It has been remarked before that he was by no means an exemplary young man.
It was during these days he got the notion into his head that the world was already beginning to look askance at him, that the greetings of his acquaintances were scarcely so cordial as they used to be, that there was a chilliness in the social atmosphere such as he had never experienced before.
All this was probably due to some touch of morbid fancy on his part. One unpleasant fact there was, however, which he found it impossible to ignore: he rarely opened his morning's letters nowadays without finding among them one or more bills, most of them containing a pressing request for an early settlement. To poor Burgo it seemed as if the air was full of portents.
If he had ever thought much about the matter--which, to give him his due, he never had--he would have said that it was impossible he could have owed so much money. Yet here was account after account tumbling in, embodying items not one of which, when he came to look at them, was he in a position to dispute. And when, one morning, he found courage to take a sheet of paper and a pencil and total up the lot, he was astounded at the magnitude of the result. It was not the first time he had floundered into a similar quagmire. His uncle had already paid his debts on two previous occasions--not without a little grumbling, for Sir Everard was somewhat penuriously inclined, and living well within his own income, considered that everybody should do the same--and, under ordinary circumstances, Burgo would have appealed to him for the third time, and would have felt confident that the appeal would not have been in vain. But now the door was shut in his face, at least for the time being. Until he should know what kind of woman this new aunt should prove to be, he felt that it would be impossible for him to appeal to his uncle as he should otherwise have done. It was a capital thing, he said to himself, that quarter-day was so close at hand.
When those important epochs came round, it was Burgo's practice to charter a hansom, and be driven into the City, to the office of Mr. Garden, his uncle's lawyer, have ten minutes' chat and a glass of dry sherry with him, pocket the cheque which was always waiting for him, give a receipt in due form, and then lounge back westward, with a fine glow of satisfaction such as he had not been conscious of half-an-hour before. "You have heard the news, I presume," said Mr. Garden on the present occasion, as he shook hands with the young man.
"I have; and very much surprised I was. Were not you also surprised?"
"I have lived too long, and have seen too much of human nature, to be greatly surprised at anything. Still I must confess that I never looked upon Sir Everard as a marrying man."
"I should think not, indeed."
"Let us hope that the step he has taken will in no way interfere with your prospects in life."
"It is pretty sure to do that," responded Burgo a little ruefully.