“What was this swindle?” asked the owner of Kemms Park.
“It was one in which all the tickets sold were to draw prizes,” was the reply; “in which shares were regularly issued, and prospectuses carefully drawn up and freely forwarded; in which samples of goods were sent to agents on deposit of two pounds; in which the hopes of fortune held out were so great, that money poured in from the provinces like water, and would have continued to pour in but for a smashing article on the subject, which appeared in a respectable journal. That proved a death-blow to the scheme, and the reputable little lot had to close their concern, and adopt some other means of subsistence. What the others did I am unable to say: one appeared in the Bankruptcy Court, but that was some time afterwards.
“To Mr. Peter Black, however, ‘Limited Liability,’ in which the concern I have mentioned was his first venture, appeared in the very nick of time.
“He had tried his hand at most other trades; why not at the promotion of large companies?
“The shilling swindles, the wonderful City fraud, were but introductions to this mightier arena, and the first time, after years, when I met Mr. Black again, was when I saw him in splendid offices in Cannon Street, sipping Madeira, and issuing his orders as though poverty and he had never been even on speaking terms. I am not easily surprised, but I confess those offices and Mr. Peter Black himself astonished me.
“There was not a thing under heaven in those days that could not be formed into a company, and accordingly Mr. Black was secretary to a Limited Liability for supplying England and the world with hermetically-sealed soups made from the flesh of South American oxen.”
Here Lord Kemms laughed outright.
“There was nothing impossible about the matter,” said Mr. Raidsford, quietly. “I’ll be bound, if any man liked to go in single-handed for a project of the kind to-morrow, he could compass it—ay, and make money out of it too; but what a man may do, a company cannot do, and accordingly the soup never came from South America, and the bullocks Mr. Black represented in his reports as slain and in the English market may, for aught I know, be still roaming over the prairies.”
“And after that company collapsed?” inquired his lordship.
“Why, since that, Mr. Black has been sometimes up and sometimes down—sometimes living in retirement with his banking account drawn down to two and three half-pence; and again, giving grand dinners and living utterly regardless of expense. He is in the latter state at present—has a house in Stanley Crescent, servants in livery; dinners from Gunter’s; Mrs. Black “receives” on Tuesdays; Mr. Black asks great people to dinner any day in the week that suits his purpose. He has three separate banking accounts—he is promoting four different companies; he has offices in Cannon Street, Broad Street, and George Street, Westminster. He has an efficient staff of clerks—he has got, it is said, a couple of first-rate backers; he has all his past experience to guide him safely through the quagmires of limited liability; and, in short, if Mr. Black do not now make his fortune, he never will. My own opinion is, he never will; but that, of necessity, is merely an opinion.”