Chapter XI: Part 11

Leslie was wearing a pair of man’s slippers when she came down the broad stairs. Dick’s study door was open and she saw him sitting in a deep cane chair on the lawn outside, a pipe between his teeth, a heap of documents on his knees which he was examining slowly one by one. He looked round, rising from his chair at the sound of her voice. She saw his face and was shocked.

“Dick, you look a hundred years old!”

“I feel a thousand,” he said, and guided her to the chair. “Sit down. Well, that’s the end, Leslie--and the beginning.”

She nodded.

“I think we’ve managed to keep the ugliest part of it out of the newspapers. Poor old Harry!” There were tears in his eyes which he did not attempt to hide. “Poor old victim!”

“Victim of what?”

“Of his mother,” said Dick. “There never was a time when she was sane. My poor father did not discover this until after the child was born, and her death removed one of the greatest sorrows from his life. The other was--Harry! Well, now you know the secrets of us all, what do you think, Leslie?”

“Who was the Black Abbot?” she asked, and then, to her amazement:

“I was,” he replied quietly, and told her all he had told the high official from Scotland Yard.

“The queer thing was that he must have seen the gold before he died. What fools we were! The Diary told us as plainly as anything could that the old Lord Chelford who hid his treasure chose the bed of the river. It was a year of drought, the river was quite dry, and probably he found a deep hole in its bed, hid the gold and covered it with shingle that would not wash away.”

“You are very rich now, Dick?”

He nodded slowly.

“Yes--I suppose I am. There are a few minor trials and troubles for us, Leslie dear,” he said, “but when those are all over and everything is settled we will go abroad for a year and forget all about these ghastly days and nights.”

She took his hand between her two palms.

FINIS

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

Minor spelling inconsistencies (_e.g._ frock-coat/frock coat, paving-stone/paving stone, shirt-sleeves/shirt sleeves, etc.) have been preserved.

Alterations to the text:

Abandon the use of drop-caps.

Adjust the chapter numbering (the source text had two chapter XLIs).

Add ToC.

Punctuation: fix some missing periods and quotation mark pairings.

[Chapter I]

Change “such _aws_ the gloom in the library” to _was_.

[Chapter XIII]

“he said, and his voice was _kusky_ with emotion” to _husky_.

[Chapter XX]

“then went _downstars_ to his own room” to _downstairs_.

[Chapter XXI]

“moved stealthily toward the bed, _feeeling_ for the brass rail” to _feeling_.

[Chapter XXIV]

(“Do you know that _Robison_ Crusoe was a German?”) to _Robinson_.

[Chapter LVI]

“and _occasionlly_ as prospective buyers of our property” to _occasionally_.

[Chapter LXIV]

“Her mouth went _dray nd_ she felt for the knife she” to _dry and_.

[End of text]