“Very well. If you suppose that you are going to spend your days in idleness, you are mistaken. I give you a week to choose some occupation that will not involve me in further outlay.”
Bruce took out his embroidered pocket-handkerchief, redolent with scent, and blew his nose affectedly. On doing so, an unopened envelope dropped on the floor, out of his pocket; picking it up, he glanced at it, tore it across, and flung it into the fire. Sir Rollo immediately picked up the pieces with the tongs and opened it.
“I see that this is a bill, and I shall proceed to look at it.”
“Yes, if you like,” said Bruce, in an indifferent tone—“it’s from a dun.”
It was a tailor’s bill which had been sent after him, and it amounted to 150 pounds.
“And you suppose,” said his father, “that I am going to pay these debts for you?”
“I suppose so, certainly—some day. Let the dogs wait.”
Sir Rollo seemed on the point of a great burst of wrath; his lips positively quivered and his eye flashed with passion. He seemed, however, to control himself,—darted at his son a look of wrath and scorn, and left the room. A note that evening informed Lady Bruce that business detained him from home, and that he might not return for some days.
A week after Bruce received a letter with foreign post-marks, to the following effect:—
Dear Vyvyan—By the time you receive this, I shall be on the Continent, far beyond the reach of the law.
“I have been living for the last ten years on the money I embezzled from the company whose affairs I managed. The fraud cannot fail of being detected almost immediately.
“I feel acutely the position in which I am forced to leave your mother. I do not pity you in the least. I gave you the amplest opportunity to save yourself from this ruin, if you had not been a fool. You cared for nothing and for nobody but yourself. You never worked hard, though you knew it to be my wish; you assumed an air of spurious independence, and affected the fine gentleman. Your conceit and idleness will be their own punishment. You have made your own bed; now you will have to lie in it.
“Rollo Bruce.”