or you could do any
good."

He spoke in an extremely low tone, almost in a whisper, and Mr. Prohack
comprehended that the youth was trying to achieve privacy in a domicile
where all conversation and movements were necessarily more or less
public to the whole flat. Charles's restraint, however, showed little or
no depression, disappointment, or disgust, and no despair.

"But what's it all about? If I'm not being too curious," Mr. Prohack
enquired cautiously.

"It's all about my being up the spout, dad. I've had a flutter, and it
hasn't come off, and that's all there is to it. I needn't trouble you
with the details. But you may believe me when I tell you that I shall
bob up again. What's happened to me might have happened to anybody, and
has happened to a pretty fair number of City swells."

"You mean bankruptcy?"

"Well, yes, bankruptcy's the word. I'd much better go right through with
it. The chit thinks so, and I agree."

"The chit?"

"Mimi."

"Oh! So you call her that, do you?"

"No, I never call her that. But that's how I think of her. I call her
Miss Winstock. I'm glad you let me have her. She's been very useful, and
she's going to stick by me--not that there's any blooming sentimental
nonsense about her! Oh, no! By the way, I know the mater and Sis think
she's a bit harum-scarum, and you do, too. Nevertheless she was just as
strong as Lady M. that I should stroll up and confess myself. She said
it was _due_ to you. Lady M. didn't put it quite like that."

The truckle-bed creaked as Charlie shifted uneasily. They caught a faint
murmur of talk from the other room, and Sissie's laugh.

"Lady Massulam happened to tell me once that you'd been selling
something before you knew how much it would cost you to buy it. Of
course I don't pretend to understand finance myself--I'm only a civil
servant on the shelf--but to my limited intelligence such a process of
putting the cart before the horse seemed likely to lead to trouble,"
said Mr. Prohack, as it were ruminating.

"Oh! She told you that, did she?" Charlie smiled. "Well, the good lady
was talking through her hat. _That_ affair's all right. At least it
would be if I could carry it through, but of course I can't now. It'll
go into the general mess. If I was free, I wouldn't sell it at all; I'd
keep it; there'd be no end of money in it, and I was selling it too
cheap. It's a combine, or rather it would have been a combine, of two of
the best paper mills in t