Mortomley's Estate.

Vol. III.

by Charlotte Elizabeth Lawson Cowan Riddell.

CHAPTER I.

THE MEETING OF CREDITORS.

If any person ever questioned the wisdom of Mr. Asherill in taking for his partner that perfect gentleman Mr. Swanland, his doubts must have been dispelled had he chanced to be present at the meeting of creditors--_re_ Archibald Mortomley.

Mr. Asherill himself would have felt proud of his junior, had his principles permitted of his attending on the occasion.

There was a judicial calmness about Mr. Swanland, which produced its effect on even the most refractory member of that motley throng.

It would have been almost as easy for a creditor to question the decision of a Vice-Chancellor, as the statements of that unprejudiced accountant.

If Mr. Swanland did not fling back his coat and unbutton his waistcoat, and tear open his shirt and request those present to look into his heart, and see if falsehood could there find a resting-place, he, at least, posed himself as Justice, and held the scales, I am bound to state, with strict impartiality between debtor and creditor.

His worst enemy could not say he favoured either. If his own brother had gone into liquidation, he would not have turned the beam against the creditors in favour of that misguided man.

Even-handed justice was meted out in Salisbury House. The old fable of the two animals that stole the cheese, and asked a wiser than themselves to decide as to the share to which each was entitled, was put on the boards there, and acted day after day, and with a like result. In their earnest desire to be perfectly impartial towards both sides, Messrs.

Asherill and Swanland ate up the cheese themselves.

If this proceeding failed to satisfy either creditor or debtor, it was no fault of theirs.

No one could say they had shown favouritism; and, indeed, it would have been very wicked if any one had, since Mr. Asherill--and inclusively Mr.

Swanland--always declared each estate as it came, and was liquidated, left them losers by the transaction. Nevertheless, the villa residences of both gentlemen bore no evidence of poverty; on the contrary--though had either partner taken the trouble to visit the houses of those who were so ill-advised as to go into liquidation instead of bankruptcy, he would have found that the "friendly arrangement" carried on under the paternal eye of Mr. Asherill, or the dispassionate gaze of Mr. Swanland, had not resulted in any increase of luxury for the debtors or their families.

Like his senior, however, Mr. Swanland was utterly indifferent to the ruin of his clients, so long as he compassed his own success.

Heaven forbid I should say that all men of his profession are cast in the same mould, but there can be no question that the new law throws a fearful amount of power into the hands of any one who likes to use it for his own advantage, and places at the same time any trustee who desires to deal leniently with a bankrupt in a position of unpleasant responsibility.

To put the matter plainly, if a trustee has a fancy for the cheese, he can eat it himself, rind and all; but if he thinks this creditor has been hardly done by, or that the debtor is a poor devil, really very much to be pitied, he had better take care how he gives expression to such sentiments.

It is far wiser to adopt Mr. Swanland's _role_, and please nobody, than run the risk of trying to please anybody but himself.

But at a meeting of creditors when his mission was to tell a flattering tale and get the ear of the assemblage, Mr. Swanland was a man of whom his partner felt justly proud.

What could be neater than the way in which he placed the state of affairs, _so far as his information went_, before the bulls of Bashan with whom he had to deal.

Like oil on the waters came the flow of Mr. Swanland's fluent tongue.

He uttered no disparagement of Mortomley. His position was unfortunate, doubtless, and so was the position of his creditors, but Mr. Swanland was pleased to inform the meeting that he expected the estate to return a very good dividend; a very good dividend indeed.

From what he could hear and from what he had seen, he was justified in saying a large profit could be realized by carrying on the works. There were a fine plant, an extensive connection, and a considerable amount of stock.

It was perhaps unfortunate that Mr. Mortomley had not sooner taken his creditors into his confidence; but, said Mr. Swanland with a touching humility that might have done credit to Mr. Asherill himself, "we are all liable to error."

"Mr. Mortomley acted for the best, no doubt." Here there was a murmur of dissent from the bulk of the audience, "but whether it has proved for the best or not in the past, at all events he has acted wisely in the present by relinquishing everything to his creditors."

Here one sceptical wretch suggested "he hadn't given anything up till he couldn't help hisself."

Which was indeed a statement too perfectly true to be controverted.

Mr. Swanland therefore glossed it over. "No doubt," he said, "Mr.

Mortomley would have done better for himself, and--others--had he consulted his friends and creditors at an earlier stage of his embarrassments, but even as matters stood, it afforded him, Mr.

Swanland, much gratification to be able to state that no real cause existed for the gloomy view of affairs taken by a few of the gentlemen in the room.

"He begged to be allowed to lay before the meeting a statement of Mr.

Mortomley's liabilities and probable assets." Which he did.

