In the morning Sir Samuel saw his brother and whispered in his ear the whole of the case, as prepared and drawn up by Checkley. "What do you say?" he asked when he had concluded.
"I say nothing." Mr. Dering had heard all the points brought out one after the other without the least emotion. "There is nothing to be said."
"But, my dear brother, the evidence!"
"There is no evidence. It is all supposition. If Athelstan committed the first forgery--there is no evidence to show that he did--if he has been living all these years a life of profligacy in England--I have evidence to the contrary in my own possession--if he was tempted by poverty--if young Austin was also tempted by poverty--if the two together--or either separately--could undertake, under temptation, risks so terrible--you see, the whole case is built upon an "if.""
"Yet it holds together at every point. It is a perfect case. Who else could do it? Checkley certainly could not. That old man--that old servant."
"I agree with you, Checkley could not do it. Not because he is too old--age has nothing to do with crime--nor because he is an old servant.
He could not do it because he is not clever enough. This kind of thing wants grasp and vision. Checkley hasn"t got either. He might be a confederate. He may have stopped the letters. He is miserly--he might be tempted by money. Yet I do not think it possible."
"No--I cannot believe that," said Sir Samuel.
"Yet it is quite as difficult to believe such a thing of young Austin.
Oh! I know everything is possible. He belongs to a good family: he has his own people to think of: he is engaged--he has always led a blameless life. Yet--yet--everything is possible."
"I have known cases in the City where the blameless seeming was only a pretence and a cloak--most deplorable cases, I a.s.sure you--the cloak to hide a profligate life."
"I think if that were so, I should not be deceived. Outward signs in such cases are not wanting. I know the face of the profligate, open or concealed. Young Austin presents no sign of anything but a regular and blameless life. For all these reasons, I say, we ought to believe him incapable of any dishonourable action. But I have been in practice for fifty years--fifty years--during this long period I know not how many cases--what are called family cases--have been in my hands. I have had in this room the trembling old profligate of seventy, ready to pay any price rather than let the thing be known to his old wife, who believes in him, and his daughters, who worship him. I have had the middle-aged man of standing in the City imploring me to buy back the paper--at any price--which would stamp him with infamy. I have had the young man on his knees begging me never to let his father know the forgery, the theft, the villainy, the seduction--what not. And I have had women of every age sitting in that chair confessing their wickedness, which they do for the most part with hard faces and cold eyes, not like the men, with shame and tears. The men fall being tempted by want of money, which means loss of pride and self-respect, and position, and comfort. There ought to have been a clause in the Litany, "From want of money at all ages and on all occasions, Good Lord, deliver us.""
"True--most true," said Sir Samuel. ""From want of money"--I shall say this next time I go to church--"from want of money at all ages, and particularly when one is getting on in years, and has a t.i.tle to keep up--Good Lord, deliver us." Very good indeed, brother. I shall quote this in the City. To-morrow, I have to make a speech at the Helmet Makers" Company. I shall quote this very remarkable saying of yours."
Mr. Dering smiled gravely. "A simple saying, indeed. The greatest temptation of any is the want of money. Why, there is nothing that the average man will not do rather than be without money. He is helpless: he is a slave: he is in contempt: without money.--Austin, you tell me, was tempted by want of money. I think not. He was poor: he had enough to keep him: he was frugal: he had simple wants: he had never felt the want of money. No--I do not think that he was tempted by poverty. Everything is possible--this is possible.--But, brother, silence. If you speak about this, you may injure the young man, supposing him to be innocent.
If he is guilty, you will put him on his guard. And, mind, I shall show no foolish mercy--none--when we find the guilty parties. All the more reason, therefore, for silence."
Sir Samuel promised. But he had parted with the secret--he had given it into the keeping of a woman.
CHAPTER XV
WHO IS EDMUND GRAY?
Athelstan laughed on the first hearing of the thing--it was on the Tuesday evening, the day after the discovery, and George was dining with him. He laughed both loud and long and with some of the old bitterness.
"So the notes were in the safe all along, were they? Who put them there?
"I," says old Checkley, "with my pretty fingers--I put them there.""
"As soon as this other business is over, the Chief must tell your mother, Athelstan. It ought to come from him. I shall say nothing to Elsie just yet. She shall learn that you are home again, and that your name is clear again, at the same moment."
"I confess that I should be pleased to make them all confess that their suspicions were hasty and unfounded. At the same time I did wrong to go away; I ought to have stuck to my post. As for this other business, one thinks with something like satisfaction of the wise old lawyer losing forty thousand pounds. It made him sit up, did it? For such a man to sit up indicates the presence of deep emotion. Lost forty thousand pounds!
And he who holds so strongly to the sanct.i.ty of Property! Forty thousand pounds!"
"Well; but we shall recover the certificates, or get new ones in their place."
"I suppose so. Shares can"t be lost or stolen, really--can they?
Meantime, there may be difficulty, and you must try to find the forger.
Has it yet occurred to you that Checkley is the only man who has had control of the letters and access at all times to the office?"
"It has."
"Checkley is not exactly a fox: he is a jackal: therefore he does somebody"s dirty work for him at a wage. That is the way with the jackal, you know. Eight years ago he tried to make a little pile by a little forgery--he did not commit the forgery, I am sure--but he did the jackal; only he forgot that notes are numbered: so when he remembered that, he put them back. Now, his friend the forger, who is no doubt a begging-letter writer, has devised an elaborate scheme for getting hold of shares--ignorant that they are of no value."
"Well, he has drawn the dividends for four months."
"That is something, you see; but he hoped to get hold of thirty-eight thousand pounds. It is the same hand at work, you infer from the writing. You are quite sure of that?"
"There can be no doubt of it. How could two different hands present exactly the same curious singularities?"
"And all the letters, cheques, and transfers for the same person. What is his name?"
"One Edmund Gray, resident at 22 South Square, Gray"s Inn."
"No. 22? Oh! that is where Freddy Carstone lives. Do you know anything about the _nomme_ Edmund Gray?"
"I have been in search of information about him. He is described by the landlord of the rooms and by his laundress as an elderly gentleman."
"Elderly. Checkley is elderly."
"Yes, I thought of Checkley, of course. But somehow the indications don"t fit. My informants speak of a gentleman. n.o.body at his kindliest and most benevolent mood could possibly call Checkley a gentleman."
"The word gentleman," said Athelstan, "is elastic. It stretches with the employer or the consumer of it. It is like the word truth to a politician. It varies from man to man. You cannot lay down any definition of the word gentleman. Do you know nothing more about him?"
"A little. He has held this set of Chambers for nine years, and he pays his rent regularly before the day it falls due. Also I called upon him the other day when his laundress was at work and wrote a note to him at his table. The room is full of Socialist books and pamphlets. He is therefore, presumably, a Socialist leader."
"I know all their leaders," said Athelstan the Journalist.
"I"ve made the acquaintance of most for business purposes. I"ve had to read up the Socialist Literature and to make the acquaintance of their chiefs. There is no Edmund Gray among them. Stay--there is a Socialist letter in the _Times_ of to-day--surely---- Waiter"--they were dining at the club where Athelstan was a temporary member--"let me have the _Times_ of to-day. Yes, I thought so. Here is a letter from the Socialist point of view, signed by Edmund Gray--and--and yes--look here--it is most curious--with the same address--22 South Square--a long letter, in small print, and put in the supplement; but it"s there. See; signed "Edmund Gray." What do you think of that, for impudence in a forger?"
George read the letter through carefully. It was a whole column long; and it was in advocacy of Socialism pure and simple. One was surprised that the editor had allowed it to appear. Probably he was influenced by the tone of it, which was generous, cheerful, and optimistic. There was not the slightest ring of bitterness about it. "We who look," it said, "for the coming disappearance of Property, not by violence and revolution, but by a rapid process of decay and wasting away, regard the present position of the holders of Property with the greatest satisfaction. Everywhere there are encouraging signs. Money which formerly obtained five per cent. now yields no more than half that rate.
Shares which were formerly paying ten, twelve, and twenty per cent. are now falling steadily. Companies started every day in the despairing hope of the old great gains, fail and are wound up. Land, which the old wars forced up to an extraordinary value, has now sunk so enormously that many landlords have lost three-fourths and even more of their income.
All those enterprises which require the employment of many hands--as docks, railways, printing-houses, manufactories of all kinds--are rapidly falling into the condition of being able to pay no dividend at all, because the pay of the men and the maintenance of the plant absorb all. When that point is reached, the whole capital--the millions--embarked in these enterprises will be lost for ever. The stock cannot be sold because it produces nothing: it has vanished. In other words, sir, what I desire to point out to your readers is that while you are discussing or denouncing Socialism, the one condition which makes Socialism possible and necessary is actually coming upon the world--namely, the destruction of capital. Why have not men in all ages combined to work for themselves? Because capital has prevented them.
When there is no capital left to employ them, to bully them, to make laws against their combinations, or to bribe them, they will then have to work with and for themselves or starve. The thing will be forced upon them. Work will be a necessity for everybody: there will be no more a privileged cla.s.s: all who work will be paid at equal rates for their work: those who refuse to work will be suffered to starve."
The letter went on to give ill.u.s.trations of the enormous losses in capital during the last fifteen years, when the shrinkage began. It concluded: "For my own part, I confess that the prospect of the future fills me with satisfaction. No more young men idle, middle-aged men pampered, and old men looking back to a wasted life: n.o.body trying to save, because the future of the old, the widows, the children, the decayed, and the helpless, will be a charge upon the strong and the young--that is, upon the juvenes, the workers of the State. No more robbery: no more unproductive cla.s.ses. Do not think that there will be no more men of science and of learning. These, too, will be considered workers. Or no more poets, dramatists, artists, novelists. These, too, will be considered workers. And do not fear the coming of that time. It is stealing upon us as surely, as certainly, as the decay of the powers in old age. Doubt not that when it comes we shall have become well prepared for it. Those of us who are old may lament that we shall not live to see the day when the last shred of property is cast into the common h.o.a.rd. Those of us who are young have all the more reason to rejoice in their youth, because they may live to see the Great Day of Humanity dawn at last.--EDMUND GRAY, 22 South Square, Gray"s Inn."
"You have read this?" asked George.
"Yes; I read it this morning before I knew the significance of the signature. Letter of a dreamer. He sees what might happen, and thinks that it will happen. Capital is too strong yet."
"Is this the letter of a forger, a conspirator--a thief?"
"It does not strike me in that light. Yet many great thieves are most amiable in their private lives. There is no reason why this dreamer of dreams should not be also a forger and a thief. Still, the case would be remarkable, I admit."
"Can there be two Edmund Grays--father and son?"
"Can there be a clerk to Edmund Gray, imprudently using his master"s name, and ready to open any letter that may come? Consider--Clerk is a friend of old Checkley. Clerk invents the scheme. Checkley does his share. However, we can easily find out something more about the man, because my old friend, Freddy Carstone, has Chambers on the same floor.