"It would help very much. Ten thousand dollars in cash is, you know, a basis of credit to nearly four times that sum."
"Yes, I am aware of that."
"Is your capital readily available?" inquired Dalton.
"Yes, since I have been in the city I have invested every thing in government securities, as safe property, and readily convertible into cash."
"Very judicious."
Dalton mused for some time.
"Yes," he at length said, as if he had been thinking seriously of the effect of ten thousand dollars in his business. "The capital you have would put a new face on every thing. That"s certain. Suppose you think the matter over, and I will do the same."
"I will, certainly. And I may say now, that there will hardly be any hinderance on my part to the arrangement, if you should see it to be advantageous all around."
Of course Mr. Dalton professed, after taking a decent time for pretended reflection, to see great advantage to all parties in a business connection, which in due time was formed. But few of those who knew Eldridge were apprized of what he intended doing, and those who did know, and were aware at the same time of Mr. Dalton"s character, like Mr. Hueston, concluded to mind their own business.
And so, unwarned of the risk he was encountering, an honest and confiding young man was permitted to form a copartnership with a villain, who had already been the means of involving three or four unsuspecting individuals in hopeless embarra.s.sment.
Confident that he had entered the road to fortune, Eldridge commenced his new career. The capital he had supplied gave, as Dalton had predicted, new life to the business, for the offer of liberal cash advances brought heavier consignments, and opened the way for more extensive operations. The general management of affairs was left, according to previous understanding, in the hands of the senior partner, as most competent for that department; while Eldridge gave his mind to the practical details of the business, which, by the end of a year, had grown far beyond his antic.i.p.ations.
Accepting large consignments of goods, upon which advances had to be made, required the raising of a great deal of money; and this Dalton managed to accomplish without calling away the attention of his partner from what he was engaged in doing. Thus matters went on for about three years, when Dalton began to complain of failing health, and to hint that he would be compelled to retire from active business. Eldridge said that he must not think of this; but the senior partner did think of it very seriously. From that time his health appeared to break rapidly; and in a few months he formally announced his intention to withdraw. Finding both remonstrance and persuasion of no avail, the basis of a dissolution of the copartnership was agreed upon, in which the value of the business itself, that would now be entirely in the hands of Eldridge, was rated high as an offset to a pretty large sum which Dalton claimed as his share in the concern. Without due reflection, there being a balance of five thousand dollars to the credit of the firm in bank, which, by the way, was provided for special effect at the time by the cunning senior, Eldridge consented that, for his share of the business, Dalton should be permitted to take bills receivable amounting to six thousand dollars; a check for two thousand, and his notes for ten thousand dollars besides, payable in three to eighteen months. After all this was settled, a dissolution of the copartnership was publicly announced, and Eldridge, with some misgivings at heart, undertook the entire management of the business himself. It was but a very little while before he found himself embarra.s.sed in making his payments. The withdrawal of two thousand dollars in cash, and six thousand in paper convertible into cash, created a serious disability. In fact, an earnest and thorough investigation of the whole business showed it to be so crippled that little less than a miracle would enable him to conduct it to a safe issue. Nevertheless, still unsuspicious to the real truth, he resolved to struggle manfully for a triumph over the difficulties that lay before him, and overcome them, if there was any virtue in energy and perseverance.
The first point at which the business suffered was in the loss of consignments. Inability to make the required advances turned from the warehouse of Eldridge large lots of goods almost weekly, the profits on the sales of which would have been a handsome addition to his income.
At the end of three months, the first note of a thousand dollars held by Dalton fell due, and was paid. This was so much more taken from his capital. Another month brought a payment of a like amount, and at the end of six months a thousand dollars more were paid. Thus Dalton had been able to get eleven thousand dollars out of the concern, although three years before he was not really worth a dollar; and there were still due him seven thousand dollars.
By this time, the eyes of Eldridge were beginning to open to the truth.
Suspicion being once finally awakened, he entered upon a careful examination of the business from the time of forming the copartnership.
This occupied him for some weeks before he was able to bring out a clear and comprehensive exhibit of affairs. Then he saw that he had been the victim of a specious and cunning scoundrel, and that, so far from being worth a dollar, he had obligations falling due for over ten thousand dollars more than he had the means to pay.
