He bustled through with the bag, greeted his father gaily, and placed his burden on the floor beside him. Then he went back for the other bag. He made a second countryman weigh this, grinned at his face of astonishment, then taking up the two bags he went through with his father to the parlor. His arrival did good. The clerks perked up, smiled at one another, went to and fro more briskly. Rodd braced himself and, though he knew the truth, began to put on airs, bandied words with a client, and called contemptuously for order. And the customers looked sheepish. Gold! Gold coming in like that in bags as if ’twere common stuff. It made them think twice. A few, balancing in their minds a small possible loss against the banker’s certain favor, hesitated and hung back. Two or three even went out without cashing their notes and shrugged their shoulders in the street, declaring that the whole thing was nonsense. They had been bamboozled. They had been hoaxed. The bank was sound enough. But behind the parlor door things wore a different aspect. CHAPTER XL The banker looked at the money lying at his feet. Clement looked at his father. He noted the elder man’s despondent attitude, he read the lines which anxiety had deepened on his brow, and his assumed gaiety fell from him. He longed to say something that might comfort the other, but _mauvaise honte_ and the reserve of years were too much for him, and instead he rapidly and succinctly told his tale, running over what had happened in London and on the road. He accounted for what he had brought, and explained why he had brought it and at whose request. Then, as the banker, lost in troubled thought, his eyes on the money, did not speak, “It goes badly then, sir, does it?” he said. “I see that the place is full.” Ovington’s eyes were still on the bags, and though he forced himself to speak, his tone was dull and mechanical. “Yes,” he said. “We paid out fifteen thousand and odd yesterday. About six thousand in odd sums to-day. I have just settled with Yapp—two thousand seven hundred. Mills and Blakeway have drawn at the counter—three thousand and fifty between them. A packet of notes from Birmingham, eleven hundred. Jenkins sent his cheque for twelve hundred by his son, but he omitted to fill in the date.” “And you didn’t pay it?” “No, I didn’t pay it. Why should I? But he will be in himself by the two o’clock coach. The only other account—large account outstanding—is Owen’s for eighteen hundred. Probably he will come in by the same coach. In the meantime—” he took a slip of paper from the table—“we have notes for rather more than two thousand still out; half of these may not, for one reason or another, be presented. And payable on demand we still owe something like two or three thousand.” “You may be called upon for another six thousand, then, sir?”