She paused to give him a chance to reply, but he only gazed meditatively at the thread of blue smoke rising from his cigar, and after a moment she went on:-- “Of course I know that you helped him out a few months ago when he mixed himself up in some speculation or other, and I know Mrs. Jervis Curtin, too; so that it seems queer that he should have been able to get hold of enough of the Bagsbury stock to lay down the law to you and John.” “There’s nothing to make a mystery about,” he said at length. “He hasn’t any of the stock; not a dollar of it. I hold all that’s in his name. I had him get it for me because I thought I might be able to use it to better advantage if it wasn’t known to belong to me.” “Why did you put him in the bank?” “He wanted it; he can’t afford to do nothing. You’re right in thinking that his wife spends more than his income, and he needed the salary. I put him in just on general principles.” “With the understanding that he’s to watch John Bagsbury,” she said quickly. “With no definite understanding at all. Of course, in a general way, he’s there in my interest, and he knows it.” “What are you planning to do to John?” she asked. “Stick him or squeeze him or something? I thought you two were friends.” “We are friends,” Sponley answered slowly, patiently, as one might speak to a child. “And I’m not laying any plot to stick him. Nobody does that wantonly, unless he’s a great fool. It’s a kind of smartness that doesn’t pay. We are friends,” he repeated, “and I hope we always may be. I honestly believe that our interests lie together.” “Then I don’t see why you go to the trouble of hiring a man to spy on him.” “If a man could trust absolutely to his foresight, he wouldn’t have to do things like that, but he can’t. I don’t expect to have to fight John Bagsbury; but something may turn up that I’m not looking for. If it does, I’m better off for not laying all my cards on the table. That’s all. But I’d go a long way to avoid a fight with him.” “Then your friendship for him is just like your friendship for other men, only a little more so; it goes just as far as it pays.” He said nothing. She rose abruptly, walked to the window, and drawing aside the curtain, stood looking at the dusty snow on the ledge. She had suddenly felt that she could not bear to look at him, he sat so still. After a moment she spoke again. “I knew it was that way at first. We made friends with him because we thought it would help along. But I thought that in all these years he had got to be something more to you than just a good investment that you’d hate to have to take your money out of.” Still he did not speak. He had not even turned his head when she had walked to the window.