditions as to secrecy, and he therefore
considered himself free to indulge in hints to his two greatest friends,
which caused those gentlemen to entertain some doubts as to his sanity.
Mr. Robert Stobell, whose work as a contractor had left a permanent and
unmistakable mark upon Binchester, became imbued with a hazy idea that
Mr. Chalk had invented a new process of making large diamonds.  Mr.
Jasper Tredgold, on the other hand, arrived at the conclusion that a
highly respectable burglar was offering for some reason to share his loot
with him.  A conversation between Messrs. Stobell and Tredgold in the
High Street only made matters more complicated.

"Chalk always was fond of making mysteries of things," complained Mr.
Tredgold.

Mr. Stobell, whose habit was taciturn and ruminative, fixed his dull
brown eyes on the ground and thought it over.  "I believe it's all my eye
and Betty Martin," he said, at length, quoting a saying which had been
used in his family as an expression of disbelief since the time of his
great-grandmother.

"He comes in to see me when I'm hard at work and drops hints," pursued
his friend.  "When I stop to pick'em up, out he goes.  Yesterday he came
in and asked me what I thought of a man who wouldn't break his word for
half a million.  Half a million, mind you!  I just asked him who it was,
and out he went again.  He pops in and out of my office like a figure on
a cuckoo-clock."

[Illustration: "He pops in and out of my office like a figure on a
cuckoo-clock."]

Mr. Stobell relapsed into thought again, but no gleam of expression
disturbed the lines of his heavy face; Mr. Tredgold, whose sharp, alert
features bred more confidence in his own clients than those of other
people, waited impatiently.

"He knows something that we don't," said Mr. Stobell, at last; "that's
what it is."

Mr. Tredgold, who was too used to his friend's mental processes to
quarrel with them, assented.

"He's coming round to smoke a pipe with me to-morrow night," he said,
briskly, as he turned to cross the road to his office.  "You come too,
and we'll get it out of him.  If Chalk can keep a secret he has altered,
that's all I can say."

His estimate of Mr. Chalk proved correct.  With Mr. Tredgold acting as
cross-examining counsel and Mr. Stobell enacting the part of a partial
and overbearing judge, Mr. Chalk, after a display of fortitude which
surprised himself almost as much as it irritated his friends, parted with
his news and sat smiling with gratification at their growing excitement.

"Half a million, and he won't go for it?" ejaculated Mr. Tredgold.  "The
man must be mad."

"No; he passed his word and he won't break it," said Mr. Chalk.  "The
captain's word is his bond, and I honour him for it.  I can quite
understand it."

Mr. Tredgold shrugged his shoulders and glanced at Mr. Stobell; that
gentleman, after due deliberation, gave an assenting nod.

"He can't get at it, that's the long and short of it," said Mr. Tredgold,
after a pause.  "He had to leave it behind when he was rescued, or else
risk losing it by telling the men who rescued him about it, and he's had
no opportunity since.  It wants money to take a ship out there and get
it, and he doesn't see his way quite clear.  He'll have it fast enough
when he gets a chance.  If not, why did he make that map?"

Mr. Chalk shook his head, and remarked mysteriously that the captain had
his reasons.  Mr. Tredgold relapsed into silence, and for some time the
only sound audible came from a briar-pipe which Mr. Stobell ought to have
thrown away some years before.

"Have you given up that idea of a yachting cruise of yours, Chalk?"
demanded Mr. Tredgold, turning on him suddenly.

"No," was the reply.  "I was talking about it to Captain Bowers only the
other day.  That's how I got to hear of the treasure."

Mr. Tredgold started and gave a significant glance at Mr. Stobell.  In
return he got a wink which that gentleman kept for moments of mental
confusion.

"What did the captain tell you for?"  pursued Mr. Tredgold, returning to
Mr. Chalk.  "He wanted you to make an offer.  He hasn't got the money for
such an expedition; you have.  The yarn about passing his word was so
that you shouldn't open your mouth too wide.  You were to do the
persuading, and then he could make his own terms.  Do you see?  Why, it's
as plain as A B C."

"Plain as the alphabet," said Mr. Stobell, almost chidingly.

Mr. Chalk gasped and looked from one to the other.

"I should like to have a chat with the captain about it," continued Mr.
Tredgold, slowly and impressively.  "I'm a business man and I could put
it on a business footing.  It's a big risk, of course; all those things
are . . .  but if we went shares . . .  if we found the money----"

He broke off and, filling his pipe slowly, gazed in deep thought at the
wall.  His friends waited expectantly.

