Uncle Rik’s Adventures.  
Uncle Rik seated in Mr Wright’s drawing-room; Mr Wright in an easy-chair near the window; Mrs Wright—with much of the lustre gone out of her fine eyes—lying languidly on the sofa; Madge Mayland at work on some incomprehensible piece of netting beside her aunt,—all in deep mourning.
 
Uncle Rik has just opened a telegram, at which he stares, open eyed and mouthed, without speaking, while his ruddy cheeks grow pale.
 
“Not bad news, I trust, brother,” said poor Mrs Wright, to whom the worst news had been conveyed when she heard of the wreck of the Triton. Nothing could exceed that, she felt, in bitterness.
 
“What is it, Rik?” said Mr Wright, anxiously.
 
“Oh! nothing—nothing. That is to say, not bad news, certainly, but amazing news. Boh! I’m a fool.”
 
He stopped short after this complimentary assertion, for uncle Rik had somewhere read or heard that joy can kill, and he feared to become an accomplice in a murder.
 
“Come, Rik, don’t keep us in suspense,” said his brother, rising; “something has happened.”
 
“O yes, something has indeed happened,” cried Rik, “for this telegram is from Sam Shipton.”
 
“Then Robin is alive!” cried Mrs Wright, leaping up, while Madge turned perfectly white.
 
“No—that is to say—yes—it may be so—of course must be so—for,—bah! what an ass I am! Listen.”
 
He proceeded to read Sam’s telegram, while Mrs Wright covered her face with her hands and sank trembling on the sofa.
 
The telegram having suffered rather severe mutilation at the hands of the foreigners by whom it was transmitted, conveyed a very confusing idea of the facts that were intended, but the puzzling over it by the whole party, and the gradual, though not perfect, elucidation of its meaning, had perhaps the effect of softening the joyful intelligence to a bearable extent.
 
“Now,” said uncle Rik, while the perspiration of mental effort and anxiety stood on his bald forehead, “this is the outcome of it all. Sam clearly says ‘all well,’ which means, of course, that Robin is alive—thank God for that! Then he refers to a previous telegram, which, of course, must be lost, for it hasn’t come to hand. Bah! I wonder the nasty things ever do come to hand. Anyhow, that telegram must have been meant to announce their safe arrival at Bombay, undoubtedly.”
 
“Of course—I see it now,” said Mrs Wright, with a deep sigh.
 
“Of course,” echoed Rik. “Then there’s some queer reference to a ship and a Fiery Queen, and a Stamps and a Shunks, and a Gibson, and a thief, and three bags, and the port of London, which of course means London, and a public-house named, apparently, Torture—”
 
“Tartar, I think, uncle,” said Madge.
 
“Well, Tartar if you like, it’s much the same if you catch him. And it winds up with a girl—which is not surprisin’—who is to be expectorated—”
 
“Expected, surely,” said Madge, with a rather hysterical laugh, for the conflicting feelings within her tended rather to tears.
 
“So be it, Madge—expected, with an unreadable name beginning with an L,—and that’s all; and a pretty penny he must have paid to send us such a lot o’ rubbish.”
 
“It has brought the oil of gladness to our hearts, brother,” said Mr Wright, “and is worth its cost. But, now, what do you intend to do?”
 
“Do!” exclaimed Rik, who was never happier than when he could explode his feelings in action. “I’ll go this moment to the port of London, find out the owners of the Fiery Queen, make particular inquiries about the Stampses, Shunkses, and Gibsons, visit Torture public-houses—though they’re all that, more or less—and see if I can hear anything about girls to be expectorated, with names beginning with L. There—these are my sailing directions, so—up anchor and away!”
 
Uncle Rik immediately obeyed his own commands, and spent the remainder of that day in what he styled cruising. And he cruised to some purpose, for although he failed to obtain any information as to the girl, he discovered the owners of the Fairy—not Fiery—Queen, who said that she was expected home in a few weeks, but that they knew nothing whatever about the rather remarkable names which he submitted for their consideration. With this amount of information he was fain to rest content, and returned in an elevated state of mind to his brother’s house.
 
Some weeks after these events, the Wright family was again seated round the social board, as uncle Rik called it, when two visitors were announced. The social meal happening to be tea, and the drawing-room at that time in dishabille, owing to carpet disturbances, the visitors were shown into the dining-room—a lady, accompanied by a pretty little girl.
 
“Excuse my calling at an unusual hour,” said the lady, “but I trust the occasion of my visit will be a sufficient excuse. I have just arrived from Bombay, and hasten to present a letter from your son, and to deliver over my interesting charge, this dear child, Letta Langley, whom—”
 
“The expectorated girl!” shouted uncle Rik, leaping up, “begins with an L,—two L’s indeed. Bah, I’m an idiot! Excuse my excitement, madam—pray go on.”
 
Slightly surprised, but more amused, the lady went on to tell all she knew about Robin and his friends, while the happy mother read snatches of Robin’s letter through her tears, and Mr Wright and Madge plied the lady with questions and tea, and Letta, taking at once to uncle Rik, ecstatified, amazed and horrified that retired sea-captain with her charming earnest little ways, her wonderful experiences, and her intimate acquaintance with pirates and their habits.
 
A letter from Robin to his mother, and another from Sam to Mr Wright, arrived next morning, and proved to be those which had been written immediately after their landing at Bombay, and had been posted, so the writers thought, at the time their first telegram was despatched. But the letters had been given to Stumps to post, and Stumps was not blessed with a good memory, which may account for the delay in transmission. These letters corroborated all the lady had said. Thus was Letta formally installed in the Wright family, and uncle Rik solemnly charged himself with the discovery of her mother!
 
“Depend upon it, my dear,” he said, with an amount of self-sufficient assurance and indomitable resolution that carried sweet consolation to the child’s heart, “that I’ll find your mother if she’s above ground, though the findin’ of her should cost me the whole of my fortune and the remainder of my lif............