and when I come back from Paris I shall try to stir you all up to something like activity."
There was another laugh, and then Wilson said, "Well, it is the best thing you can do to go abroad. I don't believe you would ever make a fresh start here."
"I have made fresh a start, Wilson; our respected brother Terrier here, has undertaken to teach me the rudiments, and for the next three months his studio doors will be closed to all visitors from ten to five."
"Is that so? I congratulate you, Cuthbert; that really looks like business, and if Terrier can't teach you how to use the brush and put on color no one can. Gentlemen, we will drink the health of the new boy. Here is to Cuthbert Hartington, and success to him." Glasses were raised and the sentiment heartily echoed.
For three months Cuthbert worked steadily; to his own surprise, not less than to that of his instructor, he found the hours none too long for him. During that time he had received a letter from Mr. Brander that surprised him.
"Dear Mr. Hartington—In accordance with your instructions I at once informed the Receiver of the bank that you were prepared to hand over the Fairclose estates for the benefit of the creditors, instead of waiting for the calls to be made, and that you wished the matter to be arranged as speedily as possible as you were shortly going abroad. The necessary deeds will in a few days be prepared. You will doubtless be surprised to hear that I have arranged with the Receiver for the purchase of the estates by private treaty. I have long been intending to retire from business, and have been on the lookout for an estate in the county. I hope this arrangement will not be displeasing to you."
As Mr. Brander had the reputation of being a wealthy man, and his wife's wishes that he should retire from business and purchase an estate in the county were public property, Cuthbert was not surprised, but at the same time he was not altogether pleased. He had never liked the lawyer. He had no particular grounds for not doing so, but he had as a boy an instinctive notion that he was a humbug.
"I wonder," he said to himself, "whether he has all along had an eye to Fairclose, and whether he really did his best to dissuade my father from making that disastrous investment. At any rate, it does not make any difference to me who is there. It might have been some stranger, some manufacturing fellow; I would rather think of Mary being at the old place than a man of that sort. He would have been more likely than Brander to be hard on the tenants, and to have sold off all the things and have turned the place inside out. I don't say that under ordinary circumstances I should choose Brander as a landlord, but he will know well enough that there would be nothing that would do him more harm in the county than a report that he was treating the Squire's tenants harshly. Well, I suppose I had better write him a line saying that I am glad to hear that he has bought the place, as I would naturally prefer that it should be in his hands than those of a stranger."
A fortnight later, Cuthbert, in looking over the "Abchester Guardian," which was sent to him weekly, as the subscription was not yet run out, read the following paragraph: "We understand that our greatly respected townsman, Mr. J. Brander, has purchased the house and estate of Fairclose, which has come into the market owing to the failure of the Abchester Bank, in which the late Mr. Hartington was most unfortunately a shareholder, and which has involved hundreds of families in ruin. The greatest sympathy is everywhere expressed for Mr. Cuthbert Hartington. We understand that the price given by Mr. Brander was £55,000. We believe that we are correct in stating that Mr. Brander was the holder of a mortgage of £15,000 on the estate."
"Mortgage for £15,000," Cuthbert repeated, "impossible. Why should my father have mortgaged the place? He could have no occasion to raise the money. His tastes were most simple, and I am sure that he never lived beyond his income. He paid me a handsome allowance, but, thank God, I never exceeded it. What in the world can this mean! I will write to Brander at once. No, I won't, I will write to the liquidator. If there was such a thing he is certain to have looked into it closely, for it was so much off the sum available for assets."
By return of post Cuthbert received the following letter:
"Dear Mr. Hartington—In reply to your question I beg to confirm the statement in the newspaper cutting you send to me. Mr. Brander was the holder of a mortgage for £15,000 on your father's estate. I looked into the matter very closely, as it came as a surprise upon us. Everything was in proper order. Mr. Brander's bank-book showed that he drew out £15,000 on the date of the mortgage, and the books of the bank confirm his book. Notice had been given to them a week previously that he would require that sum in notes and gold, and it was so paid over to him. His books also show payment of the interest, and his receipts for the same were found among Mr. Hartington's papers. There was, therefore, no shadow of a doubt possible as to the genuine nature of the mortgage.—Yours truly, W. H. Cox."
Although satisfied that for some reason or other his father had borrowed this sum on mortgage from his lawyer, Cuthbert was no less puzzled than before as to the purpose for which it had been raised, or what his father could possibly have done with the money. He, therefore, wrote to Mr. Brander, saying that though it was a matter in which he had himself no pecuniary interest, he should be glad if he would inform him of the circumstance which led his father to borrow such a sum.
"I thought," he said, "that I knew everything about my father's money affairs, for he always spoke most openly about them to me, and he never let drop a word as to the mortgage or as to any difficulty in which he had involved himself, or any investment he had thought of making; and I am, therefore, entirely at a loss to understand how he could have required such a sum of money."
The lawyer's answer came in due course.
"My dear Mr. Hartingon—I was in no way surprised at the receipt of your letter, and indeed have been expecting an inquiry from you as to the mortgage. It happened in this way: Some three years ago your father said to me, 'I want to raise £15,000 on the estate, Brander.' I was naturally greatly surprised, for acting for him as I did, I was, of course, aware that he lived well within his income. He went on, 'Of course you are surprised, Brander, but as you must know well most men have a skeleton in a cupboard somewhere. I have one, and as I am getting on in life I want to bury it for good. It makes no difference to you what it is, and I have no intention of going into the matter. It suffices that I want £15,000.' 'Of course there is no difficulty about that, sir,' I said, 'the estate is unencumbered, and as there is no entail you are free to do with it as you like. 'But I want it done quietly,' he said, 'I don't want it talked about that I have mortgaged Fairclose. The best plan by far would be for you to do it yourself, which I have no doubt you can do easily enough if you like.' I said that I would much rather have nothing to do with it, as I have always considered it a mistake for lawyers to become principals in money transactions with their clients, and had always refused to do anything of the sort. However, he put the matter so strongly that he at last induced me, against my better judgment, to consent to advance the money, and at his earnest request I handed him the money in notes, so that no one, even at the bank, should be aware that such a sum had passed between us. Of course the mortgage was drawn up in the usual form and duly executed and witnessed, and I have no doubt that the liquidator of the bank will be happy to show you your father's receipt for the money and the receipts given by me to him for the interest. As you say the matter does not pecuniarily affect you now, but at the same time I am naturally anxious you should satisfy yourself thoroughly that the transaction was in every respect a bona fide one."
Cuthbert sat for some time with the letter before him.
"I suppose the dear old dad must have got into some scrape or other years ago," he said to himself. "What it was it is no use wondering, still less inquiring about. I am surprised he never told me, but I suppose he could not wind himself up to the point, and I have no doubt he intended to tell me some day, and would have done so if he hadn't been carried off so suddenly. Anyhow, he knew me well enough to be sure that when I heard of this mortgage, and learned how it had been done that my love and respect
