Meta finished the remainder of her breakfast and slid off her chair.

Rea.s.sured upon the subject of the dogs, she was eager to be off at once to the pleasures of the swing. Maria rang the bell for Harriet, and gave orders that she should be dressed.

"Let her come in this frock," said Charlotte. "There's no knowing what damage it may undergo before the day's out."

Meta was taken away by Harriet. Charlotte finished her breakfast, and Maria sat burying her load of care, even from the eyes of friendly Charlotte. "Do you like my Garibaldi shirt?" suddenly asked the latter.

"Like what?" questioned Maria, not catching the name.

"This," replied Charlotte, indicating the yellow article by a touch.

"They are new things just come up: Garibaldi shirts they are called.

Mrs. Verrall sent me three down from London: a yellow, a scarlet, and a blue. They are all the rage, she says. Do you admire it?"

But for Maria's innate politeness, and perhaps for the sadness beating at her heart, she would have answered that she did not admire it at all: that it looked a shapeless, untidy thing. Charlotte continued, without waiting for a reply.

"You don't see it to advantage. It is soiled, and has lost a b.u.t.ton or two. Those dogs make horrid work of my things, with their roughness and their dirty paws. Look at this great rent in my gown which I have pinned up! Pluto did that this morning. He is getting fearfully savage, now he's old."

"You must not allow them to frighten Meta," said Maria somewhat anxiously. "She should not see them."

"I have told you she shall not. Can't you trust me? The dogs----"

Charlotte paused. Meta came running in, ready; in her large straw hat with its flapping brim, and her cool brown-holland outdoor dress.

Charlotte rose, drew her shawl about her shoulders, and carried her hat to the gla.s.s, to settle it on. Then she took Meta by the hand, said good morning, and sailed out; the effect of her visit having been partly to frighten, partly to perplex, Maria.

Maria sat on with her load of care, and her new apprehensions. These agreeable visitors that Charlotte warned her of--she wondered that Thomas had not mentioned it. Would they take all the clothes she had upstairs, leaving her only what she stood upright in? Would they take Meta's? Would they take her husband's out of his drawers and places?

Would they take the keeper off her finger? It was studded with diamonds.

Charlotte had said they would only leave her her wedding-ring. These thoughts were troubling and perplexing her; but only in a degree.

Compared with that other terrible thought, they were as nothing--the uncertain fear, regarding her husband, which had been whispered to her by the careless sailor, Reginald Hastings.

CHAPTER XXII.

BEARING THE BRUNT.

Thomas G.o.dolphin sat in the Bank parlour, bearing the brunt of the shock. With his pain upon him, mental and bodily, he was facing all the trouble that George ought to have faced: the murmurs, the questions, the reproaches.

All was known. All was known to Thomas G.o.dolphin. Not alone to him.

Could Thomas have kept the terrible facts within his own breast, have shielded his brother's reputation still, he would have done it: but that was impossible. In becoming known to Mr. G.o.dolphin, it had become known to others. The discovery had been made jointly, by Thomas and by certain business gentlemen, when he was in London on the Sat.u.r.day afternoon.

Treachery upon treachery! The long course of deceit on George G.o.dolphin's part had come out. Falsified books; wrongly-rendered accounts; good securities replaced by false; false balance-sheets. Had Thomas G.o.dolphin been less blindly trustful in George's honour and integrity, it could never have been so effectually accomplished. George G.o.dolphin was the acting manager: and Thomas, in his perfect trust, combined with his failing health, had left things latterly almost entirely in George's hands. "What business had he so to leave them?"

People were asking it now. Perhaps Thomas's own conscience was asking the same. But why should he not have left things to him, considering that he placed in him the most implicit confidence? Surely, no unprejudiced man would say Thomas G.o.dolphin had been guilty of imprudence. George was fully equal to the business confided to him, in point of power and capacity; and it could not certainly matter which of the brothers, equal partners, equal heads of the firm, took its practical management. It would seem not: and yet they were blaming Thomas G.o.dolphin now.

Failures of this nature have been recorded before, where fraud has played its part. We have only to look to the records of our law courts--criminal, bankruptcy, and civil--for examples. To transcribe the precise means by which George G.o.dolphin had contrived to bear on in a course of deceit, to elude the suspicion of the world in general, and the vigilance of his own house, would only be to recapitulate what has often been told in the public records: and told to so much more purpose than I could tell it. It is rather with what may be called the domestic phase of these tragedies that I would deal: the private, home details; the awful wreck of peace, of happiness, caused _there_. The world knows enough (rather too much, sometimes) of the public part of these affairs; but what does it know of the part behind the curtain?--the, if it may be so said, inner aspect?

