“Forget. And then I’m not your sister really—only by pretense.”
“Look here,” I said, “you say that when boys earn money they marry. I don’t think I ever shall because—well, because of something that has happened. So why shouldn’t you and I agree to live always together, the same as we do now?”
She said that that would be grand; she would be a little mother to me. But she wanted to know what made me so sure that I would always be a bachelor. With the sincere absurdity of youth, the more absurd because of its sincerity, I confided my passion for Fiesole. “After what she has done,” I said, “I could never marry her; and yet I love her too well ever to marry anybody else. I can only love golden hair now, and the golden hair of another girl would always remind me of Fiesole.”
Ruthita was silent. Then I remembered that her hair was black and saw that I had been clumsy in my sentiment, so I added, “But, Ruthie, in a sister I think black hair is the prettiest color in the world.”
After she had tiptoed away to her room and I had crept into bed, I lay awake thinking over her words—that she was only my sister by pretense.
Next day my father called me to him. “You had fifty pounds given you last Christmas. I want you to let me have it.”
I supposed that he wanted me to lend it to him, so I gave him my book and we went together to the savings bank and drew it out. I noticed that he drew out Ruthita’s fifty pounds as well. We climbed on to the top of an omnibus; nothing was said about where we were going.
He had bought a paper and I read it across his arm as we journeyed. As he turned over from the first page my eye caught a column headed DISAPPEARANCE OF GEORGE RAPSON. Underneath was a complete account of the whole affair.
My uncle had been interviewed by a reporter and had given a generously indiscreet history of the catastrophe from beginning to end. He tried to defend Rapson, and by his own innocent disclosures pilloried himself as a sanguine, gullible old ass. He insisted on believing in Rapson’s integrity. Things looked queer of course, but sooner or later there would be an explanation, satisfactory to everybody. What the nature of that explanation was likely to be he could not tell, but he hoped for the best. He was reported as having said that Mr. Rapson had repeatedly referred to secret enemies in the financial world. This was the reason he had given to Mr. Spreckles for not disposing of his shares through the ordinary channels.
Mr. Spreckles stated in his interview that, on the evening of the third of January, Rapson had called at his house. He seemed excited and said that certain plots were culminating against his interests which made an instant and secret visit to South Africa essential. He had not hinted at anything definitely serious, but, on the contrary, had given orders for the declaration of the half-yearly dividend, payment of which would not fall due till February. That evening he had disappeared; since then nothing had been heard of him. When four weeks later Mr. Spreckles drew checks on Rapson’s bank-account for payment of the dividends, they were all returned to him dishonored. A month previously, on the morning of January the third, Rapson had withdrawn every penny.