"O, yes; you hate me, and you want to persecute me," replied the old
man, bitterly, as he glanced spitefully at his nephew. "There, now, you
broke my glasses," continued the miser, as he picked them up from the
hearth, on which they had fallen. "I gin a dollar for them glasses; I'm
a poor man, and 'tain't right I should lose 'em."

"Will you tell me where Vincent is, or shall I send a constable to
arrest you for conspiracy?" demanded Mr. Watson.

"I don't know nothin' at all where he is," replied the miser, alarmed
by this threat.

"You were to receive this money."

"That may be. Cap'n Vincent did tell me if you paid any money to me for
him to keep it till he come for't. He didn't tell me nothin' at all he
was go'n' to do, nor where he was goin' to. I hain't no idee in the
world where he is."

This was all that either Mr. Watson or Levi could get out of the old
man. It was really all he knew; and the visitors, disappointed and
disheartened, retired from the miser's presence, though not till the
merchant had declared that he did not intend to pay one penny to Dock
to restore his daughter. The old man groaned when they had gone; but it
was because he was to lose his reward, and probably the money he had
loaned. It was a bitter hour to him.

Mr. Watson and Levi conferred together as they walked home. From that
time no one passed in or out of the miser's house without being
observed. Levi watched that day; but at nine o'clock in the evening,
Mr. C. Augustus Ebenier took his place, to serve for the night.

CHAPTER XXI.

THE CARIBBEE SAILS FOR AUSTRALIA.

If Mrs. Dock Vincent had not been a person of higher moral purposes
than her husband, sad indeed would have been the lot of the two
children that slept in the captain's state-room on board of the
Caribbee. As is often the case, she knew less of her husband's moral
obliquity than the world at large, though even she knew enough to
believe that he was not what he should be. People did not tell her of
Dock's wicked deeds, and he complained bitterly to her of the hard
treatment which the world bestowed upon him. That good men frowned at
him and spurned him he unjustly attributed to their hypocrisy and
self-esteem, rather than to his own evil deeds and evil intentions.

Dock had spent a term in the state prison, and his character was
damaged, if not ruined. Men would not trust him, and the reprobate
chafed under the public censure. To his wife and his frien