Nelson adjusted his gold-rimmed eye-glasses to look at his list of suspects, and gave his head a shake. "Well, we’ve got to keep them afloat till these troubles are over," he said with decision. "And the infernal part of it is," said Partridge, "that those fellows know it. I’d give a thousand dollars out of my own pocket, if we could let them drop without hurting any one else." And he resumed his study of the ticker with an irritated face. The noise of the shouting crowds that filled and surrounded the exchanges floated up through the windows, rising and falling like the roar of ocean breakers. There was a curious variation of quality in the swelling volumes of sound. Now it expressed apprehension; now desperation; and again there was the tonic roar of exultation rising above the lesser cries. We had not been in consultation ten minutes when the first application for support came from a pale but assertive man who tried to conceal his desperation under an air of bluster. "Manning, of Smith and Manning," whispered Nelson to me, as the man entered the door. He began to explain his business in roundabout phrase. "Never mind that, Manning," said Partridge. "You’re in the door, and you’ll be squeezed if we don’t help you. That’s the long and short of it. How much are you in for, and what security can you offer? Let’s see those papers. They tell the story, don’t they?" Manning wiped his forehead, with a sigh, and looked relieved rather than hurt at Partridge’s abruptness. "Five thousand will pull us through," he gasped. "No it won’t," said Partridge, running over the papers. "Here’s another note for thirty-five hundred. Einstein and Company won’t wait. This is a pretty poor showing. No wonder the bank wouldn’t carry you any longer!" "We can get along all right if we get out of this hole," pleaded Manning. "Well, we’ll take up these two claims on your note for thirty days," said Partridge after a telegraphic glance at Nelson and me. "Sign here." I made out the checks, and Manning, once more putting on his blustering air as he would have put on an overcoat, went out to face his enemies. From this time on, there was a steady stream of applicants, some frankly admitting their desperate condition, some trying to conceal their fears under an assumption of confidence. But whatever of pretense a man had covered himself with to enter our office was ruthlessly stripped from him as soon as he made his request for money. For one minute of the day, at least, he had to face the truth, and to see himself as he was. I soon discovered that Partridge’s judgment of commercial paper was quick and sure. Nelson and I recognized our inferiority and promptly deferred to his opinions. Only once during the day did we overrule him, and in that instance we acted rather on an inspiration of mercy than on our commercial judgment.