Again, what was Thomas Godolphin to answer? Generous to the end, he would not say, “My brother has played us both alike false.” “If I find that any care or caution of mine could have averted this, Mr. Barnaby, I shall carry remorse to my grave,” was all he replied.
“What sort of a dividend will there be?” went on the dealer.
“I really cannot tell you yet, Mr. Barnaby. I have no idea. We must have time to go through the books.”
“Where is Mr. George Godolphin?” resumed the applicant; and it was a very natural question. “Mr. Hurde says he is away, but it is strange that he should be away at such a time as this. I should like to ask him a question or two.”
“He is in London,” replied Thomas Godolphin.
“But what’s he gone to London for now? And when is he coming back?”
More puzzling questions. Thomas had to bear the pain of many such that day. He did not say, “My brother is gone, we know not why; in point of fact he has run away.” He spoke aloud the faint hopes that rose within his own breast—that some train, ere the day was over, would bring him back to Prior’s Ash.
“Don’t you care, Mr. Godolphin,” came the next wailing plaint, “for the ruin that the loss of this money will bring upon me? I have a wife and children, sir.”
“I do care,” Thomas answered, his throat husky and a mist before his eyes. “For every pang that this calamity will inflict on others, it inflicts two on me.”
Mr. Hurde, who was busy with more books in his own department, in conjunction with some clerks, came in to ask a question, his pen behind his ear; and Mr. Barnaby, seeing no good to be derived by remaining, went out. Little respite had Thomas Godolphin. The next to come in was the Rector of All Souls’.