tf I
 
 RESOLVED TO BE RICH 
 
 GALIF. LIBRARY. LOS ANGELES
 
 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 A NOVEL 
 
 BY 
 
 E. H. COOPER 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 ' The Marchioness Against the County" "Children, Race-horses, 
 and Ghosts," etc. 
 
 HERBERT S. STONE AND COMPANY 
 
 CHICAGO AND NEW YORK 
 
 MDCCCXCIX
 
 COPYRIGHT 1899, BY 
 HERBERT S. STONE * CO
 
 Stack 
 
 Annex 
 
 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 "On the Corniche Road, near to the little 
 village of Eze, where the plash of Mediter- 
 ranean waves is the only sound heard, one may 
 see an old tombstone inscribed with the strange 
 words: 'HERE LIES THE SOUL OF COUNT Louis 
 ESTERFELD. ' Wanderers along this road had 
 passed by the stone year after year repeating 
 the words: 'Here lies the soul of Count Louis 
 Esterfeld" with a light laugh, and muttering 
 to themselves 'a madman!' till one day there 
 came by a man with thoughts in his mind of 
 which these words were a curious echo. He 
 paused in front of the stone considering, and at 
 last began to dig. Working for some time 
 with his hands he came at last upon a metal 
 box, and opening it found it full of gold and 
 jewels. Among them was a paper containing 
 these words: 'You are my heir: to you I 
 bequeath this wealth, to you who have under- 
 
 2128915
 
 2 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 stood. In this box is my soul the money 
 without which man is but a machine and his 
 life but a long procession of weary empty 
 years. . . . ' ' 
 
 A boy who was reading this queer legend 
 dropped the newspaper and stared round him 
 with hungry eyes and parted lips. He looked 
 like a youngster of eleven or twelve, though 
 he was in fact fourteen, and had a face differ- 
 ing in no respect from that of a hundred of 
 his contemporaries. Freckled cheeks, small 
 turned-up nose, broad forehead and indeter- 
 minate mouth this is a combination of fea- 
 ture which Nature seems to turn out by the 
 hundred thousand for the confusion of parents 
 who want to discover some indication of a 
 special talent in their sons: the good dame 
 giving no indication of the iron will, reckless 
 courage, calculating energy or grubbing greed 
 which is hidden behind it. Perhaps she is 
 right, and the humour and interest of a study 
 of life would be perceptibly lessened if we 
 could not now and then see men with noble 
 countenances do great deeds for love of gold ; 
 and cowards with receding foreheads and timid 
 eyes sacrifice ease, reputation, life itself, for a 
 sudden whimsical notion of honour; and an 
 idle vagabond suddenly grow upright and 
 industrious while his once reproachful and
 
 Resolved to be Rich 3 
 
 irreproachable neighbour forges a cheque and 
 goes to Spain with the proceeds, and his 
 neighbour's wife to help him spend them. 
 But this sketch (or part of it never mind 
 which part) is anticipating the career of Master 
 Gerald Franklin. 
 
 The young gentleman sat in a deep and 
 comfortable arm-chair with his legs crossed, 
 his feet (or, to be exact, as he invariably was 
 himself, with one foot) on a foot-stool, and a 
 Manchester weekly paper in his hands. He 
 had read every word of it, foreign intelligence, 
 money-market news, local gossip and leading 
 articles, not because he was interested in a 
 quarter of what he read but because it was his 
 principle and practice to collect every morsel 
 of information available on every business 
 subject. For general literature he had the 
 profoundest scorn. Latin and Greek poets he 
 not only loathed as his contemporaries loathed 
 them because they meant work and pain and 
 tears, but above all despised because they 
 were useless. He worked at these idiotic 
 tasks, as he called them, just as much as was 
 necessary to avoid the fate of other young 
 gentlemen with strong (though, perhaps, less 
 debatable) views as to the value of their tasks, 
 but he never gained or aspired to high marks 
 for Latin verses or brilliant construing. The
 
 4 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 classical master thought Franklin a dullard 
 and the youth thought the classical master a 
 bore: that was the extent of their concern 
 about one another. But when Gerald found 
 himself in a class where arithmetic, geog- 
 raphy, or other modern useful knowledge was 
 being imparted, or even where a German or 
 French master was doing battle with giggling 
 and scornful young Britons, there was another 
 story to be told. Many a man looked anxious 
 when Franklin began to ask him questions: 
 most of them had to think before answering 
 him, and to realise sometimes how slight a 
 hold they had on their subject. The masters 
 at Gerald's school were young men from high 
 schools and training colleges who had studied 
 science not to know but to pass examinations, 
 and outraged science had avenged herself: 
 they did pass and they did not know. 
 
 The purely imaginative side of life did not 
 often present itself to young Franklin, and 
 since it mostly concerned itself with love, self- 
 sacrifice and such-like unprofitable subjects, he 
 did not go in search of it. Books of adventure 
 interested him when a treasure-hunt was the 
 point of the story, but otherwise he despised 
 them and their readers. In any case he con- 
 sidered that to read them was a waste of time, 
 since, as he justly observed, the story could
 
 Resolved to be Rich 5 
 
 have been told in a page if the writer had left 
 out all the scenery, character-description, lion- 
 shooting, snake-bites, and other superfluous 
 matter. Never before to-day had he come 
 across a story like this one in the Manchester 
 Weekly Sun which combined interest and 
 brevity in such a high degree. The fact that 
 it was an advertisement of some one's pills (a 
 five-years' sufferer from dyspepsia, discovering 
 the pills later on in the article, even as the 
 young man discovered diamonds) affected him 
 not at all, or even gratified him further as evi- 
 dence of a business-like mind. For one single 
 moment the story forced him into a day- 
 dream, filling him with a vague desire to visit 
 foreign countries and dig there. Then he 
 shook himself together, read to the end of the 
 advertisement, and came to the conclusion that 
 it would be better to make pills. Just as he 
 had arrived at this sensible decision the door 
 of the room opened and his sister came in. 
 The child approached him hesitatingly and 
 stood looking at him with troubled eyes. 
 
 "Well, old girl?" 
 
 "Don't you think, Gerald, that you could 
 come and see Aunt Marian? She has asked 
 for you twice." 
 
 "I've got to go to school. It's past eight 
 already. ' '
 
 6 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Monica Franklin looked at the arm-chair, 
 foot-stool and newspaper, without any verbal 
 answer. 
 
 ' ' I suppose I must come in for a bit, ' ' said 
 the boy vexedly, "though it will probably make 
 me late again. If she's worse I mustn't stay 
 long, I suppose?" 
 
 "She is much worse," said his sister gravely, 
 yet unable to repress a smile at the considera- 
 tion shown in this remark, and the speaker's 
 obvious satisfaction at his own thoughtfulness. 
 
 The woman by whose bedside the children 
 were presently standing was white and motion- 
 less. As the boy came in she tried to raise her 
 hand, but could not move it and lay in silence 
 looking at the young pair with eyes which 
 already knew the last great secret. A grey 
 shadow was even now stealing across her face ; 
 her breathing seemed almost at an end, 
 though now and again with a great struggle 
 she would win one more deep breath from the 
 enemy which had already conquered her. The 
 thought that her time for speech was probably 
 now an affair of minutes made her set her 
 teeth in a last desperate effort, and raising her 
 head she beckoned the boy nearer to her. He 
 bent unwillingly and nervously over the bed. 
 
 "Monica . . . you will take care of 
 her?"
 
 Resolved to be Rich 7 
 
 The lad looked helplessly across at his 
 sister, not understanding-. 
 
 "I am dying," said the woman; "don't you 
 know? don't you see?" Through the mists 
 which hung round her Marian Franklin caught 
 sight of the sudden blaze of terror which 
 started up in her young nephew's face. "Dr. 
 Hare should have told you. Answer me: will 
 you take care of Monica?" 
 
 Gerald spoke no word ; he hardly heard the 
 question; his mind was trying to adjust itself 
 to the reality of death as presented to him in 
 this room. Hitherto it had appeared to him 
 only as a last refuge of people who could not 
 do any more business; it had not entered into 
 his range of actual vision. Sickness he knew 
 (by reputation) and weakness and pain, be- 
 cause his aunt had often been ill, but the idea 
 of death could not immediately reach his under- 
 standing. He stood in continued silence bring- 
 ing his intellect to bear on the problem as he 
 would have brought it to bear on a new rule of 
 arithmetic which was presented to him, without 
 sympathy, fear, anxiety, or any other emotion, 
 but merely with resolution to understand it. 
 
 1 ' You shall answer me, ' ' said the woman with a 
 sudden access of strength ; ' ' you shall promise ! ' ' 
 
 "What do you want me to promise?" he 
 asked cautiously.
 
 8 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "That you will keep Monica with you . . 
 provide for her . . . she has nothing 
 except what you will share with her." 
 
 "Say yes; please do say yes, Gerald," whis- 
 pered the sobbing child who was standing by 
 his side; "only just to please her now; I will 
 not hold you to it." 
 
 ' ' But I will, ' ' said the dying woman in a low 
 clear voice which thrilled through the room 
 like the whisper of some great tragic actress, 
 so that the two children turned to her with 
 startled faces. "Wherever I am I shall know, 
 and if you break your word . . . " 
 
 There was a long silence during which she 
 lay with her eyes fixed on the boy, as though 
 she were reading every thought which was 
 passing through his mind and foreseeing every 
 future thought which would pass through it. 
 A great wave of fear suddenly swept over his 
 soul as the eyes with that dread knowledge in 
 them held his own and would not let them go. 
 He stammered out some words; he did not 
 know what. She did not understand them and 
 spoke again in an impatient whisper: 
 
 "Do you promise? Yes or no?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Louder." 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "I hear. I will remember. "
 
 Resolved to be Rich 9 
 
 There was another long silence broken only 
 by an occasional sob from Monica, and then 
 Dr. Hare came quietly and quickly into the 
 room. He looked in startled fear at the 
 unconscious figure on the bed and then at the 
 children standing in frightened helplessness by 
 its side. 
 
 "I couldn't get here a minute sooner," he 
 muttered, seeming rather to be offering 
 excuses to himself than to them, and began 
 hastily to apply remedies. "One of you had 
 better run to the Vicarage and ask Mr. Lowe 
 to come; or stay don't it is too late, I am 
 afraid." 
 
 For even while he was speaking Miss Marian 
 Franklin died.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 In the little study of Oakhill Vicarage the 
 Reverend James Lowe sat in a desk-chair with 
 his arms folded and brow puckered, while 
 opposite to him in an exactly similar attitude 
 sat Gerald Franklin. It was the day after 
 Miss Franklin's funeral, and the Vicar of Oak- 
 hill had taken upon himself the task of explain- 
 ing to the boy the financial position of himself 
 and his sister. 
 
 "You have no other relatives, I think, and I 
 don't know who will be the new trustee of your 
 money. This is a sum of ^3000 left you by 
 your father, and it brings in ^120 a year. 
 Your aunt had an annuity of a similar amount 
 which died with her, but she had insured her 
 life for .200, and has left this sum to your 
 sister. This and 3 r our income of ^120 is what 
 you both have to live on." 
 
 The Vicar felt that it was ridiculous to be 
 speaking of such matters to a boy of this age, 
 but talked on in the perfunctory manner of a 
 lawyer reciting to some young spendthrift the 
 terms and conditions of a mortgage. 
 10
 
 Resolved to be Rich II 
 
 "Whom does the furniture belong to?" asked 
 his companion, in business-like fashion. 
 
 "Eh? The furniture? Oh, that is Mon- 
 ica's," said Lowe, in some surprise. 
 
 "Is there any money in the bank, or any 
 other money at all?" 
 
 "Money in the bank? Oh er yes; about 
 ^15, I believe." 
 
 "My aunt ought to have saved something out 
 of my ;i2o a year," said Gerald. 
 
 The Vicar stared at the young gentleman 
 before him with the look which one might 
 bestow on a monkey who became suddenly 
 endowed with speech and offered opinions on 
 the subject of house-keeping. 
 
 "Your education cost her a considerable 
 sum," he said, with mild severity, "and she 
 thought herself justified in spending some of 
 the money on your sister. ' ' 
 
 "Women are certainly pretty cool hands in 
 dealing with money," said the boy. 
 
 Mr. Lowe sat silent for the space of a min- 
 ute, trying to realise the fact that instead of 
 consoling a puzzled and unhappy little boy he 
 had to discuss business with a sharp man of the 
 world. He was the mildest and gentlest of 
 men, who, when he said to a parishioner, "You 
 grieve me greatly," imagined that he had 
 administered a stern rebuke, but he thought
 
 12 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 that this boy certainly wanted whipping. 
 Moreover the good man felt somewhat nervous 
 about himself: he had agreed and sympathised 
 with Miss Franklin as to the impossibility of 
 saving money out of her narrow income except 
 by giving to the two children an inferior edu- 
 cation, and had advised that the money should 
 be spent as Miss Franklin had spent it. She 
 had, he argued, taken the children out of pure 
 kindness: their arrival compelled her in any 
 case to go without many of the small comforts 
 to which she was accustomed, since the chil- 
 dren's income was insufficient for their life as 
 she had planned it, and there was no actual 
 necessity to save money. In the event of Miss 
 Franklin's death the two children could, he 
 supposed, be sent to school on the interest of 
 Gerald's ^3000: the idea of this being unjust 
 or of Gerald objecting to it really never 
 occurred to the Vicar. Now that Gerald men- 
 tioned it (and not till now), he understood that 
 Miss Franklin's arrangement had in fact been 
 a trifle unbusinesslike "cool" as Gerald had 
 called it and apparently he was going to be 
 called to account for it by this boy. The 
 Vicar stroked his beard and wished devoutly 
 that he had left this task to Dr. Hare. Gerald, 
 on his side, sat pondering with folded arms and 
 vexed frown. He knew most things about
 
 Resolved to be Rich 13 
 
 house-keeping- from house-rent down to the 
 price of Malaga raisins which latter he bought 
 in a falling market to retail to his school-com- 
 panions at a price which showed himself clearly 
 the folly of dealing with middle-men instead 
 of directly with the producer. He had 
 remarked more than once to his sister that the 
 household was conducted on very wasteful 
 principles, and now his opinion had received 
 confirmation. I do not wish, you will under- 
 stand, to suggest that my young friend Gerald 
 was a very agreeable boy, but I must do him 
 the justice to point out that what he knew he 
 knew thoroughly. There were many persons 
 who, both at his present age and in after years, 
 would have done well to take his advice. 
 Unfortunately no one could ever get beyond a 
 vehement desire to box his ears. 
 
 "I do not think," said the Vicar, "that it 
 would be kind or profitable" (he put a slightly 
 sarcastic emphasis on the word profitable which 
 he hoped would rebuke the boy, whereas 
 Gerald merely viewed him with good-humoured 
 contempt at the word "kind" and with sur- 
 prised approbation at the word "profitable") 
 "to discuss now what she did. It was done for 
 the best after long consideration. What I 
 wished to talk about was the future. Miss 
 Franklin has appointed Dr. Hare and myself
 
 14 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 executors under her will and has asked her 
 cousin, Miss Christina Bertram, to be Monica's 
 guardian. I think it would be best, if possible, 
 to place you both under the same guardian, 
 and for you both to live with Miss Bertram. 
 Should you be willing to agree to this if it can 
 be arranged?" 
 
 "I couldn't answer just yet," said Gerald 
 cautiously. 
 
 "For us to ask your consent to our arrange- 
 ment," said the Vicar drily, "is rather a matter 
 of politeness than necessity, you know." 
 
 'I know that," was the quiet reply, "but I 
 think it would be more pleasant and easy-going 
 for all parties if I did happen to like your 
 arrangement." 
 
 Mr. Lowe lay back in his chair and stared at 
 his companion with absolute dismay. What on 
 earth had he done in thrusting himself into 
 such a post as adviser to these children and 
 trustee to one of them? Why had he offered to 
 undertake such a task? He had rarely seen 
 this boy and knew nothing whatever of him 
 except what Miss Franklin had told him that 
 Gerald was "a little precocious in business- 
 matters." A little precocious! The creature 
 was a full-fledged business-man fit to go on the 
 Stock-Exchange or set up a money-lending 
 establishment this afternoon! Miss Franklin
 
 Resolved to be Rich 15 
 
 had expressed her fears lest Mr. Lowe should 
 find the post a tiresome one "full of small 
 worries" was her exact expression and he 
 thought now that she was very likely to prove 
 right. Her words, he said to himself, were a 
 euphonious description of the situation of a man 
 in a hornets' nest without his clothes on. 
 
 "Do you know Miss Bertram?" he asked. 
 
 "Oh yes," said Gerald. "She used to come 
 and see Aunt Marian pretty often. There is 
 really nothing particular against her being 
 guardian, but are you sure we have no other 
 relations?" 
 
 "Miss Franklin spoke once of a relative an 
 uncle, I think who went out to South Africa 
 many years ago. I gathered in fact that she 
 was a favourite of his, that they were very 
 great friends once, but nothing has been heard 
 of him for many years. I believe he is sup- 
 posed to have been killed in the last Zulu War. 
 You probably have some other relations some- 
 where, but I don't know who they are." 
 
 "Well, that's a mercy," said Gerald, "there'll 
 be nobody to lend money to." 
 
 Mrs. Lowe came into the room at this point. 
 She had intended to allow her husband a 
 reasonable time in which to explain money- 
 matters to Gerald, and then come in with 
 motherly pity and consolation. She had also
 
 1 6 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 prepared a large tea knowing something about 
 the nature of bo5^s in general with abundance 
 of cake, and meant to proffer first pity and 
 then cake as consolation. As a preliminary to 
 both she put a hand on the boy's shoulder and 
 kissed him, at which her husband looked 
 shocked and amazed, and Gerald murmured, 
 "Oh, Lord!" 
 
 "Has Mr. Lowe finished talking to you, my 
 dear," she asked, noticing nothing; "it must 
 have been so sad for you listening to the story 
 of all that your dear aunt has done, and the 
 arrangements which she has made for you. I 
 do so hope that you and Monica will be very 
 happy. Have you finished talking to Gerald, 
 my dear?" 
 
 "Yes," said her husband, looking round him 
 rather doubtfully. He had an impression that 
 it was Gerald who had done most of the talk- 
 ing, and that he himself had come rather dis- 
 creditably than otherwise out of the interview. 
 However, it was over, which was a great 
 point, and he was relieved to see Mrs. Lowe 
 leading the youth away, though he could have 
 wished that her arm was not round Gerald's 
 neck. The young scamp just gave the Vicar a 
 little look out of the corner of his eye as he 
 passed, which said: "This must be a very dis- 
 tressing affair for you to witness, but I pledge
 
 Resolved to be Rich 17 
 
 my word that I have given her no encourage- 
 ment. " 
 
 Being seated at tea he became affably con- 
 versational, as though recognising that Mr. 
 Lowe had meant to do well, and had failed 
 through no fault of his own. He spoke of the 
 poor of the parish, lamenting their improvi- 
 dence, drunkenness and general incapacity. 
 His friend Mr. Muirhead had explained to him 
 a system by which a man might, by paying a 
 very small yearly sum from the time he was 
 twenty, receive a regular pension at sixty, or 
 even before if he increased the earlier pay- 
 ments. Every one ought to insure themselves 
 against old age in this manner. . . . Even 
 Mrs. Lowe became a trifle puzzled and sus- 
 picious as the boy talked on. She had heard 
 persons by the dozen talk like that before, but 
 she had never gone into tea with her arm 
 round their neck. The poor woman got quite 
 hot at the recollection. 
 
 Towards the end of the meal Mr. Lowe made 
 a resolute effort to get back to the question of 
 guardianship. He was sorry for Miss Chris- 
 tina Bertram, but he supposed that in appoint- 
 ing her to be guardian to one child, and asking 
 her to be guardian to the other, Miss Franklin 
 had known what she was doing. He could not 
 of course be aware of the truth that Miss
 
 1 8 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Franklin knew as much or as little about the 
 boy's character as he did himself. 
 
 "I suppose then," he said, trying to speak 
 lightly and cheerfully, "we may take it for 
 granted that you will be content to live with 
 Miss Bertram?" 
 
 "I cannot answer now," was the politely 
 resolute reply. "I must talk to my friend, 
 Mr. Muirhead."
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 In introducing the villain of his piece the 
 dramatist has a great advantage over the 
 novelist. If a man comes on to the stage with 
 black whiskers, rolling eyes, a terrific frown, 
 immaculate trousers and a hoarse whisper, you 
 see the villain before you, you hear his dark 
 innuendoes, watch his blighting though loving 
 glances at the heroine, and you know without 
 further words or elaborate introduction that the 
 man is ready for forgery, abduction, highway 
 robbery or murder, as circumstances shall dic- 
 tate. Even if his actions are dull he can 
 always loll about and look picturesquely 
 rascally. Like the young lady who, consult- 
 ing a manager as to whether she could play 
 Juliet, was told that she would look very nice 
 in the tomb, so any man aided by burnt cork 
 can make something on the stage of a villain's 
 part. 
 
 But the novelist's introduction of this char- 
 acter is much less effective. How laborious is 
 the written catalogue of his points the sinister 
 frown, the shifty eye, the stealthy tread! 
 19
 
 2O Resolved to be Rich 
 
 How dull the fellow is except when he is mov- 
 ing briskly about with his knife or pen and 
 book of (somebody else's) cheques! 
 
 I beg therefore for the kind toleration of the 
 reader while Gerald's friend Mr. Sampson Muir- 
 head is clothed with such flesh and blood and 
 raiment as my poor pen can depict. Frankly 
 he would have made but a poor figure on the 
 stage and is not worth, so far as externals 
 are concerned, a very elaborate description. 
 Figure to yourself, please, a thin, starved-look- 
 ing man of medium height and some thirty 
 summers though he did not look as if any- 
 thing so wholesome and warm as summer had 
 ever been near him with grey, rather pleasing 
 eyes, straight, narrow pointed nose, a wide 
 mouth and an expression of absolute vacuity. 
 That was his ordinary appearance, without 
 interest to any man. There were persons, 
 however, who had seen the thin lips set, and 
 eyes grow hard and keen, and nose twitch like 
 that of a cat with a bird under its foot, and 
 these persons said that if they ever had to do 
 business with Mr. Muirhead they would choose 
 the morning, before lunch, on a day when their 
 wits were sharpest, for its transaction. Prob- 
 ably they were right, for the gentleman had 
 been meddling, ever since he was eighteen, 
 with various bits of business in which one side
 
 Resolved to be Rich 21 
 
 or the other had mostly got to burn its ringers, 
 and if any fingers had been burnt during these 
 years they had not been those of Mr. Muirhead. 
 Sampson was just now in a position which 
 seemed sufficiently harmless so far as financial 
 operations were concerned. He was master in 
 a high school in Stoke-on-Trent, and though 
 he might have presented Stock- Exchange 
 problems to his arithmetic classes, could not, 
 one would imagine, have had any serious influ- 
 ence for good or ill on the neighbourhood. 
 But the fact is that in money matters people 
 will take any advice, so long as it is risky 
 enough, and the adviser is not a broker, lawyer 
 or other person whose business it is to give it. 
 A schoolmaster thus has many advantages as a 
 financial councillor. He knows no more and 
 no less about such matters than the parson, the 
 friendly post-master, or other persons who are 
 usually consulted, but from mere habit he 
 speaks with more authority. He is so accus- 
 tomed to stating in a masterful voice that 
 seven times one are seven to an audience who 
 dared not if they could dispute the fact, that 
 he talks about gold-mines, railways and build- 
 ing-societies, in the same way; and finds too 
 that men are but long-legged boys, and will 
 listen with similar docility to any one who 
 speaks with decision. Muirhead besides had
 
 22 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 the jargon of the money-market at command, 
 an accomplishment which would impress no one 
 nowadays, when your baby, if it could speak, 
 would ask for "Chartered" shares as a chris- 
 tening present, but was a matter for local 
 wonder then. He was a clever man, too, as 
 evidenced by the position to which he had 
 attained at the age of thirty, and could make a 
 little knowledge go further than most people, 
 besides being possessed of a discrimination 
 amounting to an instinct as to the company in 
 which it was and was not safe to show it off. 
 Soon after his arrival at Stoke he made a little 
 money for himself and his friends by a small 
 speculation in Mexican Rails; the friends 
 talked far and wide about the author of their 
 success; people begged for an introduction to 
 this magician who could bring gold from the 
 clouds. In short Muirhead had not been in his 
 position for a year before he became known as 
 a man who could influence capital to a quite 
 appreciable extent, and such a reputation flies 
 nearly as far and fast as a reputation for hav- 
 ing the capital itself in your bank. 
 
 To a casual observer of men and things to a 
 person going about the world, so to speak, with 
 a rough note-book and jotting down mere 
 results of superficial observation, without car- 
 ing to consider their connection or results, it
 
 Resolved to be Rich 23 
 
 must seem sometimes as if Providence, having 
 put a raw rather helpless person on a hedge 
 between good and evil, occasionally heaped up 
 to an unnecessary extent the influences which 
 should make him come down on the wrong 
 side. Gerald Franklin had his good points. 
 All men have. Even Turkish Paschas and 
 Belgian Colonial officials and American railway 
 speculators are not as black as they are painted 
 though they have so many other points of 
 resemblance to the devil that one feels no 
 desire for closer intimacy with them. Gerald 
 was quick, industrious, accurate, patient and 
 scrupulously just, and there was nobody among 
 all his elders who could appreciate or recognise 
 these qualities in him or help him to develop 
 them aright. On the other hand he was con- 
 ceited, avaricious, and not very scrupulously 
 honest (a failing which is not incompatible with 
 being just), and by mere chance Sampson 
 Muirhead had become his most intimate friend 
 and counsellor. This, I maintain, was hard 
 luck on Gerald, who was running the race of 
 life with an amount of over-weight which 
 handicapped him quite out of the contest. The 
 odds were 1,000 to i against him. 
 
 Gerald spent the evening thinking over Mr. 
 Lowe's statement and by bedtime had decided 
 on which points he meant to ask Muirhead's
 
 24 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 advice, and on which other points he had 
 already made up his own mind and wanted no 
 advice. The youth had method. In the morn- 
 ing at school he went through a Virgil lesson 
 with his accustomed air of good-humoured 
 contempt, wrote a short essay on the Spanish 
 Colonies, the information in which was so 
 much fuller and more accurate than that in the 
 geography, book out of which he was supposed 
 to have obtained it that the master could not 
 make up his mind how to mark it ; and at last 
 the boy found himself free and by Mr. Muir- 
 head's side. 
 
 "Well, Franklin, have you made any plans 
 yet?" 
 
 "I have been thinking over some, sir, and 
 wanted your advice if you could spare me half- 
 an-hour. " 
 
 "Certainly." The man eyed his little com- 
 panion for a moment, and again on his face 
 was the look of a cat with a bird in its claws. 
 
 Gerald briefly recapitulated what Mr. Lowe 
 had told him, and went on: "This Miss Ber- 
 tram lives only just a little further off from 
 here than my aunt did, so I should come here 
 just the same. It is a choice between my 
 going to school as a boarder somewhere else at 
 a cheaper place or staying here and living with 
 her."
 
 Resolved to be Rich 25 
 
 "Stay here, " said the man decisively rather 
 eagerly in fact. "The education is very good; 
 you could hardly get anything better for the 
 money anywhere ; and I think I may say that 
 you will find me of some use to you. From here 
 you will easily pass on to some business post in 
 the mines or potteries, or if you liked it better 
 you could get into one of the banks or lawyer's 
 offices. I will tell you something about myself 
 if you won't repeat it." 
 
 "I promise not to, sir." 
 
 "In a year's time, when my engagement 
 here is at an end, I am going to set up a little 
 business of my own. I shall begin, I hope, 
 with an agency for the Merton Insurance Com- 
 pany and one or two little things will follow. 
 In two years' time when you are thinking of 
 leaving school you may find it worth while to 
 come and join me. I advise you to stay on 
 here." 
 
 "What capital would your business want?" 
 asked the boy cautioiisly. 
 
 "None, my dear fellow; only brains and 
 push, and a few matters like book-keeping, 
 which you could pick up in a month or 
 two. ' ' 
 
 "Will you undertake to teach me that while 
 I am here?" 
 
 Gerald was perfectly aware that a bargain
 
 26 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 was being driven, and meant to have the terms 
 of it clear. 
 
 "Certainly. We will begin directly you have 
 settled down at Miss Bertram's," said the 
 other, who was accustomed to his pupil's style 
 of doing business, and admired it. He had 
 himself given nothing for nothing all his life, 
 having indeed made but one present in the 
 course of his thirty years, and that was merely 
 to give his deceased mother's false teeth to his 
 landlady. 
 
 "I will join you," said Gerald deliberately, 
 "if you have got that agency when I leave 
 here. There would be work for two even in 
 that ; and of course we should get plenty more 
 work of that kind. ' ' 
 
 "Yes, I could command plenty," said the 
 other, with a dry emphasis on the personal 
 pronoun. 
 
 Gerald looked at his master out of the corner 
 of his eyes, and a very faint smile twitched his 
 face. No respect for Muirhead kept him 
 silent, yet he said nothing. It was odd that in 
 this little personal altercation the boy was the 
 first to drop into contemptuous silence.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 There are old maids and old maids. Some 
 have the recognised habits of the species 
 encrusted on them too thickly and fast to allow 
 of any alteration by any accident ; others for 
 some imperceptible reason slough these habits 
 like a snake his skin (only that they really 
 renew them), and astonish and occasionally 
 terrify their relations into fits. I knew a 
 maiden lady of fifty who was so much struck 
 by the effect wrought on a lively contemporary 
 by a little rouge that she bought some herself, 
 moved from a respectable Sussex village into 
 the giddy frivolity of Brighton, and went to 
 every ball for five miles round (in a white dress 
 with blue ribbons) till she died. I knew 
 another who, having spent a long and virtuous 
 life in cultivating poetry and selling eggs, sud- 
 denly lost her head at the sight of a bicycle, 
 invested all her egg-savings in a "Humber" 
 with the latest improvements, and was 
 arrested by the police three times in five 
 weeks for scorching. Such reminiscences are 
 not, however, in any way (except by the 
 law of contraries) suggested by Miss Christina 
 27
 
 28 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Bertram, the lady to whom Fate, in unkind 
 caprice, had assigned the charge of Gerald 
 Franklin and his sister. 
 
 Miss Bertram was a queen among old maids, 
 a precision compared to whom Greenwich 
 Observatory clock was a disorderly and rowdy 
 piece of mechanism. She never broke, upset, 
 spoilt, or changed anything; she did every- 
 thing at the same hour every day every week, 
 and had detested all hurry and unrest from the 
 days when she screamed at her cradle being 
 rocked to this very morning when she had 
 reproved Jane for telling Bridget to "hurry 
 up with getting those children's bedrooms 
 ready." She lived in the little suburb of 
 Stoke called Hartshill, near to the Infirm- 
 ary, of which she was a pillar of support. The 
 house had at first been taken to accommodate 
 Miss Bertram's brother, who had also sup- 
 ported the Infirmary (as Secretary) for some 
 time, but was found at length to be rather in 
 the nature of a flying buttress, since he had 
 absconded to Spain with most of the current 
 funds. Miss Bertram had paid the greater 
 part of the money and no more was heard from 
 or about her brother by any human being in 
 England except a certain Stoke lawyer who 
 twice a year paid a certain sum of money on 
 Miss Bertram's behalf into a bank at Madrid,
 
 Resolved to be Rich 29 
 
 and after an interval of varying length got 
 receipts from Madrid, Rio Janeiro, Buenos 
 Ayres, and other places resorted to by gentle- 
 men for whom the police have made other 
 (though futile) arrangements. This little inci- 
 dent happened eleven years ago, and Miss Ber- 
 tram still occupied the house on Hartshill, 
 looking down through a cloud of blue smoke 
 into the valley where men and women worked 
 in their small companies flat-pressers, hollow- 
 ware pressers, "jolly women," casters and 
 squeezers and the great crates of dishes, 
 plates, jugs, basins, jam-pots, cups and vases, 
 were packed and swung into barges, for a 
 reality of 308. a week and a vision of heaven 
 knows what wealth and fame. In the blue 
 smoke-clouds Fortune hovered, sometimes out 
 of sight and sometimes in : you could hear the 
 rustle of her wings in those halcyon days as she 
 made a swoop, now on some young inventor, 
 now on some lucky speculator, and lifted him 
 up into the sunshine. During the daytime the 
 smoke-cloud hung motionless or in a high wind 
 rocked slowly to and fro, floating past the tall 
 chimneys out of which it had come : while at 
 night the orange-red light of colliery and iron- 
 work furnaces throbbed through it and played 
 over it like the rays of a flashing light-ship 
 over a heaving sea-swell.
 
 30 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Miss Bertram was expecting the arrival of 
 the two children one Wednesday afternoon in 
 May. She had thought of going to fetch them, 
 but considered that they would prefer to go 
 through their home-partings alone, and she sat 
 now at her sitting-room window watching for a 
 luggage-laden cab. It came into view pres- 
 ently, crawling up the steep hill and stopping 
 opposite her low green gate. The children got 
 out and walked soberly and a little shyly up 
 the front to the doorstep on which she was 
 standing. 
 
 "How do you do, Aunt Christina?" said 
 Monica; "we are so glad to be here." 
 
 "It is very kind of you to take us, Aunt 
 Christina," said Gerald. 
 
 Miss Bertram had asked the children to call 
 her Aunt Christina and they did so obediently. 
 Gerald always conceded these small unim- 
 portant points, maintaining that to do so sur- 
 prised people into conceding him large and 
 important ones. Miss Bertram, watching him, 
 saw with satisfaction that he wiped his boots 
 on the door-mat, hung his hat and coat in their 
 proper place in the hall, and walked twice 
 across the drawing-room, entered the dining- 
 room, and finished his tea without breaking 
 anything or even treading on the cat's tail. 
 She said to herself rashly that he was a
 
 Resolved to be Rich 31 
 
 model boy, and having had no expectation of 
 finding him more than tolerable she made up 
 her mind that she could tolerate him, and so 
 turned her attention to Monica. 
 
 And now, the villain of the piece having 
 been presented, we will if you please look at 
 the person who (if it is not premature to make 
 such an announcement) is to be the heroine. 
 
 Once upon a time, when Monica Franklin 
 was half-way between her seventh and eighth 
 birthdays, there arose some trifling occasion 
 when one of the children only one because 
 money had to be carefully guarded was to 
 accompany their aunt on a visit to a certain 
 relative where strawberries, sponge-cakes, 
 "tips," and other matters dear to the seven- 
 year-old heart, would certainly be plentiful. 
 Monica was first invited to go, but declined: 
 "Cousin Alison would like to see me best," 
 she said; "but Gerald would like to go best. 
 Take Gerald." And Gerald went. Written 
 on the child's face as she made her decision 
 you might see even then the proud little 
 knowledge of her own value in the world, the 
 certainty that people whose love and respect 
 were worth having loved and respected her, 
 and also the quietly resolute unselfishness 
 whose existence is a long wonder to those who 
 possess only the saving grace of being able to
 
 32 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 admire it. Now at the age of fifteen Monica 
 was for a time inclined to exaggerate this self- 
 renunciation, to give up things needlessly, to 
 fling self and the world too far on one side, and 
 yet to guard a very high rather conceited per- 
 haps idea of her own importance in the world. 
 As you may sometimes see a little child throw 
 away all its toys and fall upon a chair in an 
 apparently complete abandonment of woe, 
 while all the time it has one eye on its nurse 
 or mother to see that its sorrow is being 
 watched and to hint mutely that it is still open 
 to be consoled by kisses and chocolate : so their 
 elders may be noticed sometimes doing their 
 good works not for men to see but with the too 
 evident knowledge that men do see, and too 
 high an estimate of what is being done. And 
 for Miss Monica's personal appearance? Was 
 she lovely as an old-fashioned heroine or ugly 
 as a new-fashioned one should be? I know not 
 yet. I am blind as regards little children, 
 seeing only something which is small and inno- 
 cent and fresh and therefore fair, and being 
 myself content at any moment to exchange a 
 room full of the most lovely women in London 
 for the company of one little maiden with a 
 brain full of fairy-stories and eyes which ask 
 questions about all things, of all men, and 
 believe all the answers. What indeed is the
 
 Resolved to be Rich 33 
 
 pleasure of raven locks and flowing tresses if 
 you may not stroke them? of rose-petal cheeks 
 if they are not to be kissed? And would you 
 choose to listen to the talk of balls and fash- 
 ions, of theatres, scandal and theology, to stale 
 cynicism and staler philosophy oh ! the weari- 
 ness of it ! when you can have my little lady's 
 company with her whispers from the dawn of 
 life, with her breath of hope, and youth and 
 novelty, and faith? Miss Bertram at any rate 
 fell in love with her young charge from that 
 Wednesday evening, and watched over her and 
 puzzled over her as maiden ladies sometimes 
 will over such living problems, making little 
 advances, proffering timid bits of help, hold- 
 ing but experienced hands and showing the 
 stepping-stones at life's most dangerous cross- 
 ings. The two, woman and child, understood 
 and loved one another from the first. "She is 
 worth all our care ; we shall all be proud of her 
 one day," said Miss Christina to her chief 
 crony, the Vicar of Hartshill. 
 
 "And the boy?" asked Mr. Lowe, curiously. 
 
 "He is very nice too. A quiet, well-man- 
 nered, harmless little fellow. I like him very 
 much, though he has not got anything like his 
 sister's brains, or cleverness, or industry. He 
 has asked leave to bring his friend Mr. Muir- 
 head to tea here this afternoon one of the
 
 34 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 masters at his school, you know, and a great 
 friend of Gerald's. It is a good sign when a 
 boy and his master are friends, isn't it?" 
 
 Mr. Lowe looked round him doubtfully ; he 
 hardly liked to express the deep suspicion with 
 which he himself regarded Gerald and all his 
 friends. 
 
 "Here they come," went on Miss Bertram, 
 as the boy and his master walked up the front. 
 "You will stay and have tea with us, Mr. 
 Lowe, won't you? Have you ever met Mr. 
 Muirhead?" 
 
 "Yes, oh yes," said the parson. He had 
 risen as if to go, and now stood hesitating, 
 realising with a shock of surprise that he 
 regarded this boy with something absolutely 
 like fear. "It is too absurd, " he muttered to 
 himself, and accepting Miss Bertram's invita- 
 tion he went and stood by the mantel-piece 
 with his eyes on the door. 
 
 Muirhead was very soon on a friendly footing 
 with the company, talking of Infirmary busi- 
 ness, of the last big order received by Messrs. 
 Wedgewood, and other local matters with the 
 detailed accuracy and decision which always 
 marked his gossip. At tea he sat next to 
 Monica, who had a child's instinctive dislike of 
 him, but as the man was Gerald's friend did 
 not care to show it or speak of it. He asked
 
 Resolved to be Rich 35 
 
 her if she had yet made friends with Mary 
 Carton, who lived near by. The child said 
 no: her aunt only knew the Cartons very 
 slightly. 
 
 "Mr. Carton goes to races and bets and specu- 
 lates, " said Miss Bertram, shaking a big knife 
 at a loaf of bread as if the loaf were Tattersal's 
 Ring, and she were about to hack it in pieces. 
 "He made all his money by speculation. I 
 should not like Gerald to be intimate with him 
 or his sons. I am sure indeed that Gerald 
 would not care for such people. ' ' 
 
 Mr. Lowe glanced at Gerald, but the boy 
 was eating his bread and butter steadily with- 
 out paying any apparent attention. He scarcely 
 seemed to hear his aunt's remarks or Muir- 
 head's reply. 
 
 "I think," said the latter, "you can hardly 
 say that he got his money by speculation. He 
 joined with some other friends in buying some 
 shares in a company to make a railway in 
 Argentine. The railway was built and was 
 very successful. Is that speculation?" 
 
 "No one has any business to want more than 
 three per cent, for their money," said Miss 
 Bertram dogmatically. "Don't you think so, 
 too, Mr. Lowe?" 
 
 "I must confess that I am getting three and 
 a half for the ^4,000 which poor Mrs. Monckton
 
 36 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 left me," said the parson with a smile, "but I 
 think that is quite enough." 
 
 "You would get just double seven per cent. 
 in the East Argentine Railway," said Gerald 
 quietly. "That would be ^280 a year, and it 
 would be quite safe." 
 
 Miss Bertram looked at the boy with sus- 
 picion, Mr. Lowe with a sudden renewal of 
 vague fear. He had then been listening to 
 and taking in everything. Of course there had 
 been no harm in the conversation, but how 
 should this lad know that the East Argentine 
 Railway paid seven per cent. , and how had he 
 been able to calculate in ten seconds that 
 ^4,000 at seven per cent, would produce ^280 
 a year? Mr. Lowe would have required a pen- 
 cil and paper and five minutes to do the sum. 
 
 "I know more than one sound business 
 where you can get eight per cent, nowadays," 
 added Muirhead. 
 
 "I would rather buy tickets in a lottery!" 
 said Miss Bertram angrily. 
 
 Seeing that she was really annoyed, Muir- 
 head turned the conversation skilfully. 
 
 "I am surprised at the number of lotteries 
 which exist in this neighbourhood," he said. 
 "Harper has one at the Red Lion; Grenfell 
 had two last Christmas at his house ; Roberts 
 had one every Christmas, with prizes of geese,
 
 Resolved to be Rich 37 
 
 turkeys and plum-puddings, but he will never 
 have another. He used to win several some- 
 times half of the prizes himself, and people 
 talked of his good luck. The lottery was 
 managed like this: small pieces of tin were 
 numbered and put into a bag and one was 
 drawn out by the man's little seven-year-old 
 daughter. Last Christmas when the drawing 
 was going on there was a long pause, the child 
 holding her hand in the bag for an unusually 
 long time. Her father told her to be quick, to 
 which the child answered: 'I can't find the hot 
 one, father'! There won't be any more lot- 
 teries at the Old Canal Inn at Tunstall!" 
 
 "To make his innocent child a party to such 
 wickedness!" said Miss Bertram, who always 
 made the inevitable comment on a story. 
 "That Roberts was one of your parishioners, 
 Mr. Lowe, wasn't he?" 
 
 The Vicar answered yes without further 
 comment. He had been watching Gerald's 
 face again. At the point of Muirhead's story 
 the boy's lips had turned down and his eyes 
 had lit up with the beginning of a good laugh. 
 Then at Miss Bertram's words every symptom 
 of amusement had disappeared and he had 
 gone on eating quite gravely, so that a casual 
 observer would have judged that he saw as 
 little point in the story as Monica did. It was
 
 38 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 a curiously clever bit of acting, as Mr. Lowe 
 admitted to himself, with a mental addition of 
 "the wretched little hypocrite!" 
 
 Tea being over, Miss Bertram led the way 
 back to the drawing-room, and began a conver- 
 sation with Muirhead, who feeling that he had 
 not yet made a very favourable impression 
 talked more seriously while Mr. Lowe sat 
 down by Gerald. 
 
 "You are happy here?" he asked in a kindly 
 voice, resolute to overcome his antipathy to his 
 young charge. 
 
 "Yes, thank you." 
 
 "And has your aunt made any plans for you, 
 or" Gerald's face had remained absolutely 
 expressionless, and yet something compelled 
 the Vicar to add "have you made any for 
 yourself?" 
 
 "Oh no, none." 
 
 "Yet it is time to begin to think of this, isn't 
 it?" 
 
 "Yes, perhaps it is. " There was an air of 
 polite resignation on Gerald's face which would 
 have enchanted a cynical spectator. He was 
 evidently saying to himself: "Parsons and 
 platitudes happen to all men sometimes. I 
 will not even yawn in this worthy man's face if 
 I can help it. " So he sat giving gentle assent- 
 ing answers to everything said by Mr. Lowe,
 
 Resolved to be Rich 39 
 
 while he listened anxiously to the conversation 
 between his relation and Mr. Muirhead. He 
 was nervous about it: vexed at his master's 
 failure at tea-time: anxious that they should 
 make friends now if it was not too late. It 
 mattered much both to man and boy for certain 
 reasons that this should be so. Muirhead had 
 arrived to-day easily confident, believing in his 
 own power to make himself agreeable to any 
 one; the boy (who believed in no one) had 
 warned him to be careful where so much was 
 concerned, and he had not been careful and 
 things had gone wrong. There was a change 
 for the better before Muirhead left the house, 
 but the visit, Gerald told himself, had not been 
 a success.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 The number of signs and omens which 
 prophesy disaster (after the disaster has 
 occurred) to "every one with eyes in his head" 
 is truly remarkable. When an engagement is 
 broken off half the friends of the lady appear 
 to have "known from the first" by certain 
 symptoms that it would never last. When a 
 man takes to gambling or drinking and finally 
 uses (or misuses) his razor to his throat, his 
 relatives have mostly "seen it in his eye" 
 (horses, brandy-bottle and razor complete) 
 from infancy. Thus when at a subsequent 
 date the newspapers were full of the names of 
 Messrs. Gerald Franklin and Sampson Muir- 
 head more than one of their Staffordshire 
 neighbours declared on their conscience that 
 they felt quite queer and even shivered on first 
 seeing a certain brass plate with the name of 
 "Mr. Sampson Muirhead, Agent for the Mer- 
 ton . Insurance Company, " on a door in the 
 High Street of Newcastle-under-Lyme. Yet 
 'twas quite a modest little plate marking two 
 modest little first-floor rooms, nearly opposite 
 40
 
 Resolved to be Rich 41 
 
 to the town-hall, where on police-court days 
 you might see the prisoners being brought in 
 and out by staid policemen, and next door to 
 the shop of Mr. Briggs, unto whom resort all the 
 rank and fashion of North Staffordshire when 
 they require dresses, ribbons, laces, and other 
 matters of adornment and use. Upstairs there 
 was even less cause for shivering. In the outer 
 room sat Gerald with a ledger or two in front 
 of him "and a pen in his hand: in the inner 
 room sat Muirhead writing letters; two more 
 guileless persons you could not wish to see. 
 Business came in slowly but steadily, policies 
 multiplied, commissions swelled, another clerk 
 was engaged, before a year was over the High 
 Street office was too small for Muirhead 's 
 work. He and his young partner sat together 
 in the outer room one morning before business 
 hours discussing a move into larger premises, 
 and debating whether they were justified in 
 recommending the Company to take a whole 
 house and engage two more clerks and can- 
 vassers. It was a certain Wednesday morning, 
 Gerald's sixteenth birthday how well he 
 remembered it in after years! and he had 
 promised to go home for the afternoon; not 
 that he had much feeling about birthdays him- 
 self but that Miss Bertram and Monica had 
 made a great appeal for the half-holiday and
 
 42 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Muirhead, for his own purposes, had insisted 
 on according it. At nine o'clock the second 
 clerk arrived, a young man five years older than 
 Gerald in years and about fifty years younger 
 in most other respects. The youth, Nicholson 
 by name, hung up his coat and hat and came 
 to the fire to warm his hands, for it was snow- 
 ing slightly, an east wind was blowing cuttingly 
 and other genial signs of an English spring 
 were to be seen and felt outside. Gerald 
 saluted the new-comer with a grave good- 
 morning, Muirhead gave him a nod and went 
 on talking, while Nicholson, after leaning over 
 the fire for a moment, went up to his desk and 
 stood looking down on it as if he were a swim- 
 mer about to plunge boldly into a sea of figures. 
 
 There was a knock at the door, and in 
 response to Muirhead's "come in" there 
 entered a man of middle height, with short 
 black beard, moustache and whiskers, and hair 
 of the dull shadowless black which suggests 
 hair-dye not very skilfully applied. His face 
 was so overpowered by this black framework 
 that no man after talking to Mr. Joshua Mar- 
 shall for an hour could tell you whether his 
 nose was straight or crooked, whether his eyes 
 were blue or green, honest or shifty ; they only 
 knew that he was very black. 
 
 "Mr. Muirhead?" said the new-comer inter-
 
 Resolved to be Rich 43 
 
 relatively. It was curious that though there 
 could hardly be much mistake as to which was 
 the elder man of the two, Marshall turned 
 first to Gerald, as if recognising something of 
 the leader in the lad's face, but he was quick 
 to see his mistake. 
 
 ' ' I have come down from London to speak to 
 you about a new building society for which we 
 want agents in this part of the world. May I 
 speak to you privately?" 
 
 Muirhead led the way into the inner room 
 and Gerald and the stranger followed, the 
 latter seeming to take for granted that the boy 
 would come too. Marshall explained to them 
 that several small building societies in different 
 parts of England had recently amalgamated 
 into one big society which had established 
 some headquarters in London and proposed to 
 extend itself all over England. They wanted 
 help of two kinds; first some local clergy, 
 schoolmasters and such like people who could 
 influence money, but in their own unbusiness- 
 like fashion ; secondly, some smart business 
 men to reduce the proceedings of these miscel- 
 laneous canvassers to order. The pay for this 
 latter work would be good. Would Muirhead 
 and Franklin undertake it? 
 
 The matter was discussed at length, and 
 finally the partners agreed to Marshall's pro-
 
 44 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 posals. The man himself filled them with 
 respect, especially Gerald, who was making his 
 first acquaintance with London city smartness. 
 Marshall seemed to know everybody in their 
 neighbourhood, his or her income, prospects 
 and capacities. He knew ten times more 
 about the Merton Insurance Company as a 
 whole than they did themselves, and quite as 
 much as they did about the Staffordshire 
 branch of it. His explanation of the work 
 required by his own society was a model of 
 clearness, and though he held papers in his 
 hand, he rarely looked at them, whether men- 
 tioning sums of thousands of pounds or 
 explaining how fifteen shillings could be saved 
 by drawing up building contracts in one way 
 rather than another. Gerald looked on in 
 ever-growing admiration, and Marshall on his 
 side seemed almost as much impressed by the 
 boy, and spoke to him instead of to Muirhead 
 with increasing frequency. Indeed it was the 
 boy who decided the matter at last, agreeing to 
 Marshall's proposals and finally inviting Mar- 
 shall to come and dine with himself and his 
 family. The visitor knew Miss Bertram's 
 name, apparently, as he did that of everybody 
 in the district with money to invest, and 
 accepted the invitation, for which indeed it 
 might have struck some persons that he had
 
 Resolved to be Rich 45 
 
 been angling, so that at one o'clock the three 
 men walked down to Hartshill chatting amiably 
 as they went. 
 