"Combine business with pleasure," resumed Mr. Tredgold, lighting his
pipe; "sea-air . . . change . . . blow away the cobwebs . . . experience
for Edward to be left alone.  What do you think, Stobell?" he added,
turning suddenly.

Mr. Stobell gripped the arms of his chair in his huge hands and drew his
bulky figure to a more upright position.

"What do you mean by combining business with pleasure?" he said, eyeing
him with dull suspicion.

"Chalk is set on a trip for the love of it," explained Mr. Tredgold.

"If we take on the contract, he ought to pay a bigger share, then," said
the other, firmly.

"Perhaps he will," said Tredgold, hastily.

Mr. Stobell pondered again and, slightly raising one hand, indicated that
he was in the throes of another idea and did not wish to be disturbed.

"You said it would be experience for Edward to be left alone," he said,
accusingly.

"I did," was the reply.

"You ought to pay more, too, then," declared the contractor, "because
it's serving of your ends as well."

"We can't split straws," exclaimed Tredgold, impatiently.  "If the
captain consents we three will find the money and divide our portion,
whatever it is, equally."

Mr. Chalk, who had been in the clouds during this discussion, came back
to earth again.  "If he consents," he said, sadly; "but he won't."

"Well, he can only, refuse," said Mr. Tredgold; "and, anyway, we'll have
the first refusal.  Things like that soon get about.  What do you say to
a stroll?  I can think better while I'm walking."

His friends assenting, they put on their hats and sallied forth.  That
they should stroll in the direction of Dialstone Lane surprised neither
of them.  Mr. Tredgold leading, they went round by the church, and that
gentleman paused so long to admire the architecture that Mr. Stobell got
restless.

"You've seen it before, Tredgold," he said, shortly.

"It's a fine old building," said the other.  "Binchester ought to be
proud of it.  Why, here we are at Captain Bowers's!"

"The house has been next to the church for a couple o' hundred years,"
retorted his friend.

"Let's go in," said Mr. Tredgold.  "Strike while the iron's hot.  At any
rate," he concluded, as Mr. Chalk voiced feeble objections, "we can see
how the land lies."

He knocked at the door and then, stepping aside, left Mr. Chalk to lead
the way in.  Captain Bowers, who was sitting with Prudence, looked up at
their entrance, and putting down his newspaper extended a hearty welcome.

"Chalk didn't like to pass without looking in," said Mr. Tredgold, "and I
haven't seen you for some time.  You know Stobell?"

The captain nodded, and Mr. Chalk, pale with excitement, accepted his
accustomed pipe from the hands of Miss Drewitt and sat nervously awaiting
events.  Mr. Tasker set out the whisky, and, Miss Drewitt avowing a
fondness for smoke in other people, a comfortable haze soon filled the
room.  Mr. Tredgold, with a significant glance at Mr. Chalk, said that it
reminded him of a sea-fog.

It only reminded Mr. Chalk, however, of a smoky chimney from which he had
once suffered, and he at once entered into minute details.  The theme was
an inspiriting one, and before Mr. Tredgold could hark back to the sea
again Mr. Stobell was discoursing, almost eloquently for him, upon
drains.  From drains to the shortcomings of the district council they
progressed by natural and easy stages, and it was not until Miss Drewitt
had withdrawn to the clearer atmosphere above that a sudden ominous
silence ensued, which Mr. Chalk saw clearly he was expected to break.

"I--I've been telling them some of your adventures," he said,
desperately, as he glanced at the captain; "they're both interested in
such things."

The latter gave a slight start and glanced shrewdly at his visitors.
"Aye, aye," he said, composedly.

"Very interesting, some of them," murmured Mr. Tredgold.  "I suppose
you'll have another voyage or two before you've done?  One, at any rate."

"No," said the captain,  "I've had my share of the sea; other men may
have a turn now.  There's nothing to take me out again--nothing."

Mr. Tredgold coughed and murmured something about breaking off old habits
too suddenly.

"It's a fine career," sighed Mr. Chalk.

"A manly life," said Mr. Tredgold, emphatically.

"It's like every other profession, it has two sides to it," said the
captain.

"It is not so well paid as it should be," said the wily Tredgold, "but I
suppose one gets chances of making money in outside ways sometimes."

The captain assented, and told of a steward of his who had made a small
fortune by selling Japanese curios to people who didn't understand them.

