“Your papa, Mary?” exclaimed the lieutenant putting out his hand. “I am happy to see you, sir, whatever claim you have to that relationship, although you shall not carry off our Mary if I can help it.”
The gentleman smiled faintly. “You certainly, sir, have a superior, if not a prior claim, from all the loving-kindness which you and your sister have shown her, and I should indeed be ungrateful were I to act contrary to your wishes,” answered the stranger.
“Well, well, come along, we will settle that by-and-by,” said the lieutenant, as he walked hurriedly on. “I want to see my good sister Sally and assure her that I am as sound in health and limb as when I went away.” He had let go Mary’s hand, and she and Ned now followed, Charley having got out some time before to take a shorter cut to the coast-guard station, where he expected to find his father.
Miss Sally did not go into hysterics, as Mary had so nearly done, on seeing the lieutenant and her nephew, but received them both as her affectionate nature prompted, though as she looked up into Ned’s face she declared that, had not he come back with his uncle, she would have had some doubts as to his identity.
Mr Farrance now came forward and more formally introduced his brother, assuring the lieutenant of the proofs he had obtained to his entire satisfaction that he was Mary’s father, “though,” he added, as he took him aside, “I fear, from the trials and sufferings he has endured, his days on earth are destined to be few.”
This, indeed, when the lieutenant had an opportunity of observing the elder Mr Farrance, he thought likely to be the case. The lieutenant and Ned were too much engaged—the one in describing his voyage, and the other his adventures in Africa—to inquire after any of their neighbours, though it was very evident that Miss Sally had a matter of importance which she wished to communicate.
“Come, Sally, what is it?” exclaimed the lieutenant. “Has Mrs Jones got twins? or is Miss Simpkins married? or is poor old Shank dead and not left enough to bury him, as I always said would be the case?”
“Hush, hush,” said Miss Sally, looking towards Mary and her father, who, with Ned, were seated at the window. “It is about Mr Shank I wish to tell you. The old man is dead, and it was partly about his affairs that Mr Farrance came down here, or they would have sent for Mary and me to London. It is a very extraordinary story. He was once a miser, and although suffering apparently from poverty, had no less than thirty thousand pounds, which he has left to our dear Mary. He did so before he knew he was her grandfather, which he turns out without doubt to have been. His only daughter married Mr Farrance, and was lost in the Indian seas on board the ship from which you saved Mary and Tom. Mary was with the old man until his death, and was a great comfort to him, but she had not the slightest suspicion that he intended to leave her a sixpence. From what our friend Mr Thorpe had said, however, I was not so much surprised as I might otherwise have been. Mary had so interested him in the sufferings of the Africans, caused by the slave trade, that he left a note expressing his hope that she would employ such means as she might have at her disposal to better their condition, especially by the establishment of missions, which he expressed his belief would prove the best way for accomplishing that end.”
No one would have supposed from Mary’s manner that she had suddenly become an heiress. Indeed no one was more astonished than Ned when he heard the account Miss Sally had given his uncle. It seemed, indeed, to afford him much less satisfaction than might have been supposed. Her wealth, however, was not increased by her father’s death, which occurred a short time afterwards.
Several years passed away; by that time Africa had been explored by the many energetic travellers who have so greatly benefited its people by acting as pioneers to the missionaries who have since gone forth to carry to them the blessings of the Gospel.