“Really, Mr Luke Vine!”
“Hold your tongue, sir! Wasn’t my five hundred pounds—new crisp Bank of England notes—in your charge?”
“Yes, sir, in our charge.”
“Then, why didn’t you watch over them, and take care of ’em? Where are they now?”
“Well, sir, it is hard to say. They have never been presented at any bank.”
“Of course they haven’t, when I’ve got ’em safe in my pocket-book.”
“In your pocket-book, sir?”
“Yes. Don’t you believe me? There; look. Bit rubbed at the edges with being squeezed in the old leather, but there are the notes; aren’t they? Look at the numbers.”
As the old man spoke he took a shabby old pocket-book from his breast, opened it, and drew out a bundle of notes held together by an elastic band, and laid them on the office table with a bang.
“Bless my heart!” cried Crampton excitedly, as he hastily put on his spectacles and examined the notes, and compared them with an entry in a book. “Yes, sir,” he said to Van Heldre; “these are the very notes.”