"He ought to do so. We must get him into an office. Perhaps, when the concern is wound up, Mr. Ferguson may find him a berth when a fresh start is made."
"A fresh start!" exclaimed Mr. Ferguson; "that will never be, as far as I am concerned. I should think a clerkship in a bank would be better."
"I think you ought to see Raymond," Dr. Loftus Wilton said; "he is his father's representative, and everything should be laid before him. Then there is the eldest girl, close on sixteen; a little creature, but full of nerve and sense. Shall we call them?"
The gentlemen seemed doubtful; and Mr. De Brette said,—
"Poor things! I think we had better leave it to you to tell them what must happen. The house will realize a good deal," he added, looking round; "fine pictures, and everything in good order. The cellar, too, must be valuable—poor Wilton's wine was always of the choicest."
"Yes, poor fellow. My brother lived up to the mark, perhaps a little too much so; but who was to foresee such a calamity as this?"
After a little more discussion the party broke up,—the lawyer gathering together the papers and Mr. Wilton's will with a half sigh, as he said,—
"This is so much waste paper now. It is a melancholy story, and there are hundreds like it. Nothing but losses all round."
Dr. Loftus Wilton strolled out into the grounds when he was left alone. He would put off talking to the children till the next day, he thought, and there was no immediate necessity to do so. He was sorry for them; but he had a large family, and a hard fight to provide for them out of a professional income as a doctor in a fashionable watering-place, where much was required in the way of appearance, and people were valued very much by what they wore, and very little by what they were. The summer was always a flat time at Roxburgh, and hence Dr. Loftus Wilton could better afford the time away from his practice. "There are good schools at Roxburgh for the small boys, and the two girls could get advantages," he thought; "but then Anna will not trouble herself about poor Arthur's family. In fact, she would not care to have them there. Still, I must do my duty. She and Emily never did hit it off. Anna thought she patronized her; and now it would be the other way, poor things." And then Dr. Wilton lighted another cigar and paced up and down the garden, till at last he found himself on the wooden bridge, and in the stillness of the summer evening heard voices. He went on, and came upon the lake, on the bank of which three black figures were sitting—Salome and her two elder brothers. The opportunity was too good to be lost, and knocking the ashes off his cigar end, Dr. Wilton descended, saying,—
"The very people I wanted to see.—Here, Reginald, my boy, stop—Raymond, I mean."