In the Hands of the Malays, and Other Stories Part 4

"I was sorry not to be able to come, Cissie," Roland said, "and I am sorry I shall not be able to keep my engagement to go sleighing on the 26th."

"I am very sorry too; I should have been so glad to have gone with you, if you could have taken me, but I was afraid you would not be able to. I want to tell you, Roland,"--and she hesitated. "I don't know whether people talk about such things, but I am sure you won't mind. I want to tell you how sorry we all are about the news we have heard, and to say I hope it is not going to make any difference to you."

"I am afraid it must make a difference, Cissie," Roland answered; "but thank you very much for what you have said, and I want to tell you that whatever people may think, I and my mother know that my father did not do this thing that they accuse him of, and some day I hope to prove his innocence."

"I am so glad to hear you say so, Roland; it did seem impossible, and yet,"--and she hesitated.

"And yet everyone said so," he put in. "Unfortunately my father is a very nervous and sensitive man, and the thought of such a charge made him well-nigh beside himself, and he went away; but he is not guilty for all that, and some day I will prove it. Will you please tell the people--the people I know, I mean--not that my father is innocent, for they might not believe it, but that his wife and son are absolutely sure that he is so?"

"I will indeed, Roland, and I am very, very glad to hear what you say.

You may be sure that whatever other people say in future, I shall believe it as you tell me. Good-bye now!" And again shaking hands warmly, she hurried away after her companions, who were waiting for her at the corner of the next block.

"What have you found to talk about, Cissie? I would have stopped and spoken too, only I could not think what I should say."

"I told him that I was sorry to hear the news," Cissie said, "and that I hoped it would not make any difference to him."

"Oh, Cissie, you don't mean to say you alluded to that! How could you!"--a chorus from the others.

"Why not?" Cissie asked. "He knew that we must be thinking about it, and why shouldn't I say it? and I am glad I did, for if I had not spoken perhaps he would not have alluded to the matter, and he told me that whatever other people might say, he and his mother were quite sure that Mr. Partridge did not take the money."

There was an incredulous "Oh!" from her hearers, and Jane Simmonds asked, "What did he run away for, then, if he wasn't guilty?"

"Because he is sensitive, and could not stay to face such an accusation.

Of course Roland did not say that he was foolish, but I could see that he thought that it was an awful pity."

"I should think it was," Jane Simmonds replied sarcastically. "Of course his wife and son say they think he is innocent, that is only natural; but they won't get anyone to believe them."

"You are wrong for once, Jane," Cissie said quietly, "although I know that it must appear to you to be quite impossible; but, as it happens, I believe them entirely, and although I am a very insignificant person, still I am somebody, and that, you see, upsets your sweeping a.s.sertion."

"Well, my dear," Jane Simmonds replied, "if you wish to retain your reputation as a sensible girl I should advise you to keep your opinion to yourself, unless indeed you wish to set up as knowing more than anyone else in the town."

"I shall do nothing of the sort," Cissie replied. "Ca.s.sandra was looked upon as an idiot, you know, but she turned out to be right. Brownsville is welcome to entertain the same opinion about me, and I am content that they should think so till I turn out to be right, as you will see will be the case in the end; and now I must be off to tea."

The sale came off on the day arranged. No word had been received from Mr. Partridge, but his wife had hardly expected that he would write so soon; and as she knew he had some hundred dollars in his possession when he went away, she was under no uneasiness respecting him. On the morning of the sale she went to her brother's, Roland's plan having finally been decided upon as the best. The day before the sale Mrs. Partridge received a note from Mr. Johnstone saying that he should be glad to obtain a position for her son in a mercantile house in New York; to which Mrs. Partridge replied that she was greatly obliged and thankful for the offer, but that Roland had quite made up his mind that for the present he should remain in Brownsville, where he hoped to obtain some sort of occupation.

The refusal was speedily known in Brownsville, Percy Johnstone spreading the news everywhere; it excited surprise among some, displeasure among many.

"I think it was wonderfully good of my father," Percy told his friends, "after the trouble and loss the fellow's father has caused, to offer to put him into a situation. I should have thought that he would have been only too glad to have got away from here, and I am sure his absence would have been a relief to us all. I can't understand his motives."

