Which of us does not know the fearful joy of mental flirtation with crime? William, restraining his first sound impulse to tear up the letter and to put its fragments where they properly belonged, in the waste-paper basket, persuaded himself that his motive was simple curiosity. It had nothing to do with Gertrude, nor with her impatience of Rupert who was prolonging a holiday into a habit, and who, if he made no signal that her reign in Staithley Hall must end, made no signal, either, that his training for the Service must begin. By this time, William had, distinctly, his puzzled misgivings about Rupert, but he hadn’t quite reached the point of seeing in Rupert’s absence and his uncommunicativeness a deliberate challenge to the Service. He attributed to thoughtlessness an absence which was thoughtful. He had at first no other idea than to calculate what fabulous figure would, in existing circumstances, be justly demanded for Hepplestall’s on the ridiculous hypothesis of Hepplestall’s being for sale. There was surely no harm on a slack morning in a little theoretic financial exercise of that kind. There wasn’t; but, for all that, he went about the collecting of data, alone in his office under the pictured _eyes_ of bygone Hepplestalls, with the furtive air of a criminal. For insurance purposes, in view of post-war values, they had recently had a professional valuation made of the mills, machinery, office and warehouse buildings in Staithley and Manchester. Providential, William thought, meaning, of course, no more than that he need not waste more than an hour or so in satisfying his natural curiosity. It was, he asserted, defiantly daring the _gaze_ of the Founder on the wall, natural to be curious. He had the valuation for insurance before him now: he applied the multiplication table to reach an estimate of the market value. He meditated goodwill. Guiltily he attempted to capitalize the name of Hepplestall’s, and it made him feel less guilty to capitalize it in seven figures. The total result was so large that, notwithstanding the national eminence of the chartered accountants whose letter was in his pocket, he felt justified in regarding his proceedings as completely extravagant. So he might just as well amuse himself further. He might, for instance, refresh his memory of the distribution of Hepplestall’s shares, and he might turn up the articles of association and see if that document, usually so comprehensive, had anticipated this unlikeliest of all improbabilities, a sale of Hepplestall’s: and what emerged from his investigation was the fact that if he and Rupert voted, on their joint holdings of shares, for a sale at a legally summoned general meeting of Hepplestall’s shareholders, a sale would be authorized. He and Rupert! William found himself sweating violently. It was impure, obscene nightmare, but style his communings what he would, the pass was there and he and Rupert had the power to sell it.