Then ensued a pause, during which Werner looked out at the weather, which was wet and cheerless, and Mr. Forde looked at him. "What do you think?" asked the manager at length. "I do not think. What is the good of thinking? If you had not been so decided on having your own way and insisting on Benning taking out the order, this need never have happened; but you always imagine yourself cleverer than anybody else, and so overshot the mark. Have you been to Swanland?" "Yes, he was out. I saw Asherill, however, who repudiated all knowledge of Mortomley and his affairs and Swanland and his doings. He blessed me and gave me a tract, and said he was going to speak at a meeting this evening on behalf of a mission to some hopeful heathens in Africa. He presented me with tickets and asked me to give them to any friend if I could not make use of them myself. Here they are." Henry Werner took the tickets and tore them into small atoms, flinging these contemptuously into his waste basket. "If he would speak on behalf of a mission to the heathens of the City of London, I could furnish him with some anecdotes calculated to adorn his address," he remarked. "But to return to Mortomley. In your place I should meet the difficulty boldly. There is nothing disgraceful about Mortomley's debt to you; nothing disgraceful about the man, spite of all the mud with which you have been pleased to bespatter him. His worst crime is illness, and that illness leaves you at liberty to make good any story you like to tell. If it were Kleinwort now--" "Kleinwort would never serve me as Mortomley has done," interrupted Mr. Forde. "It is very hard to tell what any man would do till he is tried," said Mr. Werner sententiously. "_You_ would not fail me. _You_ would always consider me. _You_ would remember I have a wife and family depending upon me," observed Mr. Forde entreatingly. "If I were in a corner myself, I am quite certain I should do nothing of the kind," was the frank reply. "My dear fellow bring the case home. Do _you_ never fail other people? Do _you_ always consider me for instance? Have _you_ given throughout the whole of this affair of Mortomley's one thought to his wife or child? No you have not, and no man in business does. You would pitch Kleinwort and me and a score more over to-morrow if you could do so safely, and we would pitch you over if any extraordinary temptation came in our way. You do not believe in us, and we do not believe in you; but we do believe we have amongst us got into such a cursed muddle we cannot afford to throw anybody overboard who might swim to land and tell the story of our voyage. That is the state of the case, my friend. It is not a cheerful view of the position, but it is the true one." "I have no doubt you would throw anybody overboard and jeer him while he was drowning," said Mr. Forde bitterly. "Now let Kleinwort be what he may, he has a heart. He is not like you, Werner."