"You'll have to leave me before I order the liqueur. This," with a hand-sweep about the cluster of dishes, "is some music I'll have to face alone. But what's that, when you're on the last inch of the last rope-end?"
"Your position," I ventured, "sounds almost like a desperate one."
"Desperate!" he echoed. "It's more than that. It's hopeless!"
"You have doubtless been visiting Wall Street or possibly buying mining-stock?" was my flippant suggestion. His manner of speech, I was beginning to feel, was not markedly southern.
"No," he cried with quick solemnity. "I've been selling it."
"But such activities, I assumed, were far removed from the avenues of remorse."
He stared at me, absently, for a moment or two. Then he moved restlessly in his chair.
"Did you ever hear of a wire-tapper?" he demanded.
"Quite often," I answered.
"Did you ever fall for one of their yarns? Did you ever walk into one of their nice, gold-plated traps and have them shake you down for everything you owned—and even for things you didn't own?"