Chapter 16: The Accusation

Alna couldn't resist a small indulgence and managed to catch one more fish before finally heading home with the box of gold bars and a few pearls.

Just in time, she rushed into her room and collapsed onto the bed.

The next day, Alna went out and exchanged half of the gold and all the pearls for pounds at a place recommended by Holmes, the ever-resourceful consulting detective who assured her the owner was trustworthy.

With a pouch full of money, she headed straight to the office of Lawyer Green.

Once inside and making sure no one else was around, Alna pulled out the stack of pounds from her bag.

"Three hundred pounds — I’ve managed to raise the full amount," she said casually, then, remembering she hadn’t given Green a gift this week, generously tossed a gold bar onto his desk. "This one’s for you."

Mr. Green’s small mustache trembled violently as he stared at the shining gold bar lying on his desk.

It hit the surface with a heavy thud, echoing through the room like a wooden mallet striking.

In the next moment, his gaze shifted from the gold to the three hundred pounds laid out in front of him, then back to Alna.

“Miss Esas,” he said cautiously, as if she were a sleepwalker holding a lit match near a powder keg, “while I appreciate your punctual fundraising, I must ask… how exactly did you come by these funds?”

He knew well enough that this child was poor everywhere except in spirit; he had even covered her travel expenses before.

Without hesitation, Alna replied, “Fishing.”

Lawyer Green’s expression grew complicated. “...Fishing?”

Did she really think he was a fool? Or perhaps he was simply too old to realize that nowadays, deception came in such blunt, unvarnished forms?

“Yes, a lucky day,” Alna shrugged. “Unfortunately, I was busy with other things last night, or I might have caught even more.”

She patted her pockets with satisfaction, where the remaining gold bars and coins jingled pleasantly—some paper money alongside the coins she had earned earlier.

The clinking of coins and gold bars was music to her ears but grating to Green, who instinctively gripped the edge of the desk.

“Let me be clear,” he grumbled, resembling a walrus about to lose his temper, “if Scotland Yard comes asking about stolen gold bars, I’ll pretend to have a stroke and let them take you away directly.”

Alna, who had genuinely been fishing the night before and had done no wrong, thought bitterly: Is it really so hard to be a good person now?

After all, she had helped solve a major extortion case involving three thousand pounds’ worth of jewelry just the night before! She was, by any measure, a good citizen!

With that thought, she grinned mischievously and lowered her voice, “Since you know I did this… how dare you talk to me like that? Don’t you want to live?”

Green’s face instantly went pale.

“I’m joking,” Alna laughed heartily at his desperate urge to escape, thoroughly pleased. “It really was me fishing. And yes, I helped with the case yesterday.”

She nudged the gold bar on his desk forward, her smile bright as sunshine. “Anyway, please accept this. It’s just… a discovery, like finding treasure.”

Relieved from the scare, Green pretended to scold her, “You child!”

He broke off to chuckle himself, shaking his head as he tucked the gold bar into a drawer. “I’ll submit your patent documents today.”

He clicked his tongue. “For heaven’s sake, stop smiling like that. You look like a bandit.”

Alna’s eyes widened.

“No way,” she protested. “How could I look like a bandit?”

Though she did love robbing those who came to rob others, that was all legal income! Self-defense!

...And maybe during the defense, the other’s purse mysteriously ended up with her—well, that wasn’t her fault. Clearly, those purses had good taste, choosing the right owner, right?

Back at Baker Street, Alna remained indignant.

“Do I really look like I robbed a jewelry store?” she complained, sitting at the dining table just in time for lunch. “Even though I caught a lot fishing afterward, I was working with Holmes on a case yesterday!”

She emphasized, “I am a model citizen!”

Watson, sipping his tea, nearly choked when Alna slammed her hand on the table.

Meanwhile, Holmes didn’t even glance up, absorbed in cutting a strangely colored pie with a butter knife.

“A model citizen,” he echoed perfunctorily, prying out a nasty-looking dried fruit from the pie, “indeed.”

Watson wiped tea off his vest with a napkin.

“For heaven’s sake—did you really catch gold bars?” he marveled. “In the Thames?”

“And pearls, nine of them,” Alna added helpfully, plopping into her chair and snatching a piece of bread. “Very lovely, the biggest one’s worth ninety pounds.”

She beamed with pride. “I sold mine to a middleman, but last night I gave Holmes one — Watson, you really should join us!”

Watson looked a little dazed.

“That’s… almost two years’ salary for a policeman!”

Holmes finally gave up his pie autopsy and leaned back in his chair.

“Yes,” he began embellishing, “and see, Watson, we only used a sturdy stick and a rusty hook. Of course, we combined them and called it a fishing rod.”

Watson: “I always thought the Thames was full of fish and factory waste!”

His worldview was shaken. “I need a bottle of whiskey.”

Alna changed the subject. “Actually, you can catch anything in the river.”

Including trash bins.

“For some, indeed,” Holmes added, “except fish.”

