Roland moved like a sympathetic cow, and waited to hear more.
“You were not up when my husband left for the city this morning, or he would have told you himself. Mr. Bleke, I hardly know how to break it to you.”
“Break it to me!”
“My husband advised you to put a very large sum of money in a mine called Wildcat Reefs.”
“Yes. Thirty thousand pounds.”
“As much as that! Oh, Mr. Bleke!”
She began to cry softly. She pressed his hand. Roland gaped at her.
“Mr. Bleke, there has been a terrible slump in Wildcat Reefs. To-day, they may be absolutely worthless.”
Roland felt as if a cold hand had been laid on his spine.
“Wor-worthless!” he stammered.
Mrs. Windlebird looked at him with moist eyes.
“You can imagine how my husband feels about this. It was on his advice that you invested your money. He holds himself directly responsible. He is in a terrible state of mind. He is frantic. He has grown so fond of you, Mr. Bleke, that he can hardly face the thought that he has been the innocent instrument of your trouble.”
Roland felt that it was an admirable comparison. His sensations were precisely those of a leading actor in an earthquake. The solid earth seemed to melt under him.
“We talked it over last night after you had gone to bed, and we came to the conclusion that there was only one honorable step to take. We must make good your losses. We must buy back those shares.”
A ray of hope began to steal over Roland’s horizon.
“But–-” he began.
“There are no buts, really, Mr. Bleke. We should neither of us know a minute’s peace if we didn’t do it. Now, you paid thirty thousand pounds for the shares, you said? Well”—she held out a pink slip of paper to him—”this will make everything all right.”
Roland looked at the check.
“But—but this is signed by you,” he said.
“Yes. You see, if Geoffrey had to sign a check for that amount, it would mean selling out some of his stock, and in his position, with every movement watched by enemies, he can not afford to do it. It might ruin the plans of years. But I have some money of my own. My selling out stock doesn’t matter, you see. I have post-dated the check a week, to give me time to realize on the securities in which my money is invested.”
Roland’s whole nature rose in revolt at this sacrifice. If it had been his host who had made this offer, he would have accepted it. But chivalry forbade his taking this money from a woman. A glow of self-sacrifice warmed him. After all, what was this money of his? He had never had any fun out of it. He had had so little acquaintance with it that for all practical purposes it might never have been his.
With a gesture which had once impressed him very favorably when exhibited on the stage by the hero of the number two company of “The Price of Honor,” which had paid a six days’ visit to Bury St. Edwards a few months before, he tore the check into little pieces.
“I couldn’t accept it, Mrs. Windlebird,” he said. “I can’t tell you how deeply I appreciate your wonderful kindness, but I really couldn’t. I bought the shares with my eyes open. The whole thing is nobody’s fault, and I can’t let you suffer for it. After the way you have treated me here, it would be impossible. I can’t take your money. It’s noble and generous of you in the extreme, but I can’t accept it. I’ve still got a little money left, and I’ve always been used to working for my living, anyway, so—so it’s all right.”
“Mr. Bleke, I implore you.”
Roland was hideously embarrassed. He looked right and left for a way of escape. He could hardly take to his heels, and yet there seemed no other way of ending the interview. Then, with a start of relief, he perceived Johnson the groom coming toward him with the evening paper.
“Johnson said he was going into the town,” said Roland apologetically, “so I asked him to get me an evening paper. I wanted to see the lunch scores.”
If he had been looking at his hostess then, an action which he was strenuously avoiding, he might have seen a curious spasm pass over her face. Mrs. Windlebird turned very pale and sat down suddenly in the chair which Roland had vacated at the beginning of their conversation. She lay back in it with her eyes closed. She looked tired and defeated.
Roland took the paper mechanically. He wanted it as a diversion to the conversation merely, for his interest in the doings of Surrey and Yorkshire had waned to the point of complete indifference in competition with Mrs. Windlebird’s news.
Equally mechanically he unfolded it and glanced at front page; and, as he did do, a flaring explosion of headlines smote his eye.
Out of the explosion emerged the word “WILD-CATS”.
“Why!” he exclaimed. “There’s columns about Wildcats on the front page here!”
“Yes?” Mrs. Windlebird’s voice sounded strangely dull and toneless. Her eyes were still closed.
Roland took in the headlines with starting eyes.
THE WILD-CAT REEF GOLD-MINE
ANOTHER KLONDIKE
