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In "Harvey Garrard's Crime," E. Phillips Oppenheim crafts a riveting narrative that delves into the labyrinthine world of crime and morality in early 20th century England. Using a deft mix of suspense, intricate plotting, and rich character development, Oppenheim explores themes of justice, societal norms, and the human psyche. The novel is characterized by its sharp dialogue and atmospheric settings, reflecting both the optimism and the disquietude of the post-Victorian era, where personal ambitions often clash with ethical dilemmas. Through his deft literary style, Oppenheim engages the reader, merging the thriller genre with poignant psychological insights that remain pertinent to contemporary discourse on crime and personal responsibility. E. Phillips Oppenheim, often hailed as the 'Prince of Storytellers,' was born in 1866 and gained significant acclaim for his deft works in the mystery and thriller genres. His diverse experiences in a rapidly changing society, alongside an acute awareness of the intricacies of human behavior, undeniably influenced his narrative choices in this enthralling novel. Oppenheim's prolific career, marked by a penchant for engaging plots and compelling characters, positions him as a pivotal figure in the evolution of popular literature during his time. For readers drawn to crime fiction laced with psychological depth, "Harvey Garrard's Crime" is an essential read. It not only entertains but prompts reflection on the moral choices that define us all. The vivid portrayal of its characters and the suspenseful unraveling of its plot will captivate both genre aficionados and those seeking a deeper understanding of human motivations and societal implications.
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022
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Harvey Garrard's Crime
Table of Contents
BOOK I
CHAPTER I
Harvey Garrard, as his limousine crawled over London Bridge and turned into the dingy streets beyond, leaned forward in his seat looking out of the window with the half-weary anticipation of one who revisits familiar but distasteful scenes. There was a faint air of disgust in his expression as the well-known odours of the neighbourhood assailed his nostrils. Forty-eight hours ago he had been living in a paradise of mimosa and roses warmed by Riviera sunshine, his senses reacting pleasurably to the mild excitement, the music and the gaiety of Monte Carlo. The malodorous atmosphere of Bermondsey, into which district he had now passed—the smell of leather, the sullen, brooding skies through which it seemed impossible that the sun could ever force its way, all added to his depression. He glanced with distaste at the familiar landmarks which he passed, exchanged mechanical greetings with one or two passers-by whose names he failed to remember, and finally stepped out on to the pavement with the sigh of an unaccountable feeling of depression as his car drew up before the magnificent pile of buildings, the pride of the whole neighbourhood, the enormous warehouse built by his grandfather, Phineas Garrard, the Quaker, nearly a hundred years ago.
"You had better wait for a time, John," he told the chauffeur. "If I have to stay here long, I'll send down word and you can go home in case your mistress requires you."
The man touched his hat and turned off his engine. Harvey Garrard mounted the steps, pushed open the swing doors and made his leisurely way past the spacious suites of offices which occupied the front of the ground floor into the open spaces beyond—spaces piled with great stacks of all descriptions of sole leather, from the odour of which he shrank once more with a little instinctive aversion. With his hand upon the iron railing of the circular staircase which led to the first floor where his own private office was situated he paused for a moment to look round. Perhaps because he had just emerged from an utterly different world, he was conscious of a queer sense of unreality in all he saw. He was unable to link together the past and the present. It seemed to him indeed that the men in their aprons and overalls who moved backwards and forwards were like the ghosts of themselves rather than actual human beings. Reminiscences of past years here in these surroundings puzzled at the same time that they depressed him. The clerks in the offices—he could see them through the glass partition—were all grey-headed, all seemed to bend a little wearily over their tasks. Many of their faces were familiar but all seemed changed. It was the same thing with the porters. He called one of them to him—one of the few whose name he remembered.
"Well, James," he said, "still working as hard as ever?"
The man shook his head doubtfully
"No chance of that nowadays, sir," he replied. "There ain't enough to do to keep any of us busy."
"Business bad, eh?"
"Bad enough in our department anyway, sir," was the somewhat depressed admission.
His master turned away with a nod and mounted the winding stairway. Arrived on the first floor he paused and looked downward once more at the great room below. A vague sense of uneasiness, which had at odd times assailed him during the last six months, took to itself very definite shape in those few moments. The change in his surroundings was too apparent to exist only in his imagination; a spirit of listlessness seemed to have taken the place of those old days of bustle and commotion. The huge stacks of leather looked as though they had lain undisturbed for many months, the warehousemen, of whom there were a sufficient number in evidence, seemed to be occupying themselves with purely trivial tasks. After a brief but puzzled contemplation he turned away, acknowledged mechanically the salutations of the salesmen whose counters he passed, and entered his own office—a spacious apartment with a thick carpet upon the floor, filled with heavy Victorian furniture and hung with oil paintings of various members of the firm. The window was open, but the atmosphere was still musty after many months of disuse. The handsome table was carefully dusted but bare except for a clean sheet of blotting paper and a massive inkstand. Harvey hung up his hat on a huge wooden peg, seated himself in the familiar chair and rang the bell.
