Chilcote moved restlessly in his seat. “You talk bitterly,” he said.
The other looked up. “I think bitterly, which is worse. I am one of the unlucky beggars who, in the expectation of money, has been denied a profession—even a trade, to which to cling in time of shipwreck; and who, when disaster comes, drift out to sea. I warned you the other night to steer clear of me. I come under the head of flotsam!”
Chilcote's face lighted. “You came a cropper?” he asked.
“No. It was some one else who came the cropper—I only dealt in results.”
“Big results?”
“A drop from a probable eighty thousand pounds to a certain eight hundred.”
Chilcote glanced up. “How did you take it?” he asked.
“I? Oh, I was twenty-five then. I had a good many hopes and a lot of pride; but there is no place for either in a working world.”
“But your people?”
“My last relation died with the fortune.”