rough the door which as yet divided the shareholders from their
directors. Having surveyed their empty chairs, their ink and papers, and
nodded to a shareholder or two, he stood, watch in hand, contemplating
the congregation. A thicker attendance than he had ever seen! Due, no
doubt, to the lower dividend, and this Pillin business. And his tongue
curled. For if he had a natural contempt for his Board, with the
exception of the chairman, he had a still more natural contempt for his
shareholders. Amusing spectacle when you came to think of it, a general
meeting! Unique! Eighty or a hundred men, and five women, assembled
through sheer devotion to their money. Was any other function in the
world so single-hearted. Church was nothing to it--so many motives were
mingled there with devotion to one's soul. A well-educated young
man--reader of Anatole France, and other writers--he enjoyed ironic
speculation. What earthly good did they think they got by coming here?
Half-past two! He put his watch back into his pocket, and passed into the
Board-room.

There, the fumes of lunch and of a short preliminary meeting made cosy
the February atmosphere. By the fire four directors were conversing
rather restlessly; the fifth was combing his beard; the chairman sat with
eyes closed and red lips moving rhythmically in the sucking of a lozenge,
the slips of his speech ready in his hand. The secretary said in his
cheerful voice: "Time, sir."

Old Heythorp swallowed, lifted his arms, rose with help, and walked
through to his place at the centre of the table. The five directors
followed. And, standing at the chairman's right, the secretary read the
minutes, forming the words precisely with his curling tongue. Then,
assisting the chairman to his feet, he watched those rows of faces, and
thought: 'Mistake to let them see he can't get up without help. He ought
to have let me read his speech--I wrote it.'

The chairman began to speak:

"It is my duty and my pleasure,' ladies and gentlemen, for the nineteenth
consecutive year to present to you the directors' report and the accounts
for the past twelve months. You will all have had special notice of a
measure of policy on which your Board has decided, and to which you will
be asked to-day to give your adherence--to that I shall come at the end
of my remarks...."

"Excuse me, sir; we can't hear a word down here."

'Ah!' thought the secretary, 'I was expecting that.'

The chai