I thought I should hear nothing but execrations and blasphemies;
for I think I know my gentleman pretty well of old, and that he's not a
person to take a disappointment of this kind very sweetly. There must be
something under that quiet manner of his. Perhaps he knows more about his
daughter than he cares to let out; knows that she is sickly, and that he
stands a good chance of surviving her."
There was indeed a lurking desperation under Percival Nowell's airy
manner, of which the people amongst whom he lived had no suspicion.
Unless some sudden turn in the wheel of fortune should change the aspect
of affairs for him very soon, ruin, most complete and utter, was
inevitable. A man cannot go on very long without money; and in order to
pay his hotel-bill Mr. Nowell had been obliged to raise the funds from an
accommodating gentleman with whom he had done business in years gone by,
and who was very familiar with his own and his father's autograph. The
bill upon which this gentleman advanced the money in question bore the
name of Jacob Nowell, and was drawn at three months. Percival had
persuaded himself that before the three months were out his father would
be in his grave, and his executors would scarcely be in a position to
dispute the genuineness of the signature. In the meantime the money thus
obtained enabled him to float on.
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