"Send Mr. Greatorex in," he told the boy who presently answered it.
As he leaned back, waiting, a memory came to him; a memory of the day upon which he had been admitted into partnership. His father, his grandfather and an uncle had toasted him in a bottle of the famous port, the various vintages of which it had been their custom to lay down since the establishment of the house.
"A matter of twofold celebration," his grandfather had said. "We admit one of the younger generation into the firm on the same day that our balance sheet shows that for the first time in our history our capital has reached the sum of a million pounds."
Wealth incredible, it had seemed to him in those days! His grandfather had died in the following year, his father ten years later, and now the death of the sole surviving partner had resulted in the summons which had brought him home from the Riviera a month before his usual time. It was really ridiculous that they should have sent for him, he thought a little wearily, remembering the urgent phrasing of the message which had perplexed as well as annoyed him. During the last seven or eight years he had only entered the premises three times. He had long ago lost all touch with the activities and routine of the business. His presence there in any capacity whatsoever could be neither helpful nor necessary.
There came in due course a formal knock at the door, and Mr. Greatorex, the manager and cashier, entered; a tall, spare man with thin grey hair and straggling beard, an old-fashioned style of dress and steel-rimmed spectacles which had a habit when at close quarters with anyone of slipping down on his nose. Harvey held out his hand, struggling against the depression with which the sight of everyone in the place affected him.
"Well, Greatorex," he began, "you're looking just the same as ever. Terribly sad about poor Armitage."
"It was very sad indeed, sir," was the quiet reply. "Mr. Armitage had been ailing for some time, but we none of us expected to lose him quite so suddenly."
"Heart trouble, I understand?"
"Heart trouble and worry."
Harvey produced from his pocket a thin, gold case, selected a cigarette and lit it. He leaned back in his chair, waving his manager to a seat. For a moment he smoked in silence.
"What's wrong with this place, Greatorex?" he asked a little abruptly.
Mr. Greatorex coughed.
"Business has been very bad with us for some years, sir," he confided. "Mr. Armitage was unwilling to trouble you too much with details, but there is no doubt that his end was hastened by apprehensions for the future."
"What sort of apprehensions?" Harvey enquired, frowning. "Do you mean that the firm is not making the profits that it used to?"
"It is no longer a question of profit at all, sir," was the gloomy response.
"What is it a question of, then?" Harvey insisted impatiently. "Speak plainly, Greatorex. Let me understand the situation."
"I will do so, sir," the manager assented nervously. "The fact is that during the last three years prices of leather have fallen all over the world, and, as you may possibly remember, it has always been the custom of the House to keep very large stocks. The stock here and in our various branches has never amounted to much less than six to seven hundred thousand pounds, and since the purchase of the major portion of it I imagine that the fall in prices amounts to something like twenty-five per cent. Sales have been exceedingly difficult, therefore, and side by side with the fall in prices the shoe trade has been bad."
"This all sounds very unpleasant," Harvey remarked. "So far as I remember there was very little indication of it in the last balance sheet, a copy of which you sent me."
"In that balance sheet, sir," Greatorex explained, "a great many debts were taken as good which should not have been, and no reserve whatever was made for bad debts. The whole of the stock, too, was taken at cost price. Mr. Chalmer, when he signed it on behalf of the accountants, added a rider to that effect which you probably did not notice."
There was a brief silence. Harvey Garrard, bewildered by premonitions of catastrophe, looking across the room, seemed for a moment to meet the stern yet benevolent gaze of his father, looking down at him from the enclosure of that heavy gilt frame opposite. Perhaps something of his inherited spirit for the first time asserted itself.
"I will look into these matters," he announced a little shortly. "Ring up and make an appointment for me to see Mr. Chalmer. I will spend the day here."
"I will do so at once, sir," Mr. Greatorex assented. "In the meantime—"
He hesitated, glancing across at his employer. Harvey recognised signs of distress.
"There is something else?" he asked, not unkindly. "Out with it, Greatorex."
The man's voice was a trifle choked. He took off his spectacles and wiped them.
"I have just come back from the Bank, sir," he said. "The day after to-morrow is the fourth of the month, and we have bills of exchange due amounting to about eighty thousand pounds. I handed in the advices as usual. Mr. Poulton, the manager, called me into his office. I must admit that what he said came as a great shock, although we have been expecting something of the sort. We are already overdrawn to the extent of about a hundred and ten thousand pounds—an overdraft which I confess that we have been asked several times to reduce. Mr. Poulton told me this morning that unless funds were provided to the full amount, either in cash or adequate security, he would be unable to meet our acceptances."
"Unable to meet the firm's acceptances?" Harvey repeated, aghast.
Mr. Greatorex nodded. For the moment he was incapable of speech. His fingers were shaking.
