"And how will the money—be paid?" said the poor clergyman.
"Do not bother yourself about that at present. It shall so be managed that the burden shall fall ultimately on yourself—not on any one else. But I am sure it must be a comfort to you to know that your wife need not be driven out of her drawing-room."
"But, Lufton, I can not allow you, after what has passed, and at the present moment—"
"My dear fellow, I know all about it, and I am coming to that just now. You have employed Curling, and he shall settle it; and, upon my word, Mark, you shall pay the bill. But, for the present emergency, the money is at my banker's."
"But, Lufton—"
"And, to deal honestly, about Curling's bill I mean, it ought to be as much my affair as your own. It was I that brought you into this mess with Sowerby, and I know now how unjust about it I was to you up in London. But the truth is that Sowerby's treachery had nearly driven me wild. It has done the same to you since, I have no doubt."
"He has ruined me," said Robarts.
"No, he has not done that. No thanks to him, though; he would not have scrupled to do it had it come in his way. The fact is, Mark, that you and I can not conceive the depth of fraud in such a man as that. He is always looking for money; I believe that in all his hours of most friendly intercourse—when he is sitting with you over your wine, and riding beside you in the field—he is still thinking how he can make use of you to tide him over some difficulty. He has lived in that way till he has a pleasure in cheating, and has become so clever in his line of life that if you or I were with him again to-morrow he would again get the better of us. He is a man that must be absolutely avoided; I, at any rate, have learned to know so much."
In the expression of which opinion Lord Lufton was too hard upon poor Sowerby, as, indeed, we are all apt to be too hard in forming an opinion upon the rogues of the world. That Mr. Sowerby had been a rogue I can not deny. It is roguish to lie, and he had been a great liar. It is roguish to make promises which the promiser knows he can not perform, and such had been Mr. Sowerby's daily