A sad and disheartening result! And what added to the pain of Eldridge was the fact, that he should have been so weak and short-sighted as to permit himself to be thus duped and cheated.
"I knew how it would be," said Mr. Hueston, coolly, when he was told that Eldridge was in difficulties. "Nothing else was to have been expected."
"Why so?" inquired the person to whom the remark was made.
"Everybody knows Dalton to be a sharper. Eldridge is not his first victim."
"I did not know it."
"I did, then, and prophesied just this result."
"You?"
"Yes, certainly I did. I knew exactly how it must turn out. And here"s the end, as I predicted."
This was said with great self-complacency.
Soon after the conversation, a young man, named Williams, who had only a year before married the daughter of Mr. Hueston, came into his store with a look of trouble on his countenance. His business was that of an exchange-broker, and in conducting it he was using the credit of his father-in-law quite liberally.
"What"s the matter?" inquired Mr. Hueston, seeing, by the expression of the young man"s face, that something was wrong.
"Have you heard any thing about Eldridge?" inquired Williams, in an anxious voice.
"Yes, I understand that he is about making a failure of it; and, if so, it will be a bad one. But what has that to do with your affairs?"
"If he fails, I am ruined," replied the young man, becoming greatly excited.
"You?" It was now Mr. Hueston"s turn to exhibit a disturbed aspect.
"I hold seven thousand dollars of his paper."
"Seven thousand dollars!"
"Yes."
"How in the name of wonder did it come into your possession?"
"I took it from Dalton at a tempting discount."
"From Dalton! Then his name is on the paper?"
"No, I hold it without recourse."
"What folly! How could you have done such a thing?"
"I believed Eldridge to be perfectly good. Dalton said that he was in the way of making a fortune."
"Why, then, was he anxious to part with his paper without recourse?"
"It was, he alleged, on account of ill-health. He wished to close up all his business and make an investment of what little he possessed previous to going south, in the hope that a change of air would brace up his shattered const.i.tution."
"It was all a lie--the scoundrel! His health is as good as mine. A greater villain than he is does not walk the earth. I wonder how you could have been so duped."
"How do you think Eldridge"s affairs will turn out?" asked the young man.
"Worse than nothing, I suppose. I understand that he paid Dalton some eighteen thousand dollars for his half of the business. There was but ten thousand dollars capital at first; and, from the way things were conducted, instead of its increasing, it must have diminished yearly."
Here was an entirely new aspect in the case. Mr. Hueston"s self-complacency was gone; he knew how it would be with Eldridge from the first, but he didn"t know how it was going to be with himself. He didn"t for a moment dream that when the fabric of the young man"s fortune came falling around him, that any thing belonging to him would be buried under the ruins.
"Too bad! too bad!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, as, under a sense of the utter desperation of the case, he struck his hands together, and then threw them above his head. But it did no good to fret and scold, and blame his son-in-law; the error had been committed, and it was now too late to retrace a step. Six or seven thousand dollars would inevitably be lost; and, as Williams had no capital, originally, of his own, the money would have to come out of his pocket. The ruin of which the young man talked was more in his imagination than anywhere else, as Mr.
Hueston was able enough to sustain him in his difficulty.
In the winding up of the affairs of Eldridge, who stopped payment on the day Williams announced to his father-in-law the fact that he held his notes, every thing turned out as badly as Mr. Hueston had predicted. The unhappy young man was almost beside himself with trouble, mortification, and disappointment. Not only had he lost every thing he possessed in the world; he was deeply involved in debt besides, and his good name was gone. A marriage contract, into which he had entered, was broken off in consequence; the father of the lady demanding of him a release of the engagement in a way so insulting, that the young man flung insult back into his teeth, and never after went near his house.
For months after the disastrous termination of his business, Eldridge lingered about the city in a miserable state of mind. Some friends obtained for him a situation as clerk, but he did not keep the place very long; it seemed almost impossible for him to fix his attention upon any thing. This neglect of the interests of his employer was so apparent, that he was dismissed from his place at the end of a few months. This increased the morbid despondency under which he was labouring, and led to an almost total abandonment of himself. In less than a year, he was travelling swiftly along the road to utter ruin.
One day, it was just twelve months from the time of Eldridge"s failure, Mr. Hueston stood conversing with a gentleman, when the unhappy young man went reeling by, so much intoxicated that he with difficulty kept his feet.