"It seems incredible, sir," he continued presently—"absolutely incredible. For fifty years Garrard & Garrard have held the first position in the trade. Our credit has been like the credit of the Bank of England. Until ten years ago we paid cash for everything. Then we began to accept. Lately we have paid cash for nothing unless it was specifically asked for, and this morning the bank manager actually spoke of dishonouring our acceptances—the acceptances of Garrard & Garrard. I could scarcely believe my ears. I have not been myself since, sir."
"Is there no cash we can lay our hands on?" Harvey demanded. "There must be money owing to the firm."
"We have collected everything possible," was the melancholy reply. "All our branches have had orders to draw bills on our customers and send them in. We paid in yesterday seventeen thousand pounds. That still left us overdrawn at the bank about a hundred thousand, and eighty thousand pounds' worth of bills to be met."
"And supposing they are not met?"
The manager rose to his feet. He shook his head and turned his back upon his employer. His shoulders seemed a little unsteady.
"You must excuse me, sir," he begged. "I will ring up Mr. Chalmer."
"One moment," Harvey enjoined. "We still bank, I suppose, at that poky little branch of the Southern Bank at the corner of the street?"
"We still bank there, sir."
"And the name of the manager?"
"Mr. Poulton, sir. He is naturally favourably disposed towards us, but he can only act on instructions from headquarters."
Harvey rose to his feet and took up his hat.
"I shall go and see him," he decided.
Mr. Poulton was glad enough to receive the only surviving member of a world-famed firm; a man, too, of other distinctions—a famous polo player, golfer and ex-cricketer, a figure in the social life of London as well as the Riviera. In his well-cut tweed clothes, with his bronzed complexion and his air of distinction, Harvey Garrard seemed indeed like an alien figure in the dingy office where the bank manager entertained his clients.
"I am glad you've come to see me, Mr. Garrard," he said, leaning a little forward in his chair and regarding his visitor with curiosity not unmixed with sympathy. "I am afraid that you will find the affairs of your firm need very careful attention. Mr. Armitage was a clever man, but an optimist. He needed a restraining hand. It was, perhaps, a pity that the business did not appeal more to you and that you were not able to follow its progress more closely."
"Mr. Poulton," Harvey replied, "it is of no use beating about the bush. I know nothing whatever about the business."
Mr. Poulton coughed a little huskily.
"That is, perhaps, under the circumstances, somewhat unfortunate," he ventured.
"This summons which reached me, to return at once," Harvey continued, "surprised me, but I came without delay. I made my first appearance at the warehouse this morning, and I must confess that I do not understand the position at all. My manager, Mr. Greatorex, tells me that you need a considerable sum of money or securities at once, to provide for our engagements."
"That is, unhappily, true," Mr. Poulton admitted.
"The part of it which seems to me somewhat arbitrary," Harvey pointed out, "is that you expect us to find it in something a little less than forty-eight hours."
"But, my dear sir," the other protested vigorously, "you must remember, or perhaps you do not know, that this matter has been talked out with Mr. Armitage at least a dozen times within the last six months. I told him constantly that my directors insisted upon a reduction of the overdraft. He kept on promising that something should be done, but instead of that it has grown larger. To-day your cashier appears and hands in advices which, if we acted upon them, would actually increase your overdraft by another eighty thousand pounds. I regret very much that Mr. Armitage should have kept you in ignorance of the situation, but there it is."
"A most unpleasant situation, too, apparently," Harvey remarked.
"A most regrettable one," the bank manager acquiesced. "To put the matter before you plainly, which I conceive to be your desire and my duty, if your acceptances due the day after to-morrow are to be met, we shall require eighty thousand pounds in cash or first-class securities, taking no account of the overdraft of a hundred thousand pounds which headquarters insist upon your reducing."
"No use my seeing your directors, I suppose?" Harvey suggested.
"You can do so if you wish, but I can assure you that it would be waste of time. I am expressing to you their firm and unanimous decision. They wish the overdraft reduced and reduced at once. Apart from that the idea of increasing it by a single shilling would be entirely out of the question."
"Then, in order to completely satisfy your people, I take it that I have a matter of forty-eight hours to find a hundred and eighty thousand pounds or security to that amount," Harvey remarked.
"It comes to that, I am afraid, Mr. Garrard," the manager acquiesced. "Of course if you hand over the eighty thousand pounds in cash, the acceptances shall be met, but I must warn you that the question of the overdraft will then have to be dealt with at once."
Harvey Garrard rose to his feet. Already there was a change in his expression since he had driven across London Bridge to pay what he had simply looked upon as a distasteful two or three hours' visit to the goose which had laid golden eggs for him all its life. The lines of his mouth were firmer, his grey eyes almost steely.
"I have no doubt that the matter can be arranged," he said coldly. "I should have liked a little more time, however."
"The urgency is without doubt unfortunate," Mr. Poulton confessed, "but so far as we are concerned we hold ourselves free from blame. How your late partner proposed to meet these engagements if he had lived, I cannot tell you, but he knew perfectly well that no question of any further overdraft would ever have been entertained. It is an exceedingly fortunate thing, Mr. Garrard, that you have returned in time to deal with this crisis, and you will permit me—er—to add that, considering the great reputation of your firm and the pride which we have always felt in your account, it is our very sincere hope that you may be able to avert this—er—disaster."
