A MILLIONAIRE IN THE MAKING.
There was a bright light in the little drawing-room, and Harry made
sure that the master of the house had returned from town. Miss Lowndes
put the question as soon as the door was opened, however, and he heard
the reply as he followed her within.
"No, miss, not yet."
"Then who is here?"
"Mr. Huxtable."
"Mr. Huxtable--in the drawing-room?"
"He insisted on waiting, and I thought he might as well wait there as
anywhere."
Harry thought the man's manner presumptuous, and, looking at him
severely, was actually answered with a wink. Before he had time to
think twice about that, however, Miss Lowndes marched erect into the
drawing-room, and the visitor at her heels became the unwilling witness
of a scene which he never forgot.
A little bald man had planted himself on the hearthrug, where he stood
trembling like a terrier on the leash, in an attitude of indescribable
truculence and determination.
"Good evening, young lady!" cried he, in a tone so insolent that Harry
longed to assault him on the spot.
"Good evening, Mr. Huxtable. Do you wish to speak to me?"
"No, thank you, miss. Not this time. I've spoken to you often enough
and nothing's come of it. To-night I mean to see your pa. 'E's not come
'ome yet, 'asn't 'e? Then 'ere I stick till 'e does."
"May I ask what you want with him?"
"May you arst?" roared Mr. Huxtable. "I like that, I'm blessed if I
don't! Oh, yes, you may arst, young lady, and you may pretend you don't
know; and much good it'll do you! I want my money; that's what _I_
want. Thirty-eight pound seventeen shillings and fourpence for
butcher-meat delivered at this 'ere 'ouse--that's all _I_ want! If
you've got it 'andy, well and good; and if 'e's got it 'andy when 'e
comes in, well and good again, for 'ere I wait; but if not, I'll
county-court 'im to-morrow, and there's plenty more'll follow my
example. It's a perfect scandal the way this 'ouse is conducted. Not a
coal or a spud, let alone a bit o' meat, are you known to 'ave paid for
this blessed year. It's all over Richmond, and for my part I'm sick of
it. I've been put off and put off but I won't be put off no more. 'Ere
I stick till 'is nibs comes in."
During the first half of this harangue--considerably lengthened by
pauses during which the tradesman gasped for breath and seemed once or
twice on the verge of apoplexy--Harry Ringrose was on the horns of a
dilemma in the hall. One moment he was within an ace of rushing in and
ejecting the fellow on his own responsibility, and the next he felt it
better to spare his new friend's feelings by making his own escape. But
the butcher had only partly said his say when a latch-key grated in the
door, and Gordon Lowndes entered in time to overhear the most
impertinent part. Shutting the door softly behind him, he stood
listening on the mat, with his head on one side and a very comical
expression on his face. Harry had been tremulous with indignation.
Lowndes merely shook with suppressed amusement; and, handing a heavy
parcel to Harry, entered the room, as the tradesman ceased, in a
perfect glow of good-humour and geniality.
"Ah! my dear Huxtable, how are you?" cried he. "Delighted to see you;
only hope I haven't kept you very long. You must blame the Earl of
Banff, not me; he kept me with him until after eight o'clock. Not a
word, my dear sir--not one syllable! I know exactly what you are going
to say, and don't wonder at your wishing to see me personally. My dear
Huxtable, I sympathise with you from my soul! How much is it? Thirty or
forty pounds, eh? Upon my word it's too bad! But there again the Earl
of Banff's to blame, and I've a very good mind to let you send in your
account to him. His Lordship has been standing between me and a million
of money all this year, but he won't do so much longer. I think I've
brought him to reason at last. My good Mr. Huxtable, we're on the eve
of the greatest success in modern finance. The papers will be full of
it in about a week's time, and I shall be a rich man. But meanwhile I'm
a poor one--I've put my all on it--I've put my shirt on it--and I'm a
much poorer man than ever you were, Huxtable. Poor men should hang
together, shouldn't they? Then stand by me another week, and I give you
my word I'll stand by you. I'll pay you thirty shillings in the pound!
Fanny, my dear, write Mr. Huxtable an IOU for half as much again as we
owe him; and let him county-court me for _that_ if he doesn't get it
before he's many days older!"
