Upon two of the listeners no word was lost, and Mr. Wade and Cornish knew that the paper-makers had right upon their side.
Quite suddenly Mr. Thompson's manner changed, and he glanced towards the door to see that it was closed.
“Then it's a matter of paying,” he said to his companions. Turning towards Lord Ferriby, he spoke in a voice that sounded more contemptuous than angry. “We're plain business men,” he said. “What's your price—you and these other gentlemen?”
“I have no price,” answered Cornish, meeting the angry blue eyes and speaking for the first time.
“And mine is too high—for plain business men,” added Major White, with a slow smile.
“Seeing that you're a lord,” said Thompson, addressing the chairman again, “I suppose it's a matter of thousands. Name your figure, and be done with it.”
Lord Ferriby took the insult in quite a different spirit to that displayed by his two co-directors. He was pale with anger, and spluttered rather incoherently. Then he took up his hat and stick and walked with much dignity to the door.
He was followed down the stairs by the paper-makers, Mr. Thompson making use of language that was decidedly bespattered with “winged words,” while Mr. MacHewlett detailed his own thoughts in a plaintive monotone. Lord Ferriby got rather hastily into a hansom and drove away.
“There is nothing for it,” said Mr. Wade to Cornish in the gay little office above the Ladies' Tea Association—“there is nothing for it but to run Roden's Corner yourself.”