A Gamble with Life Part 48

Marshall Brook came across to see him once or twice, and they had long walks and talks together, but he got no help out of their conversation and discussions. On the contrary, every talk seemed to make his task more and more difficult.

By slow and almost imperceptible steps he was coming back to the faith he had cast aside. He read the gospels with new interest, and saw in the books Madeline Grover lent him, and which he still kept, new and deeper meanings. But all this only put fresh thorns in his path. He wished sometimes that his philosophy of negations had never been disturbed, that he could still believe what he believed honestly enough when he entered into this fatal compact.

It seemed as though everything conspired to put difficulties in his path. He might be the victim of a malicious fate. He had told Muller that if he failed he should not want to live--that there would be nothing left worth living for. How little he knew! How little he guessed that that very day he would see a face that would change the world for him; that from that day a train of circ.u.mstances would be set in motion that would alter his entire outlook!

He was a different man to-day from what he was nine months ago. He looked at life and the world through different eyes. He had loved, and love had greatened him in spite of the fact that he had loved in vain.

He had reasoned about temperance, and righteousness, and a judgment to come, and out of the chaos of his own thinking had appeared the faint glimmerings of an eternal order. He had suffered, and suffering had developed in him the grace of patience, and toughened the fibres of his moral nature. He had come under influences which had quickened his drooping moral sense and made him look with steadier eyes at the meaning and mystery of life.

He never more ardently desired to do the right thing, was never so absolutely compelled to do the wrong. He wished sometimes that he could take some one into his confidence, Captain Tom Hendy, for instance. With his clear vision and strong common sense he might see a way out of the difficulty. But to take anyone into his confidence would be to give the whole case away. For Muller's sake he would have to preserve an inviolable silence, and yet the very silence was becoming more and more intolerable.

Toward the end of April he paid what he deemed would be his last visit to Muller. It would be a relief to put some of his thoughts into speech.

That, however, was not the main purpose of his visit. He had succeeded in putting all his affairs in order, in turning into cash everything that was saleable, and in discharging all outstanding obligations, and he was pleased to discover that he had still three hundred pounds left.

"I suppose this belongs to me," he said to himself, "to do what I like with," and he smiled sadly. Some men, under the circ.u.mstances, might have spent it in having what they would call a good time, but he was in no mood for feasting or mirth.

"I will take it back to Muller," he went on, "and lessen my obligation by that amount." So one Sat.u.r.day afternoon, when they left off early at the mine, he donned his holiday suit, and trudged off into Redbourne to see his friend.

He found Muller in his office as he expected. Muller had no domestic ties, and he preferred his office, as a rule, to any other place in the world.

Muller looked up with a little start of surprise when Rufus entered. In the first place, he was not expecting him, and in the second place, he was shocked at his appearance.

"h.e.l.lo, Sterne," he said, "what brings you into Redbourne to-day? Not to see a doctor, I hope," and a curious smile played round the corners of his mouth.

"I came to see you," Rufus answered, with a smile. "Doctors are of no use to me."

"Well, no," Muller replied, reflectively. "I presume you are right in that. But you look ill all the same--painfully ill."

"Do I? I was not aware. I feel about as usual."

"Not over cheerful, I presume. Well, I don't wonder. It's beastly hard luck. I think if I were in your place I should get the business over as quickly as possible."

"I have to consider your interests as well as my own feelings," Rufus answered, going to the window and looking down into the street.

"Well, yes, of course. If people suspected anything there might be old Harry to pay."

"Exactly. Then, you know, I have had a good many things to square up, and, on the whole, I have come out fairly well."

"What do you mean by that?"

"I mean that out of the thousand pounds I borrowed of you, I have three hundred left."

"So much?"

"Three pounds, seventeen and ninepence over, to be exact. But what I propose to do is to hand over the three hundred pounds to you, and so lessen my obligation by that amount."

Muller started, and a puzzled expression came into his eyes.

"The burden will seem a little lighter," Rufus went on, looking down into the street again.

"I confess I do not quite understand," Muller said, adjusting his pince-nez. "You don't mean t--t----" Then he stopped, and waited for Rufus further to explain himself.

"I mean," Rufus answered, walking across the room, and dropping into a chair, "that if there is any profit arising out of the transaction you shall have the full benefit of it."

"Oh, thanks, old man; that is good of you," and Muller's face brightened instantly.

"There are always expenses, of course?"

"A great many expenses, I am sorry to say. But you have been very thoughtful. Extremely considerate, if I may say so, without flattery."

"Oh, you can flatter as much as you like," Rufus answered, with a mirthless laugh. "It would be much more to the purpose, however, if you could see some other way out of the difficulty."

Muller's countenance changed again in a moment.

"You like not the prospect?" he said, cynically.

"To be honest, I don't. As a matter of fact, I despise myself for not seeing at the beginning all the issues involved."

"What issues do you refer to?"

"Moral issues in the main. The repayment of this loan is with us both a question of honour."

"That is so. As an honourable man you cannot escape it."

"I see that clearly enough. What I failed to see at the first--either because I refused to entertain the idea of failure, or else because my moral sense had become dull--was that I was proposing to pay a debt by fraud."

Muller laughed uneasily. "I think I pointed that out to you quite clearly on the day we settled the matter."

"I have no recollection of it."

"I did so most distinctly. I said if the company scented suicide they would dispute the claim, or words to that effect."

"And seeing this clearly you were willing to become a party to the fraud?"

Muller's eyes blazed in a moment. "Look here, Sterne," he said, angrily, "this is above a joke. You know very well that the proposal was not mine. You badgered and bullied and persuaded and gave me no peace. I yielded at length, much against my will, to oblige you. I made you angry when I pointed out in the frankest and most explicit way the consequences of failure, and now, confound it, when you have failed you come and blame me."

"No, no; you misunderstand me," Rufus said, mildly. "I have no wish to blame you. The proposal was my own, I frankly admit, and you yielded very reluctantly. But the thing that puzzles me is that while we talked about honour we neither of us seemed to realise that the proposal involved a glaring act of dishonour."

"Do you refer to the insurance company?"

"I do."

"My dear fellow, would you consider it a dishonourable act to appropriate a pin from your neighbour's dressing-table?"

"Well, no. There is no value in a pin."

"Yes, there is. All values are relative. To the company concerned the amount involved is scarcely more than the value of a pin to your landlady."

"If I took a penny from her dressing-table it would be theft."