Captain Bayley's Heir: A Tale of the Gold Fields of California

by G. A. Henty

"Sit down a bit, lad," he said; "James is going to the camp to get a few things for our journey to-morrow, and I shall be alone, and now that it's all over I feel the reaction. It has been an exciting time the last month."

"It has indeed," Frank agreed, "and I have often thought to myself what a comfort it was that they had established a regular way of sending down gold twice a week with an escort; it would have been terrible if you had had to keep all that gold by you."

"Yes, I often thought so myself, and your offer to keep the gold in your tent on the days when the escort wasn't going was a great relief to me."

"It was safe enough with us," Frank said. "No one would venture to try a tent with a pretty strong party; but with only your son and yourself there might have been a temptation to some broken-down gambler to carry it off. Besides, we have Turk as a guard, and I don't fancy any one would venture to try any tricks with our tent while he is inside it."

"Well, I hope it will be your turn now," the old man said, "and that before another two months are over you too will be setting out on your way home with what your friend called your pile."

"I shall not be doing that," Frank said; "whatever we find, I have no thought of going back to England."

"No? Well, lad, I don't want your confidence if you would rather not give it; but I will tell you my story, and perhaps when you have heard it you may be the more inclined to tell me yours. It is a painful story to tell, but that is part of my punishment; and you, lad, have a right to hear it, for I know that it is to you I owe my life, and that it is through you that I am to-morrow going home to do all that I can to retrieve my fault, and to wipe out the stain on my name. I was a solicitor, with a good practice, in a town of the west of England,—it does not matter what it's name was. I lost my wife, and then, like a fool, I took to drink. No one knew it except my son, for I never went out in the evening, but would sit at home drinking by myself till I could scarce stagger up to bed.

"He did all that he could to persuade me to give it up, but it had got too strong a hold upon me. At last we quarrelled over it, and he left the house, and henceforth we only met at the office. He was engaged to be married to the daughter of our Vicar. When the crash came—for in these cases a crash is sure to come sooner or later—the business had fallen off, and a bill was presented for payment which I had altogether forgotten I had signed. Then there was an investigation into my affairs. I could help but little, for there were but few hours in the day now when my brain was clear enough to attend to any business whatever. Then it was found that ten thousand pounds which had been given me to invest by one of my clients had never been invested, and that it was gone with the rest.

"I had not intended to do anything dishonest, that even now I can affirm. I had intended to invest it, but in my muddled state put off doing so, and had gone on paying the interest as if it had been invested as ordered. When I knew that I had not enough in the bank to replace it, I went into foolish speculations to regain what I had lost; but until the crash came I had never fairly realised that I had not only ruined myself but was a swindler. I shall never forget the morning when James, who had been up all night going through my papers with my head-clerk, came down and told me what he had discovered. I was still stupid from what I had drunk overnight, but that sobered me. I need not tell you what passed between my son and me. I swore never to touch liquor again. He sold out of consols five thousand pounds which he had inherited from his mother, and handed it over to the man I had defrauded, giving him his personal bond that he would repay the rest of the money, should he live; and on those terms my client agreed to abstain from prosecuting me, and to maintain an absolute silence as to the affair.

"Then Jim broke off his engagement, and took passages for us in a sailing ship for Panama, and so on to San Francisco. I need not tell you the struggle it was to keep to my promise; but when Jim had given up everything for me, the least I could do was to fight hard for his sake. My thoughts were always fixed on California, my only hopes that I might live to see the rest of the debt repaid, and the boy's money replaced, so that he could buy a business and marry the woman he loved. I dreamt of it over and over again, and, as I told you, three times I dreamt of the exact spot where we are now sitting.