Page:Max Havelaar; or, the Coffee Auctions of the Dutch Trading Company (IA dli.granth.77827).pdf/240

 Yet I thought such a repayment right; for the non-exaction of it would lay one open to a charge of dishonesty.

“After waiting for many days, you may conceive with what feelings I received at last from the Governor's Secretary a letter, in which I was given to understand that I was suspected of dishonesty, and I was ordered to reply to a number of charges that had been made against my administration. Some of them I could explain immediately, for others I wanted to look at documents, and, above all, it was most important for me to look into these matters at Natal. I could have examined clerks and other employés, to ascertain the causes of the mistakes, and very likely I should have succeeded in my endeavours to clear up all. The neglect, for instance, to book money that had been sent to Mandhéling—[you know, Verbrugge, that the troops in the interior are paid out of the Natal exchequer]—or something like that, which I should, perhaps, have seen immediately, if I could have examined into it on the spot, as having been the cause of these sad faults. But the General refused to let me go to Natal. This refusal caused me to pay still more attention to the strange manner in which this accusation of dishonesty had been brought forward against me. Why had I been suddenly transferred from Natal, and under colour of good intentions to me, if I was really suspected of dishonesty? Why did they communicate to me that disgraceful suspicion only for the first time, when I was far from the place