So saying, I turned the despatch-box upside down upon the table. At sight of the heap of bank paper and gold that lay in front of us between the candles, or rolled upon the floor alongside, I stood astonished.
“O Lord!” cried Mr. Rowley; “O Lordy, Lordy, Lord!” and he scrambled after the fallen guineas. “O my, Mr. Anne! what a sight o’ money! Why, it’s like a blessed story-book. It’s like the Forty Thieves.”
“Now, Rowley, let’s be cool, let’s be business-like,” said I. “Riches are deceitful, particularly when you haven’t counted them; and the first thing we have to do is to arrive at the amount of my—let me say modest competency. If I’m not mistaken, I have enough here to keep you in gold buttons all the rest of your life. You collect the gold, and I’ll take the paper.”
Accordingly, down we sat together on the hearthrug, and for some time there was no sound but the creasing of bills and the jingling of guineas, broken occasionally by the exulting exclamations of Rowley. The arithmetical operation on which we were embarked took long, and it might have been tedious to others; not to me nor to my helper.
“Ten thousand pounds!” I announced at last.
“Ten thousand!” echoed Mr. Rowley.
And we gazed upon each other.
The greatness of this fortune took my breath away. With that sum in my hands I need fear no enemies. People are arrested in nine cases out of ten, not because the police are astute, but because they themselves run short of money; and I had here before me in the despatch-box a succession of devices and disguises that ensured my liberty. Not only so; but, as I felt with a sudden and overpowering thrill, with ten thousand pounds in my hand, I was become an eligible suitor. What advances I had made in the past, as a private soldier in a military prison, or a fugitive by the wayside, could only be qualified or, indeed, excused as acts of desperation. And now, I might come in by the front door; I might approach the dragon with a lawyer at my elbow, and rich settlements to offer. The poor French prisoner, Champdivers, might be in a perpetual danger of arrest; but the rich travelling Englishman, St. Ives, in his post-chaise, with his despatch-box by his side, could smile at fate and laugh at locksmiths. I repeated the proverb, exulting, Love laughs at locksmiths! In a moment, by the mere coming of this money, my love had become possible—it had come near, it was under my hand—and it may be by one of the curiosities of human nature, but it burned that instant brighter.
“Rowley,” said I, “your Viscount is a made man.”
“Why, we both are, sir,” said Rowley.