“This,” said Justin, with a white light in his eyes, and holding out a letter which the other took half reluctantly, relapsing mechanically into the chair by his desk, while Justin dropped straddle-legged into another opposite, his face looking over the back of it, around which his arms were clasped. He went on talking, while the other slowly unfolded the paper and looked at the heading. “You remember those first big consignments we sent out after the fire? Well, the whole output was rotten!” “Great heavens!” said the other, sitting up straight, with his eyes stuck to the lines. “Are you sure it’s as this says?” “Sure? It’s the sixth letter of the kind we’ve had in ten days; three came in this morning’s mail. The packing-room is full now of returned machines—what we’ll do with the rest I don’t know. A couple of firms want the instruments duplicated; the rest want their money back. We talked big at first, thought it was a mistake—that’s why I didn’t speak of it to you—but it’s no mistake; the whole output’s rotten. The bars are rusted and bent, so that everything’s out of gear; it would cost more to repair the machines than to make new ones.” “Were the bars those you got from Cater?” asked Leverich. “Yes.” Leverich whistled. “It’s no fault of his, those he used were all right.” Bullen says they must have been a fraction off size for us, and that did the business. Heaven only knows how many more letters we’ll get! I don’t see how we’re to pay up and get out of it, as it is.” “Yes,” said Leverich, throwing the letter down on the desk, drumming on it with the ends of his fingers. Then he shrugged his big shoulders as if shunting the burden from them as he rose. “Well, I must go. Sorry I can’t help you out, but Martin’s away now. By the way, when you can pay up on that interest, we’ll be glad to have it. We’ve been going pretty easy with you, you know, but it can’t last forever; we’ve got to have our money, as well as other people.” He had not meant to say anything of the kind, but the bad news and the inferred appeal had accented the irritation of the day. “Oh, certainly,” said Justin, with a swift gleam in his blue eyes, and a pride that could be large enough to make contemptuous allowance for a little meanness in the man from whom he had received benefits. He had counted on Leverich’s ready help in this trouble, but there was more between the two men than the money—from the first moment of meeting this afternoon, Dosia’s name, unspoken, had correlated in each a little hidden spring of antagonism. One of Justin’s womenkind had misused Leverich’s hospitality; both resented the fact and her enforced departure. How many business situations have been made or marred by domestic happenings, no history of finance will ever tell. And still the long day wore on in Dosia’s silent room.