"I have great hopes of him," he said. "The poor hate him, because they say he is trying to foist property on to them by removing their taxes one after the other, and piling them on the rich, and that if he goes on in this way much longer he will wreck the Constitution, and that that is really what he wishes to do. They say he is on the side of capital because he has none himself; but, as a matter of fact, he has sprung from the rich, and has a very tender heart for their sufferings; I have often heard him say so. If he will put himself at the head of this movement its success will be assured."
I wished Edward good luck, and when I had seen him safely round the corner set out to find Mr. Hobson's house.
According to Upsidonian ideas, this unfortunate man had certainly been brought to a pass of great misery. He lived in a large and handsome mansion surrounded by some acres of ground, and kept up an imposing establishment.
I was shown into a library very richly furnished, but in far better taste than any of the rooms I had been in on my visits that morning. The effect was somewhat spoiled to my eye by a plain deal-topped table and three or four Windsor chairs, which were mixed up with the rest of the furniture; but tears came into my eyes—or should have done—when I reflected that these were probably the few articles that Mr. Hobson had been able to save from the wreck of his fortunes, and must be very dear to him as reminders of his former simple and happy life. Probably they would have to go soon, for he would not be able to take up room with them which might be filled with more expensive articles.
I was sitting in one of the Windsor chairs when Mr. Hobson came into the room. He was a dejected-looking man of middle age, with refined features and courteous manners, and my heart leapt as I thought of the solace I was about to bring to his over-burdened mind.
"Mr. Hobson," I said, coming at once to the point, "I have heard your sad story, and I have come to offer you some small relief. I am prepared to accept from you the sum of twenty thousand pounds, and I hope that with this assistance you will be able to make a fresh start and get free of your difficulties."
His thin face, already beginning to fill out from the course of high feeding to which he had been brought, flushed eagerly, and his eyes brightened, but sank immediately to their previous unhappy dullness.
"You are very kind, Mr. Howard," he said, "but I am beyond help, I fear. I could not hold out any hope of asking you to repay me. My spirit is broken. Nothing goes right with me. A week ago I might have accepted such relief, and promised to take back the money when times were brighter. But they will never be brighter for me. I could not even use the interest you would pay me for a sum of twenty thousand pounds."
"But I don't want to pay the money back, and I don't want to pay any interest," I assured him. "I am not a money borrower. I have a good deal less than I know what to do with, and nothing will give me greater pleasure than to receive twenty thousand pounds, or even thirty thousand, as a free gift from you. We should keep the transaction entirely to ourselves, and nobody outside need know anything about it at all."
He stared at me in amazement, and then suddenly broke down altogether, and sobbed. "Oh, it is too much!" he cried. "Who are you, that you come as a messenger of hope, when nothing but ruin and darkness seemed to surround me? And why do you do it?"