Homeward Bound - James Fenimore Cooper (free e books to read .txt) 📗

no more of feelings that you do not seem to understand. You confess to have taken forty thousand pounds of the public money, to which you have no right or claim?"

"I certainly have in my hands some money, which I do not deny belongs to government."

"It is well; and here is my authority to receive it from you. Gentlemen, will you have the kindness to see that my powers are regular and authentic?"

John Effingham and others cast their eyes over the papers, which seemed to be in rule, and they said as much.

"Now, sir," resumed Mr. Green, "in the first place, I demand the bills you received in London for this money, and your regular endorsement in my favour."

The culprit appeared to have made up his mind to this demand, and, with the same recklessness with which he had appropriated the money to his own use, he was now ready to restore it, without proposing a condition for his own safety The bills were in his pocket, and seating himself at a table, he made the required endorsement, and handed them to Mr Green.

"Here are bills for thirty-eight thousand pounds," said that methodical person, after he had examined the drafts, one by one, and counted their amount; "and you are known to have taken forty thousand. I demand the remainder."

"Would you leave me in a strange country penniless?" exclaimed the culprit, in a tone of reproach.

"Strange country! penniless!" repeated Mr. Green, looking over his spectacles, first at Mr. Truck, and then at Mr. Sandon. "That to which you have no claim must be restored, though it strip you to the skin. Every pound you have belongs to the public, and to no one else."

"Your pardon, Mr. Green, and green enough you are, if you lay down that doctrine," interrupted Captain Truck, "in which neither Vattel, nor the revised statutes will bear you out. A passenger cannot remove his effects from a ship, until his passage be first paid."

"That, sir, I dispute, in a question affecting the king's revenues. The claims of government precede all others, and the money that has once belonged to the crown, and which has not been regularly paid away by the crown, is the crown's still."

"Crowns and coronations! Perhaps, Master Green, you think you are in Somerset House at this present speaking?"

Now Mr. Green was so completely a star of a confined orbit, that his ideas seldom described a tangent to their ordinary revolutions. He was so much accustomed to hear of England ruling colonies, the East and the West, Canada, the Cape, and New South Wales, that it was not an easy matter for him to conceive himself to be without the influence of the British laws. Had he quitted home with the intention to emigrate, or even to travel, it is probable that his mind would have kept a more equal pace with his body, but summoned in haste from his desk, and with the office spectacles on his nose, it is not so much a matter of wonder that he hardly realized the truths of his present situation. The man-of-war, in which everything was His Majesty's, sustained this feeling, and it was too sudden a change to expect such a man to abandon all his most cherished notions at a moment's warning. The irreverent exclamation of Captain Truck shocked him, and he did not fail to show as much by the disgust pictured in his countenance.

"I am in one of His Majesty's packets, sir, I presume, where, you will permit me to say, a greater deference for the high ceremonies of the kingdom ought to be found."

"This would make even old Joe Bunk laugh. You are in a New York liner, sir, over which no majesty has any control, but their majesties John Griswold and Co. Why, my good sir, the sea has unsettled your brain!"

Now, Mr. Green did know that the United States of America had obtained their independence, but the whole proceeding was so mixed up with rebellion, and a French alliance, in his mind, that he always doubted whether the new republic had a legal existence at all, and he had been heard to express his surprise that the twelve judges had not long since decided this state of things to be unconstitutional, and overturned the American government by mandamus. His disgust increased, accordingly, as Captain Truck's irreverence manifested itself in stronger terms, and there was great danger that the harmony, which had hitherto prevailed between the parties, would be brought to a violent termination.

"The respect for the crown in a truly loyal subject, sir," Mr. Green returned sharply, "is not to be unsettled by the sea; not in my case, at least, whatever it might have been, in your own."

"My own! why, the devil, sir, do you take me for a subject ?"

"A truant one, I fear, though you may have been born in London itself."

"Why, my dear sir," said Captain Truck, taking the other by a button, as if he pitied his hallucination, "you don't breed such men in London. I came from the river, which never had a subject in it, or any other majesty, than that of the Saybrook Platform. I begin to understand you, at last: you are one of those well-meaning men who fancy the earth but a casing to the island of Great Britain. Well, I suppose it is more the fault of your education than of your nature, and one must overlook the mistake. May I ask what is your farther wish, in reference to this unhappy young man?"

"He must refund every pound of the public money that remains in his possession."

"That is just, and I say yea."

"And all who have received from him any portion of this money, under whatever pretences, must restore it to the crown."

