'I am requested,' he wrote, 'by Miss Elsie Arundel, my Scholar, to state what I know of a certain transaction which took place in March 1882. The facts are as follows: I had need of a sum of seven hundred and twenty pounds. For certain purposes I wanted it in ten-pound notes. I asked my agent, Mr. Dering, to give me a cheque; and as I thought that I should want the money immediately, perhaps in an hour or so, I asked him to make it payable to my order, and not to cross the cheque. He drew the cheque and gave it to me in his office. I then went to the hotel where I was stopping—a place in Arundel Street, Strand, and sent a commissionaire to the Bank for the money. He brought it, as I had requested, in ten-pound notes. In a few days I discovered that my plan could not be even commenced without the greatest danger of defeating its own object. I therefore took the notes to Mr. Dering's office and placed them in his safe. I suppose that he has long since returned them to the Bank.'
'There, child,' he said, reading this statement aloud. 'That is what I recollect about this matter.'
'Sign it.' Elsie gave him the pen again. 'Sign it, dear Master.—Oh! thanks—thanks a thousand times! You don't know—oh! you will never know or understand—I hope—how precious this document will be for me'—she folded the paper in an envelope and placed it in her handbag—'and for my people—my brother and all. Oh! my dear Master.' She stooped and kissed his hand, to hide the tears in her eyes. Athelstan's name was safe now whatever happened. He would be completely cleared at last.
'Why, my dear Scholar—my dear daughter.' Mr. Edmund Gray was moved himself almost to tears at this unexpected burst of feeling. 'As if there was anything I would not do for you if I could. I, who have never loved any woman before, love one now. She is my daughter—my grandchild.—So your brother will be helped by this little reminiscence—will he? Actually, your brother! I wonder if there is anything more that I could remember for you in this uneventful life of mine.'
'Oh no!—that would be too much to hope. Yet there is a chance—just a chance. I wonder if I may tell you. There is still time before us. If we are at the Hall by six we shall do very well. It is no more than half-past four. Shall I tell you the trouble? Oh! But it is a shame. And you with this great work laid upon you! No—no—I must not.' Oh! Delilah! oh! Circe! for she looked as if, in spite of her unwilling words, she wanted to tell it very badly indeed.
'Nay, my dear. You must, and you shall.—What? You are in trouble, and you will not tell me what it is. You—my Scholar—my clear-eyed disciple, who can see what these dull creatures of clay around us can never understand—you are in trouble, and you hesitate to tell me?—Fie! fie! Speak now. Tell me all.'
'I have told you that I have a lover, and that I am engaged to be married.'
'Yes—yes. His name, too, you have told me. It is George—George Austin. There were Austins once—I seem to remember—but that does not matter.'
'We are to be married on Wednesday.'
'So soon? But you have promised that I shall not lose my pupil.'