regular labors--to examine the proposals for discount.

The day happened to be cold and stormy. The twenty clerks were busily
and silently at work behind their counters and gratings, and the
fourteen directors were shut tight in their mahogany room. There was but
little passing to and fro from the street, though now and then a
half-frozen messenger came stamping in, and did his errand, with
benumbed fingers, through the little windows. The tempest made business
light.

At eleven o'clock Fields wrote a note and sent it to the directors'
room. The boy who carried it knocked softly, and the president appeared,
took the letter, and then closed the door again.

Then there was a moment of almost total silence; the clerks wrote, the
leaves rattled, and it seemed as if it were an instant before an
expected explosion.

Presently an explosion came. The clerks heard with astonishment a tumult
in the directors' room--exclamations, hurried questions, the hasty
rolling of chairs on their casters, and then the sound of feet.

The door was hastily drawn open, and those who were near could see that
nearly all the directors were clustered around it, straining their eyes
to look at the paying teller. Most of them were pale and they called,
in one voice, "Come here!" "Come in here at once!" "Fields!" "Mr.
Fields!" "Sir, you are wanted!" "Step this way instantly!" Fields put
down his pen, opened the tall iron gate which separated him from the
counters, and walked rather quickly toward the den of lions. An opening
was made for him in the group, and he passed through the door, and it
was shut once more.

He walked across the room to the fireplace. He took out his
handkerchief, and, seizing a corner between a thumb and forefinger,
slowly shook it open, and then turned around.

"This note, sir! What does it mean?" cried the president, advancing upon
him, waving the paper in his trembling hand.

"Have you read it?" demanded Fields, in a loud voice.

"Yes," said the president. He was astonished at Fields's manner. He cast
a glance upon his fellow-directors.

"Then what is the use of asking me what I mean? It is as plain as I can
make it."

"But it says--but it says," faltered the venerable gentleman, turning
the paper to the light, "that you have only money enough to last until
twelve o'clock. Your statement yesterday showed a balance to your credit
of three hundred and fifty-two thousand dollars. That will last at
least--"

"But