Many others, even among those most favourably disposed towards Roland, were inclined to agree with Percy. His continued presence in Brownsville would be a source of embarra.s.sment and trouble to those who had previously been intimate with him, and it did seem strange that he should prefer to live among people cognisant of his father's misdoings, instead of taking the opportunity that offered of beginning life elsewhere.

Mr. Johnstone's conduct in interesting himself on his behalf was considered kind in the extreme. Still more surprise was excited when, at the meeting of the directors of the bank called a day or two after the beginning of the new year, after explaining the amount of the loss to the bank, he said, in reply to questions, that he had not as yet offered any reward for the apprehension of the fugitive, and had not indeed instructed the police to take any steps in the matter. Rumours to that effect had already been current, for the police authorities, when interviewed on the subject, had declared that they had no instructions on the matter; but it was generally supposed that this was mere official reticence intended to lull the fugitive into security, while they were quietly working to arrest him. The announcement of Mr. Johnstone caused quite a sensation among his colleagues.

"I must say, Mr. Johnstone," one said angrily, "that your course in this matter appears to me to be most extraordinary. As you did not call us together at once, we naturally supposed that you were taking all the necessary steps, and that Partridge would, in a few days at latest, be in the hands of the police; and now you meet us and tell us that you have done nothing. You said, in fact, when we wanted to go into the question on the morning after the discovery of the cashier's flight, and one of us suggested that a hot pursuit should be at once set on foot, that we could safely leave that matter in your hands, and that we had best confine our attention to the investigation of the accounts."

Several others spoke to the same effect, and Mr. Johnstone then rose with his usual placid and undisturbed aspect. "Gentlemen," he said, "in the first place I have not called you together earlier because just at this time of year every man is occupied more or less by family matters; and as it did not seem to me that there was any extreme urgency in the matter, I thought I would allow you to enjoy the holiday undisturbed.

Now, as to the main subject of your remarks, namely, that I have taken no steps to secure the arrest of our late cashier. Well, gentlemen, I am aware that in not doing so I have a.s.sumed a certain amount of responsibility. Certainly, when I met you ten days since, I had intended to set the police at work without delay. For the first twenty-four hours, however, I was so occupied with the investigations into the state of the books, and, I may say, with rea.s.suring the minds of our depositors and restoring confidence, that I had really no time to move in the matter.

"Then, gentlemen, came Christmas, with Christmas thoughts, Christmas sermons, and Christmas a.s.sociations, and I said to myself, this man is undoubtedly a thief and a defaulter. But how stands it? The man should be punished; but, gentlemen, for the last fifteen years he has been our friend. We have all been proud of him as a gentleman of singular culture. Most of us have been intimate at his house and acquainted with his wife, one of the most charming ladies in our section. In all these years his conduct has been above reproach, and although he has had pa.s.sing through his hands the funds of the bank, he has up till now accounted for them up to the last penny. There can be no doubt that the mania of speculation, which is the bane of our civilization, seized upon this unhappy man, and that in a moment, I may say of temporary insanity, he laid his hands upon the bank funds to meet some loss, intending, no doubt, to replace them at the earliest opportunity.

"Well, gentlemen, that opportunity never came. We know the usual sad story in these cases. Loss follows loss, and a man becomes desperate, until at last comes the inevitable discovery. Gentlemen, we all know that the man who does these things should be punished, but it seemed to me that no punishment that the law could allot would add very greatly to that which he must be now suffering. Imagine, gentlemen, a man with refined tastes and habits skulking, a fugitive from justice, perhaps by this time half-way across the ocean, knowing that he can never raise his head again in the society of honest men. There was nothing to gain, for you may be sure that the money has long since pa.s.sed out of his hands, and I feel that it would do us no good were he arrested and tried.

Everyone knows now that the bank has made a loss; they are also satisfied that the bank is solvent; confidence is restored, and we have avoided anything like a run. No one, indeed, has any idea how large the losses really are outside this board.

"Now, gentlemen, if we were to have a trial, the real amount of the loss would become known; and although we ourselves may feel confident that we can weather the storm, and can in time pull round, it is by no means certain that the public will take the same view. The run which has now been averted might then take place, and the bank be compelled to shut its doors. And you know, gentlemen, that when you come to a forced realization of effects, how far the sum realized falls short of the value placed upon it, and how heavy the calls upon the shareholders to make up the deficiency! Well, gentlemen, we are all large shareholders in the bank, and now that ten days have elapsed, and we have kept matters quiet, I ask you, is it worth while to run the risk of bringing ruin upon the bank, and beggary upon its shareholders, merely for the pleasure of knowing that our defaulting cashier has got so many years of penal servitude?"