 Two of them were expected, and Miss Ber- 
 tram, on being told privately by Gerald of the 
 business on which the stranger had come, did 
 her best to make him welcome. She had an 
 acute suspicion and mistrust of all these finan- 
 cial folk with sharp eyes and incomprehensible 
 talk who were collecting round her young kins- 
 man, but she was obliged to think that it was 
 all right. Gerald, at any rate, seemed to be 
 prospering, to be keeping regular hours and 
 decent company and earning good money. 
 Certainly she ought to be content and even 
 more, for the lad came to church with them on 
 Sunday morning and evening, talked respect- 
 fully enough to his elders, had agreed readily 
 to be confirmed when Mr. Lowe asked him, 
 and even went to three or four of the Vicar's 
 classes before that event, and conducted him- 
 self, when there, with perfect propriety. Miss 
 Bertram professed satisfaction with her lips, 
 and, if she did not feel it, could not have told 
 even herself why. One has a vague idea 
 about certain things and people which can only 
 be summed up in the words that they are too 
 good to be true, and, if Miss Bertram had put 
 into words her exact feeling about Gerald, she
 
 46 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 would have used some such expression. For 
 Muirhead she had a more pronounced dislike 
 and mistrust; though hardly seeing how to 
 prevent them, she objected to his visits here, 
 especially now that Monica was growing up, 
 and she could see or thought that she could 
 see his eyes already resting with pleasure on 
 the fair young face of her ward. 
 
 Monica Franklin, at the age of seventeen, 
 had the grave sober look common to children 
 who have lived alone with an elder for many 
 years. Her hair was done up, her dresses were 
 long and a little old-fashioned, but the quaint 
 seriousness of dress and manner seemed to 
 suit marvellously well with the grave, beautiful 
 young face of the child. Withal, she was not 
 always to all men a very pleasant companion. 
 While you were admiring the steady grey eyes, 
 you became conscious that they were looking 
 through you, judging and condemning what 
 they saw. As you watched the soft, mobile 
 mouth with its red lips, it suddenly opened 
 and asked an awkward question, or spoke some 
 quiet, half-conscious disapproval of what you 
 were saying. With very few people did Monica 
 drop her reserve and coldly judicial attitude; 
 certainly not with her brother or his friends. 
 Gerald talked freely to her about his likes and 
 dislikes, his plans, hopes, judgments, and work;
 
 Resolved to be Rich 47 
 
 he had made no concealment of them from her 
 in the past, and, finding- it difficult to begin to 
 do so, he continued his revelations, which 
 squared so little with any of Monica's prin- 
 ciples and ideals that she began after a time to 
 merely study her brother and his friends as 
 types of humanity and very unpleasing types 
 she thought them. To-day, when she came 
 into the room, it was with the intention of 
 keeping perfectly quiet and leaving all the con- 
 versation to her aunt and Muirhead. But her 
 intention received a curious check.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 White, nervous and silent, with restless 
 hands and trembling lips, staring blankly alike 
 at Monica when she came in to speak to Muir- 
 head, and at the servant who came in to 
 announce the mid-day dinner what was the 
 matter with Miss Christina Bertram? She had 
 been introduced to Marshall, had sat down 
 opposite to him and talked to him in her usual 
 quiet, reserved manner for a minute or two, 
 and then her face had slowly frozen, and her 
 eyes dilated with bewilderment and fear. He 
 sat opposite to her talking easily about the 
 neighbourhood, which he seemed to have 
 visited before, and to know slightly apart from 
 business matters; and if he looked a trifle 
 whiter than usual, well, no one who knew him 
 was perhaps present to notice it. He glanced 
 admiringly at Monica as she came in, and 
 flashed an amused look at Muirhead, who 
 started up in eager greeting. At dinner he 
 talked fluently rather too much so, praising 
 everything in a slightly condescending fashion. 
 
 "English meat is so good, "he began once, 
 48
 
 Resolved to be Rich 49 
 
 "I have passed much of my time in Southern 
 Europe, where everything is so nasty that I 
 am greedy over English meals. I spent a 
 month once in an inn kept by Italians; the only 
 servants were the son and daughter of the 
 landlady. The son waited on us; a very 
 handsome young man he was, I assure you, 
 Miss Franklin; his name was Orestes, and 
 after dinner he played the mandolin in the 
 garden. The girl was very good-looking, and 
 a great friend of mine very great. I should 
 hardly like to tell you all that passed between 
 us, Miss Franklin, I assure you." He laughed 
 across at the girl with bold, coarse eyes, and 
 she coloured angrily. "Then our peace was 
 disturbed by the arrival of some more visitors 
 for whom a chef had to be engaged. The chef 
 quarrelled with Orestes, and as he kept a knife 
 in his belt and a revolver in his pocket, we 
 feared every day that we should be left without 
 a waiter. If I begged Orestes to get me some 
 food he would be sure to come back saying that 
 it was cooked and ready, but that he dare not 
 get it because the chef was guarding it with his 
 pistols loaded and cocked, and his knife sharp- 
 ened in his hand." 
 
 "How very Italian!" laughed Muirhead. 
 "You said it was in Italy, didn't you?" 
 
 "It was in Southern Europe," said Marshall
 
 SO Resolved to be Rich 
 
 curtly. "The people were Italians, yes. 
 Have you ever been abroad, Miss Franklin?" 
 
 It was odd that the man never addressed 
 himself to Miss Bertram, always to Monica. 
 As the girl shook her head he went on talking 
 to her with the expansive smile and voice 
 growing continually louder of a man who 
 thinks that he is the object of every one's 
 admiration. 
 
 "I know most of the world pretty well," he 
 said. "My friends tell me that I have been 
 into every country in the world, and brought 
 away a little additional wickedness from each 
 of them. Friends say these kind things to us, 
 Miss Franklin! At any rate I know the four 
 continents well; or are there five, Miss Frank- 
 lin? I am always willing to receive corrections 
 from you. I shall write my adventures one 
 day. All the books of travel which I have 
 ever read are the most shocking nonsense ; one 
 closes the book and one's left eye together. I 
 remember somewhere or other in some part of 
 Europe where I was once in my youth there 
 was a man who used to tell travel stories and 
 to write them too. Every one hung on his 
 words, and no one paid any attention to me. 
 He was the idol of the neighbourhood, you 
 understand, and I was the idler, ha, ha! You 
 must excuse my little jokes, Miss Franklin;
 
 Resolved to be Rich 51 
 
 but one day he began to tell . . . Can I 
 help you, Miss Franklin? Is your aunt ill?" 
 
 Miss Bertram's face had turned to such an 
 ashen grey during the progress of this narrative 
 that Monica jumped up and ran round to the 
 head of the table, asking whether she should 
 get some brandy or sal-volatile. But by an 
 immense effort the woman recovered speech 
 and movement; with forced calm she made 
 some small excuse for her attack and went on 
 playing with the food on her plate. Marshall 
 did not resume his story, but /sat silent for 
 nearly a minute with the vexed /puzzled look of 
 a man who knows that he has been guilty of 
 some indiscretion, but cannot settle exactly 
 what it is. A little talk went on between 
 Monica, Muirhead and Gerald, during the 
 interval; then Marshall's loud voice began 
 again, and put a stop to all further conversa- 
 tion by keeping all the task to itself. 
 
 Shortly after dinner Nicholson arrived with 
 his sister. 
 
 "We are at a birthday party. It is Gerald 
 Franklin's sixteenth birthday," said Muirhead 
 to Marshall, and the latter's stare of surprise 
 amused his companion. 
 
 "Sixteen!" muttered the Londoner. "Six- 
 teen! Oh, Lord! Yes, we want that young 
 man for our work. Decidedly we want him."
 
 52 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 The afternoon dragged by a little heavily. 
 Marshall's booming voice got on every one's 
 nerves, and all the inmates of the little draw- 
 ing-room except one were wondering why he 
 did not go. Presently it appeared that he 
 wanted to catch the 6 : 30 train from Stoke to 
 London, and Muirhead explained the way to 
 the station with elaborate plans. "You can 
 see the whole road from the dining-room 
 window," said Miss Bertram, suddenly rising 
 from her chair and leading the way into the 
 dining-room. Marshall followed and the two 
 stood by the window looking down on to Stoke. 
 Then without looking round or moving, and in 
 a scared shaking voice, Miss Bertram asked 
 abruptly : 
 
 "What are you doing here? Why have you 
 come back?"
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 A great friend of mine who had gained a 
 precarious livelihood between the ages of 
 twenty and forty by stealing horses in Texas, 
 "holding up" stage-coaches in California, rob- 
 bing gold-convoys in West Australia, slave- 
 dealing and illicit-diamond-buying in Africa, 
 piracy on the high seas, and other methods on 
 which Society has placed its irrational ban, 
 told me once that nothing in his career had ever 
 irritated him more than the discovery of those 
 varied and artistic disguises which circum- 
 stances (and by circumstances he of course 
 meant the police) forced him to adopt. He 
 was not clever at disguising himself; it was the 
 weak point in his otherwise admirable intelli- 
 gence ; but to the end of his life (which regret- 
 table event took place on a gallows in Sydney, 
 New South Wales) he could never be convinced 
 of this fact, and not only would he recount to 
 me with genuine amazement and vexation how 
 the police found him out again and again, but on 
 one occasion when I met him in the streets of 
 Buenos Ayres disguised as an Argentine police- 
 
 53
 
 54 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 man (certainly his most brilliant effort of imag- 
 ination), and went up to him with a delighted, 
 "My dear C , how are you?" the proceed- 
 ing on my part nearly cost me his friendship. 
 "Take my word for it," he said, frowning and 
 working his mouth about so that his wig got 
 away and one of his whiskers fell off; "take 
 my word for it you can't annoy a man in my 
 position more than by recognising him even if 
 you are his friend, and it is done in private. 
 Not only does he realise that much time and 
 money have been wasted, but fancy the fool 
 that he feels walking about with his discoverer 
 in the outrageous clothes and false hair, and 
 high heels and false stomach, which his friend 
 has seen through and is laughing at!" 
 
 Mr. Marshall's annoyance at being recog- 
 nised by his sister was a reproduction of the 
 complex feelings so eloquently described by 
 
 poor C . He looked at her first in angry 
 
 astonishment, then with a semblance of polite 
 amazement as if minded to deny that he was 
 her brother, the ex-secretary of the North 
 Staffordshire Infirmary; then evidently giving 
 up this idea as a bad job he looked out of the 
 window with sullen wrath in his eyes and a 
 very miserable skeleton of a smile on the rest 
 of his face. 
 
 "I have been trying all afternoon for a
 
 Resolved to be Rich 55 
 
 chance to see you alone and tell you who I 
 am," he said, wondering whether the woman 
 believed him, and very easily perceiving that 
 she did not. 
 
 "What are you doing here?" she insisted. 
 "Why have you come back?" 
 
 "I wanted to make some money," he said at 
 last; "and one can only do that in England. 
 Are you so very unhappy at seeing me again?" 
 he added sentimentally. 
 
 The woman turned and looked full at him 
 for the first time since she had sat opposite to 
 him before lunch and realised who he was. 
 She studied the white, slightly-puffed cheeks; 
 the coarse, bold eyes; the profusion of black 
 hair, curled and oiled and scented. The fel- 
 low looked like a prosperous provincial money- 
 lender. Miss Christina shuddered slightly and 
 turned away. Above all the other thoughts 
 caused by this return above the certainty that 
 Marshall was living dishonestly, that he would 
 worry her by demanding her money, making 
 friends with Monica and influencing Gerald, 
 and would generally make her life in Stafford- 
 shire intolerable rose a feeling of pure per- 
 sonal dislike for the man himself. Her brother 
 had filled her with anxiety all, his life; now he 
 disgusted her. 
 
 Marshall thought that she was overpowered
 
 56 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 by emotion and threw more pathos into his 
 face and voice, which looked and sounded like 
 those of a melodramatic actor playing the per- 
 secuted curate in a small country theatre. 
 
 "It has saddened me," he went on, "to come 
 back to these scenes of my youth, and to think 
 that I shall never be able to visit them again 
 under my own name. At least I suppose not. 
 Did they tell me, Chris," he dropped his 
 voice still lower and moved nearer to her, "did 
 they issue a warrant against me directly I had 
 gone off? Are they still looking for me, eh? 
 I haven't liked to make any inquiries." 
 
 Miss Bertram stood silent. In a second it 
 flashed across her how easy it would be to 
 keep the man in check by fear of arrest if he 
 thought that a warrant had been issued for his 
 apprehension and was still out. Gerald's 
 future, Monica's happiness, her own peace, 
 might depend on her having some hold over 
 him. She could not lie about it, but answered 
 coldly : 
 
 "I suppose a warrant holds good until you 
 are caught, however long a time it may be 
 afterwards. Are you staying on in England?" 
 
 "Yes, I am quite safe. Smart chap that 
 youngster of yours. And his sister is a very 
 pretty girl, too. Where did they come from, 
 and what are they doing here?"
 
 Resolved to be Rich 57 
 
 "As you will never see or speak to either of 
 them again after to-day, I do not think that I 
 need tell you their story." 
 
 The fellow looked at her, stroking his black 
 whiskers and considering. He did not mean 
 to defy her, partly because he anticipated 
 wanting her money, partly because he was not 
 quite sure how far she would go in defence of 
 her young charges. She was clearly very fond 
 of them. Equally clearly, he regretted to 
 notice, she was not at all fond of him, and had 
 no sentimental recollection of the days when 
 they were young and played (or, as he would 
 have preferred to call it in his present mood, 
 sported) together, and were whipped one after 
 another for playing truant from school, and 
 were sent to bed equally hungry in adjoin- 
 ing bedrooms. So Marshall answered her 
 mildly: 
 
 "Of course not; of course not; just as you 
 
 will. I might have helped the boy, but it 
 
 shall be as you please. And for his sister 
 
 she is really a very pretty girl. How 
 
 old is she? Twenty, perhaps?" 
 
 "She is seventeen," said Miss Bertram, 
 stiffly, "and the boy is sixteen. He could be 
 no possible use to you in any business. He is 
 a mere boy, just out of school, and knows 
 nothing of any money-matters, though, of
 
 58 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 course, Mr. Muirhead is teaching him some- 
 thing." 
 
 "Muirhead teach that youth . . . !" 
 muttered Marshall with a laugh. "What he 
 doesn't know about money-matters isn't worth 
 knowing. Muirhead couldn't teach him 
 much. He's forgotten more than Muirhead 
 ever knew. Gerald Franklin . . . that 
 would be a son of that head clerk in the rail- 
 way office, I suppose?" 
 
 "Yes," said Miss Bertram unwillingly. 
 
 "I think I remember him. And Monica 
 . . . Monica . . ." The man dwelt on 
 the name with a slight smile on his lips, and 
 Miss Christina glanced at him in angry amaze- 
 ment. At last he turned abruptly away and 
 went into the next room. 
 
 "I must catch the 6:30 from Stoke," he was 
 saying when she followed him in, "and must 
 go at once. Good-bye, Miss Franklin. I 
 shall be indeed vexed if I cannot find an excuse 
 to come here again soon, and call on your aunt 
 and you. Good-bye, Mr. Franklin. You will 
 hear from us in London very soon. You are 
 coming part of the way to the station with me, 
 Mr. Muirhead? That is very good of you. 
 Thank you. Good-bye, Miss Bertram." The 
 man looked at her with much show of depre- 
 catory humility, but she shook her head wrath-
 
 Resolved to be Rich 59 
 
 fully, and when they were close together for a 
 moment near the front door, she muttered to 
 him: "You will not come here again . . . 
 never, or you know the consequences!" He 
 looked at her with a smile, gently and humbly 
 defiant, and departed. 
 
 The swagger and bravado left Marshall as he 
 turned with his companion out of the gate and 
 walked along the crest of the hill. He hardly 
 heard Muirhead's remarks, and answered at 
 random, looking down the while, with scoffings 
 at his own sentiment, but with eyes full of 
 regret and pain and half-formed impotent 
 remorse, over the home-scene in the sunset- 
 tinted valley below. Which of us can quite 
 kill the delicate far-reaching fibres of that love 
 for scenes with which our youth has been 
 bound up for long, happy years our youth 
 that white dawn which vice, and folly, and pas- 
 sion, have at worst as yet only smirched for a 
 few moments? The faith in God, in His for- 
 giveness, and help and love, in the possibility 
 of a new life beginning daily, with courage and 
 hope for its ministers and Heaven for its end : 
 how many men have lost these through long, 
 wandering years to find them again in some 
 wet, scented woods, spring-tinted and silent, 
 where years ago they used to go a-maying with 
 the friends whom they have now defrauded or
 
 60 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 forgotten, and picked white boughs of cherry- 
 blossom for a small sister who was too small to 
 reach them? How many? . . . and some, 
 after the finding, have struggled back through 
 repentance and restitution, through tears and 
 retribution, and borne the burden of their 
 years to the light; while others have sighed 
 and enjoyed for a spell this new subtle pain 
 of memory, and stretched out feeble hands 
 towards the lost innocence ; and so come back 
 to the life of the moment, to an express to 
 London, a city office, a money-getting or 
 pleasure-hunting machine, which must go for- 
 ward at all costs.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 There is more reality, more intense emotion, 
 a keener pleasure and a bitterer pain in the 
 backwaters of life than in its main stream. 
 Hurry, noise, money-getting, the type-writer 
 and the electric light, are not real life. 
 
 On the main stream of the Amazons you fly 
 by on fast steamers, you pass boats bringing 
 turtles from Ega, timber from the Madeira 
 forests, india-rubber from all parts to Para. 
 You stop at Macapa, Santarem, Barra, Manaos; 
 drive bargains in india-rubber; exchange 
 remedies for mosquito-bites; and then hurry 
 along as you voyage to St. Paolo. The river is 
 wide, busy, ugly : you do not stop to think, but 
 hurry on. 
 
 But on the backwaters of the Amazons you 
 rest and think, and feel your own emotions, 
 recognising the true value of everything. Sit- 
 ting under a tree, 200 feet high and 50 feet in 
 girth and 1000 years old, in a forest 3000 miles 
 long and 500 miles across, you see what it 
 really means to be 5 feet 10 inches in height, 
 and to live for four score years. All around
 
 62 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 you Nature is free to develop herself. The 
 forest glades are a vast fernery ; orchids and 
 lianas hang from the great assai palms ; scarlet 
 and green tanagers, red and yellow macaws, 
 bright-coloured butterflies, flit to and fro; 
 down the slow-moving stream floats a great 
 boa-constrictor curled round the branch of a 
 tree, which he steers with his tail. Big 
 pumice-stones which have been made round as 
 balls by being washed about in the shallow 
 streams at the foot of the Andes volcanoes 
 drift ashore, bearing eggs and seeds of insects 
 and plants from 1200 miles away which are 
 seized upon and propagated in a thousand 
 variations by the insects and plants round you. 
 And sitting in the midst of this rioting nature 
 you see that you are a small, not so very 
 important part of it all. You can, it is true, 
 pick the orchids, catch or shoot the parrots, 
 and trample over the ferns; but, man alive! 
 what happens to you if you pass under a 
 branch from which a snake is hanging looking 
 out for something to eat? And did seeds 
 travel 1000 miles to unite with others in pro- 
 ducing you? You are not so very wonderful 
 after all. . . . The truths and realities of 
 life are only seen in life's backwaters. 
 
 There was a backwater at Hartshill on the 
 banks of which Mr. Reginald Nicholson, clerk
 
 Resolved to be Rich 63 
 
 to Messrs. Muirhead & Franklin, wandered, 
 and saw clearly that money-making was so 
 small a part of life as hardly to be worth call- 
 ing life at all, and that love mattered every- 
 thing. Anon he meditated on this discovery 
 alone, and anon he told the story of his love to 
 an audience of one. I do not mean to suggest 
 that he ever said to Monica in words, "I love 
 you, please marry me," for this, as he well 
 knew, would have been the signal for his 
 immediate ejection from the house by Monica's 
 aunt ; but he said it in a thousand other ways. 
 Indeed, when eyes and mute lips can tell tales 
 so much more clearly than words, it hath 
 always seemed to me remarkable that parents 
 and guardians should attach so much impor- 
 tance to the escape of such second-rate mes- 
 sengers. "Will yon give me your word, if I 
 let you remain here, not to speak to my 
 daughter about this for another two years?" 
 Oh, foolish father! to think such a pledge 
 when given worth twopence ; when the young 
 man that very morning will look such love and 
 hopes into his mistress' eyes as no words or 
 kisses, or a diamond engagement-ring itself 
 could tell of! 
 
 Nicholson was the eldest son of a pottery 
 manufacturer in Stoke who, having a great 
 admiration for Muirhead, had sent his son to
 
 64 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 him to be taught book-keeping and other such 
 business matters as might be picked up in the 
 branch of a big insurance office. He did cer- 
 tain work for Muirhead in return for this 
 instruction, coming into Newcastle every morn- 
 ing at nine, and returning to his home just 
 outside Stoke (when he could find no excuse 
 for going to Hartshill, which was not often) at 
 six. He was a happy-minded, easy-going 
 youngster, well educated, contented with life 
 (except when Monica was angry), unsuspicious, 
 and clean in mind and body. His years num- 
 bered twenty-one, and he loved Monica Frank- 
 lin with the single-hearted unselfishness and 
 purity which you may see sometimes in lovers 
 of his age. I do not mean to say that he would 
 have given her up to some one else if he saw 
 that she preferred his rival, or that he would 
 not have sulked for an afternoon if she had 
 permitted some audacious pretender to button 
 her glove or give her a new carnation for her 
 garden; Nicholson would on the contrary have 
 cuffed the head of such a man, or cheerfully 
 helped to do him any reasonable injury; but 
 when Monica wanted something which did not 
 square with Nicholson's recreations or pleasure 
 or happiness, the something in question was 
 always given to her. The girl watched her 
 admirer with a little bewilderment (for he was
 
 Resolved to be Rich 65 
 
 her first lover), a little wonder and doubt, 
 sometimes with a touch of amusement, and just 
 now and again with a little inclination to return 
 his love. It is only in the back-waters, you 
 know, that two lives like these can be noticed 
 drifting down stream and coming nearer and 
 nearer together as they sweep along. I do not 
 know that their story it is so old! is really 
 very interesting. It is stale rather, is it not, 
 this history of young love, this book of inno- 
 cence written in white on white? But we will 
 get back soon to the main stream. After all, 
 however much more interesting and real the 
 tranquillity of the back-water may be to the 
 philosopher, one must have hurry and noise in 
 a story. 
 
 The little house in Hartshill had a garden, 
 and the garden had a summer-house, built by 
 some friendly architect who knew that people 
 occasionally had something to say which 
 entailed sitting close together, touching one 
 another's hands, and other proceedings which 
 cannot be carried on in view of drawing-room 
 windows. On a bench in this summer-house 
 sat Reggie Nicholson and Monica watching the 
 friendly April sun which had come out for a 
 few moments before he went to bed, to dry up 
 the rain and warm the damp air. 
 
 "Who is this man Marshall, Mr. Nicholson?"
 
 66 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 They had not reached the stage of Christian 
 names yet, even in the summer-house, though 
 now and then Reggie slipped out a "Monica," 
 and pretended to look very much annoyed by 
 his mistake. 
 
 "He came down from London this morn- 
 ing," answered the young man. "I don't 
 know what about. Miss Bertram didn't seem 
 to take to him exactly." 
 
 "He was detestable," said Monica, which 
 settled the estimate of Marshall for both of 
 them. 
 
 "Yet you talked to him all afternoon," said 
 Nicholson, relieved to find that his lady-love 
 had not returned Marshall's too evident admira- 
 tion, yet willing to air his grievance in case she 
 should think it one worthy of compensation. 
 
 "You mean he talked to me," said Monica 
 with a laugh. "I would have been just thank- 
 ful to any one who had saved me. I looked 
 across at you and your sister a dozen times 
 wishing you would come." 
 
 "I suppose then that Franklin or Muirhead 
 or Martha would have done just as well?" 
 
 Martha was Miss Bertram's housemaid, and 
 Mr. Nicholson, you perceive, was in a huff 
 because Monica had bracketed him with his 
 sister in her last sentence. Some people are 
 never satisfied, and you may be sure that no
 
 Resolved to be Rich 67 
 
 one ever knew for certain at what a lover 
 would or would not take offence. Monica did 
 not know, and sat for a moment considering 
 why he spoke in this resentful voice. 
 
 "I am sorry that he is coming to see Mr. 
 Muirhead and Gerald again," went on the girl; 
 "he will do them harm: he is not honest." 
 
 "I will keep your brother out of his way as 
 much as possible," said the young man, point- 
 edly ignoring her inclusion of Muirhead. And 
 the extent of his acquaintance with his 
 employers may be guessed from the fact that 
 he really believed in his own ability to do what 
 he promised. The girl flashed a grateful little 
 look at him in which was yet a little wonder at 
 the resentment in his voice. She knew her 
 brother about as well as Reggie did, and really 
 believed that he was open to such mild influ- 
 ences as Nicholson could bring to bear on him. 
 Then she stood up and wandered to the front 
 of the summer-house and he stood as close as 
 he dared to her side, happy when a breath of 
 evening wind blew her dress against him, and 
 to think that he must hold her hand in his for 
 half a minute perhaps if he could talk on and 
 make her forget when he went. How such 
 evenings hang in the memory when a hundred 
 great triumphs are forgotten! You see, the 
 life of the back-waters, being real, lives on.
 
 68 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 It was time to go, long past it really, but 
 even lovers have a parting hour which they 
 recognise as inevitable. It is controlled of 
 course by no such trivial matters as the clock, 
 but mostly by sudden fear lest their mistress 
 should be getting tired of them. Such a sus- 
 picion came to Nicholson's mind now, and he 
 rose to go. 
 
 "I am afraid your brother means to have a 
 lot to do with this man," he said, being in fact 
 afraid of nothing of the sort and infinitely 
 indifferent to Marshall's proceedings, house 
 building or insurance, honest or dishonest,' in 
 Newcastle; but it was an absorbing topic to 
 Monica, who might therefore forget that her 
 hand was being held all the time; "but I will 
 never miss an opportunity of telling him what 
 I think of the fellow. You must do the same 
 and we will drive him out between us. Good- 
 bye, Miss Franklin. I see my sister coming 
 to look for me. I must go and get the pony- 
 cart and take her home. " 
 
 The girl stood quite still with her eyes on 
 the ground and a soft flush like the reflection 
 of some pale pink light on her cheeks. He 
 held her hand still, though he could find no 
 further words, could think of nothing except 
 that he loved his young companion and wanted 
 to tell her so, to put his arm round her and
 
 Resolved to be Rich 69 
 
 whisper his story of love. Then at last she 
 took her hand away and said good-bye in a 
 very low voice, and stood still again for a 
 moment as if waiting for him to say something 
 more. And as he did not say it they both 
 turned and walked slowly homewards. . . . 
 Such an old stale story! as old as the sunset 
 which was painting the western clouds with 
 gorgeous scarlet and gold, as old as the hills 
 which to-morrow's sunrise would tinge with 
 primrose and rose! as dull as the little back- 
 water where only the leaves rustle and the 
 waters sweep past bending reeds, and the air 
 sings with the rapid beating of birds' wings! 
 Yet it is a page in the life of the heroine of this 
 tale which must be told if the rest is to be 
 clear, and thus with many apologies I offer it 
 to the readers of Monica's story.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 "No, sir; I am not at all satisfied with 
 Reginald. ' ' 
 
 The time was about a year after Marshall's 
 first visit to Staffordshire, and the speaker was 
 Reginald Nicholson's father, who after the 
 manner of many of his species was holding 
 forth to a companion about his son's misdeeds. 
 It really never seems to occur to persons of this 
 kind that the knowledge which they obtain 
 about their offspring owing to circumstances 
 (mostly financial) over which the offspring 
 has no control, is private. Most people know 
 the story of Schopenhauer sitting at dinner 
 with a party of men friends round him and 
 a twenty-franc piece by the side of his plate. 
 "There is a louis," said the philosopher, 
 "which I have placed here every night for 
 a month with the intention of giving it to 
 the poor when these gentlemen shall have 
 spoken during dinner of something else than 
 promotion, horses, or women. I still have the 
 louis." It would be safe to make the same 
 promise (though it might be prudent to do it 
 70
 
 Resolved to be Rich 71 
 
 more quietly) with regard to an average party 
 of men at an English club, if you added to 
 your list of subjects their son's school-bills, 
 debts, and other iniquities. This is very 
 improper behaviour on the part of one's father. 
 
 Mr. Nicholson's companion was the Rev. 
 Canon Hobart, vicar of Stoke-on-Trent, a 
 middle-aged bachelor with a rich living, nine 
 curates (instead of the nine children which 
 might have been expected from his profession) 
 and a fund of quiet humour which made his 
 parishioners an object of inexhaustible joy to 
 himself, and himself an object of unmitigated 
 terror to his parishioners. 
 
 "No; I am not satisfied with him," repeated 
 Nicholson, senior. "My children are all grow- 
 ing up a bit cranky. There is Ethel wanting 
 to ride a bicycle ; to dress like a man, Canon ; 
 to wear what she calls divided skirts. I said to 
 her, 'Take that thing off, my dear; as a favour 
 to me take it off,' I said. 'I don't object to 
 you trying to look like a man,' I said. 'It's 
 the kind of man you succeed in looking like 
 now that I object to,' I said. That's what I 
 said to her. Then there's Reggie. I began 
 life at his age in Josiah Wedgewood's works 
 with 4s. a week, rising 23. 6d. every year till I 
 had 3 is. at the end of my apprenticeship. 
 What do I offer my son, sir? My own pay,
 
 72 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 which ought to be good enough for him if it 
 was good enough for me? Not a bit of it. I 
 said to him : 'Go and learn figuring with Muir- 
 head and then take a choice.' I said, 'You can 
 travel for us and then have a hundred a year at 
 once, and two hundred to three hundred later 
 on,' I said; 'or you can stay at home and 
 begin with 305. a week and go on till you are 
 confidential pricing clerk with ^3 a week, and 
 cashier with ^250 a year, and then my 
 partner.' That's what I said. And what did 
 he say? Thank me for giving him six months 
 with a clever accountant and for offering him 
 this chance of earning good mcne)' afterwards? 
 No, sir. He said he was very contented where 
 he was, that Muirhead would pay him a pound 
 a week, which was quite enough for his work, 
 and that he was going to stay where he was! 
 Now you know, Canon, some fathers would 
 have cut up rough at that, would have said to 
 the chap, 'See here, young man, you go your 
 way and I will go mine, and I will take care 
 that the ways are different. ' That's what my 
 father would have done in my place. But 
 that's not my style. I said, 'Take your own 
 way, lad, take your own way. If it's honest I 
 won't stop you. You'll come to see the folly 
 of it soon. ' That's what I said. But it vexed 
 me, sir."
 
 Resolved to be Rich 73 
 
 "He prefers to work with that Muirhead lot 
 at a pound a week when you offer him 303. to 
 stay among that gang of swindlers with less 
 pay and more work? That is a programme of 
 such an extremely objectionable character that 
 there must be something more in it than we 
 know. Is there, I wonder, a young lady in the 
 case?" 
 
 "No, sir. Certainly not. .Why, my son is 
 only just twenty-one ! A pretty age to begin 
 running after the girls! I was thirty before I 
 thought of such a thing." 
 
 "Gerald Franklin, Muirhead's partner, has a 
 sister who is young, pretty, and very charming 
 ah, Mr. Nicholson, the world begins earlier 
 and goes faster than when we were young! I 
 have seen her with your son. I know nothing. 
 Probably there is nothing to know. But I can 
 see what may be a reason for your son stopping 
 on in that den of thieves." 
 
 "You have your own opinion about Muir- 
 head's office," said Nicholson, in a bewildered 
 tone. His anxiety about his son was old and 
 permanent and would keep, but Canon 
 Hobart's repeated condemnation of Muirhead 
 required explanation. 
 
 "I have a good nose for a rascal," said 
 Hobart coolly, "and I have found out Muir- 
 head long ago. To be frank, one of the objects
 
 74 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 of my visit to you to-day is to remonstrate 
 about your leaving your son where he is. You 
 have authority over him; use it, my friend; 
 use it vigorously to get him away, I pray you, 
 unless there is something in the background of 
 which I know nothing." 
 
 "Do you think they are as bad as that?" 
 asked Nicholson. 
 
 "They? Marshall and Franklin? Ah, that 
 is another matter. Those two are a little 
 above me. Muirhead is a scoundrel as clumsy 
 as he is impudent. About the other two I can 
 say nothing. ' ' 
 
 "But tell me what you think, Canon," said 
 the other eagerly. "Every man has an opinion 
 and may tell it. I am a bit anxious." 
 
 "Well, Reginald has a head on his shoul- 
 ders." 
 
 "Reginald . . . ah, yes." There was a 
 sharp impatient tone in Nicholson's voice, 
 which only one subject can, as a rule, bring to 
 the front. "You see the fact is I have ^600 in 
 this Freehold Building Society of theirs. Six 
 hundred pounds I have already and was think- 
 ing of putting some more in. Now, what do 
 you think of it, sir?" 
 
 "You should know more of such matters than 
 I do, ' ' said the Rector. 
 
 "The Company looks well," said Nicholson,
 
 Resolved to be Rich 75 
 
 speaking slowly so as to give his companion 
 ample opportunity to contradict him by word 
 or look if he felt inclined; "it has begun down 
 here in a small cautious way and is doing the 
 same they tell me everywhere. I know the 
 properties they have bought down here. A 
 safe seven or eight per cent, we were promised, 
 and indeed it looks as if we were going to get 
 it. Now, you know, sir, that's tempting." 
 
 Hobart sat silent for a moment and then 
 shook his head. "I leave all the business con- 
 sideration alone," he said. "When you get 
 eight per cent, for your money you are specu- 
 lating, but it is no affair of mine to condemn 
 speculation. What I do say is : keep clear of 
 Muirhead; take your son out of his office; he 
 is a scamp. ' ' 
 
 "It's true he is hand in glove with Luke 
 Robinson and Fiske and their set," muttered 
 Nicholson, mentioning the Wesleyan and Bap- 
 tist ministers and evidently following out a line 
 of thought not very complimentary to Canon 
 Hobart's impartiality. The Canon indeed fol- 
 lowed the thought and flushed angrily. 
 
 "Muirhead's preferences and friendships are 
 no great concern of mine," he said coldly, "but 
 I don't think I have ever made myself 
 notorious by prejudice against non-conformists. 
 I mostly venture to regard dissent as a family
 
 76 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 or even business matter. Inside my Stafford- 
 shire experience it is not a very vital affair. 
 When a man sets up two horses they mostly 
 have a habit of stopping at the door of the 
 Parish Church." 
 
 "No offence, sir, no offence to you," said 
 Nicholson vaguely, but in fact he had spoken 
 his real thought in suggesting that Hobart was 
 prejudiced against Muirhead on account of the 
 latter's friendship with the two non-conformist 
 ministers. The Building Society of which he 
 had spoken was a very taking affair, and had 
 pleased every one immensely. During the 
 eight months in which it had been in existence 
 in Staffordshire its managers had cither by 
 foresight or good luck put their hand on one 
 or two thoroughly good bits of property; 
 shares were being bought eagerly; it was 
 notorious that the Staffordshire branch of the 
 Company could have paid a half-yearly divi- 
 dend at the rate of eight per cent. And there 
 was another consideration. It was and would 
 be of immense benefit to the working classes 
 who could by its help gradually acquire posses- 
 sion of the houses in which they lived. The 
 Society was a philanthropic work; a philan- 
 thropic work which paid a big dividend. Small 
 wonder that Mr. Nicholson invested his ;6oo, 
 that Mr. Lowe ventured ^500 of his last
 
 Resolved to be Rich 77 
 
 legacy, and advised Miss Bertram to invest cer- 
 tain savings in the wonderful Company. To 
 get a thank-you for some charitable work had 
 hitherto been a surprise to many of these good 
 folk. When they heard charity-managers, who 
 were their guides, applauding the good work 
 and business-men on whose judgment they 
 were used to rely, recommending the invest- 
 ment there was no more to be said or done but 
 pour money into the ready coffers of the Free- 
 hold Building Society. 
 
 Canon Hobart encountered another investor 
 as he left Nicholson's work after his recent' 
 conversation. 
 
 "Spare me five minutes, Lowe," he said, 
 drawing the Vicar of Hartshill on to the ter- 
 race surrounding the Town Hall. "I want to 
 speak to you about a very serious matter. 
 This building society affair, you know; is it 
 not a bit out of our line? Is it exactly our busi- 
 ness to recommend it?" 
 
 "The amount of good which it will do to all 
 the working-classes is incalculable," said 
 Lowe. "To give a man a chance of buying his 
 house steadies him, makes him more regular 
 and hopeful. And financially the thing is 
 qtiite sound, a perfect investment. But it is 
 above all a most useful work. Luke Robinson 
 says "
 
 78 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "Luke Robinson!" echoed Canon Hobart. 
 
 Vigorously but never too vigorously, often 
 but never too often, doth the wise man preach 
 against the hasty word. So idiotically does the 
 mind of the average man work that seven solid 
 arguments can be pulverised in it by one ver- 
 bal blunder; or is it that instinct is right, and 
 that your companion's advice is really less 
 valuable if he cannot keep the blunder out of 
 it? I know not ; I only know that at this scorn- 
 ful ejaculation of Hobart's, Lowe merely said 
 to. himself, "Oh, that is the reason why you are 
 so strong against the Freehold Society, just 
 because Robinson is for it; well, well!" and so 
 stood silent and indifferent. Maybe also 
 though I love not to skin my friends, of whom 
 Lowe is certainly one deep down in the heart 
 of the Vicar of Hartshill was a certain appre- 
 ciation of a social distance between himself and 
 the Hon. and Rev. Canon Hobart, and of a 
 social kinship with Mr. Robinson, which made 
 this lecture exceptionally unpalatable. 
 
 "Robinson understands the needs of his fol- 
 lowers very well," said Lowe stiffly after a 
 pause. 
 
 "How much commission do you suppose the 
 Society is paying him on the money which he 
 brings in?" asked Hobart scornfully. 
 
 Lowe stroked his beard and did not trouble
 
 Resolved to be Rich 79 
 
 to conceal his disapproval of this remark, but 
 there was nothing to be said in reply to it. 
 After another moment of silence Canon Hobart 
 went on almost roughly: "But do I understand 
 that you are also recommending the Society?" 
 
 "I have spoken in favour of it several times." 
 
 "I disapprove of it very strongly, Mr. Lowe. 
 There is disaster in it. I prophesy evil noth- 
 ing but disaster and evil from it." 
 
 A line of waggons laden with pottery crates 
 went lumbering by, making an amount of 
 noise which justified another silence. Three 
 men came out of the Town Hall one after 
 another, and the big swing-doors swung noisily 
 to and fro. A bell on an opposite factory 
 began to ring for the dinner hour. Lowe 
 noted all these things carefully at the moment 
 because he did not know what to say or do 
 next and was glad of the mental occupation. 
 Years afterwards he saw and heard them all 
 again as vividly as now with Hobart's dark 
 angry form towering over him and Hobart's 
 threatening prophecy in his ears. 
 
 Then for a fourth time the doors of the 
 Town Hall swung open and Gerald Franklin 
 appeared. The past year had made no mark 
 whatever on his face or figure, which were 
 those of a boy of fifteen. His manner was a 
 little more assured, but it had been so very
 
 8o Resolved to be Rich 
 
 \ 
 
 assured before that this was not an improve- 
 ment. Otherwise he was unchanged. He 
 came up to the two clergymen and with easy 
 affability detached Lowe from his superior and 
 walked with him towards the London and 
 County Bank. 
 
 "My aunt has just had an annoying letter," 
 he said, "a notice that the Elvaston mortgage 
 is to be paid off. It is nearly ^5000. " 
 
 "She will have to find another investment," 
 said the parson sympathetically. "Very tire- 
 some for her. ' ' 
 
 "Very," assented Gerald. 
 
 "Why doesn't she . . . what would she 
 think . . . " Lowe stammered a little, for 
 the memory of that prophecy was stitt strong 
 in him. Then he went on resolutely : "What 
 could she want better than the Freehold?" 
 
 'Well, she will be sure to consult you," said 
 the boy, looking straight before him and 
 speaking with apparently complete indifference. 
 "I can't imagine a better investment myself, 
 but then of course she would think more of 
 your advice than of mine. Are you likely 
 to be coming up to see her to-day or to- 
 morrow?" 
 
 "Very possibly to-morrow afternoon." 
 
 "If she mentions the matter to you, then you 
 will advise the Freehold perhaps? Would you
 
 Resolved to be Rich 81 
 
 like to see any of the last papers or other 
 details?" 
 
 "Well, thank you, thank you. It is always 
 interesting to know the last news of an affair in 
 which all the neighbourhood is interested as 
 well as oneself. How we are all working for 
 you! Your friend Luke Robinson is bringing 
 in shareholders as if he were paid for it!" 
 
 Gerald turned to his companion and for a 
 brief part of a second his eyes rested on him in 
 startled inquiry. After all the boy was only 
 seventeen, when no man has complete com- 
 mand of his features or colour. 
 
 Maybe too that in Gerald's mind, as in the 
 mind of many older business folk, there was a 
 touch of superstition or I would advance no the- 
 ories about another world, having none which I 
 can defend, but only beliefs maybe there are 
 really guardians beyond our mortal ken who 
 will not suffer their wards to be injured. But 
 on that night a curious thing happened to 
 Gerald Franklin. He Sfc late at home over 
 some accounts of the Freehold Building 
 Society; it was midnight when he rose with 
 the sudden satisfied relaxation of a man who 
 has finished his work, and he put away his 
 papers and went to the window for a moment 
 to cool and calm the fever of figures which 
 surged in his brain. The wind flung itself
 
 82 Resolved to be Rich ^ 
 
 wildly against the branches of two great elms 
 which faced him, swaying them to and fro and 
 tearing down their young leaves and twigs. 
 Through a flying scud of clouds the moon 
 stooped now and again with quick white 
 flashes; and on the cloud-scud there glowed 
 red and yellow and white the reflection of the 
 North Staffordshire furnaces. Here blazed the 
 fires of the Stafford Coal and Iron works, there 
 the more distant furnaces of the Fenton Col- 
 lieries, close under him glowed the covered 
 fires of the pottery works, whose tall chimneys, 
 standing up among the flames like giant stok- 
 ers, seemed to sway to and fro with the fire- 
 shadows. Gerald looked at them without 
 special notice for a minute, then shivered a 
 little, he knew not why, and re-closing the 
 shutter which he had opened, turned round 
 from the window. . . . Standing by the 
 table where he had been writing, and looking 
 down on the sheets of calculations, was a figure 
 which for a second he did not know and stared 
 at with arrested breath and terrified eyes. 
 Then the figure turned its head and looked at 
 him, and into Gerald's brain there flashed the 
 memory of a morning three years ago, of him- 
 self standing by a dying woman's bedside, of 
 the woman's words: "I hear; I will remember."
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 The first yearly meeting of the Freehold 
 Building Company the first, that is to say, in 
 which North Staffordshire was interested 
 received a four-column report and a leading 
 article in the local papers, and never, sure, 
 was such universal joy in a neighbourhood. A 
 dividend of 12 per cent, had been declared, and 
 an immense sum carried to the reserve fund. 
 Among women and men, lay and clerical, 
 church and non-conformist, rich and poor, 
 there was but one topic of conversation for the 
 next few days the wonderful Company to give 
 money to which was an act of charity which 
 brought 12 per cent, in this world as well as 
 (presumably) 100 per cent, in the next. Lowe, 
 Robinson, Nicholson, a score of folk who had 
 their ,500 or ^1000 in the Company, and to 
 whom the difference between 4 and 12 per 
 cent, on such sums was the difference between 
 comfort and luxury, coul'd hardly stop talking 
 about its wonders. They sang the praises 
 now of its good works, now of its dividends. 
 They overbore scoffers, they fairly tumbled 
 their friends and relations into it. "My dear 
 83
 
 84 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Miss Bertram," said Lowe one day in reply to 
 a remark of hers, "what does it matter whether 
 we do or do not like Muirhead or Marshall? 
 We have only to consider the work of the 
 Company, whose figures tell only one story, 
 that the work is good and successful. Do not 
 let Marshall come to your house if you dislike 
 him, but do not let this prevent you from mak- 
 ing yourself comfortable for life by putting 
 your money in his Company." Lowe's ordi- 
 narily timid common-sense had been swept 
 away by the excitement of the first financial 
 speculation which he had understood and 
 embarked in, but the reputation of it remained 
 here among folk who had not noticed its 
 wreck, and he fairly forced Miss Bertram to 
 promise to invest her ^5000 in the Company. 
 He invested all that he could himself lay hands 
 on ; half a hundred ministers of all denomina- 
 tions were doing the same; while the cooler 
 men in the district Canon Hobart on one side 
 and Luke Robinson on the other protested 
 angrily or laughed with quiet amusement. To 
 the men who are engineering a boom of this 
 kind there is a quiet humour in it which must 
 be irresistibly charming. You make churches 
 and creeds, finance and newspapers, law and 
 society spin round to your lash as if you were 
 whipping half a dozen tops on a clear floor;
 
 Resolved to be Rich 85 
 
 and does any man with a pretence of recollec- 
 tion of his boyhood assert that a more entranc- 
 ing occupation than that could be found? 
 Gerald Franklin had never whipped tops, but 
 the excitement and sport of this game of 
 intrigue made his eyes shine and his whole face 
 light up now and again with the joy of it. The 
 boy had the whole business at his finger-ends. 
 He was the real, the only trusted counsellor in 
 the North Staffordshire department. I think, 
 incredible as it may seem though to be sure 
 he regarded all men as more or less astute 
 knaves and all their successful proceedings as 
 prtmd facie dishonest that he saw from top- 
 most branch to deepest roots the real character 
 of the Freehold Building Company, and fore- 
 saw, dimly, perhaps, but as clearly as any one 
 could yet do, its disastrous end. 
 
 It was an afternoon in May, not very long 
 after the last yearly meeting of the Company, 
 and Marshall had come down to discuss with 
 his confidants the new shareholders who were 
 coming in. Muirhead, Gerald, and Luke Rob- 
 inson lunched with him at the Borough Arms 
 at Newcastle, and then after an hour's chat at 
 the offices, the Wesleyan Minister departed, 
 and Marshall proposed a visit to Hartshill. 
 
 "My sister has had rather a surprise since 
 you saw her last," said Gerald in his quiet,
 
 86 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 even voice, unusually quiet this time in order 
 to hide the fury which was raging below. 
 "My late aunt, Marian Franklin, who died 
 three years ago, had an uncle who went out to 
 South Africa. He died just before she did and 
 made a will, of which we have just heard, leav- 
 ing everything to my Aunt Marian. My aunt, 
 just before she died, made a will leaving every- 
 thing she had to my sister Monica, who so 
 comes in for this old man's money." 
 
 "Is it much?" 
 
 His two auditors asked the question in a 
 breath and then flushed angrily, glaring at one 
 another. The boy between them looked 
 straight before him, and if the corners of his 
 mouth twitched a little no one saw it. 
 
 "His property consisted only of two thou- 
 sand shares in the Carlton mines in South 
 Africa. The shares are only worth about 155. 
 each now and are paying no dividend, but the 
 lawyers who have the will advise us to hold 
 them because some new machinery is being put 
 up and a new part of the roof opened, and so 
 the shares may soon be more valuable. ' * 
 
 The two men on each side of the speaker 
 quickened their pace involuntarily as if the 
 gold mine shares, even two thousand in a 
 doubtful mine, were a magnet drawing them to 
 it faster as they came nearer.
 
 Resolved to be Rich 87 
 
 "But it is rather rough on you, Franklin," 
 said Marshall at last. 
 
 "Oh, I have my own money, as you know," 
 said Gerald. "It only pays 4 per cent. ; still 
 it's enough for me." 
 
 "Lowe is the trustee of it, isn't he?" 
 
 "Yes," was the brief reply. 
 
 "He wouldn't make any difficulty about let- 
 ting you transfer it into the Freehold." 
 
 For answer the boy turned his head and 
 while one might count five looked very quietly 
 and steadily at Marshall. The elder man 
 turned away after this momentary understand- 
 ing and walked on in silence. Astonishment 
 and alarm were in his mind, with wonder as to 
 how he should deal with this new development 
 of affairs. Gerald Franklin knew the finance 
 of the Freehold and saw something wrong? If 
 so why not a score of other local managers? 
 The fellow stroked his perfumed black beard 
 and stared before him in gloomy perplexity, 
 wishing that he were alone now with this 
 youngster. And so they came to Miss Ber- 
 tram's house. 
 
 Monica was alone in the sitting-room and 
 greeted the party in her usual impassive 
 manner, a compound of fear lest she should 
 offend her brother's patrons and suspicion of 
 the patrons themselves. She listened to Mar-
 
 88 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 shall's congratulations on her legacy and 
 explanations about the position of the Carlton 
 mines with polite interest, but asked no ques- 
 tions or advice, while Miss Bertram, who had 
 come in, made attempts to change the conver- 
 sation. Suddenly a gleam of quiet amusement 
 flashed across Monica's face, and Muirhead 
 noting it, and following the direction of her 
 eyes, saw Canon Hobart walk up the front and 
 ring the door-bell. He leant across and mut- 
 tered something to Marshall, who answered 
 curtly, "I know it, " and then stood up with the 
 rest as the Rector was shown in. 
 
 "It is curious that I should not have met you 
 before," said Marshall affably when the two 
 men had been introduced. 
 
 "You know a good many people in Stoke 
 now, of course." 
 
 "Well, they have put me in charge of their 
 money at any rate. And I know a good many 
 of clients, as one may call them, personally 
 too." 
 
 "You have known the neighbourhood 
 before?" asked Hobart. 
 
 "Oh, no. I was down here some years ago, 
 but only for a few days. Trade has improved 
 since then. There is plenty of money to invest 
 among all classes now. ' ' 
 
 "It seems all going into your Company."
 
 Resolved to be Rich 89 
 
 "A large amount of it certainly." 
 
 "You are in treaty for the Arkhill collieries, 
 I hear." 
 
