"Then close it. I suppose you have brought my letters of credit?"
"That," said he in formal lawyer tone, "brings me back to the news which, as your man of affairs, I was trying to break to you when you thought, as a friend, I was trying to propose."
"What news?"
"You will recall that the money with which I was to buy your letters of credit was money which I was to draw for you, to-day, as dividends on the stock you hold in the New York and New England Railroad."
"Certainly—though I do not see the drift of your remarks."
"And I hardly need remind you that the bulk of your fortune is invested in this railroad."
"A perfectly good stock, I believe," Mrs. De Peyster commented.
"Perfectly good—perfectly sound," Judge Harvey agreed. "But there has existed a certain possibility in the company's affairs for some time of which I hesitated to inform you. I did not wish to give you any unnecessary concern, which would have been the case if I had spoken to you and if the situation had terminated happily."
"And what is the situation to which you refer?"