"Oh, before the Day of Judgment, sure: next year, I guess."
"Next year?" Ralph flushed. "What earthly good will that do me?"
"I don't say it's as pleasant as driving your best girl home by moonlight. But that's how it is. And the stuff's safe enough any way—I've told you that right along."
"But you've told me all along I could count on a rise before August. You knew I had to have the money now."
"I knew you WANTED to have the money now; and so did I, and several of my friends. I put you onto it because it was the only thing in sight likely to give you the return you wanted."
"You ought at least to have warned me of the risk!"
"Risk? I don't call it much of a risk to lie back in your chair and wait another few months for fifty thousand to drop into your lap. I tell you the thing's as safe as a bank."
"How do I know it is? You've misled me about it from the first."
Moffatt's face grew dark red to the forehead: for the first time in their acquaintance Ralph saw him on the verge of anger. "Well, if you get stuck so do I. I'm in it a good deal deeper than you. That's about the best guarantee I can give; unless you won't take my word for that either." To control himself Moffatt spoke with extreme deliberation, separating his syllables like a machine cutting something into even lengths.
Ralph listened through a cloud of confusion; but he saw the madness of offending Moffatt, and tried to take a more conciliatory tone. "Of course I take your word for it. But I can't—I simply can't afford to lose…"