"Let me go in your stead. You can trust me to manage matters to the best of my power?"
The banker overwhelmed him with gratitude.
"Nay, that ought to be my word, standing in this house, and remembering"—His eyes turned to the two portraits—grimly-coloured daubs, yet with a certain apology of likeness too, which broadly smiled at one another from opposite walls—the only memorials now remaining of the good doctor and his cheery little old wife. "Come, Mr. Jessop, leave the matter with me; believe me, it is not only a pleasure, but a duty."
The old man melted into senile tears.
I do not know how John managed the provincial magnates, who were sitting in council considering how best to save, first themselves, then the bank, lastly—If the poor public outside had been made acquainted with that ominous "lastly!" Or if to the respectable conclave above-stairs, who would have recoiled indignantly at the vulgar word "jobbing," had been hinted a phrase—which ran oddly in and out of the nooks of my brain, keeping time to the murmur in the street, "Vox populi, vox Dei"—truly, I should have got little credit for my Latinity.
John came out in about half an hour, with a cheerful countenance; told me he was going over to Coltham for an hour or two—would I wait his return?
"And all is settled?" I asked.
"Will be soon, I trust. I can't stay to tell you more now. Goodbye."
I was no man of business, and could assist in nothing. So I thought the best I could do was to pass the time in wandering up and down the familiar garden, idly watching the hoar-frost on the arbutus leaves, and on the dry stems of what had been dear little Mrs. Jessop's favourite roses—the same roses I had seen her among on that momentous evening—the evening when Ursula's bent neck flushed more crimson than the sunset itself, as I told her John Halifax was "too noble to die for any woman's love."
No—he had lived for it—earned it—won it. And musing over these long-ago times, my heart melted—foolish old heart that it was! with a trembling joy, to think that Providence had, in some way, used my poor useless hand to give to him this blessing, a man's chiefest blessing of a virtuous and loving wife—which had crowned his life for all these wonderful years.