Civil service -- Fiction; London (England) -- Fiction
Thus Alaric obtained full control of Miss Golightly's fortune: for
Figgs, his co-trustee, was, as has been said, a shadow. He obtained the
full control of £20,000, and out of it he paid the calls due upon the
West Cork shares, held both by himself and Undy Scott. But he put a
salve upon his conscience, and among his private memoranda, appertaining
to that lady's money affairs he made an entry, intelligible to any who
might read it, that he had so invested this money on her behalf. The
entry was in itself a lie--a foolish, palpable lie--and yet he found in
it something to quiet remorse and stupefy his conscience.
Undy Scott had become tyrannical in his logic as soon as he had
persuaded Alaric to make use of a portion of Madame Jaquêtanàpe's
marriage portion. 'You have taken part of the girl's money,' was Undy's
argument; 'you have already converted to your own purposes so much of
her fortune; it is absurd for you now to talk of conscience and honesty,
of your high duties as a trustee, of the inviolable distinction between
meum and tuum. You have already shown that the distinction is not
inviolable; let us have no more such nonsense; there are still
left £15,000 on which we can trade; open the till, and let us go on
swimmingly with the business.'
Alaric was not addressed absolutely in these words; he would not
probably have allowed the veil with which he still shrouded his
dishonesty to be withdrawn with so rough a hand; but that which was said
was in effect the same. In September he left town for a few weeks and
went down to Scotland, still with Undy Scott. He had at first much
liked this man's society, for Scott was gay, lively, clever, and a good
companion at all points. But latterly he had become weary of him. He
now put up with him as men in business have to put up with partners whom
they may not like; or, perhaps, to speak the truth openly, he bore with
him as a rogue bears with his confederate, though he absolutely hates
his brother rogue on account of his very roguery. Alaric Tudor was now
a rogue; despite his high office, his grand ideas, his exalted ambition;
despite his talent, zeal, and well-directed official labours, he was a
rogue; a thief, a villain who had stolen the money of the orphan, who
had undertaken a trust merely that he might break it; a robber, doubly
disgraced by being a robber with an education, a Bill Sykes without any
of those excuses which a philanthropist cannot but make for wretches
brought up in infamy.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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