The conversation was interesting, but extremely distasteful to a business
man intent upon business.  Mr. Stobell took his pipe out of his mouth and
cleared his throat.  "Why, you might build a hospital with it," he burst
out, impatiently.

"Build a hospital!" repeated the astonished captain, as Mr. Chalk bent
suddenly to do up his shoelace.

"Think of the orphans you could be a father to!" added Mr. Stobell,
making the most of an unwonted fit of altruism.

The captain looked inquiringly at Mr. Tredgold.

"And widows," said Mr. Stobell, and, putting his pipe in his mouth as a
sign that he had finished his remarks, gazed stolidly at the company.

"Stobell must be referring to a story Chalk told us of some precious
stones you buried, I think," said Mr. Tredgold, reddening.  "Aren't you,
Stobell?"

"Of course I am," said his friend.  "You know that."

Captain Bowers glanced at Mr. Chalk, but that gentleman was still busy
with his shoe-lace, only looking up when Mr. Tredgold, taking the bull by
the horns, made the captain a plain, straightforward offer to fit out and
give him the command of an expedition to recover the treasure.  In a
speech which included the benevolent Mr. Stobell's hospitals, widows, and
orphans, he pointed out a score of reasons why the captain should
consent, and wound up with a glowing picture of Miss Drewitt as the
heiress of the wealthiest man in Binchester.  The captain heard him
patiently to an end and then shook his head.

"I passed my word," he said, stiffly.

Mr. Stobell took his pipe out of his mouth again to offer a little
encouragement.  "Tredgold has broke his word before now," he observed;
"he's got quite a name for it."

"But you would go out if it were not for that?" inquired Tredgold,
turning a deaf ear to this remark.

"Naturally," said the captain, smiling; "but, then, you see I did."

Mr. Tredgold drummed with his fingers on the arms of his chair, and after
a little hesitation asked as a great favour to be permitted to see the
map.  As an estate agent, he said, he took a professional interest in
plans of all kinds.

Captain Bowers rose, and in the midst of an expectant silence took the
map from the bureau, and placing it on the table kept it down with his
fist.  The others drew near and inspected it.

[Illustration: "The others drew near and inspected it."]

"Nobody but Captain Bowers has ever seen the other side," said Mr. Chalk,
impressively.

"Except my niece," interposed the captain.  "She wanted to see it, and I
trust her as I would trust myself.  She thinks the same as I do about
it."

His stubby forefinger travelled slowly round the coast-line until, coming
to the extreme south-west corner, it stopped, and a mischievous smile
creased his beard.

"It's buried here," he observed.  "All you've got to do is to find the
island and dig in that spot."

Mr. Chalk laughed and shook his head as at a choice piece of waggishness.

"Suppose," said Mr. Tredgold, slowly--"suppose anybody found it without
your connivance, would you take your share?"

"Let'em find it first," said the captain.

"Yes, but would you?" inquired Mr. Chalk.

Captain Bowers took up the map and returned it to its place in the
bureau.  "You go and find it," he said, with a genial smile.

"You give us permission?" demanded Tredgold.

"Certainly," grinned the captain.  "I give you permission to go and dig
over all the islands in the Pacific; there's a goodish number of them,
and it's a fairly common shape."

"It seems to me it's nobody's property," said Tredgold, slowly.  "That is
to say, it's anybody's that finds it.  It isn't your property, Captain
Bowers?  You lay no claim to it?"

"No, no," said the captain.  "It's nothing to do with me.  You go and
find it," he repeated, with enjoyment.

Mr. Tredgold laughed too, and his eye travelled mechanically towards the
bureau.  "If we do," he said, cordially, "you shall have your share."

The captain thanked him and, taking up the bottle, refilled their
glasses.  Then, catching the dull, brooding eye of Mr. Stobell as that
plain-spoken man sat in a brown study trying to separate the serious from
the jocular, he drank success to their search.  He was about to give vent
to further pleasantries when he was stopped by the mysterious behaviour
of Mr. Chalk, who, first laying a finger on his lip to ensure silence,
frowned severely and nodded at the door leading to the kitchen.

The other three looked in the direction indicated.  The door stood half
open, and the silhouette of a young woman in a large hat put the upper
panels in shadow.  The captain rose and, with a vigorous thrust of his
foot, closed the door with a bang.

"Eavesdropping," said Mr. Chalk, in a tense whisper.

