CHAPTER XIV.—THE SHARING OF THE SPOIL.

The name of Mr Enoch Wilkins, Solicitor in the High Court of Chancery, and Attorney-at-law, before, according to the polite legal fiction, the Queen herself at Westminster, was deeply inscribed, in fat black engraved characters, on a gleaming brass plate which formed the chief adornment of the dark-green door of his City office. If this brass plate really did gleam, as it did, like a piece of burnished gold, its refulgence was due to unremitting exertions on the part of the office lad, whose objurgations were frequent as at unholy matutinal hours he plied the obdurate metal with rotstone, oiled flannels, and chamois leather. For the atmosphere of St Nicholas Poultney (so named from the hideous effigy of a begrimed saint, mottled by frost and blackened by soot, which yet decorated the low-browed doorway of a damp little church hard by) was not conducive to brilliancy, whether of glass, brass, or paint, being heavily charged, on the average of days, with tainted air, foul moisture, and subdivided carbon, with rust, dust, and mildew. Nevertheless Mr Wilkins, who was a master to be obeyed, contrived that his plate-glass windows should flash back whatever rays of light the pitying sun might deign to direct on so dismal a region, girt in and stifled by a wilderness of courts, lanes, streets, and yards, and also that door-handles and bell-pulls should be shining and spotless as a sovereign new-minted, the door-step a slab of unsullied stone, and passage, staircase, and offices as trim and clean as the floors of some lavender-scented farmhouse among the cabbage roses of Cheshire. These praiseworthy results were not attained without labour, sustained and oft renewed, on the part of Mrs Flanagan, the so-called laundress, whose washing was effected by the vigorous application of scrubbing-brush and Bath-brick; of a melancholy window-cleaner from Eastcheap, whose bread was earned by perpetual acrobatic feats on narrow sills and outside ledges; and of the office lad already mentioned, whose main duties, though he called himself a clerk, were those of keeping the externals of his master’s place of business at the utmost pitch of polish.

In very truth, although there was a messenger, fleet of foot and cunning in threading his way through the labyrinthine intricacies of the City, always perched on a leather-covered stool in the antechamber, to supplement the services of the office lad, Mr Wilkins had no clerk. A great deal of his business was transacted by word of mouth; he answered his own letters; and when much of the scribe’s work became requisite, some civic law stationer would send in one or two red-eyed men in mouldy black, with finger-nails indelibly stained by the ink that had become their owners’ element, and a sufficient quantity of draught folio paper would be covered with legal copperplate.

The outer office was neatness itself, from the bright fire-irons in the fender to the maps on the wall and the rulers and pewter inkstands on the desks. And the inner room, where the lawyer himself gave audience, was almost cheerful, with its well-brushed Turkey carpet, sound furniture, well-stored book-shelves, and general aspect of snug comfort. There were those who wondered that Mr Wilkins, whose reputation did not rank very high in the learned confraternity to which he belonged, should so pointedly have deviated from the tradition which almost prescribes dirt and squalor and darkness for the surroundings of those who live by the law. There were, not very far off, most respectable firms, the name of whose titled employers was Legion, yet through whose cobwebbed panes was filtered the feeble light by which their bewildered clients stumbled among ragged carpets and rickety furniture to reach the well-known beehive chair. But Mr Wilkins was a man capable of attending to his own interests, and probably he had found out what best chimed with the prejudices of those for whose custom he angled.

There was nothing in the room itself to shew that it was a lawyer’s office. It might have been that of a surveyor or a promoter of companies, for there was nothing on the walls but a set of good maps and four or five excellent engravings. Not a deed-box, not a safe, was to be seen, and if there were law-books on the shelves they held their place unobtrusively amongst other well-bound volumes. Mr Wilkins sitting in his usual place, with one elbow resting on the table before him, seemed to be indulging in a reverie of no distasteful character, to judge by the smile that rested on his coarse mouth as he softly tapped his front teeth with the mother-of-pearl handle of a penknife, as though beating time to his thoughts. At last, warned by the striking of the office clock, the hour-hand of which pointed to eleven, Mr Wilkins shook off his preoccupation of mind, and rang the hand-bell at his elbow.

The office lad, who called himself a clerk, was prompt in answering the tinkling summons of his employer.

‘Any one been here yet?’ demanded the lawyer.

‘Touchwood and Bowser’s articled clerk with notice of new trial in case of Green (in holy orders) v. Gripson—the bill-stealing case, you know, sir, that the country parson chose to go to a jury about.’

