"
"My recommendation? You have a little the advantage of me."
I was stricken with painful doubts, and the cold sweat started upon me.
Perhaps this was not Mrs. Knapp after all.
"Oh, perhaps you didn't mean it," I said.
"Indeed I did, if it was a recommendation. I'm afraid it was
unconscious, though. Mr. Knapp does not consult me about his business."
I was in doubt no longer. It was the injured pride of the wife that
spoke in the tone.
"I'm none the less obliged," I said carelessly. "He assured me that he
acted on your words."
"What on earth are you doing for Mr. Knapp?" she asked earnestly,
dropping her half-bantering tone. There was a trace of apprehension in
her eyes.
"I'm afraid Mr. Knapp wouldn't think your recommendations were quite
justified if I should tell you. Just get him in a corner and ask him."
"I suppose it is that dreadful stock market."
"Oh, madam, let me say the chicken market. There is a wonderful
opportunity just now for a corner in fowls."
"There are a good many to be plucked in the market that Mr. Knapp will
look after," she said with a smile. But there was something of a
worried look behind it. "Oh, you know, Henry, that I can't bear the
market. I have seen too much of the misery that has come from it. It
can eat up a fortune in an hour. A dear friend saw her home, the house
over her head, all she possessed, go in a breath on a turn of the cards
in that dreadful place. And her husband left her to face it with two
little children.
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