"There'll be a rival expedition," said the captain, falling in with his
mood.  "I've already warned that young woman off once.  You'd better
start tonight."

He leaned back in his chair and surveyed the company pleasantly.
Somewhat to Mr. Chalk's disappointment Mr. Tredgold began to discuss
agriculture, and they were still on that theme when they rose to depart
some time later.  Tredgold and Chalk bade the captain a cordial
good-night; but Stobell, a creature of primitive impulses, found it
difficult to shake hands with him.  On the way home he expressed an
ardent desire to tell the captain what men of sense thought of him.

The captain lit another pipe after they had gone, and for some time sat
smoking and thinking over the events of the evening.  Then Mr. Tasker's
second infringement of discipline occurred to him, and, stretching out
his hand, he rang the bell.

"Has that young woman gone?" he inquired, cautiously, as Mr. Tasker
appeared.

"Yessir," was the reply.

"What about your articles?" demanded the captain, with sudden loudness.
"What do you mean by it?"

Mr. Tasker eyed him forlornly.  "It ain't my fault," he said, at last.
"I don't want her."

"Eh?" said the other, sternly.  "Don't talk nonsense.  What do you have
her here for, then?"

"Because I can't help myself," said Mr. Tasker, desperately; "that's why.
She's took a fancy to me, and, that being so, it would take more than you
and me to keep 'er away."

"Rubbish," said his master.

Mr. Tasker smiled wanly.  "That's my reward for being steady," he said,
with some bitterness; "that's what comes of having a good name in the
place.  I get Selina Vickers after me."

"You--you must have asked her to come here in the first place," said the
astonished captain.

"Ask her?" repeated Mr. Tasker, with respectful scorn.  "Ask her?  She
don't want no asking."

"What does she come for, then?" inquired the other.

"Me," said Mr. Tasker, brokenly.  "I never dreamt o' such a thing.  I was
going 'er way one night--about three weeks ago, it was--and I walked with
her as far as her road-Mint Street.  Somehow it got put about that we
were walking out.  A week afterwards she saw me in Harris's, the
grocer's, and waited outside for me till I come out and walked 'ome with
me.  After she came in the other night I found we was keeping company.
To-night-tonight she got a ring out o' me, and now we're engaged."

"What on earth did you give her the ring for if you don't want her?"
inquired the captain, eyeing him with genuine concern.

"Ah, it seems easy, sir," said the unfortunate; "but you don't know
Selina.  She bought the ring and said I was to pay it off a shilling a
week.  She took the first shilling to-night."

His master sat back and regarded him in amazement.

"You don't know Selina, sir," repeated Mr. Tasker, in reply to this
manifestation.  "She always gets her own way.  Her father ain't 'it 'er
mother not since Selina was seventeen.  He dursent.  The last time Selina
went for him tooth and nail; smashed all the plates off the dresser
throwing 'em at him, and ended by chasing of him up the road in his
shirt-sleeves."

The captain grunted.

"That was two years ago," continued Mr. Tasker; "and his spirit's quite
broke.  He 'as to give all his money except a shilling a week to his
wife, and he's not allowed to go into pubs.  If he does it's no good,
because they won't serve 'im.  If they do Selina goes in next morning and
gives them a piece of 'er mind.  She don't care who's there or what she
says, and the consequence is Mr. Vickers can't get served in Binchester
for love or money.  That'll show you what she is."

"Well, tell her I won't have her here," said the captain, rising.
"Good-night."

"I've told her over and over again, sir," was the reply, "and all she
says is she's not afraid of you, nor six like you."

[Illustration: "All she says is she's not afraid of you, nor six like
you."]

The captain fell back silent, and Mr. Tasker, pausing in a respectful
attitude, watched him wistfully.  The captain's brows were bent in
thought, and Mr. Tasker, reminding himself that crews had trembled at his
nod and that all were silent when he spoke, felt a flutter of hope.

"Well," said the captain, sharply, as he turned and caught sight of him,
"what are you waiting there for?"

Mr. Tasker drifted towards the door which led upstairs.

"I--I thought you were thinking of something we could do to prevent her
coming, sir," he said, slowly.  "It's hard on me, because as a matter of
fact----"

"Well?" said the captain.

"I--I've 'ad my eye on another young lady for some time," concluded Mr.
Tasker.

He was standing on the bottom stair as he spoke, with his hand on the
latch.  Under the baleful stare with which the indignant captain favoured
him, he closed it softly and mounted heavily to bed.





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