‘Well, I don’t know—I don’t know,’ replied the auctioneer. ‘You mustn’t take everything for gospel a man says when he’s had a glass.’
The captain’s face grew long.
‘Oh, you needn’t look so glum. I’m not going back upon what I intended, though perhaps it may not be all you were expecting. I have felt uncommon sore about this business, Ferrard, I can tell you; and if you and I are to patch up a bad job, you’ll have to make a fresh start altogether, and that’s flat.’
Ferrard remained silent.
‘I’m pretty plain-spoken, and I tell you straight that I can’t bear an idle man, and won’t have anything to do with one, if I can help it. All the same, I want to be friends with you, and let bygones be bygones; and so this is what I offer. Cut the West End, and racing and billiards and gallivanting, and come into the City. I’ll employ you in the business. If you give your mind to it and work hard, you’ll soon find your feet; and then I’ll take you into partnership. When I go, you will have it all to yourself; and a very pretty penny it will be in your pocket. Your father will stop your allowance, of course; but you and Amy can live here with me, free; that’ll save you a good bit; and giving up your expensive habits will save you a lot more. Till you are in the business, I’ll allow you—ah, I’ll allow you three hundred a year; and altogether, you’ll be better off in this way than you’ve been for some time.—Don’t say anything now’ (not that the captain had any such intention, being stricken literally dumb); ‘think it over, and make up your mind by the time I come back.’
He gathered his keys together with a good deal of unnecessary clatter, and locked them into a leathern wallet, muttering something about leaving them at his bank. Then he looked at his watch. ‘Hillo! I have not got another minute. You must excuse me, captain—don’t hurry over your breakfast, but I must leave you at once—there’s a deal to be seen to before we start. Good-bye; don’t move; and think it over—think it over.’
He had shaken hands, talked himself into the hall, and slammed the front-door, before the captain had been able in the slightest degree to grasp the situation, so utterly confused and astounded was he at this sudden wreck of his hopes. Anger had no place whatever in his mind. At another time, he might have been both amused and indignant at the offer which had been made him and at the manner of its making. The picture of himself as an auctioneer’s clerk, with the prospect of becoming in time, if he were good, a real auctioneer, might have struck him as exquisitely ludicrous; yet, though a gambler, a spendthrift, a debauchee, he was no fool; and it was just possible that, considering the splendid reward in prospective, he might at anyrate have seemed to assent, in the hope of making better terms after a while. But now, there was no room for any such speculations, for absolute ruin stared him in the face. The auctioneer had supposed him to be hard pressed for money; but what was the real nature of the pressure, he was far from imagining. In a short while, a certain acceptance for a heavy amount would fall due, renewal of which had been definitely and decidedly refused on the very day of Amy’s visit to her father. Unless that acceptance were taken up on presentation, it would forthwith be known that the signature of one of the indorsers had never been written by that gentleman; and in that case, the career of the Honourable James Ferrard would be most unpleasantly terminated. This was more than suspected by the holders of the bill; it was their reason for refusing renewal; and it was their intention to use it as a lever for extorting from the captain or his family, not only payment of the debt, but a goodly sum, by way of hush-money, into the bargain. Money he must have somehow, and that immediately, even if he had to appeal to his father; a last resource which, though audacious enough in general, he could not contemplate without dismay. Besides, the earl’s affairs were themselves so desperate, and the amount was so large, that he had little expectation that assistance would be possible, even if the will to afford it were good. A faint hope of escape had been held out to him by the auctioneer’s visit; and last night, from the friendliness of his host’s manner and the extraordinary mark of his confidence, he had fully expected that, with a little management, the money would be forthcoming. But this chance was now utterly gone; and flight, suicide, or penal servitude seemed to be the only alternatives left to him.
At this stage of his meditations, he became aware of three keys in a ring which were lying under the edge of his host’s plate. He continued to gaze abstractedly at them for some moments, half-unconsciously noting certain peculiarities in the shape of the larger of them. All at once he came to himself with a start. They were the keys of the strong-room and the iron box; overlooked, of course, by the auctioneer when he put the others into the locked-up wallet. To do him justice, Ferrard’s first thought was to snatch them up, take a cab into the City, and restore them to their owner. Mechanically he stretched out his hand, then drew it quickly away, and fell back in his chair, horrified at the thought which had at that moment seized upon him. He had written the name of another man; it was done in a minute, and was comparatively easy. But it is not easy, for the first time at least, to take the goods of another man—to steal.
There they lay, close to his hand as it were, utterly in his power. All that sweet and desirable money, frozen into a few crystals, the property of this plebeian, who had so poor an idea of enjoying it, so hateful an objection to parting with it. He tingled with envious rage at the thought. Why, a poor dozen of them, like angels of light, would put to the rout his persecuting demons of difficulty and danger; yet to help himself to them would be—theft. He looked at his watch. Half-past ten. The train was to leave at ten minutes to eleven. No doubt Cross would discover his oversight, and return with all speed to remedy it. He sat on and on, and gazed at the fatal keys until they seemed to fill his eye and brain. Once a footstep approached the door of the room. Without knowing why, he hastily moved the plate so as completely to hide them. A servant looked in, and seeing him still there, begged pardon and withdrew, wondering when he would have finished breakfast. Then he softly moved the plate back, and again sat looking at the keys. One thought ebbed and flowed continually in his mind, flowing more and more fiercely, ebbing with surely decreasing force. To take the diamonds—theft. Not to take them—ruin.
Half-past eleven. No cab at the door, no hurried step in the hall. Cross must now be well on his way to Brighton, and under the idea that the keys were safe at his bank. At anyrate, the things must not be left lying there. Clearly, it was his duty to take charge of them until they could be restored to their owner.