During their railway journey Mr. Rae strove to impress upon the Captain's mind the need of diplomacy. “Sir Archibald is a man of strong prejudices,” he urged; “for instance, his Bank he regards with an affection and respect amounting to veneration. He is a bachelor, you understand, and his Bank is to him wife and bairns. On no account must you treat his Bank lightly.”
“Oh, certainly not,” replied the Captain, who was inclined to resent Mr. Rae's attempts to school him in diplomacy.
“He is a great financier,” continued Mr. Rae, “and with him finance is a high art, and financial integrity a sacred obligation.”
“Oh, certainly, certainly,” again replied the Captain, quite unimpressed by this aspect of the matter, for while he considered himself distinctly a man of affairs, yet his interests lay more in matters of great public moment. Commercial enterprises he regarded with a feeling akin to contempt. Money was an extremely desirable, and indeed necessary, appendage to a gentleman's position, but how any man of fine feeling could come to regard a financial institution with affection or veneration he was incapable of conceiving. However, he was prepared to deal considerately with Sir Archibald's peculiar prejudices in this matter.
Mr. Rae's forebodings as to the outcome of the approaching interview were of the most gloomy nature as they drove through the finely appointed and beautifully kept grounds of Sir Archibald Brodie's estate. The interview began inauspiciously. Sir Archibald received them with stiff courtesy. He hated to be pursued to his country home with business matters. Besides, at this particular moment he was deeply engrossed in the inspection of his pigs, for which animals he cherished what might almost be called an absorbing affection. Mr. Rae, who was proceeding with diplomatic caution and skill to approach the matter in hand by way of Sir Archibald's Wiltshires, was somewhat brusquely interrupted by the Captain, who, in the firm conviction that he knew much better than did the lawyer how to deal with a man of his own class, plunged at once into the subject.
“Awfully sorry to introduce business matters, Sir Archibald, to the attention of a gentleman in the privacy of his own home, but there is a little matter in connection with the Bank in which I am somewhat deeply interested.”
Sir Archibald bowed in silence.
“Rather, I should say, it concerns my son, and therefore, Sir Archibald, myself and my family.”
Again Sir Archibald bowed.
“It is, after all, a trivial matter, which I have no doubt can be easily arranged between us. The truth is, Sir Archibald—,” here the Captain hesitated, as if experiencing some difficulty in stating the case.