“You saw this morning’s _Herald_, I suppose,” he said. “Yes--I’m coming over to see you this afternoon. I had a small dispute with Mr. Bagsbury the other day, and I’ve sold out my stock. I think we’d better come to an understanding, for his benefit, as to what our relations have been-- All right--I’ll be over in about an hour. “I’m going to make another little call on Cartwright first,” he explained to Harriet. “I won’t be long at either place. I’ll be back for tea.” Mr. Cartwright had taken his echo home with him after their disastrous interview that morning, ostensibly for the purpose of consultation, but in reality to help him fulminate against John. They were still doing it when Sponley arrived, and between them they had worked up a fine rage. They were unaffectedly glad to see Sponley, and they showed it by redoubling the din and clamor of their outcry against the unspeakable rascality of the Banker. Though Sponley had on the tip of his tongue the word that would correct their error, it looked for a while as though he would never have a chance to say it, for Mr. Meredith’s coda invariably gave Mr. Cartwright breath enough to begin again. But at last there was a lull. “You’re mistaken in thinking that Bagsbury swindled you. Bagsbury is a perfectly honest man--” “Honest!” they ejaculated. “Though he does make a fool of himself sometimes. He did not sell you that stock.” “He admitted it--practically,” said Cartwright. “He could not deny it,” said Meredith. “Whatever he said or did not say,” the Bear went on, “he did not sell you that stock. I have come here this afternoon because I have just discovered that I sold it to you myself.” Sponley might take as much time as he pleased now without fear of interruption. Two disconnected electric bells lying in a box in the hardware shop are not more incapable of sound than were at that moment the two old trustees. “I need hardly tell you,” said Sponley, “that I had no such intention. I put my stock in Myers’s hands with no other instructions than that he sell at once. I did not inquire who had bought the stock, and it was only by chance that I learned to-day that I had been so unfortunate as to sell it to you. I think I owe it to you to be quite frank with you as to my reason for selling out. I did it because I no longer regard Bagsbury and Company’s Bank as a good investment.” He gave the words time to sink in deep before he went on. “I don’t mean to say that it’s extremely dangerous, but it is not wholly safe. If anybody is going to speculate with my money, I want it to be myself, not the president of a bank that I hold stock in. “Bagsbury’s bank is running a great big speculation; they may win or they may lose; that has nothing to do with it. I get out of a bank just as soon as it goes out of the banking business, and I’m glad I’m well out of Bagsbury’s. But I regret that my profit should have been at your expense.”