Works of Ellen Wood

by Ellen Wood

  But he could not drive it down. No; like the vision which had been gratuitously presented to the Reverend Mr. Hastings, and which he had been unable to dismiss, Thomas Godolphin could not drive it away. In a sort of panic — a panic caused by his own thoughts — he called for certain of the books to be brought to him.

  Some of those wanted were in George Godolphin’s room. It was Isaac Hastings who was sent in there for them.

  “The books!” exclaimed George, looking at Isaac.

  “Mr. Godolphin wants them, sir.”

  It was quite out of the usual order for these books to come under the inspection (unless at stated times) of Mr. Godolphin. The very asking for them implied a doubt on George — at least, it sounded so to that gentleman’s all-conscious ears. He pointed out the books to Isaac in silence, with the end of his pen.

  Isaac Hastings, carried them to Mr. Godolphin, and left them with him. Mr. Godolphin turned them rapidly over and over: they appeared, so far as he could see at a cursory glance, to be all right; the balance on the credit side weighty, the available funds next door to inexhaustible, the Bank altogether flourishing. Thomas took greater shame to himself for having doubted his brother. While thus engaged, an observation suddenly struck him — that all the entries were in George’s handwriting. A few minutes later, George came into the room.

  “George,” he exclaimed, “how industrious you have become!”

  “Industrious!” repeated George, looking round for an explanation.

  “All these entries are yours. Formerly you would not have done as much in a year.”

  George laughed. “I used to be incorrigibly idle. It was well to turn over a new leaf.”

  He — George — was going out of the room again, but his brother stopped him. “Stay here, George. I want you.”

  Mr. Godolphin pointed to a chair as he spoke, and George sat down. George, who seemed rather inclined to have the fidgets, took out his penknife and began cutting at an offending nail.

  “Are you in any embarrassment, George?”

  “In embarrassment? I! Oh dear, no.”

  Thomas paused. Dropping his voice, he resumed in a lower tone, only just removed from a whisper:

  “Have you paper flying about the discount markets?”

  George Godolphin’s fair face grew scarlet. Was it with conscious emotion? — or with virtuous indignation? Thomas assumed it to be the latter. How could he give it an opposite meaning from the indignant words which accompanied it. A burst of indignation which Thomas stopped.

  “Stay, George. There is no necessity to put yourself out. I never supposed it to be anything but false when a rumour of it reached my ear. Only tell me the truth quietly.”

  Possibly George would have been glad to tell the truth, and get so much of the burden off his mind. But he did not dare. He might have shrunk from the terrible confession at any time to his kind, his good, his upright brother: but things had become too bad to be told to him now. If the exposé did come, why, it must, and there would be no help for it: tell him voluntarily he could not. By some giant strokes of luck and policy, it might yet be averted: how necessary, then, to keep it from Thomas Godolphin!

  “The truth is,” said George, “that I don’t know what you mean. To what rumour are you alluding?”

  “It has been said that you have a good deal of paper in the market. The report was spoken, and it reached my ears.”

  “It’s not true. It’s all an invention,” cried George vehemently. “Should I be such a fool? There are some people who live, it’s my belief, by trying to work ill to others. Mr. Hastings was with me this morning. He had heard a rumour that something was wrong with the Bank.”

  “With the Bank! In what way?”

  “Oh, of course, people must have gathered a version of the loss here, and put their own charitable constructions upon it,” replied George, returning to his usual careless mode of speech. “The only thing to do is, to laugh at them.”

  “As you can laugh at the rumour regarding yourself and the bills?” remarked Thomas.

  “As I can and do,” answered easy George. Never more easy, more apparently free from care than at that moment. Thomas Godolphin, truthful himself, open as the day, not glancing to the possibility that George could be deliberately otherwise, felt all his confidence return to him. George went out, and Thomas turned to the books again.

  Yes. They were all in order, all right. With those flourishing statements before him, how could he have been so foolish as to cast suspicion on George? Thomas had a pen in one hand, and the fore-finger of the other pointed to the page, when his face went white as one in mortal agony, and drops of moisture broke out upon his brow.

