"Hullo, Admiral!"
"Hullo, Westmacott!" Charles had always been a favorite of the seaman's. "What are you doing here?"
"Oh, I have been doing a little business for my aunt. But I have never seen you in London before."
"I hate the place. It smothers me. There's not a breath of clean air on this side of Greenwich. But maybe you know your way about pretty well in the City?"
"Well, I know something about it. You see I've never lived very far from it, and I do a good deal of my aunt's business."
"Maybe you know Bread Street?"
"It is out of Cheapside."
"Well then, how do you steer for it from here? You make me out a course and I'll keep to it."
"Why, Admiral, I have nothing to do. I'll take you there with pleasure."
"Will you, though? Well, I'd take it very kindly if you would. I have business there. Smith and Hanbury, financial agents, Bread Street."
The pair made their way to the river-side, and so down the Thames to St. Paul's landing--a mode of travel which was much more to the Admiral's taste than 'bus or cab. On the way, he told his companion his mission and the causes which had led to it. Charles Westmacott knew little enough of City life and the ways of business, but at least he had more experience in both than the Admiral, and he made up his mind not to leave him until the matter was settled.
"These are the people," said the Admiral, twisting round his paper, and pointing to the advertisement which had seemed to him the most promising. "It sounds honest and above-board, does it not? The personal interview looks as if there were no trickery, and then no one could object to five per cent."
"No, it seems fair enough."
"It is not pleasant to have to go hat in hand borrowing money, but there are times, as you may find before you are my age, Westmacott, when a man must stow away his pride. But here's their number, and their plate is on the corner of the door."
A narrow entrance was flanked on either side by a row of brasses, ranging upwards from the shipbrokers and the solicitors who occupied the ground floors, through a long succession of West Indian agents, architects, surveyors, and brokers, to the firm of which they were in quest. A winding stone stair, well carpeted and railed at first but growing shabbier with every landing, brought them past innumerable doors until, at last, just under the ground-glass roofing, the names of Smith and Hanbury were to be seen painted in large white letters across a panel, with a laconic invitation to push beneath it. Following out the suggestion, the Admiral and his companion found themselves in a dingy apartment, ill lit from a couple of glazed windows. An ink-stained table, littered with pens, papers, and almanacs, an American cloth sofa, three chairs of varying patterns, and a much-worn carpet, constituted all the furniture, save only a very large and obtrusive porcelain spittoon, and a gaudily framed and very somber picture which hung above the fireplace. Sitting in front of this picture, and staring gloomily at it, as being the only thing which he could stare at, was a small sallow- faced boy with a large head, who in the intervals of his art studies munched sedately at an apple.
"Is Mr. Smith or Mr. Hanbury in?" asked the Admiral.
"There ain't no such people," said the small boy.