“That is precisely what made me think of you; precisely what led me to say to Culduff, 'Bramleigh is the man to carry the scheme out.'”
Now the familiarity that spoke of Culduff thus unceremoniously in great part reconciled Bramleigh to hear his own name treated in like fashion, all the more that it was in a quotation; but still he winced under the cool impertinence of the man, and grieved to think how far his own priceless wine had contributed towards it. The Colonel therefore merely bowed his acknowledgment and was silent.
“I'll be frank with you,” said Cutbill, emptying the last of the decanter into his glass as he spoke. “I 'll be frank with you. We 've got coal; whether it be much or little, there it is. As to quality, as I said before, it is n't Cardiff. It won't set the Thames on fire, any more than the noble lord that owns it; but coal it is, and it will burn as coal—and yield gas as coal—and make coke as coal, and who wants more? As to working it himself, Culduff might just as soon pretend he 'd pay the National Debt. He is over head and ears already; he has been in bondage with the children of Israel this many a day, and if he was n't a peer he could not show; but that's neither here nor there. To set the concern a-going we must either have a loan or a company. I 'm for a company.”
“You are for a company,” reiterated Bramleigh, slowly, as he fixed his eyes calmly but steadily on him.
“Yes, I 'm for a company. With a company, Bramleigh,” said he, as he tossed off the last glass of wine, “there 's always more of P. E.”
“Of what?”
“Of P. E.—Preliminary expenses! There 's a commission to inquire into this, and a deputation to investigate that. No men on earth dine like deputations. I never knew what dining was till I was named on a deputation. It was on sewerage. And didn't the champagne flow! There was a viaduct to be constructed to lead into the Thames, and I never think of that viaduct without the taste of turtle in my mouth, and a genial feeling of milk-punch all over me. The assurance offices say that there was scarcely such a thing known as a gout premium in the City till the joint-stock companies came in; now they have them every day.”
“Revenons à nos moutons, as the French say, Mr. Cutbill,” said Bramleigh, gravely.
“If it's a pun you mean, and that we 're to have another bottle of the same, I second the motion.”
Bramleigh gave a sickly smile as he rang the bell, but neither the jest nor the jester much pleased him.