"Very good of you, I'm sure," Harvey remarked, as he picked up his hat. "You may take it for granted that the bills will be met. I shall have to discuss the matter of the overdraft with your directors."
CHAPTER II
Mildred Garrard, curled up upon a lounge in the room which she called her boudoir, threw down her novel at Harvey's entrance and raised herself a little to confront him.
"Where on earth have you been all day, Harvey?" she demanded peevishly.
"I've been down at Bermondsey," he answered.
"Down at Bermondsey?" she repeated incredulously. "Do you mean to say you forgot altogether that we were lunching at Ranelagh?"
"I'm sorry," he apologised, "but that's exactly what I did do. I forgot all about it."
She frowned. Although at thirty-five she was still a beautiful woman, the frown was not altogether becoming.
"What on earth did you want to stay down there for all this time?" she persisted. "And where did you lunch?"
"Now I come to think of it," he acknowledged, "I didn't lunch at all. I found a great deal to occupy me, and I forgot."
She rose to her feet, yawning, and drew her silk dressing-gown around her. There was still just a glimpse of blue crêpe de chine and blue silk stockings.
"You're a terribly casual person sometimes, Harvey," she complained. "Perhaps you forgot to bring me my money, too."
"I did," he confessed. "I completely forgot all about it."
She turned away from the looking-glass into which she had paused to glance with an impatient exclamation.
"If that isn't just like you," she declared petulantly. "I don't suppose you even remembered to tell Greatorex to pay in the house money."
"I didn't," he admitted. "To tell you the truth I was far too busy."
"Busy!" she repeated scornfully. "Why, what on earth can you find to do down there? You don't know anything about the business."
"Perhaps it's a pity I don't," he remarked. "They haven't been doing any too well."
She yawned once more and rang the bell.
"We'll have a cocktail before we change," she suggested. "We'll have to go out for dinner, I'm afraid. François has only just arrived and is absolutely disgusted with the kitchen. He simply declines to cook this evening, so I've telephoned to the Ritz for a table."
"Just as you like," he answered. "If François is going to be difficult he had better go back to France. He can't expect a kitchen in Curzon Street to be anything like what he's used to."
"Don't talk nonsense," she enjoined sharply. "If we parted with François I might as well give up entertaining altogether. He's the greatest attraction anyone could possibly get hold of. I saw the Duchess in the Park this morning and she told me that if I didn't ask her to dinner the very day François arrived she'd never speak to me again. These people all love him, Harvey."
"They may have an opportunity of acquiring him before long," Harvey ventured.
"That they certainly will not," was Mildred's prompt rejoinder. "If we have to economise we won't begin with François."
She gave an order to her maid, who had answered the bell, and stood for a moment yawning in front of the mirror. She was troubled at the sight of a little line near her eyes and gazed at herself discontentedly.
"What a ridiculous thing to come back to London so early," she grumbled. "Mayfair isn't fit for a human being until June. There is something about the light here or the mirrors which makes one feel, as well as look, positively ugly. I shall have to go to Madame Arlène to-morrow. And I hope you won't go down to that hideous warehouse of yours again, Harvey, if it makes you as gloomy as you are this evening."
He roused himself with a little shrug of the shoulders. The time for disclosures was not yet. Annette entered with a cocktail shaker and two glasses. Harvey, as he took a cheese wafer from the tray, was conscious that he had eaten nothing since breakfast.
"Where are your pearls, Mildred?" he asked, abruptly, as soon as the maid had left the room.
She looked at him with some surprise.
"In the safe with my other jewels."
"Let me see them," he begged.
She crossed the room, took the key from her bracelet, and opened a door let into the wall. Presently she returned with a morocco case. He drew out the pearls and studied them.
"I suppose they're still worth what I gave for them," he reflected.
She nodded indifferently.
"I should think so. They would have been worth more but for this craze for imitation jewellery."
"Twenty-eight thousand pounds," he murmured.
She nodded and held them up to the light.
"They are quite nice," she observed, "with the exception of the one or two at the back which I have always wanted to change. Of course," she went on, with a sudden gleam in her eyes, "if you have any idea of making me a present, it's an excellent time just now. Cartier's told me only this morning that at a very moderate cost they could make this into an almost perfect necklace. They have a wonderful lot of pearls their agent has just sent them from Ceylon."
She looked at him expectantly. He shook his head.
"Not the slightest chance of my being able to do anything of the sort at present," he assured her. "On the contrary—"
"Then why this mercenary interest in them?" she demanded, with obvious disappointment.
He smiled grimly.
"The taint of the City! I must have brought it back with me. I seem to have been talking about nothing but money all day."
She rang the bell again.
"Go and change now, Harvey," she enjoined. "I must have my bath. I'll wear black and the pearls tonight and you shall see how those poor ones spoil the effect. We might go on and dance at the Ambassador's afterwards for an hour."
