A trace of Mr. Wilkinson's normal impudence returned momentarily to his tone when he replied:—
"My dear sir, didn't I say that I had made a long preliminary investigation of this? You can scarcely hold my intelligence at so low a figure as to think that I didn't know that fact. That's why I'm here—because I do know it."
It may have been the effect of the return to the normal in his step-nephew's tone, or it may have been merely Mr. Hurd's business method, which expelled his next remark from sardonic lips.
"Then you need but one more fact to make your knowledge of the subject complete, and that I will now give you. Not only does my company carry no insurance, but it never intends or expects to. Is there anything else this morning?"
Charlie smiled calmly, unmoved.
"Now we are ready to begin, sir. You have disbelieved in insurance so strongly and so long that such a remark was exactly what I expected you to make. In fact, I should have been not only surprised, but positively embarrassed, had you not made it. Now, I repeat, we are ready to talk business. And I have your promise to listen to my plan."
It did not occur to the magnate that he had made no such promise, until
Wilkinson was well launched; after that, he forgot about it.
"Did any one ever call to your attention, sir, the fact that the statistics show that the fire losses on traction schedules in the Eastern states exceed the insurance premiums on those schedules by nearly thirty-five per cent?"
Mr. Hurd shook his head shortly.
"I did not know it."