THE DEBT
Violet's engagement was an accepted fact. Mr. Frazer came to see the
Captain, who received him in the dining-room--the combined ingenuity
of the family could not make the down-stairs room presentable. The
interview was short, but satisfactory; so also was the one with Mrs.
Polkington which followed; with Violet it was longer, but, no doubt,
equally satisfactory. Lunch, too, was all that could be desired. Mrs.
Polkington's manners were always gracious, and to-day she had a
charming air of taking Richard into the family--after having shut all
the doors, actual and metaphorical, which led to anything real and
personal. The Captain was rather twittery at lunch, at times inclined
to talk too much, at times heavily silent and always obviously
submissive to his wife. Yesterday's excitement was not enough to
account for this in Julia's opinion. "He has been doing something,"
she decided, and wondered what.
Mrs. Polkington and her daughters all went out that afternoon; Julia,
however, returned at about dusk. As the others had no intention of
coming back so soon, there was no drawing-room tea; a much simpler
meal was spread in the dining-room. Julia and her father had only just
sat down to it when they heard Johnny Gillat's knock at the front
door, followed a minute afterwards by Mr. Gillat himself; but when he
saw that the Captain was not alone, he stopped on the threshold;
Julia's presence, contrary to custom, seemed to discompose him. He,
then, was in her father's secret, whatever it might be; she guessed as
much when she saw his perturbed pink face. However, she did not say
anything, only invited Mr. Gillat to have some tea.
Johnny sat down, and put a small and rather badly tied parcel beside
him; next minute he picked it up again, and began surreptitiously to
put it into first one pocket and then another. It was rather a tight
fit, and in his efforts to do it unobtrusively, he made some
disturbance, but no one remarked on it; Captain Polkington because he
was too despondent, Julia because it did not seem worth while.
Conversation languished; Julia did what she could, but her father
answered in monosyllables, and Mr. Gillat said, "Very true," or "Ah,
yes, yes," eating slice after slice of thick bread and butter, and
filling his mouth very full as if to cork it up and so prevent his
having to answer awkward questions.
At last Captain Polkington rose; "Gillat," he said, "if you have
finished, we may as well go down-stairs."
Johnny set down his half-finished cup of tea with alacrity, and with
alacrity followed the Captain. But Julia followed too; Johnny turned
uneasily as he heard her step behind him on the dark stairs;
doubtless, so he told himself, she was going to the kitchen. She was
not, however; on the contrary, she showed every sign of accompanying
them to the little room behind.
"Do you want anything, Julia?" her father asked, turning about in the
doorway; "I'm busy to-night--I wish you would go away."
The sentence began with dignity, but ended with querulousness. But
Julia was not affected; she came into the room. "I want to talk to
you," she said, closing the door. "You had much better tell me about
it, you will be found out, you know; mother would have guessed there
was something wrong to-day if she had not been so busy with Mr.
Frazer."
"Found out in what?" the Captain demanded; "I should like to know of
what you accuse me--you, my own daughter--this is much, indeed."
He paced the hearthrug with outraged dignity, but Julia only drew one
of the horse-hair chairs to the table. "You would do better to tell
me," she said; "I might be able to help you--Johnny, won't you sit
down?"
Johnny took the cane deck-chair, sitting down nervously and so near
the edge that the old chair creaked ominously. Captain Polkington
paced the rug once or twice more, then he sat down opposite, giving up
all pretence of dignity.
"It is money, of course," Julia went on; "I suppose you lost at the
races yesterday--how much?"
The Captain did not answer, he seemed overwhelmed by his troubles.
"How much?" Julia repeated, turning to Mr. Gillat.
"It was rather much," that gentleman answered apologetically.
Julia looked puzzled. "How could he have much to lose?" she asked.
"You couldn't, you know," bending her brows as she looked at her
father--"unless you borrowed--did you borrow?"
