CHAPTER XIV
THE BEGINNING OF THE TRAIL
For a while the unrighteous may bask in the sunshine of prosperity, but there comes a time of reckoning, more especially in the City of London, and things were at this moment shaping ill for Mr. Philip Slotman.
He stood at the door of the general office and surveyed his clerks. There were five of them; at the end of the week there would be but two, he decided. Next week probably there would be only one.
“Hello, Slotman!” It was a business acquaintance, who had dropped in to discuss the financial position.
“Things all right?
“Nothing to complain about,” said Slotman, who did not believe in crying stinking fish. Credit meant everything to him, and it was for that reason he wore very nice clothes and more jewellery than good taste warranted.
In Mr. Slotman’s inner office he and his friend, Mr. James Bloomberg, lighted expensive cigars.
“So the pretty typist has gone, of course?” said Bloomberg.
Slotman started. “You mean—?”