 "We should like the whole Arkhill estate," 
 said Marshall, "if we could get it at our own 
 price, and we don't mind having the colliery 
 as well. It is worth money. Sir Richard 
 Cullamore made a mistake in digging for coal 
 in that particular corner. It was farthest from 
 the house, of course. . . . " 
 
 "That was his reason for choosing that spot 
 certainly. And since he died ten, no eleven 
 years ago, wasn't it? no one has had money 
 to do any more. You knew him apparently?" 
 
 In a French duel between two skilful fencers, 
 you may notice how after reprise of cautious 
 en garde fighting, there is a sudden, quick mur- 
 mur of "touche" among the spectators. Before 
 the director or seconds know it, before even 
 the combatant himself feels it, the bystanders 
 seem to guess by instinct that something has 
 gone wrong somewhere. Hobart, Muirhead 
 and Gerald saw with surprise an uneasy look 
 come into Marshall's eyes, heard him begin a 
 long, rapid explanation of how he had come by 
 his knowledge. Then Hobart noted suddenly 
 that he was pronouncing Sir Richard Culla- 
 more's name in Staffordshire fashion "Cul- 
 mer' ' and he turned and looked straight and
 
 9O Resolved to be Rich 
 
 fixedly at the man, whose uneasiness, he per- 
 ceived, increased under the look. Where had 
 he seen Marshall before, where heard this 
 smooth, high-pitched voice? Somewhere, he 
 was certain. Yet likely enough the man had 
 been in Staffordshire ten years ago on very 
 ordinary business: though why in that case 
 should he look so uncomfortable about it, and 
 edge away from all talk about the subject as he 
 now proceeded to do? The Rector bent his 
 mind as he walked home to the problem, but 
 it was no use yet, he could not remember. 
 
 In the house which he had left, Miss Ber- 
 tram drew her brother into the garden : 
 
 "Are you mad?" she asked angrily. "Why 
 do you come here if you can't help making 
 blunders like that? Why do you come at all?" 
 
 "I am obliged to be in the neighbourhood 
 pretty often," he answered gloomily, "and this 
 is the first time I have made any mistake. " 
 
 "You will be in prison soon, I can see," said 
 the woman, shaking her finger at him in 
 threatening warning. "But I have to ask you 
 something now" her voice changed; she 
 hesitated, and then spoke again almost plead- 
 ingly "you are connected with this Company 
 somehow; I don't understand in what position, 
 biit I hope you are working honestly ; indeed, ' ' 
 she added hurriedly, "I daresay you are. But
 
 Resolved to be Rich 91 
 
 you know something about it anyhow. I sup- 
 pose you would not deliberately deceive me" 
 she eyed him rather wistfully, and the man did 
 his best to look honest. "I have got ,5000 to 
 invest, and every one is urging me to put it 
 into this Company. The loss of it would ruin 
 me, as you know. Is the Company safe? Tell 
 me truthfully, Joshua. You don't want to 
 injure me, I suppose. Tell me if the invest- 
 ment is a safe one." Miss Christina's hands 
 were being clasped and unclasped in front of 
 her as she spoke. The lace cap on her head 
 trembled a little. She stood quite near him, 
 and once stretched out a mittened hand as if to 
 put it on his arm. 
 
 "Who has spoken to you about it?" he asked, 
 wanting to gain time. 
 
 "Mr. Lowe, Mr. Robinson, every one I meet 
 in fact." 
 
 "You would be quite content with the invest- 
 ment?" 
 
 ' ' I feel it would be ridiculous to go against 
 such advice without any reason." 
 
 "Haven't you asked Benson?" asked her 
 brother nervously. Benson was the Stoke 
 lawyer who did Miss Bertram's little bits of 
 business for her. 
 
 "He recommends it too. I met him again 
 only yesterday in Stoke walking with Mr. Rob-
 
 92 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 inson, and they both urged me to buy the 
 shares at once. ' ' 
 
 A soft May breeze drifted through the lilac- 
 bush under which they were standing, scatter- 
 ing its scent and brushing off some rain-drops 
 which hung on its vividly-green leaves. The 
 scent from beds of wet yellow daffodils and late 
 primroses and early pinks was carried past 
 them. From the elm-trees, on whose young 
 leaves rain-drops lay gleaming in the sunlight, 
 came the high shrilling of young birds and the 
 answering notes of the parent birds. Spring 
 flowers and greenery, washed by the recent 
 showers from their smoke-covering, flushed 
 out in vivid colours above the smoke-clouds 
 which hung below. Through even these the 
 May afternoon sunlight pierced rainbow paths 
 and turned the chimneys to columns of gold. 
 The familiar home scene, every detail of which 
 seemed to have been burnished up to a degree 
 of beauty which even his exile memories of it 
 had hardly exceeded, worked on Marshall's 
 mind now to such an extent that with a mut- 
 tered curse on Robinson he turned away, say- 
 ing aloud: "You should never invest money 
 anywhere in a hurry. Wait till I send you all 
 possible particulars about the company. I will 
 write my own advice too. I don't care to 
 answer any such questions offhand." He
 
 Resolved to be Rich 93 
 
 stood still for a moment looking round the 
 garden, and another great breath of lilac-scent 
 swept across his face; then he came back and 
 stood near his sister. 
 
 "I will be more careful, Chris," he said. 
 "You would be sorry, I really believe, if I were 
 nabbed. As for my work now, I am earning 
 money perfectly honestly; you believe that, 
 don't you?" 
 
 "I suppose you are," said the woman a little 
 grudgingly. "Everybody speaks well of the 
 work, and I know nothing against it."
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 On the "broad road leading to destruction" 
 there is a point, one knows not exactly where, 
 at which it is in effect impossible to turn back ; 
 and even as to some persons that text in the 
 Revelation: "He that is unjust let him be 
 unjust still; he that is filthy let him be filthy 
 still," hath always seemed the most terrible 
 ideal of Hell ever conceived, so this house on 
 the road of sin where we may imagine this con- 
 demnation to eternal filth and eternal injustice 
 being pronounced is a place of horror unspeak- 
 able. A man sits down in it tired of vice, 
 fraud, greed, unsated and knowing himself to 
 be insatiable, sick of self-seeking, tired of the 
 pain and ruin which he has caused, and often 
 enough suffered in the world, horror-stricken at 
 the evil which he has done, is doing and is plan- 
 ning to do. He will repent and reform, he 
 will even restore a little of his ill-gotten gain 
 to mankind ; he will retrace his footsteps, enter 
 that other gate, struggle down that other 
 thorny path. But, ah Heaven! where is the 
 road back? There is one, but along it are 
 
 94
 
 Resolved to be Rich 95 
 
 scoffing companions and ridicule and shame; 
 another, but there is suffering and pain for 
 those who have shared his misdeeds, and the 
 certainty that to them at least his salvation 
 means ruin and death; there is another, but it 
 is very grim, for it leads by confession and 
 restitution to prison and perhaps even further. 
 With dim and ever-growing fear the man looks 
 out and sees that he cannot go back, or even 
 stay where he is, for retribution is at his heels. 
 He must go on on and his only ambition as 
 he flies is to outstrip the pursuing vengeance. 
 
 "I dare not spare her," muttered Marshall 
 to himself as he sat in the train speeding back 
 to London. "Suppose that she and the boy, 
 both of whom are supposed to be my friends, 
 refuse to invest money in this, what will people 
 down here say? I dare not risk it. She must 
 put her money in, and I will try and save 
 some of it before the smash comes. That boy! 
 how does he know?" . . . The man's 
 eyes grew dark and furious and his face was 
 very white "How can one trust him? Yet 
 one must; there is no choice. " His thoughts 
 grew more sombre every hour, and when the 
 express arrived at Euston, late as it was, he 
 drove to the house of a fellow-director and 
 asked to see him at once. 
 
 Lord Eastney was a peer with a large
 
 96 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 country and town house, an army of footmen, 
 cooks, agents and secretaries, and a consider- 
 able estate which produced a nominal rental 
 known only to readers of the Financial Reform 
 Almanack and a real income of about ^1200 a 
 year. He had one valuable asset an old and 
 famous name, and on this he lived as comfort- 
 ably as he desired and as honestly as he could. 
 He really had no cut and dried desire to 
 plunder his neighbours, but merely a wish to 
 get his share of this world's goods; and my 
 Lord's idea of his share was as much as he 
 could possibly get without being hanged or sent 
 to gaol while getting it. 
 
 "How are you, Mr. Marshall? Anything 
 wrong?" The Marquis had no great love for 
 his fellow-director, but regarded his acquaint- 
 ance like getting up early, studying figures, 
 missing two days of Ascot, and lunching in 
 City restaurants as one of the evils of an 
 income which would not cover one's expendi- 
 ture. Therefore he shook hands with him, 
 smiled affably, asked him if he had dined, and 
 offered him coffee, liqueurs and a cigar. 
 
 "I want," began Marshall abruptly, "to say 
 a few words about that Arkhill property in 
 Staffordshire before the meeting on Thursday. 
 You remember the details of it?" 
 
 "We were to buy it from the Merton Insur-
 
 Resolved to be Rich 97 
 
 ance Company." The Marquis half -lowered 
 his eyelids over his eyes and sat straight up in 
 his chair. His fingers, which had been twirling 
 some gold eye-glasses round and round on their 
 string, stopped working and his face was very 
 grave. 
 
 "I think myself that ^85,000 would be a fair 
 price," said Marshall. 
 
 "Yes?" asked the Marquis in a tone which 
 gave you the impression that the speaker would 
 have been startled if he had not been Chairman 
 of the Freehold Building Company, and so past 
 being startled by anything. 
 
 "Yes," went on Marshall aggressively; "the 
 land round Dently could be let as allotments, 
 and there is workable coal, I am certain, nearer 
 the Hall. ..." 
 
 "I know the Arkhill property, Mr. Mar- 
 shall, ' ' said the other a trifle drily. 
 
 "Then your lordship must know how it has 
 increased in value since we bought it for the 
 Merton. " 
 
 "Ten months ago that was, wasn't it? And 
 we paid ,30,000. Yes, I remember. Oh, no 
 doubt it has improved." 
 
 "We may consider the price fixed at ^85,000 
 then?" asked Marshall. 
 
 "Very good," assented Lord Eastney in a 
 low voice.
 
 98 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "There is another very small matter. I 
 have been down in Staffordshire several times 
 lately, and there is very little more to be done 
 down there for some time. We have every 
 one in the Company who has any money to 
 invest; we have bought all the property which 
 is worth buying. I want to bring our best man 
 there up here a man called Franklin. We 
 could send Seymour down into Essex and give 
 his place to young Franklin." 
 
 "He is young?" 
 
 "Very; but he understands our business 
 thoroughly." 
 
 "I see. Yet ^"400 a year is a big salary for 
 a lad. Don't we want to reserve places of that 
 sort for people who understand our business 
 more thoroughly than any lad could?" 
 
 "When I find one who knows the whole of it 
 from top to bottom better than this person, he 
 shall have Franklin's place," said Marshall 
 grimly. 
 
 "Very good." The pale patrician face was 
 beginning to look very wear^ "Is that all, 
 Mr. Marshall? Yes? Then ..." 
 
 With an unusually decisive movement Lord 
 Eastney rose and moved towards the library 
 door, which he held open. Marshall passed 
 out biting his lips, and held out his hand to say 
 good-bye with almost a threatening gesture.
 
 Resolved to be Rich 99 
 
 Eastney looked at the hand, hesitated for a 
 moment, then slightly shrugging" his shoulders 
 with a "what's the good of it?" air, put his own 
 hand into it for a moment. 
 
 Marshall went home frightened and furious; 
 he had never before met with these curt laconic 
 answers, this chilling reception, from the chair- 
 man of the Freehold Building Society. Lord 
 Eastney was also a fellow-director of the Mer- 
 ton Insurance Company, and one or two other 
 smaller associations by whose financial jug- 
 glings between themselves money flowed into 
 his pocket. He dared not think of what would 
 happen if the Marquis was going to desert 
 him, and Gerald was going to drop hints in 
 Staffordshire about the Freehold finance and 
 its transactions with the Insurance Company. 
 He sat late that night poring over a private 
 investment ledger, and at last wrote instruc- 
 tions for the sale of all his English invest- 
 ments. Then he walked about thinking for 
 another half hour, then sat down again and 
 wrote to his sister, enclosing papers about the 
 Freehold, and advising her strongly to put her 
 ^5000 into it. As he finished his letter, and, 
 fearful of his resolution, took it out at once to 
 the post, the sky was yellow and pink and grey, 
 birds twittered in the pearl-grey light and 
 faintly-glimmering stars were dying one by one
 
 IOO Resolved to be Rich 
 
 in the dawn of day. For a short time longer a 
 soft restful silence reigned, and then in far-off 
 murmurs the life of London began. As he 
 reached his own door-step again Marshall stood 
 for a moment and listened to its rising tide of 
 sound, half fancied, half real, and wholly awe- 
 some. Lives coming and going, pain sighing 
 gratitude for the daylight, and weariness curs- 
 ing its recall to toil, dancers coming home from 
 the ball with music in their ears, and workers 
 coming out to their labour with the hunger- 
 spectre at their heels, lovers who have passed 
 their nuit blanche drawing aside curtains to 
 whisper odes to the rose-tinted sunrise, men 
 who have blundered frightfully, and spent the 
 night searching for remedies, and finding none, 
 and now stood at open windows, muttering 
 despair all added their little whisper to the 
 murmur which floats under the London dawn. 
 And Marshall, listening to it, shuddered 
 slightly and went to his room with a curious 
 feeling of oppression and fear, as of a multi- 
 tude waiting for him, to tear him in pieces.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 Unrequited love and sea-sickness are the 
 subjects of universal scoffing, yet while their 
 agony is at its height, the world can hardly 
 show more horrible suffering. Some people 
 say that sea-sickness is the worst, and affect to 
 prove their theory by pointing out that the 
 pain of it swallows up or let us say absorbs, 
 since to swallow up is not a happy expression 
 under the circumstances the other. It is too 
 true that an unfortunate love, though it may 
 feed on your damask cheek night and day, will 
 certainly be forgotten during a crossing to the 
 Isle of Man or Dieppe, but it has a bigger 
 record of suicide and crime behind it, and 
 therefore I should award it the first place. Yet 
 it may be said again in reply that this record 
 counts for little, since the sea-sick are, for 
 obvious reasons, incapable of committing crime 
 themselves, and that if all the murders and 
 other injuries done in intention especially to 
 the steward when he cometh not promptly at 
 call, or to the captain who "lies to" for an hour 
 off Douglas Point were counted, the record of 
 101
 
 IO2 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 the sea-sick would be the blackest on earth. 
 But your intention and desire to commit mur- 
 der, whatever their theological value, have 
 none in the eyes of the police, whereas the 
 unhappy lover, with his dagger, and pistol, and 
 poison, most distinctly has. Therefore his 
 record is the worst, and I count him chief 
 among sufferers. 
 
 Mr. Sampson Muirhead could yet experience 
 moments of hope. When he was in good 
 spirits, or when good spirits were in him, he 
 could still see himself the husband of Monica, 
 and, though to do him justice this counted for 
 very little, the part-proprietor of her gold-mine 
 shares, and heir to Miss Bertram's little for- 
 tune. But it wanted every day a greater 
 height of exaltation to see this vision, and 
 every day the hours of hopelessness grew 
 longer. With all his heart he loved the girl; 
 for her sake he worked hard and steadily, 
 abjuring many a little amusement which cost 
 money or seemed wrong. So far let us pity 
 him. If his manner of getting rich was not 
 very honest well, the whole business of the 
 Freehold Building Society and the Merton 
 Insurance Company, of which he was nomi- 
 nally local manager, was dishonest from top to 
 bottom, and he was no worse than a hundred of 
 other men in both of them. A scoundrel you
 
 Resolved to be Rich 103 
 
 call him, and ask why he did not throw up his 
 business, and denounce it in public and private? 
 Ah ! messieurs ! do you think that such scrupu- 
 lous men crowd life's highways, and that every 
 other person you meet in the street is so very 
 anxious about poking his nose into the morals 
 of a business out of which he clears ^1000 a 
 year, and so very eager to find and hunt down 
 and expose its faults? Pardieu ! it seems to me 
 that nine-tenths of my own acquaintances con- 
 tentedly leave that to the law, and are only 
 thankful if after a crash they find their own 
 skins whole, and themselves on the right side 
 of the county gaol's wide gates. Yet, remem- 
 ber, I have written down long ago that Muir- 
 head is a villain. 
 
 The suspense with regard to Monica became 
 unbearable, yet in his heart he knew that cer- 
 tainty would be worse. His visits to Hartshill 
 grew sometimes frequent till they became a 
 daily occurrence, then he would meet young 
 Nicholson at the house three days running, 
 Monica's patient politeness would give way a 
 little, Miss Bertram's reception grew colder, 
 and he would retire, resolved to stay away for 
 a week. The week ended, he came back with 
 a touch of hope in his mind, having explained 
 away to his own satisfaction all previous 
 repulses; his love flamed back and burnt
 
 104 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 higher than ever before as Monica, anxious 
 lest she should have been rude to him on his 
 last visit, met him with a little extra politeness, 
 and the man's hopes rose to heaven. How 
 many a poor devil lives and thrives on an occa- 
 sional kind word like that, and is happy for a 
 week because the young lady has offered him 
 tea with a smile instead of with a merely 
 indifferent gaze! Do not, I pray you, young 
 ladies, believe the books which recommend you 
 to discourage all lovers except the one whom 
 you mean to marry. On the contrary, encour- 
 age them, talk to them, flirt with them, let the 
 poor wretches be happy till the last possible 
 moment. You might, even when the proposal 
 comes, accept it for a short time, and after- 
 wards explain to the man that for certain 
 reasons you cannot marry him, but for his sake 
 will remain single all your life. Believe me 
 though to be sure you may not like this part of 
 the argument he will have forgotten all about 
 it long before your real engagement is 
 announced. 
 
 Monica had no intention of" stretching her 
 kindness to Muirhead to this point, but the 
 tradition of his protection of Gerald was strong 
 in the minds of both women, and they 
 treated Muirhead as well as they could. 
 They even invited him to spend an afternoon
 
 Resolved to be Rich 105 
 
 with them occasionally. Gerald brought such 
 an invitation to the Newcastle office with him 
 one Friday morning, and laughed a little at the 
 quick flush and stammering words of gratitude 
 with which Muirhead accepted it. Reggie 
 Nicholson heard it too, and a fury of jealousy 
 sprang up in his mind. She wanted Muir- 
 head, she desired his company for a whole 
 afternoon, she loved him, she was going to 
 marry him. And by "she" Reggie did not 
 mean Miss Christina, although the invitation 
 came nominally from her. Mr. Nicholson 
 resolved to give up his post in Muirhead's 
 office, to seek work in a distant part of the 
 country, or even to try tea-planting in Ceylon, 
 and above all never to see or speak to Monica 
 Franklin again. 
 
 The three men were soon deep in work, and 
 only the turning of ledger-leaves, the scratch- 
 ing of pens or a murmur of conversation from 
 Muirhead's room broke the silence of the big 
 office. Presently among some figures, refer- 
 ring to the transfer of shares, which Nicholson 
 -was checking and entering on the register of 
 shareholders, were some which he did not 
 understand, and he went into Muirhead's office 
 to ask for an explanation. Muirhead answered 
 at random; perhaps he was really busy, or 
 more probably he did not understand the
 
 io6 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 transaction very clearly himself, but at last he 
 said impatiently, "Ask Franklin to explain 
 how the entry is to be made." 
 
 Gerald took the sheet of figures, glanced 
 through it, put aside a letter which he was 
 writing to study the paper more closely, finally 
 asked abruptly, "Where did you get this?" 
 
 "Mr. Muirhead gave it to me this morning. 
 The paper is marked, you see, 'entries for the 
 North Staffordshire share-register.' " 
 
 "It came in a bundle of others from London 
 this morning," said Muirhead, looking up. 
 
 Gerald picked up the big envelope in which 
 the documents from headquarters had arrived 
 that morning; it was marked "Private and 
 Confidential" in large letters, and, young 
 Nicholson's eyes being directed again for a 
 moment on to the sheet which he had brought, 
 Gerald held up the envelope with his fingers 
 on the words for Muirhead to see. The elder 
 man flushed angrily and Gerald turned back 
 with an impassive stare to the sheet of figures, 
 pretending to study them, but in reality con- 
 sidering what to do. The sheet was to his eyes 
 so simple and straight-forward that he could 
 only suppose that Nicholson had in fact come 
 to know whether he was to enter it as it stood 
 or not. That being so, attempts at disguise 
 would be a blunder.
 
 Resolved to be Rich 107 
 
 "These five sums," he said quietly, "make 
 up five-hundred ten-pound shares which Mr. 
 Luke Robinson has sold, and Miss Bertram has 
 bought. I will attend to the register entries. 
 There is no hurry about them." 
 
 "Mr. Robinson has sold all his shares then?" 
 
 "Apparently." 
 
 " But as a director is he not obliged . . ." 
 
 "Mr. Robinson's business has nothing to do 
 with you," said Muirhead angrily; "and let me 
 remind you, Mr. Nicholson, by the way, that 
 everything which you hear in this office is 
 private, not for outside discussion." 
 
 "I remember your telling me so," was the 
 cool reply, and the young man went back x to 
 his work. 
 
 Franklin and Muirhead did not exchange 
 another word for the rest of the morning; in 
 the afternoon a little business talk passed and 
 finally, shortly after six o'clock, they left the 
 office together. 
 
 ' ' I wanted a few words with you alone, ' ' said 
 Gerald ; at last. "I got a letter yesterday from 
 Mr. Marshall offering me a clerkship at the 
 headquarters of the Freehold." 
 
 Muirhead faced round on him with terror in 
 his eyes: "And you?" 
 
 "I have accepted it of course. I wrote to do 
 so this morning."
 
 Io8 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "I think you ought to have consulted some 
 one myself Robinson some one here first." 
 
 Gerald laughed a cool irritating laugh which 
 meant "Men do not consult their subordinates 
 before taking steps like that." Aloud he said: 
 "I have told nobody but you and my aunt 
 about the offer, and nobody but you that I 
 have accepted it. I believe" the boy laughed 
 again "you are being invited to-morrow after- 
 noon to consult about whether I shall accept or 
 not." 
 
 "And suppose," said Muirhead angrily, 
 "that I tell Miss Bertram that you have said 
 'yes' already and then advise her very strongly 
 not to let you go?" 
 
 "I don't think you will do that," was the 
 quiet response. 
 
 "I will. Why shouldn't I? There are a 
 score of reasons against your going. . . ." 
 
 Gerald was silent. When men used argu- 
 ments to which they knew the answer, he 
 believed in holding his tongue as the most 
 impressive method of showing them that he 
 knew the answer too. And, like many other 
 strong-minded strong-willed persons, he had a 
 curious power of making a silence mean some- 
 thing a power which fills your adversary with 
 bewildered awe and is therefore worth culti- 
 vating.
 
 Resolved to be Rich 109 
 
 "But I am not going to do that," added 
 Muirhead rather hastily, and a faint ironical 
 smile flitted across Gerald's face; "because 
 because well, to be candid with you, my lad, I 
 want something from you, something of very 
 great importance to myself. It has nothing to 
 do with business. I have walked out here with 
 you this evening to ask you about it. I well, 
 it is difficult to explain. ' ' 
 
 "If I can be of any help to you in any way 
 of course I shall be delighted," said Gerald, 
 repressing one of the very few inclinations to 
 giggle which he had ever felt. 
 
 ' ' I I love your sister, ' ' burst out Muirhead 
 at last, stopping in the road and looking nerv- 
 ously round him to be sure that no one was 
 near, and then glancing suspiciously at Gerald 
 to see if he was going to laugh. "I have loved 
 her for years. I have said nothing to her yet. 
 I am afraid. Do you think do you know has 
 she ever spoken to you about me?" 
 
 "Very often, of course," said Gerald gravely, 
 "but notjjuite in the way you mean." 
 
 "Naturally she wouldn't," said the man 
 hastily; "of course not. But your aunt; per- 
 haps she has?" 
 
 "Oh, no." 
 
 "Well, well . . . there is another little 
 point , . . you yourself , . .of course
 
 no Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Miss Franklin would think much of your 
 opinion. Will you support me?" 
 
 "Certainly, most certainly." Promises of 
 this kind cost nothing, and Gerald would have 
 made a score of them quite cheerfully. 
 
 "Do you think yourself that I have any 
 chance of success?" 
 
 "Really," said the lad, happy to be able to 
 laugh outright, "I know nothing at all. My 
 sister and I talk so little together. I am 
 always busy. ' ' 
 
 "Yes, you and Marshall have become very 
 close friends lately. And now you are going. 
 I am sorry, my lad. ' ' 
 
 ' ' I shall be very sorry for many reasons to go, ' ' 
 said Gerald, speaking sincerely for once. "I have 
 been happy here and successful. And I owe much 
 of my success to you. I do not forget that. ' ' 
 
 "I am glad you think of that still. And now 
 one more question, Franklin. Tell me can- 
 didly; you will be open with me, won't you? 
 since you recognise that I have done some- 
 thing for you. I ask you you who are in 
 Marshall's confidence so much more than 
 myself" the man's sudden humility was hor- 
 rible to look at "is anything going wrong 
 with the Freehold? I have everything I pos- 
 sess in it. I have put several very great 
 friends in it. I am not over-particular of
 
 Resolved to be Rich in 
 
 course" the man laughed uneasily "but one 
 draws the line at deceiving certain people. 
 Pray tell me if you know anything wrong. ' ' 
 
 "What should be wrong? Why should you 
 think so?" 
 
 "Several little things, and then Robinson's 
 sale of all his shares. . . ." 
 
 "He is speculating, I suppose. He sells now 
 and hopes to get in again at a lower price. 
 There is nothing in the world wrong, I assure 
 you. Pray don't suggest such a thing by word 
 or look elsewhere. It is quite a mistake, as we 
 could easily show, but the directors would be 
 very angry. ' ' 
 
 "Then I will turn back and say good-bye. 
 Thank you for your promises of help. Of 
 course I will advise your aunt as you wish 
 to-morrow. Good-bye, lad." 
 
 To-morrow afternoon, thought Muirhead, as 
 he walked homewards, he would end the sus- 
 pense, put his question to Monica, and know 
 the best or worst. After all there was some 
 hope for- him. He was apparently a trusted 
 adviser at Hartshill, a family friend, and there 
 was hope. Even from Gerald's assurances he 
 managed to draw encouragement. To have 
 an only brother, of whom a girl must surely be 
 fond, strongly on your side, mattered much. 
 His heart grew lighter and his step brisker
 
 112 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 every moment, till by the time he reached his 
 rooms he was almost laughing to himself with 
 delight. If he were accepted, if he returned 
 here to-morrow evening engaged to Monica 
 Franklin, would not life be blissful! He 
 thought of numberless little points, the gold 
 mine shares which were now daily increasing 
 in value, the assured alliance with Gerald who 
 was now in the inner cabinet of the biggest and 
 richest speculation of modern times ; but above 
 every such minor gain, in front of the picture 
 of wealth and success which floated before him, 
 rose the vision of Monica's fair grave face. To 
 see those grave grey eyes with love-light in 
 them looking into his! to put his arms round 
 the tall lithe form and whisper love- words into 
 willing ears, and with lips close to his sweet- 
 heart's cheek! ... A passion of love and 
 longing tore the man's soul within him as he 
 thought. The room stifled him, and he went 
 out of doors and walked along country roads 
 with clenched hands and exclamations of tor- 
 tured doubt and hope, and even prayer. He 
 must succeed to-morrow! he would succeed! 
 For success here he would make all sacrifices, 
 use all means. The far-off boom of St. 
 George's clock striking midnight reached him 
 as he walked. In twenty hours at most he 
 would know his fate !
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 Gerald Franklin was resolved to be rich. 
 When he was twelve years old he had deter- 
 mined to make a fortune, and had begun at 
 once. He studied politics, the money-markets 
 of the world, the problems of taxation, and 
 even the morality of certain trades and peoples. 
 The latter subject interested him peculiarly, 
 and he had argued out the conclusion (in 
 rather remarkable fashion for a boy of his age) 
 that financial credit is necessary for any big 
 success, and that such credit is dependent on 
 strict commercial and national honesty. He 
 was pleased at first to find himself in such a 
 business as the Freehold. Marshall's admira- 
 tion and confidence flattered him, turned his 
 head so far and for as long a time as such an 
 extremely well-screwed-on young head could 
 be turned. Then came discovery after dis- 
 covery, and with it disillusion and disgust. 
 The boy had all the commercial instincts 
 developed through generations of trading 
 ancestors, and as the nose of a Perigord pig 
 has an instinct for finding truffles which no 
 113
 
 114 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 amount of modern science can give to a man, 
 so Gerald began life with an hereditary capacity 
 for picking essential facts out of a maze of 
 figures which marked him out for work of his 
 present kind. Lessons given partly by Muir- 
 head, chiefly by himself to himself, had per- 
 fected nature's work, and the lad at the age of 
 sixteen had dropped into the middle of Mar- 
 shall's work with an amount of knowledge 
 which a chartered accountant in the thick of 
 City work might envy, and a judgment whose 
 sound acumen many a hundred members of 
 that profession might desire. He took in the 
 whole business of the Freehold in a year, 
 brushed aside its pretence of philanthropy, 
 glanced down its (intentionally) confused and 
 confusing mass of figures with a contemptuous 
 smile, and so recognising perfectly well where 
 he was and able to make a pretty good guess 
 at what his masters were coming to and when 
 the) T would arrive, he sat down to consider his 
 position. 
 
 The more he considered it the less he liked 
 it. The subordinates in the Company, school- 
 masters, clergy of all denominations, insurance- 
 agents, commercial travellers and such-like, 
 who were all paid a commission on the capital 
 which they brought in, were a noisy horde of 
 .plunderers, unscrupulous, ignorant and risky to
 
 Resolved to be Rich 115 
 
 deal with. Their immediate superiors, the 
 men who reduced this mass of work to order, 
 were half-educated men performing a purely 
 mechanical task, understanding very little of 
 that, and doing it for the most part very badly. 
 Of the four or five men at the head of affairs 
 Gerald only knew one, but from certain signs 
 he judged that they were not working together 
 very harmoniously or cleverly. Contrary 
 orders came down to Newcastle very often; 
 papers marked "private and confidential" 
 arrived one day from the Freehold, and their 
 duplicates came by the next post from some 
 allied company without any such mark. 7 At 
 any rate disaster was a mere matter of a few 
 months. 
 
 So thought Gerald, vexedly and doubtingly, 
 as he sat considering Marshall's offer of the 
 London clerkship. Yet he decided to accept 
 it. A^ foothold in London was worth some- 
 thing. He would go there reckoning that the 
 Company would last a year, that he must 
 plunder it of all that he could safely get duiing 
 that time and have another situation ready for 
 himself to step into when the crash came. 
 There were probably some very pretty pick- 
 ings to be had at those offices in Southampton 
 Row during the next twelve months. As for 
 Muirhead, he must take his luck, To warn
 
 1 1 6 Resolved to be Rich , 
 
 one's friends tinder such circumstances was the 
 act of a fool. Clearly Muirhead had better not 
 marry Monica, but the boy had paid just 
 enough attention to his sister's talk to have his 
 own opinion about the probability of such an 
 event. It was necessary to encourage and sym- 
 pathise with Muirhead in order that this family 
 council about himself might pass off smoothly, 
 but he believed and hoped that Monica had no 
 more intention of marrying Muirhead than of 
 marrying Canon Hobart. 
 
 To his own secret amusement Gerald found 
 that the family council on this Saturday after- 
 noon was a very serious affair. Mr Lowe and 
 Dr. Hare had been invited as well as Muir- 
 head. Miss Christina had put on her best 
 black silk dress ; fresh piclates and a cake had 
 been ordered for tea. "Are there any pro- 
 grammes?" he asked Monica. "Shall I have 
 to make a speech? and, I say, old girl, tell me 
 if the council decides against my going to 
 London how am I to break it to them that I 
 am going in any case?" But Monica ran away 
 to dress. 
 
 Dr. Hare arrived at four o'clock, bluff and 
 kindly as usual. He was a disbeliever in the 
 Freehold, and scoffed at it publicly and 
 privately though he had no better reason for 
 doing so than a strong personal dislike of Luke
 
 Resolved to be Rich 117 
 
 Robinson. "He is a good preacher, I dare- 
 say," said the doctor, "though, from what 
 people tell me, a mere gas-pipe with nothing 
 real to say. And if you have nothing to say 
 what is the good of saying it well?" 
 
 "But in any case what has that got to do 
 with this Company?" asked Lowe. 
 
 "Well, if I want an investment for my 
 money I ask a man who deals in money, not a 
 man who spouts bad or even good theology. 
 If I wanted some gas-shares now I might think 
 of going to Robinson about them . . . !" 
 
 "You don't like his politics, doctor?" said 
 Lowe, while Muirhead looked at the speaker 
 with some alarm. 
 
 "Give you my word I don't know what they 
 are," said Hare. "Well, yes, I do just know. 
 He possesses or professes Liberal opinions, 
 I believe." 
 
 "He-is very active on the Liberal side," said 
 Lowe. 
 
 "He is," retorted Hare. "Now you come to 
 mention it I remember a story about one of his 
 evening meetings in the Hanley Road chapel at 
 the last election. He was praying and said: 
 'May the Liberal party all hang together at this 
 great crisis.' 'Amen,' said a voice in the hall 
 very emphatically. 'Not, oh Lord,' went on 
 Robinson, 'in the sense meant by the bias-
 
 Il8 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 phemous scoffer down there, but in peace and 
 concord and accord.' 'I don't much mind,' 
 said the voice again, 'what kind of a cord it's 
 in so long as it's all together. ' After which 
 the prayer passed rather quickly to other sub- 
 jects!" 
 
 "His influence is immense," insisted Lowe, 
 with a little sigh, almost of envy; "and I 
 really believe he means to use it well." 
 
 "Oh, every one swears by him and sings his 
 praises," said Hare, "because he swears by 
 himself and sings his own praises. Old Mother 
 Eardly began the other day, while I was pre- 
 scribing for her daughter, glorifying him up to 
 the skies. 'I speak so strongly,' she said at 
 last, 'because I know him so well.' I said: 
 'Madam, I don't know him, but damn him at a 
 venture. ' Forgive me, my dear Miss Bertram. 
 Only a quotation from Lamb, you know; I 
 wouldn't dream of using such words myself!" 
 
 "I have a little matter of business which I 
 wanted to ask you about," said Miss Christina 
 rather severely; and at this opening of the 
 proceedings every one took their seats and 
 listened attentively to the speaker, for whom 
 indeed every one present had a most real 
 affection and respect. "My nephew, Gerald, 
 has received an offer from Mr. Marshall to 
 come up to the headquarters of the Freehold
 
 Resolved to be Rich 119 
 
 Building Society as clerk with 400 a year. 
 He would begin work next month. I want 
 advice about the offer. Mr. Muirhead, who 
 knows Mr. Marshall very well, has a very 'high 
 opinion of him" (it was curious to see how the 
 poor woman tried at the same time to do jus- 
 tice to Marshall, and yet to dissociate herself 
 from him ; while over his name each time that 
 it occurred she hesitated for a moment as if 
 not quite certain how far its pronouncement 
 might involve herself in telling a lie) ; "but of 
 course to send Gerald alone up to London is a 
 very serious step." 
 
 "It is a good position," said Lowe thought- 
 fully, after a pause; "very good. Four hun- 
 dred pounds a year! And Gerald only just 
 eighteen!" 
 
 '_!What does the lad himself think about it?" 
 asked Hare. 
 
 "I should like to accept it," said Gerald 
 simply. The boy's power of playing the hypo- 
 crite was really remarkable. Even Monica 
 thought for a moment that he was a little anx- 
 ious about the result of the conference, and 
 would recognise its decision as binding. 
 
 Miss Bertram looked at Dr. Hare, her glance 
 seeming to say, "I suppose there is an explo- 
 sion coming. You may blow up now if you 
 like." But to her surprise the doctor sat silent
 
 I2O Resolved to be Rich 
 
 and grave. When at last he spoke it was very 
 quietly. 
 
 "I do not like the Company," he said. "I 
 disbelieve in its philanthropy. 'Charity,' said 
 St. Paul, who did not live in the days of news- 
 papers, 'is not puffed up* ; and I prefer charities 
 on the Pauline lines. Partly for that reason, 
 and partly because I dislike all its managers, of 
 course except Mr. Muirhead" the doctor 
 glanced across at Muirhead, and his eyes 
 changed the "except" into "especially" "I 
 disbelieve in its financial soundness, too. But 
 I recognise with regret I admit it openly, 
 with regret that I have no facts or figures to 
 back my opinion. It is therefore worth 
 nothing. ' ' 
 
 "Whatever you may think it worth I value it 
 very highly," said Miss Bertram, pleased to 
 find a man of the world's opinion at one with 
 her own feminine instinct. "What do you 
 think, Mr. Lowe?" 
 
 "Gerald is young, very young indeed, to go 
 up to London by himself, though of course we 
 could minimise the danger by introducing him 
 to friends and finding him a good home. Apart 
 from those dangers and we must remember 
 that Gerald is not the first who has gone up 
 from a country life to encounter them, nor is 
 he as young as some others who go apart
 
 Resolved to be Rich 121 
 
 from these, I cannot imagine a more desirable 
 opening. I cannot see any reason for refusing 
 such an offer, and we really must have solid 
 reasons for doing such a thing." 
 
 "And you, Mr. Muirhead?" As Miss Ber- 
 tram turned to his friend Gerald suddenly 
 thought what an extremely awkward thing it 
 would have been, at any rate for the moment, 
 if he had not succeeded in "squaring" Muir- 
 head yesterday; and the latter had now pro- 
 ceeded to tell about that letter to London 
 accepting the clerkship. 
 
 ' ' I can only express my entire agreement with 
 Mr. Lowe," was the answer. "Dr. Hare 
 admits that his distrust of the Company is a 
 mere personal dislike of its managers. I 
 know> .and can say positively as regards its 
 financial position, that he has no grounds for 
 his mistrust. I shall be very sorry to part with 
 Gerald, but I certainly think that he should 
 go." 
 
 "I confess to sharing some of Dr. Hare's 
 prejudices," said Miss Bertram ; "yet I do not 
 think they ought to stand in Gerald's way." 
 
 There was a moment's silence, then a little 
 desultory talk about friends in London, and 
 then Miss Bertram gave her decision: "I think 
 I ought to let him go. Yes, we must accept." 
 
 There was another and much longer silence.
 
 122 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 The room seemed heavy with fatality; the 
 decision was weighing on the minds of all as 
 something of peculiar and uncomprehended 
 importance. No one seemed willing to speak, 
 till at last Miss Bertram told Monica to order 
 tea. 
 
 "Very sorry I can't stay a bit longer, Miss 
 Bertram," said Dr. Hare, jumping up with a 
 deep breath as of relief from some oppression ; 
 "but I must be off to a case. Your piclates I 
 feel sure you are going to have piclates would 
 tempt a man to risk his own life, but one can't 
 risk one's neighbours! Good-bye. And good- 
 bye and good luck to you, Gerald. I start on 
 my holiday on Monday, so I shan't see you again 
 before you begin your London work. Good 
 luck to you fame and fortune, health, wealth 
 and wisdom ! Good-bye. We shall meet again 
 sometime. I wonder when and where?" 
 
 When and where ! If those pictures of the 
 future which now and again we conjure so 
 gaily to come before us obeyed us occasionally 
 and came, what a horrible tragedy they would 
 make of these light-hearted moments!
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 Mr. Lowe went away immediately after tea, 
 and with sudden terror Muirhead realised that 
 fate was giving him the opportunity for which 
 yesterday he had professed to be anxious. He 
 was only anxious now to escape, but he knew 
 that he would despise himself to-night if he 
 failed in his resolution ; and besides, his passage 
 through this fearful ordeal was now but a 
 matter of a few weeks. After Gerald's 
 departure his excuses for visiting Hartshill 
 would be rare. And now he was alone with 
 Monica in the garden; they were moving 
 towards a summer-house which they could 
 easily enter, and so be out of sight. Muirhead 
 felt first that he would be insane not to make 
 use of such a chance ; secondly, that he would 
 give a year's income to see some one appear 
 and interrupt him. But no one appeared, and 
 already he and Monica had turned the corner 
 of some lilac-bushes and were out of sight of 
 the house. 
 
 "Gerald's departure will be a great loss to 
 me," he began, and then thought vaguely that 
 he had said that once, twice, three times before 
 123
 
 124 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 during the afternoon. But his head was throb- 
 bing violently; he felt as if his brain were 
 turning round and round ; he could not think 
 or see, and could hardly speak coherently. 
 
 "It will be a loss for him to leave you," said 
 the girl, forcing herself to be cordial, yet 
 meaning what she said too. She quite believed 
 that Muirhead had been her brother's bene- 
 factor and best friend. Then the man's agita- 
 tion made itself perceptible to her by some 
 means, and a nameless indefinable alarm crept 
 into her mind. 
 
 "You really think that this appointment of 
 Gerald's is a good thing for him?" she asked, 
 her anxiety at once fixing itself on the topic of 
 the afternoon. 
 
 "Oh, yes, yes, certainly. His absence will 
 leave you dull. ' ' 
 
 "It will not make much difference. Gerald 
 has been so absorbed in his work lately that he 
 has not shared our occupations much." 
 
 He had planned the conversation out yester- 
 day evening quite satisfactorily what he was 
 to say, and what she was to answer; but her 
 answers were all wrong, and what could he do? 
 He had a half-formed irritable desire to 
 reproach her for. this, and to ask her how the 
 matter could get any further if she would not 
 give the right cues.
 
 Resolved to be Rich 125 
 
 "I thought you would have missed him 
 more," he began, and as he had no idea how 
 bitterly reproachful his voice sounded, he was 
 puzzled by the girl's little laugh and stare of 
 surprise. But seeing them he pulled himself 
 together and went on with more resolution. 
 "However, it was something else I wanted to 
 say to you. His going away makes me fear 
 that I shall not be able to come here so often. 
 My visits lately, for a year or more past" 
 why did his miserable voice desert him in this 
 hour of need and become loud, husky and 
 monotonous? "have not been to . . : ." 
 altogether on his account." 
 
 "Haven't they?" she asked in low, fright- 
 ened tones; but he had meant her to ask that 
 question just here, and did not notice the fear 
 in her voic, and was glad. 
 
 "No, indeed, it was you I wanted to see. I 
 do not know how long it is since I have been 
 thinking of you all day, scheming to try and 
 see you, hoping that you cared a little bit to 
 see me. Monica, I love you! I love 
 you!" . . . 
 
 He had prepared a much longer speech than 
 that, about sympathy, his own ambitions and 
 prospects, about her aunt and a score of other 
 matters, but it all ended in that cry: "I love 
 you!" To see the girl standing there with her
 
 126 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 eyes cast down, her long eyelashes lying on the 
 cheeks from which pink glows were coming and 
 going, her lips quivering, and hands clasping 
 and unclasping in front of her, made him mad 
 with sudden hope. He held his breath after 
 those last words, and as the girl kept silence, 
 he at last put out his hand and tried to take 
 hers. But she drew it away immediately and 
 decisively, and his breath came out in a quick 
 "Monica!" wherein was questioning anxiety. 
 She spoke at last in answer to it. 
 
 "It is very kind of you to like me so much. 
 I did not know. . . ." 
 
 "Did not know! Oh! I should not have 
 thought you could help knowing!" 
 
 "Indeed I did not know, or I would have 
 tried to show you I would have told you 
 somehow that it was no use." 
 
 *'Nouse!" 
 
 "I am very sorry." 
 
 "I love you, Monica! I could make you 
 happy if you would marry me. You must 
 . . . you surely will. . . ." The man 
 began to stammer and talk wildly. 
 
 "I could not marry you, Mr. Muirhead. " 
 
 "You don't mean that," he said almost 
 roughly. "You have not had time to think. I 
 implore you to think a little. You will 
 see. ,"
 
 Resolved to be Rich 127 
 
 "It would be no good to think. Indeed I 
 could not marry you." 
 
 Muirhead stood silent. The beginning of a 
 great despair was dawning in his eyes, which 
 were faxed on the girl with a look which fright- 
 ened her and made her move away. The 
 movement more than her words seemed to 
 rouse the man to a sense of his repulse. He 
 flung up his hands in a gesture of half-insane 
 misery and turned away. 
 
 "I am very sorry," murmured Monica again. 
 Like most girls in her position, she could not let 
 bad alone without some attempt to make it worse. 
 
 "Sorry!" The man turned back to her, and 
 she looked with terror at his passion-distorted 
 face. "Why do you say you are sorry? Does 
 it mean .-<" . do you mean that you will 
 let me hope a little?" 
 
 "Oh, no." 
 
 "There is no hope for me?" 
 
 "I could not marry you," repeated the girl, 
 half-wishing that she could find some other 
 words which might sound less blankly repel- 
 ling. After all she could not feel particularly 
 annoyed with the man for being in love with 
 her. Why should she? 
 
 "It is absurd to say you could not. Of 
 course you could," answered Muirhead, com- 
 ing nearer, and his eyes flashed with excite-
 
 128 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 ment and anger. "What is the obstacle? 
 There must be some, I know." 
 
 Becoming nervous Monica turned and began 
 to walk homewards, but the man put himself 
 in her way. There was a strained smile, hor- 
 rible to look at, on his face. 
 
 "You like some one else better. Who is it?" 
 he asked, and at the question and his interfer- 
 ence with her movements the girl grew first 
 more frightened and then angry. 
 
 "Let me go home, please," she said, a little 
 flush of angry red coming into her cheeks. "It 
 is" she stammered over the word, but was evi- 
 dently trying to deprecate a quarrel "kind of 
 you to want to marry me, but I have answered 
 no. That must end it, please." 
 
 "End it!" he answered, with a tone and 
 gesture of despair which were rather fine in 
 their abandonment of tragedy. "You tell me 
 to 'end' my life coolly indeed. I have won 
 position, money, respect, here, and thought I 
 should be contented, and they are all nothing 
 to me. All my life is nothing to me. 
 Oh, Monica ! Monica, dear ! they are nothing if 
 I may not have your love too! Give me a 
 little bit of hope!" 
 
 She shook her head, shrinking away from 
 him in alarm, and again her movement seemed 
 to fill the man with a fury of despair.
 
 Resolved to be Rich 129 
 
 4 'It is Nicholson!" he cried out suddenly he 
 had resolved a hundred times yesterday that in 
 no case would he mention his rival's name, but 
 a passion to know the worst was on him "it 
 is that young Nicholson who has killed my life, 
 who has taken you away. Isn't it so? Oh! 
 but he shall not do it! I came first! You 
 were mine first!" 
 
 At the mention of her lover's name Monica 
 grew angrily scarlet, and the pity and fear 
 alike left her eyes. 
 
 "We have talked enough about this," she 
 said. "I cannot imagine what . . 
 what Mr. Nicholson has got to do with it. Let 
 me pass, please." And as the man, after a 
 second's hesitation, let her go by, she walked 
 up the path with head erect and flaming 
 cheeks. Turning a corner of the path she 
 looked back through a rose-bush which con- 
 cealed her, and saw Muirhead still standing 
 there, his arms hanging by his side, his face 
 turned towards her, his shoulders bent.
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 To hate anybody night and day with all your 
 heart and soul, to hate him so that the one 
 desire of your life is to hurt him mind and 
 body, present and future, pocket, brain, and 
 flesh, to hate him so that you would be sorry 
 to hear of his death because it would put an 
 end to your plans for his torture this is a 
 vigorous but unhealthy exercise. It brings 
 into play all your wits (and sometimes 
 muscles), but it takes away your appetite, is 
 bad for your digestion, and is too absorbing a 
 pastime for a man who is otherwise and busily 
 occupied. To hate anybody like this is, in 
 fact, apart from the morality of the thing, a 
 blunder. 
 
 Poor Sampson Muirhead, however, did not 
 realise this, or perhaps he did not argue about 
 the matter at all, or perhaps he thought (which 
 is a great mistake) that love and hate are 
 beyond one's control; for he consecrated the 
 next few weeks to a passion of loathing for 
 Reggie Nicholson which annihilated every 
 other feeling and faculty in him. A rival and 
 130
 
 Resolved to be Rich 131 
 
 a successful rival! the knowledge that Nichol- 
 son was in love with Monica and she with him, 
 that they were together constantly and per- 
 fectly happy together, and probably only happy 
 when they were together, had lain in a little 
 cell of his brain unrealised, kept back, for 
 weeks past. Now it flamed into life, stared 
 him in the face like a hideous garish picture 
 thrust suddenly before his eyes, and he could 
 think of nothing else. Again and again after 
 his own rejection he saw them together, and 
 each time wondered how he could have been so 
 blind before as not to see that the two were 
 lovers, and happy lovers, united in thoughts, 
 hope, sjTnpathy, love ... in love! At 
 the recollection he would fling down pens and 
 papers if he were at work, food if he were at 
 meals, books if he were trying to occupy his 
 mind with them, and start up from his chair 
 sick with fury. Presently it was but three 
 weeks after his own proposal, but to this man 
 living in hell it might have been three hundred 
 years he heard from Gerald that the two were 
 engaged. 
 
 "Awfully sorry she wouldn't have you," said 
 the boy, watching Muirhead with a slightly 
 amused smile; love was not one of humanity's 
 passions of which Mr. Gerald Franklin took 
 much account; "but it's just a matter of a
 
 132 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 whim with these girls, you know. They never 
 have any sense. ' ' 
 
 "Miss Bertram has consented?" The man 
 standing at the window could just control his 
 lips sufficiently to ask the question. 
 
 "Oh, yes. Old Nicholson came over and 
 saw her, and they have arranged the business 
 quite happily. He is to take his son into his 
 business at once, and into partnership next 
 year. So you will have another vacancy here 
 to fill. I daresay you have forgotten your own 
 admiration for her by this time, so you must 
 come over and congratulate her. Oh, here is 
 the happy youth. Come in, Nicholson, I was 
 just telling Muirhead about you and my sister. 
 He wants to congratulate you." 
 
 Work being a little slack, Gerald was not 
 busy and wanted some amusement. From 
 stories which he had heard and by accident 
 read now and again, he understood that a cer- 
 tain amount of such amusement might be 
 extracted from a conversation between a suc- 
 cessful and an unsuccessful lover about the 
 young lady who was the object of their joint 
 affections. That the young lady in the present 
 case happened to be his own sister did not 
 occur to him as a reason for foregoing the 
 amusement. 
 
