"That is so. As an honourable man you cannot escape it."
"I see that clearly enough. What I failed to see at the first—either because I refused to entertain the idea of failure, or else because my moral sense had become dull—was that I was proposing to pay a debt by fraud."
Muller laughed uneasily. "I think I pointed that out to you quite clearly on the day we settled the matter."
"I have no recollection of it."
"I did so most distinctly. I said if the company scented suicide they would dispute the claim, or words to that effect."
"And seeing this clearly you were willing to become a party to the fraud?"
Muller's eyes blazed in a moment. "Look here, Sterne," he said, angrily, "this is above a joke. You know very well that the proposal was not mine. You badgered and bullied and persuaded and gave me no peace. I yielded at length, much against my will, to oblige you. I made you angry when I pointed out in the frankest and most explicit way the consequences of failure, and now, confound it, when you have failed you come and blame me."
"No, no; you misunderstand me," Rufus said, mildly. "I have no wish to blame you. The proposal was my own, I frankly admit, and you yielded very reluctantly. But the thing that puzzles me is that while we talked about honour we neither of us seemed to realise that the proposal involved a glaring act of dishonour."
"Do you refer to the insurance company?"
"I do."