"Yes, yes," he said, rather eagerly; "I borrowed--that was it; of
course I was going to pay back--I am going to pay back."
"From whom did you borrow?" Another pause, and the question again,
then the Captain explained confusedly: "The cheque--it came a day
early--I merely meant to make use of it for the day--"
"The cheque!" Julia repeated, with dawning comprehension. "The cheque
from Slade & Slade that mother was speaking of this morning. Our
cheque, the money we have to live on for the next three months?"
"My cheque," her father said, with one last effort at dignity; "made
out to me--my income that I have a perfect right to spend as I like; I
used my own money for my own purposes."
He forgot that a moment back he had excused the act as a borrowing;
Julia did not remind him, she was too much concerned with the facts to
trouble about mere turns of speech. They, like words and motives, had
not heretofore entered much into her considerations; consequences were
what was really important to her--how the bad might be averted, how
the good drawn that way, and all used to the best advantage. This
point of view, though it leaves a great deal to be desired, has one
advantage--those who take it waste no time in lamentation or reproof.
For that reason they are perhaps some of the least unpleasant people
to confess to.
Julia wasted no words now; she sat for a brief minute, stunned by the
magnitude of the calamity which had deprived them of the largest part
of their income for the next three months; then she began to look
round in her mind to see what might be done. Captain Polkington
offered a few not very coherent explanations and excuses, to which she
did not listen, and then relapsed into silence. Johnny sat opposite,
rubbing his hands in nervous sympathy, and looking from father to
daughter; he took the silence of the one to be as hopeless as that of
the other.
"We thought," he ventured at last, tugging at the parcel now firmly
wedged in his pocket. "We hoped, that is, we thought perhaps we might
raise a trifle, it wouldn't be much help--"
But neither of the others were listening to him, and Captain
Polkington interrupted with his own remedy, "We shall have to manage
on credit," he said; "we can get credit for this three months."
"We can't," Julia assured him; "the greater part of that money was to
have paid outstanding bills; we can't live on credit, because we
haven't got any to live on."
"That's nonsense," her father said; "it can be done with care and
economy, and retrenchments."
Julia did not answer, so Johnny took up the words. "Yes, yes," he
said, "one can always retrench; it is really marvellous how little one
can do with, in fact one is better for it; I feel a different man for
having to retrench. Your mother's a wonderful woman"--he stopped, then
added doubtfully as he thought of the lost apple tart--"I suppose,
though, she would want to make a good appearance just now, with the
engagement, Mr. Frazer in and out. It is very unfortunate, very."
By this time he had untied his parcel, and flattening the paper on his
knees began to put the contents on the table. There were some
field-glasses, a breast pin, and a few other such things; when he had
put them all out he felt in his waistcoat-pocket for his watch.
"They would fetch a trifle," he said, regarding the row a little
proudly.
"Those?" Julia asked, puzzled.
"Yes," Mr. Gillat said; "not a great deal, of course, but it would be
a help--it might pay the butcher's bill. It's a great thing to have
the butcher's bill paid; I've heard my landlady say so; it gives a
standing with the other tradespeople, and that's what you want--she
often says so."
"You mean you think of selling them for us?" Julia asked, fixing her
keen eyes on Johnny, so that he felt very guilty, and as if he ought
to excuse himself. But before he could do it she had swept his
belongings together. "You won't do anything of the kind," she said.
"Why not?"
"Because we won't have it. Pack them up."
"Oh, but," Johnny protested, "it would be a little help, it would
indeed; they would fetch something, the glasses are good ones, though
a bit old-fashioned, and the watch--"
"I don't care, I won't have it," and Julia took the matter into her
own hands, and began with a flushed face to re-pack the things
herself.
"Is it that you think I can't spare them?" Gillat asked, still
bewildered. "I can--what an idea," he laughed. "What do I want with
field-glasses, now? And as to a watch, my time's nothing to me!"
"No, I dare say not," Julia said, but she tied the parcel firmly, then
she gave it to him. "Take it away," she said, "and don't try to sell a
thing."
