“Show them in at once, Banning,” he finished.
Setting down the instrument, he leaned back, eyes fixed on the door with a touch almost of pleasurable anticipation in them. When presently it swung open to admit Bob Bainbridge, followed closely by Tweedy, Crane’s mouth tightened cruelly, and the sandy-fringed lids drooped a trifle.
“And so,” he said at length, his lips curling, “you’ve come to crawl.”
Bainbridge did not answer for a moment. He was busy settling down in the chair which had not been offered him, and in seeing that Tweedy did the same. Then he drew out a cigar case and, with elaborate courtesy, extended it to Crane.
“No?” he murmured, as the latter declined with a brief gesture. “Given up smoking? Here, John.”
When Tweedy had accepted, and his own weed was lighted, Bainbridge leaned comfortably back in his chair.
“To crawl?” he repeated slowly, “Well, I don’t know about that. A fellow never likes to crawl if there’s another way out of a difficulty.”
Crane’s eyes glinted. “Rest assured there isn’t,” he retorted crisply. “You’re in a hole. You haven’t a single resource left. Your credit’s no good.”
“Oh, I don’t admit that,” put in Bob hastily.
“Whether you admit it or not, it’s true,” retorted Crane, a note of cold, calculating triumph creeping into his voice. “You can’t bluff me. I’ve had a man looking up your affairs for some time, and I know what I’m talking about. Tweedy, here, has been breaking his neck all last week trying to borrow enough to meet your note of eight thousand which is due at noon to-morrow. That note”—he bent forward, and raised for an instant the oblong sheet of paper from his desk—“is here.”