When Miss Costigan had seen all the outstanding bills paid to the
uttermost shilling, she handed over the balance to her father, who broke
out into hospitalities to all his friends, gave the little Creeds more
apples and gingerbread than he had ever bestowed upon them, so that the
widow Creed ever after held the memory of her lodger in veneration, and
the young ones wept bitterly when he went away; and in a word managed the
money so cleverly that it was entirely expended before many days, and
that he was compelled to draw upon Mr. Dolphin for a sum to pay for
travelling expenses when the time of their departure arrived.
There was held at an inn in that county town a weekly meeting of a
festive, almost a riotous character, of a society of gentlemen who called
themselves the Buccaneers. Some of the choice spirits of Chatteris
belonged to this cheerful club. Graves, the apothecary (than whom a
better fellow never put a pipe in his mouth and smoked it), Smart, the
talented and humorous portrait-painter of High Street, Croker, an
excellent auctioneer, and the uncompromising Hicks, the able Editor for
twenty-three years of the County Chronicle and Chatteris Champion, were
amongst the crew of the Buccaneers, whom also Bingley, the manager, liked
to join of a Saturday evening, whenever he received permission from his
lady.
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