"No, sir; he never said a word to me about it."
"Have you shown it to him?"
"No sir; of course not. There is something wrong about it. You understand these things so well that I suppose you can tell me at a glance just what the matter is."
"Perhaps I can," he added, glancing at my sheets. "What's the matter with it?"
"I make it out that the concern has lost about ten thousand dollars in the last six months' business. Of course that can't be so."
"Certainly not; and that shows the folly of boys like you meddling with what you don't understand," said he, sourly, and in a more crabbed tone than he had ever before used to me.
I had expected to be commended for the zeal I had shown in my efforts to master the details of the business, instead of which I found myself sharply reproved. I had made a failure of my purpose to get out a correct trial balance, and this was sufficiently mortifying without the reproach the junior partner cast upon me. I hung my head with shame while he glanced over the trial balance, which, according to my father's system, included the balance sheet. I supposed his practised eye would promptly detect my error.
"What's the matter with it?" said he, petulantly.
"There is something about the invoices that I don't understand; but I suppose it must be because I am so thick-headed," I replied, with becoming humility.
"With the invoices?" added he, with a kind of gasp which attracted my attention.