Mr. Hankes was disposed to add, “Home, sweet home;” but he coughed down the impulse, and was silent.
Dunn walked the room with his arms crossed on his breast and his head bent down, deep in his own reflections, while his lips moved, as if speaking to himself. Meanwhile Mr. Hankes busied himself gathering together his papers, preparatory to departure.
“They 've taken that fellow Redlines. I suppose you 've heard it?” said he, still sorting and arranging the letters.
“No,” said Dunn, stopping suddenly in his walk; “where was he apprehended?”
“In Liverpool. He was to have sailed in the 'Persia,' and had his place taken as a German watchmaker going to Boston.”
“What was it he did? I forget,” said Dunn, carelessly.
“He did, as one may say, a little of everything; issued false scrip on the Great Coast Railway, sold and pocketed the price of some thirty thousand pounds' worth of their plant, mortgaged their securities, and cooked their annual accounts so cleverly that for four years nobody had the slightest suspicion of any mischief.”
“What was it attracted the first attention to these frauds, Hankes?” said Dunn, apparently curious to hear an interesting story.
“The merest accident in the world. He had sent a few lines to the Duke of Wycombe to inquire the character and capacity of a French cook. Pollard, the Duke's man of business, happened to be in the room when the note came, and his Grace begged he would answer it for him. Pollard, as you are aware, is Chairman of the Coast Line; and when he saw the name 'Lionel Redlines,' he was off in a jiffy to the Board room with the news.”
“One would have thought a little foresight might have saved him from such a stupid mistake as this,” said Dunn, gravely. “A mode of living so disproportioned to his well-known means must inevitably have elicited remark.”