  The same pain, which had taken him occasionally before, had come to him again. Mortal agony in verity it seemed. He dropped the pen; he lay back in his chair; he thought he must have fallen to the ground. How long he so lay he could not quite tell: not very long probably, counted by minutes; but counted by pain long enough for a lifetime. Isaac Hastings, coming in with a message, found him. Isaac stood aghast.

  “I am not very well, Isaac. Give me your arm. I will go and sit for a little time in the dining-room.”

  “Shall I run over for Mr. Snow, sir?”

  “No. I shall be better soon. In fact, I am better, or I could not talk to you. It was a sudden paroxysm.”

  He leaned upon Isaac Hastings, and reached the dining-room. It was empty. Isaac left him there, and proceeded, unordered, to acquaint Mr. George Godolphin. He could not find him.

  “Mr. George has gone out,” said a clerk. “Not two minutes ago.”

  “I had better tell Maria, then,” thought Isaac. “He does not look fit to be left alone.”

  Speeding up to Maria’s sitting-room, he found her there, talking to Margery. Miss Meta, in a cool brown-holland dress and a large straw hat, was dancing about in glee. She danced up to him.

  “I am going to the hayfield,” said she. “Will you come?”

  “Don’t I wish I could!” he replied, catching her up in his arms. “It is fine to be Miss Meta Godolphin! to have nothing to do all day but roll in the hay.”

  She struggled to get down. Margery was waiting to depart. A terrible thing if Margery should have all the rolling to herself and Meta be left behind! They went out, and he turned to his sister.

  “Maria, Mr. Godolphin is in the dining-room, ill. I thought I would come and tell you. He looks too ill to be left alone.”

  “What is the matter with him?” she asked.

  “A sudden pain,” he said. “I happened to go into his room with a message, and saw him. I almost thought he was dead at first; he looked so ghastly.”

  Maria hastened down. Thomas, better then, but looking fearfully ill still, was leaning upon the arm of a couch. Maria went up and took his hand.

  “Oh, Thomas, you look very ill! What is it?”

  He gazed into her face with a serene countenance, a quiet smile. “It is only another of my warnings, Maria. I have been so much better that I am not sure but I thought they had gone for good.”

  Maria drew forward a chair and sat down by him. “Warnings?” she repeated.

  “Of the end. You must be aware, Maria, that I am attacked with a fatal malady.”

  Maria was not quite unaware of it, but she had never understood that a fatal termination was inevitable. She did not know but that he might live to be an old man. “Can nothing be done for you?” she breathed.

  “Nothing.”

  Her eyes glistened with the rising tears. “Oh, Thomas! you must not die! We could none of us bear to lose you. George could not do without you; Janet could not; I think I could not.”

  He gently shook his head. “We may not pick and choose, Maria — who shall be left here, and who be taken. Those go sometimes who, seemingly, can be least spared.”

  She could scarcely speak; afraid lest her sobs should come, for her heart was aching. “But surely it is not to be speedy?” she murmured. “You may live on a long while yet
?”

  “The doctors tell me I may live on for years, if I keep myself quiet. I think they are wrong.”

  “Oh, Thomas, then, you surely will!” she eagerly said, her cheek flushing with emotion. “Who can have tranquillity if you cannot?”

  How ignorant they both were of the dark cloud looming overhead, ready even then to burst and send forth its torrent! Tranquillity! Tranquillity henceforth for Thomas Godolphin!

  CHAPTER XVII. GONE!

  The days passed on to a certain Saturday. An ominous Saturday for the Godolphins. Rumours, vague at the best, and therefore all the more dangerous, had been spreading in Prior’s Ash and its neighbourhood. Some said the Bank had had a loss; some said the Bank was shaky; some said Mr. George Godolphin had been lending money from the Bank funds; some said their London agents had failed; some actually said that Thomas Godolphin was dead. The various turns taken by the rumour were extravagantly marvellous: but the whole, combined, whispered ominously of danger. Only let public fear be thoroughly aroused, and it would be all over. It was as a train of powder laid, which only wants one touch of a lighted match to set it exploding.

