It is needless to say, that Mr. Godfrey indignantly refused to listen to
these monstrous terms. Mr. Luker thereupon, handed him back the Diamond,
and wished him good night.
Your cousin went to the door, and came back again. How was he to be
sure that the conversation of that evening would be kept strictly secret
between his friend and himself?
Mr. Luker didn't profess to know how. If Mr. Godfrey had accepted his
terms, Mr. Godfrey would have made him an accomplice, and might have
counted on his silence as on a certainty. As things were, Mr. Luker
must be guided by his own interests. If awkward inquiries were made, how
could he be expected to compromise himself, for the sake of a man who
had declined to deal with him?
Receiving this reply, Mr. Godfrey Ablewhite did, what all animals (human
and otherwise) do, when they find themselves caught in a trap. He looked
about him in a state of helpless despair. The day of the month, recorded
on a neat little card in a box on the money-lender's chimney-piece,
happened to attract his eye. It was the twenty-third of June. On the
twenty-fourth he had three hundred pounds to pay to the young gentleman
for whom he was trustee, and no chance of raising the money, except
the chance that Mr. Luker had offered to him. But for this miserable
obstacle, he might have taken the Diamond to Amsterdam, and have made a
marketable commodity of it, by having it cut up into separate stones. As
matters stood, he had no choice but to accept Mr. Luker's terms. After
all, he had a year at his disposal, in which to raise the three thousand
pounds--and a year is a long time.
Mr. Luker drew out the necessary documents on the spot. When they were
signed, he gave Mr. Godfrey Ablewhite two cheques. One, dated June 23rd,
for three hundred pounds. Another, dated a week on, for the remaining
balance seventeen hundred pounds.
How the Moonstone was trusted to the keeping of Mr Luker's bankers, and
how the Indians treated Mr. Luker and Mr. Godfrey (after that had been
done) you know already.
The next event in your cousin's life refers again to Miss Verinder. He
proposed marriage to her for the second time--and (after having being
accepted) he consented, at her request, to consider the marriage as
broken off. One of his reasons for making this concession has been
penetrated by Mr. Bruff. Miss Verinder had only a life interest in her
mother's property--and there was no raising the twenty thousand pounds
on THAT.
But you will say, he might have saved the three thousand pounds, to
redeem the pledged Diamond, if he had married. He might have done so
certainly--supposing neither his wife, nor her guardians and trustees,
objected to his anticipating more than half of the income at his
disposal, for some unknown purpose, in the first year of his marriage.
But even if he got over this obstacle, there was another waiting for him
in the background. The lady at the Villa, had heard of his contemplated
marriage. A superb woman, Mr. Blake, of the sort that are not to be
triffled with--the sort with the light complexion and the Roman nose.
She felt the utmost contempt for Mr. Godfrey Ablewhite. It would be
silent contempt, if he made a handsome provision for her. Otherwise,
it would be contempt with a tongue to it. Miss Verinder's life interest
allowed him no more hope of raising the "provision" than of raising the
twenty thousand pounds. He couldn't marry--he really couldn't marry,
under all the circumstances.