Against the Tide

JOHN WYCLIFFE (Henry Bedford-Jones)

New York Dodd, Mead And Company 1924

Copyright, 1924, By Dodd, Mead And Company, Inc.

Printed In U. S. A.

Vail-Ballou Press, Inc. Binghamton And New York

Contents

Book I

"The Hidden Things of Dishonesty"

Book II

"He Who Did Eat of My Bread"

Book III

"A Man's Heart Deviseth His Way"

Book I

"The Hidden Things Of Dishonesty"

Against The Tide

Chapter 1

The old-fashioned Deming mansion, for the hundredth time in its sedate existence, was filled with a gayety which offset even the menacing weather.

Although noon was close at hand, the morning was deeply gloomy and ominous. Thunder clouds of late summer brooded over the Ohio, and rain, already sweeping across the wide crescent-bend of the river, was threatening to burst upon Evansville. Yet it was not because of these clouds that the old house was ablaze with light from cellar to attic.

From the twelve-foot ceilings of the huge rooms hung electric clusters, whose glare was softened yet quickened by tinkling prisms and pendants of crystal. Along the walls twinkled sconces and candelabra; this richer glow brought out the scarlet coats of tapestried huntsmen, pursuing stags through indefinite forests of Gobelin weave. Everywhere was light and sound and laughter.

A babel of tongues filled the rooms--crisply concise northern speech, mingled with the softer slur of southern accents. A listener might gather that this house was symbolic of Evansville itself, bordering both north and south, drinking of its best from either section; an Indiana city, yet of infinite variety, proudly exclusive, living more in past than present, yet cordial and open-hearthed.

At noon, in this house, Dorothy Deming was to be married to Reese Armstrong. The wedding was yet some little distance away. Macgowan, who had been dressing for his part of best man and who was a house guest, crossed the upstairs hall toward the stairway, just as Dorothy herself appeared from a room which was aflutter with excited feminine voices. With the license of his age and position, he led her to the window-nook and began to speak of Armstrong. Dorothy, oblivious of the confusion around, yielded to the detention and listened eagerly.

Why not? When Lawrence Macgowan spoke, few men but would have listened; not to mention a bride who was chatting with the groom's most intimate and trusted friend, and hearing wondrous things about the man whom she was soon to call her husband.

Macgowan was impressive. More impressive than J. Fortescue Deming, in whose features the Deming Food Products Company had seared deep lines; more impressive than Deming's business directors and social friends here gathered; more impressive by far than young Armstrong, whose financial genius was making its mark so rapidly.

Despite the gray at his temples, Lawrence Macgowan possessed a charm of personality, a steely keenness of intellect, a direct force of character, which dominated all who came in contact with him. Being quite used to making this impression, he made it the more readily. Men said of Macgowan that he disdained politics, had refused a supreme court appointment, and preferred corporation law to marriage as a means of advancement. True,--perhaps. Among the doctors of the law, among those upright ones who lived rigorously by legal ethics and by ethical illegality, Macgowan moved as a very Gamaliel, honored in the Sanhedrim and respected by all those whose fortunes his brain had made.

Men said, too, that some day he would set that brain to making his own fortune.

"Then," Dorothy was inquiring, "you and Reese are looking this very minute for some new business to take hold of? And you haven't found one?"

Macgowan evaded, smilingly. His whole person seemed to radiate that smile as some rich crystal radiates and warms the sunlight, and when he thus smiled all the strong lines of his face were softened; his level gaze lost its almost harsh intensity and became winning, genial, intimate.

"We're not looking, exactly," he said. "You see, we're more sought after than seeking--though I should not include myself. Reese is the whole thing. It's his genius that is the very breath of life in Consolidated. Do you know that he's put nearly sixteen thousand investors on our books by his sheer selling ability? He has actually sold himself to them. All small ones, people who can invest only a few hundred dollars each year. That is more than an accomplishment; it is a triumph!"

The girl's cheeks were flushed, her blue eyes shone like stars.

"But it's your help, your faith and backing, which made such big things possible for him. To think that he's been in New York only a year or two! To think where he will be after ten years--" Dorothy broke off, caught her breath sharply, and laughed at her own enthusiasm. "Oh, I'm intoxicated with the very thought of what he's accomplished and what he will accomplish! Now tell me about the companies you-all handle. Do you buy them and then sell them later for more money?"

