The merchant made no answer. His heavy eyebrows were drawn down, and his forehead all puckered with thought.
"You are the one man," continued the sufferer, "whom I know to be just and upright. Give me the water, for my mouth is dry. Should, which God forbid, my dear girl perish before she marries, then " His breath failed him for a moment, and he paused to recover it.
"Well, what then?"
"Then, old friend, her fortune reverts to you, for there is none who will use it so well. Those are the terms of the will. But you will guard her and care for her, as I would myself. She is a tender plant, John, too weak to grow alone. Promise me that you will do right by her promise it?"
"I do promise it," John Girdlestone answered in a deep voice. He was standing up now, and leaning over to catch the words of the dying man.
Harston was sinking rapidly. With a feeble motion he pointed to a brown-backed volume upon the table.
"Take up the book," he said.
The merchant picked it up.
"Now, repeat after me, I swear and solemnly pledge myself "
"I swear and solemnly pledge myself
"To treasure and guard as if she were my own " came the tremulous voice from the bed.
"To treasure and guard as if she were my own " in the deep bass of the merchant.
"Kate Harston, the daughter of my deceased friend "
"Kate Harston, the daughter of my deceased friend "
"And as I treat her, so may my own flesh and blood treat me!"
"And as I treat her, so may my own flesh and blood treat me!"
The sick man's head fell back exhausted upon his pillow. "Thank God!" he muttered, "now I can die in peace."
"Turn your mind away from the vanities and dross of this world," John Girdlestone said sternly, "and fix it upon that which is eternal, and can never die."
"Are you going?" the invalid asked sadly, for he had taken up his hat and stick.
"Yes, I must go; I have an appointment in the City at six, which I must not miss."
"And I have an appointment which I must not miss," the dying man said with a feeble smile.
"I shall send up the nurse as I go down," Girdlestone said.
"Good-bye!"
"Good-bye! God bless you, John!"
The firm, strong hand of the hale man enclosed for a moment the feeble, burning one of the sufferer. Then John Girdlestone plodded heavily down the stair, and these friends of forty years' standing had said their last adieu.
"Are you going?" the invalid asked sadly, for he had taken up his hat and stick.
"Yes, I must go; I have an appointment in the City at six, which I must not miss."
"And I have an appointment which I must not miss," the dying man said with a feeble smile.
"I shall send up the nurse as I go down," Girdlestone said.
"Good-bye!"
"Good-bye! God bless you, John!"
The firm, strong hand of the hale man enclosed for a moment the feeble, burning one of the sufferer. Then John Girdlestone plodded heavily down the stair, and these friends of forty years' standing had said their last adieu.
The African merchant kept his appointment in the City, but long before he reached it John Harston had gone also to keep that last terrible appointment of which the messenger is death.
CHAPTER II.
CHARITY A LA MODE
It was a dull October morning in Fenchurch Street, some weeks after the events with which our story opened. The murky City air looked murkier still through the glazed office windows. Girdlestone, grim and grey, as though he were the very embodiment of the weather, stooped over his mahogany table. He had a long list in front of him, on which he was checking off, as a prelude to the day's work, the position in the market of the various speculations in which the capital of the firm was embarked. His son Ezra lounged in an easy chair opposite him, looking dishevelled and dark under the eyes, for he had been up half the night, and the Nemesis of reaction was upon him.
"Faugh!" his father ejaculated, glancing round at him with disgust.
"You have been drinking already this morning."
"I took a brandy and seltzer on the way to the office," he answered carelessly. "I needed one to steady me."
"A young fellow of your age should not want steadying. You have a strong constitution, but you must not play tricks with it. You must have been very late last night. It was nearly one before I went to bed."
"I was playing cards with Major Clutterbuck and one or two others.
We kept it up rather late."
"With Major Clutterbuck?"
"Yes."
"I don't care about your consorting so much with that man. He drinks and gambles, and does you no good. What good has he ever done himself? Take care that he does not fleece you." The merchant felt instinctively, as he glanced at the shrewd, dark face of his son, that the warning was a superfluous one.
"No fear, father," Ezra answered sulkily; "I am old enough to choose my own friends."
"Why such a friend as that?"
"I like to know men of that class. You are a successful man, father, but you well, you can't be much help to me socially. You need some one to show you the ropes, and the major is my man. When I can stand alone, I'll soon let him know it."
"Well, go your own way," said Girdlestone shortly. Hard to all the world, he was soft only in this one direction. From childhood every discussion between father and son had ended with the same words.
