“They won’t let him go.”
“Who said that?” The others, much in the manner of schoolboys, indicated Burnham.
“I believe,” said Mr. Amherst—“set me right if I’m wrong—but I believe I’m Chairman. Unless I’m woefully mistaken, I was made Chairman about four years ago, at a time when the club was right out on the rocks. It had got a past, but no present. If my memory serves me right, I made it a small present. I bought shares when no one else was prepared to do so. And since that time, what has the club done?” He put out the fingers of one hand and prepared to recite the successes. His daughter coughed.
“I was only going to run through the list, my dear.”
“You can save yourself the trouble,” she said.
“Now, having arrived at this point,” addressing the table, “I ask myself the question, where are we weak? Where are we deficient? Where are we—”
He was so much annoyed at their impatience in anticipating him by giving the answer, that he found himself obliged to apply a match to his cigar, which was still alight.
“Very well, then,” reluctantly. “Discovering this, I look around and I endeavour to find out the best man available.”
“Mr. Pangbourne,” said Burnham, taking heart, “would no more think—”
Mr. Amherst snapped finger and thumb.