"I'll keep 'em a while," said Bean. "I have a sort of plan."

"I should not like to think it possible--"

Bean was tired of Tully. What was the man trying to get at, anyway? He didn't know; but he would shut him off. His mind leaped with an inspiration.

"I can imagine nothing of less consequence," said Bean.

He was at once proud of the snappy way the words came out. Breede, he thought, could hardly have been snappier. He glared at Tully, who looked shocked, hurt, and disgusted. Tully sighed and walked back to his own desk, as if the ice cracked beneath his small feet at every step.

Bean resumed his work, with the air of one forgetting a past annoyance.

But he was not forgetting. He might let them have the stock; he had never thought any too well of that express directorship; but let them send some one that could talk straight. He didn't care if he _had_ been short with Tully. He was going to lose his job anyway, the day after that wedding, if not before.

He wrote many of Breede's letters, and was again interrupted, this time by Markham, Breede's confidential secretary. Markham's approach to Bean was emphatically footed, as that of a man unable to imagine ice being thin under _his_ feet. He was bluff and open, where Tully lurked behind his "not impossibles." He was even jovial now. He smiled down at Bean.

"By the way, Bean, some one was telling me you have some Federal Express."

"Have the shares right there in my desk," admitted Bean, wonderingly. He was suspicious all at once. Tully and Markham had both opened on him with "By the way." He had always felt it a shrewd thing to suspect people who began with "By the way."

"Ah, yes, fifty shares, I believe." Markham smiled again, but seemed to try not to smile. He apparently considered it a rare jest that Bean should own any shares of anything; a thing for smiles even though one must humour the fellow.

"Fifty shares! Well, well, that's good! Now the fact is, old man, I can place those for you this afternoon. Some of the Federal people going to meet informally here, and they happen to want a little block or two of the stuff, for voting purposes, you know. Not that it's worth anything.

How'd you happen to get down on such a dead one?"

"Well, you know, I had a sort of a plan about that stock. I don't know--"

"Of course I can't get you what you paid for it," continued the affable Markham, "because it's poor stuff, but maybe they'll stand a point or two above to-day's quotations. Just let me have them and I'll get your check made out right away; you can go out of here with more money to-night than any one else will." Markham was prattling on amiably, still trying not to be overcome by the funny joke of Bean owning things.

"I don't want to sell," declared Bean. There had been a moment's hesitation, but that opening, "By the way," of Markham's had finally decided him. You couldn't tell anything about such a man.

"Oh, come now, old chap," cajoled Markham, "Be a good fellow. It's only needed for a technical purpose, you know."

"I guess I'll hold on to it," said Bean. "I've been thinking for a long time--"

"Last quarter's dividend was 3 per cent.," reminded Markham.

"I know," admitted Bean, "and that's just why. You see I've got an idea--"

"As a matter of fact, I think J.B. doesn't exactly approve of his people here in the office speculating. He doesn't consider it ... well, you know one of you chaps here, if you weren't all loyal, might very often take advantage--you get my point?"

"I guess I won't sell just now," observed Bean.

"I don't understand this at all," said Markham, allowing it to be seen that he was shocked.

Bean wavered, but he was nettled. He was going to lose his job anyway.

You might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb. To Markham standing there, hurt and displeased, he looked up and announced curtly:

"I can imagine nothing of less consequence!"

He had the felicity to see Markham wince as from an unseen blow. Then Markham walked back to his own room. His tread would have broken ice capable of sustaining a hundred Tullys.

He saw it all now. They were plotting against him. They had learned of his plan to become a director and they were trying to freeze him out. He had never spoken of this plan, but probably they had consulted some good medium who had warned them to look out for him. Very well, if they wanted fight they should have fight. He wouldn't sell that stock, not even to Breede himself--

"Buzz! Buzz! Buzz!" went the electric call over his desk. That meant Breede. Very well; he knew his rights. He picked up his note-book and answered the summons.

Breede, munching an innocent cracker, stared at him.

"How long you had that Federal stock?"

"Aunt bought it five years ago."

"Where?"

"Chicago."

"Want to sell?"

"I think I'd rather--"

"You won't sell?"

"No!"

"'S all!"

Back at his machine he tried to determine whether he would have "let out" at Breede as he had at Tully and at Markham. He had supposed that Breede would of course nag him as the other two had. And would he have said to Breede with magnificent impudence, "I can imagine nothing of less consequence?" He thought he would have said this; the masks were very soon bound to be off Breede and himself. The flapper might start the trouble any minute. But Breede had given him no chance for that lovely speech. No good saying it unless you were nagged.

He became aware that the "Federal people" Markham had mentioned were gathering in Breede's room. Several of them brushed by him. Let them freeze him out if they could. He wondered what they said at meetings.

Did every one talk, or only the head director? Markham had said this was to be an informal meeting.

It is probable that Bean would not have been much enlightened by the immediate proceedings of this informal meeting. The large, impressive, moneyed-looking directors sat easily about the table in Breede's inner room, and said little of meaning to a tyro in the express business.

The stock was pretty widely held in small lots, it seemed, and the agents out buying it up were obliged to proceed with caution. Otherwise people would get silly ideas and begin to haggle over the price. But the shares were coming in as rapidly as could be expected.

Bean would have made nothing of that. He would have been bored, until Markham made a reference to fifty shares that happened to be owned by a young chap in the outer office.

"Take 'em over," said one heavy-jowled director who incongruously held a cigarette between lips that seemed to demand the largest and blackest of cigars.

"He won't sell," answered Markham. "I spoke to him."

"Tell him to," said the director to Breede.

"Tell him yourself," said Breede. "He said he wouldn't sell."

"Um! Well, well!" said the director.

"Exactly what I told him," remarked the conscientious Tully, who was present to take notes, "and he said to me, 'Mr. Tully, I am unwilling to imagine anything of less consequence.' He seemed, uh--I might say--decided."