But as he wrote, the figures seemed to join hands and dance before him; then his pen ceased to form others, and an imaginary picture painted itself on the delicately tinted blue paper with its red lines—a pleasant landscape in fair France with sunny hill-sides on which ranged in rows were carefully cultured vines. To the north and cast were softened bosky woods, and dominating all, one of those antique castellated châteaux with pepperbox towers and gilded vanes, such as he had seen in pictures or read of in some books.
“If I only had the money,” thought Harry, as he entered a sum similar to that which Pradelle had named. “He knows all these things. He has good advice from friends, and if we won,—Hah!”
The château rose before his eyes again, bathed in sunshine. Then he pictured the terrace overlooking the vineyards—a grey old stone terrace, with many seats and sheltering trees, and along that terrace walked just such a maiden as Aunt Marguerite had described.
Scratch! Scratch! Scratch! Scratch! His pen and Crampton’s pen; and he had no money, and Pradelle’s project to borrow as he had suggested was absurd.
Ah, if he only had eighty-one pounds ten shillings and sixpence! the sum he now placed in neat figures in their appropriate columns.
Old Crampton tilted back his tall stool, swung himself round, and lowered himself to the ground. Then crossing the office, he went into Van Heldre’s private room, and there was the rattle of a key, a creaking hinge, as an iron door was swung open; and directly after the old man returned.
Harry Vine could not see his hands, and he did not raise his eyes to watch the old clerk; but in the imagination which so readily pictured the château that was not in Spain, he seemed to see as he heard every movement of the fat white fingers, when a canvas bag was dumped down on the mahogany desk, the string untied, and a little heap of coins were poured out. Then followed the scratching of those coins upon the mahogany, as they were counted, ranged in little piles, and finally, after an entry had been checked, they were replaced in the bag, which the old man bore back into the safe in the private room.
“Fifty or a hundred pounds,” said Harry to himself, as a curious sensation of heat came into his cheeks, to balance which there seemed to be a peculiarly cold thrill running up his spine, to the nape of his neck.
“Anybody at home?”
“Yes, sir; here we are hard at work.”