self--and you
suggested the inference was plain," he asserted.

Here Gillow, who had been fidgeting nervously, opened his lips as if
about to say something, but closed them again when his employer, moving
one foot beneath the table, trod hard upon his toe.

"I am afraid I should hardly mend matters by saying I am sorry it is,"
said the official, dryly. "However, a mistake by a junior partner does
not prove your firm incapable of high-class work, and I hardly think
you will be troubled by further interference after my report is made.
My superiors may warn you--but I must not anticipate. It is as well
you answered frankly, as, otherwise, I should have concluded you were
endeavoring to make your profits at the risk of the community; but I
cannot help saying that the admission may be prejudicial to you, Mr.
Thurston, if you ever apply individually for a Government contract.
Here is the drawing. It is your property."

Geoffrey stretched out his hand for it, but Savine was too quick for
him, and when he thrust it into his pocket, the contractor, rising
abruptly, stalked out of the room. Gillow, who followed and overtook
him, said:

"I can't understand this at all, sir. Mr. Savine made that drawing. I
know his arrows on the measurement lines, and I was just going to say
so when you stopped me. I have a confession to make. I believe I
dropped that paper out of my wallet on board the steamer."

"You have a very poor memory, Gillow," and Thurston stared the speaker
out of countenance. "I fear your eyes deceive you at times as well.
You must have lost it somewhere else. In any case, if you mention the
fact to anybody else, or repeat that you recognise Mr. Savine's
handiwork, I shall have to look for an assistant who does not lose the
documents with which he is entrusted."

Gillow went away growling to himself, but perfectly satisfied with both
his eyesight and memory. Thurston had hardly dismissed him than Thomas
Savine approached, holding out the sketch.

"See here, Geoffrey," began the contractor's brother, and one glance at
the speaker was sufficient for Thurston, who stopped him.

"Are you coming to torment me about that confounded thing? Give it to
me at once," he said.

He snatched the drawing from Savine's hand, tore it into fragments, and
stamped them into the mould. "Now that's done with at last!" he said.

"No," was the answer. "There's no saying where a thing like this will
end, if public misch