"But I s'pose, now, it sounds queer to 'ave me a-callin'
you Sir Richard, w'en, as like as not, I might be dammin' your eyes as
second mate?"
Royson tried to escape, in his hurry he did not notice a bulky letter
which lay on the top of one of his leather trunks. Stump called him
back.
"You're missin' your mail, Sir Richard," he said, and Dick, perforce,
returned. Oddly enough, the letter covered the initials "R. K." painted
on the portmanteau. Turning a deaf ear to Stump's further pleasantries,
he opened the envelope. A scrawl on a sheet of thin continental note-
paper contained the brief statement that, "by inadvertence," von Kerber
had "detained the enclosed letters and cablegrams." The enclosures,
which were from Mr. Forbes, bore out the accuracy of Mrs. Haxton's
revelations. He was, in very truth, the twenty-seventh baronet of his
line, sole owner of Orme Castle and its dependencies, and befitted, by
rank, descent, and estate, to take a social position of no mean order.
For an instant he forgot his surroundings.
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