He continued enthusiastically, “It reminds me of a case I once handled — it started with a fisherman discovering a corpse. So it’s natural for Lawyer Green to be suspicious; no one finds legitimate treasures in the Thames without some skeletons involved.”

Alna finished her food and reached out mischievously for a cookie.

“If I find a skeleton, it’ll be just to shut you up,” she said, disgusted by Holmes bringing up corpses at mealtime, and hurled a cookie, hoping to hit his nose.

Watson, grim-faced at the farce, grabbed a bottle of whiskey from the shelf.

“This is why I drink after lunch,” he said.

Alna’s eyes darted.

“Maybe not,” she said slowly. “Maybe it’s because we didn’t see the Countess yesterday. What a pity?”

Watson’s eyes widened.

His face flushed red as he glanced at the innocent-looking Alna, then at Holmes, who caught the cookie mid-air with a triumphant bite. “Leaving you two alone for one night was definitely the worst decision I’ve made recently.”

He remembered when Esas first arrived—so diligent, unassuming, and taciturn.

Damn Holmes!

*

With some money now in hand—enough to keep the factory running for months—Alna decided to stop selling finished parts to the system for the time being. Instead, she bought many boxes to store the items.

Once the patent was approved and she found a carriage company willing to take over, she could earn far more than the system’s “recycling price.”

Thirty years east, thirty years west—never underestimate a factory owner, no matter how poor they seem!

Satisfied, she lounged lazily in her chair and checked her panel.

Everything was good. Her eleven employees were doing well, except for the empty pet enclosure.

Last night, the black-furred, gray-eyed cat had slipped away with a fish just as Mrs. Hudson opened the door, too quick for Alna to catch.

...Back to being a feral without a cat!

Alna sighed, worried, then looked at the money left in her hand and decided to be generous.

—Since money was no longer tight, feeding the children better food wasn’t a bad idea.

Oliver had stew twice in three days, a lavish treat that unsettled the boy who had scarcely tasted anything good in his life.

He wasn’t alone; the other children whispered among themselves, finding the factory owner’s behavior odd.

Besides the unusually hearty meals, other changes hadn’t escaped their notice.

Mr. Esas, who once loved taking his beloved carriage out for rides, had stopped doing so and was fishing less often. Instead, he spent all day in the office, looking sullen when he appeared.

Moreover, everyone noticed the growing number of boxes in the factory.

The finished parts hadn’t disappeared; they remained piled in boxes, growing higher and more precarious, forming a towering heap.

The children felt the Esas factory was about to collapse like that tower of boxes.

—Who didn’t know that when Mr. Esas took the carriage out for a spin in the past, some boxes would mysteriously go missing?

He must have been selling those mysterious parts.

Now, he probably couldn’t sell them anymore—or couldn’t find any fools to buy them—and so the parts just sat to rot.

If that was true, Mr. Esas was close to bankruptcy. And in that case, what about those golden treasures they once glimpsed in the safe?

Upon hearing this, Fagin and Sikes instantly grew anxious.

They cursed Mr. Esas as a fool and idiot—they had long considered those treasures theirs, and now someone was recklessly destroying their property. How could they not be worried?

“Listen carefully, my dear,” Fagin said.

Standing in a small alley near the factory, rubbing his hands, surrounded by Dodger and a few other children, he continued, “Mr. Esas’s ship is sinking. Yes, if we don’t do our best to save what we can, the other rats will defeat us.”

Oliver, called out, leaned dazed against the wall, silent.

Dodger scoffed at Fagin’s words and adjusted his hat.

“There’s nothing inside but scrap metal, Fagin,” he blurted out, as if last week’s encounter with Mr. Esas fiddling with the safe had nothing to do with him.

“We’ve been searching for weeks!”

Oliver glanced at him in surprise.

Fagin sighed.

“No, you haven’t searched seriously, children,” he said, pointing a bony finger toward the factory. “If there were only worthless things inside, why would this gentleman lock up the junk? There must be something valuable. This Saturday, we’ll see what’s hidden in the rabbit hole.”

He whispered his plans to the others, mentioning he had already reached an agreement with Sikes and that Nancy would assist them.

While Fagin was immersed in his scheming, he failed to notice a figure cautiously hiding around the corner, eavesdropping on their conversation.

The next day, the eavesdropper found an excuse and boldly went upstairs, stopping at Alna’s office door.

“Mr. Esas!” Lucy called out loudly. “Mrs. Laura made extra breakfast today, and I’m here to deliver a portion!”

Soon, Mr. Esas, who never refused any food, opened the door.

“Come in,” Alna said expectantly. “What did you have this morning?”

Lucy set the plate on the desk. “Bread, sir.”

As she spoke, she casually closed the door.

Under Alna’s puzzled gaze, Lucy calmly lowered her voice and poured out the truth in a rush.

“I saw Oliver, Dodger, and a few others with a strange old Jewish man yesterday… in the alley behind the factory. They were talking about doing something big on Saturday, related to the factory, and apparently aimed at the safe…”

She paused. “I suspect Miss Nancy knows them too. They mentioned her.”