"It is business time," he resumed. "Let us confine ourselves to business. I see that Illinois were at 112 yesterday."
"They are at 113 this morning."
"What! have you been on 'Change already?"
"Yes, I dropped in there on my way to the office. I would hold on to those. They will go up for some days yet."
The senior partner made a pencil note on the margin of the list.
"We'll hold on to the cotton we have," he said.
"No, sell out at once," Ezra answered with decision, "I saw young Featherstone, of Liverpool, last night, or rather this morning. It was hard to make head or tail of what the fool said, but he let fall enough to show that there was likely to be a drop."
Girdlestone made another mark upon the paper. He never questioned his son's decisions now, for long experience had shown him that they were never formed without solid grounds. "Take this list, Ezra," he said, handing him the paper, "and run your eye over it. If you see anything that wants changing, mark it."
"I'll do it in the counting-house," his son answered. "I can keep my eye on those lazy scamps of clerks. Gilray has no idea of keeping them in order."
As he went out he cannoned against an elderly gentleman in a white waistcoat, who was being shown in, and who ricochetted off him into the office, where he shook hands heartily with the elder Girdlestone. It was evident from the laboured cordiality of the latter's greeting that the new-comer was a man of some importance. He was, indeed, none other than the well-known philanthropist, Mr. Jefferson Edwards, M.P. for Middlehurst, whose name upon a bill was hardly second to that of Rothschild.
"How do, Girdlestone, how do?" he exclaimed, mopping his face with his handkerchief. He was a fussy little man, with a brusque, nervous manner. "Hard at it as usual, eh? Always pegging away. Wonderful man. Ha, ha! Wonderful!"
"You look warm," the merchant answered, rubbing his hands. "Let me offer you some claret. I have some in the cupboard."
"No, thank you," the visitor answered, staring across at the head of the firm as though he were some botanical curiosity. "Extraordinary fellow. 'Iron' Girdlestone, they call you in the City. A good name, too ha! ha! an excellent name. Iron-grey, you know, and hard to look at, but soft here, my dear sir, soft here." The little man tapped him with his walking-stick over the cardiac region and laughed boisterously, while his grim companion smiled slightly and bowed to the compliment.
"I've come here begging," said Mr. Jefferson Edwards, producing a portentous-looking roll of paper from an inner pocket. "Know I've come to the right place for charity. The Aboriginal Evolution Society, my dear boy. All it wants are a few hundreds to float it off. Noble aim, Girdlestone glorious object."
"What is the object?" the merchant asked.
"Well, the evolution of the aborigines," Edwards answered in some confusion. "Sort of practical Darwinism. Evolve 'em into higher types, and turn 'em all white in time. Professor Wilder gave us a lecture about it. I'll send you round a Times with the account. Spoke about their thumbs. They can't cross them over their palms, and they have rudimentary tails, or had until they were educated off them. They wore all the hair off their backs by leaning against trees. Marvellous things! All they want is a little money."
"It seems to be a praiseworthy object," the merchant said gravely.
"I knew that you would think so!" cried the little philanthropist enthusiastically. "Of course, bartering as you do with aboriginal races, their development and evolution is a matter of the deepest importance to you. If a man came down to barter with you who had a rudimentary tail and couldn't bend his thumb well, it wouldn't be pleasant, you know. Our idea is to elevate them in the scale of humanity and to refine their tastes. Hewett, of the Royal Society, went to report on the matter a year or so back, and some rather painful incident occurred. I believe Hewett met with some mishap in fact, they go the length of saying that he was eaten. So you see we've had our martyrs, my dear friend, and the least that we can do who stay at home at ease is to support a good cause to the best of our ability."
"Whose names have you got?" asked the merchant.
"Let's see," Jefferson Edwards said, unfolding his list. "Spriggs, ten;
Morton, ten; Wigglesworth, five; Hawkins, ten; Indermann, fifteen;
Jones, five; and a good many smaller amounts."
"What is the highest as yet?"
"Indermann, the tobacco importer, has given fifteen."
"It is a good cause," Mr. Girdlestone said, dipping his pen into the ink-bottle. "'He that giveth' you know what the good old Book says. Of course a list of the donations will be printed and circulated?"
"Most certainly."
"Here is my cheque for twenty-five pounds. I am proud to have had this opportunity of contributing towards the regeneration of those poor souls whom Providence has placed in a lower sphere than myself."
"Girdlestone," said the member of Parliament with emotion, as he pocketed the cheque, "you are a good man. I shall not forget this, my friend; I shall never forget it."