 But he was not destined to extract much
 
 Resolved to be Rich 133 
 
 from the present situation. There comes a 
 point of suffering when an all-merciful nature 
 says to us: "You cannot bear this any longer; 
 come away with me ; let me take your mind 
 out of that torture-environment for a while to 
 a far-off world of sun-lit skies and babbling 
 water and rest. . . . " And so another turn 
 is given to the rack, another twist to the 
 thumb-screw; muscles writhe, nerves vibrate 
 with agony before the torturers' smiling faces ; 
 but the writhings and outcries mean nothing, 
 for the man's mind is elsewhere and perfectly 
 happy, ^t was so now with Muirhead. Sud- 
 denly and for a little while something in his 
 brain gave a great throb and tear, and then 
 hung limp and sensationless like a certain kind 
 of wire which you pull to a strong straining 
 point at which it suddenly becomes as slack 
 and tearable as a long thread of glue. He 
 glanced round the room with a slight smile, 
 nodded to Nicholson, murmured something 
 about going into Stoke for an hour, and so left 
 the office. 
 
 Once outside he walked on and on, he knew 
 not where or for how long. Sometimes he sat 
 down under a tree and picked bits of grass and 
 bound them together and held up the plait in 
 front of him with soft pleased laughter. Once 
 he noticed two or three passers-by staring at
 
 134 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 him, and, considering the cause, found that he 
 was singing a psalm the "De Profundis" 
 which he had not heard, he supposed, for fif- 
 teen years. Once he heard a station-bell ring, 
 and stopping to wonder where he was, found 
 himself at Great Bridgeford, nearing Stafford, 
 and so mechanically turned back. Then he 
 found himself sitting in a church in which 
 some one was reading prayers, and a few 
 people began to sing a hymn. It was not till 
 then that he really awoke to reality awoke 
 with a vague stare round him, and a muttered 
 exclamation or two, like a man returning to 
 life after chloroform. The whole scene was 
 quite strange to him church, people, and 
 clergyman. He did not know where he was, 
 or how long he had been there ; in his hand he 
 held a few wild flowers, but had no idea when 
 or where he had picked them. He had left 
 the Freehold offices this morning after reading 
 certain letters and hearing some news of some- 
 thing; since then the hours were a dreadful 
 blank, a nothing, a hideous vacuum of which 
 memory could not fill one single moment. 
 The thought frightened him horribly; nothing 
 in his life had ever filled him with so much 
 fear as this sudden stoppage of memory and 
 brain-action. He looked at his watch ; it was 
 past seven o'clock, and he must have left the
 
 Resolved to be Rich 135 
 
 office this morning at ten or soon after. Nine 
 hours in a world of which he knew nothing 
 beforehand and could remember nothing now! 
 . . . A short fainting-fit frightens many of 
 us; a sleeping-draught which will plunge us 
 into unconsciousness for several hours is a 
 terror to many people ; the chief dread of death 
 lies in our ignorance of what the grim passage 
 is like and whither it leads. What had he done 
 to his brain that it should play him a trick like 
 that? Would it play him another at any time, 
 in any place that it chose? The man's face 
 grew ashen grey, a cold sweat was on it, 
 his eyes were mad with fear as he thought of 
 such a probability. He remembered now the 
 news of the morning which had given him the 
 shock the news of Monica's engagement and 
 it mattered absolutely nothing to him ; beside 
 the dread of another such brain-lapse all mortal 
 pain and disappointment seemed mere child- 
 grief. Abruptly, heedless of the fact that it 
 was in the middle of a prayer, and that the 
 congregation looked up at him with scandalised 
 glances, he got up and walked out of church. 
 He glanced anxiously round the church-yard 
 and the road outside, half-doubting whether 
 even this might not be a part of some night- 
 mare. But with a great sigh of relief he recog- 
 nised a stream which ran past there and saw
 
 136 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 where he was. Then suddenly he realised that 
 he was fatigued, footsore and hungry to the 
 last limit of endurance; he must have spent 
 nearly all those hours in walking. There was 
 a good inn in the village, and going there he 
 ordered food and went into the garden while it 
 was being prepared. Coming back into the 
 dining-room when he had been told that dinner 
 was ready he saw sitting at a table in the 
 corner . . . Reggie Nicholson and his 
 father. 
 
 Nicholson and his father . . . was it 
 these two men really or ... A ghastly 
 dread which seized him made him move a few 
 steps towards his own table gazing steadily 
 before him the while. Then he looked fur- 
 tively round again to see if they were still 
 there. Even then he dare not be quite sure 
 that they were flesh and blood, but walked up 
 to them in a hesitating manner and spoke to 
 the elder man with a timidity which the latter 
 put down to a very different cause. 
 
 "Better join tables," said Mr. Nicholson at 
 last, and Muirhead unwillingly ordered his 
 dinner to be brought across the room. 
 
 "I've just seen your friend, Robinson," said 
 Nicholson. "So he's sold all his shares in the 
 Freehold, eh? What's that for?" 
 
 "He's speculating, I suppose," said Muir-
 
 Resolved to be Rich 137 
 
 head, utterly unable to think whether he ought 
 or ought not to be talking about the matter. 
 
 "Well, that looks to me a very queer trans- 
 action; fishy, d d fishy, I call it. Anything 
 going wrong? My boy says . . . Oh, 
 Lord! he's treading on my toes under the 
 table. What have I said, Reggie? We're all 
 friends here, aren't we?" Nicholson had 
 finished his bottle of claret with very slight aid 
 from his son and was well on his way through 
 one of the bottles of port for which the inn was 
 famous. "I was only going to say that you 
 didn't like the look of that deal of Robinson's 
 any more than I do. Canon Hobart has a 
 queer story too of Marshall knowing this 
 neighbourhood a d d sight better than he 
 should do; and here's Robinson selling his 
 shares. It's . . . well, it's" Nicholson 
 shook his head solemnly, trying to think 
 of a new word, but failing, and his mind drift- 
 ing for certain reasons to the thought of fresh 
 water, he repeated "fishy, d d fishy." 
 
 Food and wine were bringing back sense to 
 Muirhead's brain; he took in at last what 
 Nicholson was saying, and then looking at 
 Reggie saw that he was scarlet and playing 
 nervously with some biscuits. Directly his 
 father ceased speaking he began a long expla- 
 nation of what had brought them there to
 
 138 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 V - "-'". 
 
 dinner, but Muirhead did not listen. So the 
 boy was betraying them ! How much did he 
 know? With the new life which was throbbing 
 back into Muirhead's nerves came the smart of 
 the old pain. Monica had gone ; this youngster 
 had taken her. There was no hope now, for an 
 engagement had been announced. The pain 
 grew, but its sharp stabs were a tonic and 
 Muirhead's thoughts became perfectly coher- 
 ent. Reggie would be a relation of Miss Ber- 
 tram's now. If he warned her and made her 
 sell her Freehold shares? If he warned a 
 score of others and it was said at headquarters 
 that his proceedings were Muirhead's fault 
 . . . And what more likely than that he 
 should do so, now that his connection with the 
 Company would soon be at an end? And what 
 was Canon Hobart's story? Doubtless some 
 more work of young Nicholson's. No further 
 word spoke Muirhead that evening except to 
 mutter good-bye as the father and son rose 
 from the table ; but he sat there and thought 
 and schemed, and glanced round the room at 
 intervals with a hunted hopeless look, and then 
 thought and schemed again.
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 The Dresden Road Wesleyan Chapel was 
 unusually crowded one Thursday evening in 
 June, the congregation having been attracted 
 by the announcement of a discourse from a 
 favourite and famous local preacher. The 
 yellow glass windows which looked painfully 
 ugly at midday now glowed rather pleasingly 
 in the half-light of a summer sunset. The 
 walls, bare but tiled in one part and soberly 
 painted in another, made the chapel cool and 
 restful to the eyes. Humanity being so much 
 more interesting than architecture the absence 
 of any decorative attraction was rather an 
 advantage than otherwise to a person who 
 wanted to study the audience and their 
 emotions. 
 
 The prayer being over Mr. Luke Robinson 
 mounted the pulpit and with his hands folded 
 in front of him and his eyes flashing back- 
 wards and forwards among his auditors, stood 
 waiting till the coughing, rustling and settling 
 down of the congregation, was finished. A 
 few persons in the chapel who had not seen 
 139
 
 140 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 him before peered through the falling light to 
 try and inspect more closely this man whose 
 influence in that part of North Staffordshire 
 was a religious and political power which no 
 one could disregard. 
 
 They saw a man of middle height, square- 
 shouldered, square-headed, in fact with a 
 general appearance of (literal) squareness 
 everywhere. His hands were square (also red 
 with terribly bitten nails, but of course one 
 only noticed that on closer inspection), his chin 
 and forehead were massive and square. His 
 mouth was that of a man who only spoke to 
 give orders, and who could enforce obedience 
 to them by shutting it and looking on. His 
 eyes were steady grey eyes, a little near 
 together and rather aggressive under their 
 dark eyebrows, but always looking straight and 
 unflinchingly at their object of vision. A fine 
 face and figure altogether, and one in which 
 few men found anything wrong. Yet a certain 
 travelling phrenologist, a total stranger to the 
 district, once made a curious remark about the 
 great Wesleyan leader. He gave a lecture in 
 Stoke and invited some of the audience on to 
 the platform to have their "bumps" read. 
 Two or three giggling young men went up one 
 by one after much persuasion, but the proces- 
 sion was slow and brief; and to encourage
 
 Resolved to be Rich 141 
 
 others Luke Robinson, always ready with such 
 good-natured acts, went up and submitted 
 himself to the phrenologist. The man felt him 
 over and made some commonplace but rather 
 apt jokes: "This is what I should call more a 
 wholesale than a retail head"; "our friend 
 here gives orders at twelve o'clock and expects 
 to have them executed by half-past," etc., but 
 his voice grew a little odd at last and the jokes 
 died away. "Say, Jimmy," said a friend after- 
 wards, "that parson chap seemed to puzzle you 
 a bit." "He didn't puzzle me, " retorted the 
 phrenologist, "bul; I was just wondering what 
 he would say if I told him the truth that his 
 head was the cruellest and selfishest head I 
 ever set hands on!" 
 
 "I am going to speak to you this even- 
 ing about the responsibilities of worldly 
 wealth. . . ." Mr. Robinson could not 
 speak many words without showing you one 
 secret of his influence. His voice was 
 exquisite, strong, clear, perfectly controlled, 
 so that one would have been charmed to sit 
 and listen to the speaker reciting the multipli- 
 cation-table. Half unconscious of the reason, 
 many of his audience sat back in their seats 
 with a satisfied sigh, ready to take for gospel 
 anything told them by a preacher who had 
 such notes in his voice as this man had.
 
 142 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Besides, the subject was interesting, and Rob- 
 inson spoke in a strongly authoritative manner. 
 He denounced speculation, especially the turf, 
 and his hearers nodded their heads in approval. 
 "Anything in fact," he went on, "which caused 
 a man to give an undue amount of time and 
 thought to mere increase of money was wrong, 
 but, on the other hand," he said, "anything 
 which increased a man's money without 
 expenditure of time and thought was equally 
 wrong. It was not easy to steer between the 
 two courses, but there were certain rules 
 which, if a man would adopt them, would 
 simplify the difficulties. Money, for instance, 
 could be put into investments which gave no 
 anxiety or thought whatever to their holders, 
 into Government securities, well-established 
 banks or railways and so on. This was good, 
 because it left the holder perfectly free to think 
 of spiritual things, of charity and justice and 
 the duties of his religion. But as such invest- 
 ments only produced a very small interest it 
 was questionable whether a man who put his 
 money into them could really be said to be 
 doing the best for himself and his neighbours. 
 Money again could be invested in the extension 
 and improvement of a man's own existing 
 business, and this was good too, because it 
 employed an increased number of men of
 
 Resolved to be Rich 143 
 
 whose honesty and welfare the master could 
 directly and constantly assure himself; but 
 such a form of investment was not always pos- 
 sible. Most men had to invest their savings in 
 some business in the management of which 
 they could not have any direct control, and if 
 one wanted more than the very small interest 
 paid by Government securities and such a 
 desire was perfectly legitimate one was con- 
 fronted with innumerable risks and tempta- 
 tions. He, the preacher, thought that that 
 man would not only be occupying a higher 
 moral standpoint, but would actually be more 
 secure from loss who said to himself, 'Is 
 this business in which I want to invest not 
 only a sound money-making concern but of 
 some moral advantage to those with whom 
 it trades? Shall I by investing money in it 
 be helping my neighbours towards justice, 
 morality, righteousness, as well as doing good 
 to myself?' There were such institutions. For 
 instance . . ." 
 
 Gerald Franklin, sitting in the body of the 
 chapel amidst the rapt audience, leant forward 
 a little watching the preacher closely. He had 
 listened to this preamble spread out of course 
 over a much greater length than the above 
 summary, and delivered with frequent inter- 
 spersion of biblical texts and scraps of worldly
 
 144 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 philosophy, as well as with much earnestness 
 and eloquence critically and admiringly, not- 
 ing with acute approval each well-argued 
 clearly-put premise from which the ultimate 
 conclusion was to be drawn. He admired the 
 preacher immensely. Yet I like when it is 
 possible to put forward a good point or two in 
 my young friend's character; he cannot, I 
 must allow, afford to have the smallest of them 
 passed over in the lad's heart was a scorn and 
 contempt for Mr. Luke Robinson which not 
 even his far-calculating resolution could always 
 hide. He despised this man with his greed, 
 humbug, fraud and lies, with a passion of con- 
 tempt which was almost hatred. In public, 
 everywhere, even among his most intimate 
 friends, he was obliged to speak in terms of the 
 greatest respect and veneration for Mr. Robin- 
 son's opinion, and it was the highest testimony 
 to Gerald's powers of self-control that he was 
 able to do so. In private he talked and wrote 
 to the preacher with an open scorn and derision 
 under which Mr. Robinson winced and squirmed 
 again ; and no higher testimony could be given 
 to Gerald's influence in the Freehold than 
 Robinson's toleration of this insolence. In his 
 own review of his position in the Society there 
 was nothing which irritated Gerald more than 
 the semi-consciousness that, so far as humbug
 
 Resolved to be Rich 145 
 
 and hypocrisy were concerned, Robinson and 
 himself would be regarded by the world as in 
 very much the same boat. 
 
 The preacher was now well on his way 
 through a strong and emphatic laudation of the 
 Freehold Building Society, its works, man- 
 agers, finance and prospects. In many places 
 his words would have sounded extravagant and 
 absurd; but Robinson knew his audience, and 
 knew that hints and suggestions would be quite 
 lost on them. The panegyric was straightfor- 
 ward, forcible and consistent. At frequent 
 intervals he recurred to the philanthropic work 
 of the Society, in order to show that his praise 
 of it was not out of place in a religious build- 
 ing, and repeated more than once that the 
 main object of his sermon was to help those 
 who had a proper horror of speculation and yet 
 wanted to do the most possible good with their 
 money. "It is his masterpiece, this sermon," 
 said Gerald to himself, as the peroration came 
 to an end amidst silence, in which every man 
 could hear his neighbour breathe; "the fellow 
 has never done better. I don't wonder he 
 wanted Muirhead to come and hear it. What 
 a glowing report poor old Muirhead would have 
 sent of it to headquarters! Indeed I must 
 take one there myself. The very least one can 
 say about the hypocrite, is that he is worth all
 
 146 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 the money we pay him. I will go round and 
 see him now." 
 
 Mr. Robinson was inclined to regard it as an 
 ill-requital for his labours of the evening, when 
 Mr. Gerald Franklin stepped softly into his 
 room and with an engaging smile congratu- 
 lated him on his sermon. 
 
 "At this moment," said the boy, "when, as 
 you know, things are beginning to look a little 
 queer, we were really in want of a brilliant 
 effort like that. Now I should say that sermon 
 was good for five or six thousand pounds. 
 Quite a little haul of plunder, eh?" 
 
 "You will give a proper report of it to Mar- 
 shall?" asked Robinson, sulky yet anxious. 
 
 "Oh, yes; yes, certainly. You shall have all 
 the payment for it which it is our affair to give. 
 And I shouldn't wonder if some of your audi- 
 ence to-night made up the balance one day. 
 You'll have a lively time of it if they do!" 
 
 "I do my best for them," said Robinson 
 shamefacedly and hesitatingly. "How can 
 they blame me if something beyond my control 
 goes wrong afterwards?" 
 
 "Is anybody listening to us?" asked Gerald 
 in affected alarm. 
 
 "Not that I know of." 
 
 "Are you keeping up that d d cant for my 
 benefit? How very funny! However, I
 
 Resolved to be Rich 147 
 
 hadn't come here to hear a second edition of 
 to-night's sermon. To be honest I find one 
 about as much as I can stomach in a week. 
 There is something I want to speak about 
 before I go up to London. Those shares of 
 yours did Marshall give you leave to sell 
 them?" 
 
 "Are the shares Marshall's or mine?" asked 
 the other with surly bravado. 
 
 "Marshall's for all practical purposes. You 
 and Benson have played a trick on us, and we 
 don't choose such tricks to be played." 
 
 "Who advised Miss Bertram to buy the 
 shares?" sneered Robinson. "Who talks about 
 plunder after that?" 
 
 "Who invited you to share the plunder?" 
 was the cool reply. "Keep clear of our busi- 
 ness except when you are told to come forward. 
 Now I am going to speak to Marshall about 
 this affair, and I should think it very likely 
 that he would insist upon the shares being 
 bought back." 
 
 "Yes? Insist?" . . . The man's eyes 
 flashed furiously. 
 
 "I should think it likely," repeated Mr. 
 Franklin. "We don't choose to have agents 
 without any interest in the undertaking." 
 
 "And if I refuse? If I turn round alto- 
 gether, say I have discovered the truth, and
 
 148 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 denounce the whole affair here and in a score 
 of chapels all over the Potteries?" 
 
 " 'If !' " . . . said the boy quietly but 
 derisively. "And 'if we produce a hundred 
 letters of yours thanking us for money, promis- 
 ing to persuade this, that, and the other person 
 to buy shares, and acknowledging commissions 
 received from us on such new shareholders! 
 Fire away! Begin your sermons to-morrow! 
 I doubt if you will bring in much more money 
 after to-night. To-night has about exhausted 
 all that you can do, and for many reasons we 
 should be glad to be rid of you. I myself for 
 one detest this religious part of the business. 
 I am told that Lord Eastney does too. So fire 
 away!" 
 
 "We could do one another a great deal of 
 mischief, I daresay," said Robinson with an 
 uneasy attempt to pass off the quarrel and 
 resume a lighter tone, "so we need not argue 
 about it. Neither of us has any intention of 
 beginning. We both know too much about the 
 other. Now there is a little matter connected 
 with the Arkhill property. . . ." 
 
 "We will settle about these shares, please. 
 Do I understand I am to tell Marshall that you 
 refuse to buy any more?" 
 
 "It is about that very point I am going to 
 speak. I have seven acres of land at the
 
 Resolved to be Rich 149 
 
 corner of the Dently Road and the turn down 
 to the Hall a most valuable little lot. Now if 
 the Freehold would buy that it rounds off the 
 Arkhill estate perfectly; Sir Richard Culla- 
 more said so more than once we might 
 arrange it. I would take payment in shares, 
 even with a promise to keep some of them. 
 Then of course there would be no more talk of 
 denunciations. If they would give me say " 
 the man, who had been speaking quietly, and 
 with his eyes half-closed, suddenly changed the 
 tone of his voice, and looked straight at Gerald, 
 menacing him "say five hundred ten-pound 
 shares for the seven acres, that would satisfy 
 me." 
 
 "You would like five thousand pounds for a 
 bit of land worth perhaps two hundred, Mr. 
 Robinson?" Gerald Franklin was one of those 
 born rulers of men who, instinctively, and 
 without stopping to reason, meet threats with 
 defiances "I think I will take it on myself to 
 decline your offer on behalf of the Freehold. 
 I will speak to Marshall about it, certainly, and 
 report this conversation to him, but . . ." 
 
 "Oh, it was a mere suggestion, Mr. Frank- 
 lin. Don't make too much of it. Wait a 
 moment" Gerald was moving towards the 
 door "Pray, Mr. Franklin, do not make mis- 
 chief between me and Marshall. ' '
 
 150 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "Oh, certainly not," said the boy, drily, 
 "but you see I am just an agent of Mr. Mar- 
 shall's here, and I must keep him in touch with 
 the Society's business, with the revolts of its 
 minor agents, and so on." 
 
 "But that is nonsense. Does my sermon 
 to-night, for instance, mean that I am in revolt, 
 as you call it?" 
 
 "The sermon in question," was the reply, 
 "is not so very straightforward that I can tell 
 at a glance what it means. Good-night, Mr. 
 Robinson." 
 
 Left alone Luke Robinson sat down, and, I 
 regret to say, swore softly to himself for sev- 
 eral minutes. For about th,e hundredth time 
 in his life he had met Gerald in open conflict 
 and been badly beaten. This scheme of his 
 for selling the little plot of ground near Dently 
 to the Freehold for ^5000 just fifty times its 
 value was a pet one which had been maturing 
 for some months, and this evening's sermon 
 was a part of it. He had meant and invited 
 Muirhead to come and hear the sermon and 
 send a glowing account of it to Marshall, who 
 would thus be in a favourable mood to listen to 
 his plan. Even when Gerald had appeared 
 instead of Muirhead he had not despaired. 
 The scheme, in fact, might as well be laid by 
 himself before the boy, whose advice about it
 
 Resolved to be Rich 151 
 
 would certainly be asked by Marshall. Then 
 had come the quarrel, threats, an ill-timed 
 introduction of the proposal, more threats, and 
 somehow Gerald had come out of the contest, 
 as he usually did, victorious. Robinson cursed 
 him quietly but distinctly for the space of half 
 a minute more, and then went on thinking. Of 
 course what the boy said was true, he was in 
 the Society's power. He could damage them 
 a little perhaps: they could annihilate him for 
 certain in reply. And Gerald had said that his 
 influence was not wanted much longer: that 
 to-night's sermon had finished his work. Was 
 that so really? ... It chimed in some- 
 what painfully with certain suspicions of his 
 own. He had been a fool, ten times a fool, to 
 preach as he had preached to-night, without 
 driving his bargain beforehand! There was 
 little left to hope for if Marshall and Franklin 
 thought him used up. Gratitude was not a 
 very conspicuous virtue in gentry of that 
 description, and fear was apparently an equally 
 inconspicuous vice. He had already made, it 
 is true, a moderate fortune out of the Free- 
 hold, but moderation is a word of unknown 
 meaning to men of his breed. Their love of 
 money becomes gradually absorbed into a pas- 
 sion for money-getting, which is not only the 
 most unhappy disease upon earth, but nearly
 
 152 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 always brings its victims into difficulties, and 
 thence occasionally into gaol, for the simple 
 reason that there is a limit to the amount of 
 money which you can get honestly. This latter 
 fact a discovery of my own and one of the 
 highest importance in political economy alone 
 prevents certain men absorbing all the avail- 
 able cash of a county or town, or even country 
 into their own pockets, and has been a serious 
 annoyance to many a money-getting machine 
 besides Mr. Luke Robinson. 
 
 As he left the chapel he encountered one 
 after another of the auditors of his sermon, and 
 was obliged to listen to their congratulation, 
 approval, and arguments. As he walked up 
 the hill past the Nurses' Home, Canon Hobart 
 overtook him, and the two men nodded to one 
 another. Then the Rector, irritably conscious 
 of certain accusations of intolerance which he 
 had been hearing and which had been gather- 
 ing volume, to say truth not without cause, 
 during the past eighteen months, joined the 
 Wesleyan minister and they walked on 
 together. 
 
 "You have been preaching at the Hanley 
 Road chapel this evening?" said Hobart 
 politely. 
 
 "Yes." On any other occasion Robinson 
 would have felt rather gratified at the fame of
 
 Resolved to be Rich 153 
 
 his sermon having already spread so far. Now 
 he was simply annoyed. 
 
 "About this building society?" 
 
 "I mentioned it in my sermon." 
 
 "Now, Mr. Robinson, if you won't think me 
 impertinent for mentioning my ideas to you 
 about that affair" the Rector paused for a 
 disclaimer of such thoughts from his compan- 
 ion, who however maintained a disconcerting 
 silence "I should like to beg you to re-con- 
 sider your attitude with regard to it. I dis- 
 trust it. Who is Lord Eastney? We all know 
 him down here a poor and not over-scrupulous 
 peer with big expenses and a small income. 
 Who is this man Marshall, the real manager 
 and only apparent business man in the under- 
 taking? I say who is Marshall?" 
 
 "A well-known, perfectly honest financier." 
 . . Robinson began a perfunctory defence 
 of Marshall and was in full swing with it ; he 
 knew every word by heart, and was sick to 
 death of repeating it; when he suddenly 
 stopped bewildered by his companion's expres- 
 sion. They had reached the top of the hill and 
 had turned down a short road leading to Rob- 
 inson's house. In a valley on one side of them 
 was Stoke: on a table-land opposite to them 
 stood the long line of the North Staffordshire 
 Infirmary buildings just visible in the light of
 
 154 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 the summer sunset. The buildings had caught 
 Hobart's eye as he asked his question "Who is 
 Marshall?" and the sight seemed suddenly to 
 connect itself with his words. In vivid flashes 
 the train of thought connecting the two ran 
 on. Robinson's words fell on deaf ears. Who 
 was Marshall? What on earth had Marshall to 
 do with the North Staffordshire Infirmary? 
 Was it some mere trifle, a subscription, a 
 speech, a patient? What connection had that 
 face, that smooth silky voice with some one in 
 there? Something he was sure . . . ah! 
 but it was maddening not to be able to remem- 
 ber what! Abruptly wishing the minister 
 good-night Canon Hobart turned back and 
 walked home desperately trying t6 remember 
 something which eluded him more and more at 
 every step. He had fixed his mind firmly at 
 last upon the patients in the place and was 
 certain that Marshall had been one of them, 
 one who for a reason (probably certainly a 
 bad one) had left an impression. But what 
 was the reason? He would ask Marshall the 
 question point-blank, resolved Hobart irritably, 
 on the very next occasion on which he met 
 him.
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 "Mr. Robinson, I believe?" 
 
 "Yes, my Lord. I am pleased to see your 
 lordship down in this neighbourhood." 
 
 Lord Eastney motioned to the minister to take 
 a seat. He had come down from London with 
 Marshall that morning, two days after the now 
 famous sermon in the Hanley Road chapel, 
 and various local lights of the Freehold Build- 
 ing Society had been invited to meet him. 
 The visit, which was in fact a mere business 
 one made in connection with the purchase of 
 the Arkhill estate, caused some commotion. 
 Oddly enough several persons professed at first 
 to view it with suspicion, as indicative of some- 
 thing being wrong. Then on the following 
 day it was announced in the Staffordshire 
 Sentinel that the Marchioness of Eastney and 
 Lady Angela Purvis had come down too. A 
 report was spread about that the family was 
 looking for a house in the district and once 
 more peace and joy reigned. 
 
 "You have done some good work for us 
 here, Mr. Robinson."
 
 156 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "I do what I can, my lord, for my flock in 
 temporal as well as spiritual things." 
 
 The marquis looked round at Marshall with a 
 queer glance which seemed to ask: "Am I 
 obliged to keep up this canting nonsense with 
 this fellow? Can't you tell him to talk 
 openly?" but Marshall took no notice. 
 
 "Now we hear forgive my coming to busi- 
 ness rather abruptly; my time is short that 
 you want to sell a bit of land adjoining this 
 estate which we are buying. ' ' 
 
 "That is so, my lord. A very nice bit. Far 
 more valuable than any other bit on your 
 property. If there is coal near Dently the 
 seam must run right through my land." 
 
 "We will give you ^400; that is we will give 
 you forty shares in the Freehold for it." 
 
 "Why, my lord, the land is . . ." 
 
 "I advise you to accept our offer, Mr. Rob- 
 inson." 
 
 "If you will treble it, my lord!" 
 
 "But we won't!" 
 
 The door close by Robinson opened and 
 Lady Eastney came in accompanied by a 
 young man and a child ; her husband looked up 
 with a slight frown. 
 
 "The Harleys have just come," she said, 
 making slight bows to Marshall and Robinson 
 as she walked up the room to the table where
 
 Resolved to be Rich 157 
 
 her husband sat. "Shall you be able to come 
 and see them?" 
 
 "Yes, I will come down shortly. Ask them 
 to wait if they can." He hesitated for a 
 moment and then resolved on a manoeuvre 
 which had often enough succeeded before. 
 "Wait one moment," he said as his wife was 
 preparing to move away; "I want to present 
 to you a very good friend of our work down 
 here, Mr. Luke Robinson. Mr. Robinson, my 
 wife, Lady Eastney. " 
 
 The Marchioness seemed to study her hus- 
 band for a moment as though to learn some- 
 thing, and then turned to Robinson with a 
 polite smile: "I am most pleased to make 
 acquaintance with Lord Eastney's friends 
 down here," she said. "It is my first visit to 
 the district, and I find it most interesting. 
 Angela and I" the dark eyes with that 
 infinitely weary smile in them, looked down 
 on the small eight-year-old creature with an 
 odd look of pity "have been over the Wedge- 
 wood works this morning, and we were very 
 much interested. We were given the most 
 charming little vases." 
 
 "I suppose Miss Angela will be able to 
 make vases for herself now," said the minister, 
 smiling with embarrassed amiability, and put- 
 ting his hand on the child's head. He was
 
 158 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 (self) -celebrated for having "a way with chil- 
 dren." The little lady shrank back with a 
 glance of quick proud anger, but the Marchion- 
 ess with a hand lightly but firmly on her 
 shoulder held her still while Robinson stroked 
 her hair two or three times, and Lady Eastney 
 looked down on her with that curious look of 
 pity still in her eyes. 
 
 "We should both love to play with that clay, 
 I am sure," she said. "We should like to go 
 back there every day while we are here ; but 
 we want to see something of our friends, and 
 there is not time for everything. Has Lord 
 Eastney asked you to come to lunch with us 
 to-morrow, Mr. Robinson? I know he means 
 to do so, and I hope you will be able to come. 
 Angela and I are so anxious to hear something 
 about the lives and work of all the people we 
 saw in the manufactory this morning, and you 
 must come and tell us. ' ' 
 
 "His lordship has asked me, and I have been 
 delighted to accept his invitation. I shall be 
 most pleased to tell your ladyship and Miss 
 Angela all you want to know." The man 
 put out his hand again, and with a quick, 
 uncontrollable movement, the little one put up 
 her arms to defend her hair from being 
 stroked. But in response to another warning 
 pressure on her shoulder she dropped them
 
 Resolved to be Rich 159 
 
 again, though angry tears welled up in her 
 eyes. 
 
 "Then we need only say au revoir till 
 to-morrow," said the Marchioness, holding out 
 her hand with her most charming smile. "I 
 must go now to some friends who are waiting 
 forme. Bertie!" 
 
 The young man who had come in with Lady 
 Eastney, and who had been standing during 
 the interview looking at Robinson as if he were 
 a new and not very pleasing specimen of the 
 ourang-outang tribe of monkey, lounged for- 
 ward to the door, opened it, and with a long 
 farewell glance at Robinson's coat, as if still 
 doubtful whether it did or did not conceal a 
 tail, went out after the Marchioness. 
 
 "Only three days more!" he said cheerfully 
 when they were outside, "and then Scotland 
 and freedom ! Hullo, another couple ! Women 
 this time ! Very nice-looking girl too. Were 
 you looking?" Bertie Alford stopped in front 
 of Miss Bertram and Monica, and addressed the 
 latter with an impertinence which was curious 
 in a man who was usually well-mannered 
 enough. In point of fact he was trying to 
 amuse and distract Lady Eastney, and would 
 have chaffed and insulted half a dozen royalties 
 to bring a laugh to the pale, tired face. "Were 
 you looking for Lord Eastney?"
 
 160 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "We are waiting for my brother who is 
 with him now," said Monica. 
 
 "Well, won't you come in here, Miss Robin- 
 son?" went on Alford recklessly, and delighted 
 to hear a slight giggle from Angela. He indi- 
 cated the dining-room of the private suite 
 which Lord Eastney had engaged at the North 
 Stafford Hotel. "Your brother may be some 
 time. He told me . . ." 
 
 "That will do, Bertie." Lady Eastney came 
 forward with a vexed look as she saw Monica 
 flush angrily. ' ' But would you like to wait in 
 here?" she went on, turning to Miss Bertram. 
 "My cousin is quite right in saying that Mr. 
 Robinson seemed to be very much occupied 
 with my husband with Lord Eastney." 
 
 "We have nothing to do with Mr. Robin- 
 son," was Miss Bertram's chilling reply. "We 
 are waiting for Mr. Franklin. This is my niece, 
 Miss Franklin." 
 
 "Oh! I beg your pardon!" The strangest 
 expressions of sympathy, pity, and something 
 like fear, swept across my lady's face. Her 
 voice, in which also there was an odd touch of 
 fear, made Alford look at her with amazement. 
 "You must be Miss Bertram. I am so glad to 
 make your acquaintance, even in this odd 
 manner." The Marchioness glanced reproach- 
 fully at her cousin, who muttered something
 
 Resolved to be Rich 161 
 
 sounding like, "How the deuce was I to 
 know?" "Please come and wait in this room. 
 Everybody in there looked so very busy that 
 I feel sure you will have a long time to 
 wait. ' ' 
 
 Miss Christina and Monica followed the tall, 
 graceful young figure into the room, and then v 
 sat down and studied her. At first sight Lady ." 
 Eastney looked younger than her years, which ./ 
 numbered but thirty; on closer inspection she 
 looked as if she were trying to hide the ravages 
 of forty hard-lived years. Her dress of brown 
 holland and white muslin, with diamond 
 brooches holding a lace collar here and a flower 
 or two there, looked too young; a profusion of 
 emerald and diamond jewellery on her wrist, 
 and a long white finger, gave her the appear- 
 ance to feminine eyes in this particular en- 
 vironment of being slightly over-dressed. 
 There was also something oddly offensive to 
 the eyes of her two present companions in her 
 manner of putting her arms at once round 
 Angela, and holding her tight with an aggres- 
 sive air of protection. They could hardly, of 
 course, understand that it was an instinctive 
 habit of Lady Eastney's in the presence of 
 any of her husband's clients, or their rela- 
 tions or friends. 
 
 "My cousin and I had just been talking to
 
 1 62 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Mr. Robinson. This is my cousin, Mr. Alford. 
 Bertie, apologise to Miss Franklin for . . ." 
 
 "For supposing that she was a relation of 
 Luke Robinson's. Most willingly," said the 
 young man, but a glance of warning entreaty 
 made him look penitent. 
 
 "And you might just go and talk to the 
 Harleys for a few moments. No, Angela 
 would rather stay with us; you must venture 
 down there alone." 
 
 "Does she go about with you everywhere?" 
 asked Miss Bertram, rather at a loss for some- 
 thing to say. 
 
 "Yes," said my lady quietly. "We have 
 been to some pottery works this morning, and 
 she has been carrying about this little vase 
 which they gave her ever since." 
 
 Monica held out a hand to the child, who first 
 shrank back a little and then went resolutely 
 forward. It was dreadful to see how the baby, 
 whose nervousness could be seen in every line 
 of her white blue-veined forehead and black- 
 encircled eyes, had trained herself, or been 
 trained, to obey every such advance ; while my 
 Lady's anxious unhappy glances followed her 
 child everywhere. 
 
 "Your nephew is coming up to London, I am 
 told?" said Lady Eastney. 
 
 "Yes, next Saturday." There was some
 
 Resolved to be Rich 163 
 
 surprise in Miss Bertram's voice, and Lady 
 Eastney answered it with a smile. 
 
 "I know a good deal of the Freehold busi- 
 ness," she said. "Of course one hears a lot 
 about it. It is a big affair, and my husband, 
 who is much absorbed in it, talks of its busi- 
 ness constantly. Are you coming up to Lon- 
 don with him?" 
 
 "No, he will live with some friends." 
 
 "He is very young, is he not?" 
 
 "Just eighteen; but his friends, cousins of 
 mine, will take good care of him. My cousin 
 is engaged in some Freehold work too, as well 
 as being a shareholder. We are all interested 
 in the Society new. I have all my money in it 
 too, as perhaps your ladyship knows. " 
 
 "No, I didn't know. . . . What is it, 
 darling? Something broken in the vase 
 already? Oh, my baby, what fingers!" 
 
 "No, but ought that leaf to go like that, 
 mother?" 
 
 "I don't quite see why it should. The pat- 
 tern is funny, isn't it, sweetheart? It is a 
 design which, like some of the designs of Provi- 
 dence, isn't very easy to follow. . . . You 
 know Mr. Lowe, the Vicar of Hartshill, of 
 course, Miss Bertram?" 
 
 "Yes, my lady. Another shareholder in the 
 Freehold. He has got everything in it too. ' '
 
 164 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "Everything? . . . Really you are very 
 thorough people down here ! Nearly every one 
 I come across seems to have half or all his cr 
 her money in the Society!" 
 
 "If we can increase our incomes without 
 risk, it is our duty to do so," said Miss Ber- 
 tram. "There is so much poverty in the world 
 to relieve ; so many persons whom a little help 
 will put right for all time ; so many who, by 
 sudden accidents or illness, are genuinely 
 incapable for a time of helping themselves." 
 
 "And I am sure you are the friend of all of 
 them," said Lady Eastney, studying her com- 
 panion with very sincere admiration. "How 
 much of the increased income of which your 
 aunt speaks does she spend on herself, Miss 
 Franklin?" 
 
 "Not much certainly," said Monica with a 
 smile and a slightly puzzled look at the 
 Marchioness' face, the tired look on which had 
 increased till it gave one the idea of unbear- 
 able physical pain. She was very white too, 
 and laid her cheek down on the little head of 
 her daughter with an air of hopeless fatigue. 
 There was silence for a moment or two, and 
 then a door was opened and voices sounded in 
 the passage outside. 
 
 "The conference is at an end, apparently," 
 said Lady Eastney, rising from her chair with
 
 Resolved to be Rich 165 
 
 an arm always round Angela. "Come and find 
 your nephew, Miss Bertram." 
 
 She swept out into the passage where Lord 
 Eastney and Marshall were standing talking to 
 Robinson, while Gerald stood a little apart and 
 looked on. 
 
 "It is our last offer, on my word," the 
 Marquis was saying; "forty shares and a hun- 
 dred pounds cash." 
 
 "I must take it, my lord, I suppose," was 
 the reply, half-laughing and half-doubtful. 
 "It is a bit of a come-down from the 500 shares 
 which I asked for, though" he lowered his 
 voice and looked very straight into Lord 
 Eastney 's eyes "perhaps the hundred pounds 
 cash is about the value of the other 460 
 shares!" 
 
 Lord Eastney's face remained perfectly 
 blank and Robinson looked a little foolish. 
 Lady Eastney broke an awkward pause by 
 introducing Miss Bertram and Monica. 
 
 "They are waiting for Mr. Franklin," she 
 said. "You really ought not to keep him like 
 this when he is going away from them alto- 
 gether so soon! Good-bye, Miss Bertram;" 
 she turned back to the two women "let me 
 know when you come up to London to see your 
 nephew. Be sure and let me know. I am 
 quite sincere in what I say. If I can ever do
 
 1 66 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 anything for you, if I can ever help you in any 
 way at all, I should like to. " 
 
 "Your ladyship is very good," said Miss 
 Bertram, in some surprise. 
 
 "Oh! One may have one's fancies!" she 
 said, answering Miss Christina's tone rather 
 than her words. "That is a promise, then! 
 And who knows how soon the time may come 
 for its fulfilment? Good-bye." 
 
 Left alone in the passage with his wife and 
 child the Marquis stared gloomily at a comic 
 hunting picture on the opposite wall for a min- 
 ute. Then he asked: 
 
 "What made you talk all that d d rot to 
 her? Do you think I want people of that sort 
 hanging about me if ever . . ." 
 
 "A whim," answered my lady Marchioness 
 curtly; "one of my whims which I shall gratify 
 whenever and wherever I please. Come, 
 Angela. . , ."
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 "How much longer is it to go on? Am I a 
 saint, or rather am I a devil, to look on at such 
 work being done day after day and say noth- 
 ing? How much longer is it to last?" 
 
 Lady Eastney was raving up and down the 
 drawing-room of her suite of rooms in the 
 North Stafford Hotel, while her cousin, 
 councillor and gentleman-in-waiting (self- 
 appointed for life), Herbert Alford, sat on the 
 window-sill beating a devil's tattoo on the win- 
 dows with his fingers, and on the floor with his 
 heels and toes. 
 
 "I suppose," said the councillor grimly, 
 "that the longer it lasts the better it will be for 
 you and your baby. ' ' 
 
 4 'The better? . . ." 
 
 "I suppose money is coming in from the 
 business. Well, you will have the money." 
 
 "When the crash comes he will give every 
 farthing of it back to the wretched people from 
 whom it has been stolen." 
 
 "Will he?" 
 
 "Well, I shall." 
 . The councillor laughed. 
 167
 
 1 68 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "I would rather go and earn my own living 
 as a shop-woman," exclaimed the woman 
 tragically, "than take a penny of his hor- 
 rible money after what I have seen for the last 
 six months!" 
 
 "And Angela?" 
 
 "I will take her away and go and earn my 
 own living." 
 
 "Shop-women get about ^35 a year rising to 
 ,60," said the councillor; "would that keep 
 the baby in stockings?" 
 
 "You must be stone, Bertie, to be able to 
 think of those women's faces this afternoon 
 and talk in this fashion, knowing what is going 
 to happen to them!" 
 
 "What the deuce do I know about them, or 
 you either, my dear? They may be the smart- 
 est of speculators 'buying for a rise. ' They've 
 got a relation in the business, right inside it, 
 and he will warn them in time. Come, old 
 girl, there are tragedies enough in the world, 
 even I allow in our own little building society, 
 without working yourself into this state about 
 a half-imaginary one! We've got a free 
 evening. Let's enjoy ourselves. There's a 
 theatre at Longton and the 'Bells' is being 
 played, probably with a local genius as hero. 
 Let's go there and laugh. Do you remember 
 when we saw it at the Francaise, and the old
 
 Resolved to be Rich 169 
 
 Grayshaw cat insisted on coming into our box?" 
 Alford came over to where Lady Eastney had 
 flung herself into a chair and put a hand on to 
 her shoulder: she shook it off petulantly, and 
 he laughed good-naturedly. He was a young 
 man who laughed at everything, at his cousin's 
 tantrums out of which he tried to coax her, 
 at gambling "wins" which he mostly spent 
 within twenty-four hours, at gambling losses 
 which he was rarely able to pay, at the admira- 
 tion of women for whom he did not care and 
 the coldness of women for whom he did, at the 
 tricks and shiftings of a man trying to postpone 
 his tailor's bill and at the gigantic tricks and 
 frauds of which his cousin's husband was daily 
 guilty. For his cousin herself he had a tame- 
 cat kind of fondness, passing most of his time 
 at her house, accompanying her to "at homes" 
 and dances at which Lord Eastney was already 
 beginning to be received with doubtful looks 
 and cold greetings, and finally often coming 
 with her on business rounds of this description 
 where Lord Eastney insisted on his wife 
 accompanying him, and on which Mr. Alford 
 made himself useful by ordering dinner, teach- 
 ing (and occasionally helping) the hotel cooks 
 and beating up the neighbourhood for possible 
 companions. 
 
 A waiter appeared with a message to ask if
 
 170 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Mr. Marshall might speak to Lady Eastney for 
 a moment. 
 
 "Bertie! That horror is here again! You 
 talk of a free evening! There is no freedom 
 for me. Oh, show him up. ' ' 
 
 Marshall came in perfumed, smiling, as usual. 
 
 "Your ladyship will excuse me, I know. On 
 these business tours we are all at work from 
 morning to night. Lord Eastney has gone out 
 and no one can tell me when he will be in 
 again. Can you tell me?" 
 
 "Do you know, Bertie?" My lady passed on 
 the question, and turning round in her chair 
 stared moodily at the opposite wall. 
 
 "Couldn't possibly say," said Mr. Alford 
 laconically. 
 
 "Do you know where he is?" 
 
 "Haven't the least idea." 
 
 Marshall took a seat uninvited near Lady 
 Eastney. 
 
 "Your ladyship has been seeing quite a large 
 number of our shareholders this afternoon." 
 
 The Marchioness responded by a gesture 
 which might mean "yes" or "no," or that she 
 was certainly seeing one too many of them just 
 now probably the latter. 
 
 "Very pleasant people, Miss Bertram and 
 her niece are ; rich too. You had quite a long 
 chat with them. ' '
 
 Resolved to be Rich 171 
 
 My lady turned to him with a sort of gloomy 
 interest: "They have everything in the Free- 
 hold," she said, half as if contradicting the 
 man's assertion that they were rich. 
 
 "Miss Bertram has; her niece has a little 
 money elsewhere : some shares in the Carlton 
 mines in South Africa." 
 
 "She has, has she?" said Alford with sudden 
 animation, "that's good business for her." 
 
 "The shares are not worth much now. They 
 may be some day." 
 
 "Your information is not quite as up to date 
 as usual, Mr. Marshall. The new machinery 
 or something has brought luck there. A reef 
 has been discovered in the Carlton property. 
 I know a fellow who has a few shares and 
 who refused ^5 a-piece for them a few days 
 ago." 
 
 "You don't say so!" said Marshall with a 
 glow of excitement on his face. "Why, Miss 
 Franklin has 2000 shares! That would give 
 her ;io,ooo if they were sold at the price you 
 mention ! Perhaps it may be double that ! It 
 is quite a large fortune for people in their class 
 of life!" 
 
 "Has the girl control of her own money? Is 
 she of age?" The Marchioness asked the ques- 
 tions apparently of the fireplace, as she did not 
 turn her head, but Marshall answered.
 
 172 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "She is not of age, but a Mr. Lowe, one of 
 our best friends down here, is trustee of the 
 will under which the money comes to her. 
 Yes, Lowe is a firm believer in the Freehold, 
 and would do anything I told him if Miss 
 Franklin agreed. ' ' 
 
 "So, of course" the lady still addressed the 
 fireplace "you will try and get her money 
 transferred to Freehold shares?" 
 
 "Need your ladyship ask?" said Marshall 
 with a self-satisfied smile. 
 
 "No, I need not. Do you know this Mr. 
 Lowe's exact powers in the matter?" 
 
 "No, but if your ladyship would like to know 
 I could easily find out. It is very kind of your 
 ladyship to try and help us in the matter. 
 Perhaps if the aunt and niece were invited to 
 the lunch here to-morrow ... I can 
 assure your ladyship that they are perfectly 
 respectable persons." 
 
 The fireplace had the benefit of a fine faint 
 smile. The Marchioness opened a little 
 painted fan and swung it slowly to and fro, 
 apparently considering something. 
 
 "Yes," she said at last. "I think they 
 might be invited to-morrow. Who has sent 
 
 out the invitations to all these " my lady 
 
 suddenly checked herself in a word which 
 described with some vigour and completeness
 
 Resolved to be Rich 173 
 
 the guests of to-morrow, and changed it to 
 "persons?" 
 
 "Well, I drew up the lists and wrote the 
 letters, and his lordship signed them. A sort 
 of division of labour," added Marshall, essay- 
 ing a little humour. 
 
 "I will write this one. Give me my writing- 
 case, Bertie." 
 
 "It will do just as well after dinner," said 
 Alford in a low voice. 
 
 "Do you mind giving me my writing-case 
 thanks." 
 
 Alford brought the old white and gold case 
 to her side and held it for a moment, mutter- 
 ing: "Think please!" My lady took it on 
 her knee, put a hand on the worn old strap and 
 sat hesitating, looking at it. The white 
 morocco was yellowing in places; ink-blotches 
 were scattered over it; in a corner was her 
 monogram with an ink-blot on it and her 
 coronet over it the coronet for which she had 
 sold love, youth, honour, happiness. She 
 noticed each of the little trifles, and as she sat 
 there with her hand on the buckle, her cousin 
 standing over her with anxious perturbed face, 
 a queer thought came to her of the mass of 
 letters which she had written here, letters to 
 Angela, dinner-invitations, half-joking love- 
 letters (not to Lord Eastney), congratulations,
 
 174 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 condolences, and lately complaints complaints 
 of friends growing cold, of society looking 
 askance, of snubs and whispers and half-com- 
 prehended questions and remarks. They rose 
 up before her for some queer reason, the 
 ghosts of these letters written here, and she sat 
 looking at them. They stayed in her mind 
 when she at last opened the case, and wrote 
 the commonplace invitation to luncheon, and 
 put it in an envelope, and handed it to Mar- 
 shall with a curt nod and word of dismissal. 
 
 There was a brief silence after Marshall had 
 shut the door. 
 
 "You are mad, Frances," said the young 
 man by her side in a sort of frightened whisper. 
 "What are you going to do? You are not 
 really going to warn these people?" There 
 was no answer and he went on in the same 
 frightened voice: "Don't you know that a 
 word is enough now to topple over the whole 
 affair? The women are nothing to you! What 
 are you doing this for?" 
 
 "My husband asked me rather the same sort 
 of question a short time ago, ' ' said the woman 
 in a low voice, but with her cheeks and lips 
 very white, "and I answered that it was a 
 whim, one of my whims which I mean to 
 gratify whenever and wherever I please. 
 That answer must content you too."
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 "Angela. ..." 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "I have just thought of a story." 
 
 "Tell it me, Bertie; go on." 
 
 Bertie looked round him with an unusual 
 gravity on his insouciant young face. It was 
 the morning of the luncheon party to which 
 Miss Bertram had at the last moment been 
 invited, and very near the luncheon hour. In 
 the room Lady Eastney wandered about rest- 
 lessly, the diamonds in her laces flashing as she 
 passed across the light. She had carefully 
 avoided being alone with Alford all the morn- 
 ing, and now Miss Eardly nominally govern- 
 ess to Angela, in reality companion to herself 
 sat at the table writing letters. 
 
 "It is a funny old Eastern story, a sort of 
 parable; you won't understand it." 
 
 "You always say that," said her little lady- 
 ship with a frown and a wriggle; "now go 
 on." 
 