"My good sir, you can have no notion of the quantity of champaigne and other good things this unfortunate young man has consumed in this ship. Although but a sham baronet, he has fared like a real lord; and you cannot have the heart to exact from the owners the keeping of your rogues."

"Government makes no distinction, sir, and always claims its own."

"Nay, Mr. Green," interrupted Sir George Templemore, "I much question if government would assert a right to money that a peculator or a defaulter fairly spends, even in England; much less does it seem to me it can pretend to the few pounds that Captain Truck has lawfully earned."

"The money has not been lawfully earned, sir. It is contrary to law to assist a felon to quit the kingdom, and I am not certain there are no penalties for that act alone; and as for the public money, it can never legally quit the Treasury without the proper office forms."

"My dear Sir George," put in the captain, "leave me to settle this with Mr. Green, who, no doubt, is authorized to give a receipt in full. What is to be done with the delinquent, sir, now that you are in possession of his money?"

"Of course he will be carried back in the Foam, and, I mourn to be compelled to say, that he must be left in the hands of the law."

"What, with or without my permission?"

Mr. Green stared, for his mind was precisely one of those which would conceive it to be a high act of audacity in a ci-devant colonist to claim the rights of an old country, even did he really understand the legality and completeness of the separation.

"He has committed forgery, sir, to conceal his peculation. It is an awful crime; but they that commit it cannot hope to escape the consequences."

"Miserable impostor! is this true!" Captain Truck sternly demanded of the trembling culprit.

"He calls an oversight forgery, sir," returned the latter huskily. "I have done nothing to affect my life or liberty."

At this moment Captain Ducie, accompanied by Paul Powis, entered the cabin, their faces flushed, and their manner to each other a little disturbed, though it was formally courteous. At the same instant, Mr. Dodge, who had been dying to be present at the secret conference, watched his opportunity to slip in also.

"I am glad you have come, sir," said Mr. Green, "for here may be occasion for the services of his Majesty's officers. Mr. Sandon has given up these bills, but two thousand pounds remain unaccounted for, and I have traced thirty-five, quite clearly, to the master of this ship, who has received it in the way of passage-money."

"Yes, sir, the fact is as plain as the highlands of Navesink from the deck," drily added Captain Truck.

"One thousand of this money has been returned by the defaulter's sister," observed Captain Ducie.

"Very true, sir; I had forgotten to give him credit for that."

"The remainder has probably been wasted in those silly trifles of which you have told me the unhappy man was so fond, and for which he has bartered respectability and peace of mind. As for the money paid this ship for the passage, it has been fairly earned, nor do I know that government has any power to reclaim it."

Mr. Green heard this opinion with still greater disgust than he had felt towards the language of Captain Truck; nor could he very well prevent his feelings escaping, him in words.

"We truly live in perilous times," he muttered, speaking more particularly to John Effingham, out of respect to his appearance, "when the scions of the nobility entertain notions so loose. We have vainly fancied in England that the enormities of the French revolution were neutralized by Billy Pitt; but, sir, we still live in perilous times, for the disease has fairly reached the higher classes. I hear that designs are seriously entertained against the wigs of the judges and bishops, and the next thing will be the throne! All our venerable institutions are in danger."

"I should think the throne might indeed be in danger, sir," returned John Effingham, gravely, "if it reposes on wigs."

"It is my duty, Captain Truck," continued Captain Ducie, who was a man so very different from his associate that he scarcely seemed to belong to the same species, "to request you will deliver to us the person of the culprit, with his effects, when we can relieve you and your passengers from the pain of witnessing any more of this unpleasant scene."

At the sound of the delivery of his person, all the danger of his situation rushed forcibly before the imagination of the culprit. His face flushed and became pale, and his legs refused to support him, though he made a desperate effort to rise.

After an instant of silence, he turned to the commander of the corvette, and, in piteous accents, appealed to him for mercy.

"I have been punished severely already," he continued, as his voice returned, "for the savage Arabs robbed me of everything I had of any value. These gentlemen know that they took my dressing-case, several other curious and valuable articles for the toilet, and nearly all my clothes."

"This man is scarcely a responsible being," said John Effingham, "for a childish vanity supplies the place of principles, self-respect, and duty. With a sister scorned on account of his crimes, conviction beyond denial, and a dread punishment staring him in the face, his thoughts still run on trifles."

Captain Ducie gave a look of pity at the miserable young man, and, by his countenance, it was plain to see that