Importunate clients, who would make appointments at
unseasonable hours and would keep to them, might confide in the partner,
though they would not in the clerk. The great objections to this course
were, first and foremost, Mr. Wilkins's strong dislike to Mr. Dunster--his
repugnance to his company, his dress, his voice, his ways--all of which
irritated his employer, till his state of feeling towards Dunster might
be called antipathy; next, Mr. Wilkins was fully aware of the fact that
all Mr. Dunster's actions and words were carefully and thoughtfully pre-
arranged to further the great unspoken desire of his life--that of being
made a partner where he now was only a servant. Mr. Wilkins took a
malicious pleasure in tantalizing Mr. Dunster by such speeches as the one
I have just mentioned, which always seemed like an opening to the desired
end, but still for a long time never led any further. Yet all the while
that end was becoming more and more certain, and at last it was reached.
Mr. Dunster always suspected that the final push was given by some
circumstance from without; some reprimand for neglect--some threat of
withdrawal of business which his employer had received; but of this he
could not be certain; all he knew was, that Mr. Wilkins proposed the
partnership to him in about as ungracious a way as such an offer could be
made; an ungraciousness which, after all, had so little effect on the
real matter in hand, that Mr.
Pages:
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59