‘Ah, yes,’ rejoined Mr Wilkins, again tapping his front teeth with the pearl-handled knife, while a look of intense amusement overspread his face. ‘Wants another shot at the enemy, does he, the Rev. James Green! It was grand to see him in the witness-box, indignantly insisting on the fact that not one sixpence ever reached him in return for his promissory-note despatched per post, on the faith of Mr Gripson’s advertisement and fair words. Then some Mr Jenks, a total stranger, happens to give valuable consideration, at third or fourth hand, for the stamped paper with the clergyman’s signature, and, Rev. Green objecting to cash up, gets a fi. fa.—a neat contraction of fieri facias, which, as we lawyers know, is a term which directs an execution to be levied on the goods of a debtor, ha, ha!—has it backed in Wiltshire, and sells up every bed and chest of drawers in the vicarage. Mr Green brings an action against Gripson, who is comfortably out of the way, but retains me. We traverse everything, demur to everything, put in counter pleas and rebutters, change the venue, and play Old Gooseberry with the too confiding Green, whose counsel elects to be nonsuited. Now, like a Briton, he is ready for us again.’

Mr Wilkins laughed, and the juvenile clerk re-echoed the laugh. Sharp practice, such as that so lovingly narrated by the attorney, apparently for lack of a better audience, was congenial to the mind of this keen-witted young acolyte of Themis, with whom the proverbial distinction between Law and Equity seemed to be very clearly defined.

‘Nobody else called?’ asked Mr Wilkins.

‘Yes. Stout sporting-looking gent, who said he’d make shift, when I told him you had stepped out to the Master’s chambers, to come again to-morrow. Name of Prior,’ returned the youth.

‘Ah, Nat the bookmaker, wanting to know how near the wind he may sail without getting into the sweep-net of a criminal indictment,’ said the lawyer placidly. ‘Nothing else, hey?’

‘Only Mr Isaacs of Bowline Court, Thames Street, sent round to say he would look in between eleven and twelve,’ was the reply.

‘I’ll see him and any gentleman he may bring with him,’ rejoined Mr Wilkins, taking up the newspaper, as the office lad retired; but in five minutes returned, ushering in three gentlemen, whose hooked noses, full red lips, jet-black hair, and sloe-black eyes gave them a strong family resemblance. They were old acquaintances doubtless, for the greeting which they received from Mr Wilkins was a familiar one.

‘How do, Moss? How goes it, Braham, my buck? You’re all right, Isaacs, I can see for myself.’

Nothing could well be more unlike what, during the regency of the late King George IV., was called a buck than was Mr Braham, who was simply a corpulent Jew, ineffably greasy in appearance, and who wore a faded olive-green greatcoat that might have passed for a medieval gabardine, and carried an empty blue bag over his left arm. Mr Moss, his junior by some years, was better dressed, but his raven locks fell upon a shirt collar of dubious whiteness, and his dingy finger-nails were in unpleasant contrast with the splendour of the heavy rings he wore, and of the huge emerald in his satin necktie. The youngest of the three, Mr Isaacs, a hawk-eyed little man, bejewelled and florid of attire, was by far in dress and person the least unclean of the three.

There was a little conversation as to weather and other general topics, and then Braham the senior of the three Hebrews pulled out a watch as round and almost as big as a golden turnip, and compared it with the office clock. ‘Letsh get along,’ he said genially: ‘bushinesh, bushinesh, my dears, waitsh for no man.’

‘You’re right, Uncle Jacob,’ chimed in Mr Moss, who could scarcely have been, otherwise than figuratively and in oriental fashion, the nephew of his stout kinsman, but who was certainly a Jew of a much more modern pattern. He, at anyrate, coquetted with soap and water, and had discarded the shibboleth in his speech; but it might be doubted whether the elder Israelite, for all his repellent exterior, was not the better fellow of the two.

‘Business by all means,’ cheerily responded Mr Wilkins. ‘We’ve done it together before to-day, and we’ll do it again, I hope, gentlemen, for many a day yet to come. It is a very pleasant occasion on which we now assemble—nothing less, if I may say so, than the dividing of the profits, the sharing of the spoil.’

There was a hearty laugh.

‘Sharing of the shpoil!’ chuckled elderly but still vigorous Mr Braham. ‘What a boy he ish, thish Wilkinsh, what a boy he ish!’

