Personally, I am
very sorry, Tallente, to do an unfriendly action, but I can only say,
like the school-master before he canes a refractory pupil, that it is
for your own good."
"I should prefer to remain the arbiter of my own destiny," Tallente
observed drily. "I suppose you fully understand that that noxious
person, Miller, paid my defaulting secretary five thousand pounds for
that manuscript?"
"My dear fellow, if your pocket had been picked in the street of that
manuscript and it had been brought to us, we should still have used it,"
was the frank reply.
Tallente stared gloomily out of the window.
"Then I suppose there is nothing more to be said," he wound up.
"Nothing! Sorry, Tallente, but the chief is absolutely firm. He looks
upon you as the monkey pulling the chestnuts out of the fire for the
Labour Party and he has made up his mind to singe your paws."
"The Democrats will rule this country before many years have passed,"
Tallente said earnestly, "whether your chief likes it or not. Isn't it
better to have a reasonable and moderate man like myself of influence in
their councils than to have to deal with Miller and his lot?"
Greening shrugged his shoulders and glanced at the clock.
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