 "There was a certain man who was a famous 
 mischief-maker, who went about the world 
 making quarrels and rows everywhere. . . ."
 
 176 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Angela settled herself down in a chair with 
 her hands crossed and her eyes fixed raptly on 
 the speaker after the manner of an eight-year- 
 old audience. My lady stopped her rambling 
 walk and stood by the window looking out and 
 swinging a blind-tassel absently to and fro. 
 
 " . . . One day he came to a town where 
 no one ever quarrelled, where no one talked 
 slander, and every one was friends with every 
 one else. The people who knew him said: 'It 
 is no good coming here ; you can't make any 
 mischief here. If you told the most out- 
 rageous stories night and day about us no one 
 would believe you. If you collected witnesses 
 and even appeared to prove one of us guilty of 
 a crime you would only be laughed at. You 
 had better not waste your time here.' The 
 mischief-maker laughed and said nothing; but 
 in the morning he bought some honey, and put 
 a dab of it outside a door. "... 
 
 The young man paused for a moment. 
 Angela was looking very puzzled. The blind- 
 tassel swung steadily to and fro. 
 
 "Well, and what happened?" asked the 
 Marchioness with a strained laugh. 
 
 "A fly settled on the honey," said Bertie 
 laconically; "a spider settled on the fly and eat 
 him : a chameleon settled on the spider and eat 
 him; a cat attacked the chameleon; a dog
 
 Resolved to be Rich 177 
 
 attacked the cat : the owner of the cat attacked 
 the dog: the owner of the dog attacked the 
 owner of the cat : then all the town came out 
 and took sides. I forget what happened to the 
 mischief-maker himself." 
 
 "As he had no motive but a desire to make 
 mischief," said Lady Eastney, "he deserved a 
 bad end." 
 
 "It is too short," said Lady Angela, bewil- 
 dered by the rapid conclusion. "Can't you 
 make up some more?" 
 
 "There is no end at all to it, chicken. The 
 uproar in the town, when it once began, went 
 on and on. No one can guess the end of that 
 story even now." 
 
 "Then tell me another," said her little lady- 
 ship ; but if Mr. Alford had meant to comply 
 he was checked by the entrance of Lord 
 Eastney and Mr. Robinson. 
 
 Gracefully and charmingly Lady Eastney 
 greeted the luncheon-guests as they arrived 
 one after another, with a word or two and a 
 smile which put every one at their ease, a 
 deeply interested attitude for any one who 
 claimed her special attention, a quick eye for 
 any one who looked as if he or she wanted to 
 speak to her and dare not begin, and an air of 
 never being pre-occupied or having any other 
 care than to listen to her companion of the
 
 178 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 moment. Angela moved about with her, 
 receiving head-pats and hand-shakes with 
 polite resignation. Bertie did his duty too as 
 far as he could, though a little out of his ele- 
 ment, in a company which did not make or 
 understand jokes. Presently lunch was an- 
 nounced, and the company, some two dozen 
 in number, took their places after a certain 
 amount of shuffling about. Mr. Robinson, Mr. 
 Nicholson, senior, and one or two others, 
 wanted to be near Lady Eastney, and there 
 was a little scuffling near her end of the table. 
 Luke Robinson found himself standing near 
 Angela and began an: "Ah, Miss Angela, you 
 are coming to sit next to me. That's right. 
 I'll give you plenty of pudding," and Lord 
 Eastney called out: "Oh, she is a great admirer 
 of yours, Robinson ; take charge of her if you 
 like by all means." The Marchioness was 
 passing up the room just then, and the little 
 one turned to her with half-raised arms and a 
 passion of frightened appeal in her eyes; but 
 the woman only stooped and whispered: "It 
 won't be for long, my baby," and went on to 
 her place with her own words echoing oddly in 
 her ears. "It won't be for long" . . . she 
 had only meant to assure the scared little 
 mortal that this luncheon and the company of 
 Mr. Robinson would not last long, but as she
 
 Resolved to be Rich 179 
 
 took her place at the end of the table and 
 looked down it her words seemed to repeat 
 themselves with some wider meaning. Not for 
 long . . . ? Well, she for one did not care 
 how soon it ended. 
 
 Thoroughly accustomed to such parties as 
 that over which she was now presiding, Lady 
 Eastney soon had her guests eating and drink- 
 ing, talking and laughing at their ease, and 
 found herself with leisure to look round. 
 Monica, whose face caught her eye first, was 
 sitting between a good-looking well-groomed 
 young man who evidently was or ought to be 
 her lover, and another whose sullen face was a 
 curious study. She knew the latter it was 
 Muirhead and said to herself, "There is 
 crime in that man's mind; I wonder what is 
 wrong." Then she watched Miss Bertram for 
 a moment and muttered: "That woman looks 
 like a sort of harbour of refuge from all the 
 ills of life. I should like to go and stay with 
 her and have a long, long cry, with her to con- 
 sole me through it, and then go to sleep for a 
 week with her sitting by me. How astonished 
 she would be if I told her so . . . !" Then 
 Mrs. Robinson claimed her attention with a 
 narrative of how her husband had got the best 
 of Canon Ho bar t in an altercation about cer- 
 tain rates,
 
 i8o Resolved to be Rich 
 
 After lunch she moved away with Miss Ber- 
 tram and Monica into a corner of the drawing- 
 room. 
 
 "We hear that your niece has had a great 
 piece of luck with some South African shares," 
 she began. 
 
 "We have heard it this morning. Does your 
 ladyship understand these South African affairs 
 at all?" 
 
 "Not in the least. Very few people do. 
 Have you some good advisers?" 
 
 "My lawyer is Mr. Benson. He is standing 
 just there talking to Mr. Robinson." 
 
 "I see. Have you please forgive these 
 apparently impertinent questions have you 
 spoken to him about the matter yet?" 
 
 "I saw him this morning and he spoke to me 
 again here just before lunch. He says that 
 such shares go up and down every day for 
 reasons which we down in the country know 
 nothing about, and could not possibly foresee, 
 and that we had better sell these shares at once 
 now that they are up." 
 
 "That sounds sensible." 
 
 "And he said that he could get us some 
 more shares in the Freehold with the money 
 just now if we liked; and if Mr. Lowe, who is 
 a trustee of Monica's, would consent." 
 
 "Yes? . . . Miss Bertram, I want to
 
 Resolved to be Rich 181 
 
 give you some advice. I know what I am say- 
 ing and I mean what I say. You are listening 
 to me?" 
 
 "Naturally, my lady." 
 
 "Don't put that money into the Freehold. 
 You have some shares in it yourself now?" 
 
 "A large number." 
 
 "Sell them. . . . Shall you accept my 
 advice?" 
 
 "But if your ladyship would only . . ." 
 
 "I cannot say any more or argue about the 
 matter at all. It is a very serious affair my 
 having said this. It is so serious that I even" ' 
 the woman hesitated, looked round the room 
 with a look of infinite scorn, began another 
 sentence, caught sight of Angela, and then 
 began the first again "I even ask you not 
 to use my name in connection with it if you 
 can help it. That is rather a painful 
 rather a humiliating request to make, and 
 I cannot possibly force you to promise what 
 I ask." 
 
 "I promise most willingly never to mention 
 your ladyship's name," said Miss Bertram, "and 
 I have to thank you sincerely for advising us. 
 We must think a little, but we shall probably 
 take your advice." 
 
 "Yes. That is all right." Lady Eastney 
 rose with a smile on her white lips and a look
 
 1 82 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 in her eyes which flashed terror into those of 
 Bertie Alford as he came up to her. 
 
 "You have done it after all?" he muttered. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Then a sauve qui peut begins here this after- 
 noon, and ends where?" 
 
 "It is nothing to me." 
 
 "Or Angela?" 
 
 "Or to Angela, thank you." 
 
 "Just wait and see!"
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 Gerald Franklin permitted himself a certain 
 amount of enthusiasm on his first visit to Lon- 
 don. . . He had never been there before 
 even for a day, and when the night express 
 arrived at Euston on this Saturday evening in 
 August, and he had said good-bye to Lord 
 Eastney and Marshall on the platform and put 
 himself and his luggage into a hansorn, he con- 
 fessed to himself that he felt excited. It was a 
 pity that Great Ormond Street where his 
 cousin lived was so close by, but that again 
 had its advantages, as he was hungry. Next 
 morning he went with the Ethridges, his 
 cousins, to chapel in Red Lion Square, behav- 
 ing with great propriety as was his wont, and 
 at last found himself free to go out for a walk. 
 A young man of the Ethridge family accom- 
 panied him along Holborn, New Oxford Street, 
 and Oxford Street to the Park, pointing out 
 shops, houses, and music-halls, with a list of 
 their occupants and performers and the 
 incomes made by each, and all the current 
 gossip about them. What a young Londoner 
 183
 
 184 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 of this class does not know about London is not 
 worth knowing. In the Park Sydney Ethridge 
 showed various celebrities of a minor order 
 who were in town in spite of the season, but 
 Gerald, who had listened to him in the com- 
 parative silence and desertion of a Sunday 
 afternoon in Oxford Street, grew absorbed in 
 the crowds here and hardly heard. A crowd 
 fascinated him always and everywhere : it was 
 the only object which brought his imagination 
 into play and he could have spent days here, 
 simply looking, cataloguing and criticising. 
 Although it was August, numerous carriages 
 were passing up and down the Row, and 
 Sydney pointed out a well-known face or two. 
 Women with the eyes and mouths of English 
 great ladies (you distinguish English 
 "grandes dames" by their mouths and eyes as 
 you do French by their speech) sat here and 
 there under the trees daintily dressed, flutter- 
 ing their lace parasols in lines of shady sum- 
 mer colours. Men sat by them smoking 
 cigarettes, the slight touch of inanity and of 
 general resemblance to one another as of a 
 flock of sheep (whereas in an assembly of 
 Frenchmen you will not notice two alike and 
 will see a hundred different expressions on 
 each face in as many seconds) being redeemed 
 by their fresh healthy cleanliness and generally
 
 Resolved to be Rich 185 
 
 well-groomed appearance. A man or two rode 
 by on a park hack, glancing right and left with 
 defiance in his eyes as one who would say, 
 "This animal may be almost extinct, but I pre- 
 fer it to all others and choose to keep it." 
 Victorias full of country folk, some frankly 
 enjoying the spectacle, others trying to look as 
 if they were passing just once more through an 
 old and weary scene, moved slowly by. Lady 
 Eastney drove past with Angela, on her way 
 to Hurlingham, and with that instinctive feel- 
 ing possessed by certain people that some one 
 is waiting to salute them, she turned to the 
 side path and greeted Gerald with a bow and 
 smile which filled Sydney with respectful 
 astonishment. 
 
 "My eye!" he said, "are we in the upper 
 circles already? Shall we dine in Belgrave 
 Square to-night? If I'd known I was coming 
 out walking with such a toff I'd have put on 
 my new pink tie. That's Knightsbridge Bar- 
 racks, my young swell. Say now, would you 
 like to come down the river? There's time to 
 get down to Richmond. Mother likes some of 
 us to come to chapel with her in the evening, 
 but Susan and Mike can go to-night. I like 
 Richmond myself." 
 
 "Have we time for another walk to the other 
 end of the road and back?"
 
 1 86 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "No, not to go to Richmond afterwards, but 
 I don't care about it," said the other good- 
 naturedly. "Come along, my young lord!" 
 
 Pedestrians and vehicles grew more numer- 
 ous as the afternoon wore on, and Gerald 
 walked along absorbed and fascinated. This 
 London pleasure-crowd seemed much gayer 
 than those to which he was used in the country. 
 Working men and their families, playing 
 games, arranging tea or eating oranges under 
 the trees, laughed, chatted, moved about more 
 gaily than their fellows in Trentham Woods or 
 Clough Hall. If the faces of the society young 
 men were vacuous, their voices and laughter 
 were pleasant and ready: their mothers, sisters 
 and cousins moved past in a flutter of soft silks 
 and laces and rippling laughter which was 
 inspiriting. He remembered a phrase about 
 English folk taking their pleasure sadly, and 
 rather wondered what it meant. The phrase 
 is certainly out of date. Perhaps it is a satiety 
 of ordinary amusements, together with a large 
 increase in their cost, which has made English 
 youth of all classes more ready to be pleased 
 by a walk and a chat and a look at their neigh- 
 bours, more grateful for mere sunshine, green 
 trees and companionship. But whatever 
 the reason, it is certain that that idly saun- 
 tering crowd, asking for nothing but life
 
 Resolved to be Rich 187 
 
 and sunshine and plenty of neighbours, which 
 used to be characteristic of the Champs 
 Elysees and boulevards of Paris, has come to 
 London. 
 
 The Ethridges assembled at supper at nine 
 o'clock, and Sydney detailed the course of their 
 afternoon's walk. 
 
 "You'd hardly think it was August," he 
 added, "to see the Row. As full of folk it was 
 as if it was the middle of June." 
 
 "Well, I'm glad there was something for you 
 to see, Gerald," said Mr. Ethridge, "though 
 such sights are stupid to go and look at more 
 than once." 
 
 "Many pretty girls about?" asked Michael, 
 the elder brother. 
 
 "I didn't notice any," said the boy, simply. 
 
 "You must be difficult to please," retorted 
 Sydney. 
 
 "I don't mean there weren't any. I simply 
 didn't see them. I was thinking of something 
 else that it was odd how contented people 
 were. Fancy seeing a heap of folk like that 
 richer than yourself every Sunday, and being 
 satisfied!" 
 
 "There must always be rich and poor," said 
 Ethridge, sententiously. 
 
 "Anybody can get rich who likes to try," 
 said Gerald.
 
 1 88 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "Do you mean to try?" asked a girl sitting 
 opposite to him. 
 
 "Yes," said the boy quietly, but with a cer- 
 tain compression of the lips as if the sight of 
 Hyde Park had given him a new impatience, a 
 new resolve. 
 
 Susan Ethridge looked at him with a little 
 touch of admiration in her eyes, which Gerald 
 saw and approved of. The boyish look on his 
 face was rather a pleasant one, until with a 
 succession of considerable shocks the real 
 Gerald revealed himself. The young man's 
 eyes were grey, and clear, and steady, his skin 
 fresh and fair, his mouth and chin strong and 
 well-shaped. If his face was young the assur- 
 ance of his manner gave some appearance of 
 age, and several women, chiefly older than 
 himself, had before now expressed some liking 
 for him. Susan Ethridge, who loved laugh- 
 ter, cynicism, good-looks, and ambition, had 
 already come to the conclusion that Gerald was 
 a very agreeable addition to their household. 
 She had passed her twenty-five years in a 
 rather sombre round of learning lessons and 
 teaching them, and was beginning to revolt 
 inwardly against it. Her parents disapproved 
 of theatres, dancing, and most other entertain- 
 ments: especially they disapproved of any 
 amusement on Sunday, which was Susan's only
 
 Resolved to be Rich 189 
 
 holiday from the small pupils to whom on those 
 dreary week-days she taught scales and sums. 
 She neither complained nor rebelled: the 
 steady gloom of the girl's home life had so 
 eaten into her heart, that she hardly had spirit 
 to wish for any brightness, and under favour- 
 able circumstances would probably marry a 
 friend of her father's, and initiate a home and 
 family of her own on exactly similar lines. 
 The father was absorbed in his work and reli- 
 gion, talking and thinking of nothing else. At 
 meal-time, breakfast and supper, he carried on 
 a portentous monologue on one of the two 
 subjects, speaking slowly and impressively, and 
 so giving you the idea that what he Avas saying 
 was worth listening to which it was not. 
 Mrs. Ethridge said: "Indeed, Mr. Ethridge, 
 that is quite true," at regular intervals. Syd- 
 ney and Michael, both clerks in a neighbouring 
 accountant's office, were asked occasionally for 
 an account of how they had spent their day, 
 and gave it obediently, but otherwise no one 
 spoke. The arrival of this cousin to board 
 with them was the most exciting event which 
 had ever taken place in their lives, and for a 
 short time it quite demoralised them. The 
 mother glanced about her, now at her husband, 
 now at her children, a little anxiously as this 
 conversation sprang up, with the inquiring
 
 190 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 look which a hen might give to the cock and 
 her chickens if a duckling appeared and invited 
 the party to come out swimming. She inter- 
 vened with a narrative of having been that 
 afternoon to read to some children in the 
 adjacent hospital. Then Mr. Ethridge dis- 
 coursed on the necessity for, and advantages of 
 suffering, while the others eat their way silently 
 through cold beef and pickles and a cold cus- 
 tard pudding. Gerald looked up once and 
 caught Susan looking at him with pity and 
 apology; he gave her a just perceptible grate- 
 ful smile in reply. The little understanding 
 brought them together after supper; and the 
 girl spoke to him with a kindly elder-sister air 
 which was rather pretty. 
 
 "What used you to do in the evenings at 
 home?" 
 
 "Oh, nothing. I very often had work to 
 do." 
 
 "Did you and Monica go to theatres or 
 parties much?" 
 
 "Not very often. There are some good 
 theatres near us, but really I didn't care for 
 them. I think acting is simply stupid." 
 
 "It is so, my dear boy. It is a form of 
 trifling with the stern realities of life and death 
 which I cannot think to be right. I say to my 
 children, 'What would you do if the Last
 
 Resolved to be Rich 191 
 
 Trump should sound and call you to judgment 
 as you sat laughing at the fooleries of . . ' " 
 
 Another sermon had begun and Gerald sat 
 down with an air of quiet resignation, but the 
 few words with his cousin had left a warm 
 feeling in both hearts which even Mr. Eth- 
 ridge's Sunday night discourse could not quite 
 kill. 
 
 Next morning Gerald went to his work at the 
 head offices of the Freehold Building Society 
 in Southampton Row, and found business 
 there in very much the same condition as in 
 Staffordshire. The officials were mostly sim- 
 ple, ignorant men with money in the Society 
 and very little knowledge of its work. Their 
 tasks were apportioned in such fashion that no 
 man saw the connection between his neigh- 
 bour's work and his own. Marshall, Lord 
 Eastney and a big house-agent named Margets 
 were the only three who knew what was going 
 on. None of them were present when Frank- 
 lin arrived, and he was given certain accounts 
 and books on which Seymour, his predecessor, 
 had been engaged, and was asked to finish 
 them. "What a stupid mass of confusion!" he 
 said to Ethridge after an hour's work. 
 "Where do these figures come from? Who 
 paid the bill for these roads being made, and 
 where are the details and the receipt?"
 
 192 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Ethridge looked stupidly at the papers and 
 admitted ignorance: "If they aren't there, you 
 must leave them out," he said; "of course, in 
 a big London business we have not so much 
 time to give to little trifles as you have had in 
 Staffordshire;" and Gerald laughed inwardly. 
 He had obviously been brought here and given 
 this post as a bribe to hold his tongue, and he 
 hardly supposed that the directors wanted work 
 of this sort examined into very closely. Mar- 
 gets came in next day, and Ethridge, with an 
 air of patronage of his cousin which amused 
 the lad considerably, introduced him, and said 
 that he had been showing Gerald the work, and 
 that Gerald would soon understand it. Of 
 course the difference between London and 
 country business made beginning here a little 
 difficult for the boy: these accounts left by 
 young Seymour, for instance, had puzzled him 
 considerably. Margets took up the bundle of 
 papers referring to some South Kensington 
 flats and began some good-natured explana- 
 tions, while Ethridge left the room. Franklin 
 did not mean to have his position in these 
 offices misunderstood by any of the superiors. 
 
 "I quite understand all the points which you 
 refer to," he said, with a slighting laugh; 
 "only this road has apparently been made 
 without payment at any rate without receipted
 
 Resolved to be Rich 193 
 
 payment. However . , . " he laughed 
 again, and Margets looked frightened. 
 
 Presently Marshall entered with Lord 
 Eastney. He came up to Gerald's desk and 
 put a letter down there a letter from Benson 
 saying that Miss Bertram had given instruc- 
 tions for the sale of all her shares in the Free- 
 hold. "What does that mean?" he asked. 
 "Do you know?" 
 
 "I told you that you would have to take the 
 chance of Robinson's meaning mischief," said 
 the boy after reading the letter. "I am rather 
 surprised myself. I doubted his having the 
 courage for a move of this kind. I know noth- 
 ing about it, but I suppose it is his doing." 
 
 "It is a bad business, whoever has done it," 
 said Marshall. "What do you think, my lord?" 
 
 "I should say," said Lord Eastney, in a low 
 voice which only Marshall could hear, "that it 
 is the beginning of the end."
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 Muirhead had been passing through a ter- 
 rible time. With Nicholson every day in the 
 office as a constant reminder of his failure, with 
 the daily increasing vague suspicions of finan- 
 cial difficulties, and with a new and most 
 unpleasant feeling of responsibility for the 
 management of the Freehold, he was very 
 unhappy. Gerald's departure revealed to the 
 poor, thick-headed man how dull his wits 
 really were in comparison with the sharpers 
 and clients with whom he had to deal. He 
 went through the bundles of papers which 
 came down day after day with uneasy wonder, 
 longing to have back by his side the impassive, 
 cynical young face which used to bend over 
 these documents and take in all their contents 
 in one contemptuous glance; the cool, cock- 
 sure voice which used to decree that those 
 figures meant so and so, and were to be entered 
 in such and such a place. He realised now 
 how completely he had been the subordinate 
 and Gerald the master. 
 
 During the weeks which elapsed between 
 194
 
 Resolved to be Rich 195 
 
 Franklin's departure and young Nicholson's, 
 Muirhead allowed a passion of hatred for his 
 rival to grow upon him which frightened him- 
 self. Reggie now took Franklin's seat in the 
 inner office, and Muirhead sat opposite to him, 
 staring at him sometimes with heavy, angry 
 eyes, forgetting all business in wondering 
 when the lad had seen Monica last, what she 
 had said to him, whether they had been talking 
 about himself, whether Reggie knew that he 
 himself had proposed to the girl, and whether 
 even now perhaps there was some chance of 
 the engagement coming to an end. With his 
 eyes fixed on the young man's bent head he 
 would imagine to himself the love words which 
 had passed between them, the whispered 
 tendernesses which he had pictured himself as 
 murmuring to her, the movements of wander- 
 ing hands, searching for and finding one 
 another. His mind at last settled on this 
 point, and at intervals in the day he would find 
 himself staring furtively at Nicholson's hands, 
 wondering when they had last touched Monica. 
 He watched the long moving fingers with 
 growing fascination, saying to himself , "Yester- 
 day they touched her cheek, were round her 
 neck, stroked her hair; this very evening they 
 will hold her hands while I am sitting in my 
 room reading dull letters of this and that
 
 196 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 tradesman, or turning the dreary pages of some 
 unreal story." Then slowly a feeling would 
 creep over him that he must do some injury to 
 those hands, that he would pay money, would 
 give months of his life, to tear them, to wrench 
 them off and mutilate them. The idea would 
 pass away with a sudden flash of terror lest 
 this should be another symptom of coming 
 insanity, and with a violent effort he would 
 return to his work. Sometimes, when the 
 hatred in him grew very strong, he would 
 attempt by heaping up unnecessary tasks to 
 prevent the lovers from meeting during the 
 afternoon, but from some words dropped by 
 Reggie one day he learnt that the young man 
 merely went to Hartshill in the evening 
 instead. The picture of this meeting in the 
 summer twilight with only the stars to see the 
 lovers, ancl with only the nightingales to inter- 
 rupt their whispers, was the keenest torture of 
 all. He loved the girl passionately, furiously ; 
 he could not bear to meet her and hated not to 
 meet her; he loathed the sight of Reggie 
 Nicholson and was half wild when he was out 
 of sight because he would of course be with 
 Monica. And above and through and under 
 all these hatreds and fears and imaginations 
 was the daily and hourly terror of another brain 
 failure, of another of those intervals when time
 
 Resolved to be Rich 197 
 
 had ceased and responsibility finished, and 
 from which he would wake with horrified 
 wonder as to where he was and what he had 
 been doing. 
 
 Life became so utterly unendurable to Muir- 
 head by the end of August that he first of all 
 asked for a holiday, although he had taken his 
 usual fortnight's leave of absence, and this 
 request having been refused, looked round 
 eagerly for some local diversion. Evenings at 
 Clough Hall or Trenthan, afternoons at 
 Longton or Hanley afforded him not the slight- 
 est interest or amusement. In the former 
 place he, who had so few friends and acquaint- 
 ances nowadays (since one would as soon court 
 the companionship of the lethargetic but 
 uncertain-tempered python or the lively and 
 certain-tempered mad dog, as that of a love- 
 sick man who has tried for his prize and failed) 
 was as much alone with his thoughts as in his 
 own rooms. In the theatres a dozen scenes 
 would be sure to take place reminding him of 
 his misery. One day, seeing an advertisement 
 on the walls of Stoke announcing a special 
 train to the Manchester Races, he determined 
 to go there, and accordingly one Thursday 
 morning found himself in company with a 
 large number of more or less familiar faces in 
 a train going to Manchester. It occurred to
 
 198 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 him more than once that this proceeding on 
 the part of the local manager of the Freehold 
 Building Society, so many of whose members 
 and patrons put "Reverend" before their 
 names either by recognized right or by freak of 
 their own playful fancy, might excite some 
 highly unfavourable comment, but he cared 
 very little for that nowadays. Not only was all 
 other thought absorbed by his desire to cure 
 this miserable condition of mind, but he was 
 beginning to feel that the work of the Building 
 Society was beyond his powers, and that he 
 did not care how soon he was freed from it. 
 
 Manchester Racecourse, with the approaches 
 thereto, the Stands thereon, and the view 
 therefrom, is about the ugliest place of its kind 
 in Europe, but as few people who go there 
 wish to admire scenery, this is not of great 
 importance. The crowds are large, sporting in 
 looks and language, and sentiments, tolerant of 
 all things except the victories of outsiders, 
 hopeful of better things when they have lost 
 money, and jocularly content when they have 
 won. If it is not quite such a perfect sporting 
 crowd as that of York or Doncaster, it is many 
 degrees better than the languid picnic- 
 assembly of Sandown Park or the army of 
 scamps and roughs who patronise Brighton. 
 Muirhead, however, was paying his first visit
 
 Resolved to be Rich 199 
 
 to a racecourse, and was not hypercritical, 
 being indeed more occupied in trying to dis- 
 cover what it was all about. He saw numbers 
 and names on a board, horses and jockeys in 
 various colours, a race with a close finish which 
 the onlookers cheered excitedly, and which did 
 not interest him in the least. The contest 
 between the two horses which had finished first 
 and second might or might not have been 
 exciting ; he was willing to believe that it was, 
 but he himself was not excited by it. He 
 watched three races, one after another in this 
 fashion, finding some momentary interest in 
 the excited conversations and alternating joy 
 and despair of the men who stood near him, 
 then sighed heavily, and made his way towards 
 the gate, meaning to go home. To watch 
 another of these contests between galloping 
 horses and flogging jockeys, seemed to him the 
 most dreary of prospects. The shouting and 
 excitement of the spectators were totally incom- 
 prehensible to him, the result of the race 
 hopelessly uninteresting. 
 
 At the gate just before he went out, he met 
 a certain Robert Fairlegh, a tradesman in 
 Newcastle whom he knew slightly so slightly 
 in fact that he was considerably astonished at 
 Fairlegh's hearty greeting and his: "You look 
 pretty blue, mister! Were you on Cordova?"
 
 2OO Resolved to be Rich * 
 
 Muirhead was not of course aware that among 
 the touches of nature which make the whole 
 world akin, is the backing of an unsuccessful 
 favourite. 
 
 "I don't know anything about Cordova," he 
 answered gloomily, "but I am very dull here, 
 and I am going away." 
 
 "Oh, you've been hit rather hard, I see!" 
 answered Fairlegh, who had been drowning 
 memory of the treacherous Cordova in whisky, 
 and was indeed in a condition in which one 
 sees either nothing or double. "Come and 
 have another try. I know a really good thing 
 for the next race. Lighter is bound to win, 
 a stone blind certainty he is. George Hickson 
 says so, and if George Hickson doesn't know 
 what he is talking about, nobody in this world 
 never knew nothing about nothing at all. Come 
 and get your money back on Lighter. ' ' 
 
 "I haven't lost any money," said Muirhead 
 pettishly, becoming angry at the attention 
 which was being attracted towards him by this 
 loud-voiced sympathy. "I haven't been bet- 
 ting. I haven't come here to bet." 
 
 "Then what the have you come here 
 
 for?" asked Fairlegh, sympathetic but puzzled. 
 "When things go wrong, curse them till they 
 go right again," and this Mr. Fairlegh pro- 
 ceeded to do for the space of half a minute,
 
 Resolved to be Rich 201 
 
 making up by the wide extent of his expletives 
 for some slight uncertainty as to what he was 
 swearing about. 
 
 He had however taken Muirhead in such a 
 firm grip that in order to avoid a row, or at any 
 rate in order to change the auditors of the 
 present row, Muirhead moved back with him 
 towards the ring. The numbers were going 
 up for the fourth race as they came back, and 
 Fairlegh ordered Muirhead in a thick but confi- 
 dent voice to notice that Leslie was riding 
 Lighter. 
 
 "So he's bound to win, old pal," said the 
 man, who was of course now on such close 
 terms of intimacy as whisky and "tipping" 
 combined must produce. "So you put all 
 you've got on him. Here's young Nick Lunn, 
 a very honest man young Nick Lunn is, just 
 the man to do your business for you young 
 Nick Lunn is. What odds Lighter, Nick?" 
 
 "Fives." 
 
 "And a bad price too, but it is no good 
 
 arguing with you. You can give me fifty to 
 ten, Nick, and you can give my friend the 
 same. Hand over a tenner to Nick, my boy!" 
 
 "Stop talking nonsense," said Muirhead, 
 angrily. "I haven't gotten pounds, and cer- 
 tainly shouldn't bet them if I had. I have only 
 got two pounds with me."
 
 2O2 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "Only two quid left! You must have 
 dropped a lot over Cordova," said Fairlegh, 
 with almost tearful sympathy. "Well, hand it 
 over! Put him down ten to two, Nick." 
 
 Several other men were standing behind 
 Muirhead pushing impatiently, ordering him 
 to make haste ; and regarding the transaction 
 merely as an expensive means of escaping from 
 the scene, Muirhead handed over his money to 
 the bookmaker and moved away. Fairlegh, 
 however, stuck to him, and leading him to a 
 stand close by pointed out the horses as they 
 cantered down to the starting post. 
 
 "That's Lighter," he said, "in the pink and 
 black cap. A fidgety little devil he is, but 
 you'll see Leslie won't stand any nonsense with 
 him. Now you'll see that with brute Queen 
 Mab dancing about there'll be a breakaway. 
 There you are, you see." Half-a-dozen horses 
 were, in fact, flying along the course, and 
 Mr. Fairlegh, propped up comfortably but 
 insecurely between Muirhead and a post, nearly 
 fell backwards in an endeavour to wave them 
 back with his arms. 
 
 "But you see Lighter hardly budged an 
 inch," he went on admiringly. "Now here's 
 another start; that's right this time; off! 
 Leslie's pulled him back, you see, further and 
 further back still. You'd think he wasn't
 
 Resolved to be Rich 203 
 
 meant, but he is if George Hickson says so. 
 What George Hickson doesn't know isn't worth 
 knowing. Now you see he is creeping up on 
 the rails; see him, don't you? Ah! but that 
 Queen Mab she's coming up too, curse her. 
 
 That Leslie is waiting too long. He has 
 
 let the little mare get such a start 
 
 already that . . ." 
 
 As the rest of Mr. Fairlegh's comments on 
 the race would have to be represented in these 
 polite pages by a series of blanks with a few 
 substantives at very long intervals, and as this 
 would therefore take some time to read with 
 understanding, it is sufficient to say that the 
 famous jockey who was riding Lighter proved 
 himself to be a better judge of pace than Mr. 
 Fairlegh. Queen Mab had been rushed to the 
 front a trifle too soon, she began to stop at the 
 half-distance, and with only one or two slight 
 reminders from the whip, Lighter went past 
 her easily and won by a length. In the course 
 of a subsequent conversation in the bar, during 
 which "George Hickson," and "drinks all 
 round," were at first the only comprehensible 
 words, Muirhead grasped the fact that he had 
 won ten pounds, that he had only to go up to 
 Nick Lunn and demand this sum and that he 
 would immediately receive it. From being 
 dull, bored and angry, he suddenly became
 
 2O4 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 almost hysterically excited, and when the 
 money was actually in his pocket began himself 
 to talk almost as incoherently as Fairlegh. 
 
 "There's plenty more winners where that 
 came from," said Fairlegh. "You've just got 
 to go and put your money on Royal next. 
 You'll have to lay odds on him. Know what 
 that means, old cock? No, of course you don't. 
 Then you come along with me. Some people 
 might tell you that Mirror was going to win 
 this race, but he ain't. George Hickson says 
 he ain't worth a dollar a leg; that's what he 
 says. You put your money down on Royal." 
 
 Muirhead rather reluctantly parted with five 
 pounds and could not understand why he was 
 only to win four, knowing only enough about 
 racing to express intelligent doubts about Mr. 
 Fairlegh's "stone-blind certainties." He 
 understood, however, the business of the race 
 rather better on this occasion and said to him- 
 self that no two minutes of his life had been 
 fuller of pleasure than these two, when he 
 stood watching the horse Royal, whose jockey 
 he was able to distinguish after instruction, 
 cantering in front of his opponents from start 
 to finish of the race. He declined to make a 
 bet on the last race of the afternoon, and went 
 home almost out of his mind with excitement. 
 To have had an afternoon of rest from work, of
 
 Resolved to be Rich 205 
 
 absolute forgetfulness of all his troubles, and 
 to come home fourteen pounds the richer for 
 it, struck him as the finest idea of a holiday 
 which could well be imagined.
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 Muirhead never read any racing news; and 
 horses' names, however familiar they might be 
 to his ears from conversations in the district, 
 conveyed nothing to his mind. Therefore 
 when Fairlegh came round to his rooms on Fri- 
 day evening and began to talk of a certain 
 King John who was to run next day in the 
 Lancashire Plate, Muirhead's chief thought was 
 that by encouraging Fairlegh's intimacy on 
 Thursday he had let himself in for some rather 
 unpleasant subsequent explanations He 
 answered austerely that he had only gone to 
 Manchester on the previous day for a little bit 
 of amusement and had not suddenly become a 
 professional sportsman. 
 
 "But what I say is," said Fairlegh, dog- 
 matically, and in the loud monotone of a man 
 who loves to hear himself talk and knows 
 what he is going to say so well and has said it 
 so often without interruption that he has no 
 intention of allowing it to be disputed: "when 
 a man is in luck let him work his luck for all it 
 is worth. When he's out of luck he should lie 
 206
 
 Resolved to be Rich 207 
 
 low. George Hickson says, 'When luck's with 
 you play up to it; when luck's against you sit 
 in a chair and drink your winnings.' Now 
 you're a beginner, so of course you're in luck. 
 Come out and make the best of it while it lasts. 
 You can take your Bible oath it won't last 
 long. Mine never does," and Mr. Fairlegh 
 proceeded to take a good many oaths (not Bible 
 ones) to that effect on his own account. 
 
 "Is he quite certain to win this race?" asked 
 Muirhead meekly. 
 
 "As sure as I am here with a thirst on me 
 
 like a furnace," said Fairlegh, who was 
 
 not one of those weak-minded, weak-speaking 
 men full of constant intelligent doubts about 
 the existence of certainties. When he thought 
 that a horse was going to win he believed the 
 fact and asserted it, as now, in the strongest 
 words which he was capable of using; and to 
 show the strength of his conviction that King 
 John would win he called for whiskey, and 
 demonstrated without any possibility of cavil 
 the reality of his thirst. 
 
 Attracted as much by the oblivion which it 
 had brought him as by the desire of making 
 money, Muirhead went down to Manchester 
 again on Saturday. Throughout the journey 
 he heard the merits of the famous King John 
 being discussed on all sides. The horse had
 
 2o8 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 won a race at Ascot, of which he could not 
 catch the name, and then the St. Leger. He 
 could not, it appeared, lose to-day's race. Not 
 having Fairlegh at hand to pass on the famous 
 George Hickson's certainties, Muirhead made 
 no bets on the minor races, but when the time 
 arrived for the Lancashire Plate, he sought 
 out Lunn and with the best imitation which he 
 could muster of Fairlegh's manner, asked, 
 "What priceKing John?" 
 
 "He's heard me yelling '2 to i the field' for 
 half-an-hour past," said Lunn with blighting 
 scorn, "and comes and asks me 'what price 
 King John?' Do you think he is an outsider? 
 Would you like 100 to i? Shall I lay you 1000 
 to 8? Here, hand over that tenner that you're 
 holding. Put him down 20 to 10, Jack," went 
 on the bookmaker, seeing that he had a new 
 hand to deal with. "Here's a ticket for you, 
 young man, and if King John wins, and half-a- 
 dozen nice young men come up and say that 
 they are Sunday school teachers and will help 
 you to get the money if you'll give them the 
 ticket, just hold on to it." 
 
 The whole of this speech having been totally- 
 incomprehensible to Muirhead he went back to 
 the Stands rather uncertain as to whether he 
 had or not backed St. John to win, and if he 
 had, for how much. A neighbour in the
 
 Resolved to be Rich 209 
 
 Stands good-naturedly explained the meaning 
 of his race-card to him sufficiently to allow 
 of his making out which were King John's 
 colours. He watched the whole business of 
 the parade and canter with a fever of anxiety 
 which was new and rather pleasant, but after 
 the start his spirits sank to a very low point, 
 for King John was running last and making 
 apparently not the slightest effort to get to the 
 front. Some anxiety was expressed even 
 among the more intelligent spectators, and 
 murmurs of "too late"; "Why don't you let 
 him go?" came from the Stands. Then, sud- 
 denly, a great shout went up from the 
 enclosures and to Muirhead's amazed eyes 
 King John seemed simply to race past his 
 opponents as if they had all suddenly stopped. 
 One moment he was racing at the tail of a 
 dozen scattered horses ; the next he was gallop- 
 ing easily in front of them all, while the other 
 jockeys were spurring and floundering in 
 desperate and futile endeavours to overtake 
 him. A hoarse shout of delight escaped Muir- 
 head's lips as the winning post was passed, and 
 a number was put up on the judge's box, 
 and spectators here and there shouted King 
 John's name. "Has he really won?" asked 
 Muirhead, almost capering with excite- 
 ment and putting his hand on the shoulder
 
 2io Resolved to be Rich 
 
 of the man who had explained his race-card 
 to him. 
 
 "Won! Blimey! ain't you got no eyes? Do 
 you think it's a donkey race, where the last one 
 wins? Or do you think he will be disqualified 
 for winning by the length of a street? Lord!" 
 and with this not very clear reply Muirhead 
 had to be content. 
 
 He was better satisfied with it when Lunn 
 handed him his own ten pounds and another 
 twenty with it. He walked up and down the 
 enclosures with his hands clasped behind him, 
 his lips moving slightly, his eyes blazing with 
 excitement. Gambling success, which affects 
 so many different men in so many different 
 ways (though there is a dreary monotony about 
 its end), had completely intoxicated this man. 
 Every other idea, hope, regret and desire was 
 burnt up by this fever. He thought of nothing 
 and talked of nothing but the races of Thurs- 
 day and Saturday. In spite of all the popular 
 nonsense which is talked about the joy afforded 
 by money properly earned, I cannot imagine 
 any one who has tried the two denying that 
 money won by successful gambling affords ten 
 times more pleasure to the winner than the 
 other. This fact is unfortunately hidden by 
 the more obvious and better known fact that 
 to win ten pounds is a certain and not very
 
 Resolved to be Rich 211 
 
 lengthily spun-out prelude to losing a hundred. 
 The loss of these hundred is a black and 
 unpleasant curtain obscuring from the memory 
 the rapture of winning the ten, and the only 
 point in which a hard-earned ten-pound note 
 can favourably compare with one won on the 
 race-course is that it stays longer in one's 
 pocket. But these reflections being very 
 immoral I bring them to an apologetic end.
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 Muirhead went over to Hartshill on the Sun- 
 day after his debut on the turf in order to hear 
 the latest news of Gerald. Hitherto it had 
 always been with some reluctance and yet with 
 a sense of hopeless attraction that he paid such 
 visits. The majority of men, I imagine, are 
 not very constant lovers; rejection is to them 
 a bucket of cold water, effectively and after an 
 extremely short time curing them of their pas- 
 sion. Of course to be liked by a young lady 
 who cannot, nevertheless, quite bring her love 
 up to marrying point, is tantalizing, and one is 
 sorry for a man who finds himself in such a 
 position, and can excuse him if he goes on 
 hoping. But there must really be something 
 wrong with a man's brain who continues to be 
 violently in love with a woman who is, and 
 confesses herself to be, totally indifferent to 
 him, or even says that she rather dislikes him 
 than otherwise. To sympathise with such a 
 person, to listen to his outcries and try to 
 soothe his woe, is impossible. He is not only 
 a public nuisance but a fool, and the kindest of 
 212
 
 Resolved to be Rich 213 
 
 his friends is the one who tells this to him with 
 the most emphasis. The mere fact that there 
 are a great many more women than men in 
 the world is conclusive proof that such lamen- 
 tations for the obduracy of one of them are 
 preposterous. 
 
 Muirhead, however, was one of the idiots in 
 question, and had no kind friend to point out 
 his folly. He hung about Monica constantly, 
 enduring her snubs, which grew more numerous 
 every week, abjectly thankful for a few kind 
 words, and filled day and night with restless 
 craving to see her and speak to her again. He 
 left his rooms every Sunday afternoon with the 
 intention of going over to Hartshill, and 
 though he sometimes turned back he more 
 often went on. These and other visits ended 
 in his having a few moments' conversation 
 with Monica, and an hour's drearily dragging 
 talk with Miss Bertram, and usually ended up 
 with a glimpse of Reggie Nicholson in the 
 garden. But for the sake of those few min- 
 utes' talk, for a sight of this girl and a touch 
 of her hand, Muirhead would risk Miss Ber- 
 tram's open boredom and Monica's more active 
 disapproval day after day, returning each time 
 to his house with fresh heart-ache, fresh fury 
 against fate, fresh hatred of his successful 
 rival. It was of course hard on him that he
 
 214 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 had no means or leisure to go to the Himalayas, 
 the Rocky Mountains or other refuges of disap- 
 pointed love, and it was unfortunate that he 
 had not Gerald there to assure him how soon 
 he would get over it if he would make a little 
 effort. 
 
 Nicholson senior was with Miss Bertram, and 
 Monica, instead of as usual saying a few words 
 to Muirhead and then departing, felt obliged 
 to stop and entertain him. The man had a 
 feeling that he had better not mention any- 
 where, especially here, what he had been doing 
 lately, and so spoke about other matters. To 
 his own surprise he talked more fluently and 
 easily than usual; there was less embarrass- 
 ment and even a little gaiety in his words. He 
 cared much less than usual when the girl, who 
 was not a great adept at hiding her feelings, 
 and to say truth was more than moderately 
 rude to this visitor on most occasions without 
 altogether adequate cause, let slip some of her 
 usual discouraging comments. Even when 
 Reggie came into the room and Muirhead saw 
 her face light up with relief and joy, the sight 
 hardly caused his pulses to beat an atom faster. 
 He did not exactly realize all this at the time; 
 the habit of being miserable, the attitude of 
 disappointment had become so fixed in him 
 during the last three months that his mind, so
 
 Resolved to be Rich 215 
 
 to speak, took for granted that on each of these 
 occasions it was to experience an increase of 
 grief; but as he walked away from the house 
 and as he sat at dinner that evening it suddenly 
 struck him that, instead of brooding over 
 Monica's unkindness, instead of going over all 
 the words which she had spoken to him and he 
 to her, trying to find hope in them and succeed- 
 ing in finding failure ; instead of doing this he 
 was looking at a mental picture of a race horse 
 with splendid limbs stretched out as it moved 
 across the turf, that he was hearing the cries 
 of an excited and happy crowd: "King John 
 wins!" "The favourite walks in!" He 
 laughed to himself and then shook himself a 
 little impatiently: "I can't go to any more 
 races this month," he said, "but I think I'll try 
 and manage to get down to Newmarket for a 
 day next month. Fairlegh says that's the real 
 place to see it. Yes! I think I'll put in a day, 
 perhaps two, there next month. What did he 
 say that big race was? The . . . the 
 Cesare witch." 
 
 When Nicholson came over next morning, 
 the last day of his work at the Freehold Society, 
 Muirhead was quite polite to him. Indeed, to 
 his own astonishment he found that he was 
 really rather sorry that the lad was going He 
 had not actually reached the point of liking
 
 2l6 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 him, but some slight regret was certainly 
 caused by the reflection that he would have to 
 teach some one else Nicholson's work. He 
 himself understood so little of this business, 
 which was daily growing more complicated, 
 that he very cordially disliked having to 
 initiate any one else into it. 
 
 Among the letters which he received that 
 morning was one telling him to address some 
 fresh remonstrance to Miss Bertram about the 
 sale of her shares, and he thought it worth 
 while to say a word to Reggie about it. 
 
 "It's really nothing to us," he said, with an 
 elaborate unconcern which could not have 
 deceived a child, "but it seems a pity for her 
 own sake that she should give up what is pay- 
 ing her so well. If Benson has been instructed 
 to sell the shares, of course he will, and I do 
 not suppose that he will find any difficulty in 
 doing it, but I think I shall ask her again to 
 change her mind." 
 
 "It would not be the slightest use," said 
 Nicholson curtly. 
 
 "Have you asked her yourself?" 
 
 "No," said the other, without further 
 excuses or enlargement. 
 
 "Well, she is going to do a very silly thing, 
 and I think you would do very well to try and 
 prevent her."
 
 Resolved to be Rich 217 
 
 "She has her reasons, and I quite agree with 
 them," said the boy, flushing. Muirhead 
 looked at his face, and in a sudden flash all his 
 former suspicions and anxieties revived. 
 Gerald, he felt certain, had warned Miss Ber- 
 tram, and this was the result. Nothing else 
 could possibly account for such an unusual 
 action on her part as the making and acting 
 upon her own decision about money matters. 
 
 After a minute's silence, Reggie asked, 
 "When will a purchaser be found for the 
 shares?" 
 
 "How should I know?" said Muirhead. 
 "People are constantly investing money, but I 
 can't control it. Holiday time is hardly over 
 yet. She must wait a few weeks before any 
 dealings in the shares begin." 
 
 "Hadn't Mr. Robinson better preach another 
 sermon?" asked Nicholson; "or is it only when 
 he wants to sell his own shares that he does 
 that?" 
 
 "You had better ask him," said Muirhead 
 with a sudden grim laugh, "for here he is." 
 
 Luke Robinson in effect walked into the 
 Office at that moment. Since Gerald's 
 departure his visits there had become more 
 frequent, for he felt himself safe in patronising 
 its present occupants. This morning his face 
 looked grave and severe. He bowed severely
 
 2i8 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 to Nicholson and Muirhead, took a seat, and 
 crossed his arms with reproof in every gesture. 
 After a few words about some business matters 
 he asked to see Muirhead by himself, and 
 Reggie left the room. 
 
 4 'I extremely regret to hear, Mr. Muirhead," 
 he began, "that you have been to the Man- 
 chester Races twice." 
 
 Muirhead looked annoyed. He was not anx- 
 ious that his recent actions should come to the 
 ears of any of the Freehold people, and cer- 
 tainly Robinson was the last of them whom he 
 desired or expected to hear of it. Well as he 
 knew Robinson's position as a paid agent of 
 the Society, ready to put his religious work at 
 their disposal, he had none of Gerald's scorn 
 for the man's hypocrisy, and he had, on the 
 other hand, all Gerald's admiration of his 
 talents and influence. Therefore he answered 
 humbly enough that he had certainly been to 
 Manchester, but saw no harm in it. 
 
 "No harm! I am astonished, Mr. Muirhead! 
 I could not have imagined that any one could 
 deny the wickedness and folly of turf gambling, 
 or that a person in your responsible position 
 could encourage it. " 
 
 "I think you overrate the wickedness of it," 
 said Muirhead weakly. 
 
 "The matter is beyond all argument,"
 
 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 said Robinson. "Every man connected with 
 racing is a scoundrel. The jockeys and train- 
 ers and owners, as every one knows, rarely 
 mean to win races; they only want to win bets, 
 to swindle the people who go to races out of 
 their money. I cannot imagine how any man 
 could be such a fool as to let himself be 
 swindled like that, and I have no sympathy at 
 all with the victims of these scoundrels. You 
 will have no sympathy for your losses from 
 any right-minded man." 
 
 "But I happen to have won," said the other 
 quietly. 
 
 "You won! You made bets and won 
 money!" exclaimed Robinson in horrified 
 astonishment; and then paused for a moment, 
 his natural respect and admiration for any man 
 who made money by any means almost causing 
 him to lose his presence of mind, and ask Muir- 
 head to take him too to Manchester. 
 
 ' 'This is really a very serious matter indeed, ' ' 
 he went on at last. "I half hoped that you 
 would tell me at any rate that you hadn't made 
 any bets there. I cannot express to you the 
 horror with which I regard all such gambling. 
 I see on every side among my flock the 
 tragedies of ruin caused by it. I see men rob- 
 bing their masters to pay their debts; starving 
 their wives and children to find this gambling
 
 22O Resolved to be Rich 
 
 money; neglecting all their business, religious 
 duties, all their affairs earthly and heavenly, in 
 order to give themselves up to this disgraceful 
 gambling. It is a horror to me; and now I 
 find that one of the leaders of the Freehold 
 Society, a Society with which I concern myself 
 so actively because I believe that it is doing 
 moral as well as material good to all, has taken 
 to gambling on the turf! It is most painful to 
 me." 
 
 Muirhead satin silence under this onslaught. 
 His main idea was fear lest Robinson should do 
 him mischief with Marshall or Lord Eastney, 
 but he really could not lower himself by asking 
 Robinson to keep silence. 
 
 "How much did you win?" asked the 
 Wesleyan minister abruptly. 
 
 "Thirty or forty pounds, though really I 
 don't quite see . . ." 
 
 "Oh!" There was a distinct tone of disap- 
 pointment in Robinson's voice. It would have 
 suggested to Gerald Franklin that the minister 
 had been considering the possibility of levying 
 a little black-mail, of demanding half the win- 
 nings as the price of silence. Neither, prob- 
 ably, would Gerald have had much hesitation 
 in chaffing Robinson about such an intention. 
 "Are you going to any more of these disgrace- 
 ful places?"
 
