CHAPTER VII. — MR VILLIERS PAYS A VISIT
Slivers and his friend Villiers were by no means pleased with the existing state of things. In sending Vandeloup to the Pactolus claim, they had thought to compromise Madame Midas by placing her in the society of a young and handsome man, and counting on one of two things happening—either that Madame would fall in love with the attractive Frenchman, and seek for a divorce in order to marry him—which divorce Villiers would of course resist, unless she bribed him by giving him an interest in the Pactolus—or that Villiers could assume an injured tone and accuse Vandeloup of being his wife’s lover, and threaten to divorce her unless she made him her partner in the claim. But they had both reckoned wrongly, for neither of these things happened, as Madame was not in love with Vandeloup, and acted with too much circumspection to give any opportunity for scandal. Consequently, Slivers and Co., not finding matters going to their satisfaction, met one day at the office of the senior partner for the purpose of discussing the affair, and seeing what could be done towards bringing Madame Midas to their way of thinking.
Villiers was lounging in one of the chairs, dressed in a white linen suit, and looked rather respectable, though his inflamed face and watery eyes showed what a drunkard he was. He was sipping a glass of whisky and water and smoking his pipe, while he watched Slivers stumping up and down the office, swinging his cork arm vehemently to and fro as was his custom when excited. Billy sat on the table and eyed his master with a steady stare, or else hopped about among the papers talking to himself.
‘You thought you were going to do big things when you sent that jackadandy out to the Pactolus,’ said Villiers, after a pause.
‘At any rate, I did something,’ snarled Slivers, in a rage, ‘which is more than you did, you whisky barrel.’
‘Look here, don’t you call names,’ growled Mr Villiers, in a sulky tone. ‘I’m a gentleman, remember that.’
‘You were a gentleman, you mean,’ corrected the senior partner, with a malignant glance of his one eye. ‘What are you now?’
‘A stockbroker,’ retorted the other, taking a sip of whisky.
‘And a damned poor one at that,’ replied the other, sitting on the edge of the table, which position caused his wooden leg to stick straight out, a result which he immediately utilized by pointing it threateningly in the direction of Villiers.