THE BITER BIT.

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume XIV, Issue 2005, 29 June 1886, Page 2

THE BITER BIT.

William, generally called Bill, Fly, and one Tom Wmelt agreed to become partners in the business of carriers, which., prior to this agreement, each of them had carried on upon his own account between G-eraldine and Nokomai. The partnership was suggested by the former of the parties, who pointed out to the other the advantages to be gained by a combination of strength. An Advertisement was inserted in the papers notifying the fact that henceforth the two we have named would carry on business, together under the style or firm of "Fly and Wmelt." Now, of the partners, the latter was byfar the more deserving man of the two ; he was steady and industrious, civil and quiet, a hard working man, whose only anxiety was to do his work as well as possible, keep his team in good condition, and pay^ to the last farthing, everything that he owed. Mr Fly was, however, a schemer, and his character was the reverse of his partner's ; for reasons of his own be had prevailed upon the other to entei* into partnership with him, and now the contract of partnership was complete, bis only idea was to benefit himself thereby as much as possible. It was not long before Mr Wmelt discovered that his partner was heavily involved in debt, and he found also that many customers of the firm deducted, in settling up, amounts due to them by Fly. This, of course, caused some differencee between the parties, and Mr Fly saw an early dissolution of partnership was impending. Leaving his team and hordes one day at Palmersten, without informing Mr Wmolt of his intention, he proceeded to Dunedin. Arriving in the evening at the Borough Hotel, he went to a stationer's shop and purchased four Promissory >' ote forms, each with a two shilling stamp on it. These he filled up for one hundred pounds apiece, and signed to them the firm's name, Fly and Wmelt j making chem in his own favour. The following morning he walked, with these precious pieces of paper in his pecket, to the office of a commission agent, who knew the firm well, and who readily agreed, for a consideration, to discount two of them ; the other two he "melted at another office, by representing that he intended buying horses with the proceeds. He had some difficulty with the two second bills ; but, thanks to the good name of Wmelt, he managed to get them done. Possessed of nearly four hundred pounds, he returned to his work, and, for a month, he made no disclosure to his partner '. but, at last, one evening when Wmelt was expressinghis dissatisfaction with the partnership, :Fly said they had j better dissolve, and then informed his

partner or the bill-discounting transaction. ■ Of course, a scene took place between them, ending in Wmelt insisting upon a dissolution there and then. Fly expressed hypocritical contrition for what he had done, aaid he had lost the whole of the money by getting in with a lot, *nd he offered, by way of compensation,. t6 hand over hia team to Wmelt and to retire at one. v The offer was accepted, and was just what our wprfchy wanted ;he got, thereby, four hundred pounds for his waggon and horses, which were wori:h about half the money ; he got clear of the criminal law, and he left his partner to settle with the creditors. The notice of dissolution informed everyone that all debts due to, or owing by, the late firm Would be respectively received or paid by Wmelt, the continuing partner, When Fly read the notice in the paper, he congratulated himself upon the 1 happy issue 1 to which he had brought his plans, and as he felt the roll of notes in his pocket, he came to the conclusion that men like Wmelt were only intended to feed men like Fly. With hia ill-gotten gains, Fly came to Christchurch and opened a grocer's shop in the Ferry road, feeling quite secure, as he imagined *the notice of dissolution relieved him of any liabilities in connecwith his late firm ; but, some six months after, he was surprised at receiving a writ from Dunedin for one of the bills he had discounted. Of this, he took no notice, •but when, a fortnight afterward, the Sheriffs bailiff came in; with a Writ of Possession^ he deemed it necessary to make some inquiries re his late partner. The result rather surprised him : he found that, a month before, Wmelt had quietly sold the two teams, pocketed the money for them, and sailed, without beat of drum* for San Francisco* leaving Fly to arrange matters with the creditors. The latter then discovered, for the first time, that he was still liable for the debts of the firm, and that none ((of the bills he had discounted, for his partner to pay had been liqnidated, Wmelt had, after all checkmated him, the nert result being that Fly lost his team, was made a bankrupt upon his own bills, and received six months imprisonment, with hard labour, for fraudulent insolvency. We have not heard how Wmelt got on.