Two hours after the receipt of Mrs. McDermott’s second letter, SquireCulpepper was on his way to Sugden’s bank. His heart was heavy, and hisstep slow. He had never had to borrow a farthing from any man—at least,never since he had come into the estate—and he felt the humiliation, ashe himself called it, very bitterly. There was something of bitterness, too, inhaving to confess to his friend Cope how all his brilliant castles in the airhad vanished utterly, leaving not a wrack behind.
He could see, in imagination, the sneer that would creep over Cope’s faceas the latter asked him why he could not obtain a mortgage on his fine newmansion at Pincote; the mansion he had talked so much about—about whichhe had bored his friends; the mansion that was to have been built out of theAlcazar shares, but of which not even the foundation-stone would ever now belaid. Then, again, the Squire was far from certain as to the kind of receptionwhich would be accorded him by the banker. Of late he had seemed cool, verycool—refrigerating almost. Once or twice, too, when he had called, Mr.Cope had been invisible: a Jupiter Tonans buried for the time being among acloud of ledgers and dockets and transfers: not to be seen by any one save hisown immediate satellites. The time had been, and not so very long ago, when hecould walk unchallenged through the outer bank office, whoever else might bewaiting, and so into the inner sanctum, and be sure of a welcome when he gotthere. But now he was sure to be intercepted by one or other of the clerks witha “Will you please to take a seat for a moment while I see whether Mr.Cope is disengaged.” The Squire groaned with inward rage as, leaning onhis thick stick, he limped down Duxley High Street and thought of all thesethings.
As he had surmised it would be, so it was on the present occasion. He had tosit down in the outer office, one of a row of six who were waiting Mr.Cope’s time and pleasure to see them. “He won’t lend me themoney,” said the Squire to himself, as he sat there choking with secretmortification. “He’ll find some paltry excuse for refusing me.It’s almost worth a man’s while to tumble into trouble just to findout who are his friends and who are n