Chip now resolved that he would double his diligence in making money, out of spite to the father, if not love for the daughter.  The old fogy’s wealth he would have at any rate, and Millicent with it, if possible, as a sort of bonus.  So, obtaining an interview with his fair intended and intending, at the earliest moment, without revealing a hint of his own diplomatic blunder, he told her that her father had refused his consent to their union because his fortune was not sufficient, and she must not expect to see him again till it was so, which he fancied would be in a much shorter time than the old gentleman supposed.

Chip had not long to wait for a chance to strike the first blow in carrying out his new resolution of fast trading.  The day after his memorable rebuff, he was sitting in the choky little counting-room of a crammed commission-warehouse in India Street, musing and mousing over the various schemes that occurred to his fertile brain for increasing the profits of his business.  He had already bought cotton pretty largely on speculation.  Should he monopolize further, make a grand rush in stocks, or join the church and get large trust-funds into his hands on the strength of his reputation for piety?  All these and a hundred other questions were getting rapidly and shrewdly discussed in his mind, when a rather stubbed man, with a square, homely face and vinegar expression, opened, or partly opened, the little glass door of the counting-room, and, looking round it more greedily than hopefully, said,—­

“You don’t want the cargo of the ‘Orion’ at a bargain?”

“Can’t say I do.  But walk in, Captain Grant,—­walk in!”

Captain Grant did walk in, though he said it was no use talking, if Chip didn’t want the cotton.  Chip saw instinctively, in the sad, acid look of his visitor, that he was anxious to sell, and could be made to take a despondent view of the market.  Taking him by the button, he said, rather patronizingly,—­

“I know, Captain, you ship-owners want to keep your ships at work at something besides storage.  But look there,” pointing to the bales of cotton filling the immense floor; “multiply that pile by four and add the basements of two churches, and you see a reason why I should not buy above the level of the market.  Now, taking that into consideration, what do you ask for your two hundred and fifty bales in the ‘Orion?’”

“Seven cents.”

“I know somebody who would feel rich, if he could sell at that,” returned Chip, with a queer grin.  “No, no, Captain Grant, that won’t do at all.  Prices are sinking.  If I should buy at that figure, every sign of margin would fade out in a fortnight.  I haven’t five bales that have been bought at any such price.”

It was true, he had not; for they had been bought at seven-and-a-half and eight.

“Well, I will say six-and-a-half at sixty days, to you,” said the humiliated Grant.

“My dear Sir,” replied Chip, “you don’t begin to tempt me.  I must burn all my foreign correspondence and forget the facts before I can begin to look at anything beyond six cents and ninety days.”