To be frank with you, I don't
think he did."
"Poor dad," she murmured, "of course he didn't! I know I'd have
gone to the devil as fast as I could if I'd been treated like it!"
"Well, he drifted about from place to place and at last he got to
the Gold Coast. Here I half lost sight of him, and his few letters
were more bitter and despairing than ever. The last I had told me
that he was just off on an expedition into the interior with another
Englishman. They were to visit a native King and try to obtain from
him certain concessions, including the right to work a wonderful
gold-mine somewhere near the village of Bekwando."
"Why, the great Bekwando Land Company!" she cried. "It is the one
Scarlett Trent has just formed a syndicate to work."
Davenant nodded.
"Yes. It was a terrible risk they were running," he said, "for the
people were savage and the climate deadly. He wrote cheerfully for
him, though. He had a partner, he said, who was strong and
determined, and they had presents, to get which he had mortgaged the
last penny of his income. It was a desperate enterprise perhaps,
but it suited him, and he went on to tell me this, Ernestine. If he
succeeded and he became wealthy, he was returning to England just
for a sight of you.
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