I knew a gentleman, years ago, who was partner in a country banking-house: a sleeping partner; and the Bank failed. Failed through a long-continued course of treachery on the part of one connected with it--something like the treachery described to you as pursued by Mr.

George G.o.dolphin. This gentleman (of whom I tell you) was to be held responsible for the losses, so the creditors and others decided: the real delinquent having disappeared, escaped beyond their reach. They lavished upon this gentleman harsh names; rogue, thief, swindler, and so on!--while, in point of fact, he was as innocent and unconscious of what had happened as they were. He gave up all he had; the bulk of his fortune had gone with the Bank; and he went out of hearing of his abusers for a while until things should become smoother; perhaps the bad man be caught. A short time, and he became ill; and a medical man was called in to him. Again, a short time, and he was _dead_: and the doctors said--I heard them say it--that his malady had been brought on by grief; that he had, in fact, died of a broken heart. He was a kindly gentleman; a good husband, a good father, a good neighbour; a single-hearted, honest man; the very soul of honour: but he was misjudged by those who ought to have known him better; and he died for it. I wonder what the real rogue felt when he heard of the death? They were relatives. There are many such cases in the world: where reproach and abuse are levelled at one whose heart is breaking.

There appeared to be little doubt that George G.o.dolphin's embarra.s.sments had commenced years ago. It is more than probable that the money borrowed from Verrall during that short sojourn in Homburg had been its precursor. Once in the hands of the clever charlatan, the crafty, unscrupulous bill-discounter, who grew fat on the folly of others, his downward course was--perhaps not easy or swift, but at all events certain. If George G.o.dolphin had but been a little more clear-sighted, the evil might never have come. Could he but have seen Verrall at the outset as he was: not the gentleman, the good-hearted man, as George credulously believed, but the low fellow who traded on the needs of others, the designing sharper, looking ever after his prey, George would have flung him off with no other feeling than contempt. George G.o.dolphin was not born a rogue. George was by nature a gentleman, and honest and open; but, once in the clutches of Verrall, he was not able to escape.

Bit by bit, step by step, gradually, imperceptibly, George found himself caught. He awoke to the fact that he could neither stir upwards nor downwards. He could not extricate himself; he could not go on without exposure; Verrall, or Verrall's agents, those working in concert with him, though not ostensibly, stopped the supplies, and George was in a fix. Then began the frauds upon the Bank. Slightly at first. It was only a choice between that and exposure. Between that and ruin, it may be said, for George's liabilities were so great, that, if brought to a climax, they must then have caused the Bank to stop, involving Thomas in ruin as well as himself. In his sanguine temperament, too, he was always hoping that some lucky turn would redeem the bad and bring all right again. It was Verrall who urged him on. It was Verrall who, with Machiavellian craft, made the wrong appear right; it was Verrall who had filled his pockets at the expense of George's. That Verrall had been the arch-tempter, and George the arch-dupe, was clear as the sun at noonday to those who were behind the scenes. Unfortunately but very few were behind the scenes--they might be counted by units--and Verrall and Co.

could still blazon it before the world.

The wonder was, where the money had gone to. It very often is the wonder in these cases. A wonder too often never solved. An awful amount of money had gone in some way; the mystery was, in what way. George G.o.dolphin had kept up a large establishment; had been personally extravagant, privately as well as publicly; but that did not serve to account for half the money missing; not for a quarter of it; nay, scarcely for a t.i.the. Had it been to save himself from hanging, George himself could not have told how or where it had gone. When the awful sum total came to be added up, to stare him in the face, he looked at it in blank amazement. And he had no good to show for it; none; the money had melted, and he could not tell how.

Of course it had gone to the discounters. The tide of discounting once set in, it was something like the nails in the horseshoe, doubling, and doubling, and doubling. The money went, and there was nothing to show for it. Little marvel that George G.o.dolphin stood aghast at the sum total, when the amount was raked up--or, as nearly the amount as could be guessed at. When George could no longer furnish legitimate funds on his own account, the Bank was laid under contribution to supply them, and George had to enter upon a system of ingenuity to conceal the outgoings. When those contributions had been levied to the very utmost extent compatible with the avoidance of sudden and immediate discovery, and George was at his wits' end for money, which he _must_ have, then Verrall whispered a way which George at first revolted from, but which resulted in taking the deeds of Lord Averil. Had the crash not come as it did, other deeds might have been taken. It is impossible to say. Such a course once entered on is always downhill. Like unto some other downward courses, the only safety lies in not yielding to the first temptation.

