eps his
appointment?"

"Forgotten it? Not likely!" Phipps replied. "I was going to talk to you
about that. We must have those shares. The fact of it is the Universal
Line has played us false, the only shipping company which has. They
promised to advise us of all proposed wheat cargoes, and they haven't
kept their word. If my information is correct, and I expect confirmation
of it at any moment in the cable I arranged to have sent to you, they
have eleven steamers being loaded this very week. It's a last effort on
the part of the Liverpool ring to break us."

"What'll happen if Wingate won't sell?" Dredlinton enquired.

"I never face disagreeable possibilities before the necessity arrives,"
was the calm reply. "Wingate is certain to sell. He won't have an idea
why we want to buy, and I shall give him twenty thousand pounds profit."

"You'll find him a difficult customer," Dredlinton declared. "As you
know, he hates us like poison."

"He may do that," Phipps acknowledged. "I've given him cause to in my
life, and hope to again. But after all, he's a shrewd fellow. He's made
money on the Stock Exchange this last week, and he's had the sense not to
run up against us. He's not likely to refuse a clear twenty thousand
pounds' profit on some shares he's not particularly interested in."

Dredlinton knocked the ash from his cigar. He leaned over towards his
companion.

"Look here, Phipps," he said, "you can never reckon exactly on what a
fellow like Wingate will do or what he won't do. It is just possible I
may be able to help in this matter."

"Good man!" the other exclaimed. "How?"

Dredlinton hesitated for a moment. There was a particularly ugly smile
upon his lips.

"Let us put it in this way," he said. "Supposing you fail altogether
with Wingate?"

"Well?"

"Supposing you then pass him on to me and I succeed in getting him to
sell the shares? What about it?"

"It will be worth a thousand pounds to you," Phipps declared.

"Two!"

Phipps shrugged his shoulders.

"I don't bargain," he said, "but two let it be--that is, of course, on
condition that I have previously failed."

Dredlinton's dull eyes glittered. The slight contraction of his lips did
nothing to improve his appearance.

"I shall do my best," he promised.

There was a knock at the door. A clerk from outside presented himself. As
he held the door for a moment ajar, a wave of tangled sounds swept into
the room,--the metallic clash of a score o