Macgowan shook his head. "No. A manufacturing concern, let us say, is poorly managed yet essentially sound. We buy it. We reorganize it. Consolidated Securities owns it and continues to own it. A minority of the stock is sold to our investors, to the people who own Consolidated stock. It is their privilege to buy stock in this subsidiary company--"

"The preferred stock?" cut in Dorothy. Macgowan chuckled at her sapient air.

"Yes. Two shares and no more to each investor, but with these two shares goes one share of common at a nominal valuation. Suppose we start or reorganize two or three such companies in the course of a year--and we hope to do better than that--the chances are very good for our investors. Consolidated sells the stock, owns the subsidiary company, runs it! Thus, Consolidated must make sure that the company will not fail but succeed. The investor shares the profit with Consolidated; also, he shares Consolidated's profit from the whole group of companies. You see the idea?"

Dorothy nodded quickly, then was checked by Macgowan's air.

"There's just one thing." His tone was hesitant, embarrassed. Her eyes leaped to his face; his voice seemed to bring a swift apprehension into her mind.

"Yes?" she urged him with an eager word.

"There is one thing--" Macgowan was unaccountably at a loss for speech; to any who knew him well, an astounding thing. "You understand, the success of Reese Armstrong means everything to me; I may call myself his closest friend, at least in New York. And I know, my dear, that with you at his elbow, with your faith and help behind him, he is invincible."

Suspense flashed into the girl's eyes. This prelude, this slightly frowning air of embarrassment, hinted at some portentous secret.

"Yes?" she prompted again.

The lawyer regarded her a long moment, his eyes gravely steady.

"Well, there is one thing I want to say to you; that's why I dragged you away for a few moments. Yet I don't want to offend you, my dear."

"You won't--it's a promise! What is it?"

"One thing, for his happiness and yours. He is a wizard at finance; success has not flung him off balance, for his one thought has ever been of work. Now, my dear Dorothy, don't let him drink too deeply of this wine of wizardry! No man can serve two masters. Business takes its toll of souls, I can assure you; it hardens the spirit, until nothing is left sacred before its spell. A man will rob his best friend in the name of business. He will take what he can grasp, and call it finance. You must see to it that Reese is not too entirely absorbed in his work--that he is not dominated by the nimble dollar."

For a moment the girl met Macgowan's steady gaze, probing for the meaning underneath his words. In her eyes rose a question, a quick protest, an argument.

Then, before she could respond, came a breathless outcry, a swish of skirts, and two bridesmaids seized upon her.

"Dorothy, you shameless thing! These brides--they all need a guardian! You've driven us perfectly _wild_! Don't you know that we've been looking everywhere for you? It's time you were dressed--your mother's waiting--"

Dorothy was hustled away in peremptory fashion.

Macgowan, smiling a little to himself, sauntered away and downstairs. As he entered the great drawing-room he was instantly seized upon. New guests were each moment arriving and Macgowan, who was to be best man, was the lion of the hour. Armstrong had not yet summoned him for moral support, and he was momentarily free.

This home wedding in its very informality held a formal dignity which was novel to the New Yorker, and which he found delightful. Many of those present were out-of-town house guests, and all were old friends of the bride; Armstrong had invited only his best man. Thus the affair had a strong sense of family intimacy.

Macgowan was quick to feel any psychic and underlying influence. Behind all this glitter he perceived a curious restraint, a pride, a singular cool dignity. Through the babel of voices, underneath the laughing faces, he was vaguely aware of this thing. It was as though many of these people, guests in this house, shared some secret which they were trying to banish from memory or thought.

Lawrence Macgowan knew exactly what this hidden thing was.

He was no untutored denizen of the metropolis who viewed the country at large only through the uncertain eyes of the press. He even had direct connections with Evansville; across the room he saw his cousin, Ried Williams, a director and treasurer of the Deming company. The relationship was not, however, known to many; even Armstrong was unaware of it. Macgowan made his way to the side of Williams and clapped him on the shoulder.

"Well, Ried? How are you?"

"Hello, Lawrence!" The thin, sallow features of Williams suddenly radiated delight. "Here, I want you to meet Pete Slosson, our assistant general manager. Pete, this is Lawrence Macgowan; a man to whom the law is a servitor and shield, the Constitution an act of providence, and state legislatures mere soda-water bubbles--"

Laughing, Macgowan shook hands with Pete Slosson. A young man, this, of singularly clear-cut and intelligent features; yet the eyes were a bit sullen, the lips a trifle full. The entire face displayed a nervous energy not wholly natural. The man drank.

"Everything Lawrence touches," continued Williams warmly, "and every one in touch with him, succeeds! He simply never makes a failure of anything."

