Mr. Pagebrook Accepts an Invitation to Lunch and another Invitation.
On the morning after Robert's incarceration, his attorney came at the appointed hour for the purpose of preparing the papers on which application was to be made for his discharge.
"I have the affidavits all ready, I believe, Mr. Pagebrook, and we have only to make a complete list of your property."
"That will be easily done, sir," said Robert, with a feeling of grim amusement; "as I have literally nothing except my trunk and its contents."
"You have your claim on that bank for money deposited. I suppose that must be included, though it is only a chose in action."
"O put it in, by all means," said Robert. "I do not wish to misrepresent anything or to withhold anything. I only wish the chose in action, as you call it, were of sufficient value to discharge the debt. I should then quit here free from all indebtedness, except to you for your fee; and should not have this thing to pay.'
"Your discharge, I think, will free you, in law, from——"
"But it will not free me in honor sir. It will give me time, however; and the very first use I shall make of that time will be to earn the money with which to pay off this, my only debt. I should never ask a discharge at all if the asking supposed any purpose on my part to avoid the payment of the debt. Pardon me; this talk must sound odd to you, coming from a man in my present position. I forgot that I am an absconding debtor. You will think my talk a cheap kind of honesty, costing nothing."
"No, Pagebrook—if you will allow me to drop the 'Mister'—I should trust you in any transaction, though I have not known you a week. I don't believe you are an absconding debtor, and I'm not going to believe it on the strength of any oaths Messrs. Steel, Flint & Sharp may make." As he said this the young lawyer took Robert's hand, and Robert found himself wholly unable to utter a word by way of reply. He did not want to shed tears in the presence of his jail attendants, but the lawyer saw them standing in his eyes, and prevented any effort at replying by turning at once to the matter in hand.
"Come, Pagebrook," he said, "this isn't business. Let me see; what bank was it that you deposited with?"