"I have been ill, you know," Sir William said nervously, "I have not been able to look into or understand anything. I have not been out of the house yet. I could not go to the City or do any business."
"Yes, I see that," said Pateley, "and I am sorry to be obliged to thrust a business discussion upon you now——"
Sir William looked up at him quickly, anxiously.
"But the fact is, at this moment the business won't wait. If you remember, when the 'Equator' Company was first started, I, like many others, invested in it, having asked your opinion of it first, and having heard from you that you were going to be the Chairman of the Board of Directors."
"I believed in it, you know," Sir William said, with eagerness; "I put a lot of money into it myself."
"I know you did, yes," said Pateley, "but you fortunately had a lot to do it with, and also a lot of money to keep out of it. Every one is not so happily situated. I blame myself, I need not say, acutely, as well as others." And as Sir William looked at him sitting there in his relentless strength, he felt that there was small mercy to be expected at his hands.
"I don't know," Sir William said, trying to speak with dignity, "that I was to blame. I believed in it, as others did."
"No doubt," Pateley said. "But I am afraid that will hardly be a satisfactory explanation for the shareholders. The shares at this moment are absolutely worthless."
"But what can I do?" said Sir William. "What would you have me do?"
"It seems to me there is a rather obvious thing to be done," said Pateley. "It is to help to make good the losses of the people who, through you, will be"—and he paused—"ruined."