“Bust?” inquired the captain.
“Confound you, yes!” roared Shelf. “What do you mean by questioning me like this?”
“I’ve got £300 in that blessed company.”
“Ah!” said Shelf, changing his tone. “Well, that is unfortunate. But,” he continued, with a significant nod of the head, “I’ve managed to save a little something for myself out of the general wreck, and if you will see me safe out of the country, captain, I’ll underwrite those few shares of yours for five hundred per cent.”
“No,” said Captain Colson, “I’m damned if I do! That three hundred’s about all my pile; but I got it clean, and I’m not going to keep it dirty.”
“Do you mean,” said Shelf, with growing terror, “you’re not going to help me out of the country?”
“That’s about the size of it.”
“Good heavens, man, the police will take me, and there will be a trial, and everything I have done will be distorted and misunderstood! I shall be eternally disgraced! They will give me penal servitude!”
“Your fault for earning it,” said the captain.