"I do not think, I know!" shouted Mr. Forde in reply.
"Should you object to telling us where it is?" inquired Rupert.
"I can't tell you, because I do not yet know myself; but I mean to find out, you may be quite certain of that, Mr. Rupert Halling."
"All right," said Rupert cheerfully.
"And I mean to know what you have done with your money," continued Mr. Forde. "He had twenty pounds no later than last Friday," continued the irate manager, addressing Mr. Kleinwort, "for a picture which I am credibly informed he could have painted in a day. Why if I had lived as he and his father and sister have done on Mr. Mortomley, I should be ashamed to stand there and talk about difficulty. You may sneer, sir, but I beg to tell you that it may prove you have sneered once too often. I call your conduct disgraceful. Why, twenty pounds a day, supposing you only worked three hundred days in the year, is six thousand pounds, more than enough to pay the whole of your debt to us. What have you to say to that, sir?"
"Nothing," answered Rupert. "Your knowledge of Art and your Arithmetic appear to be so accurate that I would not presume to criticise either."
"It seems to me," suggested Mr. Kleinwort at this juncture, "that we travel like the horse in the mill, round and about. Unlike that useful quadruped we produce no good. Dear madame, cannot this evil so great be averted? Cannot we by talking all over friendly, imagine some means to cure your dear husband, and avoid so great disgrace as bankruptcy?"
"My husband does not wish to be bankrupt," said Dolly.
"Alas! my dear—pardon, madame, I mean all in sympathy, all in respect—it is the same, bankruptcy and being liquidate are one."
"What is the use of talking all this nonsense, Kleinwort?" interrupted Mr. Forde. "Let us get to business. What things are pressing?"