Strange to say, George G.o.dolphin could not see the rogue's part played by Verrall: or at best he saw it but very imperfectly. And yet, not strange; for there are many of these cases in the world. George had been on intimate terms of friendship with Verrall; had been _lie_, it may be said, with him and Lady G.o.dolphin's Folly. Mrs. Verrall was pretty.

Charlotte had her attractions. Altogether, George believed yet in Verrall. Let the dagger's point only be concealed with flowers, and men will rush blindly on to it.

Thomas G.o.dolphin sat, some books before him, pondering the one weighty question--where could all the money have gone to? Until the present moment, this morning when he had the books before him, and his thoughts were more practically directed to business details, he had been pondering another weighty question--where had George's integrity gone to? Whither had flown his pride in his fair name, the honour of the G.o.dolphins? From the Sat.u.r.day afternoon when the dreadful truth came to light, Thomas had had little else in his thoughts. It was his companion through the Sunday, through the night journey afterwards down to Prior's Ash. He was more fit for bed than to take that journey: but he must face the exasperated men from whom George had flown.

He was facing them now. People had been coming in since nine o'clock with their reproaches, and Thomas G.o.dolphin bore them patiently and answered them meekly: the tones of his voice low, subdued, as if they came from the sadness of a stricken heart. He felt their wrongs keenly.

Could he have paid these injured men by cutting himself to pieces, and satisfied them with the "pound of flesh," he would have done so, oh how willingly! He would have sacrificed his life and his happiness (his happiness!) and done it cheerfully, if by that means they could have been paid their due.

"It's nothing but a downright swindle. I'll say it, sir, to your face, and I can't help saying it. Here I bring the two thousand pounds in my hand, and I say to Mr. George G.o.dolphin, 'Will it be safe?' 'Yes,' he answers me, 'it will be safe.' And now the Bank has shut up, and where's my money?"

The speaker was Barnaby, the corn-dealer. What was Thomas G.o.dolphin to answer?

"You told me, sir, on Sat.u.r.day, that the Bank would open again to-day for business; that customers would be paid in full."

"I told you but what I believed," rose the quiet voice of Thomas G.o.dolphin in answer. "Mr. Barnaby, believe me this blow has come upon no one more unexpectedly than it has upon me."

"Well, sir, I don't know what may be your mode of carrying on business, but I should be ashamed to conduct mine so as to let ruin come slap upon me, and not have seen it coming."

Again, what was Thomas G.o.dolphin to answer? Generous to the end, he would not say, "My brother has played us both alike false." "If I find that any care or caution of mine could have averted this, Mr. Barnaby, I shall carry remorse to my grave," was all he replied.

"What sort of a dividend will there be?" went on the dealer.

"I really cannot tell you yet, Mr. Barnaby. I have no idea. We must have time to go through the books."

"Where _is_ Mr. George G.o.dolphin?" resumed the applicant; and it was a very natural question. "Mr. Hurde says he is away, but it is strange that he should be away at such a time as this. I should like to ask him a question or two."

"He is in London," replied Thomas G.o.dolphin.

"But what's he gone to London for now? And when is he coming back?"

More puzzling questions. Thomas had to bear the pain of many such that day. He did not say, "My brother is gone, we know not why; in point of fact he has run away." He spoke aloud the faint hopes that rose within his own breast--that some train, ere the day was over, would bring him back to Prior's Ash.

"Don't you care, Mr. G.o.dolphin," came the next wailing plaint, "for the ruin that the loss of this money will bring upon me? I have a wife and children, sir."

"I do care," Thomas answered, his throat husky and a mist before his eyes. "For every pang that this calamity will inflict on others, it inflicts two on me."

Mr. Hurde, who was busy with more books in his own department, in conjunction with some clerks, came in to ask a question, his pen behind his ear; and Mr. Barnaby, seeing no good to be derived by remaining, went out. Little respite had Thomas G.o.dolphin. The next to come in was the Rector of All Souls'.

"What is to become of me?" was his saluting question, spoken in his clear, decisive tone. "How am I to refund this money to my wards, the Chisholms?"

Thomas G.o.dolphin had no satisfactory reply to make. He missed the friendly hand held out hitherto in greeting. Mr. Hastings did not take a chair, but stood up near the table, firm, stern, and uncompromising.