CHAPTER XCII.
HAMILTON K. FISKER AGAIN.
Ten days had passed since the meeting narrated in the last chapter,—ten days, during which Hetta's letter had been sent to her lover, but in which she had received no reply,—when two gentlemen met each other in a certain room in Liverpool, who were seen together in the same room in the early part of this chronicle. These were our young friend Paul Montague, and our not much older friend Hamilton K. Fisker. Melmotte had died on the 18th of July, and tidings of the event had been at once sent by telegraph to San Francisco. Some weeks before this Montague had written to his partner, giving his account of the South Central Pacific and Mexican Railway Company,—describing its condition in England as he then believed it to be,—and urging Fisker to come over to London. On receipt of a message from his American correspondent he had gone down to Liverpool, and had there awaited Fisker's arrival, taking counsel with his friend Mr. Ramsbottom. In the mean time Hetta's letter was lying at the Beargarden, Paul having written from his club and having omitted to desire that the answer should be sent to his lodgings. Just at this moment things at the Beargarden were not well managed. They were indeed so ill managed that Paul never received that letter,—which would have had for him charms greater than those of any letter ever before written.
"This is a terrible business," said Fisker, immediately on entering the room in which Montague was waiting him. "He was the last man I'd have thought would be cut up in that way."
"He was utterly ruined."
"He wouldn't have been ruined,—and couldn't have thought so if he'd known all he ought to have known. The South Central would have pulled him through a'most anything if he'd have understood how to play it."
"We don't think much of the South Central here now," said Paul.
"Ah;—that's because you've never above half spirit enough for a big thing. You nibble at it instead of swallowing it whole,—and then, of course, folks see that you're only nibbling. I thought that Melmotte would have had spirit."
"There is, I fear, no doubt that he had committed forgery. It was the dread of detection as to that which drove him to destroy himself."