Hokitika?’
‘I haven’t the faintest idea,’ said Mrs. Carver.
‘Thank you, Mrs. Carver. I have no further questions.’
‘Thank you, Mr. Broham,’ she said, serenely.
Moody was already pushing his chair back, waiting for the invitation from the justice to rise. ‘Mrs. Carver,’ he said promptly, when the invitation came. ‘In the month of March, 1864, your late husband Crosbie Wells made a strike in the Dunstan Valley, is that correct?’
Mrs. Carver was visibly surprised by this question, but she paused only briefly before saying, ‘Yes, that is correct.’
‘But Mr. Wells did not report this bonanza to the bank, is that also correct?’
‘Also correct,’ said Mrs. Carver.
‘Instead, he employed a private escort to transport the ore from Dunstan back to Dunedin—where you, his wife, received it.’
A flicker of alarm showed in Mrs. Carver’s expression. ‘Yes,’ she said, cautiously.
‘Can you describe how the ore was packed and then transported from the field?’
She hesitated, but Moody’s line of questioning had evidently caught her off guard, and she had not time enough to form an alibi.
‘It was packed into an office safe,’ she said at last. ‘The safe was loaded into a carriage, and the carriage was escorted back to Dunedin by a team of men—armed, of course. In Dunedin I collected the safe, paid the bearers, and wrote at once to Mr. Wells to let him know that the safe had arrived safely, at which point he sent on the key.’
‘Was the gold escort appointed by you, or by Mr. Wells?’
‘Mr. Wells made the appointment,’ said Mrs. Carver. ‘They were very good. They never gave us an ounce of trouble. It was a private business. Gracewood and Sons, or something to that effect.’
‘Gracewood and Spears,’ Moody corrected. ‘The enterprise has since relocated to Kaniere.’
‘Indeed,’ said Mrs. Carver.
‘What did you do with the bonanza, once it was delivered safely to you?’
‘The ore remained inside the safe. I installed the safe at our residence on Cumberland-street, and there it stayed.’
‘Why did you not take the metal to a bank?’
‘The price of gold was fluctuating daily, and the market for gold was very unpredictable,’ said Mrs. Carver. ‘We thought it best to wait until it was a good time to sell.’
‘By your degree of caution, I would hazard to guess the value of the bonanza was considerable.’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Several thousand, we thought. We never had it valued.’
‘Following the strike, did Mr. Wells remain upon the field?’
‘Yes, he continued to prospect for another year: until the following spring. He was buoyed by his success, and felt that he might get lucky a second time; but he did not.’
‘Where is the bonanza now?’ Moody asked.
She hesistated again, and then said, ‘It was stolen.’
‘My condolences,’ said Moody. ‘You must have been devastated by the loss.’
‘We were,’ said Mrs. Carver.
‘You speak on behalf of yourself and Mr. Wells, presumably.’
‘Of course.’
Moody paused again, and then said, ‘I presume that the thief gained access, somehow, to the key.’
‘Perhaps,’ said Mrs. Carver, ‘or perhaps the lock was unreliable. The safe was of a modern design; and as we all know, modern technologies are never infallible. It’s also possible that a second key was cast, without our knowledge.’
‘Did you have any idea who might have stolen the bonanza?’
‘None at all.’
‘Would you agree that it is likely to have been someone in your close acquaintance?’
‘Not necessarily,’ said Mrs. Carver, tossing her head. ‘Any member of the gold escort might have betrayed us.
‘Did you open the safe regularly, to check upon the contents?’
‘Not regularly, no.’
‘When did you first discover that the fortune was missing?’
‘When Crosbie returned the following year.’
‘Can you describe what happened when you made this discovery?’
‘Mr. Wells came back from the fields, and we sat down to take stock of our finances together. He opened the safe, and saw that it was empty. You can be sure that he was absolutely furious—as was I.’
‘What month was this?’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Mrs. Carver, suddenly flustered. ‘April, maybe. Or May.’
‘April or May—of 1865. Last year.’
‘Yes,’ she said.
‘Thank you, Mrs. Carver,’ said Moody, and then, to the justice, ‘Thank you, sir.’
He felt, as he sat down, that the atmosphere in the courtroom was quickening. Harrington and Fellowes had ceased their whispering, and the justice was no longer taking notes. Every pair of eyes in the room watched Mrs. Carver as she descended the steps from the witness box and sat down.
‘The Court calls Mr. Francis Carver.’
Carver was handsome in a dark green jacket and a pinned cravat. He gave his oath with his usual terse accent, and then turned, his expression sober, to face the barristers’ bench.
Broham looked up from his notes. ‘Mr. Carver,’ he said. ‘Please describe for the Court how you first came to be acquainted with Mr. Staines.’
‘I met him in Dunedin,’ said Carver, ‘around about this time last year. He was fresh off the boat from Sydney, and looking to set himself up as a prospector. I offered to be his sponsor, and he accepted.’
‘What did this sponsorship require of each of you?’
‘I’d loan him enough money to set him up on the diggings, and in return, he’d be obliged to give me half- shares in his first venture, with dividends in perpetuity.’
‘What was the exact monetary value of your sponsorship?’
‘I bought his swag and a store of provisions. I paid for his ticket over to the Coast. He was facing down a gambling debt in Dunedin; I paid that, too.’
‘Can you guess at a total value, please?’
‘I suppose I stood him eight pounds. Something in the neighbourhood of eight pounds. He got the short- term leg-up, and I got the long-term payoff. That was the idea.’
‘What was Mr. Staines’s first venture?’
‘He bought a two-acre plot of land within a mile of Kaniere,’ said Carver, ‘known as the Aurora. He wrote to me from Hokitika once he’d made his purchase, and forwarded on all the papers from the bank.’
‘How were the Aurora dividends paid out to you?’
‘By money order, care of the Reserve Bank.’
‘And in what frequency did these payments occur?’
‘Every quarter.’
‘What was the exact value of the dividend payment you received in October 1865?’
‘Eight pounds and change.’
‘And what was the exact value of the dividend payment you received in January 1866?’
‘Six pounds even.’
‘Over the last two quarters of last year, then, you received a total of approximately fourteen pounds in dividends.’
‘That is correct.’
‘In that case, Aurora’s total net profit must have been recorded as approximately twenty-eight pounds, over
