The Coming Wave; Or, The Hidden Treasure of High Rock by Oliver Optic (books to improve english txt) 📖

can't help making a pun sometimes, you see."

"Making a what?" asked Leopold.

"A pun—you see," laughed Mr. Redmond.

"Which was the pun?"

"Don't you see it? Why, a draught of water, and a draft on a gold bank. Ha, ha!"

"O, that was it—was it? I'm much obliged to you for telling me."

Of course Mr. Redmond hardly expected a "countryman" to appreciate his wit.

"I was suffering with thirst, you see," continued the fop.

"I think you said so before."

"I wanted to introduce the matter so as not to be abrupt; not to tear myself rudely away from the ladies, you see. We were gazing out upon the vast ocean, you see; and a quotation from the poet—ah—a doosed odd sort of a[Pg 258] thing, written by the poet—what's his name? you know—about an old salt that killed a wild goose, or some sort of a thing, and then had nothing to drink. I repeated the quotation, and both of the girls laughed: 'Water, water, all around, but not a drop of whiskey to drink.'"

"I don't wonder the girls laughed," replied Leopold.

"Why so?" asked Mr. Redmond, blankly.

"You didn't quote it just as the poet 'What-you-call-him' wrote it, Stumpy can give it to you correctly."

"'Water, water everywhere;
Not any drop to drink,'"

added Stumpy; "and Coleridge was the fellow that wrote it."

"Not correct," protested Mr. Redmond, emphatically. "Do you mean to tell me that an old salt thought of drinking water? It isn't the way old salts do that sort of thing, you see."

The coxcomb felt that he had the best of the argument, however astonished he was to find that these countrymen knew something about the poets.[Pg 259]

"I told the ladies that I felt just as that old salt did, only I would rather have water just then than whiskey, however good whiskey may be in its place, you see. From this it was quite easy to say that I was very thirsty; and I said so. Though Miss Hamilton did not wish me to leave her, you see, she was kind enough to tell me that I should find a spring of nice cold water under the cliff. I apologized for leaving the ladies, you see; but they were so self-sacrificing as to say that I needn't climb up the rocks to join them again; they would soon meet me on the beach. Isn't it strange how these girls will sometimes give up all their joys for a feller?"

"The girls must be miserable up there without you," added Leopold.

"The water was clear and cold, and it suited me better than the whiskey that old salt wanted in the poem. I found a tin cup at the spring, and I drank half a gallon. I was very thirsty, you see. While I was drinking, I heard you talking about the bag of gold; and then I stepped in here under this rock, just in the nick of time. Come, Stumpy, cut the string of the[Pg 260] bag, and let us divy before the ladies join us."

"Why should you want a share of it Mr. Redmond?" asked Leopold very much embarrassed by the situation. "You are the son of a rich man, and seem to have all the money you want."

"No, not at all. That isn't the way my governor does that sort of thing, you see. A year ago he used to do the handsome thing, and then I could give a champagne supper to my friends at Delmonico's. But one night, you see, I came home just a little elevated, you see; and when I went up to my bed, I had the misfortune to tumble down—it was quite accidental, you see—near the door of my governor's chamber. The patriarch came out. I was rather bewildered, you see, by my fall; and he had the impertinence to tell me I was intoxicated. After that he reduced my allowance of pocket money about one half, so that I have been short ever since, you see. Cruel—wasn't it? What would you say, Leopold, if your governor should tell you you were intoxicated?"

"If I had been drinking champagne, or any other kind of wine, I should believe he spoke the truth."[Pg 261]

"Nonsense! You see, I'm a two-bottle man, and I was only just a little heavy, you see. But we are wasting time. Let us proceed to business. I have told you just how this sort of thing ought to be done; and I ask only the fair thing, you see. How much is there in the bag?" added Mr. Redmond, extending his hand to Stumpy to take the treasure.

Stumpy did not respond to this application for the money. On the contrary, he handed it to Leopold.

"How much is there? Do you know?" repeated the fop.

"I do know: the bag contains twelve hundred dollars in gold," replied Leopold, as he dropped the four-pound bag into his trousers pocket, where it weighed heavily upon his starboard suspender.

"Bully for you, my countryman;" exclaimed Mr. Redmond. "Twelve hundred dollars in gold! that's four hundred apiece, you see; and I don't ask for more than my third. Four hundred in gold! And that's over eight hundred dollars in greenbacks at the present time! I can give a dozen champagne suppers on that, you see; and[Pg 262] when you fellows come to New York, I shall invite you to one of them, and tell my friends the romantic incident of the finding of the bag of gold."

"I don't believe that any of this money will be spent for champagne suppers—at least, not yet a while," replied Leopold.

"Aren't you going to divy?" demanded Mr. Redmond, looking as though he had regarded such a disposition of the treasure as a foregone conclusion.

"I am not going to divy."

"No? But that's mean you see."

"I don't see it."

"But it's the thing to do, when you find any money, you see."

"Do you think you had any share in finding it, Mr. Redmond?" asked Leopold, quietly, as he began to move towards the boat.

"I was looking on when you found it, Leopold; and it's the rule, you see, in such cases, to divy. I was here when you unearthed the thing."

