retiring from the firm, anyway," said Mr. Gunterson.

"Indeed? I am glad to hear it," said Mr. Wintermuth.

With which comment the matter came to its discussion's end between
them. Nor did the President learn for a long time the real truth
regarding his Boston appointees, for with increasing years he had grown
increasingly difficult of access and intolerant of ideas conceived on
the outside and not in accord with his own. The men who once could
have come to him and frankly told him that the Guardian's Boston
appointment was a colossal blunder were, like himself, grown insensibly
out of the true current of underwriting affairs, while those who knew
the truth lacked either the purpose or the opportunity to lay before
him the exact state of affairs.

Among those who could not carry out their inclinations was Smith, for
he saw very little of Mr. Wintermuth in these early days of the
premiership of Gunterson; and he felt, moreover, that the President,
knowing his opinion of Mr. Gunterson, would be inclined to discount his
criticism on matters connected with the administration of the
Vice-President. So Mr. Wintermuth lived in ignorance until the results
began to show on the surface--which was not a far day.

From William Street, however, the busy and irreverent Street, soon came
the slings and arrows which pierced even Mr. Gunterson's almost
impregnable self-esteem. Only a few days after his return he overheard
a conversation between Mr. Cuyler and a placer, in the Guardian's own
office, which showed how the Street regarded the Boston appointment.

"Sorry, but I can't take that, Eddy; we don't write the shoe polish
manufacturers at all--there's too much naphtha used, and they all burn
eventually," were the words that caught his attention, and in the
shadow of the door he waited for the reply.

"Ah, come off, now--loosen up! I know the Guardian does write the
class, for this same concern's got a factory in Boston and I got a
Guardian policy on it only yesterday. That's why I'm giving you this.
Your Boston agents, Sternberg, Bloom, and McCoy, place the Boston end
for us. What's the matter--don't your agents have any prohibited list,
or do you let them do things you can't do in your own office?"

"Eddy," said Mr. Cuyler, sternly, "you're talking nonsense. I tell you
we don't write the class in my department, and I don't believe the
agency department does. The Boston firm you mention has just been
appointed, and