When we reached the house, who should open the door but Sir Benjamin himself! His welcome could not have been more cordial had I been his own son returning after an absence of many years. On his arm I entered the house, tenderly watched by Maud. We passed into the drawing-room, and I was soon seated in a comfortable chair before the fire.
"Sit yourself down, my dear boy," Sir Benjamin said, "and you'll just take a glass of wine and a biscuit before you do another thing. I prescribe it myself, and surely I ought to know. Hum, ha! Maud, my dear, God bless you."
I never remember having seen Sir Benjamin so much affected before. Tears stood in his eyes, and his hand trembled so violently that it was as much as he could do to pour out the wine for me. Dear old man, I had always misjudged his affection for myself, though why he should have felt any was a thing which, personally, I could never understand.
It was not till after lunch that I got an opportunity of a private conversation with him. Then, as I had made up my mind I would, I told him my whole story, from the time of my leaving England on my last voyage, up to the present moment. As my yarn progressed, I was alarmed at the change in his face. From its usual rosy hue its colour passed to an extraordinary pallor, and when I reached the account of my scene with Juanita, and my attempted assassination, with the robbery of the locket, I thought he would have fainted. He gasped--
"You say that Marmaduke, my nephew, gave you that locket containing the piece of paper?"
"Yes, and bound me by a promise that I would not open it till I had been a month in London."
"Then, John, God forgive me, I have done you an awful injury. I have, unconsciously it is true, robbed you of £200,000!"
"What!" I cried, in my turn astonished by his words. "What had you to do with that affair?"
"I was the custodian of it; my nephew sent it home to me from Chili to keep for him, with the proviso that if ever he should send a messenger for it, bearing a certain piece of paper, I should give him whatever amount, even up to the entire sum, he should ask of me."
"Came the same day that we heard of your accident, and brought the scrap of paper; he said my nephew was in great danger, and wanted his money immediately; he took away my cheque for £200,000 and accumulated interest, and, as I have found out by inquiry, cashed it the same morning. By this time he has probably left the country!"