“Unfortunately, it is no mistake, my poor child. These gentlemen you mention, I may admit to you in confidence, were my informants.”
“You say they gave you no details beyond the paramount fact of my father’s ruin? But surely they must have told you something more. I have a right to know, Dr. Franklin, and I shall not rest until I do. How did such a catastrophe come to him? There have been no gigantic failures lately, no panics which could have swept him down. What terrible mistake could he have made, he whose judgment was almost infallible?”
The minister hesitated visibly, and when he spoke at last, it was as if with a conscious effort he chose his words.
“I do not think it was any sudden collapse of some project in which he was engaged, Anita, but a––a general series of misfortunes which culminated by forcing him, just before his death, to the brink of bankruptcy. You are a mere child, my dear, and could not be supposed to understand matters of finance. If you will be guided by me you will accept the assurance of your friends who truly have your best interests at heart. Their statements will be confirmed, I know, by the lawyers who are engaged in settling up the estate of your father. Do not, I beg of you, inquire too closely into the details of your father’s insolvency.”
Anita rose slowly, her eyes fixed upon the face of the 21 minister, and with her hands resting upon the chair-back, as if to steady herself, she asked quietly:
“Why should I not? What is there which I, his daughter, should not know? Dr. Franklin, there is something behind all this which you are trying to conceal from me. I knew my father to be a multi-millionaire. You come and tell me he was a pauper instead, a bankrupt; and I am not to ask how this state of affairs came about? You have known me since I was a little girl––surely you understand me well enough to realize that I shall not rest under such a condition until the whole truth is revealed to me!”
“I am your friend.” The resonance in the minister’s voice deepened. “You will believe me when I tell you that it would be best for your future, for the honor of your father’s memory, to place yourself without question in the hands of your true friends, and to ask no details which are not voluntarily given you.”
“‘Best for my future!’” she repeated, aghast. “‘For the honor of my father’s memory.’ What do you mean, Dr. Franklin? You have gone too far not to speak plainly. Do you dare––are you insinuating, that there was something disgraceful, dishonorable about my father’s insolvency? You have been my spiritual adviser nearly all my life, and when you tell me that my father was a bankrupt, that the knowledge comes to you from his best friends and will be corroborated by his attorneys, I am forced to believe you. But if you attempt to convince me that my father’s honor––his good name––is involved, then I tell you that it is not true! Either a terrible mistake has been made or a deliberate conspiracy is on foot––the blackest sort of conspiracy, to defame the dead!”
“My dear!” The minister raised his hands in 22 shocked amazement. “You are beside yourself, you don’t know what you are saying! I have repeated to you only that which was told to me, and in practically the same words. As to the possibility of a conspiracy, you will realize the absurdity of such an idea when I deliver to you the message with which I was charged. Your father’s partner in many enterprises, the Honorable Bertie Rockamore, together with President Mallowe, of the Street Railways, and Mr. Carlis, the great politician, promised some little time ago that they would stand in loco parentis toward you should your natural protector be removed. They desire me to tell you that you need have no anxiety for the immediate future. You will be cared for and provided with all that you have been accustomed to, just as if your father were alive.”
“Indeed? They are most kind––” Anita spoke quietly enough, but with a curiously dry, controlled note in her voice which reminded the minister of her father’s tones, and for some inexplicable reason he felt vaguely uncomfortable. “Please say to them that I do sincerely appreciate their magnanimity, their charity, toward one who has no right, legal or moral, to claim protection or care from them. But now, Dr. Franklin, may I beg that you will forgive me if I retire? The news you have brought me of course has been a terrible shock. I must have time to collect my thoughts, to realize the sudden, terrible change this revelation has made in my whole life. I am deeply grateful to you, to my father’s three associates, but I can say no more now.”