 Resolved to be Rich 221 
 
 "I really haven't thought about the matter 
 at all," said Muirhead; but guilty recollections 
 of his plans to see the Cesarewitch made him 
 flush a little and look uneasily at his companion. 
 
 "It will be a most painful matter for me," 
 said Robinson, noting the answer of the man's 
 face rather than of his words, "to take any 
 decisive steps about it; but you will readily 
 understand, Mr. Muirhead, that the Freehold 
 cannot afford to allow such wrong-doing. 
 That is to say," he added, feeling that he had 
 put the case with more truth than discretion, 
 "no society, however great and well estab- 
 lished, could tolerate such wrong. I must 
 give you distinctly to understand that if I hear 
 of its repetition I shall write at once to Mr. 
 Marshall."
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 "What would you do if some one called you 
 a liar?" asked a youthful, pugnacious acquaint- 
 ance of mine, talking to a contemporary. 
 
 "To my face?" asked the other. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Well," was the reply, "about how big a 
 person?" 
 
 This unfortunately is a consideration which 
 has to enter into the calculations of all of us. 
 When a man calls us names and we want to 
 make an effective reply, we positively must 
 know how big the man is in mind and influ- 
 ence, in person and body, so as to be quite sure 
 that his answer when he resumes the discussion 
 will not be too crushing. Now, unfortunately, 
 outside a certain groove, Muirhead knew very 
 little of human nature. He could judge his 
 own friends and equals fairly well, but he 
 could not sum up a great man. Robinson was 
 a great man a great scoundrel, of course, but 
 certainly great and required a man of equal 
 intellectual size to deal with him. Gerald 
 Franklin, who knew what was in the man's 
 
 222
 
 Resolved to be Rich 223 
 
 mind as well (to use a vulgar phrase) as if he 
 had been down there with a candle, would have 
 met this lecture on gambling by a few home 
 truths of an extremely unpleasant character 
 about Mr. Robinson's public and private life, 
 and would have told him more forcibly than 
 politely to mind his own business ; but fortu- 
 nately for the minister Franklin was not there. 
 Robinson had an absolute incapacity for mind- 
 ing his own business (and might indeed have 
 pleaded that it was his business to mind other 
 peoples) ' ; and a restless resolute way of plung- 
 ing his hand into the affairs of everybody in 
 the town. On the plea of forcing the English 
 Church authorities of the neighbourhood to 
 recognise the importance of his own sect, he 
 thrust himself into Town Councils and chari- 
 ties, committees and bazaars, strikes, political 
 meetings and newspaper controversies on every 
 conceivable subject. His powers of work were 
 immense. Like the border-lord who killed 
 fifty Scots at a breakfast, and washed his 
 hands, and said to his wife: "Fie on this quiet 
 life, I want work," Robinson simply could not 
 find enough to do. Not only did he want to 
 take the souls and bodies, the work and pleas- 
 ures of everybody in the Potteries into his own 
 charge, but he would have liked another 
 obedient congregation in London as well, and
 
 224 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 desired nothing more than an opportunity for 
 showing the London authorities of the Free- 
 hold Society a few specimens of his religious 
 zeal and financial skill. He would have liked 
 at this moment to write a long letter to Lord 
 Eastney on the subject of the iniquities of the 
 turf and the scandal of Muirhead's association 
 with it. Muirhead had an instinctive suspicion 
 of this fact, though he knew little about the 
 would-be writer's motives; therefore he cow- 
 ered under Robinson's threats and said to him- 
 self that if he was going to indulge in this new 
 amusement, it would have to be done quietly 
 and at a greater distance from Staffordshire. 
 Newmarket answered his purpose very well, 
 and in October he accordingly decided to get 
 himself four days' holiday and go to the Second 
 October Meeting. 
 
 But here fortune played him more than one 
 scurvy trick. The first persons that he met in 
 the High Street on his arrival were Lady Eastney 
 and Bertie Alford, the former of whom, after a 
 slightly puzzled stare, remembered him and 
 bowed with a look of very decided astonish- 
 ment. At St. Pancras he had bought various 
 sporting papers and studied them in the train 
 on the way down to Newmarket, finding that 
 there were many people to supply the place of 
 Mr. Fairlegh as a prophet; that in fact there
 
 Resolved to be Rich 225 
 
 was almost an embarrassment of tips, He 
 found further that each paper gave two, three, 
 or sometimes four selections for the same race 
 in different columns, and he conceived the 
 brilliant idea of adding them all up and select- 
 ing the horse chosen by the majority. This 
 scheme was again, however, upset by a most 
 obliging and affable gentleman whom he met 
 on the racecourse and who, although con- 
 nected with half the stables in Newmarket 
 and the possessor of all their information and 
 all their secrets, and therefore, one would 
 imagine, in a position to make a fortune once a 
 day, was willing to take charge of Muirhead, 
 and for a consideration which was certainly 
 trifling, considering what he had to offer in 
 return for it, to tell him what was going to win 
 every race. But the owners and trainers of the 
 horses were lamentably inaccurate in the infor- 
 mation which they had confided so positively 
 to Muirhead 's new friend, for not a single horse 
 which he backed won on the first day of the 
 Meeting, and he lost under the pressure of his 
 friend's persuasion the whole of the fifty 
 pounds which he had brought with him. 
 Angrily resolved to get it back again, he tele- 
 graphed to Newcastle for money to be sent to 
 him, and went up to the course the next day 
 resolved to follow his own original newspaper
 
 226 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 scheme. But this worked no better than the 
 other, and the professional tipster turning up 
 again later in the day and persuading him to 
 plunge rather heavily on a horse in the last 
 race, he again lost all the money which he had 
 in his possession. Excitedly angry, as much 
 at his own ill-luck as at the loss of the money, 
 and with the real gambler's resolve to get it 
 all back again by any means, he telegraphed to 
 Newcastle for a hundred pounds to be sent to 
 him, and began the third day of the Meeting 
 in that state of mind in which men cheerfully 
 commit the first crime or folly which comes to 
 their hands. 
 
 He lost ^45 of this money over the first 
 three races, then wandering about in the 
 Birdcage he heard two men talking of a horse 
 called Tealeaf, which was running in the 
 Middle Park Plate. One man was apparently 
 the owner, the other had come up to him say- 
 ing that he had put ^200 each way on Tealeaf. 
 The owner, whom Muirhead recognised from 
 his photographs as a famous peer and politician 
 with an income which ran into six figures, 
 answered very politely: "Yes, I think he will 
 win. I have got ^10 on him myself;" and the 
 lad who had spoken blushed a little. One of 
 the idiotic resolves which come to gamblers of 
 Muirhead's type, immediately took possession
 
 Resolved to be Rich 227 
 
 of the man, and collecting all the rest of his 
 money, without leaving himself enough for his 
 hotel- bill, he went up to Lunn, and the num- 
 bers for the Middle Park Plate now being up, 
 asked: "What price Tealeaf?" His knowl- 
 edge of turf-language was now improved, and 
 he could even bargain a little about the odds. 
 ' ' Sixes, ' ' was the reply. 
 
 "But I want sevens to win," said Muirhead, 
 "and 7 to 4 for a place. It is only for ^30 each 
 way. ' ' 
 
 "Go and eat your ^30, " was the brief and 
 somewhat inconsequent reply. 
 
 "But they are offering sevens over there." 
 
 "Here, Jack!" Lunn turned to his clerk, 
 
 "Give this gentleman your book and pencil. 
 
 He's come to do our business for us, and he 
 
 knows such a about it that he must do it 
 
 all his own way too. " 
 
 "I only asked for 7 to i instead of 6," said 
 Muirhead. "It's only one point more." 
 
 "You see, Jack, the gentleman knows that 7 
 is i more than 6. I told you he knew all 
 about this trade. I saw in his eye from the 
 
 first that he wasn't such a fool as he looks. 
 
 I take some credit for seeing that too. Now, 
 young man ! if you want 6 to i about Tealeaf 
 and 5 to 4 for a place, hand your money over. If 
 you don't, make room for somebody who does. "
 
 228 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Muirhead handed over his money and walked 
 rapidly up and down the ring in a state of wild 
 excitement until the horses came out and can- 
 tered down to the starting post. Then he went 
 and stood on one of the Stands, staring with 
 white face at the horses as they moved about 
 under the starter's orders. There was a long 
 delay at the post with several breaks-away, 
 during which Muirhead had ample time to 
 realise what a very idiotic act he had recently 
 committed. He was as certain as if it had 
 already happened that the horse would get 
 beaten, and that the next which he proposed to 
 back, and now would be unable to back for lack 
 of the money, would win. For a moment a 
 wild idea came into his mind of going up to 
 Lunn and imploring him to cancel the bet, but 
 there was a crowd of persons round the famous 
 bookmaker doing business with him, and he 
 had not the courage to go among them on such 
 an errand. The flag fell at last. It was half a 
 minute before Muirhead could distingtiish the 
 colours, so much did his hand which held his 
 glasses shake. He saw Tealeaf at last in the 
 middle of a whole cluster of horses who were 
 apparently shutting him in, and he dropped his 
 glasses and turned away for a moment mutter- 
 ing prayers, entreaties, threats to the horse's 
 jockey, so that his companions turned round
 
 Resolved to be Rich 229 
 
 and laughed at him. Then he looked again. 
 The little group of horses had parted asunder, 
 and Tealeaf was in front of it with only two 
 horses in front of him. For a moment Muir- 
 head's heart gave a great jump which sent 
 the blood in a scarlet flush to his face. Then 
 the next moment there began a motion of 
 Watts' arms which Muirhead already knew to 
 mean that the horse was tiring and stopping; 
 but with his eyes fixed on Tealeaf he did not 
 notice that the riders of the two horses which 
 were in front of him had picked up their whips 
 and were already desperately trying to keep 
 their places. Slowly but steadily Tealeaf drew 
 up to them. Watts picked up his whip, flour- 
 ished it once, brought it down once, and then 
 Tealeaf with a final effort drew clear away 
 from his two opponents. Muirhead watched 
 him go past a length in front of the others, he 
 gazed at the picture almost with fear in his 
 face. Surely he could only have won such a 
 sum in order that it might be taken away after- 
 wards in order that he might rise to the high- 
 est point of exultation and have the greatest 
 possible fall. When the winning number went 
 up, he asked one of his neighbours whether 
 that was really Tealeaf 's number; then he 
 asked another whether he too thought that 
 Tealeaf had really won ; another whether there
 
 230 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 was likely to be any objection; another 
 whether Lunn was likely to refuse to pay. He 
 had thirty or forty men in Tatter sal's Ring 
 laughing at him before the "All right" was 
 called. Two of the most skilful ticket-snatch- 
 ers on the course stuck to him and made reso- 
 lute attempts to get hold of his ticket; but the 
 money, a sum of ^217 IDS. found its way to his 
 pocket safely at last, and the man's elation was 
 pitiful to watch. He was the worst of winners 
 and losers, a gambler as to whose ultimate fate 
 there could be no possible doubt. 
 
 He left Newmarket that night and arrived 
 home in time for business on Friday morning. 
 Feeling the absolute necessity of having some 
 one to talk to about his luck, he invited Fair- 
 legh to lunch at his rooms, and told him this 
 history over a bottle and a half of dry Mono- 
 pole; champagne at unseasonable hours and 
 meals being with such people an inevitable part 
 of successful betting.
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 
 A suspicion that he had much better have 
 held his tongue which occurred to him that 
 evening was confirmed next morning by the 
 arrival of Luke Robinson. 
 
 "I feel it now my absolute duty to write to 
 Lord Eastney about this," said Robinson. "It 
 is most painful to me, but not only should I 
 feel in any case bound to do all in my power to 
 stop the reckless proceedings which you have 
 begun, but for the sake of the Freehold I am 
 bound to stop them. You will ruin yourself 
 and the Society. I hear wherever I go now 
 stories about your bets and your winnings. 
 Your winnings most have been something 
 enormous" there was a queer tone in the 
 speaker's voice as he hinted the last question 
 which would have made Gerald Franklin laugh 
 and ask him whether a ten-pound note would 
 be of any good "I cannot allow such a scan- 
 dal to go on for a single day longer. ' ' 
 
 "My winnings only just paid my expenses," 
 said Muirhead uneasily and untruthfully. "I 
 can't stop your writing to Lord Eastney, but I 
 % 231
 
 232 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 cannot imagine what there is to make such a 
 fuss about." 
 
 "The amount of your winnings or what you 
 did with them matters nothing," said Robin- 
 son. One might have imagined there was a 
 tone of disappointment in his voice. "It's the 
 gambling which horrifies me, and which I must 
 have stopped." 
 
 "You had better," said Muirhead rather 
 coldly, for his elation at his own success had 
 taken away some of his fear of the Wesleyan 
 minister, "speak to young Franklin about it. 
 He is coming down here to-morrow for a few 
 days. ' ' 
 
 "Is he?" Robinson's face fell like that of a 
 child who is told that its holidays are over and 
 that the governess is coming back next day. 
 "Is he? What is that for?" 
 
 "On private family business," said Muir- 
 head, who didn't know the reason but thought 
 it would be wholesome for Robinson to believe 
 that he, Muirhead, knew more about Gerald's 
 intentions than the minister himself. 
 
 In fact, Muirhead had made a good shot, and 
 Gerald had come home in consequence of a 
 consultation with Marshall in which Marshall 
 had begged the boy to go down and see 
 whether he could first persuade his aunt not to 
 sell her shares, and then persuade Monica to
 
 Resolved to be Rich 233 
 
 invest her recently acquired fortune in the 
 Society. For the Carlton Gold Mine shares 
 had been sold for a sum of ^1 4,000, and 
 Monica as an heiress was one of the latest 
 sensations of the neighbourhood. 
 
 Gerald arrived at home with a pretty clear 
 idea that he would have some difficulty in 
 carrying out Marshall's orders. His aunt had 
 clearly been warned by some one. He knew 
 her previous opinion of the Freehold, saw from 
 her letter to Marshall that she had received 
 some additional information to confirm it, and 
 thought it highly improbable that he would be 
 able to say anything to change her mind. 
 Besides this, he had no intention of allowing 
 either his aunt or his sister to be involved in 
 the final crash. Even if he had persuaded 
 them to invest the money he would have made 
 them sell the shares before anything went 
 hopelessly wrong, and in that case it struck him 
 now that they would hold their shares, if 
 bought, for a very short time. So it was 
 without desire or expectation of success in his 
 mission that he arrived at Hartshill. 
 
 The current of excitement over the Freehold 
 Society was still running strong in North 
 Staffordshire, and Gerald was besieged with 
 questions on all sides. He went over to see 
 Muirhead at once, and was amused to notice
 
 234 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 the confusion into which the Newcastle Office 
 had dropped since his departure. Stories 
 about Muirhead's racing outbreak were told to 
 him by various people, at which he laughed 
 and said that Muirhead was a rich man who 
 could easily afford to amuse himself. The 
 others should invest all their money in the 
 Freehold, and then they too would have some 
 to bet with. He found Lowe in a state of 
 great exultation, having just bought a carriage 
 and pair of horses, built a small stable, refur- 
 nished his vicarage and begun a course of 
 dinners, garden parties and other country 
 entertainments which were certainly an 
 extremely good advertisement for the Free- 
 hold. The Vicar of Hartshill talked to Gerald 
 with a gratitude and affection which rather 
 touched the boy and made him view this 
 development with some concern. 
 Lowe, he resolved, should be one to receive a 
 word of warning in time, if it were possible. 
 He asked the Vicar whether he would give his 
 consent to Monica's money being invested in 
 the Society, and of course received Lowe's 
 prompt assent, "What better investment 
 could anybody possibly want?" said the man, 
 looking round on his new chairs and rosewood 
 cabinets and the new Erard piano. 
 
 ' ' But you understand of course, ' ' said Gerald
 
 Resolved to be Rich 235 
 
 a little impatiently and speaking for once on 
 impulse, "that the Society is not a legal invest- 
 ment for trust money, and that you would be 
 liable for the money if anything went wrong." 
 
 "If anything went wrong!" repeated the 
 parson with a smile. "I suppose that you 
 know best whether that is likely to happen and 
 would not be here asking me these questions 
 about your own sister's money if it were." 
 
 Gerald got up to go, feeling thoroughly 
 annoyed. Lowe's smiling certainty that 
 everything must be right angered him. 
 Remarkable as it may seem, it had really never 
 occurred to him before that he was doing a 
 most infamous thing in even risking the loss of 
 Miss Bertram's and Monica's money. Was he 
 in point of fact perfectly certain to be able to 
 save it at the last moment? Of course not! 
 the odds were rather against his being able to 
 do so than otherwise. The errand on which he 
 had come down here was, he confessed to him- 
 self, an outrageous one. He would do his best 
 to persuade the two women to agree to invest 
 their money as proposed, but if they did agree 
 to it, it by no means followed that he would 
 allow it to be done. 
 
 Monica was delighted to see her brother 
 again. Since Lady Eastney's conversation 
 with her she had been extremely anxious
 
 236 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 about him, and had urged Miss Bertram to 
 insist upon withdrawing him from his present 
 business, even if considerable penalties 
 attached to breaking the agreement with Mar- 
 shall. But the woman did not quite see her 
 way to do this, the fact being that she only half 
 believed what Lady Eastney had told her. 
 The Marchioness' words, however honestly 
 meant at the time, were as likely as not only 
 the outcome of some quarrel with her husband, 
 or with some other principals in the Society. 
 Her quick eyes had seen the relations in 
 which Lady Eastney and Bertie Alford stood 
 to one another, and oddly enough she had 
 more than half made up her mind that this 
 warning was the result of some complication 
 between herself, her husband and her lover. 
 Gerald had therefore been allowed to continue 
 his London work in peace. The boy was 
 pleased to be at home again and once more 
 among the circle of people who regarded him 
 with admiring awe. The flattery of Muirhead 
 and Lowe had pleased him immensely, and he 
 was in a very good humour when he arrived at 
 Hartshill. 
 
 "Is Nicholson flourishing?" he asked Monica 
 gaily; "and aren't you very glad to have me 
 out of the way when he is over here? I sup- 
 pose you have to go into another room, Aunt
 
 Resolved to be Rich 237 
 
 Christina, when he is here, and leave them all 
 to themselves? Are you allowed to come in to 
 tea with them?" 
 
 "I believe Reggie likes Aunt Christina 
 better than he does me," said Monica. "But 
 now you've got to tell us about Susan Ethridge. 
 You are beginning to blush, I see. Is she very 
 nice, Gerald?" 
 
 "Yes, very," said the boy decisively. 
 
 "And pretty?" 
 
 "I really don't know, I never looked. I do 
 not know, on my word," he went on, answer- 
 ing Monica's laughter. "She's the sort of girl 
 whose looks you don't think about when she's 
 talking to you. I like her very much." 
 
 Monica, who had received more than one 
 long and enthusiastic letter about Gerald from 
 her friend Susan, was amused and interested 
 at her brother's admiration. She had never 
 heard him speak of a girl before, so far as she 
 could recollect; his conversation having been 
 confined entirely to men and money. She 
 went on thinking of this new development even 
 when the talk had drifted back to Gerald's 
 more usual themes, and when he began to 
 speak to her about the investment she was 
 thinking all the time of the other matter. She 
 shook her head laughingly at his proposal, and 
 refused at first even to discuss it seriously.
 
 238 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "Reggie wouldn't hear of it," she said. 
 "Of course you don't understand just yet what 
 it means to have a masterful person saying- to 
 you that you are to do this and are not to do 
 that, though perhaps some day you may find 
 out what it is like. Is Susan very strong- 
 minded, Gerald?" 
 
 "I wish you would talk seriously about the 
 thing, my good girl. It's the worst of trying 
 to talk business with any girl that there is sure 
 to be a young man hanging about and getting 
 himself mixed up with the affair somewhere. 
 You know perfectly well that Nicholson has got 
 nothing to do with it. It's for you and Aunt 
 Christina and Mr. Lowe to decide, and you can 
 take my word for it that Nicholson isn't such a 
 young fool as to refuse .1500 a year interest 
 on your money instead of ^500. What earthly 
 objection have you to the investment? Money 
 can't lie in a bank, you know, and must be put 
 somewhere." 
 
 "Reggie is going to consult his father's 
 lawyers about it." 
 
 "But the money isn't his to do what he likes 
 with," says Gerald, who was getting quite angry 
 at his sister's resistance, and was now determined 
 to persuade her into doing what he suggested. 
 
 "Aunt Christina asked him to see about it for 
 us."
 
 Resolved to be Rich 239 
 
 "Well, she'd no business to do anything of 
 the sort, " said the boy. "Lowe is the proper 
 person to ask, and if she wanted some other 
 advice, she should have called Marshall. I 
 can't understand why she should suddenly turn 
 round and insult the whole lot of us like this. 
 It is simply absurd. Now are you going to be 
 reasonable, and think of buying some shares?" 
 
 "No, I am not," said Monica briefly. 
 
 "Do you mean to say that when you have 
 got the best investment in England offered to 
 you, with every guarantee that anybody could 
 possibly want, with all your friends recom- 
 mending the thing, you are going to chuck all 
 advice to the winds, because a chap with whom 
 you happen to be in love, and who knows noth- 
 ing on earth about the subject, happens to 
 think differently?" 
 
 "If you like to put it like that, you can," 
 said Monica; "but the fact remains that I am 
 not going to let Mr. Marshall or Mr. Lowe 
 have anything to do with investing my 
 ^14,000." 
 
 "Or me either?" 
 
 "No, nor you either. We all know how 
 clever you are, and I am sure you would get 
 me very good interest, but I simply don't want 
 to speculate." 
 
 "Speculate, my good girl! You don't know
 
 240 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 what the word means. You are simply talking 
 preposterous nonsense. " 
 
 "That is not a thing which Monica often 
 does," said Miss Bertram, who had come into 
 the room just in time to hear this last sentence. 
 
 "I was speaking to her about money 
 matters, ' ' said Gerald, who had meant to per- 
 suade Monica first, and Miss Bertram after- 
 wards, and was rather annoyed by the 
 interruption. 
 
 "Gerald wants me to buy shares in the Free- 
 hold with my gold mine money," said Monica. 
 
 Miss Bertram had more than suspected from 
 the first that this was the object of Gerald's 
 visit, and her voice was more decided than 
 pleasant when she said : "I think I may answer 
 Gerald on your behalf, my dear, better than 
 you can yourself, as I happen to have the 
 power of disposing of your money; and I can 
 say without any hesitation, that I have not the 
 slightest intention of letting you do what he 
 suggests." 
 
 "Mr. Lowe, who is one of the trustees, and a 
 man of business, is perfectly willing," said 
 Gerald rather sulkily. "I don't know why you 
 should object." 
 
 "I can't tell you my reasons. It is really not 
 worth while arguing the matter. My mind is 
 quite made up. ' '
 
 Resolved to be Rich 241 
 
 "You can't tell me your reasons?" repeated 
 Gerald, interrogatively. 
 
 "Well, I don't mean to, if you prefer that 
 answer." 
 
 "We shall all think it a little ..." 
 
 "Gerald, I do not wish to have any more 
 words about the matter at all. If you have 
 been asked to make enquiries about our inten- 
 tions, you have made your enquiries and have 
 had your answer. The answer is perfectly 
 irrevocable. I daresay Monica has already told 
 you herself that she did not care for the invest- 
 ment. Now I add that if she did like it, if Mr. 
 Lowe advocated it as strongly as he could, 
 nothing whatever would make me change my 
 mind. Monica is not going to buy any shares 
 in the Freehold, and I am going to sell my own 
 shares directly I can find any one to buy them. 
 That, by the way, does not seem to be very 
 easy to do just now." 
 
 "Holiday time is only just over," said the 
 boy in a low frightened voice. "It will be all 
 right when every one comes back to London ; 
 but they say that the fine weather has kept 
 people away very late this year." He mut- 
 tered the excuse mechanically, as though 
 repeating some lesson which he had learnt by 
 heart, and then left the room.
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 The report which Gerald sent to Marshall at 
 the end of forty-eight hours' stay in North 
 Staffordshire brought that gentleman down in 
 person by the next train, and some anxious 
 consultations between himself, Robinson, and 
 Gerald took place in the Newcastle office. The 
 affairs both of the Freehold and the Merton 
 Insurance Company were in wild disorder. 
 There had been a great falling off in insurance 
 policies and share-buying, and it was impos- 
 sible to gather from the hopelessly entangled 
 figures what was going wrong or why. The 
 purchase of the Arkhill property had been com- 
 pleted, and the boring for coal had been begun 
 in several directions; but so far it had not been 
 found in paying quantities, and the unsuccess- 
 ful shafts were there for all men to see. The 
 talk of failure went on and grew. A builder 
 who was concerned with the Freehold in cer- 
 tain new villas and streets which were being 
 built near Dentley became bankrupt suddenly, 
 and denounced Marshall for his failure. Very 
 irrationally; for these were only small acci- 
 243
 
 Resolved to be Rich 243 
 
 dents which had happened in twenty different 
 parts of the Society's properties, and could not 
 have affected any sound company; people 
 began to shake their heads, and to talk of 
 selling shares. One or two indeed tried 
 to do so, and found that it was difficult, and 
 told their neighbours about the difficulty. 
 Paragraphs were put in the local papers under 
 "London Gpssip," asserting that a dividend of 
 a perfectly phenomenal character would be 
 declared at the next half-yearly meeting, but 
 the business folks of the Potteries laughed at it. 
 
 "We must have another sermon, Mr. Robin- 
 son," said Marshall, hardly able to hide his 
 uneasiness. "We must have several more. 
 You must tell these people that when they try 
 to sell shares in this ridiculous way they 
 are in fact speculating, and that speculating is 
 the worst of sins. Couldn't you preach a 
 course of sermons about it?" 
 
 'I could," said Robinson, "and their effect 
 would be immediate and very beneficial." 
 
 'Very good. When will you begin? The 
 sooner the better." 
 
 "I said that I could do it," said the Wesleyan 
 minister drily. "The thanks I got for doing it 
 last time were not, however, so warm that I 
 should care to do it again." 
 
 The two speakers looked at one another, with
 
 244 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 a grim smile on one side and impatient annoy- 
 ance on the other. 
 
 "Mr. Robinson is, I feel sure, going to 
 demand something perfectly preposterous," 
 said Gerald in his smooth, ironical voice, "but 
 if I were you, Mr. Marshall, I should explain to 
 htm, first, that he very much overrates the 
 effect of his sermons, and, secondly, that if they 
 had any high money value to us (which they 
 have not), we simply have not got the money 
 to pay for them. Why not ask Mr. Lowe to 
 preach for us?" 
 
 "You might go and ask him certainly," said 
 Marshall. "We should like Mr. Robinson's 
 sermons, too, if the price is not too high." 
 
 ''I object, gentlemen," said the minister, red 
 with passion. "I object most strongly to these 
 remarks about my sermons being paid for. It 
 is insolence to suggest that my spiritual 
 instruction to my flock is being bought at a 
 price. What has it to do with my sermons if 
 I have land which I wish to sell ; if I wish to 
 dispose of the rest of that little Dentley estate, 
 a part of which you have already bought of me 
 at a most ludicrously small price; if I have 
 now ten more acres of land, with three houses 
 on it, and want to sell this?" 
 
 Gerald laughed rudely. "We want to under- 
 stand clearly that a sermon is to go with each
 
 Resolved to be Rich 245 
 
 house. Then I daresay Mr. Marshall will buy. 
 Now for the price. Oh! wait a bit; here comes 
 Mr. Lowe down the street, and there is my 
 aunt and Canon Hobart. They've all met, and 
 look as if they were talking about coming 
 across here? Yes! That's just what they are 
 going to do. Now, we might arrange a regular 
 course of sermons all over the Potteries, though 
 I am afraid that Canon Hobart would not do us 
 very much good." 
 
 The three visitors came in as Gerald had 
 said, and began various explanations of their 
 arrival. Miss Bertram, who was in front, said 
 she had come in to speak to Marshall about the 
 sale of her shares. Lowe said that he had 
 come to help persuade her, even at the last 
 minute, to abstain from an act which he 
 genuinely thought to be extremely silly. 
 Hobart was there, though he did not say so, to 
 put that inconvenient question to Marshall 
 about the Hospital. 
 
 Standing in the background, awaiting his 
 turn to speak, the canon took one more good 
 look at Mr . Joshua Marshall, and then sud- 
 denly, as some long-sought recollection will 
 flash across us at last at the moment when we 
 least expect it and are least searching for it, the 
 recollection of this man flashed into Hobart 's 
 brain. He knew him now. The last time he
 
 246 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 had seen him he was standing before the Board 
 of Directors of the North Stafford Infirmary 
 evading questions about some accounts, pro- 
 fessing his inability to understand certain 
 points, and promising to have a complete state- 
 ment ready for the next meeting. Hobart 
 remembered how at the time a sudden touch of 
 suspicion had come to him. He was the least 
 astonished of all the committee at Marshall's 
 flight. With this memory at last firmly in his 
 mind, he stared at the man, and only wondered 
 now why he had not recalled his face, and espe- 
 cially his voice, before. The man was speak- 
 ing to his sister Hobart supposed that she did 
 not know him and was surprised assuring her 
 that the Company was never in a better condi- 
 tion, cajoling her by all means in his power 
 into keeping her shares. The canon listened 
 with quiet amusement, and then detecting, or 
 thinking that he detected, signs of wavering in 
 Miss Bertram, he stepped forward and stood in 
 front of Marshall with his arms folded and a 
 slight smile on his face. 
 
 "You have a great facility in explaining 
 figures, Mr. Marshall," he said. "If I remem- 
 ber right, some years ago you promised to give 
 a certain explanation of the accounts of the 
 North Stafford Infirmary. Is the explanation 
 ready yet?"
 
 CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 Marshall sat down in a chair and looked from 
 Hobart to his sister, and back again to Hobart. 
 He attempted no bluff, no denial or explana- 
 tion. If he had been recognised, he had been 
 recognised, and the mischief was done. If you 
 meet a man in the street, and he says, "Hallo, 
 Jones! how are you?" it is extremely improb- 
 able that it will be of the slightest use for you 
 to turn round and say, "I am not Jones; you 
 are really quite mistaken." The odds are that 
 your friend will argue less about your identity 
 than your sanity. Epictetus sagely remarked, 
 "I am evidently conscious of my own identity, 
 because when I intend to swallow anything I 
 never carry it to your mouth but to my own;" 
 and so when a man has taken his greetings and 
 hand-shakes to a certain person, that person is 
 not going to convince him by the strongest 
 arguments or the subtlest philosophy that he is 
 talking to some one else. I believe myself that 
 even when a man addresses some one like this, 
 and is greeted perfectly truthfully with a polite 
 explanation that he is quite mistaken, he goes 
 247
 
 248 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 away in nine cases out of ten with the impres- 
 sion that his supposed friend is either wanted 
 by the police, or that for some nefarious pur- 
 pose he is making clumsy efforts at disguise. 
 
 Marshall at any rate had the wit to see that 
 denial of himself would have no other result 
 than to irritate Hobart; and that was not a 
 thing which he wished to do. Therefore he 
 looked at him in mild deprecation, then looked 
 at Lowe to see if he understood what this accu- 
 sation meant, and then glanced through an 
 open door into a room where Gerald and Muir- 
 head and Robinson had temporarily retired as 
 if appealing to Hobart not to speak before them 
 just yet. The rector softened a little at Mar- 
 shall's immediate surrender, as Marshall had 
 judged that he would, and began to think that 
 he wanted some time for reflection before fol- 
 lowing up his advantage. Therefore when 
 Miss Bertram turned to him in frightened 
 appeal, saying: "Spare him, Canon Hobart, for 
 my sake and Monica's; spare him! You will 
 not do anything just yet, will you?" he 
 answered her reassuringly. 
 
 "I don't understand what is the matter," 
 said Lowe. "Had I better not know? If so, 
 of course, I will go away." 
 
 "It is simply," said Hobart quietly, "that 
 Mr. Marshall is in point of fact Mr. Joshua
 
 Resolved to be Rich 249 
 
 Bertram, Miss Bertram's brother, who was 
 Secretary of the Infirmary some years ago and 
 left suddenly under circumstances of which you 
 have, I believe, heard. He went to Spain, as 
 I understood at the time, and for Miss Ber- 
 tram's sake we took no further steps in the 
 matter. What we ought to do now is an affair 
 which requires consideration." 
 
 "I have been working honestly ever since. I 
 have done my best to remedy the wrong," said 
 Marshall very humbly. "Everybody knows all 
 about the work which I am doing now ; it is 
 perfectly straightforward, useful, honest. My 
 sister knows all about my life now and 
 approves of it. Don't you, Christina?" 
 
 The woman leant against the table sick with 
 terror and misery. After what Lady Eastney 
 had told her she could not and would not say 
 "yes" in answer to her brother's last question, 
 but to say "no" was like giving Hobart leave 
 to do his worst. Fortunately the rector was 
 puzzling out something else in his own mind. 
 
 "I don't quite understand," he said, turning 
 to Miss Bertram. "Did you know who Mr. 
 Marshall was all the time?" 
 
 "I knew him the first time he came down 
 here. Before that I did not even know that he 
 was in England." 
 
 "You should have told some one who he was.
 
 250 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 You should have forbidden him to bring this 
 business down here," said the rector irritably. 
 
 "Before Lady Eastney told me . . ." 
 began Miss Bertram and then stopped in con- 
 fusion. 
 
 "She knew all the time, of course, that my 
 business was a perfectly honest one," said Mar- 
 shall, perceiving that his sister would not make 
 this reply herself. Even in the middle of this 
 nervous business he had time to note and 
 register the fact which he had half suspected 
 already, that it was Lady Eastney who had 
 warned Miss Bertram against the Freehold 
 Society, and advised her to sell her shares. 
 There was silence for half a minute and then 
 Hobart moved towards the door. 
 
 "Are you going to have my brother 
 arrested?" muttered Miss Bertram, beginning 
 to cry. 
 
 "No," said Hobart, "I don't suppose there 
 is any good in that. Of course I must talk 
 the matter over with one or two others first, 
 and we shall probably make certain conditions 
 with regard to this Society. I cannot tell you 
 what they will be yet. I know too little of 
 the work myself. I should like you to come 
 with me, Mr. Lowe, if you are disengaged." 
 
 Left alone with his sister, Marshall got up 
 and shut the door of communication with the
 
 Resolved to be Rich 251 
 
 inner room ; then came back and sat down by 
 Miss Bertram. 
 
 "I have no luck," he muttered in sullen 
 anger. "Luck is always against me. Every- 
 where I go, and whatever I am doing, if a little 
 bit of luck has got to come into my business, it 
 is always bad. Whether I am acting honestly 
 or dishonestly it is always the same. Posts go 
 wrong on just the one particular day in the 
 year when it matters to me more than on any 
 other that I should get some letter. Trains 
 and ships are always over their time if I am in 
 a hurry, and under it if I want delay. If a 
 thousand of my papers which do not matter 
 pass through some man's hands who rarely 
 looks at them, and there happens to be one of 
 the papers which I do not wish him to see, he 
 is sure to see it. I have backed a horse in a 
 steeplechase in Buenos Ayres which had run 
 for five seasons and never fallen, and he fell 
 the time I backed him. The only time I ever 
 played trente-et-quarante at Monte Carlo the 
 un-aprh turned up four times running, a 
 thing which, they told me, happened perhaps 
 once a-year. There is no fighting against luck 
 like that. I think that a man who watches his 
 life for ten years and sees that he is dogged by 
 evil fortune like that has only one sensible 
 thing to do, and that is to shoot himself.
 
 252 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 When everything was made, there was nothing 
 made viler or more unbearable than bad luck. 
 I would suffer torture, loss, poverty, and death 
 itself, and would mind nothing if I had brought 
 them on myself by mismanagement and 
 stupidity. It is that feeling of being followed 
 by bad luck, that certainty that wherever 
 chance enters into anything it will be against 
 me, which I loathe. I can remedy the stupidity 
 and mismanagement; against the other I can 
 do nothing. It infuriates me; it drives me 
 mad mad!" 
 
 This sort of tirade was more new to Miss 
 Bertram than to the majority of ladies who 
 have the honour to be related to ne'er-do-weels, 
 and she was impressed by it to an extent which 
 gratified its author. Some vague idea of hav- 
 ing heard or read the thing before was cer- 
 tainly in her mind, and it did strike her also 
 that if she had set her brain to work she could 
 have found an answer to most of it ; but she 
 was not concerned to do so at this moment, 
 and sat in troubled silence. 
 
 'I am at Hobart's mercy," said Marshall at 
 last. "What am I to do?" 
 
 "I will go and see him. He seems to pay 
 some attention to my appeals, " said the woman. 
 ' ' I will beg him to keep silence. ' ' 
 
 " If he or Lowe talk to any one they might as
 
 Resolved to be Rich 253 
 
 well preach about me in the Town Hall at 
 once. Half a dozen words to anybody and the 
 story will be all over the place. ' ' 
 
 "I will say so to him. I will implore him to 
 keep absolute silence." 
 
 The man looked slightly relieved and his 
 sister went on. "You will not leave England 
 again, will you? It would be unwise, I think, 
 to come down into this neighbourhood any 
 more, as your presence irritates Canon Hobart, 
 but you could find work in London. And, 
 Joshua, could you not find something else than 
 your present work?" 
 
 "Why should I?" 
 
 "You know well enough." 
 
 "I certainly see well enough that some one 
 has been talking great nonsense to you, and I 
 can pretty well guess who it is. What on 
 earth do you suppose that Lady Eastney knows 
 about a business like ours? She is fighting us 
 merely because that little fool Alford who 
 hangs on to her petticoats dislikes her hus- 
 band, and she is on the youngster's side. He 
 is her lover. I should have thought any 
 woman could have seen through an affair of 
 that sort." 
 
 "I cannot argue about the matter, but I know 
 everything, and you know that I know." 
 
 "A truly feminine remark," said Marshall,
 
 254 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 and then suddenly remembering that he was 
 not exactly in a position to make sarcastic 
 remarks to his sister, he went on: "Of course, 
 my dear Chris, every one may think what they 
 like about the Society, but you might have 
 trusted me not to let you and Monica come to 
 any harm in it. You have given a very severe 
 blow to its credit down here by trying to sell 
 those shares, but of course you must do it if 
 you think right. Now we had better leave the 
 office. I must go back to London to-night, and 
 you will see Hobart as soon as you can, won't 
 you? It is good of you to stand by me, dear 
 Chris. You always did, didn't you." 
 
 "I haven't done you much good by it, appar- 
 ently, ' ' said the woman with unusual bitterness.
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII 
 
 Canon Hobart having promised to keep 
 silence about Marshall's identity on condition 
 that no more religious pressure was brought to 
 bear to induce the neighbourhood to invest its 
 money in the Freehold, a little more breathing 
 time was given to the officials of that remark- 
 able institution. It was true that business was 
 at an absolute standstill ; that shares could not 
 be sold at any price at all, and that a large and 
 increasing number of persons were increasingly 
 anxious to sell them at any price, but such a 
 fact is a long time in becoming known, and 
 has little significance for the class of investors 
 with whom Lord Eastney and his fellow 
 directors were concerned. Local lawyers or 
 bankers might advise the sale of houses or 
 shares belonging to the Freehold at any sacri- 
 fice, but so long as the local postmaster and 
 clergyman or itinerant preachers would 
 strongly discountenance such a proceeding, 
 and express unbounded faith in the Society's 
 prospects, such advice was not of any serious 
 consequence. A few persons like Miss Ber- 
 255
 
 256 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 tram, who had their entire fortune in this 
 Company, and knew more or less the truth 
 about it, grew desperately anxious as time 
 went on and they were told on all sides to wait ; 
 but this minority was unimportant. Muirhead 
 was another who was getting anxious about his 
 prospects, but he had discovered, as he sup- 
 posed, a new and much more interesting and 
 rapid way of making money, and was less con- 
 cerned to sell his Freehold shares than to find 
 probable winners for the November races at 
 Derby, Warwick, Manchester, and other places 
 within reasonable distance of Newcastle. The 
 first week in November came at last, many of 
 the actors in this little drama having lived half 
 a dozen lives during the anxious previous 
 weeks, and Muirhead began to absent himself 
 regularly three days a week from the office. 
 Money flowed into his pockets steadily at these 
 "back-end" meetings. He appeared able to 
 commit the most outrageous acts of folly and 
 yet win continually. One day he would back a 
 horse because he had dreamt its number, 
 another because he had seen its colours on a 
 scarecrow from the passing train, another 
 because it was the only one not mentioned by 
 any of the sporting papers in their tips, another 
 for a reason more idiotic than all the preceding 
 ones put together, namely, that he liked its
 
 Resolved to be Rich 257 
 
 looks. He heard of people coming to the office 
 in Newcastle day after day, local persons anx- 
 ious about their land or houses, officials from 
 London who had come down to see himself and 
 urge caution or activity, but he paid no atten- 
 tion to any of them. He saw Monica half-a- 
 dozen times, heard that the date of her 
 wedding had been fixed, and was as absolutely 
 indifferent to sight or news as if it had con- 
 cerned Miss Bertram. Even when he came 
 back from a certain day at Derby some thirty 
 or forty pounds to the bad on the day, it did 
 not very greatly affect him. He said to him- 
 self that it was an accident liable to happen to 
 any sportsman, that it came of following other 
 people's advice instead of his own judgment, 
 that he would make up for it by an extra heavy 
 bet or two next day. The extra heavy bet was 
 made and lost; another was made with the 
 same result; and Muirhead looked down the 
 list of runners in the Derby Cup with a slight 
 touch of anxiety. These losses had occurred 
 before, they would come all right by the end of 
 the day, never had he gone home a loser two 
 days running. He shook his shoulders impa- 
 tiently and walked quickly up and down the 
 enclosure searching for distraction. The great 
 bare Stands were full of a rather sober-looking 
 crowd, many like himself were severe losers
 
 258 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 over this succession of crowded five -furlong 
 scrambles, where any clever light-weight who 
 got well away might be victorious, and win- 
 ners were best guessed by tossing up pennies. 
 There was hardly a touch of colour among the 
 Stands excepting in the County enclosure 
 where a few gay dresses, survivals from the 
 Cowes week or Scotch castles, were to be seen. 
 Bets, though small in amount, were unusually 
 numerous, and the shouting of the bookmakers 
 had hardly finished when the horses passed the 
 winning post, and began again directly the first 
 number was hoisted. The numbers of the 
 horses in the Derby Cup had not appeared on 
 the board when betting on the race, which had 
 been going on continuously all the afternoon, 
 rose to an indescribable uproar. Men of all 
 classes, with five-shilling pieces, half-sovereigns 
 and bank-notes in their hands, surrounded each 
 bookmaker in a fiercely fighting crowd, scream- 
 ing, gesticulating, and furiously pushing past 
 their neighbours to demand the price of this or 
 that favourite or outsider. From half-a-dozen 
 of the smaller bookmakers came cries of "10 to 
 i on the field" ; even the bigger men were 
 offering 8 to i, and making bets faster than 
 their clerks could write. 
 
 Muirhead had a confident feeling that this 
 was the race on which he was going to retrieve
 
 Resolved to be Rich 259 
 
 fortune. It was on races of this sort, with a 
 score of runners and fifteen possible winners, 
 that he had won his great coups hitherto, and 
 he camp up to Goodleigh with ^120 in his 
 hand. He asked the prices of various horses. 
 He never made up his mind till the last 
 moment, changing his intention sometimes in 
 speaking. In point of fact, on this occasion, 
 finding that one of his selected horses was a 
 favourite, he chose another, a certain Par- 
 mesan, against whom Goodleigh offered him 
 100 to 6 to win and 4 to i for a place. He 
 backed this and The Elf to win and for places, 
 and Table-turner and Chloe for places. He 
 continued putting on money as each new fancy 
 came into his head, and had to take out of his 
 pocket another ^15 to add to the 120. It was 
 the biggest sum of money that he had had on a 
 race yet, and his face was white and his lips 
 and hands trembled as he took his place on the 
 steps of the far stand and watched the horses 
 canter down to the starting-post. The field 
 was large and a little unmanageable. There 
 was half-an-hour's delay at the post, and even 
 then the flag fell to a very straggling start. 
 Muirhead, watching them through his glasses, 
 exclaimed at each breakaway, muttered terror, 
 anxiety, relief, and boredom, as the horses one 
 after another ran half the course, were stopped,
 
 260 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 brought back, turned into line again r.nd then 
 again, broke away. As the flag fell at last he 
 almost ceased to breathe, and as he saw nearly 
 all his own selections hopeless lengths in the 
 rear, he felt from the start that his money was 
 gone. The race was a mere pell-mell scramble 
 where half the riders were engaged in getting 
 out of the way of the blundering, swaying 
 6st.-5 brigade, with young, and small, and 
 excited stable-boys on their backs. Elf and 
 Chloe were already entirely out of the race, 
 being even now hard ridden to make them join 
 the leaders. Parmesan was sufficiently badly 
 placed at the start, and suddenly, to his horror 
 and rage, Muirhead saw him pulled right back 
 behind the whole of the front division, and 
 dragged across the course from right to left. 
 Tableturner, he thought, might get a place. 
 It was the horse, of course, on which he had 
 least money of all, and the first touch of the 
 gambler's feeling that fortune is fighting 
 against him, the same idea which had been the 
 text of Marshall's late diatribe, came to this 
 man too as he looked at the little group of 
 horses flying up the centre of the difficult 
 Derby mile. He kept his glasses fixed on 
 them, especially on Tableturner, till the horses 
 were almost opposite to him. Then as he 
 put them down his heart gave a leap which
 
 Resolved to be Rich 261 
 
 nearly choked him, and his face flushed scarlet. 
 It would have occurred to a more intelligent 
 spectator of the race to wonder why the riders 
 of the little group which he had been watching 
 had taken up their whips one by one, and had 
 sat down to ride for all they were worth. The 
 reason was simply that close under the rails, 
 on the Stand's side of the course, Parmesan had 
 come up with a rush and was leading by two 
 lengths. The result of a race when the winner 
 is in this position is mostly unperceived by the 
 majority of the onlookers, and half-a-dozen 
 names were being shouted. The shouts con- 
 fused Muirhead, who kept muttering to him- 
 self, "Impossible! impossible!" and could 
 scarcely believe the result, even when Parme- 
 san's number was hoisted as the winner. 
 Oakleaf was given second place, and then 
 another exclamation broke from Muirhead's 
 lips, for in the third place Tableturner's num- 
 ber appeared. The man leant against the rail- 
 ings of the stand shaking and almost crying 
 with excitement. He did not know how much 
 he had won ; could not remember the calcula- 
 tions which he had made beforehand; knew 
 nothing, except that he was delirious with 
 excitement and gratitude. Presently he found 
 himself standing opposite Goodleigh with 
 bank-notes being thrust into his hand. The
 
 262 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 sum which he put away into his pocket-book 
 amounted to nearly ^800 (of which ^650 were 
 his winnings on the race), and as he stood 
 drinking champagne at the bar he calculated 
 that, in spite of some previous losses, he only 
 wanted another hundred pounds to have won a 
 thousand during his short turf career. He 
 would win it, he said to himself, on the next 
 race, and then go home and bet no more that 
 year. Elated by this resolution and the cham- 
 pagne, he came out to find that there were only 
 three runners in the race. "Gulliver has 
 scared them all away, of course," said a man 
 with whom he had some acquaintance. "You 
 see the race is a walk over for him, and at this 
 time of the year there is no object in bringing 
 a horse to the race-course, and giving him a 
 training gallop behind something that he can't 
 possibly beat." 
 
 "Well, anyhow, I am going to back Gulliver 
 to win a hundred pounds," said Muirhead. 
 
 "You are, are you?" said the other, laugh- 
 ing. "You must have a good sum of money 
 on you to-day to do that. Listen there ! ' ' and 
 Muirhead, listening, heard cries of "I'll take 
 10 to i" coming from various quarters of the 
 ring. 
 
 "You see, old man, you'll want a pretty stiff 
 sum on to win ^100. "
 
 Resolved to be Rich 263 
 
 "I don't mind having a pretty stiff sum on a 
 certainty," said Muirhead. 
 
 "Well, you're right there," was the reply. 
 "I don't much mind buying money myself 
 when I've got anything to buy it with. Look 
 here; lend me a tenner, can't you? I will 
 give it you back after the race. The thing is 
 an absolute certainty, as any one can see, and I 
 want a quid awfully badly. You might make 
 it twenty as you're so flush." 
 
 Muirhead pulled out a twenty-pound note 
 and handed it to the man with a good-natured 
 smile, merely saying: "You must bring it me 
 back after the race. I wouldn't mind giving 
 you a couple of quid myself, but there is no 
 reason why you shouldn't get them out of a 
 bookmaker instead. I am going to back the 
 horse myself for a good big sum. As I said, I 
 love a certainty." 
 
 Persons who wonder at the acts of folly com- 
 mitted by a gambler, whether on the turf or at 
 a roulette table or elsewhere, forget one 
 important fact, that money loses all "value" in 
 the strict economical sense of the word. 
 Sovereigns and bank-notes are the merest 
 counters which he stakes against other count- 
 ers for purposes of excitement. A man in 
 whom the desire to make money is genuinely 
 and continuously the uppermost thought does
 
 264 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 not lose a fortune on the turf, and very prob- 
 ably wins; that is a fact which anti-gambling 
 crusaders might consider, with advantage to 
 the usefulness of their sermons. These ser- 
 mons, in so far as they are directed against 
 the greed for gain evinced by gamblers, are 
 simply unadulterated nonsense. I am saying 
 nothing against the preachers, whose work, 
 heaven knows, is badly enough wanted in 
 modern Europe; and who for the most part 
 are high-principled, well-intentioned men, say- 
 ing what they mean and meaning what they 
 say; eager to do work of which there is crying 
 need and lacking only a little more of that 
 detailed knowledge without which their dis- 
 courses are magnce passus extra viam. Their 
 especially favourite assertion, for instance, that 
 the gambler is trying to acquire his neighbour's 
 money without working for it, is enough to 
 make a whole brilliant series of the most per- 
 suasive lectures ridiculous and useless. The 
 gambler cares no more about his neighbour's 
 money than he does about his neighbour's 
 wife. He gambles with bank-notes and 
 sovereigns because they are the counters 
 appointed by convention for the purpose. He 
 would play with bits of wood, or the metal 
 discs which they give you in the cloakroom, or 
 a bundle of old clothes, with almost equal satis-
 
 Resolved to be Rich 265 
 
 faction ; the fact being of course that gambling 
 is as completely a disease as a hundred others 
 which you visit Ems or Homburg to cure; only 
 unfortunately the German baths have not yet 
 been found which will eradicate it. The Eng- 
 lish turf is divided into three parts; gamblers, 
 business men, who are there to make money, 
 and sportsmen, though of course in a few per- 
 sons the business and gambling instincts exist 
 together and are constantly fighting for the 
 mastery. No doubt it is because the purely 
 gambling passion does not play a very large 
 part on the English race-course that it is 
 ignored and misunderstood by would-be 
 reformers. It can only be studied and accu- 
 rately diagnosed at Monte Carlo, where our 
 preachers ought to be sent in a body for a 
 month. 
 
