'Thank God. How did you know I was here?'
'You wrote to me.'
'Oh, yes.'
Danny looked like a Turkish warrior with his curly beard and flashing eyes, but he was dressed like a clerk, in a well-worn black suit and a bowler hat, and he appeared to have walked a long way, for he had muddy boots and a weary expression. Kingo looked at him askance, but Solly rose to the occasion with his usual social grace. He shook Danny's hand and said: 'How are you, Robinson? This is my friend the duke of Kingsbridge. Kingo, allow me to present my brother-in-law Dan Robinson, general secretary of the Working Men's Welfare Association.'
Many men would have been dumbstruck to be introduced to a duke, but not Danny. 'How do you do, Duke?' he said with easy courtesy.
Kingo shook hands warily. Maisie guessed he was thinking that being polite to the lower classes was all very well up to a point, but it should not be taken too far.
Then Solly said: 'And this is our friend Hugh Pilaster.'
Maisie tensed. In her anxiety about Mama and Papa she had forgotten that Hugh was behind her. Danny knew secrets about Hugh, secrets Maisie had never told her husband. He knew that Hugh was the father of Bertie. Danny had once wanted to break Hugh's neck. They had never met, but Danny had not forgotten. What would he do?
However, he was six years older now. He gave Hugh a cold look, but shook hands civilly.
Hugh, who did not know he was a father and had no inkling of these undertones, spoke to Danny in a friendly way. 'Axe you the brother who ran away from home and went to Boston?'
'I sure am.'
Solly said: 'Fancy Hugh knowing that!'
Solly had no idea how much Hugh and Maisie knew about one another: he did not know that they had spent a night together telling one another their life stories.
Maisie felt bewildered by the conversation: it was skating over the surface of too many secrets, and the ice was thin. She hastened to get back onto firm ground. 'Danny, why are you here?'
His weary face took on an expression of bitterness. 'I'm no longer the secretary of the Working Men's Welfare Association,' he said. 'I'm ruined, for the third time in my life, by incompetent bankers.'
'Danny, please!' Maisie protested. He knew perfectly well that both Solly and Hugh were bankers.
But Hugh said: 'Don't worry! We hate incompetent bankers too. They're a menace to everyone. But what exactly has happened, Mr. Robinson?'
'I spent five years building up the Welfare Association,' Danny said. 'It was a mighty big success. We paid out hundreds of pounds every week in benefits and took in thousands in subscriptions. But what were we to do with the surplus?'
Solly said: 'I assume you put it aside against the possibility of a bad year.'
'And where do you think we put it?'
'In a bank, I trust.'
'In the City of Glasgow Bank, to be exact.'
'Oh, dear,' said Solly.
Maisie said: 'I don't understand.'
Solly explained: 'The City of Glasgow Bank went bankrupt.'
'Oh, no!' Maisie cried. It made her want to weep.
Danny nodded. 'All those shillings paid in by hardworking men--lost by fools in top hats. And you wonder why they talk about revolution.' He sighed. 'I've been trying to rescue the Association since it happened, but the task was hopeless, and I've given up.'
Kingo said abruptly: 'Mr. Robinson, I am sorry for you and your members. Will you take some refreshment? You must have walked seven miles if you came from the railway station.'
'I will, and thank you.'
Maisie said: 'I'll take Danny indoors, and leave you to finish your walk.' She felt her brother was wounded, and she wanted to get him alone and do what she could to ease his pain.
The others obviously felt the tragedy too. Kingo said: 'Will you stop for the night, Mr. Robinson?'
Maisie winced. Kingo was being too generous. It was easy enough to be civil to Danny for a few minutes out here in the park, but if he stayed overnight Kingo and his lotus-eating friends would soon get fed up with Danny's coarse clothes and working-class concerns, then they would snub him and he would be hurt.
But Danny said: 'I have to be back in London tonight. I just came to spend a few hours with my sister.'
Kingo said: 'In that case allow me to have you driven to the station in my carriage, whenever you're ready.'
'That's real kind of you.'
Maisie took her brother's arm. 'Come with me and I'll get you some lunch.'
After Danny left for London, Maisie joined Solly for an afternoon nap.
Solly lay on the bed in a red silk bathrobe and watched her undress. 'I can't rescue Dan's Welfare Association,' he said. 'Even if it made financial sense to me--which it doesn't--I couldn't persuade the other partners.'
Maisie felt a sudden surge of affection for him. She had not asked him to help Danny. 'You're such a good man,' she said. She opened his bathrobe and kissed his vast belly. 'You've already done so much for my family, you never have to apologize. Besides, Danny won't take anything from you, you know that; he's too proud.'
'But what will he do?'
She stepped out of her petticoats and rolled down her stockings. 'Tomorrow he's meeting with the Amalgamated Society of Engineers. He wants to be a member of Parliament and he hopes they will sponsor him.'
'And I suppose he'll campaign for stricter government regulation of banks.'
'Would you be against that?'
'We never like the government to tell us what to do. True, there are too many crashes; but there might be even more if the politicians ran the banks.' He rolled on his side and propped his head up on his elbow to get a better view of her taking off her underwear. 'I wish I weren't leaving you tonight.'
Maisie wished the same. A part of her was excited at the prospect of being with Hugh when Solly was away, but that made her feel more guilty still. 'I don't mind,' she said.
'I feel so ashamed of my family.'
'You shouldn't.' It was Passover, and Solly was going to celebrate the ritual of seder with his parents. Maisie was not invited. She understood Ben Greenbourne's dislike of her, and half felt she deserved the way he treated her, but Solly was deeply upset by it. Indeed, he would have quarreled with his father
