Page:Frank Stockton--Adventures of Captain Horn.djvu/439

ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN HORN with his hands outspread. "Very good," he said, "that will do." Then, followed by Mok, he bowed himself out of the room.

For some moments there was silence in the salon. Nobody thought of laughing, or even smiling. In the eyes of Mrs. Cliff there were a few tears. She was the first to speak. "He is a good man," said she, "and he now believes that he has done everything that ought to be done. But you will be married to-morrow, all the same, of course."

"Yes," said Edna. "But it will be with this ring."

"Yes," said the captain, "with that ring. You must always wear it."

"And now," said Mrs. Cliff, when they had all reseated themselves, "you must really tell us your story, captain. You know I have heard nothing yet."

And so he told his story—much that Edna had heard before, a great deal she had not heard. About the treasure, almost everything he said was new to her. Mrs. Cliff was very eager on this point. She wanted every detail.

"How about the ownership of it?" she said. "After all, that is the great point. "What do people here think of your right to use that gold as your own?"

The captain smiled. "That is not an easy question to answer, but I think we shall settle it very satisfactorily. Of course, the first thing to do is to get it safely entered and stored away in the great money centres over here. A good portion of it, in fact, is to be shipped to Philadelphia to be coined. Of course, all that business is in the hands of my bankers. The fact that I originally sailed from California was a great help to us. To ascertain my legal rights in the case 423