"I don't care what there is," interrupted Mr. Dean, "once an estate goes into liquidation or bankruptcy, stock and plant and good-will and book debts and everything else are really as valueless as old rubbish. What is the good of machinery if it is standing still? What is the use of a business unless it is worked, and that by somebody who understands it? What do you suppose Homewood, and every stick of furniture in the house, and every ounce of stock in the works would fetch under the hammer? Pooh! don't talk to me about creditors ever being paid when once affairs pass out of a man's own hands. There is where your uncle made his mistake. If he had come to me for advice a couple of years ago, I could have told him what to do."
"What ought he to have done?" asked Rupert.
"Why, faced his affairs, and then called a private and friendly meeting of his creditors. If there were one or two who opposed, he should, with the consent of those who did not oppose, have offered a sum to be rid of them altogether. He should then, furnished with authentic data, have said, "Now, here is a business worth so much a year. In so many years you can be paid in full. I must have a small income out of the concern for my services, and you can appoint an accountant to examine the books, check the accounts, and divide the money every three months." He would have been as much master in his own works as a man ever can be who is in debt. All these writs and other disgraceful embarrassments would have been avoided; but what is the use of talking of all this now? Mortomley's Estate has been allowed to go to the dogs, and the dogs have got it, and it will be a very clever creditor indeed who manages to snatch even a morsel out of their mouths."
"But, sir," pleaded Rupert, "you advised the present course to be adopted."
"I said there was no other course now to be adopted," amended Mr. Dean. "Could any man in his right senses say there was another way out of the difficulty, with men in possession and hungry creditors waiting impatiently to sweep the place clear? It is better that none should have money than that one should, to the exclusion of others; and this is where your uncle will be blamed, for paying out the men who proceeded to extremity, and not paying those who were patient and gave him time. No doubt he will get his discharge in due course, but how will that benefit him? He is done for commercially. He can never do any more good for himself or those belonging to him."
"I cannot see that exactly," answered Rupert. "If he were stripped to-morrow of every worldly effect, he could, given ordinary health, earn a very respectable income by means of his genius."
"What is genius?" inquired Mr. Dean, who was by this time standing before the fire and laying down the law in that manner which makes so many very commonplace gentlemen considered oracles by their wives and acquaintances. "Ah! you cannot tell me, I see; but I can tell you. Genius is success. It is of no use declaring a man is clever or has great talents or exceptional abilities. I say prove it. How are you to prove it? Show me his banker's book, show me the receipts signed by his tradesmen, show me the style in which he lives, show me these things, and I will then believe he has possessed either the genius to make money or the genius to keep money when made by his father before him."
"Then you think the man who paints a picture can have no genius unless he is able to sell it likewise?"
"I am sure of it. That person is an idiot who, possessing a certain amount of sense, requires as much more to make use of it. Take your uncle's case. According to your statement he possesses genius. Well, what has it done for him, wherein is he better at this moment than one of his own workmen? He began life with a good business. Where is that business now? He had a respectable connection, and what must he do but allow himself to be drawn into a connection—pray do not suppose I mean to speak harshly of your father, who first introduced him to it—which seems to have been anything but respectable. Once entangled, his genius failed to show him any way out of the net he had allowed to enclose him. His genius cannot enable him to make good articles out of bad. He marries a woman with money, and he tries to patch up his tottering credit with part of her fortune. If that is what genius does for a man, better have none say I. Now look at me," added Mr. Dean, after he had paused to take breath, and Rupert did look at him with as strong a feeling of repulsion as Dolly had ever felt. "No one ever accounted me clever. My father called me plodding Billy, and said I would never do much for myself or anybody else. What has the result been?"
If all his future had depended upon holding his peace at that moment, Rupert must have answered,