and I really don't wonder it hasn't been
resold. What do you propose to do about this?"

Mr. Lewis made a gesture of deprecation.

"There must be some mistake, Mr. Hollister."

"No doubt of that," Hollister agreed dryly. "The point is, who shall
pay for the mistake?"

Mr. Lewis looked out of the window. He seemed suddenly to be stricken
with an attitude of remoteness. It occurred to Hollister that the man
was not thinking about the matter at all.

"Well?" he questioned sharply.

The eyes of the specialist in timber turned back to him uneasily.

"Well?" he echoed.

Hollister put the documents in his pocket. He gathered up those on the
desk and put them also in his pocket. He was angry because he was
baffled. This was a matter of vital importance to him, and this man
seemed able to insulate himself against either threat or suggestion.

"My dear sir," Lewis expostulated. Even his protest was half-hearted,
lacked honest indignation.

Hollister rose.

"I'm going to keep these," he said irritably. "You don't seem to take
much interest in the fact that you have laid yourself open to a charge
of fraud, and that I am going to do something about it if you don't."

"Oh, go ahead," Lewis broke out pettishly. "I don't care what you do."

Hollister stared at him in amazement. The man's eyes met his for a
moment, then shifted to the opposite wall, became fixed there. He sat
half turned in his chair. He seemed to grow intent on something, to
become wrapped in some fog of cogitation, through which Hollister and
his affairs appeared only as inconsequential phantoms.

In the doorway Hollister looked back over his shoulder. The man sat
mute, immobile, staring fixedly at the wall.

Down the street Hollister turned once more to look up at the
gilt-lettered windows. Something had happened to Mr. Lewis. Something
had jolted the specialist in British Columbia timber and paralyzed his
business nerve centers. Some catastrophe had overtaken him, or
impended, beside which the ugly matter Hollister laid before him was
of no consequence.

But it was of consequence to Hollister, as vital as the breaker of
water and handful of ship's biscuits is to castaways in an open boat
in mid-ocean. It angered him to feel a matter of such deep concern
brushed aside. He walked on down the street, thinking what he should
do. Midway of the next block, a firm name, another concern which dealt
in timber, rose before his eyes. He entered the office.