“I am sick with anxiety.”
“Let me share it. That is all I ask. And you must be brave, Robert. Things are never as bad as you think they are. You are only twenty-seven years old; you have health and friends. We can half the expenses. Let the English place go. You will get your business here back soon, will you not?”
“I hope so. I cannot tell. I must leave you, and go to England tomorrow and you ought not to be alone now.”
“Nothing will harm me. Go, and find out the worst, then you know what you have to fight. Dinner is ready. You need a good meal; you will feel better after it.”
“How can I? I fear that I am ruined.”
“Now, Robert,” I said, “that depends on yourself. No man was ever ruined from without; the final ruin comes from within, when you turn hopeless and lose courage. I have heard my father tell young men that, many times.”
I suppose that most American husbands and wives would have spent the evening in talking over this trouble, and considering what steps were wisest to take. Robert did not speak of it again. During the meal, when the girl was coming in and out with the various dishes, he talked of a big fire in the High Street, and the appearance of Harrison in “The Bohemian Girl,” saying he was sorry I could not hear him sing “I Dreamt 115 I Dwelt in Marble Halls.” When dinner was over, he asked me to go on with the book I was reading to him. It was “The Newcomes,” and I lifted it, and he lay down on the sofa with his cigar. But I did not know what I was reading. The lights seemed dim, my voice sounded far away, there was a tumult in my senses that was prelusive of fainting.
“I am not well, Robert,” I murmured, “I must stop,” and I laid “The Newcomes” down, and have never touched a book of Thackeray’s since.
Robert rose immediately. “I must leave for England very early in the morning,” he said. “I will try and get some sleep first.”
The next morning he went away before daylight, and I had to bear the uncertainty and suspense as well as I could; and these journeys continued until the twentieth of December, when all court business stopped until after the twelfth day in January. I did not write home about this trouble. Father had been ill, and Mother was coming to me, on the second or third day of the New Year; and I hoped afresh every morning, that some good news would come to brighten the sad story. But all I heard was that professional accountants were going over the books of both the Glasgow and the Huddersfield business, and that it was tedious work, and required Robert’s presence constantly to explain transactions. This appeared sensible and necessary, and I made the best of the week ends, when Robert usually hurried home, traveling all night, so as to reach me early Saturday morning.