"Just as you like," he agreed, rising to his feet a little wearily as Annette entered.
The evening was like many others Harvey and his wife had spent together; superficially interesting enough, yet utterly devoid of any real and intimate intercourse. They were received at the Ritz as welcome patrons and from the moment of their entrance to their departure were exchanging greetings with friends and acquaintances, accepting and giving invitations, hearing gossip about mutual friends. Strangers observed them with a not altogether unsympathetic interest. Mildred in her black gown of severe Parisian fashion, her pearls, which were really very beautiful, her fair hair, blue eyes, and undeniably well-bred appearance, always attracted a certain amount of attention, whilst Harvey, with his sensitive yet strong face, his clean-cut features, tanned skin, and slim, athletic figure, had always been accounted one of the best-looking men in his set. He ate and talked and drank that night to all appearance just as he would have done a week or a month ago. The shadow of an impossible nightmare was always with him, but he thrust it vigorously into the background of his mind. Afterwards they made up a little party and went on to the Ambassador's to dance with Lady Felthorpe, Mildred's sister, Pattie Mallinson, her cousin, a very popular young lady indeed, and several men, who had been attached to a dinner party given by the former. It was two o'clock when they reached home and Mildred went yawning upstairs.
"One does just the same things here," she remarked, "but the atmosphere is altogether different, isn't it? In Monte Carlo I am never tired. Here I am half asleep before two o'clock."
"Try and wake up," he begged, "because I want to come and talk to you for a minute if I may?"
She looked at him in surprise.
"Talk to me, at this time of the night?" she expostulated. "Won't it do in the morning?"
"It might," he assented, "but I shall have left for the City before you are awake."
She yawned again and yielded the point.
"Well, bring me a whisky and soda and give me some cigarettes," she directed. "I'll put on my dressing-gown in a moment and we can talk in the boudoir."
He turned into the dining-room and obeyed her behests, mixed also a whisky and soda for himself and made his way into the tiny blue and white sitting-room opening from her bed-chamber. Presently she made her appearance in a wonderful rose-coloured négligé trimmed with white fur, threw herself into the one comfortable easy-chair, lit a cigarette and leaned back with her hands clasped behind her head.
"What idiots we were to come home to this cold," she declared discontentedly. "Even with a fire one seems chilled somehow."
He nodded.
"It was very hard luck on you," he admitted. "So far as I am concerned, however, it seems to have been necessary. Mildred, what have you done with the deeds of this house?"
She looked across at him, startled.
"The deeds of this house?" she repeated. "Why, what on earth do you want with them?"
He hesitated for a moment. There was a suspicious, almost an angry look in her eyes and his task seemed suddenly to have become more formidable. Nevertheless it had to be undertaken and he summoned up all his courage.
"You have a right to my whole confidence, Mildred, if you wish it," he said. "I will try to explain matters to you. I find that a very serious state of affairs exists in the City. This man, Armitage, my partner, who has recently died, to cover, I am afraid, his own extravagance, and to conceal the fact that he was heavily overdrawn with the firm, has kept me in complete ignorance of the fact that we have actually been losing money for many years. I am not, as you know, a business man, and I have not had time yet to thoroughly grapple with the situation, but this I do know, that somehow or other I have to raise the sum of eighty thousand pounds before the Bank closes the day after to-morrow."
Momentarily she collapsed. Her real emotion was to come afterwards. At first she was simply frightened. "But I can't understand," she gasped. "I always thought your firm were merchant princes. You've drawn just what you wanted—no one has ever said a word."
"That is quite true," he admitted. "I have spent very large sums this year, as you know. The reason Armitage never protested was, that to have done so would have directed attention to his own defalcations. He appears to have overdrawn nearly a hundred thousand pounds."
"But this is wicked," she exclaimed. "Can't it be got back again from his estate?"
"There is no estate to get it back from. Armitage lived in chambers and owned no property whatsoever. As a matter of fact I am nearly as much overdrawn myself, but I had no idea that the business wouldn't stand it."
She began to stiffen.
"What are we going to do?" she demanded harshly.
"As yet I am afraid I cannot tell you," he replied. "Mr. Chalmer is coming to see me to-morrow morning, and I shall make an effort to get a grasp of the whole situation. In the meantime, however, one thing is certain. Somehow or other I must raise that eighty thousand pounds before four o'clock the day after tomorrow. That is why I asked you about the deeds of the house. They should be worth at least twenty thousand pounds as security, and your pearls, say, another twenty-five thousand. Then I thought I could get ten thousand pounds as security upon my own private income and probably borrow something on my life insurance."
The dawn of an overmastering fury glittered in her hard blue eyes. She rose to her feet and stood facing him, clutching the back of a chair.
"You are out of your senses," she cried. "You're talking like a fool. The house is mine. You gave it to me and it is in my name. The pearls are mine. You think I am going to let you take them away and be beggared just because you have been fool enough to let people rob you! You must be mad to ask such a thing. The deeds are in my name at the Bank and they'll stay there. The pearls—see here!"
