Hugh glanced around rapidly. None of the partners or senior clerks was in sight. He decided to use his initiative. "Will you come upstairs to the Partners' Room, sir? I know they will be keen to see you."
"All right."
Hugh led him upstairs. The partners all worked together in the same room--so that they could keep an eye on one another, according to tradition. The room was furnished like the reading room in a gentlemen's club, with leather sofas, bookcases and a central table with newspapers. In framed portraits on the walls, ancestral Pilasters looked down their beaklike noses at their descendants.
The room was empty. "One of them will be back in a moment, I'm sure," Hugh said. "May I offer you a glass of Madeira?" He went to the sideboard and poured a generous measure while Sir John settled himself in a leather armchair. "I'm Hugh Pilaster, by the way."
"Oh, yes?" Sir John was somewhat mollified to find he was talking to a Pilaster, rather than an ordinary office.
"Yes, sir. I was there with your son Albert. We called him Hump."
"All Cammels are called Hump."
"I haven't seen him since ... since then."
"He went to the Cape Colony, and liked it there so much that he never came back. He raises horses now."
Albert Cammel had been at the swimming hole on that fateful day in 1866. Hugh had never heard his version of how Peter Middleton drowned. "I'd like to write to him," Hugh said.
"I daresay he'll be glad of a letter from an old school friend. I'll give you his address." Sir John moved to the table, dipped a quill in the inkwell and scribbled on a sheet of paper. "There you are."
"Thank you." Sir John was mollified now, Hugh noted with satisfaction. "Is there anything else I can do for you while you're waiting?"
"Well, perhaps you can deal with this." He took a cheque out of his pocket. Hugh examined it. It was for a hundred and ten thousand pounds, the largest personal cheque Hugh had ever handled. "I've just sold a coal mine to my neighbor," Sir John explained.
"I can certainly deposit it for you."
"What interest will I get?"
"Four percent, at present."
"That'll do, I suppose."
Hugh hesitated. It occurred to him that if Sir John could be persuaded to buy Russian bonds, the loan issue could be transformed from being slightly undersubscribed to slightly oversubscribed. Should he mention it? He had already overstepped his authority by bringing a guest into the Partners' Room. He decided to take a chance. "You could get five and three-eighths by buying Russian bonds."
