Hocken and Hunken Part 58

"That was on the _Saltypool_," Fancy nodded. "And oh! Cap'n Hocken, I am so sorry! but that hundred pound o' yours is at the bottom of the sea."

"Well, my dear," said Cai after a pause, pulling a wry face, "to do your master justice, he warned me 'twas a risk. There's naught to do but pay up un' look pleasant, I reckon. 'Twon't break me."

"Cut the loss, you mean. The shares was paid up in full, and there can't be no call."

"You're knowledgeable, missy: and yet you're wrong this time, as it happens. For (I may tell you privately) the money didn' belong to me, but to Mrs Bosenna, who asked me to invest it for her."

"Oh!--and Cap'n Hunken's hundred too?"

Cai reached a hand to the mantelpiece for the tobacco-jar, filled a pipe very deliberately, lit it, and drawing a chair up to the table, seated himself in face of her.

"I shouldn't wonder," said he, resting both arms on the table and eyeing her across a cloud of tobacco-smoke. "Though I don't understand what she--I mean, I don't understand what the game was."

"Me either," agreed the child, musing. "No hurry, though: I'll be a widow some day, please G.o.d--which is mor'n _you_ can hope. But now we get to the point: an' the point is, you can pay the woman up.

Cap'n Hunken can't."

"Why not?"

"He don't know it yet, but he can't."

"So you said: an' Why not? I ask. Within a thousand pound 'Bias owns as much as I do."

The child stood up, pulled her chair across to the table, and reseating herself, gazed steadily across at him through the tobacco-smoke.

"Where d'ye keep your bonds an' such like?" she asked.

"In my strong box, for the most part: two or three in the skivet of my sea-chest."

"You got 'em all?"

"All. That's to say all except the paper for this hundred pounds, which 'twas agreed Rogers should keep."

"You're a lucky man. . . . Where did Cap'n Hunken keep his?"

"Darn'd if I know. Somewheres about. He was always a bit careless over his securities--and so I've told him a dozen times,"

"When did you tell him last?"

This was a facer, and it made Cai blink. "We haven't discussed these things much--not of late," he answered lamely.

"I reckoned not. He don't keep 'em in his strong-box?"

"He hasn't one."

"In his chest?"

"Maybe."

"But he don't. He's left 'em with Mr Rogers from the first, or I'm mistaken. I used to see the two bundles, his and yours, lyin' side by side on the upper shelf o' the safe when the old man sent me to unlock it an' fetch something he wanted--which wasn't often. Then, about six months back, I noticed as one was gone. I mentioned it to him, and he said as 'twas all his scrip--that was his word--made up in a parcel an'

docketed by you, and that some time afterwards you'd taken it away."

"Quite correct, missy. And t'other one is 'Bias's, as I know. I had 'em in my hands together when I opened the safe as Mr Rogers told me to do, givin' me the key. I took out the two, not knowing t'other from which, made sure, docketed mine careful--to take away--and put 'Bias's back in the safe afore lockin' it. That would be back sometime in October last."

Fancy nodded. "That's what he told me: and up to this mornin' I reckoned Cap'n Hunken's bonds was still there, though it must be a month since I opened the safe. This mornin' I had a talk with Dad--he doesn't know the half about the master's affairs, nor how they've been these two years, and I didn' let on: but I allowed as we ought to look into things and call in Peter Benny--knowin' that Peter Benny was made execlator, if anything happened. So we agreed, and called him in: and I told Peter Benny enough to let him see that things were serious. In the end I fetched the keys, and he unlocked the safe. There was a good few papers in it, which he overhauled. But there wasn' no parcel 'pon the top shelf where I'd seen it last."

"Then you may depend he'd given it to 'Bias unbeknown to you, same as he handed mine over to me. Wasn' that Benny's opinion?"

"Oh, you make me tired!" exclaimed the wise child frankly. "As if I'd no more sense than to go there an' then an' frighten him--an' him with all those papers to look over!"

"Then if you're so shy about worriting Benny--and I don't blame you--why be in such a hurry to worrit yourself? 'Bias has the papers--that you may lay to."

Fancy tapped her small foot on the floor, which it just reached.

"As if I should be wastin' time, botherin' you! On my way here I ran against Cap'n Hunken, and of course he wanted to hear the latest of master--said he was on his way to inquire. So I told him that matters was bad enough but while there was life there was hope--the sort o'

thing you _have_ to say: and I went on that the business would be all in a mess for some time to come, and I hoped he'd got all his papers at home, which would save trouble. 'Papers?' said he. 'Not I!'--and I wonder I didn' drop: you might have knocked me down with a feather.

'Papers?' said he. 'I haven't seen 'em for months. _I_ don't trouble about papers! But you'll find 'em in the safe all right, though I haven't seen 'em for months.' Those were the very words he used: and nothin' would interest him but to hear how the invalid was doin'.

He went off, cheerful as a chaffinch. It's plain to me," Fancy wound up, "that he hasn't the papers. He trusted you, to start with, and he's gone on trustin' you and the master. Didn' you intejuce him?"

"Sure enough I did," Cai allowed. "But--confound it, you know!--'Bias Hunken isn't a child."

"Oh! if that contents you--" But well she knew it did not.

"Mr Rogers never would--"

"I've told you," said Fancy, "more'n ever I ought to have told.

There's no knowin', they say, what a man'll do when he's in Queer Street: _and_ the papers have gone: _and_ Cap'n Hunken thinks they're in the safe, where they ain't: _and_ I come to you first, as used to be his friend."

"Good Lord '" Cai stood erect. "If--if--"

"That's so," a.s.sented Fancy, seated and nodding. "If--"

"But it can't be!"

"But if it _is?_" She slipped from her chair and stood, still facing him.

He stared at her blankly. "Poor old 'Bias!" he murmured. "But it can't be."

"Right O! if you _will_ have it so. But, you see, I didn' put the question out o' curiosity altogether."

"The question? What question?"

"Why, about Mrs Bosenna."

"What has Mrs Bosenna to do with--Oh, ay, to be sure! You're meanin'

that hundred pounds." His wits were not very clear for the moment.

"No, I'm not," said Fancy, moving to the door. In the act of opening it she paused. "'Twas through you, I reckon, he first trusted master with his money."

"I--I never suggested it," stammered Cai.