Not that there was anything wrong showing on the surface of affairs. The factory seemed to be running quite as usual. But as the end of the business year approached Ethel could not fail to note that the reports on output were not so favorable as they had been earlier in the year. As, of course, it was not really within the compass of her work she could not discover why this should be. From the very day Mayberry had been balked in his endeavor to put the Bogata order through, the tide of fortune for the Hapwood-Diller Manufacturing Company seemed to have turned. The superintendent never spoke again about the Bogata Company to Ethel. The latter knew, however, that Hammerly’s prophecy regarding a receivership for that concern had come true--and that before the new year. In the matter of the shop reports the girl was puzzled and alarmed. It did not seem to be anybody’s fault; certainly Mayberry did not neglect his supervision of the factory, and most of the foremen were old and faithful employees. The report of the corporation compared unfavorably with the last report. A good deal of money was tied up in raw material. Contracts unfilled and bills not yet collectible were items that bulked big on the wrong side of the ledger. The board voted the usual dividend; but the surplus was much reduced thereby. And then, suddenly and like the bursting of a bomb, trouble came. The Hapwood-Diller Company stock was listed in the market; that is, it was traded in by the curb brokers both in State and Broad Streets. One morning Hammerly came raging into the offices, his _Financial Gazette_ in his hand, his spectacles pushed up to the line of his grizzled hair, and his eyes fairly snapping. “What’s the meaning of this, I want to know?” he cried, shaking the financial sheet under Jim Mayberry’s nose as that young man appeared from the manager’s office. “Do you know anything about this?” “About what, Mr. Hammerly?” “This trading in Hapwood-Diller shares? It’s been going on for a week, I understand. Yesterday three hundred shares was sold for eighty-nine--eleven points off. Never heard of such a thing! Who’s selling?” “Why, bless your heart, Mr. Hammerly,” said the superintendent, “I don’t know. I own only fifty shares and I haven’t sold them, I can assure you.” “Some tarnal fool is dumping his shares on the market, and at a bad time. Right after such a poor showing as was made by our last report. If Frank Barton was on the job such a report would never have been made.” Mayberry flushed. “No man can make bricks without straw, Mr. Hammerly,” he said. “Huh?” snorted the grain dealer. “Who ever told you they made bricks of straw? That’s about all you know, Jim Mayberry. They make bricks with clay around these parts. You ain’t in Egypt. But that ain’t neither here nor there. This here selling of shares--and maybe these were only wash sales?” added the suspicious old man. “Here! let me see the stock book, Mayberry.”