“To those lawyers who wrote to me last night;—Bentham and Ellis is the name of the firm. The sooner I interview them the better,—don’t you think so?”
“Yes—but see here,”—and he drew me aside—“You must have some ready cash. It doesn’t look well to apply [p 45] at once for advances,—and there is really no necessity to explain to these legal men that you were on the verge of starvation when their letter arrived. Take this pocket-book,—remember you promised to let me be your banker,—and on your way you might go to some well-reputed tailor and get properly rigged out. Ta-ta!”
He moved off at a rapid pace,—I hurried after him, touched to the quick by his kindness.
“But wait—I say—Lucio!” And I called him thus by his familiar name for the first time. He stopped at once and stood quite still.
“Well?” he said, regarding me with an attentive smile.
“You don’t give me time to speak”—I answered in a low voice, for we were standing in one of the public corridors of the hotel—“The fact is I have some money, or rather I can get it directly,—Carrington sent me a draft for fifty pounds in his letter—I forgot to tell you about it. It was very good of him to lend it to me,—you had better have it as security for this pocket-book,—by-the-bye how much is there inside it?”
“Five hundred, in bank notes of tens and twenties,”—he responded with business-like brevity.
“Five hundred! My dear fellow, I don’t want all that. It’s too much!”
“Better have too much than too little nowadays,”—he retorted with a laugh—“My dear Tempest, don’t make such a business of it. Five hundred pounds is really nothing. You can spend it all on a dressing-case for example. Better send back John Carrington’s draft,—I don’t think much of his generosity considering that he came into a mine worth a hundred thousand pounds sterling, a few days before I left Australia.”
I heard this with great surprise, and, I must admit with a slight feeling of resentment too. The frank and generous character of my old chum ‘Boffles’ seemed to darken suddenly in my eyes,—why could he not have told me of his good fortune in his letter? Was he afraid I might trouble [p 46] him for further loans? I suppose my looks expressed my thoughts, for Rimânez, who had observed me intently, presently added—