There, however, he found a person closeted with the banker, whose remarkable appearance drove everything else out of his mind. He was a huge, shaggy, toil-worn man, the deep melancholy earnestness of whose rugged features reminded him almost ludicrously of one of Land-seer’s bloodhounds. But withal there was a tenderness—a genial, though covert humour playing about his massive features, which awakened in Lancelot at first sight a fantastic longing to open his whole heart to him. He was dressed like a foreigner, but spoke English with perfect fluency. The banker sat listening, quite crestfallen, beneath his intense and melancholy gaze, in which, nevertheless, there twinkled some rays of kindly sympathy.
‘It was all those foreign railways,’ said Mr. Smith pensively.
‘And it serves you quite right,’ answered the stranger. ‘Did I not warn you of the folly and sin of sinking capital in foreign countries while English land was crying out for tillage, and English poor for employment?’
‘My dear friend’ (in a deprecatory tone), ‘it was the best possible investment I could make.’
‘And pray, who told you that you were sent into the world to make investments?’
‘But—’
‘But me no buts, or I won’t stir a finger towards helping you. What are you going to do with this money if I procure it for you?’
‘Work till I can pay back that poor fellow’s fortune,’ said the banker, earnestly pointing to Lancelot. ‘And if I could clear my conscience of that, I would not care if I starved myself, hardly if my own children did.’
‘Spoken like a man!’ answered the stranger; ‘work for that and I’ll help you. Be a new man, once and for all, my friend. Don’t even make this younker your first object. Say to yourself, not “I will invest this money where it shall pay me most, but I will invest it where it shall give most employment to English hands, and produce most manufactures for English bodies.” In short, seek first the kingdom of God and His justice with this money of yours, and see if all other things, profits and suchlike included, are not added unto you.’
‘And you are certain you can obtain the money?’