"He said that what I called 'my word'
wasn't a collateral. Wanted something better. So I've got to hunt
for it somewhere else."
"And he wouldn't give it to you?" cried Peter indignantly. "No, of
course not! A man's word doesn't count with these pickers and
stealers. Half--three-quarters--of the business of the globe is
done on a man's word. He writes it on the bottom or on the back of
a slip of paper small enough to light a cigar with--but it's only
his word that counts. In these mouse-traps, however, these cracks
in the wall, they want something they can get rid of the moment
somebody else says it is not worth what they loaned on it; or they
want a bond with the Government behind it. Oh, I know them!"
Cohen laughed--a dry laugh--in compliment to Peter's way of
putting it--but there was no ring of humor in it. He had been
reading Jack's mind. There was something behind the forced smile
that Peter had missed--something deeper than the lines of anxiety
and the haunted look in the eyes. This was a different lad from
the one with whom he had spent so pleasant an evening some weeks
before.
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