noon
It was happiness all , happiness , and triumph : they were weathering the storm famously , and had safely passed the breakers of False witness . Amidst the other part of London sate a sullen fellow , quite alone , in Newgate , looking for his trial on the morrow , and prophesying accurately enough how some two days hence , he , John Dillaway , of Broker 's alley , son and heir of the richest stationer in Europe , was to appear in the character of a convicted felon , and be probably condemned to transportation for life . A pleasant retrospect was his , a pleasanter aspect , and a pleasanter prospect ; all was pleasure assuredly . And the morrow duly came ; with those implacable approvers , those accurate Irish witnesses , those tell-tale documents , that prosecuting crown and bank , that dogged jury , and that sentencing recorder : so then , by a little after noon , to the scandal of Finsbury square , John Dillaway discovered that the `` wise man 's trick or two in the money market '' was about to be rewarded with twenty-one years of transportation . Of this interesting fact Henry Clements became acquainted by an occasional peep into the public prints ; and he perceived to his astonishment , that the defrauded Mrs. Jane Mackenzie , of Ballyriggan , near Belfast , could surely be none other than his mother 's Ulster cousin , the nominal guardian of his boyhood ! To be sure , it mattered little enough to him , for the old lady had never been much better than a stranger to him , and at present appeared only in that useless character to an expectant , a person despoiled of her money ; nevertheless , of that identical money , certain sanguine friends had heretofore given him expectations in the event of her death , seeing that she had nobody to leave it to , except himself and the public charities of the United Kingdom : clearly , this cousin must have been the defrauded bank annuitant , and he could not help feeling more desolate than ever ; for John Dillaway 's evil influences had robbed him now of name , fame , fortune , and what hope regards as much as any -- expectations . Yet -- must not the bank of England bear the brunt of all this forgery , and account for its stock to that innocent depositor ?