Hamlen raised his hands in a silent gesture.
"Have you arranged your business matters to your satisfaction?" Huntington asked, rather by way of conversation than from curiosity.
"Yes," Hamlen answered, but with a mental reservation which his friend noticed,—"yes; and yet even that wasn't as I expected."
He paused a moment, gazing into the fire which Huntington had ordered lighted to take off the chill which the late Spring still left in the air.
"I am puzzled about it," Hamlen continued. "You see, most of my investments have been in England, and it seemed to me that it would be wise to take advantage of an opportunity I had to realize on them, and to reinvest here in the States while everything is so much below its real value. Knowing Mr. Thatcher as I did I naturally went straight to him about it. He was most kind in advising me to hold off a while longer, as securities are likely to fall still further; but when I asked him to accept my money on deposit he declined, and offered instead to give me a letter of introduction to a bank."
"Why, Thatcher's house does a large banking business."
"That is what puzzles me; why should he decline my account?"
"I don't believe he meant just that," Huntington explained; "he probably wanted you to understand that he was not looking for business from his friends."
"No, he flatly refused to accept it; for I tried to insist upon it. I know few people here now, and I didn't feel like entrusting so considerable a sum to any institution, however well recommended, without personal acquaintance with some of its officers."
"I don't understand it."