‘Oh, they’re sure to be all right, Bloxam. I can trust you better than myself.’
‘I hope you may trust me, Mr Henry, after forty years’ service with your honoured father and yourself, but still it would be a satisfaction if you would look into matters a little more closely than you have done of late. You’re not yourself, sir, if you’ll forgive my saying so, since poor Mr Crampton’s death.’
Hindes roused himself directly, and, sitting upright in his chair, pulled the ledger towards him.
‘Why, since Mr Crampton’s death, Bloxam,’ he said irritably, ‘I’ve had plenty of time to get over that. But I’m not well, I haven’t been for months, and I ought to go away—go away,’ he continued, muttering to himself. ‘Now, what’s the matter with these confounded ledgers?’
He stuck his fingers through his hair, and stared in a vague way at the rows of figures before him.
‘There’s nothing the matter, sir, I trust,’ replied the cashier; ‘I can detect no error in them, but here are the bills of lading and the accounts of sale, for you to compare with the entries. Mackintosh & Prome of Antwerp sent us five hundred bales of the December order, but, in consequence of a fire taking place on the wharf, they were unable to complete the order—’
‘Oh, hang it, man, take the beastly things back, do,’ cried Hindes, pushing the books across the table, ‘and look into them yourself. I’m not well enough. My eyesight has failed terribly of late, and the long rows of figures dazzle me. I trust it all to you—all to you. Do as you think best, but don’t worry me about it! I’m going home!’
And, reaching down for his hat and coat, Mr Hindes stumbled out of his office, followed by the winking eyes of the clerks, who, with their tongues stuck in their cheeks, whispered to each other that the governor had, ‘got ’em again.’ But poor old Bloxam returned to his desk, shaking his head, and repeating that the business was going to the devil.
CHAPTER X.
Henry Hindes reached Hampstead quite early in the afternoon, and his wife met him with a foreign letter in her hand.