Hocken and Hunken eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 379 pages of information about Hocken and Hunken.

Hocken and Hunken eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 379 pages of information about Hocken and Hunken.

“Scarce midnight yet.  I reckoned maybe you might be sittin’ up, frettin’ over this—­’Twas the child here, though, that found it out and insisted on bringing me.”

“After we’d locked up,” broke in Fancy, “and just as I was packin’ Dad off to bed, it came into my head to ask him—­’I suppose you don’t know,’ said I, ‘of anyone’s havin’ been to master’s safe without my bein’ told?’ He thought a bit, and ‘No,’ says he; ’nobody ‘cept myself, an’ that but once. ‘You?’ says I, ‘and whoever sent you there?’ ‘Why, the master hisself,’ says Dad.—­Who else?’ ‘But what for?’ I asks, feelin’ as you might have knocked me down with a feather.  ‘I meant to ha’ told you,’ says Dad, ’but it slipped my mind.  ’Twas one afternoon, when you was out on your walk.  I heard Master’s stick tap on the plankin’ overhead so I went up, thinkin’ as he might be wantin’ his tea in a hurry.  He told me to open the safe an’ take out a packet o’ papers from the top shelf; which I did.’  ‘What papers?’ said I ‘How should I know?’ says Dad:  ’I don’t meddle with his business—­I’ve seen too much of it in my life.  I didn’ even glance at ’em, but locked the safe again, an’ put ’em where he told me—­which was in the japanned box by his chair!’ ‘Why,’ says I,’ that’s his Insurance Box as he called it—­the same as I handed to Mr Benny only yesterday, to take away and sort through!’ . . .  After that, as you may guess, I was like a mad person till we’d taken down the bolts again and I’d run to Mr Benny’s.”

“Ay,” chimed in Mr Benny, “I was upstairs and half-undressed:  but she had me dressed again an’ down as if ’twas a matter of life and death. . . .  And when we got out the box, there the papers were, sure enough.  After that—­for I saw their value to you—­no one with a human heart could help running along with her, to bear the news. . . .  So here we are.”

“‘Bias!” called Cai softly.  “Didn’ I hear ’Bias’s voice below there, a while since?”

“Ay, here I be.”—­It was ’Bias’s turn to step out from the shadow of his doorway into the broad moonlight.  “And glad enough to hear this news.”

“Would ye do me a favour? . . .  Dressed, are you?”

“Ay—­been sittin’ up latish to-night.”

“Well, I’m not azackly in a condition to step down—­not for a minute or two; and I doubt Mrs Bowldler, if I called her, wouldn’ be in no condition either. . . .  ’Twould be friendly of you to ask Mr Benny in and offer him a drink; and as for missy—­”

“No thank ‘ee, Cap’n,” interposed Mr Benny.  “Bringin’ you this peace o’ mind has been cordial enough for me—­and for the child too, I reckon, Good-night, gentlemen!”

“Cap’n Hunken,” said Fancy, “will you take the papers up to him?  Then we’ll go.”

“May I bring the papers to ’ee?” asked ’Bias, lifting his face to the window.

“Ay, do—­if they won’t come in. . . .  I’ll step down and unbar the door.”

He lit a candle and hurried downstairs, his heart in his mouth.  By the time he had unbarred and opened, Mr Benny and Fancy had taken their departure; but their “good-nights” rang back to him, up the moonlit road, and his friend stood on the threshold.

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Hocken and Hunken from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.