It was no part of Mr. Swanland's policy at this period to cover his canvas with dark colours.

Rather he went in for Turneresque effects, and threw a lurid light upon the profits which might be expected from the continuance of the business under _proper supervision_; from the leasing of Homewood and its grounds to a suitable and responsible tenant; from the sale of the effects; from the collection of the outstanding book debts, and the appropriation of the remaining portion of Mrs. Mortomley's fortune.

When he came to this last part of his story, over which he was rather inclined to slur, as an inexperienced pianist slurs a difficult passage in a new piece of music, the knowing ones amongst the creditors pricked up their ears, and one of them, a gentleman who was quite as sharp in his way as Mr. Gibbons, and a vast deal more honest, said,

"If you tell us, Mr. Swanland, how much the estate can pay in cash now, we had better take that amount than await the result of liquidation; whether it be a shilling, half-a-crown, or five shillings in the pound, I say let us all agree to take whatever the estate can pay, and give the bankrupt his discharge. Then if he is honest he can begin again and pay us all off; and if he is not honest, we shall not be one bit worse off than if we allow the concern to go on and stand by watching the whole estate eaten up by lawyers and accountants."

There was a horrible pause; a pause during which Mr. Forde turned sick with terror and Mr. Swanland white with rage, and more than one non-fluent creditor cleared his throat and wetted his lips preparatory to following the suit of the last speaker, and expressing his own humble opinion about the subject on hand.

That pause was broken by Kleinwort.

"I mean not to be rude," he began in his broken English, which was no better and no worse than on that evil day (for England) when he first landed at Folkestone, "but might I make bold to inquire how large is the little stake of that last speaker so confident, in the estate of our poor sick Mortomley?"

"Our little stake, Mr. Kleinwort," answered the opposing creditor, "is not quite three hundred pounds; but still three hundred pounds is more than I and my partner care to lose totally if we can get anything out of the fire. To the majority of people, this liquidation business is as a new toy. Creditors are delighted with it at first. We have had some experience of its working, however; and when a man goes into bankruptcy we write his account down "doubtful," when he goes into liquidation we write it off "bad."

Then arose a babel of tongues. Mr. Forde, Mr. Kleinwort, Mr. Gibbons, and a host of other creditors, talking all at once, none listening.

To all intents and purposes there was not the slightest necessity for this expression of opinions. Mortomley's affairs had been all settled before the meeting of his creditors was convened. Forde had spoken, and Kleinwort had spoken, and a few other people besides, who amongst them virtually arranged the programme of his business future; and though an Act of Parliament rendered this crush, by intimation, indispensable as a matter of formality, it was, in reality, perfectly useless as a matter of fact.

The only possible pleasure or advantage the most persistent of the smaller creditors could derive from attending the meeting, was the opportunity it afforded him of bemoaning his own hard fortune, and the wickedness of Mortomley in having omitted to settle his little account at all events.

It did not signify in the least that to these lamentations no one listened, unless, indeed, some man gifted with a louder voice and greater powers of endurance than his neighbours compelled the attention of the trustee, who was always able to silence him with some calm and plausible answer,--the indignant creditor had spoken aloud and "given them a piece of his mind straight out,"--while, so far as Mr. Swanland was concerned, his experience had taught him that these ebullitions were all so many safety valves which prevented the possibility of any serious explosion damaging his interests.

At last it became patent even to the representative man who always announces his intention of "attending the meeting personally," of "seeing to his own matters for hisself," and who generally tells the assembled company that all he wants is his money--and his money he will have--that the large creditors were with the trustee; and as the trustee, they considered, must be friendly to Mortomley, there was no use in pushing opposition further.

And indeed there was not. A certain number of creditors who did not "wish to do Mr. Mortomley any harm," who had found Mr. Mortomley a very fair dealing gentleman, and hoped he would get through his trouble all right, had readily agreed to everything Mr. Benning's managing clerk proposed in Mr. Mortomley's interest, and the result was that the amount required and the numbers required to carry a majority had all been made up long before the meeting.

Nevertheless, as he blandly suggested, Mr. Swanland liked to see unanimity amongst the creditors. Kleinwort backing him up with a remark to the effect that "the goods of one was for the goods of all."

"If I get my money," he observed to one splenetic individual, "you get your money. If I get not mine, you get not yours; but look how big is mine besides your little dot; and I am content to wait and believe. Be you content too."

Over the choice of the gentlemen who were to form the committee of management, and who were popularly supposed to be placed on a higher pinnacle of power than that occupied by Mr. Swanland, there proved, however, more difficulty than the trustee bargained for.

Not that it mattered materially to him; but opposition in any shape chafed a temper by no means angelic, induced to a certain degree, perhaps, by a digestion far from good.