She opened the door as she spoke, and he, accepting it as a hint of
dismissal, meekly followed her from the room. When they had reached
the hall above he ventured on a last protest. "Why may I not sell
anything?" he asked.
"Because we have not quite come to that," she said, with a ring of
bitterness in her voice: "We have come pretty low, I know, with our
dodges and our shifts, but we haven't quite come to depriving you.
Johnny"--and she stretched out a hand to him, a thing which was rare,
for no one thought it necessary to shake hands with Mr. Gillat--"it's
very good of you to offer; I'm grateful to you; I'm awfully glad you
did it; you made me ashamed."
Johnny looked at her perplexed; the note of bitterness in her voice
had deepened to something more he was altogether at a loss to
understand. But she gave him no opportunity for inquiry, for she
opened the street door.
"Good-bye," she said, her usual self again, "and don't you let me
catch you selling those things."
"Oh, I say! But how will you manage?" he protested.
"Somehow; I have got several ideas already; I'm better at this sort of
game than you are, you know."
And she shut the door upon him; then she went back to Captain
Polkington.
"Father," he said, "would you mind telling me if you have borrowed any
other money? It would be much simpler if we knew just how we stood."
The Captain seemed to have a painfully clear idea of how he stood.
"Your mother," he remarked, with apparent irrelevance, "is such an
unreasonable woman; if she were like you--if she saw things sensibly.
But she won't, she'll make a fuss; she will entirely overlook the fact
that it is my own money that I have lost."
"I am afraid she will," Julia agreed. "Will you tell me if you lost
any one else's money as well?"
"Oh, a trifle," the Captain said; "nothing to speak of yesterday; I
have borrowed a little now and again, at cards and so on; a trifling
accommodation."
"From whom?"
"Rawson-Clew."
Julia nodded; this was bad, but it might have been worse. Mr.
Rawson-Clew was not a personal friend of the Polkingtons, and he was
not a man in an inferior position who might presume upon his loan to
the Captain to establish a friendly footing. On the contrary, he was
in a superior position, so much so that for a moment Julia was at a
loss to understand how he came to accommodate her father. Then she
recalled his face--he had been pointed out to her--he looked a
good-natured fool; probably he had met the Captain somewhere and been
sorry for him, or perhaps he did not like to say "no." In any case he
had lent the money and, so Julia fancied, would have to wait a very
long time before he saw it again. She dismissed the young man from her
mind and fell to working out plans to meet the more pressing
difficulties.
The relations would have to help; not with money; they would not do
that to a useful extent, but with invitations. Chèrie was easily
provided for; Aunt Louise had before offered to take her abroad for
the winter; Chèrie did not in the least want to go; it was likely to
be nothing nicer than acting as unpaid companion to a fidgety old
lady; but under the present circumstances she would have to go. For
Violet it was not quite so easy; it would look rather odd for her to
go visiting among obliging relatives, seeing that she was only just
engaged--how things looked was a point the Polkingtons always
considered. But it would have to be managed; Julia fancied something
might be arranged at Bath, a place which was a cheap fare from
Marbridge. Mrs. Polkington would probably go somewhere for part of the
time, then there could be some real retrenchments not otherwise
possible. Mary might be dismissed; Mr. Gillat even might come to board
with them for a little; the outside world need not know he was a guest
that paid.
Julia was not satisfied with these plans; they would barely meet the
difficulty she knew, even with credit stretched to the uttermost and
the household crippled for some time; but she could think of nothing
better, and determined to suggest them to Mrs. Polkington. With these
thoughts in her mind, she went up-stairs; as she passed the
drawing-room, she noticed that the blinds had not been pulled down;
she went to the window to remedy the omission, and so saw in the
street below the young man who, with the debt owing to him, she had
lately dismissed from her mind. There was a street lamp directly below
the window, and she stood a moment by the curtain looking down. Mr.
