s my husband's ship--and me making the coffee for breakfast as usual,
comes off a boy with a telegram, saying, 'Meet me and Miss Myra by the
foot of the Monument. Most important.--Tom Trevarthen.' You might have
knocked me down with a feather, and even then I couldn't make head nor
tail of it."

To this extent her experience seemed to be repeating itself in Mr. Joshua.

"For to begin with," she went on, "how did I know that Tom Trevarthen was
in London? let alone that last time we met we parted in anger. But he'd
picked us out among the shipping as he was towed up last night in the
_One-and-All_ to anchor in the Pool. And I defy anyone to guess that he'd
got Myra here on board, who's my own niece by a second marriage, and
shipped herself as a stowaway, but was hurt by a fall down the hold, and
might have lain there and starved to death, poor child--and all for love
of her brother that his uncle had shipped off to a blind orphanage.
But there's a providence, Mr. Benny, that watches over children--and you
may lay to that." Mrs. Purchase took breath. "Well, naturally, as you
may guess, my first thought was to set it down for a hoax, though not in
the best of taste. But with Myra's name staring me in the face in the
telegram, and blood being thicker than water, on second thoughts I
told 'Siah to put on his best clothes and come to the Monument with me,
not saying more for fear of upsetting him. 'Why the Monument?' says
'Siah. 'Why not?' says I; 'it was put up against the Roman Catholics.'
So that determined him; and I wanted company, for in London you can't be
too careful. Sure enough, when we got to it, there was Tom waiting, with
this poor child holding his hand; and then the whole story came out.
'But what's to be done?' I said, for my very flesh rebelled against such
cruelty to the child, let alone that he was flogged black and blue at
home. And then Tom Trevarthen had a thought even cleverer than his
telegram. 'Peter Benny,' says he, 'has a brother here in London connected
with the press; the press can do anything, and by Peter's account his
brother can do anything with the press. If we can only find him, our
job's as good as done.' So we hailed a cab, and told the man to drive us
to the _Shipping Gazette_. But I reckon we must have started someways at
the wrong end, for the _Shipping Gazette_ passed us on to a place called
the _Times_, where they kept us waiting forty minutes, and then said they
didn't