She unfastened them from her neck, hurried to the safe and unlocked it, stowed them away, locked it again, and replaced the key in its attachment to her bracelet. Harvey made no movement at all. He watched her all the time with curious eyes.
"The pearls and the house are mine," she declared, "and you shan't touch them. You are abominably selfish, Harvey, to have even suggested such a thing. Perhaps you'd like me to give up my beggarly settlement to satisfy your creditors. Do you think I married you, Harvey, to be poor?"
"I have wondered once or twice," he said deliberately, "what you did marry me for. Just now I am wondering more than ever."
"I'll tell you then," she exclaimed bitterly, walking up and down the room with quick, uneven steps, and looking at him every now and then: "I married you because I believed you to be what everyone said you were—a rich man with a gold mine behind him. I hated your business—a leather business. Faugh! But no one seems to mind these things nowadays, so I didn't. Externally you were of my world, I will admit. You satisfied me in many ways; but first and last, since you wish to know, I married you because I wanted to be rich. There have been four generations of Farringdons, each one poorer than the last. I was brought up in an atmosphere of poverty and I wanted to get out of it. I wanted to have money to spend with both hands. I didn't know that I was marrying a fool who would play polo and hunt and shoot whilst everyone else robbed him of his fortune."
As though in response to the change in her, there was a distinct difference in his own tone and manner. The slight, apologetic kindliness passed from his face. He reached out his hand for a cigarette and lit it. The fingers which struck the match were perfectly steady, his tone clear and well-balanced.
"Psychologically," he admitted, "your attitude is interesting. After all I don't know that it surprises me very much. I shall, of course, accept your decision to lend me neither your pearls nor the deeds of this house. Nevertheless I feel bound to point out to you, in our joint interests, that there is just a chance if I succeed in raising this money that means may be found of meeting the crisis. If, on the other hand, our engagements are not met the day after to-morrow, there seems to be no alternative but bankruptcy."
She shuddered, but it was obviously in distaste of the ugly word, not from any measure of sympathy.
"If that comes," she announced, "I shall go and live abroad. You will not be such an absolute fool as to let them take everything, I suppose. You will remember your duty as a husband. There will be something for me."
"I have not so far had time to survey the future at all," he replied. "I may remind you, however, that you have your settlement of two thousand a year."
"Do you suppose," she demanded contemptuously, her voice quivering once more with anger, "that I or any other woman in my position could live on two thousand a year? Why, my dressmaker's bills alone come to more than that."
"It is a pittance, no doubt," he agreed regretfully, "but it is at least a certainty. I myself cannot at the present moment see two thousand pence which I shall be able to call my own."
"Oh, who cares about a man?" she cried impatiently. "You'll look after yourself all right. I shall put the house up for sale to-morrow. I won't be robbed of that anyhow."
He rose to his feet.
"I must confess," he said, "that I am a little disappointed, Mildred, with your attitude. I am forced to remind you once more before we close the subject finally that your assistance with the loan of the pearls and the deeds of the house, besides being the reasonable sacrifice which a husband who is faced with a great difficulty might demand of his wife, might in the end avert this crisis altogether."
"Rubbish!" she scoffed.
"Believe me, it is nothing of the sort," he protested. "I have perhaps been a little clumsy in breaking this thing to you, and I am sure that you have not had time yet to understand what it means. The failure of the House of Garrard would bring disgrace upon a name which has been honoured everywhere since my great-grandfather founded the business more than a century ago. The horror of the thing grows upon me every hour. I shall do all that a human being can do to avert such a catastrophe and I ask you to help, Mildred. Remember that it is not only for my sake but for your own. If I can get over the day after to-morrow, I promise you that I will put up a great fight for it."
"I refuse absolutely," she declared, without a moment's hesitation. "I shall part with neither my pearls nor the deeds of the house. If you ask me a thousand times, Harvey, that is my last word to you. If you have let others deceive you, you must pay the penalty yourself. You should be ashamed to even ask such a sacrifice of me."
He remained silent for a moment. There was no sign of anger in his face or disappointment. Only his eyes lingered upon his wife as upon some curious thing.
"If upon reflection," he begged, "you should change your mind, let me hear from you before eight o'clock to-morrow morning. I shall be leaving the house at that time."
She laughed hardly.
"I am about as likely to change my mind," she told him, "as you are to redeem the fortunes of your wretched business."
Upon the threshold, with his fingers upon the handle of the door, he turned around. His expression had become harder. His tone was severe.
"There is one thing I insist upon, Mildred," he said, "until this matter is settled one way or the other, I forbid you to breathe a word of what has passed between us."
"Forbid!" she scoffed.
"I use the word advisedly," he assured her. "A careless word from you might ruin all my efforts. Credit is one of the great factors in the commercial world, and at present the House of Garrard stands where it did. If you are inconsiderate enough to betray my confidence to any living person, you would deserve what may be coming to you—and more. I neither ask for nor expect any kindness or sympathy from you. What I have asked for in material things you have refused. I accept your decision, but I forbid you absolutely and emphatically to breathe one word of anything I have said to anybody until I give you permission."