Mr. Huxtable had made several ineffectual attempts to speak; now he was
left without a word. Less satisfied than bewildered, he put the IOU in
his pocket and was easily induced to accept a couple of the Earl of
Banff's cigars before he went. Lowndes shook hands with him on the
steps, and returned rubbing his own.
"My dear Ringrose," said he, "I'm truly sorry you should have come in
for this little revelation of our _res angusta_, but I hope you will
lay to heart the object-lesson I have given you in the treatment of
that harmful and unnecessary class known as creditors. There are but
two ways of treating them. One is to kick them out neck-and-crop, and
the other you have just seen for yourself. But don't misunderstand me,
Ringrose! I meant every word I said, and he shall have his thirty
shillings in the pound. The noble Earl has been a difficult fish to
play, but I think I've landed him this time. Yes, my boy, you'll be
drawing your three hundred a year, and I my thirty thousand, before
midsummer; but I'll tell you all about it after supper. Why, bless my
soul, that's the supper you've got in your hands, Ringrose! Take it
from him, Fanny, and dish it up, for I'm as hungry as a coach-load of
hunters, and I've no doubt Ringrose is the same."
And now Harry understood the trepidation with which Miss Lowndes had
consulted him as to whether they should wait supper for her father, and
her relief on hearing his opinion on the point: there had been no
supper in the house. Lowndes, however, had brought home material for an
excellent meal, of which caviare, a raised pie, French rolls,
camembert, peaches and a pine-apple, and a bottle of Heidsieck, were
conspicuous elements. Black coffee followed, rather clumsily served by
the man-servant, who waited in a dress suit some sizes too small for
him. And after supper Harry Ringrose at last heard something definite
concerning the Company from which he was still assured that he might
count on a certain income of three hundred pounds a year.
"Last night my tongue was tied," said Lowndes; "but to-night the matter
is as good as settled; and I may now speak without indiscretion. I must
tell you first of all that the Company is entirely my own idea--and a
better one I never had in my life. It is founded on the elementary
principle that the average man gives more freely to a good cause than
to a bad one, but most freely to the good cause out of which he's
likely to get some change. He enjoys doing good, but he enjoys it most
when it pays him best, and there you have the root of the whole matter.
Only hit upon the scheme which is both lucrative and meritorious, which
gives the philanthropist the consolation of reward, and the
money-grubber the kudos of philanthropy, and your fortune's made. You
may spread the Gospel or the Empire, and do yourself well out of
either; but, for my part, I wanted something nearer home--where charity
begins, Ringrose--and it took me years to hit upon the right thing.
Ireland has been my snare: to ameliorate the Irish peasant and the
English shareholder at the same swoop: it can't be done. I wasted whole
months over the Irish Peasants' Potato Produce Company, but it wouldn't
pan out. Nobody will put money into Ireland, and potatoes are cheap
already as the dirt they grow in. But I was working in the right
direction, and the crofter grievances came as a godsend to me about a
year ago. The very thing! I won't trouble you with the intermediate
stages; the Highland Crofters' Salmon and Trout Supply Association,
Limited, will be registered this week; and the greatest of Scottish
landlords, my good old Earl of Banff, is to be Chairman of Directors
and rope in all the rest."
Harry asked how it was to be made to pay. Lowndes had every detail at
his finger-ends, and sketched out an amazing programme with bewildering
volubility. The price of salmon would be reduced a hundred per cent.
The London shops would take none but the Company's fish. Fresh trout
would sell like herrings in the street, and the Company would buy up
the fishmongers' shops all over the country, just as brewers bought up
public-houses. As soon as possible they would have their own line to
the North, and expresses full of nothing but fish would do the distance
without stopping in time hitherto unprecedented in railway annals.
"But," said Harry, "there are plenty of fish in the sea, and in other
places besides the Highlands."
"So there are, but in ten years' time we shall own every river in the
kingdom, and every cod-bank round the coast."
"And where will the crofters come in then?"
Lowndes roared with laughter.
"They won't come in at all. It will be forgotten that they ever were
in: the original Company will probably be incorporated with the British
Fresh Water and Deep Sea Fishing Company, Limited. Capital ten
millions. General Manager, Sir Gordon Lowndes, Bart., Park Lane, W.
