The Three Clerks eBook

And then in the evening, on this evening and other evenings, on all evenings, they talked over the prospects of the West Cork and Ballydehob branch, and of the Limehouse Bridge, which according to Undy’s theory is destined to work quite a revolution in the East-end circles of the metropolis.  Undy had noble ideas about this bridge.  The shares at the present moment were greatly at a discount—­so much the better, for they could be bought at a cheaper rate; and they were sure to rise to some very respectable figure as soon as Undy should have played out with reference to them the parliamentary game which he had in view.

And so from morning to morning, and from night to night, they talked over their unholy trade till the price of shares and the sounds of sums of money entered into Alaric’s soul.  And this, perhaps, is one of the greatest penalties to which men who embark in such trade are doomed, that they can never shake off the remembrance of their calculations; they can never drop the shop; they have no leisure, no ease; they can never throw themselves with loose limbs and vacant mind at large upon the world’s green sward, and call children to come and play with them.  At the Weights and Measures Alaric’s hours of business had been from ten to five.  In Undy’s office they continued from one noon till the next, incessantly; even in his dreams he was working in the share market.

On his return to town Alaric found a letter from Captain Cuttwater, pressing very urgently for the repayment of his money.  It had been lent on the express understanding that it was to be repaid when Parliament broke up.  It was now the end of October, and Uncle Bat was becoming uneasy.

Alaric, when he received the letter, crushed it in his hand, and cursed the strictness of the man who had done so much for him.  On the next day another slice was taken from the fortune of Madame Jaquetanape; and his money, with the interest, was remitted to Captain Cuttwater.

CHAPTER XXX

MRS. WOODWARD’S REQUEST

We will now go back for a while to Hampton.  The author, for one, does so with pleasure.  Though those who dwell there be not angels, yet it is better to live with the Woodwards and Harry Norman, with Uncle Bat, or even with the unfortunate Charley, than with such as Alaric and Undy Scott.  The man who is ever looking after money is fitting company only for the devils, of whom, indeed, he is already one.

But Charley cannot any longer be called one of the Cottage circle.  It was now the end of October, and since the day of his arrest, he had not yet been there.  He had not been asked; nor would he go uninvited, as after what had passed at Hampton Court Bridge he surely might have done.

And consequently they were all unhappy.  No one was more so than Charley.  When the prospect of the happy evening with Norah had been so violently interrupted by his arrest, he had, among his other messages, sent word to the ‘Cat and Whistle,’ excusing his absence by a statement of the true cause.  From that day to this of which we are now speaking he had seen neither Mrs. Davis nor her fair protegee.