The half-scornful retort died away upon her lips. She looked into the face of a man who was a stranger to her. He waited for a second or two and then departed, closing the door behind him, leaving her listening to his level footsteps as he crossed the corridor and entered his own room. Then she collapsed once more upon the couch, her head buried amongst the cushions. She began to tear in pieces with quick convulsive movements a lace handkerchief which she had been holding doubled up in her hand.
CHAPTER III
Mr. Chalmer, the well-known accountant to the leather and kindred trades, lived in a country house in Essex, cultivated orchids and came to town each morning by the nine thirty-seven. On the morning after Harvey Garrard's visit to Bermondsey he was met at the office by so urgent a message that, without even stopping to open his letters, he hastened to keep the somewhat peremptory appointment suggested. He was ushered into the very imposing but dreary-looking private office where Harvey was awaiting him, expecting to be welcomed by a somewhat dissipated-looking young roué, a typical example of the leisured class which he half despised and half secretly admired. Instead he found himself greeted a little curtly by a clean-shaven, keen-eyed man of youthful middle age, who was obviously in perfect physical condition, and who seemed to have nothing whatever in common with the world to which the absentee member of this famous firm was supposed to belong.
"I am sorry that I was in Bristol on business yesterday," he apologised. "I came directly I got your note this morning."
"I understood that you were away," Harvey replied, waving his visitor to a seat. "I am much obliged for your promptness this morning. I have sent for you, Mr. Chalmer," he continued, "because I find myself suddenly confronted with a very difficult position. I am not a man of business. I understand nothing of figures. What is your opinion as to the present financial position of my firm?"
Mr. Chalmer coughed. This was plain speaking with a vengeance.
"You have doubtless already realised, Mr. Garrard," he said, "that the firm has met with severe losses."
"I have realised that," Harvey acknowledged. "There have also been what I presume one must call defalcations on the part of Mr. Armitage. There was nothing in the deed of partnership, which I was examining last evening, entitling him to overdraw to the extent of nearly a hundred thousand pounds."
"Nothing whatever," the accountant assented. "A most irregular proceeding."
"And this hundred thousand pounds, I understand, figures in our last balance sheet as an asset."
"It is amongst the book debts, I believe," Mr. Chalmer admitted. "I remonstrated seriously with Mr. Armitage on this point. He insisted, however, that he would be returning the money almost immediately, and looking at the matter in that light it was impossible to exclude it from the assets."
"I see," Harvey commented drily. "There is another point connected with the balance sheet of which I desire to speak to you," he added, indicating the document which lay stretched out before him. "You have a note here that the stock has been taken by the firm and that you accept no responsibility with regard to its valuation."
"That is quite usual," the other concurred, adjusting a pair of gold-rimmed eye-glasses and looking over the document for a moment. "We accountants can only put together the figures which are given to us. If people choose to wilfully deceive themselves by inflating the value of their assets, we cannot prevent them."
"I see," Harvey murmured. "It comes to this then: that unless the principals of a firm are entirely honest, a balance sheet is not worth the paper it is written upon."
Mr. Chalmer puffed out his chest a little. His clients seldom indulged in such plain language and he was inclined to resent the attitude of this stranger who upon his first appearance in the world of affairs was tilting against tradition.
"There are cases," he explained, "when a firm is publishing its figures for the purpose of attracting capital, for instance—when with the aid of experts the stock itself is verified and any irregular book debt of such a character as Mr. Armitage's would be mentioned in detail. This, however, is not the custom in the ordinary yearly balance sheets of established firms who are not incorporated."
"Incorporated?" Harvey queried.
"An incorporated business," the accountant explained, "would be a limited liability company whose accounts must be published for the information of shareholders."
Harvey nodded.
"I understand," he observed. "Well, according to this balance sheet, Mr. Chalmer, the capital of the firm should be approximately two hundred thousand pounds—that is to say the balance of assets over liabilities amount to that sum. Should you consider that to be a fair statement of the condition of affairs?"
"I certainly should not," Mr. Chalmer acknowledged. "In the first place, Mr. Armitage's personal estate, to the great surprise of everyone, is practically non-existent, and the whole of the hundred thousand pounds owing by him to the firm may now be written off as a dead loss. In the second place the stock there is announced—we insisted upon that—as being taken at cost price. Markets are to-day something like twenty per cent. lower."
Harvey produced his pencil and made a few calculations.
"That would mean," he pointed out, "a loss of about eighty thousand pounds on the stock and a hundred thousand off the book debts. Those two amounts together practically wipe out the capital."
"Most regrettable, but true," Mr. Chalmer acquiesced. Harvey pushed the balance sheet away from him. "To pass on," he continued, "to the imminent and serious side of the situation—my real reason for wishing to see you without any delay—the Bank have absolutely refused to increase our overdraft and we need eighty thousand pounds to meet our acceptances due tomorrow."
