“Shut up the place!” he answered, with lordly geniality. “I've walked all the way from the City in the rain. I wanted the exertion--I couldn't have sat in a cab. Come back and build up the fire, and let's have a talk. God! What things I've got to tell you!”
“There isn't any fire down here,” she said, apologetically, as they edged their way through the restricted alley to the rear. “The old fireplace took up too much room. Sometimes, in very sharp weather, I have an oil-stove in. Usually the gas warms it enough. You don't find it too cold--do you?--with your coat on? Or would you rather come upstairs?”
“Never mind the cold,” he replied, throwing a leg over the stool before the desk. “I can't stay more 'n a minute or two. What do you think we've done today?”
Louisa had never in her life seen her brother look so well as he did now, sprawling triumphantly upon the stool under the yellow gas-light. His strong, heavily-featured face had somehow ceased to be commonplace. It had acquired an individual distinction of its own. He looked up at her with a clear, bold eye, in which, despite its gloss of good-humour, she discerned a new authority.
The nervous and apprehensive lines had somehow vanished from the countenance, and with them, oddly enough, that lethargic, heavy expression which had been their complement. He was all vigour, readiness, confidence, now. She deemed him almost handsome, this curious, changeable brother of hers, as he beat with his fist in a measured way upon the desk-top to emphasize his words, and fastened his commanding gaze upon her.
“We took very nearly twenty thousand pounds to-day,” he went on. “This is the twenty-eighth of February. A fortnight ago today was the first settlement. I wasn't here, but Semple was--and the working of it is all in his hands. He kept as still as a mouse that first day. They had to deliver to us 26,000 shares, and they hadn't got one, but we didn't make any fuss. The point was, you see, not to let them dream that they were caught in a trap. We didn't even put the price up to par. They had to come to Semple, and say there didn't seem to be any shares obtainable just at the moment, and what would he carry them over at? That means, to let them postpone delivery for another fortnight. He was as smooth as sweet-oil with them, and agreed to carry them over till today without any charge at all. But today it was a little different. The price was up ten shillings above par. That is to say, Semple arranged with a jobber, on the quiet, d'ye see? to offer thirty shillings for our one-pound shares. That offer fixed the making-up price. So then, when they were still without shares to-day, and had to be carried over again, they had to pay ten shillings' difference on each of twenty-six thousand shares, plus the difference between par and the prices they'd sold at. That makes within a few hundreds of 20,000 pounds in cash, for one day's haul. D'ye see?”