The solemn process of verifying the printed numbers by tens was to begin when Mr. Petre—in a last eccentricity at which, for all his thought of the future, the Banker could hardly refrain from protesting—had them all put back.
“I’ll take it as read,” he said. “All I want to understand is these locks.”
The simple, the ingenious mechanism was explained, and when cordial farewells had somewhat raised the hearts of the mourners who were to remain thus widowed, a menial bore the box away in train of the millionaire, the last poor corpse of an immortal episode, and put it into the roomy motor at its master’s feet. So went a little more—a trifle of one or two odd one hundred thousands more—than three million pounds through Guildford to Alton, where they lunched late and took the air.
At Alton Mr. Petre bought a good strong sack and corded it about the box. At Winchester he stopped for the night, paid off the car, and dined well with Thompson. As for the sacking parcel, it went up to his room with his luggage. Next morning Mr. Petre hired a standing rotor cab himself in the street, standing by it to see that none should speak to its chauffeur. His luggage was put within and without, and he and Buffy, whom he had asked to pay the bill, drove to Lymington. The taxi was paid off with its return fare, and Mr. Petre had the satisfaction of seeing it go off without comment or converse.
He and his companion lunched. After lunch Thompson went out, saying that all might hear, “I’m sure I can get something,” and sure enough, in an hour he was back with a little old-fashioned trap, still surviving, and a venerable horse, his purchases, for they designed to tour the forest. They put their few things aboard and the small sacking case which held some camping kit and off they went; so slowly that the children jeered at them as the old horse wheezed along.
The Forest was divine with Autumn; they drove on alone, exploring its views. One night Mr. Petre took out those bonds and made a nice brown-paper parcel of them, leaving the metal box empty. But he took it carefully along. They turned the old horse’s head westward toward the Dorset border.
They took it easy. They made their twelve or fourteen miles in a day, all leisurely, nor in a direct line. On the fifth day, from a hill-top, they saw before them in its vale the happy roofs of Harrington, its belfry, the sober gray of Blagden’s House beyond the trees, and slowly their voyage ended at the cottage by the North Lodge.
The heavy camping kit was lifted in. Then the rest. The ramshackle old trap put away in a barn behind a farm cart. They would not need it for some time. It had only been for the forest, said Mr. Blagden. The old horse found a good stable and the much-enduring man his home.
He was released. He had given the slip to that incredible world of shuffling and of falsehood and of cozening, of vain gambling and snatching and open robbery which pretends, in our toppling moment, to govern mankind. So long as the State was secure he was secure; he had his money out at usury, but to one debtor only, the Government of his country; better investment he could not find. He was washed of all the slime of evil acquaintance as he was rid of all that terror and perplexity and agony of nothingness which had poisoned the spring and summer of ’53.
But the gigantic sum in the locked cupboard of his bedroom above less affected him than the doubling of his insufficient revenue two years before would have done. He desired nothing but his old friends, his home and the peaceful passage of age, and these were now secure.