l mistake so many good women make--the reformer's passion.
Dredlinton's rotten to the core, though. No one could reform him, could
even influence him to good to any extent. He's such a wrong 'un, to tell
you the truth, that I'm surprised Phipps put him on the Board. His name
is long past doing any one any good."

"Lady Dredlinton did not strike me as having altogether the air of an
unhappy woman," Wingate observed tentatively.

Kendrick shrugged his shoulders.

"No fundamentally good woman is ever unhappy," he said, "or rather ever
shows it. She is face to face all the time with the necessity of making
the best of things for the sake of other people. Lady Dredlinton carries
herself bravely, but the people who know her best never cease to feel
sorry for her."

"You have those figures I sent you a wireless for?" Wingate asked, a
little abruptly.

"I have them here," Kendrick replied, producing a little roll of papers
from a drawer. "They want a little digesting, even by a man with a head
for figures like yours. In some respects, these fellows seem to have had
the most amazing luck. Unless we come to an understanding with Russia
within the next month, of which there doesn't seem to me to be the
slightest prospect, we shall get no wheat from there for at least
another year."

"And the harvests all over eastern Europe were shocking," Wingate said,
half to himself.

"It doesn't seem to me," Kendrick pointed out, "that more than driblets
can be expected from anywhere, except, of course, the greatest source of
all, Canada and the United States."

"You've no indication of the Government's attitude, I suppose?"
Wingate asked.

"I don't suppose they have one," Kendrick answered, "upon that or any
other subject. Of course, if all the wheat that's being stored in the
country under the auspices of the B. & I. stood in their own name, the
matter would appear in a different light, but they've been infernally
clever with all these subsidiary companies. They own a majority of shares
in each, without a doubt, but they conduct their transactions as though
they were absolutely independent concerns."

Wingate studied the figures in the document he was holding for some
minutes in thoughtful silence. The telephone rang at Kendrick's elbow. He
picked up the receiver and listened.

"That Kendrick?" a voice enquired.

"Speaking," Kendrick answered.

"This is Peter Phipps, from right away opposite. Say, I am told that John
Wingat