He stowed away a little package of memorandum cards and a couple of hard pencils, and moved to leave the office. “I’m going up to the floor now,” he said. “You’re wanted at the telephone, Mr. Sponley,” said his clerk, coming out of the cabinet. It was Curtin who had called him up, and the moment the Bear recognized his voice he demanded,-- “Where are you?” “At the bank,” the assistant cashier answered. “Ring off right away then,” said Sponley. “I told you not to run that risk.” “It’s all safe enough,” he could hear Curtin laugh, “they aren’t watching the ’phone just now. They’re all over by the vaults.” “Have they found out anything?” “No, they think it’ll come open in a minute.” “All right,” said the Bear; “but don’t call me up again in any case. You wound it up till twelve, didn’t you?” There was a moment’s pause, then came the short rattle of the ring for disconnection. Curtin must have seen some one coming and rung off. Sponley was glad the assistant cashier had so much discretion. At twenty minutes after nine, when the Bear, with a word of greeting to the guard at the entrance, came out on the floor, it was, to the unaccustomed eyes and ears in the crowded gallery, already a bedlam. Traders and clerks were grouped about that big room, talking in every key of excitement, and little messenger boys, to whom nothing mattered until the bell rang, larked about, pelting one another with handfuls of sample grain, and making a gratuitous addition to the uproar. All the while, monotonous and incessant, the metallic chatter of scores of telegraph instruments made a long organ-point against the varying pitch of the voice of the crowd. Sponley breathed a long sigh of complete contentment as the old air and the familiar noises greeted him. The pervasive, inarticulate sound was as perfectly intelligible to him as is the song of the locomotive to an old railroad engineer. He knew every cadence of it. He walked slowly across toward the provision pit, and before he had taken twenty paces he felt that every man in the great room knew of his presence and was wondering what it portended. His half-shut eyes that were everywhere, saw Keyes scribble a note and despatch a messenger boy with it on the run, and he smiled. That note did not contain pleasant news for Pickering. This was his last day, the last of a multitude of days, and safe, as this one was, or precarious, he had enjoyed them all. He wished there were to be more of them. But he had promised Harriet and himself, and he was particular about such promises. He would enjoy the little that was left, however.