  Remittances arrived on the Saturday morning, in the ordinary course of business. Valuable remittances. Sufficient for the usual demands of the day: but not sufficient for any unusual demands. On the Friday afternoon a somewhat untoward incident had occurred. A stranger presented himself at the Bank and demanded to see Mr. George Godolphin. The clerk to whom he addressed himself left him standing at the counter and went away: to acquaint, as the stranger supposed, Mr. George Godolphin: but, in point of fact, the clerk was not sure whether Mr. George was in or out. Finding he was out, he told Mr. Hurde, who went forward: and was taken by the stranger for Mr. George Godolphin. Not personally knowing (as it would appear) Mr. George Godolphin, it was a natural enough mistake. A staid old gentleman, in spectacles, might well be supposed by a stranger to be one of the firm.

  “I have a claim upon you,” said the stranger, drawing a piece of paper out of his pocket. “Will you be so good as to settle it?”

  Mr. Hurde took the paper and glanced over it. It was an accepted bill, George Godolphin’s name to it.

  “I cannot say anything about this,” Mr. Hurde was beginning: but the applicant interrupted him.

  “I don’t want anything said. I want it paid.”

  “You should have heard me out,” rejoined Mr. Hurde. “I cannot say or do anything in this myself: you must see Mr. George Godolphin. He is out, but — —”

  “Come, none of that gammon!” interposed the stranger again, who appeared to have come prepared to enter upon a contest. “I was warned there’d be a bother over it: that Mr. George Godolphin would deny himself, and say black was white, if necessary. You can’t do me, Mr. George Godolphin.”

  “You are not taking me for Mr. George Godolphin?” exclaimed the old clerk, uncertain whether to believe his ears.

  “Yes, I am taking you for Mr. George Godolphin,” doggedly returned the man. “Will you take up this bill?”

  “I am not Mr. George Godolphin. Mr. George Godolphin will be in presently, and you can see him.”

  “It’s a do,” cried the stranger. “I want this paid. I know the claims there are against Mr. George Godolphin, and I have come all the way from town to enforce mine. I don’t want to come in with the ruck of his creditors, who’ll get a sixpence in the pound, maybe.”

  A very charming announcement to be made in a banking-house. The clerks pricked up their ears; the two or three customers who were present turned round from the counters and listened for more: for the civil gentleman had not deemed it necessary to speak in a subdued tone. Mr. Hurde, scared out of his propriety, in mortal fear lest anything worse might come, hurried the man to a safe place, and left him there to await the entrance of Mr. George Godolphin.

  Whether this incident, mentioned outside (as it was sure to be), put the finishing touch to the rumours already in circulation, cannot be known. Neither was it known to those interested, what Mr. George did with his loud and uncompromising customer, when he at length entered and admitted him to an interview. It is possible that but for this untoward application, the crash might not have come quite so soon.

  Saturday morning rose busily, as was usual at Prior’s Ash. However stagnant the town might be on other days, Saturday was always full of life and bustle. Prior’s Ash was renowned for its grain market; and dealers from all parts of the country flocked in to attend it. But on this morning some unusual excitement appeared to be stirring the town; natives and visitors. People stood about in groups, talking, listening, asking questions, consulting; and as the morning hours wore on, an unwonted stream appeared to be setting in towards the house of Godolphin, Crosse, and Godolphin. Whether the reports might be true or false, there would be no harm just to draw their money out and be on the safe side, was the mental remark made by hundreds. Could put it in again when the storm had blown over — if it proved to be only a false alarm.

  Under these circumstances, little wonder that the Bank was unusually favoured with visitors. One strange feature in their application was, that they all wanted to draw out money: not a soul came to pay any in. George Godolphin, fully aware of the state of things, alive to the danger, was present in person, his words gracious, his bearing easy, his smile gay as ever. Only to look at him eased some of them of half their doubt.

  But it did not arrest their cheques and old Hurde (whatever George might have done) grew paralyzed with fear.

