“Well,” confessed William, “tentatively, purely as a matter of curiosity, I have gone into that.” “Uncle,” said Rupert, surprising William with a giant’s hand-grip, “you and I speak the same language. And we won’t stammer, either. These accountants wrote to you, so the reply must be from you. You have not had an opportunity to consult your Board and you speak for yourself in estimating the market value of Hepplestall’s at so much. This figure should not be regarded as the basis of negotiation, but as the minimum financial consideration on which other terms of sale could be founded. Something like that, eh? Now show me the figure and tell me how you arrived at it.” From nephew to uncle, this did not strain courtesy; it was hot pace-making irresistibly recalling to William occasions when Sir Philip, well in his stride, had made him wonder whether such alert efficiency was quite gentlemanly. But with the figures in his pocket he had been no sloven himself, and if Rupert and he did indeed speak the same language, he hadn’t stammered. At the same time, this production of the figures, to one so pertinacious as Rupert, advanced matters to a stage from which there was no retreat and he hesitated until a thought, sophistical but consoling, came into his mind. He had heard it rumored that the Banks were beginning to frown on the excessive speculation in mills; of course, and time, too. The Government had cried, “Trade! Trade!” and had inspired the Banks to encourage trade by lending money readily. Then it was found that too much of the money lent was being used not for sound trade but for speculation, and borrowers were faced with a decided change of front on the part of bank managers. William conveniently forgot that the type of rich man behind the accountants who had written to him would be above the caprice of bank managers, and decided happily that the whole affair had merely an academic interest; in that case, there was no harm in discussing the figures with Rupert behind the backs of the rest of the Board, and in submitting them to London. The nationally eminent accountants would have been infuriated to know that William Hepplestall imagined them capable of having to do with a mare’s-nest; but that it was all a mare’s-nest was the salve he applied to his conscience as he went to the safe to collect his data for Rupert.