The doctor pointed out to the old woman the perils she ran, by fire, robbery, or other accident, of having her books destroyed, and the evidence of her investment, or that investment itself, obliterated. She listened to this demonstration with greediness and anxiety. She saw the force, not to say truthfulness or disinterestedness, of the suggestion. He pointed out to her the comparative profitlessness of the mode of investment she had selected. He told her that money was worth twice, thrice, fourfold, or even tenfold, under careful, judicious management, the amount she was receiving for it.
The greediness of the old woman was aroused. There is nothing so tempting to the over-thrifty and penurious or miserly person as the offer of large interest. This is a weakness they share with the common usurer, who is met with in the ordinary walks of society. I believe it would be possible to cheat an ordinary Jew bill-discounter, or the most subtle and acute of Christian usurers, by the temptation of large interest, and a little manipulation of their great ruling instinct of greediness.
The pauper patient, before this interview had been concluded, entreated her good kind doctor to lend her the benefit of his extreme practical sagacity, great worldly experience, and unmistakable judgment, in the investment of the moneys which had been saved up by her. After a little hesitation, he agreed to comply with her request.
Within a fortnight the money was withdrawn from the savings-banks in which it had been distributed, in order to evade those regulations which prevent more than a certain sum being at any one time invested in any one bank. And after being withdrawn from this channel, it was placed in the hands of the surgeon, for him to lend or employ as he might deem expedient, and upon those securities that would yield a larger return.
The doctor used the money thus intrusted to him in payment of claims which pressed upon himself, and in reduction of his own embarrassments. He paid the old woman, or rather carried to her account, an interest of twenty per cent. per annum with the greatest regularity; and his conscience was satisfied by a belief that he was conferring upon her an essential benefit, by enabling her to obtain this liberal usufruct in preference to the scanty dole of interest she had been receiving. He satisfied scruples, or rather prevented her distrusting him, by from time to time showing her bills of exchange, documents, or papers, which he called bills of sale, and slips of paper which he denominated scrip, railway shares, &c. &c., all of which, he explained to her, were bringing interest at a rate more than four times that she had been previously obtaining.
Goody thus learned to regard the doctor, who alone possessed her secret and stood in the relation of her confessor, as her best and sincerest friend. She occasionally rewarded him, as she thought, by purchasing little presents for his children, and by an occasional visit to the hosier’s or glover’s to make some slight purchase for his own benefit or comfort.
After two years or thereabouts had rolled away, Goody, whose physical infirmities increased, whose mental knowledge became more and more warped, whose miserly vices had become more intense, also became dissatisfied with the irregular mode in which she obtained the charity upon which she continued to live, while in her imagination she saw her investment increase.
One day the doctor called upon her, to explain that the interest upon a railway debenture fell due to-morrow, and 4l. 15s. had been thus obtained, which he was prepared to either hand over to her or hold for her investment. She told him she would much rather that he kept all of it except a shilling, which she needed for some purpose, and which sum he gave her. He promised to lay out this further amount, as he had laid out all the rest, in a way to increase its store.
“There,” she then continued to say, “I have been thinking that I feel very lonesome and very uncomfortable here by myself, and I should like to get into the house.”
“What! the union workhouse?”