Well, the situation had to be faced. I must pull myself together and make the best of it—which sounds an excellent, hard-headed, common sense, even cheery, way of looking at things, as a theory. At any rate, I kept repeating it over and over again to myself during that homeward ride and afterwards. But, alternating with it, in jangling refrain, was gloomy, hopeless, desperate fact—Ruined! Penniless! Beggared!
Chapter Twenty Four.
Turns of the Knife.
“Hullo, Kenrick. What’s the row?” sang out Brian, even before he had got down from the driving seat. “Man, but you do look sick.”
“He just does,” echoed Iris from the back, herself as yet hardly visible.
A stranger who had been seated beside Brian now got down.
“Mr Holt, isn’t it?” he said. “Glad to meet you. I’ve heard so much about you.”
The address was frank and friendly, the aspect of the speaker prepossessing. I strove to respond with suitable cordiality, and while doing so a resolve flashed lightning-like through my mind. I was giving myself away by dwelling too much on this direful change. Well, I would not.