"Have I put myself forward? Do I ever deny your rights?"
"Be damned to Prentice." He took his hands out of his overcoat pockets, and brandished them furiously. "Prentice was my enemy from the very beginning;" and he raised his voice. It seemed as if he was purposely working himself into a passion. "I was a fool to submit to his bounce. I ought to have had a marriage settlement—money properly settled on me—and I was a fool to let him jew me out of it."
"I gave you a half share."
"Yes, in the business—but only the business."
"Wasn't that enough for you?"
"Yes, in good times, no doubt. But what about bad times? And what the devil did I know of the business before I came into it? Nothing was explained to me. I came in blindfold. I took everything on trust."
"Oh, I think you understood it was a paying concern."
"It wasn't proved to me, anyhow. No one took the trouble to let me see the books—and give me the plain figures. Oh, no, that would have been beneath your dignity."
"Or beneath yours, Dick?"
"Yes, and I was a fool to consider my dignity. That was old Prentice again. I suppose he took his cue from you. You had put your heads together, and decided that I was to behave like the good boy in the copy-books. Open your mouth and shut your eyes, and see what God will send you."