‘And now for it,’ said Mr Wilkins, rustling over a bundle of papers that lay before him. ‘Here we have it in black and white, worth all the patter and palaver in the world. These are the baronet’s first and second letters, the second inclosing an uncommonly stiff cheque. Here are Captain Denzil’s bills—pretty bits of kites they are, renewed here and renewed there—and here are our old agreements, notes, and memoranda, duplicates of which I’ve no doubt are in all your pockets. Pass them round, Isaacs, and take a good look at them first. You’re an attorney, you know, and that’s why you’re here, though I don’t believe, my friend, that you “pull off” a clear five hundred out of the haul.’

‘Yesh, yesh, he’sh an attorney, ash Wilkinsh saysh,’ said Mr Braham, whose laughter was very ready, as that of fat people often is; ‘and sho we have him here. Shet a thief to catch a’——

Here a warning kick or other practical exhortation to caution on the part of his kinsman appeared to cut short the over-fluency of the bulky Hebrew, and he became as mute as a mouse, while Mr Isaacs read aloud in a high shrill voice the contents of Sir Sykes Denzil’s letters and also a brief summary which Mr Wilkins had prepared.

There was some discussion, but there really was not room for much. Here was no compromise, no handing over of so many shillings in the pound. Sir Sykes Denzil had paid his son’s liabilities without the abatement of a guinea. Mr Braham was to receive what he called ‘shix thoushand odd;’ Mr Moss, two thousand eight hundred and seventy-two; four hundred and thirty were for Mr Isaacs; and the residue was for Enoch Wilkins, Esquire, gentleman.

It was a strange sight when the rolls of bank-notes were produced, to see the actual partition of the Bank of England’s promises to pay, the vulture beaks bending over the crisp paper, the wary inspection of water-mark and number and signature, and the stuffing of pocket-books and cramming of purses and stowing away of what seemed to be regarded rather as plunder than as lawful gains. Two odd things during this transaction were to be noticed—first, that Mr Braham, who was incomparably the shabbiest Jew present, met with deference on every hand save from irreverent Wilkins; and secondly, that all the Jews seemed to take up their money grudgingly, like hounds that have chopped their fox in covert.

‘Well done, Shir Shykesh!’ exclaimed the heavy Hebrew with the green gabardine and the blue bag. ‘If they wash all of hish short, there might be the moneysh, but there wouldn’t be the fun!’

‘We’ll drink Sir Sykes’ health, at anyrate,’ briskly put in Mr Wilkins.—‘Sims!’ and he tinkled the office hand-bell as he spoke, ‘glasses and cork-screw.’

It was good amber-hued sherry, none of your modern abominations, but a real Spanish vintage, long mellowed in its dusty bin, that gurgled into the glasses under the careful handling of Mr Wilkins. The Hebrews sipped, appraised—where could be found judges so critical!—and drank.

‘I’m shorry for the poor young man,’ said Mr Braham, in a sort of outburst of sentiment, at mention of Captain Denzil’s name.

‘So that he gets his victuals,’ remarked the Jew attorney curtly, ‘I don’t see why he’s to be pitied.’

‘It ish a shelling out!’ was the mild rejoinder of the stout Israelite with the blue bag, who seemed to be by far the softest-hearted of the company. ‘Of courshe, when I thought he would do me, I didn’t care; but now I remember he didn’t get much, not above sheven-fifty cash. All the resht wash pictures, wine—not like yoursh, Wilkinsh—cigars, and opera-tickets.’

‘He went through the mill, I suppose,’ said Mr Moss, ‘as others have done before him, and others will do after him; eh, Uncle Jacob?’

‘Eh, eh, grisht to the mill!’ chuckled the stout proprietor of the empty blue bag; and the quartette of confederates soon separated.

Mr Wilkins, left alone, purred contentedly as he poured out and tossed off another glass of the sherry so deservedly lauded, and then, rising from his chair, took down a Baronetage, bound in pink and gold, and fluttered over the leaves until his finger rested on the words: ‘Denzil, Sir Sykes; of Carbery Chase, county Devon; of Threepham Lodge, Yorkshire; Ermine Moat, Durham; and Malpas Wold, Cheshire, succeeded his father, Sir Harbottle Denzil, August 18—; married, May 18—; formerly in the army, and attained the rank of Major. Is a magistrate and deputy-lieutenant for Devonshire. Unsuccessfully contested the county at the election of 18—.’

‘To think,’ said the attorney, stroking the book with his fleshy hand, ‘how much one can read between the lines of these plausible announcements, almost as blandly eulogistic as the inscriptions which chronicle on their tombstones fond wives, faultless husbands, and parents worthy to be immortalised by Plutarch! How trippingly the name of that needy old reprobate Sir Harbottle rolls off the tongue. He to be described as of Threepham and Malpas! Say, rather, of any foreign lodging or foreign jail, of the Isle of Man while it was yet a sanctuary for the debtor, of the Rules of the King’s Bench. But Carbery is very genuine anyhow.’

