The golden pool

"The golden pool : A story of a forgotten mine" by R. Austin Freeman is a novel written in the early 20th century. It follows Richard Englefield, a weary English bank clerk who seizes a chance to ship out as purser on the brig Lady Jane and is drawn into West African trading, local legends, and hints of hidden gold. Guided and sometimes misled by sailors, merchants, and colonials—including Captain Bithery and the dignified trader Pereira—he stumbles on stories of a sacred treasure and a “forgotten” mine that promise peril and discovery. The opening of the story traces how a misplaced matchbox leads Englefield into a tavern brawl, a hasty rescue of a surly shipmaster, and an impulsive offer to sail as purser to the West African coast. After a fair voyage, he helps establish trade at Quittah, learning the rhythms of buying and selling palm oil, rubber, and copra, while hearing unsettling tales: a Hausa merchant’s talk of a king’s treasure house and “many blind men,” and Pereira’s account of fetish-guarded gold at the Aboasi pool. A Sunday trip inland reveals a mission graveyard and a scarred, eyeless Krepi man who seems a former Ashanti slave, deepening the mystery. Sent down the coast to Adena, Englefield meets the smooth Olympio, endures a fiery local feast, and in a secret compartment of an old sea chest discovers the faded journal of Captain Barnabas Hogg—an artifact that hints his own quest is only beginning.

The golden pool, by R. Austin Freeman. Republished by OpenStories from Project Gutenberg eBook #76845.