'Well, I will send for him, and tell him to come as soon as possible, and to bring along with him all the letters and papers he has.'
'Good, good,' said Mr. Dering, more cheerfully. 'That is practical. I ought to have thought of that at the very outset. Now we shall get along. The first thing is to arrive at the facts—then we can act. If it was another man's case, I should have known what to do. But when it is your own—and to lose the certificates, and when a sum of nearly forty thousand pounds is at stake—it looks like losing the money itself—and the feeling of uncertainty——'
'All taken together, becomes rather overwhelming. Of course I should like to see the letter-book, and we must run through the letters to see if they throw any light upon the business. Perhaps the papers themselves may be found among them.'
The presence of this young man, cheerful, decided, taking practical measures at once, cheered up the lawyer, and steadied his shattered nerves. But Checkley the clerk looked on gloomily. He replaced the papers in the safe, and stood beside it, as if to guard it; he followed the movements of the new partner with watchful, suspicious eyes; and he muttered sullenly between his teeth.
First George sent a telegram to the City for the broker. Then, while the old clerk still stood beside the safe, and Mr. Dering continued to show signs of agitation uncontrollable, sometimes walking about the room and sometimes sitting at his table, sometimes looking into the empty shelves of the safe, he began to look through the copied letters, those, that is, which had gone out of Mr. Dering's office. He searched for six months, working backwards.
'Nothing for six months,' he said.—'Checkley, give me the letters.' He went through these. They were the letters received at the office, all filed, endorsed, and dated. There was not one during the letters of six months which he examined which had anything to do with the sales of stocks and shares.
'If,' he said, 'you had written to Ellis & Northcote, a copy of your letter would be here in this book. If they had written to you, these letters would be among these bundles. Very well. Since no such letters are here, it is clear that no such letters were written. Therefore, no sales.'
'Then,' said Mr. Dering, 'where are my certificates? Where are my dividends?'
'That we shall see. At present, we are only getting at the facts.'
Then Mr. Ellis, senior partner of Ellis & Northcote, arrived, bearing a small packet of papers. Everybody knew Mr. Ellis, of Ellis & Northcote, one of the most respectable stockbrokers in London—citizen and Lorimer. He belonged eminently to the class called worthy: an old gentleman, carefully dressed, of smooth and polished appearance, pleasing manners, and great integrity. Nobody could look more truly integer vitæ than Mr. Ellis. Nor did his private practice belie his reputation and his appearance. His chin and lips looked as if they could not possibly endure the burden of beard or moustache; his sentiments, one observed at a glance, would certainly be such as one expects from a citizen of his respectability.