'Indeed I cannot guess,' said Ugolina; 'her education has been sadly deficient.'
None but Charley called on Alaric that day, and he found himself shut up alone with his wife and child. His own house seemed to him a prison. He did not dare to leave it; he did not dare to walk out and face the public as long as daylight continued; he was ashamed to show himself, and so he sat alone in his dining-room thinking, thinking, thinking. Do what he would, he could not get those shares out of his mind; they had entered like iron into his soul, as poison into his blood; they might still rise, they might yet become of vast value, might pay all his debts, and enable him to begin again. And then this had been a committee day; he had had no means of knowing how things had gone there, of learning the opinions of the members, of whispering to Mr. Piles, or hearing the law on the matter laid down by the heavy deep voice of the great Mr. Blocks. And so he went on thinking, thinking, thinking, but ever as though he had a clock-weight fixed to his heart and pulling at its strings. For, after all, what were the shares or the committee to him? Let the shares rise to ever so fabulous a value, let the Chancellor of the Exchequer be ever so complaisant in giving away his money, what avail would it be to him? what avail now? He must stand his trial for the crime of which he had been guilty.
With the utmost patience Gertrude endeavoured to soothe him, and to bring his mind into some temper in which it could employ itself. She brought him their baby, thinking that he would play with his child, but all that he said was—'My poor boy! I have ruined him already;' and then turning away from the infant, he thrust his hands deep into his trousers-pockets, and went on calculating about the shares.
When the sun had well set, and the daylight had, at last, dwindled out, he took up his hat and wandered out among the new streets and rows of houses which lay between his own house and the Western Railway. He got into a district in which he had never been before, and as he walked about here, he thought of the fate of other such swindlers as himself;—yes, though he did not speak the word, he pronounced it as plainly, and as often, in the utterance of his mind, as though it was being rung out to him from every steeple in London; he thought of the fate of such swindlers as himself; how one had been found dead in the streets, poisoned by himself; how another, after facing the cleverest lawyers in the land, was now dying in a felon's prison; how a third had vainly endeavoured to fly from justice by aid of wigs, false whiskers, painted furrows, and other disguises. Should he try to escape also, and avoid the ignominy of a trial? He knew it would be in vain; he knew that, at this moment, he was dogged at the distance of some thirty yards by an amiable policeman in mufti, placed to watch his motions by his two kind bailsmen, who preferred this small expense to the risk of losing a thousand pounds a-piece.
As he turned short round a corner, into the main road leading from the railway station to Bayswater, he came close upon a man who was walking quickly in the opposite direction, and found himself face to face with Undy Scott. How on earth should Undy Scott have come out there to Bayswater, at that hour of the night, he, the constant denizen of clubs, the well-known frequenter of Pall Mall, the member for the Tillietudlem burghs, whose every hour was occupied in the looking after things political, or things commercial? Who could have expected him in a back road at Bayswater? There, however, he was, and Alaric, before he knew of his presence, had almost stumbled against him.
'Scott!' said Alaric, starting back.
'Hallo, Tudor, what the deuce brings you here? but I suppose you'll ask me the same question?' said Undy.
Alaric Tudor could not restrain himself. 'You scoundrel,' said he, seizing Undy by the collar; 'you utterly unmitigated scoundrel! You premeditated, wilful villain!' and he held Undy as though he intended to choke him.
But Undy Scott was not a man to be thus roughly handled with impunity; and in completing the education which he had received, the use of his fists had not been overlooked. He let out with his right hand, and struck Alaric twice with considerable force on the side of his jaw, so that the teeth rattled in his mouth.
But Alaric, at the moment, hardly felt it. 'You have brought me and mine to ruin,' said he; 'you have done it purposely, like a fiend. But, low as I have fallen, I would not change places with you for all that the earth holds. I have been a villain; but such villany as yours—ugh—' and so saying, he flung his enemy from him, and Undy, tottering back, saved himself against the wall.