“Perhaps,” suggested Edward, “’t were as well that you should give me an outline of the matter on which you desire my assistance. I can afterwards consider the papers in detail, for I understand the affair is one of complexity.”
“A perfect maze, I assure you, my dear sir. I was tenth wrangler of my year, and one would have thought I should know something about figures. But when I try to understand the books and accounts of the Skerne Iron Works Company, of which I am a director, I am as utterly befogged as if I had never heard of Todhunter or Colenso.”
“Ah, well! happily I know something of book-keeping, so we may be able to unravel the skein. Now tell me all about it.”
“What do you say to a little whisky and seltzer to your cigar—unless you prefer a dry smoke?”
“If you will join me, Archdeacon.”
“With all my heart. We have a couple of hours before the dressing-bell sounds. If whisky and rheumatism had been known to St. Paul, and Timothy’s complaint had not apparently been simply stomachic, no doubt the Pauline injunction would have been more comprehensive. But I am not for literal interpretation, Mr. Beaumont, are you?”
“Assuredly not! We will apply the cy pres doctrine. ’tis merest equity.”
The Archdeacon looked puzzled, but passed the decanter.
“It is some five years since I acquired my shares in the Skerne Iron Works. The concern had, according to all seeming, been a prosperous one for years. The three brothers who owned it were most respectable men, good churchmen, justices for the borough of G——, and, in a word, most respectable men. When they turned their business into a company, and sold out the greater part of their interest, I was easily persuaded to adventure a large part of my savings in the shares of the company. I was only getting a beggarly 4 per cent. on mortgage securities, and had often as much difficulty and delay in getting my interest as I still have in getting my tithes. But the Skerne shares showed 7 per cent., and the interest was to come as punctually as quarter-day itself. So it did for a year or so, and I congratulated myself on my prescience in making so excellent an investment. I assured myself that my dear daughter’s welfare was now secured, die when I might. Of course, as you know, my income with this living dies with me. My poor wife had some three thousand pounds of her own, which, by her will, she left to our child, and as I was sole trustee of it, I thought I could not do better than invest it along with my own money, and my daughter, of course, assented to my proposal.”
“Was she of age?” asked Edward.