"'Whether I do or not I shall not follow your advice, though I suppose you mean it kindly. If my husband's creditors want every article in Homewood, why, they must take even to the last chair, that is all. If I had to turn out to-night without a shelter or a penny I would not do what you suggest.'

"He bowed and went away without speaking another word, and of course I thought the subject was ended.

"Quite by accident I went an hour ago to Lenore's room, and there to my astonishment I found piled up on the drawers and tables all the knick-knacks out of the drawing-room; the timepieces, the vases, the statuettes, the little genuine silver we have not parted with, and a whole tribe of other articles.

"Then I rang for Esther and asked what it meant. Turner, it appeared, after leaving me, told her I understood nothing whatever of our real position, and that the greatest service she could do me was to send as much as possible to some safe place of keeping without mentioning the matter to me.

"And acting on this, she had intended to get up about four o'clock and pack up all she could, and take the spoil with her to Great Dassell.

"I was so angry I said sharp things to the girl I ought not to have said. I believe I frightened her to death, and I know I have made myself quite ill and hysterical with the passion I got into."

"Esther is happy enough now. She did it all for the best, and I have told her how sorry I am to have spoken sharply; but, Rupert, Rupert, what is the meaning of all this? There is something in liquidation we do not understand."

"I do not think there is," was the reply. "This man only spoke according to his light, which seems to be a very poor one. He simply advised that course to be taken which would be taken by ninety-nine people out of a hundred."

"Then if such is the case, I cannot wonder at Mr. Forde's idea that debtors are thieves."

"And at the same time there may be some reason for the debtors' belief that creditors are robbers."

"Oh!" cried Dolly, "that it were all ended."

"It will be some day, please God," he answered. "And now, Dolly, do get to bed; your white face will disturb my dreams. When had you anything to eat?"

"I don't think I have eaten anything since Thursday," she answered; "anything, I mean, worth calling a meal."

"You will kill yourself if you go on as you are doing," he said, but she shook her head.

"I am going to live to a hundred and forty, like the Countess of Desmond, who died in consequence of a fall from a cherry-tree," Dolly explained. "I shall be a great-great-great-grandmother, and I shall inculcate upon the first, second, third, and fourth generations the truth of that old proverb, 'Take care of the pence, and the pounds will take care of themselves.'"

"Never mind pence or pounds either, Dolly. I wish you would take care of yourself."

"Why?" she asked; then went on, "I wonder if on the face of the earth besides Archie and Lenore, and Esther and Mrs. Werner, and perhaps my Aunt Celia, there is a creature who would be really sorry if I died to-night?"

"Do you exclude me?" Rupert marvelled.

"You have not lived long enough to be very sorry about anything except your own affairs--about any trouble coming to those connected with you unless their sorrow means loss of comfort to yourself."

"Do you think I am not sorry for Archie and you now?"

"I am quite sure you are," she replied bitterly. "Homewood has been a pleasant house for you to live in; far pleasanter than Elm Park can ever prove."

"Dolly," he interrupted, "I do not mean to call you ungrateful, but considering how I have been working on your behalf to-day--"

"We need not discuss the question," she remarked as he stopped and paused. "There is no necessity now for us to go into our accounts and put down, 'I have done this, and Archie has done the other.' Before this liquidation business is ended we shall have ample opportunity of doing full justice each to the other--only--Rupert, I do not think you would have been quite so ready to leave Homewood had your opinion and that of the man Turner not to a certain extent coincided."

"You wrong me greatly," he answered, "but as you say there is no necessity for us to discuss these questions now. Do go to bed, dear; you will knock yourself up if you neither rest nor sleep, and then who can see to Archie?"

"Good night," she said holding out her hand, "if I have misjudged you I am sorry."

He held the door open for her to pass out, and watched her as she flitted up the staircase.

Had she misjudged him Rupert wondered. No. Her instinct guided her aright when reason might have failed to do so.

"I suppose I am a rat," he thought, "and that by some curious intuition I did guess the ship was sinking. Knowledge and calculation had, however, nothing to do with the matter. That I can declare. Now it will perhaps be well for me to calculate. I do not much relish hearing a list of benefits conferred, recited at each interview."

In his heart Rupert felt very angry. An individual must be remarkably good looking to approve of a mirror which reflects him feature by feature, wrinkle by wrinkle, exactly as he is!

CHAPTER VIII.

MR. SWANLAND STIRS HIS TEA.

At a few minutes before six next morning, as Messrs. Lang and Hankins were coming up the road, still sleepy after the long rest afforded by the previous day, they saw Rupert Halling advancing to meet them.

It was a miserable morning, raining a fine drizzling rain with a cold wind blowing at the same time, but Rupert, careless as usual of the state of the weather, walked along under the trees, his cap a little on one side, his shooting-jacket flying open, whistling a low soft melody confidentially to himself.

"Good morning," he said to the men. "No one could call this a fine one.

Lang, give the keys to Hankins and walk with me a little way; I want to speak to you."

In a few words Mr. Halling explained his difficulty, and asked Lang to help him out of it.

"I can manage that easily enough," was the answer. "Luckily I did not make up my books on Saturday as I generally do. Now, sir, remember you know nothing except that you understood I was short twenty-five pounds for the wages. Leave all the rest to me."

"You are sure, Lang, you do not mind interfering in this."

Mr. Lang laughed a short laugh, more like a snort than an evidence of merriment.

"Mind!" he echoed, "have I not been through the fire myself? but then I knew what was coming and arranged accordingly. Otherwise me and my wife and the children would not have had a bed to lie on. Mind! If the governor or you had only told me things were coming to this pass, we might have had a snug business at work some place else by this time, and snapped our fingers at them all. By Heavens, to think of it!" added Mr.

Lang, stopping to look at Homewood. "I wish it had been bankruptcy though, if it must be anything, and then we should have had some chance of speaking out our minds about that rubbish from the General Chemical Company."

"I did not know you had ever been bankrupt," said Rupert.

"Yes, sir; I had to fail; after the old gentleman's death," with a jerk of his head he indicated that he meant Mr. Mortomley, senior. "I must needs go as working partner into a firm who promised to do wonders for me. When they had picked my skull clean, they wanted to pitch me over, and they did pitch me over, thinking to have all the road to themselves, but that was not good enough for me, not at all," added Mr. Lang sarcastically. "I had a little money and I got a place and I set to work, and I could have done well only there was not an article I dealt in they did not offer at a lower price.

"Seeing their game I lowered my prices, then they cut theirs still lower, and so we went on till at last what we charged did not pay men's wages, let alone material and rent and all the rest of it.

"I being a practical man, and able to work myself, had a little the advantage of them; and besides I knew what must come, sooner or later, and so managed matters that when the brokers came in at last--and I was sick to death of expecting them before they did come--there was not enough in my house to pay the expenses of levying.

"At the works of course everything remained as usual, for there was not an article in them ever likely to be of use to me again.

"My old partners and me smashed up about the same time, and they have never done any good since. I met one of them only the other day and he says,

"'Lang,' he says, 'I wish we could have agreed and stayed together,' he says, 'we might all have been independent by this time.'

"'I wish,' I says, 'you could have acted honourable by me. It might have been better for you in the long run. For myself, I'm pretty comfortable, thank you. I have a good berth at Mortomley's, and needn't lie awake half my nights thinking about the wages for Saturday.'