In the Land of the Long White Cloud

lascivious Mr. Morrison. “I would have liked to take the next ship back to London, but of course that wasn’t an option. No one would have taken a girl like me. I thought about Australia too. But God knows they have enough…ahem, women of easy virtue over there who could not find a job selling Bibles. And then I found the twins. They were headed the same place I was: away from here—and ‘away’ meant a ship.”
    “How exactly did they find each other again?” Helen inquired. “They were in completely different areas.”
    Daphne shrugged. “They’re twins, after all. What the one thinks, the other thinks too. Believe me, I’ve had them with me for more than twenty years, and I still think it’s uncanny. If I understood them correctly back then, they ran into each other on the Bridle Path. How they slogged all the way there, I have no idea. When I found them, they were running around the harbor, stealing their food together, and trying to stow themselves away on a boat. Utter nonsense; someone would have found them straightaway. So what was I supposed to do? I held onto them. I was a bit nice to a sailor, and he got me the papers of a girl who died on the way from Dublin to Lyttelton. Officially my name is Bridey O’Rourke. Everyone believed it too, with my red hair and all. But the twins kept calling me Daphne, naturally, so I kept my first name. It’s a good name anyway for a…I mean, it’s a Biblical name; it’s not easy to let something like that go.”
    Helen laughed. “They’ll canonize you someday!”
    Daphne giggled, looking for a moment like the young girl from back then. “So then we left for the West Coast. We traveled around a bit at first, finally ending up in a broth…ahem, in the establishment of a certain Madame Jolanda. It was pretty run-down. First thing I did was clean the place up, which really caused business to pick up. That’s where your friend Mr. Greenwood smoked me out, though I didn’t leave because of him. It was rather that Jolanda was neversatisfied. One day she told me that she wanted to start putting the girls to work the following Saturday. It was time, she said, that they were broken in…ahem, that they knew somebody, as it says in the Bible.”
    Helen had to laugh. “You really have your Bible memorized, Daphne,” she said. “Next we’ll have to test your knowledge of
David Copperfield
.”
    “So that Friday I really kicked up my heels one last time, and then we made off with the cash box. Naturally, that wasn’t very ladylike.”
    “Let’s just say—an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,” Helen remarked.
    “And then we followed the ‘scent of gold’ here.” Daphne grinned. “And we struck it big! I’d go so far as to say that seventy percent of the yield of all the gold mines in the area comes my way.”

    Ruben was confused, bordering on a little unsettled, when he received an official-looking envelope only six weeks after he had posted his letter to the governor. The postman handed him the missive almost ceremoniously.
    “From Wellington!” he exclaimed importantly. “From the government! Are you being ennobled now, Rube? Is the queen coming by?”
    Ruben laughed. “Not likely, Ethan, not in the least bit likely.” He checked his desire to rip the envelope open immediately since Ethan was looking a little too curiously over his shoulder, and Ron from the rental stables was hanging around Ethan’s shop.
    “I’ll see you two later, then,” he said, trying to appear relaxed, but he was already playing with the envelope as he walked toward the warehouse. He had a change of plan as he walked past the police station. This was undoubtedly about James McKenzie, so he should be the first to find out what the governor had decided.
    Soon Ruben, Leonard, and James were all bent eagerly over the missive. All of them moaned at the governor’s long introduction, in which he stressed all the services Ruben had rendered for theblossoming young settlement of Queenstown. The governor finally came to the heart of the matter:
    …we are happy to be able to grant your request for further clemency regarding the livestock thief James McKenzie, whose case you so illuminatingly represented, a positive response. We too are of the opinion that James McKenzie could be of use to the young community of the South Island, as long as he limits himself in the future to the legal exercise of his doubtlessly considerable talents. We also hope herewith and