This was only one move in the game and a legitimate one; there were others, more devilish, that required a clear head, infinite patience and the unscrupulous use of means which Inman judged it prudent to conceal from Nancy’s eyes. Every evening when the men had gone Baldwin and Inman would return to the office and discuss the situation out of earshot of the women. On one of the earliest of these occasions Inman had produced from a cupboard of which he had been given the key a bottle of whisky and a single tumbler. “You don’t touch this stuff?” he said. “You were a wise man not to begin it, for it’s a habit ’at isn’t easy dropped. I wish I could do without it; but I’ve always found in my case that a drop of whisky’s a help when I’m hard pushed, and gingers me up a bit. I don’t recommend it, mind you, all the same, to them that aren’t used to it.” He was mixing himself a glass as he spoke, with a veiled eye on his master who looked as if he was going to forbid the indulgence. Inman, however, took no notice. “A cup of coffee or a bottle o’ bitters might get you to the same place in time,” he said; “but this lands you there quicker, and time’s money just now. It gives your brain a spurt and comforts your heart, _I_ find; but those who haven’t begun it had better keep off it.” He turned a deaf ear to Baldwin’s mutterings, and from that moment showed himself unusually resourceful. No actor on the stage of a crowded theatre who was drawing the plaudits of his audience that night was playing his part more admirably than Inman to this company of one. He had no great liking for spirits, and he was on ordinary occasions studiously abstemious; but he could drink hard on occasion and be little the worse for it, and he counted on this capability now, when he had an object in view—the object of guiding a pair of unaccustomed feet into the perilous groves of Bacchus. Midway in the course of their deliberations on that first occasion he had stretched out his hand for the bottle again and had checked himself. “That won’t do!” he said with a laugh; “—too much is as bad as too little,” and he had risen and returned the bottle and tumbler to the cupboard, putting the key in his pocket—an action which had made the desired impression on Baldwin. For a time the ingenious and infernal scheme seemed likely to fail; but if his hopes were disappointed Inman continued the same tactics and displayed no hurry. At one time he would leave the bottle untouched until the ineffectiveness of his suggestions led Baldwin to bring down his hand upon the table with a hot recommendation that the condemned stuff should be fetched out and his counsellor should get a move on. At another he would profess physical weariness and depression, and would refuse almost angrily to drink on the ground that a man might go too far in drowning sorrow. On such an occasion Baldwin might storm as he liked and Inman would remain unmoved.