Mr Wilkins paused for a moment, and then mused: ‘I could spoil your little game, Sir Sykes—spoil it in a moment, and compel you to exchange your D. L.’s uniform of scarlet and gold for—never mind what! So long as the goose lays the golden eggs, it would not be the part of a wise man to twist her neck.’ Having said which, Mr Wilkins brushed his coat, drew on his gloves, and taking up his hat, sallied out. ‘Taxing office; back in an hour,’ he said to the office lad as he went out. ‘If I am detained, you need not wait for me after two o’clock.’

‘Ten to four, he don’t shew up,’ said the youth, who was accustomed to the professional figments which served to beguile credulous clients, but who congratulated himself at the prospect of a speedy release from duty. ‘If the governor doesn’t put in an appearance by 1.30, I’ll make myself scarce, or my name is not Sims!’

Meanwhile, Mr Wilkins made his way through the jostling crowd that roared and seethed among the busy streets of the City, until he reached an office, resplendent with plate-glass and French-polished mahogany, in Cornhill, on the door of which was inscribed, ‘Bales and Beales, Stock and Share Brokers.’

There were a good many customers in the outer office, a few of whom were quiet men of business, while the others, nearly half of whom were anxious-eyed ladies who had reached middle life, seemed flushed and ill at ease as they perused and reperused the written and printed memoranda with which they all seemed to be provided, and glanced impatiently at the ornamental clock on its gilded bracket. The lawyer, as an habituÉ of the place, sent in his name, and gained speedy admittance to the inner den, where Mr Bales himself, tall, thin, and with a thatch of bushy eyebrows projecting in pent-house fashion over his steady blue eyes, held out a cool white hand to be grasped by the hot red hand of Mr Wilkins.

The head of the firm of Bales and Beales was pre-eminently a cool man, and nothing could be in stronger contrast than was his unimpassioned bearing and the flutter and flurry of his customers.

‘How about my Turks?’ unceremoniously demanded Mr Wilkins. ‘Of course I know they’re down again—confound them!’

‘The fall continues. They have receded, let me see, two and seven-eighths since this morning,’ returned the broker, pointing to the official bulletin in its frame on the wall beside him. ‘Probably they are falling as we speak, for the Bourses of Paris, Amsterdam, and Vienna opened heavily.’

‘Well, you are a Job’s comforter, Bales,’ said the lawyer, wiping his heated brow. ‘Will this sort of thing go on, hey? Shall I sell, or stick to my colours like a Briton? Can’t you give a fellow your advice?’

‘I never advise,’ answered Mr Bales, with his cold smile. ‘Life would be a burden to me if I did. I prefer to lay the facts before those who do me the favour to come to me, leaving to their unbiassed judgment the course to pursue. Here are some Stock Exchange telegrams, part of which you will see presently, no doubt, in the evening papers. They help to explain the rush on the part of the public to sell out.’

The attorney took the half-dozen square pieces of hastily printed paper, yet damp from the press, some of them, which Mr Bales courteously proffered him, and at a glance mastered their contents.

‘Can rascally fabrications like this,’ asked the attorney, in a glow of something like honest indignation, ‘impose upon the veriest gull in Christendom?’

‘Ah!’ answered the unmoved Mr Bales, scrutinising the despatch which his irate client held between his finger and thumb, ‘you mean the rumour about the sale of the six Turkish ironclads to the Russian government? Popular credulity, my dear sir, would swallow more than that. You have overlooked the other telegram, which mentions that Adamapoulos and Nikopolos, the Greek bankers of Galata, have declined to advance to the Porte at twenty per cent. the wherewithal to meet the next coupon of the Debt. That report has more weight with business-men than the nautical one. Will you give me instructions to sell?’

‘No; but to buy!’ rapped out Mr Wilkins, with suddenness. ‘There must come a reaction soon. I’ll take another ten thousand of the Imperial Ottomans. I know what you would say, Bales,’ he added irritably: ‘the cash I left on deposit won’t cover the margin. Here’—and he produced the bank-notes that had fallen to his share in the division of that day—‘are funds, and to spare.’

As the lawyer quitted the stock-broker’s office he muttered between his set teeth: ‘I stand to win; but at anyrate I know of back-play of a safer sort. Sir Sykes Denzil of Carbery, you are a sponge well worth the squeezing!’