Rawson-Clew was riding past, but slowly; it was quite possible to see
his face, which did not contradict her former opinion--good-natured
but foolish, and possibly weak. He turned in his saddle just below the
window to speak to his companion, and she noticed that it was a
stranger with him, a man wearing a single eyeglass, ten years older
than the other, and of a totally different stamp. Indeed, of a stamp
differing from any she had seen at Marbridge, so much so that she
wondered how he came to be here, and what he was doing. But this was
rather a waste of time, for the next day she knew.
The next day he came down the street again, but this time alone and on
foot. He stopped at No. 27, and there asked for Captain Polkington.
Julia, hearing the knock, and the visitor subsequently being ushered
into the dining-room, guessed it must be Mr. Gillat, perhaps come with
his parcel again; when she saw Mary she asked her.
"No, miss," was the answer; "it's another gentleman to see the
master."
"Who?" Julia's mind was alert for fresh difficulties.
"Mr. Rawson-Clew."
"I don't know who he is," Mary went on; "I've never set eyes on him
before, but he's a grand sort of gentleman; I hardly liked to put him
in the dining-room, only missis's orders was 'Mr. Gillat or any
gentleman to see the master there.'"
Which was true enough, and might reasonably have been reckoned a safe
order, for no one but Mr. Gillat ever did come to see the Captain.
"I hope I've done right," Mary said.
"Quite right," Julia answered, though she did not feel so sure of it.
The name and the vague description of the visitor somehow suggested to
her mind the stranger who had ridden past with young Mr. Rawson-Clew.
She went up-stairs, uneasy as much from intuition as from experience.
In the hall she stood a minute. The dining-room door did not shut too
well, the lock was old and worn, and unless it was fastened carefully,
it came open; the Captain never managed to fasten it, and now it stood
ajar; Julia could hear something of what was said within almost as
soon as she reached the top of the kitchen stairs. The visitor spoke
quietly, his words were not audible, but the Captain's voice was
raised with excitement.
"The money, sir, the money that your cousin lent--accommodation
between gentlemen--"
So Julia heard incompletely, and then another disjointed sentence.
"Do you take me for an adventurer, a sharper? I am a soldier, sir, a
soldier and a gentleman--at least, I was--I mean I was a soldier, I am
a gentleman--"
Julia came swiftly up the hall, the instinct of the female to spread
frail wings and protect her helpless belongings (old equally as much
as young) was strong upon her. The pushed open the dining-room door
and walked in.
"Father," she said, "is anything the matter?"
Both men turned, the stranger clearly surprised and annoyed by the
interruption, the Captain for a moment thinking of pulling himself
together and dismissing his daughter with a lie. But he did not do it;
he was too shaken to think quickly, also there was a sense of
reinforcement in her presence; this he did not realise; indeed, he
realised nothing except that she spoke again before he had collected
himself.
"Is it about the money Mr. Rawson-Clew lent you?" she asked.
He nodded, and she turned to the other man, who had risen on her
entrance, and now stood with his back to the evil-smelling stove which
Mary had lighted as usual in honour of Captain Polkington's visitors.
She measured him swiftly, and no detail escaped her; the well-bred
impassive face, where the annoyance caused by her entrance showed only
in the rather hard eyes; the straight figure, even the perfection of
his tailoring and the style of his boots--she summed it all up with
the rapidity of one who has had to depend on her wits before. And her
wits were to be depended on, for, in spite of the warmth of her
protective anger, she felt his superiority of person, position and
ability, and, only too probably, of cause also. She could have laughed
at the contrast he presented to her father and herself and the
surroundings. It was perhaps for this reason that she asked him
maliciously, "Have you come to collect the debt?"
The question went home. "Certainly not," he answered haughtily; "the
money--"
But the Captain prevented whatever he was going to say. "He thinks I
am an adventurer, a sharper," he bleated, now thoroughly throwing
himself on his daughter's protection; "his intention seems to be a
warning not to try to get anything more out of his cousin--something
of that sort."
