Old Heythorp nodded. The eight gentlemen took their hats, and went out one by one, Mr. Brownbee courteously bringing up the rear.
The old man, who could not get up without assistance, stayed musing in his chair. He had diddled 'em for the moment into giving him another month, and when that month was up-he would diddle 'em again! A month ought to make the Pillin business safe, with all that hung on it. That poor funkey chap Joe Pillin! A gurgling chuckle escaped his red lips. What a shadow the fellow had looked, trotting in that evening just a month ago, behind his valet's announcement: “Mr. Pillin, sir.”
What a parchmenty, precise, thread-paper of a chap, with his bird's claw of a hand, and his muffled-up throat, and his quavery:
“How do you do, Sylvanus? I'm afraid you're not--”
“Port! I never drink it. Poison to me! Poison!”
“Oh! I know, that's what you always say.”
“You've a monstrous constitution, Sylvanus. If I drank port and smoked cigars and sat up till one o'clock, I should be in my grave to-morrow. I'm not the man I was. The fact is, I've come to see if you can help me. I'm getting old; I'm growing nervous....”
“You always were as chickeny as an old hen, Joe.”
“Well, my nature's not like yours. To come to the point, I want to sell my ships and retire. I need rest. Freights are very depressed. I've got my family to think of.”
“Crack on, and go broke; buck you up like anything!”
“Now--in a word--won't your 'Island Navigation Company' buy my ships?”
A pause, a twinkle, a puff of smoke. “Make it worth my while!” He had said it in jest; and then, in a flash, the idea had come to him. Rosamund and her youngsters! What a chance to put something between them and destitution when he had joined the majority! And so he said: “We don't want your silly ships.”
That claw of a hand waved in deprecation. “They're very good ships--doing quite well. It's only my wretched health. If I were a strong man I shouldn't dream....”
“What d'you want for 'em?” Good Lord! how he jumped if you asked him a plain question. The chap was as nervous as a guinea-fowl!
“Here are the figures--for the last four years. I think you'll agree that I couldn't ask less than seventy thousand.”
Through the smoke of his cigar old Heythorp had digested those figures slowly, Joe Pillin feeling his teeth and sucking lozenges the while; then he said: