kruptcy. The stoppage of a bank, with
little hope of its resuming its functions, is like the stoppage of a
heart which will never beat again. It may have been dreaded as a
possible calamity, and occasionally hinted at in awed whispers; but when
the blow falls it does so with a stunning, crushing force because of its
irreparable nature and far-reaching ruin.

There was just a little preparation to herald the catastrophe. Poor
Carey, an honest, weak tool of dishonest speculators and birds of prey
in the shape of needy, unscrupulous relations, when the appalling
tidings reached him which could only betoken immediate wreck, did all
that there was left to him to do. He called a meeting of the Redcross
shareholders. These were the leading professional men in the town who
had invested their savings, and a small proportion of the neighbouring
country gentlemen who had put a little capital--not often to spare in
those days--in a concern once regarded as sound and incapable of
collapse as the Bank of England itself. With a faltering tongue and a
hanging head the nominal head of the firm told to those nearly concerned
what was coming on them. Nobody reproached him; either no man had the
heart, or all felt the uselessness of reproaches. Certainly these
shareholders' silence was his heaviest punishment.

They made a hasty examination, as far as they could, for themselves, and
then the meeting broke up. Its members did not even linger to consult,
being well assured that consultation, like reproaches, would be of no
avail; the failure was so much more extensive and complete than their
worst fears had led them to anticipate. The men looked blankly in each
other's whitening faces and sought the refuge of their own houses at
first. There would be time enough for outcry, for desperate plans and
schemes a little later.

Poor Dr. Millar had not even this breathing space. It happened to be a
particularly busy day with him. Various neutral individuals, in no way
concerned with Carey's Bank, even when its misfortunes should be made
public, took that inconvenient time for falling ill, and their medical
man had to attend upon them with spasmodic promptitude and mechanical
attention--projected, as it were, against the dazed and confused
background of his brain. After all he was glad of his profession with
its outward and immediate calls, taking him out of himself in the hour
when he had heard the worst. He preferred to be about the town doing