Page:Dombey and Son.djvu/635

532 "You have looked so earnestly at me more than once," rejoined the visitor, "that I think I can divine your question. Has he taken money? Is it that?"

"Yes."

"He has not."

"I thank Heaven!" said Harriet. "For the sake of John."

"That he has abused his trust in many ways," said Mr. Morfin; "that he has oftener dealt and speculated to advantage for himself, than for the House he represented; that he has led the House on, to prodigious ventures, often resulting in enormous losses; that he has always pampered the vanity and ambition of his employer, when it was his duty to have held them in check, and shown, as it was in his power to do, to what they tended here or there; will not, perhaps, surprise you now. Undertakings have been entered on, to swell the reputation of the House for vast resources, and to exhibit it in magnificent contrast to other merchants’ Houses, of which it requires a steady head to contemplate the possibly—a few disastrous changes of affairs might render them the probably—ruinous consequences. In the midst of the many transactions of the House, in most parts of the world: a great labyrinth of which only he has held the clue: he has had the opportunity, and he seems to have used it, of keeping the various results afloat, when ascertained, and substituting estimates and generalities for facts. But latterly—you follow me, Miss Harriet?"

"Perfectly, perfectly," she answered, with her frightened face fixed on his. "Pray tell me all the worst at once."

"Latterly, he appears to have devoted the greatest pains to making these results so plain and clear, that reference to the private books enables one to grasp them, numerous and varying as they are, with extraordinary ease. As if he had resolved to show his employer at one broad view what has been brought upon him by ministration to his ruling passion! That it has been his constant practice to minister to that passion basely, and to flatter it corruptly, is indubitable. In that, his criminality, as it is connected with the affairs of the House, chiefly consists."

"One other word before you leave me, dear Sir," said Harriet. "There is no danger in all this?"

"How danger?" he returned, with a little hesitation.

"To the credit of the House?"

"I cannot help answering you plainly, and trusting you completely," said Mr. Morfin, after a moment’s survey of her face.

"You may. Indeed you may!"

"I am sure I may. Danger to the House’s credit? No; none. There may be difficulty, greater or less difficulty, but no danger, unless—unless, indeed—the head of the House, unable to bring his mind to the reduction of its enterprises, and positively refusing to believe that it is, or can be, in any position but the position in which he has always represented it to himself, should urge it beyond its strength. Then it would totter."

"But there is no apprehension of that?" said Harriet.

"There shall be no half-confidence," he replied, shaking her hand, "between us. Mr. Dombey is unapproachable by anyone, and his state of mind is haughty, rash, unreasonable, and ungovernable, now. But he is disturbed