His obedient son glanced at it, and pushed the paper away in contempt.
"Stale news," he remarked shortly.
Mr. Levy looked at him amazed.
"Maybe you knew all about it," he remarked a little sarcastically.
"May be I did," was the cool reply.
"And yet you have let them be beforehand with us!" Mr. Levy exclaimed angrily. "If this was to be done, why did we not do it?"
"Because we've got a better game to play," answered the junior partner of the firm, with a hardly restrained air of triumph.
Mr. Levy regarded his son with a look of astonishment, which speedily changed into one of admiration.
"Is this true, Benjamin?" he asked. "But—but——"
"But you don't understand," Benjamin interrupted impatiently. "Of course you don't. And you'll have to wait a bit for an explanation, too, for here's the very person I was expecting," he added, raising himself on his stool, and looking out of the window. "Now, father, just you sit quiet, and don't say a word," he went on quickly. "Leave it all to me; I'll pull the thing through."