ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN HORN
necessity of thinking so much about door-locks and window-fastenings,—when there came a letter from Edna, informing her of the captain's safe arrival in Acapulco with the cargo of guano and gold, and inclosing a draft which first made Mrs. Cliff turn pale, and then compelled her to sit down on the floor and cry. The letter related in brief the captain's adventures, and stated his intention of returning for the gold.
"To think of it!" softly sobbed Mrs. Cliff, after she had carefully closed her bedroom door. "With this and what I am to get, I believe I could buy the bank, and yet I can only sit here and try to think of some place to hide this dangerous piece of paper."
The draft was drawn by a San Francisco house upon a Boston bank, and Edna had suggested that it might be well for Mrs. Cliff to open an account in the latter city. But the poor lady knew that would never do. A bank-account in Boston would soon become known to the people of Plainton, and what was the use of having an account anywhere if she could not draw from it? Edna had not failed to reiterate the necessity of keeping the gold discovery an absolute secret, and every word she said upon this point in creased Mrs. Cliff's depression.
"If it were only for a fixed time, a month or three months, or even six months," the poor lady said to herself, "I might stand it. It would be hard to do without all the things I want, and be afraid even to pay the money I borrowed to go to South America, but if I knew when the day was certainly coming when I could hold up my head and let everybody know just what I am, and take my proper place in the
236
