“What?” the clothier cried rudely. “Come! Let’s have it in plain words!”
“That we can discount no more bills for him until the account against him is reduced. You know as well as I do, Mr. Wolley, that you have been drawing more bills and larger bills than your trade justifies.”
“But I have to meet the paper I’ve accepted for wool, haven’t I? And if my customers don’t pay cash—as you know it is not the custom to pay—where am I to get the cash to pay the wool men?”
The banker took up one of two bills that lay on the table before him. “Drawn on Samuel Willias, Manchester,” he said. “That’s a new name. Who is he?”
“A customer. Who should he be?”
“That’s the point,” Ovington replied coldly. “Is he? And this other bill. A new name, too. Besides, we’ve already discounted your usual bills. These bills are additional. My own opinion is that they are accommodation bills, and that you, and not the acceptors, will have to meet them. In any case,” dropping the slips on the table, “we are not going to take them.”
“You won’t cash them? Not on no terms?”
“No, we are going no further, Wolley,” the banker replied firmly. “If you like I will send for the bill-book and ledger and tell you exactly what you owe, on bills and overdraft. I know it is a large amount, and you have made, as far as I can judge, no effort to reduce it. The time has come when we must stop the advances.”
“And you’ll not discount these bills?”
“No!”