With such a temper attaching to the ordinary affairs of the State; with a view of the occupation of Egypt (for example) that it was provoked by a group of bankers and scripholders; with the confirmed opinion that the problems of the Irish Land were principally due to the greed of English moneylenders—with every illusion a belated radical can nourish, it is not wonderful that Mr Abbott, the moment difficulties of any sort threatened himself, should have positively raved.
A man of quieter temper would have known that Cosmo’s strong and virile attitude during the moment of their short interview was a piece of very legitimate finesse. A man who could see modern commerce as it is, would have admired the young man for the attempt, but would have known how little strength lay behind it.
You cannot “freeze out” a man in Mr Abbott’s position. A shipowner, a prosperous member of the most prosperous trade in England, has no paper floating about that you can buy up; the investment of his savings are not commonly in such securities as even a group of enemies can largely affect. The principal weapons of that engrossing warfare which is the crusade and school of knighthood of our day, are useless in shipping circles. Freights are still a sort of neutral ground in the fierce contest of high souls, and will so remain until one dominating brain shall have pooled the interests of the main lines, frozen out the tramps, and unloaded the shares of a Trust upon legislators in such a manner as to forbid the interference of Parliament.
In spite of the strength of his position, however, Mr Abbott’s suspicions raged. A Government contract which lay between him and the Excelsior Line fell to the Excelsior. He employed two men at Somerset House for five days to discover the shareholders of the Excelsior, and of the syndicate that was behind the Excelsior, and of the investing company which was the principal holder of the syndicate:—and so forth. He got very little for his pains; but he remained convinced that some influence allied to the M’Korio had defrauded him.
A cargo of which he had made certain at Barcelona failed him, and the ship came home in ballast. The innocent name of the worthy Spaniard who had been unable to oblige was darkly connected in his mind with Mr Harbury.
He had great difficulty in effecting an insurance upon the Polecat. He was asked a rate which he would not pay, and she went out uninsured. More than three weeks overdue in the customary run to the Plate, he did at last reinsure at thirty-five guineas; the very next day she appeared, apologetic but undamaged, in the river. If Mr Abbott had dared, he would have talked of bribery.
A succession of small incidents such as these, incidents which in fifteen days had hardly cost him £15,000, had driven Mr Abbot quite off his balance; and it happened that, on the evening before Mr Burden was to return to his business, Mr Abbot sat down and wrote to Norwood a letter as mad as ever man wrote; but in such terms as have since, I am glad to say, been found indictable before a common jury.
I must offer a passing apology for printing it; it is the business of a recorder to record, and I am impelled to put down even this offensive extravagance.
The letter reached Avonmore by the first post of Monday, the 3rd of September. It came with a batch of others on that morning when Mr Burden had determined to return to town; the morning of a day upon which he was expected to see, for a moment a least, his fellow Directors at the offices of the M’Korio.
The merchant came down to breakfast cheerily, with a deceptive thin veneer of health. He sat at his table assuming the airs of old (Cosmo had long been gone); he opened his correspondence envelope by envelope. The first, second, and third, were circulars; the fourth was a wedding card, the fifth a prospectus; he saw next Mr Abbott’s handwriting, and his mind changed, darkened, and grew cold, as does a plain in early summer when a snow cloud comes above it from the hills. He opened the envelope and read these words:—