“But—you know!”
“Yes, alas! I know.”
“Felix, there is one thing, at least, that you can do. Rebuild this little mission chapel as it ought to be done. I will pay for it, and the prayers of the grateful people may help you.”
“Yes. I have thought of that myself. Thank you, Fred. I can do that, and I will, without your help. It will be like an acknowledgment of my fault; but that I must not mind, it is only justice. O God, I wish I could be just! That is what I have not been. I cannot think how I could have done some of the things which I have done. I think my conscience has been asleep, and is awake now with a vengeance. But competition is ruining many beside me. The little men do some of the mischief. They work themselves for workmen’s wages, and get a few to help them who are unskilled, and therefore take less; and I suppose they get some profit, for they go on for a few years, and then, having cheapened things for every one else and having nothing to lose themselves, they fail—while the men of capital have to suffer for their folly and ambition.”
“Yes; perhaps some trades are being ruined in this way. But if any people are able to prevent it, the big men, as you call them, are; for they might make a stand, and insist on having none but good work done, or giving up business altogether. And, of course, capital ought not to monopolise the trades. Other men, as well as you, have tried and hoped for success.”
“Certainly; and deserved it more than I. I have been too grasping and ambitious. I am truly sorry now that I did not find some plan of making my workmen sharers in my prosperity. I have not trusted them, nor they me. Excepting at first there has been no friendliness or goodwill between us, and this has cost us both dear. I have lost thousands of pounds through strikes, and more than a few through speculation. Ah! if I could have my time over again, how differently I would order my life! But I am afraid the crash must come, though I am not quite sure even now that if I had, say, seven or eight thousand pounds of ready-money, I could not tide over the worst and wait for better times. Forgive me, old fellow, I have put my burden on your shoulders, though it still rests upon my own. Pray for me, as you used to do. I cannot pray myself; and yet I am uttering words of verity when I say that now, as never before in my life, my one desire is to do the right, if I only could be sure what it is.”
The words came brokenly, and the speaker threw himself wearily into a chair. The Doctor put his arm over his shoulder.
“You may count on me, you know, without my saying it. I will go home to-morrow and think all this over, and come and see you again soon. You must reduce your expenditure in the meantime—that is certainly necessary and right; but we will avert the crash if it can be done. Go to bed now, Felix; you looked tired to death.” And the brothers parted.
The Scourby people were perfectly correct in their opinion that Dr. Stapleton had a secret trouble on his mind. After his return he was a very much sadder man than they had ever known him. He gave offence to his patients by raising his fees, and soon became conscious that his practice was leaving him.
And on the eve of the Scourby election a temptation assailed him. Dr. Stapleton late at night was asked to receive a visitor. At first the two men spoke on ordinary subjects in ordinary tones, but afterwards they were lowered. Once only Stapleton’s voice rang out, indignantly, “Am I a dog that I should do this thing?” and the two men, with white faces, glared in each other’s eyes; but after awhile they calmed down, and when, an hour later, the stranger left, Stapleton himself let him out, neither lifting his eyes to the other’s face.