Page:Frank Stockton--Adventures of Captain Horn.djvu/441

ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN HORN will be almost impossible for them to claim anything or prove anything. Therefore, it will be good policy and common sense for them to acknowledge that we are acting honestly, and, more than that, generously, and to agree to take what we offer them, and that we shall keep what is considered by the best legal authorities to be our rights.

"As soon as possible, an agent will be sent to Peru to attend to the matter. But this matter is in the hands of my lawyers, although, of course, I shall not keep out of the negotiations."

"And how much percentage, captain?" asked Mrs. Cliff. "What part do they think you ought to keep?"

"We have agreed," said he, "upon twenty per cent. of the whole. After careful consideration and advice, I made that claim. I shall retain it. Indeed, it is already secured to me, no matter what may happen to the rest of the treasure."

"Twenty per cent.!" exclaimed Mrs. Cliff, "And that is all that you get?"

"Yes," said the captain, "it is what I get—and by that is meant what is to be divided among us all. I make the claim, but I make it for every one who was on the Castor when she was wrecked, and for the families of those who are not alive—for every one, in fact, who was concerned in this matter."

The countenance of Mrs. Cliff had been falling, and now it went down, down, again. After all the waiting, after all the anxiety, it had come to this: barely twenty per cent., to be divided among ever so many people—twenty-five or thirty, for all she knew. Only this, after the dreams she had had, after the castles she had built! Of course, she had money now, and she 425