 A person who did not know to what a point 
 of insanity this passion will bring a man would 
 have hardly believed it possible that Muirhead 
 would put the whole of his day's winnings, 
 together with all the money which he had 
 brought with him for the day's possible 
 losses, on Gulliver for the next race. A 
 gambler with the slightest shadow of business 
 instinct left in him, or a sportsman who knew 
 the merest elements of racing-business would 
 have refrained from such an act of idiocy, for
 
 266 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 the cries of, "I'll take 10 to i," had died away; 
 "8 to i bar i" had changed to "7 to i bar i," 
 and even that had stopped. "Take 100 to 12:" 
 "Take 8 to i:" was echoing round the ring 
 when Muirhead came forward to make his bet, 
 and a more experienced hand would have 
 realised that he had only to wait another ten 
 minutes to lay 6 to i. However, he handed 
 ,800 to Goodleigh, who opened his eyes a little 
 at the bet So little money was being invested 
 on the race that this actually had the effect of 
 making Gulliver rather more steady in the bet- 
 ting-market for a time. But presently a bet of 
 "six monkeys" was taken about Goldleaf and 
 something like a knock-out of the favourite 
 began. Muirhead heard nothing of it, having 
 already taken his place on a distant stand 
 whence he watched the three horses turn into 
 line and jump off together as the flag dropped. 
 The outsider was ten lengths in the rear before 
 half a mile had been covered. At the end of 
 another half mile backers of Gulliver knew 
 their fate, for Loates* arms began to swing, his 
 spurs touched the horse's side, and then as 
 Goldleaf still swung along at an easy canter 
 the dismayed plungers saw Loates pick up his 
 whip, and saw too that it was only with the 
 utmost exertion that he could keep his mount 
 level with Goldleaf. From start to finish, in
 
 Resolved to be Rich 267 
 
 fact, there had hardly been the slightest doubt 
 as to the result of the race. At the distance 
 Kempton Cannon had only to let Goldleaf go 
 in order to come away and win the race by 
 three lengths. 
 
 Watching a train of men coming home from 
 the English race-course, it is more difficult than 
 you would think to tell which are the losers 
 and which are the winners. A certain number 
 there are who explain to their companions with 
 furious voices and adjectives more numerous 
 than various how some horse had just got 
 beaten and done them out of a hundred or a 
 thousand pounds; or how they had "put" some 
 friend "on" to the winner of a race but had 
 unfortunately backed something else them- 
 selves. But the greater part of each train-load 
 keeps its woes or its triumphs to itself, and the 
 average English sportsman, whether he has lost 
 a fortune or won one, says very little except 
 that he is thirsty. I think, however, that a 
 certain craving for company, a very strong 
 resolution not to be left alone under any cir- 
 cumstances during the next few hours, distin- 
 guishes the loser. A man who has won 
 money, if he is an ordinarily amiable person, 
 would on the whole rather dine with half-a- 
 dozen jovial companions than otherwise; but 
 your man who has lost means to have a dinner
 
 268 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 companion at any price. I myself, after hav- 
 ing been "discharged of my money by the 
 bookmakers," as a delightful French acquaint- 
 ance of mine once put it, would dine with a 
 bi-metallist or an impressionist art critic, rather 
 than alone. But Muirhead, who had to be 
 back in Newcastle that evening, could find no 
 companion except his own thoughts, com- 
 pared to which the conversation of either of the 
 two gentlemen above mentioned would have 
 been gay and amusing. The fact was, as he 
 told himself again and again, that he was very 
 nearly ruined. That afternoon, after the race 
 for the Derby cup, when those bank-notes were 
 bulging out his pockets, he had allowed him- 
 self to realise that, but for Parmesan's victory, 
 he would have been in what his racing com- 
 panions called a tight place. Previous days' 
 losses had been considerable. His story of 
 ready money was almost at an end, and all the 
 rest of his fortune was invested in the Freehold 
 invested in that literal sense of the word 
 which means hemmed round by a good many 
 difficulties about getting it out again. Unfor- 
 tunately, now that he had lost those bank- 
 notes, he could not equally quickly lose with 
 them the realisation of his position. Except 
 for this Freehold money or rather paper and 
 for the twenty pounds which he had lent to his
 
 Resolved to be Rich 269 
 
 acquaintance on the Derby race-course, which 
 was an asset of even less doubtful value, he 
 had barely ten pounds left in the world, and 
 his quarter's pay as local manager of the 
 Society was not due till Christmas. The 
 business instinct which told him that he must 
 find money somewhere; the gambling one 
 which told him that he must get back 
 those losses at all costs, were united in his 
 mind as he at last went to bed muttering: "I 
 will go to Manchester and win it back. If I 
 have to commit robbery and murder to get the 
 money, I will go to Manchester and win those 
 losses back!"
 
 CHAPTER XXIX 
 
 Lady Eastney was driving along Piccadilly 
 in her victoria with Bertie Alford seated by her 
 side and Angela on the small seat in front of 
 her. It was mid-November and bitterly cold, 
 and the Marchioness and her little daughter 
 were wrapped in lace-edged furs. Lady 
 Eastney's face appeared delicately rose- 
 coloured, fretfully angry above her furs. The 
 small person's appeared very white and blue 
 and patient above hers. Mr. Alford, with 
 philosophy on his lips and pity in his soul, was 
 discussing the situation with his companion. 
 
 "Fame," he was saying, "is the incredulous 
 surprise shown by a man's friends when he 
 does anything noteworthy. Infamy is the 
 'I-told-you - so - that's - just - what - 1 - expected' 
 chorus sung by his friends and relatives when 
 he does anything scandalous. In the nature of 
 things this chorus must be more common than 
 the surprise ; therefore your lot is a very com- 
 mon one, and to you who hate to be eccentric 
 that ought to be a consolation. ' ' 
 
 "I loathe notoriety, and we are notorious!" 
 said the woman. 
 
 270
 
 Resolved to be Rich 271 
 
 "Fame and infamy are easy to acquire, but 
 very difficult to keep," said her companion. 
 "In painting and book- writing we demand a 
 celebrated and a new name. In music we only 
 want a celebrated writer. Outside these three 
 we want nothing but a new man. You are, or 
 soon will be, a nine days' wonder; but take it 
 as philosophically as you can during the nine 
 days, and be sure that with any luck they will 
 be reduced to seven. For myself, if I antici- 
 pated such an ill and even a man who is not 
 a company-director may find himself in the 
 dock at any moment I should buy an alma- 
 nack, and mark off the ninth day, and sit down 
 in front of it and say, 'Respice finem. ' " 
 
 "Is that your idea of consolation?" asked the 
 woman scornfully. 
 
 "It is the kind of consolation which I 
 thought you would like best, " said the young 
 man with a look of pity and affection at her. 
 "Some women's idea of consolation is to be 
 told that in spite of all affliction their com- 
 plexion is still perfect and their hat a triumph 
 of genius ; but I did not suppose you wanted 
 that. I say to you what I would like people to 
 say to me when a surgeon was around with a 
 knife, or a dentist with pincers: 'It will soon 
 be over.' " 
 
 "It will certainly be over," said the Mar-
 
 272 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 chioness bitterly, "when I have every door in 
 London shut in my face and can't have a 
 single guest for a dinner party. . . ." 
 
 "The word 'guest' is derived from the 
 Sanscrit 'ghas, ' which means 'to eat up.' One 
 can always get guests. ' ' 
 
 "Don't talk nonsense. I say when one can't 
 get a single person of one's own set into one's 
 house, when Eastney has been obliged to sell 
 the houses and has been turned out of every 
 club in London . . . " 
 
 ' ' My dear, he will do like Roberts, my tailor, 
 who bought a yacht and said he must have the 
 burgee of the R.T.Y.C. or the R.C.Y.C. or 
 something of the sort to fly on it. But he 
 couldn't get elected to a single yacht club in 
 England. At last I found written after the 
 name of his yacht M.O.B.Y.C., and asked him 
 what it meant. He said it stood for 'My Own 
 Blooming Yacht Club.' Suggest that to 
 Eastney." 
 
 "You are perfectly hateful this afternoon, 
 Bertie. You would go on with your silly jokes 
 and stories if I told you I was going to poison 
 myself to-night." 
 
 "Well, that remains to be seen. In the 
 meantime you have merely told me that you 
 are going to call on the Duchess of Dovedale. 
 As a matter of courage the visit is superior to
 
 Resolved to be Rich 273 
 
 poison. It strikes me that it is also very 
 nearly as foolish." 
 
 "I owe her a call," said Lady Eastney, biting 
 her lips. "Here is Down Street, where you are 
 going to get out. Come with me? No, of 
 course you are not coming with me. You 
 must get out here. Goodbye. ' ' 
 
 Lady Eastney drove into the courtyard of 
 Dovedale House with lips which were a little 
 white in spite of biting, and eyes whose reso- 
 lute stare could not hide their nervousness. 
 Through the great hall with its powdered 
 footmen standing about, up a small side stair- 
 case, through two big saloons and into a small 
 gaily-decorated drawing-room beyond, she 
 passed with Angela's hand held tightly in hers. 
 She waited here for a few minutes and at last 
 the doors were opened again to admit the 
 Duchess of Dovedale, a woman of five or six- 
 and-thirty, tall and rather clumsily made, 
 untidily dressed, and with a slight air of sur- 
 prise on her face. 
 
 "So you are still here," said Lady Eastney, 
 after the usual greetings. "You are beginning 
 to love London as much as I do." 
 
 "We are going away on Tuesday. Some 
 people are coming to dine to-morrow and Mon- 
 day, and then we are going." 
 
 "Yes?" Hostess and visitor had been the
 
 274 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 most intimate friends some time ago, meeting 
 one another every day and knowing all about 
 one another's friends, entertainments and 
 guests. Lady Eastney understood the inten- 
 tion of those words, "some people." 
 
 "Are you stopping on till Christmas?" asked 
 the Duchess after a just perceptible pause. 
 
 "Probably, or perhaps we may go to Cannes 
 earlier this year. The winter seems to have 
 come on so much sooner than usual." 
 
 "To Cannes? Really? Shall you go there 
 again this season?" 
 
 "I hope so," said Lady Eastney, who had 
 nerved herself for this with only a very slight 
 hope of escaping it ; so she went on resolutely 
 enough: "We shan't be able to afford the same 
 villa that we had last year, I suppose, so we 
 shall go to an hotel. It is really more com- 
 fortable in hotels in many ways, besides being 
 so much cheaper. Eastney likes it better in 
 every way. ' ' 
 
 "Will Lord Eastney be there this year?" 
 asked the Duchess, and looked at her visitor 
 with raised eyebrows and a slight laugh. 
 When a woman means to insult another now- 
 adays, she does not as a rule trouble to wrap 
 up the poison in honey. To compose courtly 
 phrases with a sting in them is too much 
 trouble.
 
 Resolved to be Rich 275 
 
 "It is difficult to be decisive about any 
 arrangements six weeks beforehand, isn't it?" 
 said Lady Eastney with a smile. She had not 
 come here to pick a quarrel but to find out 
 whether the world was going to pick a quarrel. 
 "Have you heard that Sophie Arnold is 
 engaged?" 
 
 "Yes, I heard about it." 
 
 "They will be married in January. His 
 father has given him Bedford House. They 
 are in luck." 
 
 "I heard about it." 
 
 There were a few half- whispered words from 
 Angela, and Lady Eastney asked: "May she 
 go up and see Bee and Mary?" 
 
 "They have gone out, or they are just going 
 out," said the duchess, with a glance under 
 her eyes, and a slight lifting of the eyebrows, 
 and then a long full stare at Lady Eastney. 
 Only a woman could have thought of hurting 
 another woman through her child like that. 
 
 There was another pause, of longer duration 
 this time, and then Lady Eastney began again 
 resolutely: "I see that Mr. Lightfoot has got a 
 picture into the British Artists' Exhibition. 
 He is painting Frances Hampton's portrait. 
 That ought to be a success for him at the 
 Academy." 
 
 "Oh, yes."
 
 276 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "He is very clever and has been very 
 unlucky. I had a good mind to let him paint 
 me. I should like to help him." 
 
 "Wouldn't he want to be paid for the pic- 
 ture?" Her Grace's remarks were getting 
 broader as Lady Eastney appeared to be 
 impervious to them. 
 
 "I suppose so. I did not exactly mean that 
 I was going to ask him to paint me for noth- 
 ing." 
 
 As she said this Lady Eastney rose to take 
 her leave. She had asked her question and 
 received the answer, and there was nothing 
 more to wait for. The two women stood and 
 looked into one another's eyes for a moment 
 the two peeresses who to some extent had been 
 rival queens in London for seven or eight 
 years past; who had chatted over every single 
 detail of one another's houses, lovers, dresses, 
 parties and children; who had lorded it 
 together at Sandown, Ascot, Hurlingham, in 
 Scotland, Paris and Homburg, with a crowd of 
 followers, male and female, in their train, with 
 money, credit, wit, admiration, constant 
 change and excitement, and everything which 
 makes life worth living around them. They 
 had been neither friends nor enemies, merely 
 together always, sharers in everything good 
 and bad which Europe had to offer. Now
 
 Resolved to be Rich 277 
 
 something had gone, or was about to go wrong 
 with one of these chance partners, and the 
 other proceeded to cut the thin cord which 
 bound them together. 
 
 Lady Eastney held out her hand and as the 
 other put her limp hand into it, the visitor said 
 very quietly: "Is this a last good-bye? Is 
 there is there no pity for me?" 
 
 "Pity?" said the other with a cold stare. "I 
 really do not know what you mean. ' ' 
 
 Which was quite true,
 
 CHAPTER XXX 
 
 "I am going to ask you a question which of 
 course you will answer or not as you please. I 
 really have no right to an answer, and hardly 
 expect it." 
 
 Bertie Alford, dining in Portman Square 
 that evening, was sitting with Lord Eastney 
 after dinner. 
 
 "I am not fond of questions and have had 
 rather too many of them lately," was the 
 gloomy reply; "but go on." 
 
 "Can you tell me about how much longer 
 the smash of the Freehold will be delayed?" 
 
 "Oh, damn the Freehold!" 
 
 "That's been done already, hasn't it?" said 
 Alford; "I wanted to know, if you don't mind 
 telling me, when the event is to be 
 announced?" 
 
 "Would you think it rude of me, considering 
 the fact that you are my guest here, if I were 
 to ask you to mind your own business?" 
 
 " Certainly not, *' said Bertie. "It is a per- 
 fectly natural reply to my question." 
 
 Each man sipped a whole glass of claret in 
 278
 
 Resolved to be Rich 279 
 
 silence, then Lord Eastney pushed the decanter 
 towards Mr. Alford with a "help yourself." 
 They both rilled their glasses the claret was 
 Chateau Margaux of 1869, and a man would 
 have been a fool who refused another glass of 
 it because of a woman or a fortune and then 
 Lord Eastney began again abruptly: 
 
 "I want the news taken to my wife somehow, 
 and you can break it to her, I dare say, as well 
 as anybody. The fact is, it's all over would 
 you care for some dry biscuits? Frazer has 
 forgotten them and though I do not know 
 exactly what will come next, I do know that it 
 will be something most infernally unpleasant. 
 I don't suppose that I can be put in prison, 
 though, on my soul and conscience, I don't see 
 why I shouldn't be, quite as much as some of 
 the other chaps who will, but there will be a 
 big scandal. I shall have to give up every 
 penny and we shall practically be paupers. I 
 do not mean that we shall starve on a thousand 
 a year in a house at Brighton or a flat in Paris ; 
 I mean that I shall have very considerable 
 difficulty in putting my hands on fifty pounds. 
 I should say that the whole matter will be pub- 
 lic property next week, certainly before the 
 end of this month. If you wish to tell Lady 
 Eastney so, I shall be rather obliged to you 
 than otherwise for doing it. She must know
 
 280 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 somehow sooner or later, and I for one have no 
 wish to tell her. ' ' 
 
 "Your confidences are at least complete now 
 they have come," said Mr. Alford drily. 
 
 "Are they?" asked Lord Eastney quietly. 
 "Do you know the whole business now? If so, 
 then you know a good deal more than I do 
 myself." 
 
 "What will happen to all those men, Mar- 
 shall, Robinson, and that crew whom we enter- 
 tained in Stoke last autumn?" 
 
 "What the devil do I care?" was the surly 
 reply. 
 
 "Nothing, I feel sure," said Mr. Alford; 
 "but do you know?" 
 
 The other shrugged his shoulders: "Arrest, 
 trial, imprisonment, escape how can I tell? 
 They deserve all they get. ' ' 
 
 "Yes," was the meaning answer, "I can 
 quite believe that," and Mr. Alford, having 
 finished his third glass of claret, rose and left 
 the room. 
 
 Lord Eastney laughed quietly, and having 
 finished the bottle put on a hat and coat and 
 drove off to Margets' Rooms, where another 
 meeting of the directors had been fixed for 10 
 o'clock that night. He sat through the busi- 
 ness, weary, absent-minded, smiling occasion- 
 ally with a far-off tired gaze. How much did
 
 Resolved to be Rich 281 
 
 he really care about the scene which he could 
 pretty well guess was going on in his own 
 house? Not very much, he said to himself. 
 Lady Eastney had been resignedly acquiescent, 
 sometimes he admitted to himself almost good- 
 natured, in helping him in his work. She had 
 many good friends of her own and had offered 
 no active opposition to his attempts on their 
 purses. She had helped him actively and ably 
 in robbing his own friends. So said the 
 Marquis to himself now, not caring any longer 
 to mince words about his own proceedings; 
 yet the woman hated and despised him and 
 had been very unhappy with him. Slightly 
 and vaguely her contempt irritated him. He 
 admitted cynically enough that he deserved it, 
 but he knew, and she ought to have known, 
 that but for the circumstances of his poverty 
 and horribly encumbered position, he would 
 have been different. The business of the 
 Freehold Society jarred on himself as much as 
 it could possibly jar on her, and she ought to 
 have recognised this. She had judged and 
 condemned him without mercy, and was now, 
 he supposed, going to abandon him. His 
 pride revolted a little against the idea, but a 
 certain sense of justice, and a feeling that he 
 had lost all right to judge or interfere or 
 make any claim as regards his wife, prevented
 
 282 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 him from taking any action. Weeks ago, when 
 she had hinted not obscurely what she meant 
 to do and indeed he had read her intentions 
 himself and needed no such hints he had 
 resolved not to intervene by word or look or 
 deed; and so now, when he supposed the 
 decisive moment was at hand, he sat in 
 Margets' Rooms listening to sums all of which 
 ended in one answer ruin ; to calculations and 
 forecasts which all ended in one word dis- 
 grace. He kept on signing papers, more than 
 half -conscious all the time that he ought not to 
 be signing nine-tenths of them. He agreed to 
 this and that recommendation, fully aware 
 while he was doing it that he was kicking down 
 one more ladder by which he might possibly 
 have climbed out of dishonour. But it was all 
 done with a shrug of the shoulders, and a bitter 
 laugh, and the thought, "What does a detail 
 more or less matter if there is no one but 
 myself to pay the price. ' ' Perhaps after all he 
 did care a little about what was going on in 
 Portman Square. 
 
 Mr. Alford had left the dining-room and 
 gone straight to the little boudoir where Lady 
 Eastney went after dinner. He found her 
 there standing by the window, looking out into 
 the November night. A moon was shining out 
 of the dark winter sky on to a little bare black
 
 Resolved to be Rich 283 
 
 garden at the back of the house, on to the tall 
 unbroken walls which surrounded it and the 
 ugly lines of chimney-pots and stables beyond. 
 One small electric lamp was burning in the 
 room, but its heavy pink shade could not hide 
 the ghastly whiteness of the woman's face. 
 She turned to the young man as he came in 
 and held out both hands. As he took them it 
 was like taking up two bits of ice, and her lips 
 as she held them up to be kissed were almost 
 as cold. 
 
 "Have you asked him?" she said. 
 
 " Yes, I asked him." 
 
 "Bertie! For the love of heaven don't let 
 me drag it all out of you by questions. Pray 
 do tell me the whole story rationally." 
 
 "I am going to tell you, my dear. There is 
 nothing the least exciting to tell. We haven't 
 been flinging decanters about, or anything of 
 that sort. I asked him in just so many words 
 when the smash was due. First he told me to 
 mind my own business, then he said in effect 
 that it had come that it was a matter of days, 
 or hours. That was all." 
 
 "That was all? On your honour?" 
 
 "Well; almost. He asked me" the young 
 man laughed nervously "to come and break it 
 to you." 
 
 "Did he?" The woman's eyes flashed with
 
 284 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 rage, Bertie could not imagine why. ' ' So that 
 is all he cares! And what are we going to 
 do, you and I? Will you keep your promise? 
 Will you take we away?" 
 
 "Of course I am going to keep my promise," 
 answered Alford gravely, and looking at her 
 with eyes in which there was infinite pity but 
 nothing else. "I only want to be quite sure 
 that you want to come with me. We will go 
 now, to-night if you like, and where you like." 
 
 "And will you forgive me for ruining your 
 lifelike this?" 
 
 "I have nothing to forgive, dear. It is only 
 kind of you to choose me to save you. ' ' 
 
 "You will never say anything more than 
 that? You will never change from that?" 
 
 "How should I change? What more could I 
 say?" 
 
 "If you could say that you love me!" cried 
 the woman passionately. "If you would only 
 just once say that!" 
 
 "I love you, dearest. You know that I love 
 you more than anybody on earth." 
 
 Lady Eastney stood very still for a moment, 
 crying silently. Then she shook her head 
 slightly and, freeing herself from Alford's 
 arms, moved away to the window. The man 
 stood there with a slightly blank look on his 
 face. He had done his best to persuade his
 
 Resolved to be Rich 285 
 
 companion that he was in love with her, and 
 she had seen through him perfectly clearly 
 had seen that he was simply sorry for her and 
 weakly good-natured. Through the long 
 pause he stood there thinking and his thoughts 
 were more clear than pleasant. Lady Eastney 
 was in love with him because he had stood by 
 her with help and sympathy while all other 
 friends were dropping away. She thought 
 that she had only to escape to Italy with him 
 and Angela in order to get a divorce, marry 
 her lover and live happy with him and her 
 child ever afterwards. Bertie knew better, 
 but it sounded horrible to speak out a few 
 facts just now. To spend thirty years making 
 jokes at every good or evil which life brings 
 before you makes the time pass pleasantly 
 enough, but the worst of it is that, when a 
 crisis arrives which refuses to be smoothed 
 away by jokes or epigrams, and demands 
 serious thought, you have no serious thoughts 
 with which to meet the demand. A decision 
 which will merely influence the important but 
 strictly ephemeral question of where you are to 
 dine that night differs of course only in degree, 
 and not in kind, from the decision which will 
 affect the whole of the rest of your life. But 
 somehow or other the numerous dinner 
 decisions are found to be a very inadequate
 
 286 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 training for the life decision. Over this ques- 
 tion, as over the question whether he should 
 order claret or champagne for dinner, Bertie 
 shut his mental eyes, and shrugged his 
 shoulders, and said that it would be all the 
 same a hundred years hence. 
 
 "I have sometimes thought" Lady 
 Eastney's voice broke in on his desultory and 
 scattered thoughts, almost making the young 
 man start "I have sometimes thought that 
 the prodigal son was a very lucky person to be 
 able to say: 'I will arise and go to my Father,' 
 whenever he pleased. It seems to me that it 
 would be easy to live with the swine and eat 
 the husks if you knew that you could leave 
 them whenever you chose, at the price of just 
 a little humiliation. You and I will not be 
 able to do that, you know, Bertie. When we 
 do this thing that we are talking of, it will be 
 done for ever. We may humiliate ourselves 
 into the dust and cry that we had .sinned 
 against heaven and before the world, till we 
 can cry no more ; but it will be no use. There 
 will be no return for us. It is for all our 
 lives." 
 
 The young man looked at her with wide 
 startled eyes. She had put into words so 
 clearly and suddenly what he had been vaguely 
 thinking, that he could not hide the effect
 
 Resolved to be Rich 287 
 
 which the words had on him. The woman 
 saw this and, with a glance in which love, 
 entreaty and anxiety were mingled, she turned 
 round to the window again, as if wishing to 
 give him time to think over what she had 
 said. But the feeling uppermost now in 
 Alford's mind was one of annoyance that she 
 should have so clearly read his thoughts, and 
 so clearly perceived that his protests of affec- 
 tion were unreal. He came up to her and put 
 his arms round her again, saying eagerly: 
 
 "How often do you want me to tell you that 
 I love you? Apart from all your troubles, 
 apart from every bit of sympathy which I have 
 for you, I love you, dearest. I am thankful for 
 all your troubles because they are going to 
 give you to me. I was thankful when Eastney 
 told me to-night that the smash had come, 
 because I knew it meant that my turn had 
 come at last. I love you, darling! Surely you 
 must believe it." 
 
 "Sometimes I do almost," she answered 
 softly, "and then again I feel that I am a fool 
 to believe it. Why should you care for me 
 who do nothing but worry you with my 
 miseries? You like people who laugh, and I 
 never laugh now." 
 
 "I love you, my dear, laughing or crying, 
 troubled or happy. It is so ridiculous to doubt
 
 288 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 that. You don't doubt it, really? What more 
 in the world could I do to prove it to you?" 
 
 "Nothing! nothing!" she answered with 
 some contentment in her voice for the 
 moment. "Have we really settled then to go 
 away? Is everything decided?" 
 
 "Everything," said Bertie recklessly, re- 
 solved that he would not initiate any more 
 doubts for himself to smooth away afterwards. 
 "We are going by the eleven o'clock train 
 to-morrow to Paris, you and Angela and I. 
 Let us go upstairs and tell the baby about it. 
 Does she know anything?" 
 
 "I told her that you might perhaps take me 
 and her away for a few days soon, and she was 
 delighted. She is quite used to that of 
 course." 
 
 "We must tell her not to talk about it this 
 time. Come along!" 
 
 Bertie Alford knew his way very well to the 
 nursery portion of this house, having visited it 
 often enough before with his present compan- 
 ion. Lady Eastney had one real sentiment left 
 in the world amongst the purely negative senti- 
 ments disenchantment, disappointment, fail- 
 ure, and regrets which made up her life, and 
 this was a passion of love for her only child. 
 She estimated two-thirds of her friends by what 
 Angela thought of them. A house or place
 
 Resolved to be Rich 289 
 
 was dull or pleasant to her chiefly according to 
 whether Angela was unhappy or happy there. 
 She had liked Alford himself at first because 
 Angela approved of him. For people who 
 liked her child and gave her small presents and 
 treats, the Marchioness would do anything. 
 For people who snubbed the little one in any 
 way she had a hatred which was as bitter as it 
 was endless. The whole business was perhaps 
 a trifle ridiculous, but it was the strongest 
 feature in Lady Eastney's life. The child's 
 bedroom was a big front room on the fourth 
 floor. A fire was burning in it, and a great red 
 glow lit up the white wood bed with its muslin 
 curtains and lace pillows and pink ribbons. 
 The little one had been expecting her visitors 
 and greeted them with a low laugh of con- 
 tentment as they came in. Bertie came for- 
 ward first, but Lady Eastney brushed by 
 him and took the small white figure in her 1 
 arms. 
 
 "We are going away to-morrow. Bertie is 
 going to take us. Aren't you pleased, my 
 baby?" 
 
 "Oh, yes! How long shall we stay?" 
 
 "For a very, very long time. Even I don't 
 know how long. Would you rather stay with 
 us, sweetheart, or come home again?" 
 
 "Mother, darling!" . , , the small lips
 
 290 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 could not so suddenly find words to explain 
 that where her mother was, Angela wanted to 
 be too, and that there all desire ended. 
 
 "And you do love Bertie too, don't you?" 
 
 "Of course I do. But, Bertie, you will take 
 Esther too, won't you?" 
 
 "Are we going to take her?" asked the 
 young man in a low whisper. 
 
 "Oh, I suppose so," said Lady Eastney, who 
 was engaged in tying up a refractory curl of 
 Angela's. "We had better come and speak to 
 her. Here she is. Esther!" 
 
 The woman who came in now and came up 
 to Angela's bedside was a tall, quietly-dressed 
 person with a slight stoop, and eyes which 
 drew all children to her like a magnet. 
 
 "We are going to Paris to-morrow morning," 
 said Lady Eastney, "Mr. Alford and Angela 
 and I, and we want you to come too ; but we 
 must ask you first whether you mind. Will 
 you come with us?" 
 
 "I am going wherever you and my little one 
 go, my lady," answered the woman very 
 gravely. 
 
 "And you will stay with us always?" 
 
 "Until" she moved the sheets about with 
 one hand, and put the other on Lady Eastney's 
 arm "until I am obliged to bring Lady 
 Angela home alone. ' '
 
 Resolved to be Rich 291 
 
 "Alone!" echoed the Marchioness, not 
 understanding. 
 
 "There will be no resisting certain orders 
 when they come, my lady." 
 
 "You talk the same nonsense as Mr. Alford, " 
 said Lady Eastney in a low, nervous voice. 
 "Do you think," she went on, pushing the 
 woman aside and holding the child tight in her 
 arms, "that anybody or anything could take 
 her away? I would simply kill the person 
 who tried. You are talking nonsense." 
 
 "I am saying what I know, my lady, and 
 what you know. Mr. Seaton told you so when 
 you went to see him. You argued with him, 
 and he told it you again and again." 
 
 "There is no argument about it, " answered 
 Lady Eastney, "I simply tell you that I would 
 kill the person who tried. But, Bertie . . ." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 "I think I would rather put off the start till 
 to-morrow evening. It would be better in a 
 good many ways to go at night, and I want to 
 see that lawyer again. We must come away 
 now and leave the chicken to go to sleep. You 
 must tell nobody about our journey, do you 
 hear, baby darling? You mustn't say a word 
 to anybody. Yes; we will go to-morrow evening 
 instead of in the morning. I must know when 
 and where to be on my guard about the child. "
 
 CHAPTER XXXI 
 
 Gerald Franklin was for the moment 
 extremely pleased with liimself. For a year 
 or two past he had been chafing at the fact that 
 none of the big dividends being paid by the 
 Freehold Building Society could come to him, 
 and that he was obliged to take 4 per cent, for 
 his ^3000. Of course he had no faith in the 
 stability of the Society, but he had a most 
 profound faith in his own ability to make the 
 most of a speculation, and he was entirely cer- 
 tain that if he had that ^3000 in his own hands 
 he could get 10 per cent, for the money in one 
 quarter or another, and keep the capital per- 
 fectly secure. Now, at last, with Marshall's 
 assistance, he had managed to get hold of the 
 capital. It was not to be invested in the Free- 
 hold; neither Lowe nor Miss Bertram would 
 have allowed that ; but they had agreed to the 
 purchase of certain shares in the Carlton Gold 
 Mines. Gerald had been extremely anxious 
 to buy them, Marshall had strongly backed up 
 his request, and the Railway stock, which had 
 been standing in Lowe's name in a very casual 
 fashion for the past three years, had been sold. 
 292
 
 Resolved to be Rich 293 
 
 Marshall had represented during a flying visit 
 to Staffordshire that, as the shares were still 
 fluctuating in price, it would be rational to buy 
 them as cheaply as possible, and accordingly, 
 without the slightest demur, Lowe had 
 handed him the ^3000 to be expended in the 
 purchase of the Carlton shares whenever he 
 thought proper. This confiding transaction 
 had taken place on a certain Tuesday, and on 
 the Friday evening, after business hours, 
 Gerald, seeing that the shares had fallen very 
 slightly, and judging that Marshall might have 
 selected that occasion to purchase some, 
 decided to go round to his rooms and make 
 inquiries. He walked down Great Ormond 
 Street and across Queen's Square and Russell 
 Square with a certain amount of elation in his 
 soul, for things had been going well with him 
 lately, not only financially but in new and 
 curious directions about which he understood 
 much less. Sympathy of any kind with his 
 schemes and hopes was new to him. Sym- 
 pathy of the kind which Sophie Ethridge gave 
 was a most exciting novelty. 
 
 The street lamps gleamed in long yellow 
 lines across the wide pavements of Queen's 
 Square and Russell Square as he crossed them. 
 A man with his head bandaged up, and a nun 
 standing by his side, were looking out of the
 
 294 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 window at the Italian Hospital, and Gerald 
 spared him a glance of pity. On the ragged 
 little school children playing around the garden 
 railings; on the old flower woman standing at 
 the corner of Southampton Row with her 
 daughter by her side, he bestowed a benignant 
 smile. The rooms of some of the houses in 
 Russell Square were lighted up, and between 
 half-drawn curtains he could see here and there 
 an old-fashioned sombrely- furnished dining- 
 room, where the maid-servants were laying the 
 table for dinner. At the front door of one 
 house the owner was standing watching a pass- 
 ing omnibus, with his latch-key half inserted in 
 the key-hole. A small barrel which looked as 
 if it might contain oysters was in his other 
 hand, and contented prosperity was written on 
 every line of his face and clothes. Gerald 
 glanced at him, and recognising a partner of a 
 well-known firm of accountants to whom he 
 had once or twice brought messages, took off 
 his hat. The old gentleman let go his door- 
 key to return the salute with a slight wave of 
 the hand, and Gerald looked at him again, say- 
 ing to himself: "You've gone far, my friend, 
 but not far enough. I will go further than 
 that." He went on his way, planning his 
 future as usual, only that now, to his bewilder- 
 ment, Sophie Ethridge was constantly appear-
 
 Resolved to be Rich 295 
 
 ing in it; and at last found himself at 
 Marshall's house in Gordon Square. 
 
 He was told that Marshall was out, but being 
 anxious to see him, and being of course a well- 
 known visitor at the house, he was allowed to 
 go upstairs and wait. He entered a room on 
 the first floor for some curious reason Mar- 
 shall did not live in chambers, but had a whole 
 house to himself, and used all the rooms in it 
 very much as if he were a man with a wife and 
 family without any other notice than simply 
 turning the handle of the door. He was sur- 
 prised, and not a little startled, to see a man 
 jump up from a table at which he had been 
 sitting and begin to retreat towards an inner 
 room. The man, who was clean shaven, and 
 dressed in a rough grey cloth suit, was un- 
 known to him at first ; but in the doorway of 
 the inner room he stopped for a second, facing 
 Gerald, and the vague candle light fell full on 
 two flashing black eyes. The man was Mar- 
 shall. 
 
 A wave of terror and fury and despair swept 
 across Gerald's mind. He had no time to 
 think of details, but he was convinced, hur- 
 riedly but completely, that the worst of 
 disasters had overtaken him. He shut the 
 door behind him with a bang, and sprang 
 forward towards Marshall, who, perceiving that
 
 296 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 he was recognised and that escape was impos- 
 sible, came forward a few steps and confronted 
 him. The lad stared for half-a-dozen moments 
 with quick-coming breath and flashing eyes, 
 seeming to be measuring his own strength 
 against Marshall's in case it came to an open 
 fight. Perhaps Marshall had been doing the 
 same, and had come to the conclusion that the 
 fight was too equal to be altogether desirable, 
 for a conciliatory smile suddenly appeared on 
 his face, and in a very low but amiable voice, 
 he said: 
 
 'The game is up, my dear boy, and I am 
 off. I have just sent a note round to your 
 place advising you to leave, too." 
 
 "I have got nothing to escape from," said 
 Gerald, trembling; "and I should have thought 
 that you would have done much better to 
 stop and brazen it out ; but that is your own 
 affair. Before you go, however I want my 
 money." 
 
 "Your money is in my bank all right, and in 
 my note to you this evening I have sent you a 
 cheque for it, so that you will be able to draw 
 it out to-morrow." 
 
 For an instant Gerald had almost believed 
 this assertion, so coolly and decisively was it 
 made; but a glance at Marshall's altered face, 
 a sudden recollection of the man's eagerness to
 
 Resolved to be Rich 297 
 
 get hold of this money, brought him back to 
 reason. 
 
 "I have not got the note or the cheque," he 
 said. "I went to Great Ormond Street before 
 I came here, and there was nothing for me." 
 
 "I sent it by post this afternoon," said Mar- 
 shall, "and you would not get it till this even- 
 ing." But even as he spoke he felt that the 
 boy did not believe a word of what he was 
 saying, and that this pretence would not serve 
 him for much longer. 
 
 "Very likely," said Gerald; "but I do not 
 mean to lose sight of you till I have got it." 
 
 "I will cancel the cheque I sent you and 
 write you another now, ' ' said Marshall. 
 
 "You can if you like," was the cool reply, 
 "but you will not go till it is cashed." 
 
 "It could not be cashed to-night." 
 
 "Then you will have to wait till to-morrow 
 morning." 
 
 "I can't!' 
 
 "You must!" 
 
 "Must I, you little devil?" 
 
 For the last half minute the two men had 
 both been preparing for a contest. Marshall 
 pulled a revolver out of his pocket, but Gerald 
 had calculated, and calculated rightly, that he 
 would not choose to shoot, and so bring the 
 household into the room. The fellow had his
 
 298 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 finger on the trigger for a second, but suddenly 
 recollecting himself, he made a rush at the boy 
 and struck at him with the butt-end of the 
 weapon. Gerald was as little anxious as Mar- 
 shall to bring the servants on to the scene. 
 He merely wanted his own money, and beyond 
 that was rather desirous than otherwise that 
 Marshall should escape from the country. 
 Therefore he did not call for help, but trusting 
 to his youth and agility, first dodged his 
 opponent, and then, tackling him, tried to hold 
 him. The elder man, however, was not only 
 by far the stronger, but he had a weapon. As 
 the boy tried to seize him he held him easily 
 at arms-length with his left hand, and with his 
 right struck at him with the butt-end of the 
 revolver. The first blow fell painfully enough 
 but harmlessly on the lad's shoulder. As 
 Gerald flung his head backwards and on one 
 side to avoid the second blow, the heavy 
 jagged handle of the revolver came down with 
 frightful force on his throat, cutting open some 
 veins, and inflicting a horrible bruise. He fell 
 back fainting from the pain of the blow, and 
 Marshall, having stood over him for a moment 
 to make sure that he was not likely to recover 
 immediately, took up his hat, blew out the 
 candles on the tables, stuffed some papers into 
 his pocket, and then went to the head of the
 
 Resolved to be Rich 299 
 
 stairs. Here he listened for a short time to 
 make sure that there was no one moving about 
 in the hall or dining-room, then creeping 
 downstairs he opened the street door, shut it 
 noiselessly with the help of his latch-key, 
 walked up to Euston, and got into an omnibus 
 going to Waterloo Station. Here he took a 
 ticket for Winchester, and having arrived there 
 shortly before ten o'clock, chartered a dog-cart 
 and drove over to Southampton, where he got 
 safely on board the boat for St. Malo.
 
 CHAPTER XXXII 
 
 "Now, Sister. 1 You said I might have this 
 iron thing off this very evening. ' ' 
 
 "Robin! I told you that if you used one 
 single one of those words again, I would put 
 the sheet over your face and keep it there for 
 an hour. ' ' 
 
 The young gentleman who had made this 
 remark had prefixed to the substantives 
 "thing" and "evening" a string of adjectives, 
 of which a Billingsgate fishmonger might be 
 proud. 
 
 "Oh, Sister! I forgot; forgive me just this 
 once. It's my birthday to-morrow, so you 
 might let me off " 
 
 "You are the very naughtiest boy I ever had 
 here. How old will you be to-morrow?" 
 
 "Six, Sister. I can swear pretty tidy for 
 that, can't I? Old Hicks taught me, him as 
 keeps the parrot shop near us. He taught me 
 and the parrots, too. You should have just 
 heard us all swear together, him and me and 
 the parrots. You wouldn't have thought much 
 of me after that. ' ' 
 
 300
 
 Resolved to be Rich 301 
 
 "It isn't at all clever to swear, Robin; any- 
 body can do it. I could do it; nurse could do 
 it. It is only a silly and horrid kind of talk. 
 It isn't at all funny." 
 
 "Why do those doctors laugh, then, every 
 morning when they hurt me and I swear?" 
 
 The Sister was spared from answering this 
 embarrassing question by a nurse who brought 
 tea to the small patient. She got up and 
 passed down the ward towards a bed which 
 was screened off from the rest. A nurse came 
 out from behind the screens as she approached 
 them saying: "We had better ask Mr. Thorn- 
 ton to come in. The throat is swelling again 
 on the left side, and I don't like the looks of it 
 at all." 
 
 "Send for him, then," said the Sister, and 
 went herself behind the screens. 
 
 A curious stillness seemed to rest here, as if 
 something more than cloth and cardboard 
 screens were separating this bed from the rest 
 of the ward. A murmur of conversation, a 
 rustle of nurses' dresses and dragging of 
 patients' feet as they moved about with tea- 
 trays, the laughter of three or four convales- 
 cents who were grouped round the fire, the 
 shrill voices of Robin and a certain young per- 
 son called Tom-Tit, with whom he had picked 
 a quarrel, seemed to come here, as it were,
 
 302 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 from a distance. On the bed lay a young man 
 with his eyes closed and a face as white as the 
 bandages which encircled his throat, while by 
 the side of the bed sat another man, with his 
 hands before him, and a certain severe martial 
 air which left little doubt as to his profession. 
 
 "I think you may go away, policeman, if you 
 want to smoke or anything of the kind," said 
 the Sister. "One of the doctors is just coming 
 and I shall be staying here for some time." 
 
 "Well, thank you, miss. I should like a 
 pipe. It's rather dull work here." 
 
 A nurse came in and whispered something. 
 
 "I am afraid you won't be able to go after 
 all," said the Sister. "Some friends of the 
 patient have just come, and have been given 
 leave to see him. You would not be allowed 
 to leave them with him, I suppose?" 
 
 "No, miss, my orders are very strict about 
 that." 
 
 "What's it all about?" asked the recently- 
 arrived nurse in a whisper. 
 
 "A financial swindle, miss. Our chaps at 
 Scotland Yard have had their eye on the gang 
 for a long time past, but they haven't been 
 able to do anything till to-day. Unluckily the 
 worst of them, a fellow called Marshall, had 
 reckoned his time pretty accurately and 
 escaped last night. We can't quite make out
 
 Resolved to be Rich 303 
 
 whether this youngster has tried to commit 
 suicide, or has been having a row with some 
 one. We were told last night that this might 
 have been a queer bungling attempt to cut his 
 own throat. To-day we are told it looks more 
 like a fight. Anyhow, he's under arrest, and 
 half-a-dozen others with him." 
 
 "What rubbish! Of course it couldn't have 
 been attempted suicide," said the Sister. 
 "Well, here's Mr. Thornton, and afterwards, I 
 suppose, his friends will be allowed to come 
 in." 
 
 At these last words, added in a louder voice, 
 Gerald Franklin slowly opened his eyes and 
 looked round. He had been conscious once or 
 twice before, and knew where he was, but a 
 new anxiety seemed to have taken hold of him 
 this time. After thinking for a little he signed 
 that he wanted to ask something, and, being 
 given the slate which was by his bedside, wrote 
 on it: "Shall I get well?" As he turned the 
 slate towards the Sister, his eyes looking 
 across her shoulder suddenly clouded with a 
 new look of pain. Thornton, the young 
 surgeon, had just come in, and with him was 
 Dr. Hare, who came up to him and took his 
 hand with tears in his own eyes. One of those 
 trivial memories which come to us at such 
 moments passed into Gerald's mind now; the
 
 304 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 memory of the afternoon in his aunt's house, 
 when Dr. Hare had said good-bye and wished 
 him luck, with kindly hope for the future and 
 light-hearted wonder as to when and where 
 they would meet again. This dark November 
 afternoon, the crowded hospital ward with 
 nurses standing round and a policeman sitting 
 by the bedside, was certainly not the picture 
 which either of them had in their mind when 
 the words were spoken. 
 
 In answer to the question on the slate 
 Thornton muttered a brief technical explana- 
 tion to Dr. Hare, who, still holding Gerald's 
 hand, answered gently : 
 
 "We cannot be quite sure, my poor lad. 
 Mr. Thornton hopes that he will be able to do 
 something now to help you, but he dare not 
 say that you are quite certain to recover. You 
 would like to see } r our aunt and sister, would 
 you? They are downstairs, and Mr. Thornton 
 will let them come in for a few minutes first, if 
 you like. . . . No one can see you, you 
 know," he went on, noticing how Gerald 
 looked round him with shrinking fear. "No 
 one can hear or see you except this officer, and 
 I am sure he will be good-natured and wait 
 outside for a bit, or at any rate" as the 
 policeman shook his head "will keep out of 
 hearing."
 
 Resolved to be Rich 305 
 
 "We would have put him in a private 
 ward," said the Sister, beginning to grow a 
 little pitiful in spite of the stories with which 
 the evening papers had been filled, "only 
 every place is so full. The whole hospital is in- 
 deed so full that we are being obliged to bring 
 children into these wards, as you see. Here 
 are the two visitors. It must only be for five 
 minutes. Please explain that to them." 
 
 Unable to turn his head away, Gerald shut 
 his eyes as Miss Bertram and Monica came in. 
 The woman and girl were both speechless, and 
 could say and do nothing but stand by the bed- 
 side touching the boy's hand and asking him to 
 show by some means if he knew them. They 
 were in utter ignorance, like every one else, as 
 to what had happened to him, except that he 
 had been found wounded in Marshall's room. 
 No one could understand how this had 
 occurred, since the story of the servants of the 
 house was that Marshall had left it at three 
 o'clock and had never returned. Gerald 
 Franklin, they said, had come in much later, 
 and had been absolutely alone in the first-floor 
 room throughout the time of his stay there. 
 Nobody had come in or out of the house, and 
 there had been no sound of a quarrel or the 
 slightest sign of anything being wrong, until a 
 housemaid came into the room to bring some
 
 306 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 coal, and had found the young man uncon- 
 scious on the floor. Every bit of circumstantial 
 evidence pointed to a discovery by Gerald of 
 Marshall's flight and the collapse of the busi- 
 ness, and a subsequent attempt at suicide on 
 his part ; everything, that is to say, except the 
 nature of the wound, which argued forcibly, 
 though not conclusively, against it. Gerald 
 would write nothing, being of course ignorant 
 as to how far the collapse had gone and 
 whether he would be facilitating further 
 exposure by a confession. As a result of this, 
 Miss Bertram and Monica could hardly avoid 
 sharing the belief that he had tried to kill him- 
 self. 
 
 The two women stood almost in silence, only 
 murmuring now and then some word of affec- 
 tion, while the moments went by. The prom- 
 ised five minutes had elapsed and the Sister 
 came up to Miss Bertram and put a hand on 
 her shoulder, saying gently but decisively: 
 "You must come away now, I am afraid. The 
 doctor has something to do." 
 
 Hearing the words, a slight tremor passed 
 across Gerald's face, and for the first time he 
 opened his eyes. 
 
 "I must ask him one question," said Monica, 
 pushing past Miss Bertram ; and flinging her- 
 self on her knees by the bedside, she bent her
 
 Resolved to be Rich 307 
 
 face, resolute and almost as white as Gerald's 
 own, over her brother and asked in a low 
 whisper: "Did you do it yourself? Oh, 
 Gerald, do tell me!" 
 
 A very faint tinge of colour came into her 
 brother's face. He looked as if he were trying 
 to speak, so that the Sister leant forward 
 quickly, giving him the slate and saying: "You 
 must not try to say anything." The boy took 
 the pencil and wrote "No"; then he held it 
 and lay looking alternately at Monica and Miss 
 Bertram. There was a slight bewildered 
 expression on his face as if he were trying to 
 remember something else which he wanted to 
 say and could not for the moment think of it. 
 Inside the screen every one stood motionless, 
 almost holding their breath. From outside 
 came the murmur of voices in the ward, a 
 boy's laugh, the soft voice of a nurse who was 
 standing over the fire reading something out of 
 a newspaper to two or three men. Even 
 sounds from outside came faintly to their ears, 
 a very slight roll of passing traffic and the 
 shrill voices of the newspaper boys running 
 down Gower Street with special editions. One 
 of the chief items of news in each paper was 
 the last bulletin about the patient by whose 
 bedside they were standing, with the last 
 guesses as to whether and when he would be
 
 308 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 able to appear before the magistrates in Bow 
 Street, or whether his trial would take place 
 before another judge, and in a court beyond 
 mortal sight. 
 
 A flash of memory came back to the young 
 face on the bed, and some words were traced 
 very slowly and with light uncertain strokes on 
 the slate. The Sister looked away while the 
 two other women bent over the wandering 
 hand with wet eyes. Behind them, also read- 
 ing, stood the policeman with a murmured 
 word of apology: "It is my duty to see it, 
 ma'am." 
 
 "Even if you think what a merciful ending, 
 please do not say so. ' ' 
 
 When the sentence was finished the pencil 
 still hovered for a moment, and was then lifted 
 once more to underline the word "please"; 
 then it was put down. 
 
 Miss Bertram stared at the words with such 
 evident uncomprehension on her face that 
 Gerald saw it and moved the slate impatiently. 
 
