The Power of the Dead by Henry Williamson

invest any money in the Copleston business.
    “They reminded me of the Babes in the Wood,” he said. “Of course such inexperienced young men should not have been allowed to undertake such a venture. Whatever were their trustees thinkingof?” He remarked that the eldest boy possibly had the makings of an engineering genius. “His design and lathe work is first-class. Is he always so remote from life?”
    “Yes, they’re all rather like that, even Tim, the youngest. They live in a private world. I find it almost impossible to communicate with them, especially with Ernest.”
    “That eldest boy is wasted where he is. He should be in the draughtsman’s office of an engineering firm. Now may I ask you a question: are you committed in any way—financially, I mean?”
    “Only a few pounds to stave off the bailiffs.”
    “Helping relations is a thankless task, usually.”
    “I don’t want any thanks.”
    “It might be as well,” the lawyer replied. “Now tell me, how do you like living at Rookhurst?”
    “I quite like it. By the way, may I ask you a question—but don’t reply, if you’d rather not. Is my Uncle fed-up with me?”
    “Oh, I don’t think so. If anything, he regards it as a useful lesson for one about to enter the business world of farming.”
    When he got back to Down Close, Phillip found Pa in his chair doing a cross-word puzzle with the aid of the new Encyclopædia Britannica, which had the little trade-mark name and address of Robert Roper, Shakesbury. How had it got there? He hadn’t paid for it.
    “May I have a word with you, sir?”
    Pa looked up from reading about Red Indians and said “Shoot!” His eyes were kindly and friendly, so Phillip found it easier to say, “The Boys are in a financial mess, and I don’t see how a knock-down sale can be prevented.”
    “Oh well, if it happens, it happens, I suppose. No use worrying oneself over what can’t be helped.”
    “A hundred pounds would stave it off, sir. Forgive my asking you, but could you possibly lend us that sum for a day or two, security being the machinery, which is paid for?”
    “I? Good lord, I’ve no money. It’s all gone long ago, I’m afraid. I’m still paying off sixty pun’ a year on a debt to ‘Mister’s’ Deed of Settlement, for a hundred and fifty I borrowed from him twenty years ago, before he went bankrupt—let me see—eleven years ago this past July.”
    “How very strange, for Mister has borrowed that sum, exactly, from the Boys during the last year. Actually it is ten pounds from me, and a hundred and forty from them.”
    “That makes us quits then.”
    “Well, I got him to sign a promissory note, but interest isn’t mentioned.”
    “Ah.”
    Mr. Copleston blew the stub of an Empire cigarette from his holder expertly into the fireplace, and carefully fitted another into the tube. “Cigarette? So they’re in a mess, are they? I thought something like that was happening. Well, it’s their look-out, not mine.”
    “You must think me an interfering busybody, sir, but I must try every means I can to stop a knock-down sale. You say you have been paying sixty pounds a year for twenty years, on a debt of one hundred and fifty. Isn’t that a long time to pay? Would you mind if I looked into it? The Boys, you know, were misled by one lawyer; and it might be a parallel case with this payment you are making.”
    “I don’t mind you looking into it, not at all. So far as memory serves me, I’ve been paying sixty pounds a year for the last three years, and thirty for eight years before that. It seemed a lot, but these lawyer fellows have their own arrangements. Come with me, and I’ll give you the box.”
    Mr. Copleston took him to his room, opened the desk, took out a small japanned box, produced a handful of receipts, and left Phillip alone with them.
    ‘Mister’ had apparently gone bankrupt in 1915, when he made a deed of settlement with his creditors. On Adrian Copleston, Esquire’s debt of £