"No lie, Richard. Witnesses proved that the man had spoken the truth."
"Witnesses? Pooh! More liars, you mean."
"I went to the owners of the vessel," pursued Sir Joseph. "I got from
them the names of the officers and the crew, and I waited, leaving the
case in the hands of the Liverpool police. The ship was wrecked at the
mouth of the Amazon, but the crew and the cargo were saved. The men
belonging to Liverpool came back. They were a bad set, I grant you. But
they were examined separately about the treatment of the foreign sailor,
and they all told the same story. They could give no account of their
captain, nor of the sailor who had been his accomplice in the crime,
except that they had not embarked in the ship which brought the rest of
the crew to England. Whatever may have become of the captain since, he
certainly never returned to Liverpool."
"Did you find out his name?"
The question was asked by Turlington. Even Sir Joseph, the least
observant of men, noticed that it was put with a perfectly unaccountable
irritability of manner.
Pages:
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35