 " He means, " said Monica in a stifled voice, 
 "that if he dies he does not want us to say that 
 it is a good thing. Of course we shan't, Gerald 
 darling; but you are not going to die. You 
 will get well and come and live with us and we 
 shall all be happy again together. I know 
 quite well , , ,"
 
 Resolved to be Rich 309 
 
 "I cannot possibly allow another moment," 
 said the Sister. "This will not do at all. Mr. 
 Thornton is waiting and you must come at 
 once, please. " 
 
 The two doctors came in as she spoke, and 
 with a hurried farewell Miss Bertram and 
 Monica left the ward. As they passed out of 
 the hospital into Gower Street and Euston 
 Road the newspaper boys were crying out the 
 story of the fall of the Freehold, and Marshall's 
 flight. "Attempted suicide of a clerk," 
 screamed one of them running past Miss Ber- 
 tram, while further on a knot of men whom the 
 two women passed were talking about the 
 crash, and Monica heard her brother's name 
 mingled with curses and talk of penal servi- 
 tude.
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII 
 
 Muirhead stood on the bleak Manchester 
 race-course on the Saturday which was the 
 last racing day of the year, and on his face was 
 the haggard, horrible stare of a gambler who is 
 going to play his last stake and knows before- 
 hand what will be the result. It was his last 
 in a very desperate sense of the word, for, like 
 a hundred other weak passionate men, he had 
 become demoralized by his losses to the point 
 of saying, "I must and will have these back;" 
 and from saying, "I must have this money 
 back," to saying, "I must have the capital to 
 get this back," there is of course no step at all; 
 while from saying this latter to procuring the 
 capital, first by questionable means, and then 
 by means about which there is no question at 
 all, is only a moderate step. Muirhead had 
 raised money for several days on various 
 securities with which he had at least a certain 
 right to deal. On Friday and to-day he had 
 raised more money, and no inconsiderable sum 
 either, on securities which he had no right to 
 touch. Half the money which he had brought 
 310
 
 Resolved to be Rich 3 1 1 
 
 to Manchester with him that morning was 
 already gone; the other half was at that 
 moment invested on West End for the Man- 
 chester November Handicap. 
 
 A cold soaking rain was driving down on 
 to the course in heavy, hopeless lines. An 
 east wind blew clouds of smoke and grime 
 from the Ship Canal Works, while all over the 
 stands and along the railings stood wet and 
 shivering men and women, discussing their 
 bets in listless voices, and for the most part too 
 miserable to care whether their favourites lost 
 or won. A few men, warmed up by whisky, 
 or champagne, or hope, stamped about the 
 rings with their collars up and their hands in 
 their pockets, whistling and chaffing the book- 
 makers, but the greater part of the spectators 
 rushed back to cover directly they had made 
 their bets. 
 
 Parmesan, carrying a ten-pound penalty for 
 his Derby Cup victory, was running in the 
 race, and Muirhead had hesitated for some 
 time as to whether he should or not back him 
 again. Finally he had decided to back him for 
 a place, but had changed his mind at the last 
 moment, and backed Elf for a place instead. 
 He said to himself that one horse had already 
 won him money, and that it was the other's 
 turn now. The race was very late in starting.
 
 312 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 There were three break -aways and Muirhead 
 was in a fretting fever when the flag finally 
 fell. West Wind went to the front with a 
 great rush; his little jockey, being unable to 
 hold him, let him go, according to wise orders, 
 and the horse came round the bend with a ten- 
 lengths lead. Muirhead, who knew enough 
 about racing by this time to guess that "cut- 
 ting down" tactics were not likely to pay over 
 mile and three-quarters, watched the animal 
 with despair and fury, yet with a growing spark 
 of hope as the horse came on up the straight 
 without appearing to falter. Too soon, how- 
 ever, he began to see the field closing up like a 
 telescope. Parmesan, Amazon and half-a- 
 dozen other horses rushed up to West Wind, 
 and already the little jockey had his whip up 
 and was lurching about in a desperate attempt 
 to make his tiring horse keep up the pace. 
 Long before the distance he had dropped back 
 hopelessly beaten. Amazon rushed to the 
 front, followed by Kodak, Elf, and Parmesan. 
 With passionate exclamations of anger, Muir- 
 head saw the four go past him with scarcely a 
 length separating them all. At least, how- 
 ever, he would not lose much money over the 
 race if Elf were placed, and he heaved a sigh 
 of relief when the horses swept past the judges' 
 box, and he heard among the general uproar
 
 Resolved to be Rich 313 
 
 cries that Elf had won. But number seven 
 Kodak's number went up first, then in quick 
 succession Amazon's number was put into the 
 second place and Parmesan's number into the 
 third place. Elf was fourth, and Muirhead had 
 the not uncommon gratification of reflecting 
 that his first judgment had been correct, and 
 that if he had followed it and backed Parmesan 
 for a place, he would not only not have lost 
 money on the race but, the horse being at much 
 longer odds, might even have won something. 
 When fate begins to inflict such reverses of 
 fortune, she piles them up to an extent which 
 her victim mostly finds to be seriously annoy- 
 ing. 
 
 After the decision of the November Handi- 
 cap, Muirhead had exactly 2, los. left in his 
 pocket; it would hardly be correct to say in 
 his possession, since the money could not be 
 said in any possible sense to belong to him at 
 all. Seven and sixpence of this he spent on a 
 half-bottle of champagne, keeping half a crown 
 for his cab to the station, and put the rest on 
 an outsider for the Final Plate. The outsider, 
 ridden by a gentleman-jockey, took at the com- 
 mencement of the race, and maintained to its 
 finish the conspicuous but disappointing posi- 
 tion known as "a bad last," so that a little boy 
 was moved to put his head over the railings
 
 3 14 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 
 
 and call out to the aforesaid gentleman-jockey, 
 "Hi, Captain! What detained you?" and 
 Muirhead had left the course before the race 
 could strictly be said to be finished. 
 
 The man's mind was a complete blank. He 
 refused to think of the past, present, or future, 
 and took his seat in a cab with three other 
 men without any other feeling or thought 
 than annoyance at the rain. Once, for a 
 second, when he put his hand on a certain 
 empty pocket-book in his breast-pocket, a sud- 
 den momentary realisation of what had hap- 
 pened came to him, and he flung up his hands 
 in a gesture of horror and despair; but a stare 
 of astonishment from his opposite neighbour 
 brought back his senses, or to speak more 
 accurately, distracted them again, and he 
 looked round him in eager search for some- 
 thing else to think about. The cab was driving 
 past a stationer's shop at the time, and his eye 
 caught the contents board of a Manchester 
 evening paper: "Exposure of the Freehold 
 Building Society," "Escape of the Secretary," 
 "Arrest of the Managers," "Attempted suicide 
 of a clerk." 
 
 If Muirhead had recently had much time or 
 attention to devote to the affairs of the Society 
 of which he was the manager in Staffordshire, 
 this news would not have come to him with
 
 Resolved to be Rich 315 
 
 much of a shock. Half a score of letters and 
 telegrams had arrived even during the last 
 forty-eight hours, which would have been 
 enough to show an ordinarily wakeful business 
 man that a crisis was at hand. But Muirhead 
 had not been paying the slightest attention to 
 any of the affairs of the Society. He had 
 tossed this document to one clerk, that to 
 another, telling them to enter the figures in 
 their proper register, or file the paper on its 
 proper file, and that was all. 
 
 The news on this contents bill beat its way 
 through the cloud which hung over his brain 
 like a torpedo boat through a heavy sea, and 
 crashed on to his intelligence. As the cab 
 drove up to the London Road Station, he 
 jumped out, and tossing his share of the fare 
 to the driver, rushed to the bookstall and 
 snatched up the first two papers which came to 
 his hand. Half a page of the Staffordshire 
 Sentinel was devoted to the news. Every- 
 where telegrams in big letters announcing 
 some additional horror met his eye. "Mar- 
 shall's escape, a warrant out for his arrest, and 
 all the exits from the country being carefully 
 watched." "Gerald Franklin found in Mar- 
 shall's house with his throat cut, and taken to 
 the hospital and not expected to live. " "All 
 the books of the Society in charge of the
 
 316 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 police." "Additional arrests being announced 
 every hour, and numerous others expected." 
 Merciful heavens ! what if a warrant were out 
 for his own arrest, just at this moment when 
 it was imperatively necessary that he should be 
 at liberty, in order to arrange a certain little 
 matter with a Birmingham money-lender; a 
 little matter, the discovery of which might also 
 mean arrest and some far more serious pro- 
 ceedings? The man stood on the platform 
 completely stupefied, staring at the paper with 
 suspended breath and ashen cheeks. Presently 
 he saw several people running, and seeing that 
 he only just had time to catch the 5 : 30 
 Express to Stoke, he ran down the platform 
 with the open newspapers in his hand, and 
 jumped into the nearest compartment just as 
 the train was moving off. Some one in the 
 compartment who knew him nudged his neigh- 
 bour and whispered who it was, so that Muir- 
 head, looking up, found himself confronted 
 with scowling suspicious faces, the first of the 
 hundreds which afterwards met his eyes every- 
 where he turned. Every one was reading the 
 news and talking about it. Passengers for 
 Stoke, Rugby and London were there, all of 
 whom knew some one who would be buried 
 under these tumbling ruins. "Is this true, 
 sir?" asked an old man, rapping a newspaper
 
 Resolved to be Rich 317 
 
 angrily with his stick, and as Muirhead 
 shrugged his shoulders he went on: "I sin- 
 cerely trust, sir, that all the scoundrels 
 involved in this business will shortly be in 
 gaol, where they deserve to be," and added a 
 great deal more to the same effect which Muir- 
 head did not hear. He was thinking of noth- 
 ing now but what he would find when he got 
 home. 
 
 As the train ran up to Stoke platform Muir- 
 head saw two police officers standing there 
 scanning each carriage as it went by, and with 
 the prescience which belongs to such moments 
 of tragedy, he knew at once why they were 
 there. He got out and stood by the carriage 
 door, waiting quietly, swinging his race glasses 
 in his hand and watching the officers as they 
 walked rapidly down the train. He knew one 
 of them well enough, it was Burton, the head 
 of the Newcastle police. The two men came 
 up to him and Burton said in a low voice: "I 
 fear, Mr. Muirhead, it is my painful duty to 
 arrest you on charges connected with the Free- 
 hold Building Society. Do you wish to see the 
 warrant?" 
 
 "No," said Muirhead in a whisper. "Let's 
 be off as quickly as possible. You don't want 
 to handcuff me, I suppose?" 
 
 "No, if you come quite quietly."
 
 3i 8 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "Of course I will come quietly," muttered 
 the wretched man. "Oh! for God's sake, do 
 let us come out of this. Here's a crowd col- 
 lecting. Do make haste ! ' '
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV 
 
 Lady Eastney found that between the mak- 
 ing of schemes for departure from England 
 with her lover, and carrying them out, various 
 trivial accidents could fix a gulf. She meant 
 to see Mr. Seaton, her lawyer, before leaving, 
 and it chanced that two people came in to 
 lunch next day and afterwards insisted on tak- 
 ing her into the Park. They were of the tire- 
 some class of persons who, having made up 
 their minds to do what they consider a kind- 
 ness, refuse to consider the possibility of the 
 other person thinking it a bore, and they 
 laughed away all Lady Eastney's protests 
 about having work to do, under the impression 
 that she was merely protesting against their 
 giving themselves trouble for her. She was 
 weak and they were strong, and the journey to 
 Paris was postponed for another twenty-four 
 hours. Next day Seaton himself had to make 
 a journey into the country and could not see 
 her, but promised to come to Portman Square 
 on the following morning. In the morning, 
 however, he telegraphed from a remote village 
 319
 
 320 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 in Norfolk, saying that he coiild not reach 
 London till late that evening, but would come 
 round to Portman Square about half -past nine 
 if the business was urgent. The Marchioness 
 telegraphed that it was, and shortly before ten 
 o'clock on that Friday evening Seaton made 
 his appearance. Lady Eastney received him 
 in her boudoir. 
 
 "You have heard nothing more about the 
 affairs of this horrible Society, I suppose?" she 
 asked. 
 
 "I have been out of town for the last thirty- 
 six hours, " he said, "and have driven here direct 
 from Liverpool Street Station. I have heard 
 nothing at all and I still think, as I told you 
 some days ago, that the business may perhaps 
 be wound up without any serious loss or great 
 scandal; but of course I know nothing what- 
 ever about it. A few of my clients have some 
 small share in it, but only a very small one, 
 and none of them appear to be very anxious 
 about its affairs. At any rate they have not 
 spoken to me about it. ' ' 
 
 "There will be a scandal, and a very big one, 
 and it will begin within a few hours," said the 
 Marchioness, little knowing that the first scene 
 had already begun; "but I must not detain 
 you here about that. I want to ask you a 
 question about a more private matter. I told
 
 Resolved to be Rich 321 
 
 you some days ago," the woman walked away 
 to the mantel-piece and spoke in a careless 
 defiant tone which was contradicted by the 
 scarlet which dyed her cheeks and neck, "that 
 I was going to leave the country with Mr. 
 Alford. My mind is quite made up," she went 
 on quickly, seeing that the lawyer was about 
 to speak, "and my question to you has nothing 
 to do with that otherwise I can quite under- 
 stand that you would not care to say anything 
 which might assist me. I want you simply to 
 tell me what I can do to keep Angela. " 
 
 "Absolutely nothing," said the lawyer 
 unhesitatingly. 
 
 "But please think. I am going to take her 
 with me and she will of course be left with me 
 until divorce proceedings have been begun and 
 finished. What difference can they make to 
 her?" 
 
 "If they are successful you would have no 
 right to keep the child. She would pass to 
 Lord Eastney's charge." 
 
 "But he would not claim her," said the 
 woman; "he cares nothing whatever about 
 her." 
 
 "Whether he claimed his rights or not, you 
 would cease to be her guardian or to have any 
 legal rights at all in connection with her. " 
 
 "He would not exercise his rights, I say!"
 
 322 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "That would not matter, as his relatives 
 would come forward and claim the child. 
 Lady Jane Baxter would probably be asked by 
 the others to do so, as she is married." 
 
 "What right would they have to interfere?" 
 The woman turned round from the mantel- 
 piece and faced Seaton. The colour had all 
 died out of her face, and her hands were 
 clasped together as if she were begging the 
 man to give her the answers which she desired. 
 
 "Simply this. If Lady Angela were with 
 you, a child of Lord Eastney's with whom you 
 have nothing to do would be under illegal 
 guardianship. They would wish to take it 
 away. " 
 
 "They could not do it without his help." 
 
 "I beg your pardon," said the lawyer, more 
 anxious perhaps to avert a family catastrophe 
 than to explain the niceties of the law, "they 
 certainly could, and I may leave you, with 
 your knowledge of Lady Jane Baxter and her 
 opinions, to judge whether they would." 
 
 "They would have to find us first." 
 
 "My dear lady, do you imagine that you and 
 Mr. Alford with a child and a maid could 
 travel about in Europe or in any other part of 
 the world without leaving any trace of where 
 you had been? I do not natter myself that I 
 have any great detective skill, but I think that
 
 Resolved to be Rich 323 
 
 I would undertake to find Lady Angela within 
 a week without the slightest difficulty. A 
 detective would probably ask for forty-eight 
 hours." 
 
 "I would kill him when he did find her," 
 said the woman. 
 
 Looking at his client as she stood there, 
 trembling, with set teeth and flashing eyes, 
 Seaton muttered to himself : "I really believe 
 you would." Aloud, however, he only 
 remarked: "Forgive me for talking dull com- 
 mon sense, Lady Eastney, but the supply of 
 detectives is not limited, and the next one who 
 came would, I am afraid, come for you as well 
 as your daughter." 
 
 "I would kill her and myself," said the 
 woman, who was rapidly working herself into 
 a fit of hysterics. 
 
 "You tell me that your mind is made up about 
 leaving the country with Mr. Alford, " said 
 Seaton; "otherwise I would suggest that it 
 would save a considerable amount of anxiety 
 and trouble, and apparently crime, if you 
 remained with your husband. ' ' 
 
 "Yes, yes, but my mind is made up," said 
 the Marchioness distractedly, and in the tone 
 of a person whose mind had been made up and 
 unmade twenty times in as many minutes and 
 was about to take a twenty-first decision.
 
 324 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "Come in!" she said impatiently, as some 
 one knocked at the door. "Bertie! What on 
 earth are you doing here? I thought you were 
 at the Suffolks'. Is anything the matter?" 
 
 "Yes," said the young man simply. 
 "Hasn't Mr. Seaton told you?" 
 
 "He has told me no news at all." 
 
 "Marshall has bolted. That young clerk 
 Franklin has been found in his room stabbed, 
 or something. The whole business has 
 begun. ' ' 
 
 "Had we better leave? It doesn't matter 
 talking before Mr. Seaton ; he knows every- 
 thing. Had we better leave early to-morrow 
 morning?" 
 
 "We had very much better not leave at all," 
 said the young man doggedly. He folded his 
 arms and looked down on the floor resolved 
 not to meet the woman's eyes. "But I am 
 perfectly ready to do what you like. We will 
 go if you like." 
 
 "If I like! If I like! How dare you come 
 here and say that to me? What do you mean 
 by coming and saying, If I like?" 
 
 But for Seaton's presence Alford would have 
 been obliged to protest that he himself was 
 passionately anxious for the flight, and that he 
 had only meant to ask whether his recent news 
 had made any change in Lady Eastney's own
 
 Resolved to be Rich 325 
 
 desires. This would have involved him in 
 another long love scene and the fixing of their 
 departure for an early hour next morning. 
 Therefore he was unmitigatedly grateful for 
 Seaton's presence, which enabled him to 
 answer very quietly: "I mean what I say. 
 You know my wishes and I only asked yours. ' ' 
 
 There was a long silence. Pride and pas- 
 sion, rage against Alford, who had put her to 
 shame before Seaton, and love for the young 
 man, love for her child and the horrible con- 
 viction that what Seaton had told her was 
 inevitable, raged together in Lady Eastney's 
 heart as she stood there with her hands clasped 
 in front of her and her eyes flashing fury at 
 Alford. 
 
 "I have had one real sincere desire all this 
 time," she said at last in a low measured voice, 
 with a depth of anger and scorn in it which 
 made Mr. Alford squirm, and a ring of truth in 
 it too which made him flush wrathfully, "and 
 that was to take Angela away from this dis- 
 grace and trouble. For you, personally, I care 
 absolutely nothing, as little as I do for myself. 
 You came here imploring me to go abroad 
 with you, protesting that you loved me and 
 would help me to escape this trouble, and I 
 believed you" my Lady looked steadily at the 
 young man, daring him to contradict her before
 
 326 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Seaton "I believed you and accepted your 
 offer, as I would have accepted the offer of any 
 man whom I knew well and who promised me 
 a method of escape for the child. Now Mr. 
 Seaton tells me that it is not a method of 
 escape for her, that she would be taken from 
 me and brought back, therefore I have no 
 longer the slightest intention of going any- 
 where with you, for whom, as I say, I care 
 nothing at all. Now you can go away. No ! I 
 am not going to hear anything that you have 
 to say. Go at once! Do you hear me? Go!" 
 Feeling very small, and looking, as he well 
 might, extremely bewildered, Mr. Alford 
 went ; while Seaton sat on, stroking his beard 
 and saying to himself: "The woman hardly 
 knows it herself, but on my soul and conscience 
 I believe that when she told the chap she cared 
 as little for him as she did for herself, and had 
 planned the whole of this torn-foolery for the 
 sake of the child, she was telling him the 
 exact and literal truth, ' '
 
 CHAPTER XXXV 
 
 Moltke's welt-known dictum, that there are 
 eighteen ways of invading England and only 
 one way of getting out again, has a particular 
 and painful significance for a man wanted by 
 the police. It is said sometimes that London 
 is the best place for hiding in, but London 
 is in fact a very small place, as any one who 
 has ever borrowed five pounds from his neigh- 
 bour and tried to avoid him afterwards will 
 bear witness. To go to a small country town 
 is good for a time, but these places will, of 
 course, not do for anything but a temporary 
 residence. Besides, life here after London is 
 distinctly dull, and a man, even if he has 
 forged cheques, embezzled money or obtained 
 it under other false pretences, does like his 
 amusements as usual. Where to dine the night 
 after you have committed a murder, and what 
 to do afterwards, is a problem which must 
 have presented itself to many persons. For 
 myself I think that, if I were on good terms 
 with the waiters at my club and could feel 
 tolerably confident that they would not give 
 327
 
 328 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 me up to the police, I should dine there; 
 round a corner of course, and out of sight of 
 any one who was reading an evening paper. 
 One would be certain to be comfortable there 
 and at least as safe as anywhere else. 
 
 Marshall did not dine at all on the night of 
 his flight, which was a mistake, since anxiety 
 on an empty stomach is a very severe affliction. 
 He lay in his berth on the St. Malo steamer 
 considering his present and future, one, as he 
 said to himself, damnable, the other spec- 
 ulative. Having breakfasted in the buffet at 
 St. Malo Station, which is the one exception 
 to the rule that all eating-places in France are 
 good, he took a train for the South and sat in 
 it shuddering with alarm at every stoppage. 
 The fastest method of progression in Brittany, 
 as every one knows, is the bicycle; next to that 
 comes walking, and, a bad third, the railway. 
 For my own part the trains here soothe me. I 
 like to get out and walk by the engine-driver 
 and ask him whether his train is still, in the 
 cautious language of the railway notices, "se 
 dirigeant vers Rennes," and to feel that fora 
 very slight consideration he would go some- 
 where else. But this mode of progression, I 
 am aware, drives most English people mad. 
 Marshall, for instance, was fuming in his car- 
 riage, cursing every station at which he
 
 Resolved to be Rich 329 
 
 stopped, declaring that the train ought to be 
 prosecuted for furious loitering, and generally 
 conducting himself as one of his countrymen 
 does who is getting late for an appointment by 
 means of a slow train. As the appointment in 
 his case was one involving escape from ten 
 years penal servitude, Marshall had, it must be 
 allowed, some justification for his annoyance. 
 
 The train dragged past Rennes and Redon, 
 and into the pretty valley of the Loire, arriv- 
 ing at last at Saint Nazaire. This being the 
 Compagnie Generale Transatlantique's point of 
 departure for South America, the man antici- 
 pated, not without some reason, that his arrival 
 here would be looked for, and he jumped out 
 and made his way to the exit with a face of 
 alarm which would have betrayed him ten 
 times over to a detective if one had chanced to 
 be present. He had however got a good start 
 of the police arrangements, and was able to 
 go in peace to the comfortable old Hotel 
 Bretagne, where he booked a passage under 
 the name of Taylor on the next steamer for 
 Rio Janeiro. 
 
 As ill-luck would have it, he had three days 
 to wait here before the steamer sailed, and he 
 began to speculate seriously as to the advisa- 
 bility of spending them somewhere outside 
 Saint Nazaire. . His travels had given him that
 
 330 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 real knowledge of roughing it, which, while it 
 makes most men able to do so, and fluent in 
 talking about its charms, makes most of them 
 also extremely careful to avoid it if possible. 
 Also he had some experience of Breton vil- 
 lages, where you dine on onion soup and veal 
 and cheese, and are compelled to get up early 
 in the morning because the landlady wants the 
 sheets to lay the table for dejeuner; and 
 though he did not mean to risk anything he 
 was not going to plunge into these joys with- 
 out good and sufficient cause. 
 
 An Englishman who sat next to him at the 
 table d'hote dinner saved him the trouble of 
 making inquiries about such places in the 
 neighbourhood by making them himself, and 
 Marshall, on the look-out for detectives, 
 studied this person furtively and closely. He 
 was a middle-aged man, with brown hair and 
 broad flowing whiskers and a heavy moustache. 
 His clothes, which consisted of a Norfolk 
 jacket, knickerbockers and thick woollen 
 stockings, were considerably too big for him, 
 and his gait, which was rolling and rollicking, 
 gave you the idea of a man who took his 
 brandy and soda regularly but managed as a 
 rule to walk it off afterwards. Marshall eyed 
 him uncomfortably, and he eyed Marshall with 
 at least equal discomfort. At last the late
 
 Resolved to be Rich 331 
 
 Secretary of the Freehold Building Society 
 looked straight into his companion's eyes and 
 then dropped his fork with a crash on his plate. 
 In those features, which one cannot disguise 
 except with more pain than the ordinary per- 
 son cares to inflict on himself, Marshall recog- 
 nised something which made him look for a 
 scar just above the man's left eyebrow, and 
 this scar he found. This made him look more 
 closely at the flowing hair, and search for cer- 
 tain signs indicative of its having been bought 
 in a wig shop, and these signs he also found. 
 After this he came to the conclusion, not quite 
 certainly but with a feeling that he -would 
 stake a -good deal of his money on it, that he 
 was sitting next to Mr. Luke Robinson. 
 Furthermore he concluded from certain signs 
 that Mr. Luke Robinson was on the way to 
 recognise him, if he had not already done so. 
 One is not always certain of recognising any- 
 body, since marks of identification may be 
 common to several people, or may sometimes 
 be in a passive state. The man, for instance, 
 who came to the Morgue in Paris in search of 
 his father, and was told, on describing him, 
 that there were three men at present in the 
 Morgue answering to that description, and that 
 he must give some other means of identifica- 
 tion; and who then added, in a moment of
 
 332 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 brilliant inspiration, that his father was dumb ; 
 was obviously doubtful as to what marks of 
 identification really meant. Robinson and 
 Marshall, who both knew what they meant, 
 had forgotten half a dozen of them in their own 
 cases. After confronting one another for half 
 an hour neither of them had the least doubt 
 about who the other was, and they sat dur- 
 ing the rest of dinner merely considering 
 whether it would be good policy to admit the 
 recognition. Marshall could find no reason 
 against it in his own mind, and was, besides, 
 extremely curious to find out why Robinson 
 had fled at all; therefore, after dinner, he 
 strolled down towards the docks with a cigar, 
 and on turning round perceived that Robinson 
 was coming in the same direction. He waited 
 for the latter to join him, and then asked 
 briefly but forcibly: 
 
 "What the devil are you doing here?" 
 
 "What are you doing?" was the not unnatural 
 reply. 
 
 "Waiting for the Normannia" said Mar- 
 shall; "that's easy to guess; and I suppose 
 you're coming to Rio Janeiro, too, but I don't 
 understand why." 
 
 "It's a a very healthy country, " said Rob- 
 inson, vaguely and dubiously. 
 
 "Very," assented Marshall.
 
 Resolved to be Rich 333 
 
 The two men walked on in silence for a space, 
 both debating whether they had better not let 
 matters rest where they were. Marshall made 
 up his mind first. Like the boy who was con- 
 tinually being asked which of a new litter of 
 kittens he would like to keep and which to 
 drown, and who, on being shown some newly- 
 arrived twin-brothers, pointed unhesitatingly 
 to the ugliest and said: "I should drown that 
 one;" Marshall had been engaged all his life 
 in deciding difficult questions, and could there- 
 fore do it faster than most people. So he said 
 amiably: 
 
 "My departure from London was rather 
 hurried, and was dictated by motives of 
 prudence as much as health. In fact, the police 
 are looking for me. You are doubtless aware, 
 my dear Mr. Robinson, that the financial 
 arrangements of this Freehold Society were 
 not always conducted as the law requires." 
 
 "No, I believe not." 
 
 "The Staffordshire branch a most admi- 
 rably managed branch it was was, I suppose, 
 no exception ; but I am rather surprised that you 
 should have been so much involved in its affairs 
 as to make this this little change of costume 
 necessary;" and Marshall looked at the Wes- 
 leyan minister's whiskers and knickerbockers 
 and bicycling cap with an engaging smile.
 
 334 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "I had a good deal of work to do in Stafford- 
 shire," said Robinson evasively. 
 
 "Certainly you had," replied Marshall; "and 
 most admirably you did it. Did our friends 
 down there notice anything wrong?" 
 
 "Well, paitly they did," said the other 
 surlily; "and partly they minded their own 
 business. ' ' 
 
 "My dear Mr. Robinson," went on Marshall, 
 rather dashed at rinding that he had given his 
 own confidences, and was not to have any in 
 return, "I can understand that you are 
 slightly annoyed by this catastrophe, but I 
 can't understand why you shouldn't confide in 
 me. To be frank, it decreases the chances of 
 safety for both of us to be together like this, 
 and I can't imagine why the devil you are here 
 at all. Forgive me for swearing in your 
 presence." 
 
 "The result of my confidence in you up to 
 the present date has not been very fortunate." 
 
 "We are going to be travelling companions 
 for some weeks," said Marshall persuasively. 
 "I really think that you might tell me why you 
 are here. Also I might point out to you that it 
 is but a matter of twenty-four hours my find- 
 ing out all about it. No doubt I shall occupy 
 the most prominent place in the English news- 
 papers of Monday, which will arrive here on
 
 Resolved to be Rich 335 
 
 Tuesday ; but a space will probably be found 
 for your doings as well." 
 
 "I should think they would probably offer a 
 reward for your apprehension, won't they?" 
 said Robinson, meditatively. 
 
 "Very likely," said Marshall, "but if any- 
 body in this town is thinking of earning that 
 reward, well, faith! I could put my finger on a 
 town where there is going to be trouble. ' ' 
 
 "To be candid, as you have been," said Rob- 
 inson, "I could very well dispense with your 
 company on this voyage, and see no reason at 
 all why, if you persist in coming with me, I 
 shouldn't telegraph to the police to stop you." 
 
 "Why, you poor fool, for the simple reason 
 that they would have both of us." 
 
 "A man cannot be arrested without a war- 
 rant and without cause," said Robinson. "No 
 one will have any desire to arrest me for 
 another three or four days at least." 
 
 "I will show you another reason then," said 
 Marshall, springing at the man and seizing 
 him by the throat. 
 
 The two were standing on the edge of one of 
 the docks, and Marshall's intention was to 
 choke his quondam friend first and throw him 
 into the water afterwards. Unfortunately, 
 however, Robinson managed to emit one or 
 two gurgling cries for help, and then when he
 
 336 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 finally lost his footing and tumbled over the 
 edge, he was holding Marshall tightly in his 
 arms. The two men fell into the dock with a 
 mighty splash, and presently a dozen small 
 boys, half-a-dozen men and women, and finally 
 two policemen, appeared on the scene. 
 
 The two combatants were dragged out and 
 stood on the edge of the dock for a moment 
 dripping and swearing. Marshall's wig was 
 far at the back of his head, Robinson's over his 
 left eye. The latter had also lost one of his 
 whiskers, while the other had moved down under 
 his chin. The crowd, which had considerably 
 increased by this time, stood staring at the 
 Englishmen in considerable and by no means 
 respectful astonishment, and the two policemen 
 were evidently debating as to the propriety of 
 allowing the incident to terminate here. They 
 were, however, saved the trouble of a decision 
 by two other Englishmen who pushed their 
 way through the spectators, and informed the 
 hesitating French policemen that they were 
 English detectives, with warrants for the 
 arrest of the two gentlemen whose appearance 
 was now causing so much surprise.
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI 
 
 Gerald Franklin's life flickered up and down 
 for forty-eight hours; then he began to 
 recover. 
 
 "He has not been guilty of any real wrong, 
 my dear," said Miss Bertram to Monica; "it 
 was my poor wicked brother who devised the 
 whole affair arid led him astray and kept him 
 at this dreadful work. I do not suppose he 
 knew himself what he was doing. " 
 
 Monica shook her head miserably. She 
 knew her brother better than that. 
 
 "I am afraid you must have lost money in 
 the Society," said Reggie Nicholson, who had 
 come up to London to be near the pair. 
 
 "I have lost nearly everything, my dear 
 boy," said the woman quietly. "I tried to sell 
 my shares, but it was too late. I suppose 
 there is no harm in saying now that Lady 
 Eastney advised me to sell them last August, 
 and also mercifully advised me against letting 
 Monica's money be put into the Company. I 
 tried to sell the shares, but it was too late, and 
 now I have got only a few hundred pounds left in 
 337
 
 338 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 the world. I fear that I am only one of many 
 such sufferers. Probably there are hundreds 
 worse off even than myself as a result of this. 
 I shall have to find some work to do, but it will 
 be time enough to talk about that when 
 Gerald is well." 
 
 "You will do nothing of the sort, Aunt 
 Christina," said Monica. "You will live with 
 Reggie and me. I wouldn't marry Reggie 
 unless he agreed to that." 
 
 "I was only waiting until Miss Bertram had 
 done speaking to say that myself," said 
 Nicholson. 
 
 "I am healthy and strong, children," said 
 the woman in a curiously hard voice. 
 "Reggie's father has lost money by this. 
 Monica herself may also be said to have lost 
 some, since I should of course have left her 
 half of mine, and it is all my brother's doing. 
 How could I possibly ask you two to keep me? 
 I am not speaking about the matter without 
 thinking. I have thought it all over, and I 
 shall ask for a post as housekeeper or matron 
 of some small Home. For one thing, I cannot 
 possibly go on living at Hartshill in the middle 
 of all the people whom my poor brother has 
 ruined. How could I meet the Garths and 
 Wintons and Cartons? And then there is Mr. 
 Lowe. Poor Mr. Lowe! He has lost every-
 
 Resolved to be Rich 339 
 
 thing and has nothing but the income from his 
 living, and it is my fault. Why have we all 
 been trying to be rich like this? To get money 
 without earning it ! we have all set you a ter- 
 rible example, dear children, we who are sup- 
 posed to be your guardians and teachers! But 
 at any rate you will see how severely and 
 promptly such folly is punished. I think I am 
 going to leave you here together for a little 
 while. I want to be by myself to think. 
 Remember that we are going to see Gerald at 
 three o'clock." 
 
 As if resolved to escape from Monica's pro- 
 tests Miss Bertram left the room quickly, and 
 the two lovers sat in silence for a time, wonder- 
 ing whether they would be able to change her 
 intention. She did not as a rule announce such 
 decisions lightly, or readily abandon them 
 when made, and indeed Reggie saw some 
 reason in what she had said about themselves. 
 Nicholson Senior had lost a big sum, a number 
 of his workmen had lost money by the Society's 
 failure, and he would be expected to help 
 them. The young man foresaw that his own 
 allowance would have to be reduced to very 
 small proportions. They would in fact have 
 to live for some time on Monica's money, and 
 out of this she would very probably, so far as 
 could be seen at present, have to support her
 
 340 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 brother for some time to come. Gerald would 
 be unable to work for another three months, 
 and even then a young man with his record 
 would not find it easy to get work. Yet the 
 boy, who had almost as sincere an affection tor 
 Miss Bertram as Monica had, certainly did not 
 mean to let her do any work if she could be 
 persuaded to come and live with them. He 
 said to himself, not without a certain amount 
 of satisfaction, that the best thing to be done 
 was for himself and Monica to be married 
 at once, and ask Miss Bertram to live with 
 them at some place within reasonable distance 
 of Stoke, though as far as possible from 
 Hartshill. 
 
 It was Nicholson's self-imposed task to read 
 the morning and evening newspapers, and to 
 tell Miss Bertram and Monica all that they 
 were absolutely obliged to know of the proceed- 
 ings in connection with the Freehold. Mon- 
 day morning's papers seemed, as the young 
 man said to himself, to contain news of the 
 arrest of everybody they knew in London and 
 Staffordshire. Tuesday's and Wednesday's 
 papers announced the first appearance of the 
 prisoners at Bow Street and their remand. 
 Day after day the story went on of the havoc 
 and ruin wrought by the men who had planned 
 and carried out the Freehold Building Society
 
 Resolved to be Rich 341 
 
 and its kindred companies. No trace could be 
 found of any money in the possession of either 
 Margets or Marshall, and they professed to 
 have paid everything in order to settle certain 
 debts. Proof of criminal transactions was 
 found, when the public prosecutor got fairly 
 into his work, to be extremely difficult to 
 obtain. Against Lord Eastney there was abso- 
 lutely none. He posed successfully as a dupe, 
 though there were certain documents signed at 
 the midnight meeting at Margets' house which 
 came near to being his undoing. There was, 
 however, a certain amount of evidence to cor- 
 roborate his assertion that he had signed a por- 
 tion without being shown the whole. His 
 acquittal was a foregone conclusion, and took 
 place accordingly. The man went home to 
 his house on the afternoon of the day when the 
 trial came to an end. There would be a sale 
 there shortly under half a score of bankruptcy 
 notices, and Lady Eastney was superintending 
 the packing of her own private possessions. 
 She was alone in the drawing-room when he 
 entered, and looked up with cold enquiry on 
 her face. 
 
 "It is all right," he said, "I have got off. 
 The charge, as I told you, was a ridiculous 
 one. As if I could possibly know what the 
 scoundrels were doing!"
 
 34 2 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 Lady Eastney turned round to the mantel- 
 piece again, her fingers moving restlessly to 
 and fro among the small ornaments there. 
 
 "I am afraid there is a bad time coming for 
 us financially," he went on hesitatingly, "but 
 I hope you won't mind it very much. Of 
 course I shall look out for some work, and I 
 don't suppose there will be any difficulty in 
 getting some. We could live in London or 
 the country, whichever you like. Of course we 
 can't go on living in this house, but I don't 
 think you need be very uncomfortable." 
 
 For answer the Marchioness muttered to 
 herself some words which sounded so like, "I 
 suppose it doesn't matter much so long as we 
 are safely together," that the man's face 
 flushed up to the forehead and he moved 
 towards her. 
 
 "Would you would you really care about 
 our being together?" he asked with eyes down- 
 cast and the beginnings of a look of happiness 
 on his face. 
 
 Lady Eastney turned and stared at him in 
 amazement; then, as she understood, laughed 
 slightly. 
 
 "I meant Angela!" she said. 
 
 Muirhead would perhaps have escaped alto- 
 gether, though his share in the purchase and 
 management of the Arkhill Hall property was
 
 Resolved to be Rich 343 
 
 difficult to explain away, but during the last 
 three weeks he had simply, as it appeared, 
 helped himself to large sums of the Society's 
 money for betting purposes ; and this not only 
 meant five years penal servitude in itself, but 
 lent a much blacker aspect to the other shady 
 transactions in which he had been engaged on 
 behalf of the Society. It was pleaded, how- 
 ever, with a certain amount of success, that he 
 had been the dupe of Marshall throughout, and 
 some very carefully prepared and cautiously 
 given evidence of Reggie Nicholson's went to 
 prove that, even if he had realised dimly that 
 some of the proceedings of the Society were a 
 trifle queer, he had always believed the Com- 
 pany itself to be sound and solvent. The 
 result, however, was seven years penal servi- 
 tude, and it was not much satisfaction to him 
 to hear the judge's opinion that he had got off 
 very lightly. He left the Courthouse almost 
 wishing that the sentence had been for life. 
 What had he to expect or hope for at the end 
 of these years? His life was over, with failure 
 written at the end of every pathway along 
 which he had walked. He loathed failure, and 
 it had pursued and overtaken him everywhere. 
 He was a born gambler, with the true 
 gambler's feeling that, in everything he did, 
 he was playing a game with fortune, the end
 
 344 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 of which would be decided by no merit or 
 judgment, no virtue or effort. Everywhere 
 he had been beaten, and, as is natural in this 
 view of life, he saw no hope for the future 
 because he had no counters with which to 
 recommence the game. He saw immediately 
 before him a long term of years in which time 
 was simply to pass without result, good or bad, 
 and in which the most that one could possibly 
 hope was that it would pass quickly. After 
 that he foresaw merely a struggle to live, with- 
 out hope or expectation of enjoyment ; a long, 
 long fight in which there would be neither 
 victory nor defeat but only fighting* He 
 went away with a last dazed look round the 
 Courthouse, and a dull wonder, characteristic 
 of the man, why fortune should have treated 
 him so ill when it had behaved so kindly to 
 some of his companions. 
 
 In Marshall's case defence was, as he coolly 
 told his sister, an entire waste of money. "I 
 never meant to offer any defence," he said, "I 
 simply meant to escape, and I can't think what 
 induced me to put it off so long. It is a 
 blunder which will cost me pretty dear now. " 
 
 The blunder cost Mr. Marshall twelve years 
 penal servitude, which sentence he heard with 
 a resigned sigh, but a feeling on the whole of 
 relief. "That means eight years," he calcu-
 
 Resolved to be Rich 345 
 
 lafed, "unless I try to escape, or knock the 
 warders down, or complain of the food. Well, 
 I have lived hard at various periods of my life, 
 and I do not suppose that life at Portland will 
 be much worse than the years in Madrid after 
 that last little contretemps. And when I come 
 out, I shall, after all, be well on the right side 
 of fifty, and there is the best part of ^40,000 
 put away in that bank at Buenos Ayres which 
 Jackson will look after for me faithfully 
 enough. It will double in these eight years, 
 won't it? Or how long is it that these sums 
 take to double? I must ask for an arithmetic 
 book at Portland and find out. It is a bore, 
 but a man is not moribund at fifty; he has got 
 ten years of enjoyment at least before him, and 
 there is a good deal of spending in ^60,000. 
 We will call it 60,000. To get hold of 
 Master Gerald's ,3,000 at the last moment 
 was a great coup, though I expect that the 
 delay which it caused has helped to land me 
 here. Well, these accidents will happen, and 
 eight years is not eternity. ' ' 
 
 It must be admitted that Mr. Marshall 
 deserved his sentence, and might be held by 
 the most lenient moralist to have deserved a 
 good deal more, 
 
 Gerald Franklin's case was the one on which 
 most doubt existed, and on which much legal
 
 346 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 debate took place. He was defended with 
 great ability on the lines that he was a sub- 
 ordinate of a subordinate, "the dupe of a 
 dupe," as one counsel remarked, and could not 
 for a moment understand why the explanation 
 was received with general laughter. Much 
 was made of a theory invented for his benefit 
 by Dr. Hare, that the lad had found Marshall 
 on the point of escaping and had received his 
 wounds in a gallant attempt to stop him. The 
 boy's innocent and youthful appearance was of 
 course a great help to the defence, and difficult 
 as it was to combat the statement of the prose- 
 cution that somebody in North Staffordshire 
 had thoroughly known and understood the pro- 
 ceedings of the Society, and that that some- 
 body was certainly not Muirhead, Gerald's 
 counsel was finally successful. To his own 
 infinite astonishment the lad heard a verdict of 
 acquittal for himself, and for a moment hardly 
 knew which to do first, to rejoice in his escape 
 or despise the jury for believing in his inno- 
 cence. It was of course pleasing to be free ; 
 but it was very unpleasant to be free because 
 twelve of your fellow countrymen, having 
 deliberated on the matter for some time, had 
 concluded that you were a fool. Liberty, how- 
 ever, was worth having even at this price, and, 
 as Gerald very properly argued, it was the
 
 Resolved to be Rich 347 
 
 highest triumph of genius to have all the man- 
 agement and all the profit of an undertaking in 
 your own hands, and let somebody else bear all 
 the losses and the blame for all the mistakes. 
 
 And so with a sentence of eighteen months 
 imprisonment for Robinson and five years 
 penal servitude for Mr. Margets, the trial of the 
 directors and managers of the Freehold Build- 
 ing Society came to an end.
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII 
 
 The injury to Gerald's throat was sufficient 
 to prevent him from working for many weeks, 
 even after his departure from the hospital and 
 discharge from his trial. He had no money 
 and his prospects were small, for no firm would 
 willingly give employment to any one who had 
 been connected with the recently exposed 
 Building Society, whose clerks were obviously 
 either fools or scoundrels. Re-established in 
 his rooms in the Ethridges' house two days 
 after the conclusion of the trial, it occurred to 
 Gerald, who had hitherto been absorbed by his 
 own danger, to wonder how the weekly bills 
 were being paid. Miss Bertram, he suddenly 
 remembered, must have lost nearly all her 
 money in the crash of the Freehold. It was 
 not likely that Ethridge was keeping him for 
 nothing. He himself was more than penni- 
 less, for any money which he had saved had 
 been absorbed ten times over by the expenses 
 of his defence. His real position suddenly 
 occurred to him, that he was penniless, without 
 means or prospects, living on his sister's 
 348
 
 Resolved to be Rich 349 
 
 charity. The unpleasantness of the situation 
 had been dulled by illness and danger. Now 
 it fully confronted him and he writhed under it. 
 Monica was sitting in the room as he lay on the 
 sofa calculating facts and chances. He had 
 been told to talk very little and move very 
 little, and there was therefore nothing for him 
 to do but to sit there and read. Many even of 
 those people who love reading find it a detest- 
 able occupation when it suddenly becomes their 
 only one, and Gerald did not love it at the best 
 of times. For the past forty-eight hours he 
 had been reading the newspaper accounts of 
 himself and his friends, with criticisms of the 
 Freehold's finance, and had been considering, 
 as was his wont, how much better he could 
 have written them himself if it had been his 
 business to do so. The articles amused him, 
 chiefly on account of the elaborate theories by 
 which the writers accounted for Marshall's suc- 
 cess. The managing director of the Society 
 had, it appeared, made the most wonderful 
 statements and put forth the most wonderful 
 proofs as to the value of the Society. Evi- 
 dently, muttered Gerald, it takes people a long 
 time to find out that nine people out of ten 
 believe any statement which you make to them 
 about money matters without any proof at all, 
 if you make it three times in a loud voice.
 
 3 $o Resolved to be Rich 
 
 But the newspaper criticisms palled after a 
 time; thought and anxiety followed, and 
 Gerald began asking questions. 
 
 "So nothing could be got out of Marshall 
 about my money?" said the lad to his sister this 
 afternoon. 
 
 "He said, you know, that he had spent every- 
 thing he had on bribing people to keep quiet 
 till the last possible moment," said Monica. 
 
 "Yes, I know," said Gerald with a laugh, 
 "one believes as much of that as one pleases." 
 Marshall's character was in fact, as the boy 
 knew, very much like his own, and he himself 
 knew a good deal better than to try and bribe 
 people into silence. 
 
 "I am afraid however that it is gone," said 
 Monica, on the whole content that her brother 
 was beginning to think again. 
 
 "And Aunt Christina's too?" 
 
 "Yes," said the girl. "She is talking of 
 accepting a place as matron of a small orphans' 
 home at Chester which has been offered to her. 
 The pay is 40 a year, and I have had great 
 difficulty in making her promise to take 
 another ^60 a year out of my money. " 
 
 Gerald raised himself up on his arm, looking 
 thoroughly horrified and startled: "I did not 
 quite realize that it meant that," he said in a 
 low voice, and, practical young man as he was,
 
 Resolved to be Rich 351 
 
 Monica thought it very probable that he was 
 speaking the truth. 
 
 "It is very sad," said the girl, "but she has 
 got plenty of courage." 
 
 "And I say, old girl, about myself . . . 
 It is a horrible thing to have to ask you, but 
 you know I have got nothing left either. As 
 you see from the trial it is not altogether my 
 fault. Those fellows knew what they were 
 after, and I didn't. You see how they gulled 
 me. . . ." 
 
 "Oh, Gerald dear!" 
 
 Looking up quickly the boy met his sister's 
 eyes fixed on him with a curious pleading look 
 in them. He flushed scarlet and looked down 
 at the sofa-cushions, picking one of them with 
 nervous fingers. In the silence which followed 
 there flashed back into his memory a score of 
 occasions on which he had told Monica the 
 truth about some transaction in which he was 
 involved, and let her into half a hundred 
 secrets, in looking back upon which she could 
 not fail to see how deeply he himself had been 
 involved in Marshall's roguery. 
 
 "I suppose I have been rather mean to you," 
 he said at last, and even such a grudging con- 
 fession as this made Monica more contented; 
 "but anyhow the others have known so much 
 more than me that they have got the best of
 
 352 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 me in the end," went on the boy ruefully, 
 "and I have got nothing left at all. Of course 
 I shall soon get some more work to do, but, as 
 you heard old Carter say, I am good for noth- 
 ing yet. Could you" the words stuck in his 
 throat again and again "Could you help me a 
 bit? Could you lend me enough to go on with 
 till I get some work?" 
 
 "Of course I will, Gerald, and you needn't 
 surely mind so much about asking me. At 
 any rate," she went on, suddenly mindful of a 
 hundred injunctions which her aunt had given 
 her as to what she was to say when this inevi- 
 table moment came, "I will give you whatever 
 is necessary. It wouldn't be fair to Reggie to 
 give you more, though indeed, my dear old 
 boy," Monica could not remember her injunc- 
 tions for more than ten seconds at a time "of 
 course you come before him. I am going to 
 give yoUpioo" she had been told to give him 
 ^50, but somehow that didn't sound enough 
 "and that will enable you to pay Dr. Carter 
 and the Ethridges, and will keep you till you 
 are well and can get some more work." 
 
 The lad tried to mutter a few words of 
 thanks, but something choked them back. His 
 throat hurt him violently after these few min- 
 utes conversation, and the humiliation of the 
 moment was almost more than he could bear.
 
 Resolved to be Rich 353 
 
 It was curious that when only a few months 
 before he had been asking his sister for the 
 whole of her money to invest in a security 
 which he knew to be quite worthless, which 
 meant a 5 per cent, commission for himself and 
 absolute ruin for the young investor he had 
 had no hesitation and very little shame. 
 To-day when he was asking for ^100 he was 
 almost crying with the degradation of it. 
 
 Monica saw his misery, and, the matter hav- 
 ing been settled, tried to turn the conversation 
 to something more pleasant. 
 
 "Of course you will get work easily enough," 
 she said, "and then you will begin to settle 
 down better and save a little for certain pur- 
 poses, won't you?" 
 
 "To pay you back again?" asked the boy 
 with another great flush of colour. "Yes, of 
 course I shall. ' ' 
 
 "Indeed, I wasn't thinking of that," said the 
 girl with a frown at this misinterpretation of 
 her words. "I was thinking of of Sophie." 
 
 "Oh!" The flush continued on Gerald's 
 face, but a slight smile was added to it. 
 
 "Shan't you try to save something for her?" 
 asked the girl. 
 
 "How do I know that she would take it 
 when it was saved?" said Gerald with a shy 
 laugh.
 
 354 Resolved to be Rich 
 
 "I think she would, but you might ask her." 
 
 "Very well, I will." 
 
 "And then you will have something- else to 
 think about besides making money. That has 
 never seemed to me to be the one thing worth 
 thinking about; and all of you who have 
 thought so much about it, and about nothing 
 else, have been very unlucky." 
 
 "Well," said Gerald, "whether Sophie likes 
 me or not, I am still resolved to be rich." 
 
 "A very nice resolution in its right place," 
 said Monica with the air of some one who 
 knew several resolutions which were better, 
 and a glance up at Reggie Nicholson, who 
 came in and asked her what she was preaching 
 about.
 
 PRINTED BY R. R. DONNELLEY 
 AND SONS COMPANY AT THE 
 LAKESIDE PRESS, CHICAGO, ILL.
 
 A 000137808 2