His business this afternoon was to call on Tom Walsh, whose silhouette he presently observed at a window of the counting-room on the second floor of the Wayne-Craighill Mercantile Company’s establishment. A truckman bawled to him to look out for himself as he entered the main door where, in a small room, a number of gentlemen were gathered about little tables containing specimens of coffee and the agent for a California canning factory was opening his “line” for the enlightenment of the chief buyer of the house, a person who, with his last summer’s straw hat tipped over his eyes, spent his days trying to reconcile the pictured peach of the label with the fruit inside the can. A boy, engaged with marking pot and brush in decorating a soap-box with cabalistic characters, stopped chewing gum and whistled to a comrade to give heed to the strange being who had entered the front door and was now ascending the counting-room steps. As Mr. Wingfield was careful of his raiment, his manner of gathering up the skirts of his ulster on the stair, and the fact that he wore spats, caused the artist and his comrade to exchange signals of derisive delight. As Wingfield disappeared into the office, an inquiry as to “what the old man would do to ut,” was shouted across the warehouse beneath him. When Walsh had kicked the door shut and offered Wingfield a cigar, he went to a sliding window in the partition of his den and gave orders for a few minutes to his chief clerk on the other side; then he returned to his desk and lighted a cigar. “Well, I’m glad you came in; I was just thinking about you. How’s Wayne?” “All right; we spent a few days in Philadelphia and he was as good as gold. He’s been sober for nearly three months.” “Then he’s overdue,” remarked Walsh. “He usually comes down with a jar when he’s let it alone so long.” “He’s been at work, too--as regular as the clock. Your retirement from the office seems to have had a stimulating effect on Wayne’s energies. How do you account for it?” “Um. Maybe he wanted to see what’s inside the pot. He got me up there one day last week and put me through a cross-examination that gave me the headache. I noticed that the boys in the office jump when he comes in now; they didn’t use to know he was there.” “New stepmother doing it?” asked Wingfield. Walsh looked at the end of his cigar carefully and smoked quietly for a few minutes before replying. “He’s deeper than that; Wayne has a game on hand. His conversion is too sudden. He’s saving up like a volcano. He’ll let go one of these days and there will be hell. I don’t like it.” “Maybe he wants to make money and get rich,” suggested Wingfield. “And maybe--maybe,” replied Walsh contemptuously, “he wants to buy airships so he can call on the man in the moon. I don’t know what it is, but the signs point to trouble.”