Part 42 (1/2)
”Where did you pick _her_ up?” asked Marsden, when the girl had gone.
”She's healthy enough and plump enough--but she looks half-baked.”
”She will do very well, if you give her time to learn.”
”Oh, _I_'ll let her learn, if _you_ can teach her.... But what was I saying? Oh, yes--about the furniture!”
Then he walked round the room, pointing at different things, and continuing his questions.
”Did this come out of the shop?”
”Yes.”
”And this?... And those chairs?... And the sofa?”
She did not understand why he asked. But he soon explained himself. He said that all this furniture was taken out of the shop, and it therefore belonged to the firm--or at any rate could not be considered as her private property.
”A partners.h.i.+p is a partners.h.i.+p,” he added sententiously.
”But it was ages before the partners.h.i.+p. And all the things were paid for by me.”
”No, not paid for,” he said quickly. ”Not paid for in _cash_--just a matter of writing down a debit somewhere and a credit somewhere else, and saying it was accounted for. But from the point of view of the shop, that's a bogus transaction.”
”How absurd!”
”No, _not_ absurd--common sense. The shop never got a penny profit, and it seems to me that--”
”Oh, I won't dispute it with you. What is it that you want done?”
”I want the _right_ thing to be done,” he replied slowly, as if deliberating on a knotty point. ”And it isn't easy to say off-hand what that is.”
”Do you want me to send the things back into the department?”
”No.... No, the time has pa.s.sed for doing that. It would muddle the accounts. Come into the dining-room, and show me the shop things in there.”
She obeyed him; and then he asked if there were any shop things upstairs.
”Yes, several.”
”Well, you can show me those to-morrow morning.... I begin to see my way. Yes, I think I see now what's fair and proper.”
”Do you?”
He said emphatically that in justice and equity he possessed a half share of all goods taken out of his shop, no matter how long ago. And he insisted on having his share. He would obtain a valuation of the goods, and Mrs. Marsden could pay him cash for half the amount, and retain the goods. Or he would send the goods to London and sell them by auction; and they would each take half the proceeds.
Mrs. Marsden chose the second method of dealing with the problem.
”All right,” said Marsden. ”So be it. I dare say they'll fetch a tidy sum--and it's share and share alike, of course, for the two of us.”
Two days after this the house was stripped of nearly all that had given it an air of opulent comfort and decorative luxury. Mrs. Marsden went to the department of the firm, and bought the cheapest bedroom things she could find to fill the blank s.p.a.ces and ugly gaps upstairs, and paid for everything with her private purse.