"Carmichael,"he said to the father of the Large Family,after he had heard this description,"I wonder how many of the attics in this square are like that one,and how many wretched little servant girls sleep on such beds,while I toss on my down pillows,loaded and harassed by wealth that is,most of it--not mine."
"My dear fellow,"Mr.Carmichael answered cheerily,"the sooner you cease tormenting yourself the better it will be for you.
If you possessed all the wealth of all the Indies,you could not set right all the discomforts in the world,and if you began to refurnish all the attics in this square,there would still remain all the attics in all the other squares and streets to put in order.
And there you are!"
Mr.Carrisford sat and bit his nails as he looked into the glowing bed of coals in the grate.
"Do you suppose,"he said slowly,after a pause--"do you think it is possible that the other child--the child I never cease thinking of,I believe--could be--could POSSIBLY be reduced to any such condition as the poor little soul next door?"
Mr.Carmichael looked at him uneasily.He knew that the worst thing the man could do for himself,for his reason and his health,was to begin to think in the particular way of this particular subject.
"If the child at Madame Pascal's school in Paris was the one you are in search of,"he answered soothingly,"she would seem to be in the hands of people who can afford to take care of her.
They adopted her because she had been the favorite companion of their little daughter who died.They had no other children,and Madame Pascal said that they were extremely well-to-do Russians."
"And the wretched woman actually did not know where they had taken her!"
exclaimed Mr.Carrisford.
Mr.Carmichael shrugged his shoulders.
"She was a shrewd,worldly Frenchwoman,and was evidently only too glad to get the child so comfortably off her hands when the father's death left her totally unprovided for.Women of her type do not trouble themselves about the futures of children who might prove burdens.
The adopted parents apparently disappeared and left no trace."
"But you say `IF>the child was the one I am in search of.
You say 'if.'We are not sure.There was a difference in the name."
"Madame Pascal pronounced it as if it were Carew instead of Crewe--but that might be merely a matter of pronunciation.The circumstances were curiously similar.An English officer in India had placed his motherless little girl at the school.He had died suddenly after losing his fortune."Mr.Carmichael paused a moment,as if a new thought had occurred to him."Are you SURE the child was left at a school in Paris?Are you sure it was Paris?"
"My dear fellow,"broke forth Carrisford,with restless bitterness,"I am SURE of nothing.I never saw either the child or her mother.
Ralph Crewe and I loved each other as boys,but we had not met since our school days,until we met in India.I was absorbed in the magnificent promise of the mines.He became absorbed,too.
The whole thing was so huge and glittering that we half lost our heads.When we met we scarcely spoke of anything else.
I only knew that the child had been sent to school somewhere.
I do not even remember,now,HOW I knew it."
He was beginning to be excited.He always became excited when his still weakened brain was stirred by memories of the catastrophes of the past.
Mr.Carmichael watched him anxiously.It was necessary to ask some questions,but they must be put quietly and with caution.
"But you had reason to think the school WAS in Paris?"
"Yes,"was the answer,"because her mother was a Frenchwoman,and I had heard that she wished her child to be educated in Paris.
It seemed only likely that she would be there."
"Yes,"Mr.Carmichael said,"it seems more than probable."
The Indian gentleman leaned forward and struck the table with a long,wasted hand.
