Part 62 (1/2)

MR. VERRALL'S CHAMBERS.

In thoroughly handsome chambers towards the west-end of London, fitted up with costly elegance, more in accordance (one would think) with a place consecrated to the refinements of life, than to business, there sat one morning a dark gentleman, of staid and respectable appearance.

To look at his clean, smoothly shaven face, his grey hair, his gold-rimmed spectacles, his appearance altogether, every item of which carried respectability with it, you might have trusted the man at a first glance. In point of fact, he was got up _to be_ trusted. A fire was pleasant on those spring mornings, and a large and clear one flamed in the burnished grate. Miniature statues, and other articles possessing, one must suppose, some rare excellence, gave to the room a refined look; and the venerable gentleman (venerable in sober respectability, you must understand, more than from age, for his years were barely fifty) sat enjoying its blaze, and culling choice morsels from the _Times_. The money article, the price of stock, a large insolvency case, and other news especially acceptable to men of business, were being eagerly read by him.

An architect might have taken a model of these chambers, so artistically were they arranged. A client could pa.s.s into any one of the three rooms, and not come out by the same door; he might reach them by the wide, handsome staircase, descend by means of a ladder, and emerge in a back street. Not absolutely a ladder, but a staircase so narrow as almost to deserve the name. It did happen, once in a way, that a gentleman might prefer that means of exit, even if he did not of entrance. These chambers were, not to keep you longer in suspense, the offices of the great bill-discounting firm, Trueworthy and Co.

One peculiar feature in their internal economy was, that no client ever got to see Mr. Trueworthy. He was too great a man to stoop to business in his own proper person. He was taking his pleasure in the East; or he was on a visit to some foreign court, the especial guest of its imperial head; or sojourning with his bosom friend the Duke of Dorsets.h.i.+re at his shooting-box; or reposing at his own country seat; or ill in bed with gout. From one or other of these contingencies Mr. Trueworthy was invariably invisible. It happened now and then that there was a disturbance in these elegant chambers, caused by some ill-bred and ill-advised gentleman, who persisted in saying that he had been hardly treated--in point of fact, ruined. One or two had, on these occasions, broadly a.s.serted their conviction that there was no Mr. Trueworthy at all: but of course their ravings, whether on the score of their own wrongs, or on the non-existence of that estimable gentleman, whose fas.h.i.+onable movements might have filled a weekly column of the _Court Circular_, were taken for what they were worth.

In the years gone by--only a very few years, though--the firm had owned another head: at any rate, another name. A young, fair man, who had disdained the exclusiveness adopted by his successor, and deemed himself not too great a mortal to be seen of men. This unfortunate princ.i.p.al had managed his affairs badly. In some way or other he came to grief.

Perhaps the blame lay in his youth. Some one was so wicked as to prefer against him a charge of swindling; and ill-natured tongues said it would go hard with him--fifteen years at least. What they meant by the last phrase, they best knew. Like many another charge, it never came to anything. The very hour before he would have been captured, he made his escape, and had never since been seen or heard of. Some surmised that he was dead, some that he was in hiding abroad: only one thing was certain--that into this country he could not again enter.

All that, however, was past and gone. The gentleman, Mr. Brompton, sitting at his ease over his newspaper, his legs stretched out to the blaze, was the confidential manager and head of the office. Half the applicants did not know but that he was its princ.i.p.al: strangers, at first, invariably believed that he was so. A lesser satellite, a clerk, or whatever he might be, sat in an outer room, and bowed in the clients, his bow showing far more deference to this gentleman than to the clients themselves. How could the uninitiated suppose that he was anything less than the princ.i.p.al?

On this morning there went up the broad staircase a gentleman whose remarkably good looks drew the eyes of the pa.s.sers-by towards him, as he got out of the cab which brought him. The clerk took a hasty step forward to arrest his progress, for the gentleman was crossing the office with a bold step: and all steps might not be admitted to that inner room. The gentleman, however, put up his hand, as if to say, Don't you know me? and went on. The clerk, who at the first moment had probably not had time to recognize him, threw open the inner door.

”Mr. George G.o.dolphin, sir.”

Mr. George G.o.dolphin strode on. He was evidently not on familiar terms with the gentleman who rose to receive him, for he did not shake hands with him. His tone and manner were courteous.

”Is Mr. Verrall here?”

”He is not here, Mr. G.o.dolphin. I am not sure that he will be here to-day.”

”I must see him,” said George, firmly. ”I have followed him to town to see him. You know that he came up yesterday?”

”Yes. I met him last night.”

”I should suppose, as he was sent for unexpectedly--which I hear was the case--that he was sent for on business; and therefore that he would be here to-day,” pursued George.

”I am not sure of it. He left it an open question.”

George looked uncommonly perplexed. ”I must see him, and I must be back at Prior's Ash during business hours to-day. I must catch the eleven down-train if possible.”

”Can I do for you as well as Mr. Verrall?” asked Mr. Brompton, after a pause.

”No, you can't. Verrall I must see. It is very strange that you don't know whether he is to be here or not.”

”It happens to-day that I do not know. Mr. Verrall left it last night, I say, an open question.”

”It is the loss of time that I am thinking of,” returned George. ”You see if I go down now to his residence, he may have left it to come up here; and we should just miss each other.”

”Very true,” a.s.serted Brompton.

George stood for a moment in thought, and then turned on his heel, and departed. ”Do you know whether Mr. Verrall will be up this morning?” he asked of the clerk, as he pa.s.sed through the outer room.

The clerk shook his head. ”I am unable to say, sir.”

George went down to the cab, and entered it. ”Where to, sir?” asked the driver, as he closed the door.

”The South-Western Railway.”