Every moment one of them went to the door to see if Fields had appeared. The rest walked about, with their hands behind them, talking together incoherently. The air was full of doubts. The teller usually came at a quarter past nine, but the hour arrived without the man. Intolerable suspense!
Two or three of the directors made paths for themselves amid the chairs, and anxiously traversed them. Slavin took a post beside a window and gazed into the street. Debritt, with his right hand in his bosom, and with his left grasping the upper rail of a seat, looked fixedly into the coals. Stuart sipped at a goblet of water, but his trembling hand caused him to spill its contents upon the floor. No one now ventured to speak except in a whisper; it seemed that a word or a loud noise must disturb the poise of matters. The clock ticked, the blue flames murmured in the grate, and the pellets of sand thrown up by the wind rattled against the windows.
But yet there were no signs of the paying teller.
Was it possible that this immense sum of money was gone? Could it be true that they must report this terrible thing to the world? Had they permitted themselves to become the lieutenants to a wily scoundrel? Were they thus waiting silent and inactive while he was being borne away at the speed of the wind, out of their reach?
All at once Fields came in at the door.
He was met with a gladness that was only too perceptible. Every gentleman emitted a sigh of relief, and half started, as if to take the delinquent by the hand.
Fields had expected this. He was shrewd enough to act before the feeling had evaporated.
He advanced to the table. The directors hastened like schoolboys to take their accustomed places. They bent upon the teller's face the most anxious looks.
"Gentlemen," said he, "I believe that you fully understand that I return this large sum of money to you at my own option. You recognize the fact that most men would endure, for instance, an imprisonment of ten years rather than lose the control of a quarter of a million of dollars."
The directors hastened to signify "Yes!"