GUILTY OR NOT GUILTY.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 4911, 21 January 1889, Page 4

GUILTY OR NOT GUILTY.

LITERATURE

CHAPTER VII. His first act of business on reaching England, was to insure the freights of the Prosperine and Shannon. He sent Michael Penfold to Lloyd’s, with the requisite vouchers, including the receipt of the gold merchants, Penfold easily insured the Shannon, whose freight was valued at only six thousand pounds. The Prosperine with her cargo, and one hundred and thirty thousand pounds of specie to boot, was another matter. Some underwriters had an. objection to specie being subject to theft as well as shipwreck j other underwriters applied to by Penfold,, acquiesced ; others called on Wardlaw himself, to ask a few questions and he replied to them courteously but with a certain nonchalance, treating it as an affair which might be big to them, but was not of particular importance to a person doing business on his scale.

To one underwriter, Condell to whom lie was on somewhat intimate terms, he said, ‘I wish I could insure the Shanon at her value ; but that is impossible ; the City of London could not do it. The Prosperine brings me some cases of specie, but my true treasure is on board the Shannon. She carries my bride, sir.’

*Oh indeed. Miss Eolleston.’ ‘ Ah, I remember : you have seen her. Then you will not be surprised at a proposal I shall make you. Underwrite the Shannon a million pounds, to be paid by you it harm befalls my Helen. You need not look so astonished, I was only joking-; you gentlemen peal with none but substantial values ; and as for me a million would no more compensate me for losing her, than for losing my own life.’ The tears were in his pale eyes as he said these words ; and Mr Condell eved him with sympathy, but he soon recovered himselt, and was tne man of business again. ‘ Oh, the specie on board the Prosperine. Well I was in Australia and bought that specie myself off the merchants whose names are attached to the receipts. I desposited the cases with White and Co. at Sydney. Penfold will show you the receipt. I instructed Joseph Wylie mate of the Prosperine. and a trustworthy person, to see them stowed away in the Prosperine for White and Co. Hudson is a good seaman and the Prosperine a good ship built by Mare, We have nothing to fear but the ordinary perils of the sea.’ *So one would think,’ said Mr Condell and took his leave ; but at the door he hesitated and then, looking down a little sleepishly, said, ‘Mr Wardlaw may I offer you a piece ol advice.’ ‘ Certainly.’ * Then double the insurance on the Shannon if you can.’ With these words he slipped out evidently to avoid questions he did not intend to answer. Wardlaw stared after him, stupidly at first, and then put his hand to his head in a sort of amazement. Then he sat down again ashly®pale and with the dew on his forehead, and muttered faintly, ‘ Double the insurance of the Shannon.’ Men who walk in crooked paths are very subject to such surprises ; doomed like Ahab, to be pierced through the joints ot their armour, by random shafts by words uttered in one sense, but conscience interprets them in another.

It took a good many underwriters to insure the Prosperine’s freight ; but it was done at last. Then Wardlaw who had feigned insouciance so admirably in that part of his interview with Condell went without losing an hour, and raised a large sum of money on the insured freight to meet the bills that were coming due for the gold, (for he had paid for most of it in paper at short dates), also other hills that were approaching maturity. This done he breathed again safe for a month or two from everything short of a general panic and full of hope from his coming master stroke. But two months soon pass when a man has a flock of kites in the air. Pass ! They fly. So now he looked out anxiously for his Australian ships ; and went to Lloyds every day to hear if either had been seen, or heard of by steamers or by faster sailing vessels than themselves. And, although Condell had underwritten the Prosperine to the tune of £B,OOO, yet still his mysterious words rang strangely in the merchant’s ears and made him so uneasy that he employed a discreet person to sound Connell as to what he meant by ‘ double the insurance of the Shannon.’

It turned out to be tiie simplest affair in the world : Connell bad secret information that the Shannon was in bad repair ;so he advised his friend to insure her heavily. For the same reason he declined to underwrite her freight himself. With respect to those ships our readers know two things, of which "Wardlaw, nota bene, bad no idea ; namely that the Shannon had sailed last instead of first and that Miss Rolleston was not on board of her but in the Prosperine, two thousand miles ahead.

To that, your superior knowledge we, posters of the sea and land, are about to make a large addition, and relate things strange but true. While that anxious and plotting merchant strains his eyes seaward trying hard to read the future, we carry you, in a moment of time, across the Pacific and board the leading vessel the good ship Prosperine homeward bound. The ship left Sydney with a fair wind but soon encountered adverse winds, and make slow progress being close hauled which was her worst point in sailing. She pitched a good deal, and that had a very ill effect on Miss Rolleston. She was not sea-sick, but thoroughly out of sorts and, in one

week became perceptibly paler and thinner that when she started. The young clergyman, Mr Hazel, watched her with respectful anxiety and this did not escape her feminine observation. She noted quietly that those dark eyes of his followed her with a mournful tenderness, but withdrew their gaze when she looked at him. Clearly, he was interested in her, but had no desire to intrude upon her attention. He would bring up the squabs for her, and some of his own wraps, when she stayed on deck, and was prompt with his arm when the vessel lurched ; and showed her those other attentions which are called for on hoard ship, but without a word. When she thanked him in the simplest and shortest way his great eyr-s flashed with pleasure, and the colour mounted to his very temples. Engaged young ladies arejfor various reasons more sociable with the other sex than those who are still on the mock-defensive, a ship, like a distant country thaws even English reserve, and women in general are disposed to admit ecclesiastics to certain privileges No wonder then that Miss Rolleston, after a few days met Mr Hazel half way ; and they made acquaintance on the Prosperine, in monysyllables at first; but the ice, once fairly broken, the intercourse of mind became rather rapid. (To be Continued.)