There was silence for some minutes. When she spoke at length it was
with a tinge of bitterness.

"So you are unloading?"

"The firm is. I beg you, Bert, to believe that if I had known your
intention I would have tried to dissuade you. I would have advised you
to keep your money in the bank until after the air cleared. Three per
cent. is small, but it is better than tax bills on unsalable property."

"Why me particularly? I am only one of the great public. Why don't
you give your conclusions to the world? When you were convinced that a
period of inflation was about to occur you did not hesitate to say so.
If I remember you used _The Call_ for that purpose. Now that you see
the reaction setting in, doesn't honesty suggest what your course
should be?"

She had risen, and she, too, looked with unseeing eyes upon the busy
street. There was reproach in her voice, Dave thought, rather than
bitterness.

He spread his hands. "What's the use? The harm is done. To predict a
collapse would be to precipitate a panic. It is as though we were
passengers on a boat at sea. You and I know the boat is sinking, but
the other passengers don't. They are making merry with champagne and
motor cars--if you can accept that figure--and revelry and easy money.
Why spoil their remaining few hours by telling them they are headed for
the bottom? . . . Besides, they are not deserving of sympathy, after
all. They are in the game because they wanted to make money without
earning it. Gamblers, every one of them. And the man or woman who
expects to get wealth without giving value shouldn't whine if, by a
turn of fate, he gives value without getting wealth."

After a moment she placed her fingers on his arm. "Forgive me, Dave,"
she said. "I didn't mean to whine."

"You didn't whine," he returned, almost fiercely. "It's not in you.
You are too good a sport. But there will be lots of whining in the
coming months." Man-like it did not occur to Dave that in that moment
the girl had bid good-bye to her savings of a dozen years, and had
merely looked up and said, "Forgive me, Dave, I didn't mean to whine."
When he thought of it, long afterward, he had a sudden conviction that
if he had realized then just how much of a brick she was he would have
proposed to her on the spot. . . And she would have laughed, and said,
"Now, Dave, don't spoil our fun with anything like that."

What she did do was to let her hand creep up his arm u