Chapter III: Part 3

“I don’t know what’s to be done with such a mess as this. Tell me, first of all, what you put in the stocking, you unfortunate blunderer?”

“Oh yes, Sir, and tell you true as if it was the last word I had to spake entirely, and the Lord be good to you, and Ted Connor ses he to ould Phillips, regarden the five as was owen by Tim, and not includen of the ten which was changed by Pat Reilly--”

“You didn’t put Pat Reilly, or ould Phillips into the stocking, did you?”

“Is it Pat or ould Phillips as was ever the valy of eighty-sivin pound ten, lost and gone, and includen the five as was owen by Tim, and Ted Connor--”

“Then tell me what you _did_ put in the stocking, and let me take it down. And then hold your tongue, if you can, and go your way, and come back to-morrow.”

The particulars of the notes were taken, without any reference to ould Phillips: who could not, however, by any means be kept out of the story; and the man departed.

When he was gone, the stocking-foot was shown to the then Chief Engraver of the notes, who said that if anybody could settle the business, his son could. And he proposed that the particulars of the notes should not be communicated to his son, who was then employed in his department of the Bank, but should be put away under lock and key; and that if his son’s ingenuity should enable him to discover from these ashes what notes had really been put in the stocking, and the two lists should tally, the man should be paid the lost amount. To this prudent proposal the Bank of Ireland readily assented; being extremely anxious that the man should not be a loser; but, of course, deeming it essential to be protected from imposition.

The son readily undertook the delicate commission proposed to him. He detached the fragments from the stocking with the utmost care, on the fine point of a penknife; laid the whole gently in a basin of warm water; and presently saw them, to his delight, begin to unfold and expand like flowers. By and by, he began to “teaze them” with very light touches of the ends of a camel’s-hair pencil, and so, by little and little, and by the most delicate use of the warm water, the camel’s-hair pencil, and the penknife, got the various morsels separate before him, and began to piece them together. The first piece laid down was faintly recognisable by a practised eye as a bit of the left-hand bottom corner of a twenty pound note; then came a bit of a five; then of a ten; then more bits of a twenty; then more bits of a five and ten; then, another left-hand bottom corner of a twenty--so there were two twenties!--and so on, until, to the admiration and astonishment of the whole Bank, he noted down the exact amount deposited in the stocking, and the exact notes of which it had been composed. Upon this--as he wished to see and divert himself with the man on his return--he provided himself with a bundle of corresponding new, clean, rustling notes, and awaited his arrival.

He came exactly as before, with the same blank staring face, and the same inquiry, “Can you do anything for me, Sir!”

“Well,” said our friend, “I don’t know. Maybe I _can_ do something. But I have taken a great deal of pains, and lost a great deal of time, and I want to know what you mean to give me!”

“Is it give, Sir? Thin, is there anything I wouldn’t give for my eighty-sivin pound tin, Sir; and it’s murdered I am by ould Phillips.”

“Never mind him; there were two twenties, were there not?”

“Oh, holy mother, Sir, there was! Two most illigant twenties! and Ted Conner--and Phalim--which Reilly--”

He faltered, and stopped as our friend, with much ostentatious rustling of the crisp paper, produced a new twenty, and then the other twenty, and then a ten, and then a five, and so forth. Meanwhile, the man, occasionally murmuring an exclamation of surprise, or a protestation of gratitude, but gradually becoming vague and remote in the latter as the notes re-appeared, looked on, staring, evidently inclined to believe that they were the real lost notes, reproduced in that state by some chemical process. At last they were all told out, and in his pocket, and he still stood staring and muttering, “Oh holy Mother, only to think of it! Sir, it’s bound to you for ever that I am!”--but more vaguely and remotely now than ever.

“Well,” said our friend, “what do you propose to give me for this?”

After staring and rubbing his chin for some time longer, he replied with the unexpected question:

“Do you like bacon?”

“Very much,” said our friend.

“Thin it’s a side as I’ll bring your honor to-morrow morning, and a bucket of new milk--and ould Phillips--”

“Come,” said our friend, glancing at a notable shillelah the man had under his arm, “let me undeceive you. I don’t want anything of you, and I am very glad you have got your money back. But I suppose you’d stand by me, now, if I wanted a boy to help me in any little skirmish?”

They were standing by a window on the top storey of the Bank, commanding a courtyard, where a sentry was on duty. To our friend’s amazement, the man dashed out of the room without speaking one word, suddenly appeared in the courtyard, performed a war-dance round this astonished soldier--who was a modest young recruit--made the shillelah flutter, like a wooden butterfly, round his musket, round his bayonet, round his head, round his body, round his arms, inside and outside his legs, advanced and retired, rattled it all round him like a firework, looked up at the window, cried out with a high leap in the air, “Whooroo! Thry me!”--vanished--and never was beheld at the Bank again from that time forth.

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Transcriber’s Notes

This file uses _underscores_ to indicate italic text.

Lines marked with ~= ... =~ were in German Fraktur.

New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the public domain.

Itemized changes from the original text:

On page 32, changed “where-ever” to “wherever”,
near “generously subscribed to charities”
On page 34, changed “watermark” to “water-mark”,
near “paper with the ink or”
On page 38, changed “have,” to “have”,
near “chemicals, and colours, which have”