Chapter XIX Counsel’s Opinion
Grandpapa decided that Sunbury would be a likely sort of place to “lie low” in, so we went up after dark that same Sunday evening, reached our new halting-place soon after midnight, and took some lodgings by the water-side. The affair was in the papers next day, and the name of Daniel Dolphin echoed in people’s mouths once more.
Grandfather now called himself Elisha Spratt, and he entered under that name at Henley. By a curious coincidence, the first heat for the Diamond Sculls fell on grandpapa’s birthday. Nearly a month, however, had yet to pass by before that elate. Mr. Rose’s added another to the long list of indictments against grandfather, but the old man cared nothing. He went on steadily and quietly with his practice and training, and the harder he trained, the younger he began to look.
A painful incident, out of which arose another still more trying, has here to be recorded. Grandpapa, while discussing the different processes at law which he had incurred, told me, in some glee, of matters I did not know.
“I did a smart thing recently,” he began. “Of course, a man must help his chums where he can, and I’ve been able to do so without any hurt to myself. People on the river think I’ve got pots of money, because I spend very freely. On the strength of this I’ve been asked to lend my security on about twenty different occasions. I never refused. Men thought I was a fool, but I knew what I was about very well.”
The old, cunning look came back into his eyes once more. It had a very painful appearance on the face of so young a man.
“What have you done now, dear grandfather? Hide nothing from me,” I said.
“I’ve backed a lot of bills, and gone security for thousands and thousands. A good few of the Johnnies can’t pay, and they’ll come down on me like a ton of bricks. Ha, ha!”
“I don’t see what there is to laugh at, grandpapa. So little amuses you now.”
“Why, I’m under age. That’s where the laugh comes in. I’m a legal infant, or something of that sort. They can’t touch me.”
“A legal infant! Why, grandfather, you’re a hundred and eight years old in a few weeks’ time.”
“Not by the New Scheme.”
“What’s the New Scheme got to do with the money-lenders? They’ll fight it out on the Old Scheme, and trace you back and back, and confront you with your past career. It was madness to do such a thing.”
The old man grew rather wretched and uneasy, but he soon cheered up again.
“I thought it was such a smart move; and, after all, no harm’s done, for I haven’t got the money. In fact, fifteen hundred or less is about my limit now. I’m safe enough if you don’t go and give me away. People recognise you, but, of course, I shall begin changing and dwindling at a deuce of a rate, after Henley. To think that my mental powers will begin to fade, too—that’s what cuts me up.”
What he called his mental powers had already begun to fade. He was stupid for his age now, and would be a mere clown of a boy in six months’ time. But I did not tell him so. I said nothing; and soon afterwards he went to bed.
In the morning he came down to breakfast, fired with an extraordinary new project. And yet, in justice to myself, I cannot say strictly that it was a fresh idea. I had advised him to take the step he now contemplated any time this five years.
“I have been reading the agreement,” said grandpapa, “and, upon my soul, it looks to me, duffer though I am, as if the thing didn’t hold water. I don’t know anything about law, but the question is simply a legal one, after all; and if there’s a flaw anywhere, I don’t see why I shouldn’t benefit by it. Any way, it’s good enough to get an opinion on. I shall go up to Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and see Messrs. Tarrant and Hawker. They helped me in the matter of the Automatic Postcard swindle, if you remember. I shall pretend the agreement is a joke, and, of course, they won’t know me from Adam. Just think if they discovered a flaw, now, at the eleventh hour, so to speak!”
“Go, by all means, grandpapa, but don’t buoy yourself, my dearest. Recollect Who wrote that agreement. He may not be skilled in legal matters himself, but he must have had ample opportunities for submitting the draft to experts.”
“That’s the point,” answered grandpapa. “He expressly said he’d drawn it up himself. It was a new thing in agreements, even for him. He fancied it too. But there may be a slip somewhere. I want a day off the river, and I’ll go up with this document after lunch. You sit tight at home and don’t show yourself. If people see you—Rose or any of the rest—they’ll know I’m not far off.”
“And take care yourself, grandpapa. They are on the look out, no doubt. If you are arrested, I shall go mad.”
He started, and I spent the afternoon reading disquieting paragraphs about Daniel Dolphin. Many papers made mention of him, and certain of the comic organs printed what they doubtless regarded as jokes. My name appeared. There was much diversity of opinion about me. Some said that I was his daughter; others that we were brother and sister; others, again, that Daniel Dolphin’s mother or grandmother or great-aunt assisted him in his pernicious career. The Star fancied that Daniel Dolphin often masqueraded as an old woman. Everybody agreed that the truth would soon be known, because the police had an undoubted clue, and the matter was in most experienced hands.
My grandpapa returned to dinner. He wept into his plate all through that meal, and showed me in a thousand ways that his enterprise had produced no good results.
“Speak, my treasure!” I cried at length, unable to bear the suspense; “is it as bad as you thought?”
“A million times worse!”
“Worse! What could be worse, grandpapa?”
“I’ll explain. This fool—Nick, I mean—has drawn out the thing single-handed, and defeated his own object, and wrecked me utterly. I saw Mr. Hawker himself. He studied the agreement for an hour, then gave judgment on it. He said, tapping it with his eyeglass, ‘Now this document is curious—very much so. The—the person who wrote it appears to have had a certain smattering of law terms, which he sprinkles over his remarks without any legal knowledge, without any familiarity with their forensic significance. The most remarkable thing about this agreement, however, is that by the processes to be applied to Daniel Dolphin, the said gentleman will absolutely cease to exist at the end of the specified time. The deed is amateurish in many respects, but in none more than this. It defeats its own object, for on the completion of the period herein set out, there will be nothing of Mr. Daniel Dolphin left to go anywhere! He said that, and I thanked him and paid six-and-eightpence, and came away, feeling about as cheap as a bad egg.”
My grandfather flung himself on a sofa, and cried again.
“Then you can’t go to—to—!” I said, with a thrill of exultation.
“I can’t go anywhere at all,” he moaned; “I go out like gas when it’s turned off at the tap. You don’t understand—it’s terrible, it’s unheard of. I’d rather have gone down below than nowhere at all—anybody would. But now—now I shall become as extinct as the dodo. He’s spoofed himself, and squelched me. Talk about justice!”
I cannot dwell upon his sufferings. He had always believed firmly in a life beyond the grave. Now it was snatched from him by a juggling, muddle-headed, self-sufficient fiend, who ought never to have been allowed the use of writing materials. The matter was a logical one; the end of the New Scheme simply meant eternal annihilation for my unhappy old grandfather.