Mr. Chalmer's expression became very grave. "Dear me, dear me!" he exclaimed. "This is a very serious situation—very serious indeed."
"What am I to do?" Harvey demanded.
The accountant scratched a ponderous chin. Already the advice which he was intending to offer was forming in his mind.
"Every effort has been made to collect such amounts as may be due to the firm, I presume?" he suggested.
"You shall hear for yourself what Mr. Greatorex, the cashier, has to say to that," Harvey replied, pressing his finger upon the bell.
Mr. Greatorex, who presently put in an appearance, had very little helpful to say. He explained that he had been through the ledgers twice during the last week, had drawn bills wherever possible until there remained barely seven or eight thousand pounds in the books, a considerable portion of which amount was not due. Harvey listened and dismissed him with a wave of the hand.
"That is the situation, Mr. Chalmer," he wound up. "Have you any advice to give me or further suggestions to make?"
The accountant spoke with due solemnity.
"Bearing in mind the fact, Mr. Garrard," he said, "that the balance sheet does not in any way correctly represent the firm's position, and that there is no one left at the head of affairs capable of making those radical changes of policy which are evidently necessary, I am driven to the conclusion that there is only one honourable and straightforward course for you to take—deeply distasteful though I am sure it must be. I suggest that you instruct me to call a meeting of your creditors to consider the position."
Harvey made no immediate reply. His eyes seemed to have become drawn by some involuntary force towards the central one of the line of oil paintings upon the wall. For a moment his face lost its new hardness. It was almost as though he were appealing to the dead for advice—appealing against this dread sentence of disaster. His companion, on the other hand, although he did his best to conceal the fact, was already beginning to find an amazing piquancy in the situation. The failure of Garrard & Garrard would be the great sensation of the year and he, himself, the central figure. He saw himself besieged by questioners and visitors day after day. It would be an event without precedent in the annals of the trade—a firm, whose capital a few years ago had amounted to a million pounds and whose credit had been and still was unassailable, compelled to meet its creditors! He found himself already composing the first unctuous paragraph of the circular he should send out. His speculations were disturbed by a new ring in Harvey Garrard's somewhat drawling tone.
"That is a course, Mr. Chalmer," he said, "which I shall only consider as a last emergency. You can suggest, I gather, no means by which such a sum as eighty thousand pounds could possibly be raised before to-morrow afternoon?"
"I most certainly cannot," was the decided reply. "If your own Bank are unwilling to finance you further, it is scarcely likely that an outside loan would be possible."
"In that case," Harvey concluded, "I will not detain you any longer. I must try to work out my own salvation."
Mr. Chalmer smiled weakly as he rose to his feet. It was a disappointing sequel to their conversation, but the final result was after all inevitable.
"You will be a financial genius indeed, Mr. Garrard," he said, "if you are able to raise eighty thousand pounds before four o'clock to-morrow. Of course if the present crisis could be tided over, there is just a chance that with skilful manipulation of the figures—an honest manipulation I mean—a company might be floated. The name of Garrard would carry great weight upon the prospectus."
"That might become a subject for later conversation," Harvey remarked. "The immediate question, however, is to provide for to-morrow's engagements."
"That of course is the great difficulty," the other assented, as he shook hands. "I regret very much that I am absolutely powerless to assist you in this matter. Unless you have outside friends who would help, I know of no means of raising such a sum in the time."
Harvey rang the bell.
"Nevertheless, Mr. Chalmer," he insisted, dismissing him with a little nod, "it must be done."
At half-past three o'clock that afternoon, Harvey left the head offices of his Bank, after an interview by appointment with two of the Directors, and walked down Lombard Street with unseeing eyes. They had treated him kindly enough, these men whose lives seemed to be steeped in figures, who sat in an atmosphere of money and precision. Their attitude, however, was entirely hopeless. Argument with them was from the first impossible. They seemed indeed to have made up their minds beforehand even what phrases to use in rejecting his proposal. One of them, the senior, had wound up with a suggestion which Harvey heard for the second time that day with revulsion.
"From what I can gather, Mr. Garrard," he had said, leaning back in his chair, "your firm is in the unfortunate position of having no one left of sufficient experience—er—no one left likely to conduct its affairs to a successful issue. I tender you the advice with great reluctance—especially as our Bank would be amongst your largest creditors—but I honestly believe that in the interests of everyone you would do well to place your affairs in the hands of a Receiver."
At that Harvey Garrard had prepared to take his leave.
"It is a course which I shall only adopt as a last extremity," he told them.
"We quite understand your reluctance, Mr. Garrard," the junior of the two Directors had said, with a certain amount of sympathy in his tone, "but you must remember that you yourself will not be held personally responsible for the mistakes which have been made in your absence by those directing the destinies of your firm."
"My reluctance does not spring from personal consideration at all," Harvey had replied shortly, as he had picked up his hat and wished them good-afternoon. . . .
