"I have seen and conversed with him several times," replied the other; "but we are no farther acquainted."
"Well, Sir, Mr. Tracy is a lucky man," said Mr. Bond; "he has several hundred thousands of pounds in some of the most promising speculations going. Too much in the good lines, indeed, to get as much out of it as possible; but he has this morning, at my suggestion, embarked in an excellent affair. 'The diagonal North of England and John-o'-Groats-House Railway.' The fifty-pound share is now at seventeen and sixpence, and I'll stake my reputation that in six weeks it will be up at five pounds; for a great number of capital people are only waiting to come in when they see it on the rise. Now the very fact of Mr. Tracy having taken five hundred shares will raise them ten or twelve shillings in the market; so that he might sell to-morrow, and be a gainer of fifty per cent. Oh, I never advise a bad speculation. I am always sure, quite sure. Would you like to embark a few hundred pounds in the same spec as your friend, Sir? I have no doubt I could get you shares at the same rate, or within a fraction, if you decide at once. To-morrow they will probably be up to twenty or five-and-twenty. How many shall I say, Sir?" and Mr. Scriptolemus took out his note-book.
"None, I thank you," answered Chandos Winslow; "I never speculate."
"Humph!" said the other; and turning to the dandified young man in the corner, he applied to him with better success. The youth's ears had been open all the time, and the oratory displayed had produced the greater effect, because it was not addressed immediately to him.
No further conversation took place between Chandos Winslow and Mr. Scriptolemus Bond. The latter found that he was not of the stuff of which gentlemen of his cloth make conveniences, and, what is more, discovered it at once. Indeed, it is wonderful what tact a practised guller of the multitude displays in selecting the materials for his work.
At the London terminus, the young gentleman got into a cabriolet, and took his way to a small quiet hotel in Cork-street, and remained thinking during the evening a great deal more of Mr. Scriptolemus Bond and his sayings and doings, than of anything else on earth, except Rose Tracy. It was not that the prospect of making rapidly large sums of money by the speculations of the day had any great effect upon him, although it must be owned that such hopes would have been very attractive in conjunction with that bright image of Rose Tracy, had it not been for certain prejudices of habit and education. But he had a higher flying ambition; he longed not only to win wealth for Rose Tracy's sake, but to win it with distinction, in the straightforward, open paths of personal exertion. He did not wish that his marriage with her should be brought about like the denouement of a third-rate French comedy, by a lucky hit upon the Bourse. It was the words which Mr. Bond had spoken regarding the large speculations of Mr. Tracy which surprised and somewhat alarmed him. He knew well that the railroad mania was the fever of the day, that it affected every rank and every profession, that neither sex and no age but infancy was free; but he was sorry to find that Rose's father was infected with the disease in so serious a form. What might be the consequences of a mistake in such a course, to her he loved best! How great was the probability of a mistake on the part of a man in Mr. Tracy's position! He was removed from all sources of immediate information; he had few means of ascertaining the feasibility of the schemes in which he engaged; he had no means of ascertaining the characters of those with whom he was associated. Young as he was, Chandos saw dangers great and probable in such a course; and not knowing the almost omnipotent power of a popular passion over the minds of men, he could not conceive how a person of Mr. Tracy's sense, blessed with affluence, in need of nothing, with but two daughters to succeed to wealth already great, could yield himself to such infatuation.
The next morning passed in visits to several of his old friends and some of his mother's relations. His story, as far as regarded his father's will, was already known, and he was received everywhere with kindness--apparent, if not real; for it is a mistake to suppose that the world is so impolitic as to show its selfishness in a way to ensure contempt. One or two were really kind, entered warmly into his feelings and his wishes, and consulted as to how his interests were best to be served, his objects most readily to be gained. A cousin of his mother's, an old lady with a large fortune at her disposal, wrote at once to her nephew, one of the ministers, who had a good number of daughters, begging him to espouse the cause of Chandos Winslow, and obtain for him some employment in which his abilities would have room to display themselves. An answer, however, was not to be expected immediately; and Chandos went back to his solitary hotel with gratitude for the kindness he had met with, but nevertheless with spirits not raised.
Several days passed dully. The hopes of youth travel by railroad, but fulfilment goes still by the waggon. He found petty impediments at every step: people out whom he wanted to see; hours wasted by waiting in ante-rooms; ministers occupied all day long; friends who forgot what they had promised to remember, and were very much ashamed to no effect. To a man who seeks anything of his fellow-men, there is always a terrible consumption of time. Sometimes it is accidental on the part of those who inflict it--sometimes, alas! though by no means always--it is in a degree intentional, for there is a pleasure in keeping application waiting. It prolongs our importance.
"My dear Sir, I am very sorry to have detained you," said a high officer one day, running into the waiting room and shaking his hand; "but I have had pressing business all the morning, and now I must ask you to call on me to-morrow about two, for I am forced to run away upon a matter that cannot be delayed."
What had he been doing for the last hour? What was he going to do? He had been reading the newspaper. He was going to trifle with a pretty woman.