"No, you were not," answered Leopold, decidedly. "I dug it before you came to Rockhaven."[Pg 263]

"I don't claim any share of it," Stumpy put in. "Le didn't find it by accident. No part of it belongs to me, and I don't ask for a dollar of the money."

"O, you don't!" exclaimed Mr. Redmond; "then Leopold and I will divy even, you see; half to each."

"We shall not divide at all," added the skipper of the Rosabel, who had by this time reached the flat rock where the sloop was made fast.

"See here, Leopold; do I understand you to say that you are going to keep the whole?" asked Charley Redmond, very seriously. "That would be mean, you see. It would be the way a swine would do that sort of thing."

"I don't intend to divide at all, or to keep it myself. It don't belong to me any more than it does to you," protested Leopold.

"Didn't you find it?"

"Of course I did."

"Then it belongs to you."

"Not at all. If you pick up a pocket-book in the street of New York, does it belong to you, or to the one that lost it?"[Pg 264]

"That's another sort of a thing, you see. This is money buried on the sea-shore by Captain Kidd, or some of those swells of pirates. It don't belong to anybody, you see."

"This gold was not buried by pirates."

"Who did bury it, then? That's the conundrum."

"His name was Wallbridge."

"Did you know him?" asked Mr. Redmond.

"No; I never saw him."

"Well, where is he now?"

"He is dead; he was lost on the brig Waldo, which went down by those rocks you see off there," replied Leopold, pointing to the reefs.

"Then he is dead!" exclaimed the fop, with a new gleam of hope. "Then he has gone to the happy hunting-ground, where gold isn't a hundred and twenty above par; and he won't have any use for it there, you see. The right thing to do is to divy."

"I think not. If your father had lost twelve hundred dollars in gold on this beach, and went to the happy hunting-ground before he found it, you would not say that the money belonged to me, if I happened to dig it up," added Leopold,[Pg 265] earnestly, for he had some hope of convincing the New Yorker of the correctness of the position he had taken, and of inducing him to keep the secret of the hidden treasure until its ownership had been fully investigated.

"That's another sort of a thing, you see," replied Mr. Redmond. "In that case, the money would belong to me, as his nearest heir, and I should have the pleasure of spending the whole amount, thus unexpectedly reclaimed from the sands of the sea, in champagne suppers at Delmonico's up-town house. That would be the fair thing, you see."

"I think so myself; and I purpose to act on precisely the principle you suggest. Mr. Wallbridge, to whom the money belonged, has gone to the happy hunting-ground, where I don't want to trouble him to hunt for this bag of gold. For aught I know, Mr. Wallbridge had had a handsome, refined accomplished son, familiar with the poets, to whom this money now belongs just as much as though he were here to claim it; though I hope, when he gets it, that he will not spend the whole or any part of it in champagne suppers. I see that we are perfectly[Pg 266] agreed in this matter, and that you think the way I mention is the right way to do this sort of thing."

Mr. Redmond felt that he had been whipped in the argument; and he was very much dissatisfied with himself for the admission he had made in the supposed case, and very much dissatisfied with Leopold for the advantage he had taken of the admission.

"Who was the feller that buried the money?" he demanded, feeling his way to another argument in favor of a division.

"Mr. Wallbridge."

"Who was he?"

"I don't know."

"You haven't been introduced to him?"

"No."

"What do you know about him?"

"Nothing."

"Then how did you know he had a good-looking son, familiar with the poets?"

"I don't."

"That was what you said."

"I only supposed a case. So far as we know now, no one was acquainted with Mr. Wallbridge.[Pg 267] No one knows anything at all about him."

"All right, then. All we have to do is to divy."

"Not yet. I am going to see the owners of the Waldo, in which Mr. Wallbridge was a passenger. They know nothing about him, I am aware; but I am going to ask them to write to their agents in Havana, and ascertain who he was."

"That's taking a good deal of trouble for nothing, you see," added Mr. Raymond, with a look of disappointment and dissatisfaction.

"That is just what I am going to do, any how," replied Leopold, firmly. "The money don't belong to me, and I intend to keep it safely till the heirs of Wallbridge appear to claim it; or at least, till I am satisfied there are no heirs. When that time comes, I shall be willing to consider the question of dividing it with Stumpy and you."

"I don't think any of it belongs to me," added Stumpy.

"I think a share of it belongs to me; but I am willing to discount my claim, you see."[Pg 268]

"Discount it?" queried Leopold.

"I can't wait a year or two till you find out whether or not the man that buried the gold has any heirs or not."

"I am very sorry you are so impatient."

"I want the money now, when my governor is cruel to me. Besides, in two years gold may be down to par, and it won't bring anything more than its face, you see. I want to do the fair thing. Give me two hundred dollars in gold, and I will relinquish my claim: discount it, you see."

"No, Mr. Redmond; I cannot sell or discount what don't belong to me. They may do it in New York, but some of us countrymen haven't yet learned how to do that thing, you see," laughed Leopold.

"Say one hundred, then."

"Not a single dollar. The best I can do is to promise that I will consider the question of a division when I feel that the money belongs to the finder."

Mr. Redmond argued the point in all its bearings, but with no different result.

"But how long