"Who sent me the draft for five hundred?"
"I did, Graydon. Forgive me. It was just a loan, you know. I thought you'd need something--"
"I haven't touched it, Elias. Here it is. Thank you. No, I won't accept it."
"I'm sorry," muttered the old man, taking the slip of paper.
Graydon resumed his seat near the window and watched Droom with leaden eyes as he turned suddenly to resume charge of the packing. "We'll soon be through," he said shortly.
For an hour the work went on, and then Droom dismissed the workers with their pay. The storage van men were there to carry the boxes away. Graydon sat still and saw the offices divested. Secondhand dealers hurried off with the furniture, the pictures and the rugs; an expressman came in for the things that belonged to Elias Droom.
"There," said the clerk, tossing the umbrella into a corner. "It's finished. There's nothing left to do but remove ourselves."
"Elias, did Mr. Clegg know about father's conviction when he offered me the place in New York?" asked Graydon as they started away.
"Yes, that's the beauty of it. He admires you. You'll take the place?"
"Not until I've talked it all over with him--to-morrow."
Droom called a cab and the two drove over to the Wells Street rooms, Graydon relinquishing himself completely to the will of the old man. During the supper, which Droom prepared with elaborate care, and far into the night, the young man sat and listened without interest to the garrulous talk of his host, who explained the mechanism and purpose of two models.
One was in the nature of a guillotine by which a person could chop his own head off neatly without chance of failure, and the other had to do with the improvement of science in respect to shoelaces.