Читать книгу A Change in the Cabinet онлайн

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Sir Charles Repton could ride himself on the curb, and more than anything else this mastery had given him his present great position; but that day he had to exercise his will to the full, and in that exercise he felt slight twinges behind the ear where the barber’s rest had struck him. It was all he could do to prevent himself from drumming on the table or from making those interruptions which only serve as fuel to the slow criticisms of the dull.

At last—and heaven knows with what subtlety and patience—he conquered. There was a vote (a thing he had wished to avoid), but he carried it by two; and it was agreed that the issue of new capital should be made, that a General Meeting of the shareholders should be called for Tuesday the 2nd of June, and that he, Repton, should have the task of laying the scheme before them. The new prospectus, which he had already drafted, was passed round and with a very few emendations accepted. Then, after as heavy a bit of work as had ever been undertaken in the way of persuasion, the principal brain in that company was at last free for other things.