Judge Wendover looked at the young man for the space of a second, and then turned to Tenney and said abruptly:
“I suppose he knows how the Thessaly Mfg. Company stands? How it’s stocked?” He pronounced the three letters with a slurring swiftness, as if to indicate that there was not time enough for the full word “manufacturing.”
Horace himself answered the question: “Yes, I know. You represent two hundred and twenty-five to my clients’ one hundred and seventy-five.” The young man held himself erect and alert in his chair, and spoke curtly.
“Just so. The capital is four hundred thousand dollars—all paid up. Well, we need that much more to go on.”
“How ‘go on’? What do you mean?”
“There’s a new nail machine just out which makes our plant worthless. To buy that, and make the changes, will cost a round four hundred thousand dollars. Get hold of that machine, and we control the whole United States market; fail to get it, we go under. That’s the long and short of it. That’s why we sent for you.”
“I’m very sorry,” said Horace, “but I don’t happen to have four hundred thousand dollars with me just at the moment. If you’d let me known earlier, now.”
The Judge looked at him again, with the impersonal point-blank stare of a very rich and pre-occupied old man. Evidently this young fellow thought himself a joker.
“Don’t fool,” he said, testily. “Business is business, time is money. We can’t increase our capital by law, but we can borrow. You haven’t got any money, but the Minster women have. It’s to their interest to stand by us. They’ve got almost as much in the concern as we have. I’ve seen the widow and explained the situation to her. She understands it. But she won’t back our paper, because her husband on his death-bed made her promise never to do that for anybody. Curious prejudice these countrymen have about indorsing notes. Business would stagnate in a day without indorsing. However, I had another plan. Let her issue four hundred thousand dollars in bonds on the iron-works. That’s about a third what they are worth. She’ll consent to that if you talk to her.”
“Oh, that’s where I come in, is it?” said Horace.