“Quite so, quite so.”
“Somebody may come forward, and the larger the applications the higher the premium, gentlemen.”
Again eyes glistened, and there was a new movement. Woosenham took his leave, bowing to Wolley and Grounds, and shaking hands with the others. Acherley went with him and Ovington accompanied them, bare-headed, to Sir Charles’s carriage, which was waiting before the bank. As he returned Wolley waylaid him and drew him into a corner. A conference took place, the banker turning the money in his fob as he listened, his face grave. Presently the clothier entered on a second explanation. In the end Ovington nodded. He called Rodd from the counter and gave an order. He left his customer in the bank.
When he re-entered the parlor Grounds had disappeared, and Arthur, who was bending over his papers, looked up. “Wolley wanted his notes renewed, I suppose?” he said. The bank had few secrets for this shrewd young man, who had learnt as much of business in eighteen months as Rodd the cashier had learned in ten years, or as Clement Ovington would learn in twenty.
The banker nodded. “And three hundred more on his standing loan.”
Arthur whistled. “I wonder you go on carrying him, sir.”
“If I cut him loose now——”
“There would be a loss, of course.”
“Yes, but that is not all, lad. Where would the Railroad scheme be? Gone. And that’s not all, either. His fall would deal a blow to credit. The money that we are drawing out of the old stockings and the cracked tea-pots would go back to them. Half the clothiers in the Valley would shiver, and neither I nor you would be able to say where the trouble would stop, or who would be in the Gazette next week. No, we must carry him for the present, and pay for his railway shares too. But we shall hold them, and the profits will eventually come to us. And if the railway is made, it will raise the value of mills and increase our security; so that whether he goes on or we have to take the mills over—which Heaven forbid!—the ground will be firmer. It went well?”
“Splendidly! The way you managed them!” The lad laughed.