"Then I'll make a touch," Slosson grinned, "because I'm going to be broke one of these days."

Macgowan chuckled. "Any time you like," he returned. "But remember that the golden touch of Midas went against him at the last!"

One watching these three men closely might have fancied that beneath their light words lay some deeper significance.

At this moment the negro butler approached. He deftly bore a huge tray, upon which crowded tall silver cups, crowned with the rich green of new mint and steaming frostily from their iced contents.

"Compliments of the bride, gentlemen!" he addressed them. "If you-all is prohibition, dishyer in de centuh is gwineteed not to obstruct yo' feelin's or beliefs--"

"Not for us, Uncle Neb!" Slosson laughed loudly, as he extended one of the juleps to Macgowan. "Here's a treat for you, effete easterner! Uncle Neb's cocktails are famous from here to Nashville, but his juleps are symphonic memories of the good old days. Take a long whiff of the mint first, mind; there's only one way to drink a julep. That right, Uncle Neb?"

"Dat sho' is de truth, Mistah Slosson!" The old negro was beaming. "Yas, suh. Folks sho' do prove dey quality on de julep. Ain't dat de truth, Mistah Slosson? M-mm! And Mistah Deming he done growed dat mint his own self, too--ain't nobody knows mint like he do!"

Macgowan sniffed deeply of the raw fragrance, and raised his goblet.

"Gentlemen, I give you the health of the bride!"

At these words, an almost imperceptible contraction occurred in the features of Slosson. Faint as was this movement of the facial muscles, instantly as it vanished, Macgowan observed it.

After this, he took a deep and lively interest in Pete Slosson; and Slosson, flattered, talked freely enough. Any man would have been flattered to hold the absorbed attention of Macgowan.

"You're wasting your talents here, Slosson," said Macgowan at last. His tone was abrupt and incisive, and confidential in the extreme. "You ought to have a year or two in Chicago or Indianapolis, handling bigger things, then come on to New York. There's no advancement for a man like you in this town."

Slosson listened with sulky eyes.

"All very well," he returned. "But I'm a director, and assistant general manager of Food Products--which is a big thing here. If I went to Indianapolis, where'd I be? I've no pull up there."

Macgowan's thin lips curved slightly at this.

"Then you don't care to handle bigger things?"

"Of course I do!" snapped Slosson. "Will you give me a chance at 'em?"

"Yes," said Macgowan coolly. "Yes. Not now, though. Later on--when some things that are in the air have worked around right."

"Good! Then count on me. Between the two of us, Food Products is going to pieces soon."

Macgowan merely nodded indifferently. "Why?" he asked.

Slosson shrugged.

"How the devil should I know? Business depression, of course. We have a good line and it sells, but luck's against us. There's Deming now. Good lord! Look at his face!"

The two men turned. Their host had halted in the doorway and was signing the book of a messenger. A telegram was in his hand.

Macgowan, not at all astonished by the information just confided to him, searched the face of Deming. He read there confirmation of Slosson's words. Indubitably, the man was keenly worried. That elderly, handsome face was deeply lined with care; a far and deep-hidden weakness, a frightened panic, was about the eyes. As he stood there in the doorway, Deming tore open the envelope and glanced at the telegram which unfolded in his hand.

Even by the artificial light, Macgowan saw the deathly pallor that leaped into the man's face; he saw the fingers tremble, saw the frightful despair that sprang to the eyes. For one instant Deming lifted his head, stared blankly around, then turned and was gone. After him hurried Slosson, concerned and anxious.

Macgowan felt a touch at his elbow. He turned to find Ried Williams, who had perceived nothing of this happening in the doorway. His rather crafty eyes met the glance of Macgowan with a saturnine air.

"What d'you think of Slosson, Lawrence?"

"Good man." Macgowan glanced at his watch. "Well, I must be off to find Armstrong--"

"You don't know about Slosson, then?"

Macgowan regarded his cousin steadily.

"Disappointed rival; he'd always counted on marrying Dorothy. I've been afraid he'd take a drop too much and make a scene, but he has a good head. And see here, Lawrence! How long have I known you?"

"Longer than I like to think about," and Macgowan chuckled in his hearty manner.

"Yes." Williams looked at him appraisingly, keenly. "Don't wriggle with me, Lawrence. You have devilish deep meanings to some things you say. When you said Slosson was a good man, you meant something. What's in the air?"

Macgowan frowned slightly. "Nothing, except wedding bells."

