A Girl of the Commune

by G. A. Henty

"Only once, I think, and that was afterwards. We signed then as witnesses to his signature to a legal document. I don't know what its nature was. It was done in the same manner directly Mr. Hartington had driven away."

"It might have been a mortgage deed."

"It might have been, sir, but as I saw only the last page of it, and as there were but three or four lines of writing at the top of the page, followed by the signatures, I have no idea even of the nature of the document."

"May I ask if you have left the office at Abchester on pleasant terms with Mr. Brander and his partner, for, of course, you know that he still takes an interest in the firm."

"Oh, yes, it is still carried on as Brander and Jackson, and Brander still goes down there for an hour or two every day. Yes, I left on pleasant terms enough, that is to say, I left of my own free will. I had for some time wished to come up to London, and hearing through a friend in this office of a vacancy at Barrington and Smiles, I applied and was fortunate enough to get it."

Cuthbert sat silent for a time. So far the answers he had received tallied precisely with Cumming's theory. He did not see how he could carry the inquiry farther here at present. The clerk, who was watching him closely, was the first to speak.

"I own, Mr. Hartington, that I do not in the slightest degree understand the gist of your questions, but I can well imagine that at the present moment you are wondering whether it would be safe to ask farther. I will, therefore, tell you at once that one of my reasons for leaving Mr. Brander's employment was that I did not like his way of doing business, nor did I like the man himself. The general opinion of him was that he was a public-spirited and kind-hearted man. I can only say that our opinion of him in the office was a very different one. He was a hard man, and frequently when pretending to be most lenient to tenants on the estates to which he was agent, or to men on whose lands he held mortgages, he strained the law to its utmost limits. I will not say more than that, but I could quote cases in which he put on the screw in a way that was to my mind most absolutely unjustifiable, and I had been for a very long time trying to get out of his office before the opportunity came. I may also say, Mr. Hartington, that I had the highest respect for your father. He always had a kind word when he came into the office, and regularly at Christmas he handed Levison and myself a check for ten pounds each, for, as he said, the trouble his business gave us. I tell you this in order that you may feel you can safely repose any confidence in me, and that my advice will be wholly at your service if you should think fit to give me your confidence in this matter, whatever it may be. But at the same time I must say it would be still better if you put yourself in the hands of some respectable firm of solicitors. I do not suggest my own principals more than others, although few men stand higher in the profession."

"There are reasons against my laying the matter before any firm of solicitors, and the chief of these is that my hands are tied in a peculiar manner, and that I am unable to carry it through to its natural sequence, but I will very thankfully accept your offer and will frankly tell you the nature of my suspicions, for they are nothing more than suspicions. I may first say that the news that my father was a shareholder in the Abchester Bank astounded me. For a time, I put it down to one of those sudden impulses that are unaccountable, but I may tell you, and here my confidence begins, that I have come across Cumming, the bank manager, and from him have obtained some curious particulars of this transaction—particulars that have excited my suspicions.

"You wondered why I asked you those questions. I will tell you. You did not see my father affix his signature to either of those documents. The one being certainly the transfer of some of Cumming's shares to him. The other being, as I believe, the mortgage that, as you doubtless heard, Mr. Brander held over my father's estate. How could you tell those two signatures were not clever forgeries?"

Mr. Harford gave a start of surprise.