A letter from Robin to his mother, and another from Sam to Mr Wright, arrived next morning, and proved to be those which had been written immediately after their landing at Bombay, and had been posted, so the writers thought, at the time their first telegram was despatched. But the letters had been given to Stumps to post, and Stumps was not blessed with a good memory, which may account for the delay in transmission. These letters corroborated all the lady had said. Thus was Letta formally installed in the Wright family, and uncle Rik solemnly charged himself with the discovery of her mother!
“Depend upon it, my dear,” he said, with an amount of self-sufficient assurance and indomitable resolution that carried sweet consolation to the child’s heart, “that I’ll find your mother if she’s above ground, though the findin’ of her should cost me the whole of my fortune and the remainder of my life.”
And nobly did Rik redeem his promise. He obtained special introduction to the British Museum, consulted every Directory in existence, hunted up every widow of the name of Langley in the kingdom, and found the right one at last, not three miles distant from his own door in London. Captain Rik, it must be known, had a room in London furnished like a cabin, which he was wont to refer to as his “ship” and his “bunk,” but he paid that retreat only occasional visits, finding it more agreeable to live with his brother.
It was a fine Sabbath morning when Rik took Letta’s hand and led her into the presence of her mother. He would not let himself be announced, but pushed the child into the drawing-room and shut the door.
With similar delicacy of feeling we now draw a curtain over the meeting of the mother and the long-lost child.
“It’s almost too much for me, tough old sea-dog though I am, this perpetual cruisin’ about after strange runaway craft,” said uncle Rik, as he and Letta walked hand in hand along the streets one day some weeks later. “Here have I been beatin’ about for I don’t know how long, and I’m only in the middle of it yet. We expect the Fairy Queen in port to-night or to-morrow.”
“But you won’t hurt poor Stumps when you catch him, will you?” pleaded Letta, looking earnestly up into her companion’s jovial face. “He was very nice and kind to me, you know, on Pirate Island.”
“No, I’ll not hurt him, little old woman,” said Rik. “Indeed, I don’t know yet for certain that Stumps is a thief; it may be Shunks or it may be Gibson, you see, who is the thief. However, we’ll find out before long. Now then, good-bye, I’ll be back soon.”
He shook hands with Letta at Mr Wright’s house, she and her mother having agreed to reside there until Robin’s return home.
Wending his way through the streets until he reached one of the great arteries of the metropolis, he got into a ’bus and soon found himself on the banks of the Thames. Arrived at the docks, one of the first vessels his eyes fell on was the Fairy Queen.