PAGE 7
The Planter of Malata
by
He spoke with feeling. It was clear that what he had to tell appealed to his sentiment. Yet, as an experienced man of the world, he marked his amused wonder. Young man of good family and connections, going everywhere, yet not merely a man about town, but with a foot in the two big F’s.
Renouard lounging aimlessly in the room turned round: “And what the devil’s that?” he asked faintly.
“Why Fashion and Finance,” explained the Editor. “That’s how I call it. There are the three R’s at the bottom of the social edifice and the two F’s on the top. See?”
“Ha! Ha! Excellent! Ha! Ha!” Renouard laughed with stony eyes.
“And you proceed from one set to the other in this democratic age,” the Editor went on with unperturbed complacency. “That is if you are clever enough. The only danger is in being too clever. And I think something of the sort happened here. That swell I am speaking of got himself into a mess. Apparently a very ugly mess of a financial character. You will understand that Willie did not go into details with me. They were not imparted to him with very great abundance either. But a bad mess–something of the criminal order. Of course he was innocent. But he had to quit all the same.”
“Ha! Ha!” Renouard laughed again abruptly, staring as before. “So there’s one more big F in the tale.”
“What do you mean?” inquired the Editor quickly, with an air as if his patent were being infringed.
“I mean–Fool.”
“No. I wouldn’t say that. I wouldn’t say that.”
“Well–let him be a scoundrel then. What the devil do I care.”
“But hold on! You haven’t heard the end of the story.”
Renouard, his hat on his head already, sat down with the disdainful smile of a man who had discounted the moral of the story. Still he sat down and the Editor swung his revolving chair right round. He was full of unction.
“Imprudent, I should say. In many ways money is as dangerous to handle as gunpowder. You can’t be too careful either as to who you are working with. Anyhow there was a mighty flashy burst up, a sensation, and–his familiar haunts knew him no more. But before he vanished he went to see Miss Moorsom. That very fact argues for his innocence–don’t it? What was said between them no man knows– unless the professor had the confidence from his daughter. There couldn’t have been much to say. There was nothing for it but to let him go–was there?–for the affair had got into the papers. And perhaps the kindest thing would have been to forget him. Anyway the easiest. Forgiveness would have been more difficult, I fancy, for a young lady of spirit and position drawn into an ugly affair like that. Any ordinary young lady, I mean. Well, the fellow asked nothing better than to be forgotten, only he didn’t find it easy to do so himself, because he would write home now and then. Not to any of his friends though. He had no near relations. The professor had been his guardian. No, the poor devil wrote now and then to an old retired butler of his late father, somewhere in the country, forbidding him at the same time to let any one know of his whereabouts. So that worthy old ass would go up and dodge about the Moorsom’s town house, perhaps waylay Miss Moorsom’s maid, and then would write to ‘Master Arthur’ that the young lady looked well and happy, or some such cheerful intelligence. I dare say he wanted to be forgotten, but I shouldn’t think he was much cheered by the news. What would you say?”