'Well, I thought it was a good scheme,' continued her companion, 'and as the girl said she didn't mind, we told we were engaged. That settled things pretty quick. The shares went up again in forty-eight hours, and as we'd bought for cash we made the points, and the other people were short and lost. But when everything was all right again we got tired of being engaged, Miss Bamberger and I; and besides, there was a young fellow she'd a fancy for, and he kept writing to her that he'd kill himself, and that made her nervous, you see, and she said if it went on another day she knew she'd have appendicitis or something. So we were going to announce that the engagement was broken. And the very night before--'
He paused. Not a muscle of the hard face moved, there was not a change in the expression of the tremendous mouth, there was not a tremor in the tone; but the man kept his eyes steadily on the fire.
'Oh, well, she's dead now, poor thing,' he said presently. 'And that's what I wanted to tell you. I suppose it's not a very pretty story, is it? But I'll tell you one thing. Though we made a little by the turn of the market, we saved a heap of small fry from losing all they'd put in. If we'd let the slump come and then bought we should have made a pile; but then we might have had difficulty in getting the stock up to anywhere near par again for some time.'
'Besides,' said the lady quietly, 'you would not have ruined all those little people if you could help it.'
'You think I wouldn't?' He turned his eyes to her now.
'I'm sure you would not,' said the lady with perfect confidence.
'I don't know, I'm sure,' answered Mr. Van Torp in a doubtful tone. 'Perhaps I wouldn't. But it would only have been business if I had. It's not as if Bamberger and I had started a story on purpose about our quarrelling in order to make things go down. I draw the line there. That's downright dishonest, I call it. But if we'd just let things slide and taken advantage of what happened, it would only have been business after all. Except for that doubt about getting back to par,' he added, as an afterthought. 'But then I should have felt whether it was safe or not.'
'Then why did you not let things slide, as you call it?'