He
had provided for its coming too; but a decline, greater than he had
reckoned on, in the value of his good securities, made that provision
inadequate. Then it was he committed a _faux-pas._ He was one of his own
children's trustees, and the other two signed after him like machines. He
said to himself: "My honour is my children's; my position is worth
thousands _to them._ I have sacrificed a fortune to preserve it; it would
be madness to recoil now." He borrowed three thousand pounds of the trust
money, and, soon after, two thousand more: it kept him above water; but
the peril, and the escape on such terms, left him gasping inwardly.
At last, when even his granite nature was almost worn down with labour,
anxiety, and struggling all alone without a word of comfort--for the
price of one grain of sympathy would have been "Destruction"--he shuffled
off his iron burden and breathed again.
One day he spent in a sort of pleasing lethargy, like a strong swimmer
who, long and sore buffeted by the waves, has reached the shore at last.
The next day his cashier, a sharp-visaged, bald-headed old man called
Young Skinner, invited his attention rather significantly to the high
amount of certain balances compared with the cash at his (Skinner's)
disposal.
Pages:
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290