Julia paid little attention to her father. "You were going to say,"
she inquired serenely of Rawson-Clew, "something about the money, I
think?"
"No," he answered, with cold politeness. "I only meant to suggest
that this is perhaps rather an unpleasant subject for a lady."
He moved as if he would open the door for her, but she stood her
ground. "It is unpleasant," she said; "for that reason had we not
better get it over quickly? You have not come to collect the debt, you
have come, then, for what?"
"To make one or two things plain to Captain Polkington. I believe I
have succeeded; if so, he will no doubt tell you anything you wish to
know. Good afternoon," and he moved to the door on his own account,
whereupon Julia's calmness gave way.
"You do think my father an adventurer, then?" she said. "You think him
a sharper and your cousin a gull, and you came to warn him that if he
tried to get anything more in future it was you with whom he would
have to deal. And the money--you were going to say the money was not
what you came for because you never expected to see it again? But you
are wrong there; you shall see it; it will be repaid, every penny of
it."
Rawson-Clew paused till she had finished; then, "I am sorry for any
misunderstanding there may have been," he said. "I trust you will
trouble yourself no farther in the matter," and he opened the door.
It was not a denial; it was not, so Julia considered, even an apology;
to her it seemed more like a polite request to mind her own business,
and she went up to her room after he had gone almost unjustly angry,
too angry for the time being to think about the rashness of her
promise that the debt should be paid.
"He thought us dirt," she said, sitting on the end of her narrow iron
bed. Then she smiled rather grimly. "And we are pretty much what he
thought us! Father sponged the money, and I decided to myself that the
repaying did not much matter. We are, as we looked to him, two grubby
little people of doubtful honesty, in a grubby room with Bouquet," and
she laughed outright, although she was alone, and the faculty for
seeing and deriding herself as others might, had a somewhat bitter
flavour. Nevertheless, she was very angry and quite determined to pay
the money somehow, so that at least it should appear to this man that
he was mistaken.
An hour later she carried Captain Polkington's tea down to him; when
tea was in the drawing-room his was always sent to him thus. She found
him not depressed at all, on the contrary quite cheerful, and even
dignified. He was reading something when she came in, and seeing that
she was alone, he handed it to her. It was from Mr. Rawson-Clew she
found, a sort of recognition of the discharge of the debt, or at least
a formal cancelling of it. It was carefully and conclusively worded,
certainly not the unaided work of the young man who had ridden past
last night. It was dictated by the other, she was sure of it; possibly
even he had himself discharged the debt so as to end the matter. Her
eyes blazed as she read; he would not even allow her the satisfaction
of giving him the lie--and the misery of straining and pinching to do
the impossible. From pride, or from pity, or from both, he had
finished the thing there and then, or he thought he had. She tore the
paper across and then across again.
"What are you doing?" Captain Polkington cried, seizing her hands as
she would have torn it again. "Don't you know it is valuable? I must
keep it; he can't go back on it if he wants to." He took it from her,
and began to piece it together. "I can look the world in the face
again," he said, admiring the fragments. "I am free, free and cleared;
that debt would have hung like a millstone around my neck, but I am
free of it; it is cancelled."
"Free!" Julia said with scorn. There are disadvantages in reducing a
man to a subordinate position and allowing him no use for his
self-respect; it is a virtue that has a tendency to atrophy. Julia
recognised this with something like personal shame. "Your debt is
discharged," she said gently, "but mine is not; it has been shifted,
not cancelled; it lies with me and Mr. Rawson-Clew now, and it shall
be paid somehow."
Captain Polkington hardly heeded what she said; he was still smoothing
the pieces of paper. "What?" he asked, as he put them away in an
envelope, but he did not wait for her answer. "It was very heedless of
you to tear it," he said; "but fortunately there is no damage done; it
is perfectly valid, all that can be required."