"Then the assets will be nil," said Gideon. "But they can't be absolutely nil in your case. For instance, you have a watch, and you have that Chinese charm you bought from Tin Lin Chow and various other things, including the green lizard you found on the common last Saturday, if it's still alive."
"I can't give up the watch," I said, "it isn't mine. It's only lent to me by my mother. The lizard died yesterday, I'm sorry to say, owing to not liking captivity."
"Well, at any rate, the thing is to declare something in the pound," Gideon told me.
"It may be," I said, "but first get your pound. You can't declare anything in the pound if you haven't got a pound. At least, I don't see how."
He seemed doubtful about that and changed the subject.
"Anyway, I'll be at the meeting of creditors," he promised; and I felt sure he would be, because Gideon was never known to lie.
II
A good deal happened before the meeting of creditors. Among other things I went down three places in my form, because my mind was so much occupied with going bankrupt; and I also got into a beast of a row with the Doctor, which was serious, and might have been still more serious if he had insisted on knowing the truth. It was at a very favourite lesson of the Doctor's—namely, the Scripture lesson, and, as a rule, he simply takes the top of the class and leaves the bottom pretty much alone, because at the top are Macmullen and Richmond and Prodgers, all fliers at Scripture, and their answers give the Doctor great pleasure; and at the bottom are me and Willson minor and West and others, and our answers don't give him any pleasure at all. But sometimes he pounces down upon us with a sudden question, to see if we are attending; and he pounced down upon me, to see if I was attending, and I was not, because my mind was full of the meeting of creditors, who were more important to me for the minute than the people in the Old Testament.
So when the Doctor suddenly said, "Tell us what you know of Gideon, Bannister, if you please," I clean forgot there was more than one Gideon, and said—
"Gideon is an awfully decent sort, sir, and he has advised me to offer something in the pound."