Secretary, H. Ringrose, Esq., at the Company's Offices, Trafalgar
Square. We shall buy up the Grand Hotel and have them there. As for the
crofters, they'll be our Empire and our Gospel; we'll play them for all
they're worth in the first year or two, and then we'll let them slide."
Miss Lowndes had been present all this time, and Harry had stolen more
than one anxious glance in her direction. She never put in a word, nor
could she be said to wear her thoughts upon her face, as she bent it
over some needlework in the corner where she sat. Yet it was the
daughter's silent presence which kept Harry himself proof for once
against the always contagious enthusiasm of the father. He could not
help coupling it with other silences of the early evening, and the
Highland Crofters' Salmon and Trout Supply Association, Limited, left
him as cold as he felt certain it left Miss Lowndes. It was now after
eleven, however, and he rose to bid her good-night, while Lowndes went
to get his hat in order to escort him to the station.
"And I shall never forget our walk," added Harry, and unconsciously
wrung her hand as though it were that of some new-found friend of his
own sex.
"Then don't forget my advice," said Miss Lowndes, "but
write--write--write--and come and tell me how you get on!"
It was her last word to him, and for days to come it stimulated Harry
Ringrose, like many another remembered saying of this new friend,
whenever he thought of it. But at the time he was most struck by her
tacit dismissal of the more brilliant prospects which had been
discussed in her hearing.
"A fine creature, my daughter," said Lowndes, on the way to the
station. "She's one to stand by a fellow in the day of battle--she's as
staunch as steel."
"I can see it," Harry answered, with enthusiasm.
"Yes, yes; you have seen how it is with us, Ringrose. There's no use
making a secret of it with you, but I should be sorry for your mother
to know the hole we've been in, especially as we're practically out of
it. Yet you may tell her what you like; she may wonder Fanny has never
been to see her, but she wouldn't if she knew what a time the poor girl
has had of it! You've no conception what it has been, Ringrose. I
couldn't bear to speak of it if it wasn't all over but the shouting.
To-night there was oil in the lamps, but I shouldn't like to tell you
how many times we've gone to bed in the dark since they stopped our
gas. You may keep your end up in the City, because if you don't you're
done for, but it's the very devil at home. We drank cold water with our
breakfast this morning, and I can't conceive how Fanny got in coals to
make the coffee to-night."
Harry could have told him, but he held his tongue. He was trying to
reconcile the present tone of Lowndes, which had in it a strong dash of
remorse, with the countless extravagances he had already seen him
commit. Lowndes seemed to divine his thoughts.
"You may wonder," said he, "how I managed to raise wind enough for the
provender I had undertaken to bring home. I wonder if I dare tell you?
I called at your tailors' on my way to the noble Earl's, and--and I
struck them for a fiver! There, there, Ringrose, they'll get it back
next week. I've lived on odd fivers all this year, and I simply didn't
know where else to turn for one to-day. Yet they want me to pay an
income tax! I sent in my return the other day, and they sent it back
with 'unsatisfactory' written across my writing. So _I_ sent it back
with 'I entirely agree with you' written across theirs, and that seems
to have shut them up. One of the most pestilent forms of creditor is
the tax gatherer, and the income tax is the most iniquitous of all.
Never you fill one in correctly, Ringrose, if you wish me to remain
your friend."
"But," said Harry, as they reached the station and were waiting for the
train, "you not only keep servants----"
"Servants?" cried Lowndes. "We have only one, and she's away at the
seaside. I send her there for a change whenever she gets grumpy for
want of wages. I tell her she looks seedy, and I give her a sovereign
to go. It has the air of something thrown in, and it comes a good deal
cheaper than paying them their wages, Ringrose. I make you a present of
the tip for what it's worth."
"But you have a man-servant, too?"
"A man-servant! My good fellow, that's no servant of mine. I only make
it worth his while to lend a hand."
"Who is he, then?"
"This is your train; jump in and I'll tell you."
The spectacled eyes were twinkling, and the sharp nose twitching, when
Harry leant out of the third-class carriage window.
"Well, who is it?"
"The old dodge, Ringrose, the old dodge."
"What's that?"
"The Man in Possession!"
And Gordon Lowndes was left roaring with laughter on the platform.