Nevertheless, Mrs. Home cherished strong but secret hopes that her young protégée would stay at Port Blair, in spite of her own departure. Was not Mr. Quentin expected from Camorta by the very next mail?
Mrs. Creery would have liked Helen to remain with some one (not herself, for she was not given to hospitality). She considered that she would be a serious loss to the community, and was quite fond of her in her own way. Why should she not marry Jim Quentin? was a question she often asked herself in idle, empty moments. It would be a grand match for a penniless girl; a wedding would be a pleasant novelty, no matter how quiet, and she herself was prepared to give the affair her countenance, and to endow the young couple with a set of plated nut-crackers that had scarcely ever been used! One day, roaming rather aimlessly through the bazaar, she came across "Ibrahim," Mr. Quentin's butler, and was not the woman to lose a rich opportunity of cross-examining such an important functionary. She beckoned him aside with an imperious wave of the hand, and commenced the conversation by asking a very foolish question, "When did you hear from your master?" seeing that there had been no mail in, since she had seen Ibrahim last, "when is he expected?"
"Mr. Quentin not my master any more," he returned, with dignity, "I take leave that time Sahib going Nicobars."
"Having made your fortune?" drawing down the corner of her mouth as she spoke.
"I plenty poor man, where fortune getting?" he replied, with an air of surprised and injured innocence.
"Stuff and nonsense! you know you butlers make heaps out of bachelors like Mr. Quentin, who never look at their accounts, but just pay down piles of rupees, like the idiots they are; and what about Mr. Lisle?"
Ibrahim grinned and displayed an ample row of ivory teeth.
"Ah," with animation, "that very good gentleman, never making no bobbery! Plenty money got!"
"Plenty money! How do you know?"
"First time coming paying half—after two weeks paying all;" in answer to the lady's gesture of astonishment. "Truth I telling! wages, boats, bazaar, and all!"