Two hours after the receipt of Mrs. McDermott's second letter, Squire¹ Culpepper was on his way to Sugden's bank. His heart was heavy, and his step slow. He had never had to borrow a farthing from any man--at least, never since he had come into the estate--and he felt the humiliation², as he himself called it, very bitterly. There was something of bitterness, too, in having to confess to his friend Cope how all his brilliant castles in the air had vanished utterly³, leaving not a wrack⁴ behind.

He could see, in imagination, the sneer⁵ that would creep over Cope's face as the latter asked him why he could not obtain a mortgage on his fine new mansion⁶ at Pincote; the mansion he had talked so much about--about which he had bored his friends; the mansion that was to have been built out of the Alcazar shares, but of which not even the foundation-stone would ever now be laid. Then, again, the Squire was far from certain as to the kind of reception which would be accorded him by the banker. Of late he had seemed cool, very cool--refrigerating almost. Once or twice, too, when he had called, Mr. Cope had been invisible: a Jupiter Tonans buried for the time being among a cloud of ledgers⁷ and dockets and transfers: not to be seen by any one save his own immediate⁸ satellites. The time had been, and not so very long ago, when he could walk unchallenged through the outer bank office, whoever else might be waiting, and so into the inner sanctum, and be sure of a welcome when he got there. But now he was sure to be intercepted⁹ by one or other of the clerks with a "Will you please to take a seat for a moment while I see whether Mr. Cope is disengaged." The Squire

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