  “For the love of Heaven, send for Mr. Godolphin, sir!” he whispered. “We can’t go on long at this rate.”

  “What good can he do?” returned George.

  “Mr. George, he ought to be sent for; he ought to know what’s going on; it is an imperative duty,” remonstrated the clerk, in a strangely severe tone. “In fact, sir, if you don’t send, I must. I am responsible to him.”

  “Send, then,” said George. “I only thought to spare him vexation.”

  Mr. Hurde beckoned Isaac Hastings. “Fly for your life up to Ashlydyat, and see Mr. Godolphin,” he breathed in his ear. “Tell him there’s a run upon the Bank.”

  Isaac, passing through the Bank with apparent unconcern, easy and careless as if he had taken a leaf from the book of George Godolphin, did not let the grass grow under his feet when he was out. But, instead of turning towards Ashlydyat, he took the way to All Souls’ Rectory.

  Arriving panting and breathless, he dashed in, and dashed against his brother Reginald, not five minutes arrived from a two years’ absence at sea. Scarcely giving half a moment to a passing greeting, he was hastening from the room again in search of his father.

  “Do you call that a welcome, Isaac?” exclaimed Mrs. Hastings, in a surprised and reproving tone. “What’s your hurry? One would think you were upon an errand of life and death.”

  “So I am: it is little short of it,” he replied in agitation. “Regy, don’t stop me: you will know all soon. Is my father in his room?”

  “He has gone out,” said Mrs. Hastings.

  “Gone out!” The words sounded like a knell. Unless his father hastened to the Bank, he might be a ruined man. “Where’s he gone, mother?”

  “My dear, I have not the least idea. What is the matter with you?”

  Isaac took one instant’s dismayed counsel with himself: he had not time for more. He could not go off in search of him; he must hasten to Ashlydyat. He looked up: laid summary hands upon his sister Rose, put her outside the door, closed it, and set his back against it.

  “Reginald, listen to me. You must go out and find my father. Search for him everywhere. Tell him there’s a run upon the Bank, and he must make haste if he would find himself safe. Mother, could you look for him as well? The Chisholms’ money is there, you know, and it would be nothing but ruin.”

  Mrs. Hastings gazed at Isaac with wondering eyes, puzzled with perplexity.

  “Don’t you understand, mother?” he urged. “I can’t look for him: I ought not to have come ou
t of my way as far as this. He must be found, so do your best, Reginald. Of course you will be cautious to say nothing abroad: I put Rose out that she might not hear this.”

  Opening the door again, passing the indignant Rose without so much as a word, Isaac sped across the road, and dashed through some cross-fields and lanes to Ashlydyat. His détour had not hindered him above three or four minutes, for he went at the pace of a steam-engine. He considered it — as Hurde had said by Mr. Godolphin — an imperative duty to warn his father. Thomas Godolphin was not up when he reached Ashlydyat. It was only between ten and eleven o’clock.

  “I must see him, Miss Godolphin,” he said to Janet. “It is absolutely necessary.”

  By words or by actions putting aside obstacles, he stood within Thomas Godolphin’s chamber. The latter had passed a night of suffering, its traces remaining on his countenance.

  “I shall be down at the Bank some time in the course of the day, Isaac: though I am scarcely equal to it,” he observed, as soon as he saw him. “Am I wanted for anything in particular?”

  “I — I — am sent up to tell you bad news, sir,” replied Isaac, feeling the communication an unpleasant one to make. “There’s a run upon the Bank.”

  “A run upon the Bank!” repeated Thomas Godolphin, scarcely believing the information.

  Isaac explained. A complete run. For the last hour, ever since the bank opened, people had been thronging in.

  Thomas paused. “I cannot imagine what can have led to it,” he resumed. “Is my brother visible?”

  “Oh yes, sir.”

  “That is well. He can assure them all that we are solvent: that there is no fear. Have the remittances come down?”

  “Yes, sir. But they will be nothing, Mr. Hurde says, with a run like this.”

  “Be so kind as to touch that bell for me, Isaac, to bring up my servant. I will be at the Bank immediately.”