"What could have induced him to be guilty of such a thing?"
"That's just what I've been trying to study out, and I believe I understand it all fully. Some six months ago, he asked me to sign a recommendation for his appointment to a vacant clerkship in one of our banks. I told him that I would do so with pleasure, only that my nephew was an applicant, and I had already given him my name. He didn't appear to like this, which I thought very unreasonable, to say the least of it."
"Why, the man must be insane! How could he expect you to sign the application of two men for the same place? Especially, how could he expect you to give him a preference over your own nephew?"
"Some men are strangely unreasonable."
"We don't live long in this world ere becoming cognisant of that fact."
"And for this he has held a grudge against you, and now takes occasion to revenge himself."
"So it would seem. I know of nothing else that he can have against me. I have uniformly treated him with kindness and consideration."
"There must be something radically base in his character."
"I'm afraid there is."
"I wouldn't have such a man in my employment."