Put in this light the matter a.s.sumed a very different appearance. The directors knew well enough that although they had put a good face on the matter, the loss did seriously compromise the stability of the bank, and that the less the matter was dragged before the public the better. The directors looked at each other in silence when Mr. Johnstone concluded.

But one said: "The public will think it a most extraordinary thing that we do not prosecute."

"But we intend to prosecute," Mr. Johnstone said. "It is distinctly understood that is our intention. But facts have come to our knowledge which leave no doubt that our cashier escaped into Canada within a few hours of his leaving this place, and it is believed by this time he has crossed the Atlantic. Should he ever return to this country he will, of course, be prosecuted at once on grounds of public policy and as a duty to the shareholders; but at the same time we have no objection to its being whispered abroad that although the directors would strictly carry out their duty had the opportunity been afforded, they are at heart by no means sorry, both for the sake of the man himself and for that of his wife, that he has succeeded in escaping before the hand of justice could be laid upon him."

After some further discussion, the view taken by the president was unanimously approved of, and the report that the cashier was known to have escaped into Canada, and had made his way to Europe, and that the bank authorities were convinced that he had managed to take but little with him, and were not sorry that the painful duty of prosecuting him had been avoided, was speedily spread through the town.

The unpleasantness which his former friends had antic.i.p.ated from the strange resolution of Roland Partridge to remain in Brownsville was not experienced, for he never showed himself in his old resorts, and was seldom to be met with in the streets. It was known that he had applied for several situations, but without success, and that he was at present living in a poor lodging in the outskirts of the place.

"Have you seen Roland Partridge lately?" Cissie White asked Tom Fernlea.

"No, I haven't. I have not seen him since Christmas eve."

"Have you been to see him, Tom? you know where he lives."

"Yes, I know. No, I have not been there yet. I have been meaning to go every day, but what with the sleighing parties, and one thing and another, I have never found time."

"Then you ought to have found it," Cissie said indignantly. "I did not think that you were that sort of boy, Tom. I thought that you would have stuck to your friend. I am downright ashamed of you."

"Well, I am ashamed of myself, now that you have put it so, though I really do mean to stick to him, you know. I have an engagement this evening, but I will get out of it and go."

"You ought to have gone a week since," Cissie said, very little mollified. "Call yourself a friend, and let your amus.e.m.e.nts stand in the way for ten days of your going to see a chum who is all alone and in trouble! I would not give a fig for such friendship as that!"

"Well, you are a staunch friend anyhow, Cissie!" Tom said admiringly.

"It is not every girl who would care to stick up for a boy as you do for Roland."

"Why shouldn't I stick up for him?" she asked scornfully. "His mother and mine were friends, and many a pleasant afternoon have I spent there.

Why shouldn't a girl stick up for her friend as well as a boy, I should like to know? I liked Roland Partridge better than any of the boys in our set, and I don't care who knows it. And I say it is scandalous his being cut because his father turned out badly, even if he did turn out badly, which I don't believe."

"Oh, come now, Cissie, that is too much. Somebody said that you did not believe Mr. Partridge was guilty, but I put that down to pure obstinacy.

Well, you need not look angry about it, because I like people who are obstinate for their friends; but I did not imagine that you really could think so."

"Why shouldn't I? I have a right to my thoughts, Tom Fernlea, I suppose, as well as you have. Do you think that Roland Partridge would tell a lie?"

"No, I am sure that he wouldn't," Tom said. "All the years that I have known him I have never heard him tell anything like an untruth."

"Well then, why shouldn't you believe him now he says that he and his mother are absolutely convinced that his father is innocent? I suppose they are quite as likely to know the truth of the matter as anyone in Brownsville."

"Well, Cissie, if Roland says that, he must have grounds for such a statement. Anyhow, I will go to see him this evening. I need not tell him, I suppose, that you sent me?"

"If you do I will never speak to you again, Tom Fernlea, so now you know."

When Tom called at Roland's lodgings that evening he was told that he was out, whereupon he took post at the door and waited for an hour, when his friend returned.