Mr. Tubbs
should reveal his own perfidy. And the curtain should ring down
upon the play, leaving Mr. Tubbs foiled all around, bereft both of
the treasure and of Aunt Jane. Oh, how I would enjoy the farce as
it was played by the unconscious actors! How I would step in at
the end to reward virtue and punish guilt! And how I would point
the moral, later, very gently to Aunt Jane, an Aunt Jane all
penitence and docility!
Little I dreamed what surprises ensuing acts of the play were to
hold for me, or of their astounding contrast with the farce of my
joyous imagination.
I took no part in the storm that raged round Mr. Tubbs. It is said
that in the heart of the tempest there is calm, and this great
truth of natural philosophy Mr. Tubbs exemplified. His face
adorned by a seraphic, buttery smile, he stood unmoved, while Miss
Higglesby-Browne uttered cyclonic exhortations and reproaches,
while Aunt Jane sobbed and said, "_Oh, Mr. Tubbs_!" while Mr. Shaw
strove to make himself heard above the din. He did at least
succeed in extracting from the traitor a definite statement of
terms. These were nothing less than fifty per cent. of the
treasure, secured to him by a document signed, sealed and delivered
into his own hands. To a suggestion that as he had discovered the
all-important tombstone so might some one else, he replied with
tranquillity that he thought not, as he had taken precautions
against such an eventuality.
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