Mr. Anerley’s solicitor—a stout, cheerful little man—did his very best to look sorrowful, and would probably have shed tears, had he been able, to give effect to his condolences. Any more material consolation he had none. There was no doubt about it: Miall & Welling had wholly collapsed. Ultimately the lawyer suggested that things might pull together again; but in the meantime shareholders were likely to suffer. "They do hint queer things about the directors," he continued, "and if what I hear whispered be true, I’d have some of them put in the stocks until they told what they had done with the money. I’d make ’em disgorge it, sir. Why, sir, men settling their forty or fifty thousand a year on their wives out of money belonging to all sorts of people who have worked for it, who have nothing else to live on, who are likely to starve——" "My dear sir," said Mr. Anerley, calmly, "you don’t look at the matter in its proper light. You don’t see the use of such men. You don’t reflect that the tendency to excess of reproduction in animals is wholesomely checked by the ravages of other animals. But who is to do that for men, except men? There is, you see, a necessity for human tigers, to prey on their species, kill the weakly members, and improve the race by limiting its numbers and narrowing the conditions of existence." "That’s very nice as a theory, Mr. Anerley; but it wouldn’t console me for losing the money that you have lost." "Because you don’t believe in it. Tell me now, how is a penniless man, without a trade, but with some knowledge of the multiplication-table, to gain a living in London?" "There are too many trying to solve the problem, Mr. Anerley," said the lawyer. "You say there is a chance of the bank retrieving itself in a certain time?" "Yes. I have shown you how the money has been sunk. But in time——" "Until then, those who are in a position like myself must contrive to exist somehow?" "That’s it." "Unfortunately, I never settled, as you know, a farthing on my wife; and as for my life-insurance, they illogically and unreasonably exclude suicide from their list of casualties. Your ordinary suicide does not compass his own death any more doggedly than the man who persists in living in an undrained house, or in drinking brandy until his brain gives way, or in lighting his pipe in a coal-mine. However, that’s neither here nor there. You have been my lawyer, Mr. Green, for a great many years, and you have given me some good advice. But at the most critical moment, I find you without a scrap. Still I bear you no malice; for I don’t owe you any money." "It isn’t very easy, sir, to tell a gentleman how to recover his fortune," said Mr. Green, with a smile—glad that his client was taking matters so coolly. "I was a gentleman three days ago," said Mr. Anerley. "Now I am a man, very anxious to live, and not seeing my way clearly towards that end."