That very evening, without a minute's delay, Cecil determined to go
round and have a talk with Ethel Sunderland. "Strike while the iron's
hot," he said to himself. "There isn't a minute to be lost; for who
knows but somebody else may find John Cann's treasure before I do?"
Ethel opened the door to him herself; theirs was an old engagement of
long standing, after the usual Government clerk's fashion; and Aunt
Emily didn't stand out so stiffly as many old maids do for the regular
proprieties. Very pretty Ethel looked with her pale face and the red
ribbon in her hair; very pretty, but Cecil feared, as he looked into
her dark hazel eyes, a little wearied and worn-out, for it was her
music-lesson day, as he well remembered. Her music-lesson day! Ethel
Sutherland to give music-lessons to some wretched squealing children at
the West-end, when all John Cann's wealth was lying there, uncounted,
only waiting for him and her to take it and enjoy it! The bare thought
was a perfect purgatory to him. He must get that two hundred pounds
to-night, or give up the enterprise altogether.
"Well, Ethel darling," he said tenderly, taking her pretty little hand
in his; "you look tired, dearest. Those horrid children have been
bothering you again. How I wish we were married, and you were well out
of it!"
Ethel smiled a quiet smile of resignation. "They _are_ rather trying,
Cecil," she said gently, "especially on days when one has got a
headache; but, after all, I'm very glad to have the work to do; it helps
such a lot to eke out our little income. We have so _very_ little, you
know, even for two lonely women to live upon in simple little lodgings
like these, that I'm thankful I can do something to help dear Aunt
Emily, who's really goodness itself. You see, after all, I get very well
paid indeed for the lessons."
"Ethel," Cecil Mitford said suddenly, thinking it better to dash at once
into the midst of business; "I've come round this evening to talk with
you about a means by which you can add a great deal with perfect safety
to your little income. Not by lessons, Ethel darling; not by lessons. I
can't bear to see you working away the pretty tips off those dear little
fingers of yours with strumming scales on the piano for a lot of stupid,
gawky school-girls; it's by a much simpler way than that; I know of a
perfectly safe investment for that three hundred that you've got in New
Zealand Four per Cents. Can you not have heard that New Zealand
securities are in a very shaky way just at present?"
"Very shaky, Cecil?" Ethel answered in surprise. "Why, Mr. Cartwright
told me only a week ago they were as safe as the Bank of England!"
"Mr. Cartwright's an ignorant old martinet," Cecil replied vigorously.
"He thinks because the stock's inscribed and the dividends are payable
in Threadneedle Street that the colony of New Zealand's perfectly
solvent. Now, I'm in the Colonial Office, and I know a great deal better
than that. New Zealand has over-borrowed, I assure you; quite
over-borrowed; and a serious fall is certain to come sooner or later.
Mark my words, Ethel darling; if you don't sell out those New Zealand
Fours, you'll find your three hundred has sunk to a hundred and fifty in
rather less than half no time!"
Ethel hesitated, and looked at him in astonishment. "That's very queer,"
she said, "for Mr. Cartwright wants me to sell out my little bit of
Midland and put it all into the same New Zealands. He says they're so
safe and pay so well."
"Mr. Cartwright indeed!" Cecil cried contemptuously. "What means on
earth has he of knowing? Didn't he advise you to buy nothing but three
per cents., and then let you get some Portuguese Threes at fifty, which
are really sixes, and exceedingly doubtful securities? What's the use of
trusting a man like that, I should like to know? No, Ethel, if you'll be
guided by me--and I have special opportunities of knowing about these
things at the Colonial Office--you'll sell out your New Zealands, and
put them into a much better investment that I can tell you about. And if
I were you, I'd say nothing about it to Mr. Cartwright."
"But, Cecil, I never did anything in business before without consulting
him! I should be afraid of going quite wrong."
Cecil took her hand in his with real tenderness. Though he was trying to
deceive her--for her own good--he loved her dearly in his heart of
hearts, and hated himself for the deception he was remorsefully
practising upon her. Yet, for her sake, he would go through with it.
"You must get accustomed to trusting me instead of him, darling," he
said softly. "When you are mine for ever, as I hope you will be soon,
you will take my advice, of course, in all such matters, won't you? And
you may as well begin by taking it now. I have great hopes, Ethel, that
before very long my circumstances will be so much improved that I shall
be able to marry you--I hardly know how quickly; perhaps even before
next Christmas. But meanwhile, darling, I have something to break to you
that I dare say will grieve you a little for the moment, though it's for
your ultimate good, birdie--for your ultimate good. The Colonial Office
people have selected me to go to Jamaica on some confidential Government
business, which may keep me there for three months or so. It's a
dreadful thing to be away from you so long, Ethel; but if I manage the
business successfully--and I shall, I know--I shall get promoted when I
come back, well promoted, perhaps to the chief clerkship in the
Department; and then we could marry comfortably almost at once."
"To Jamaica! Oh, Cecil! How awfully far! And suppose you were to get
yellow fever or something."
"But I won't, Ethel; I promise you I won't, and I'll guarantee it with a
kiss, birdie; so now, that's settled. And then, consider the promotion!
Only three months, probably, and when I come back, we can be actually
married. It's a wonderful stroke of luck, and I only heard of it this
morning. I couldn't rest till I came and told you."
Ethel wiped a tear away silently, and only answered, "If you're glad,
Cecil dearest, I'm glad too."
"Well now, Ethel," Cecil Mitford went on as gaily as he could, "that
brings me up to the second point. I want you to sell out these wretched
New Zealands, so as to take the money with me to invest on good
mortgages in Jamaica. My experience in West Indian matters--after three
years in the Department--will enable me to lay it out for you at nine
per cent.--nine per cent., observe, Ethel,--on absolute security of
landed property. Planters want money to improve their estates, and can't
get it at less than that rate. Your three hundred would bring you in
twenty-seven pounds, Ethel; twenty-seven pounds is a lot of money!"
What could poor Ethel do? In his plausible, affectionate manner--and all
for her own good, too--Cecil talked her over quickly between love and
business experience, coaxing kisses and nine per cent. interest,
endearing names and knowledge of West Indian affairs, till helpless
little Ethel willingly promised to give up her poor little three
hundred, and even arranged to meet Cecil secretly on Thursday at the
Bank of England, about Colonial Office dinner-hour, to effect the
transfer on her own account, without saying a single word about it to
Aunt Emily or Mr. Cartwright. Cecil's conscience--for he _had_ a
conscience, though he did his best to stifle it--gave him a bitter
twinge every now and then, as one question after another drove him time
after time into a fresh bit of deceit; but he tried to smile and smile
and be a villain as unconcernedly and lightly as possible. Once only
towards the end of the evening, when everything was settled, and Cecil
had talked about his passage, and the important business with which he
was entrusted, at full length, a gleam of suspicion seemed to flash for
a single second across poor Ethel's deluded little brains.
Jamaica--promotion--three hundred pounds--it was all so sudden and so
connected; could Cecil himself be trying to deceive her, and using her
money for his wild treasure hunt? The doubt was horrible, degrading,
unworthy of her or him; and yet somehow for a single moment she could
not help half-unconsciously entertaining it.
"Cecil," she said, hesitating, and looking into the very depths of his
truthful blue eyes; "you're not concealing anything from me, are you?
It's not some journey connected with John Cann?"
Cecil coughed and cleared his throat uneasily, but by a great effort he
kept his truthful blue eyes still fixed steadily on hers. (He would have
given the world if he might have turned them away, but that would have
been to throw up the game incontinently.) "My darling Ethel," he said
evasively, "how on earth could the Colonial Office have anything to do
with John Cann?"
"Answer me 'yes' or 'no,' Cecil. Do please answer me 'yes' or 'no.'"
Cecil kept his eyes still fixed immovably on hers, and without a
moment's hesitation answered quickly "no." It was an awful wrench, and
his lips could hardly frame the horrid falsehood, but for Ethel's sake
he answered "no."
"Then I know I can trust you, Cecil," she said, laying her head for
forgiveness on his shoulder. "Oh, how wrong it was of me to doubt you
for a second!"
Cecil sighed uneasily, and kissed her white forehead without a single
word.
"After all," he thought to himself, as he walked back to his lonely
lodgings late that evening, "I need never tell her anything about it. I
can pretend, when I've actually got John Cann's treasure, that I came
across the clue accidently while I was in Jamaica; and I can lay out
three hundred of it there in mortgages; and she need never know a single
word about my innocent little deception. But indeed in the pride and
delight of so much money, all our own, she'll probably never think at
all of her poor little paltry three hundred."