"Oh!" An ironic smile lighted the face of Williams. "Wriggling, are you? All right. You had a special reason for wanting to meet Slosson, and now you say he's a good man. That's enough to show me a few things--since I know you. Just how much do you know? Know that Food Products is going bust inside of six weeks or six days? I want to get from under, so give me the benefit of your advice."

Macgowan regarded his cousin with a frowning air.

"Ried, if I had your brains I'd be in Wall Street--or the penitentiary," he said slowly and smoothly, without offense in the words. "You and Slosson should both be in Indianapolis. Should be in the investment business there, brokerage, quite on your own hook, of course."

"So!" exclaimed Williams quietly. "What's in your mind, then?"

"Nothing save paternal advice."

"Have you enough confidence in our ability to underwrite the business?"

"Strictly as a matter between cousins, yes! If done quietly."

The two men looked at each other in silence, for a long moment. It was impossible to conceive what passed between them, what unspoken comprehension, what tacit agreement, lay in their minds. Williams was furtively admiring, Macgowan was blandly imperturbable. Yet one gathered that, no matter what comprehension might exist between these two men, Macgowan alone held the complete key to it.

Their talk was swiftly interrupted.

The noisy groups had become silenced and wondering, an ominous whisper passed through the huge rooms, tongues were stilled and hushed, only to rise again in subdued conjecture and low talk. Obviously, something very untoward had happened somewhere.

To Macgowan and Williams, as they stood together, Pete Slosson came hurriedly pushing his way. From his face was stripped the mask of polite amiability; that face was dark with passion, anger and fright fought for possession of the eyes, the mouth was clenched and desperate.

"Macgowan, Armstrong wants you in Deming's library right away," he said in a low tone. "You too, Ried! There's the devil to pay. The wedding's postponed for an hour."

Slosson shoved on into the throng, seeking some one else. Macgowan went to the doorway with Williams. He laid his hand on the other's arm.

"My dear Ried," he said quietly, "you predicted that something would happen within six weeks or six days. Decidedly, you must overcome this habit of making inaccurate statements!"

"Eh?" Williams looked bewildered. "You--what d'you mean?"

"You should have said, within six minutes." Macgowan chuckled again, then halted. "Here! Where's the library? You're not going upstairs!"

"It's up there," answered the other curtly, leading the way.

A hum of suppressed voices followed and surrounded the two men as they mounted to the upper floor. At this moment, one of the upper hall doors opened, and the white-clad figure of Dorothy burst out into the hall with excited words.

"I must find father at once!" she was exclaiming. "A whole hour--why, it's terrible! I don't care what the reason is--oh, Mr. Macgowan! Where is Reese? Where's father?"

Macgowan looked down into the flushed and beautiful face of the girl; he gently and reassuringly patted the hand that had caught at his arm.

"Your father has had some bad news," he said quietly.

"Bad news!" The eyes of Dorothy widened on his. "But how--"

"A business matter." Macgowan glanced at the others crowding around, then with a quiet gesture he led Dorothy to that same window-nook where they had been talking a few moments previously. A subdued exultation was in his eyes.

"Now, my dear girl, accept the matter calmly," he said. "Do not interfere; there is an important meeting in your father's library. Let Reese have his way, I beg of you."

Dorothy caught her breath.

"It is Reese who has postponed the wedding?" she said.

"For business that could not wait." Macgowan nodded, and lowered his voice. "You recall what I warned you about? Well, this shows. Reese is going to take your father's business away from him, for his own sake. It has to be done. Consolidated will profit by it, of course. Don't mention this to any one, even to your mother. It's been all cut and dried for some time. I'm sorry. Don't blame Reese; cure him."

He turned and went his way after Williams.

Dorothy stood motionless, as though his words had stricken something far inside of her. Her mother appeared, her bridesmaids crowded about with wondering exclamations, questions, perturbed faces. A babel of voices surrounded them.

"It's nothing," said Dorothy, calmly enough, though her voice was strained. "A little matter of business that came up unexpectedly. Father and Reese have had to hold a meeting. Mother, I think I'll sit down for a minute--"

She passed through them, went to her own room, closed the door. Then she sank down on the bed, a sudden fierce anger filling her blue eyes.

"Why did he say that?" she murmured. "A lie--a lie! And the venom in his eyes--oh, I can't forget his eyes! He hates me because I've come between him and Reese. He hates me, and now he tells me this awful lie, tries to make trouble between us! He can't. I'll not believe him. I'll pay no attention to him--"

Her emotion culminated in a burst of tears. It never really occurred to her for a moment that the lie might have held any grain of truth.

Chapter II

Upon the issue of this meeting in the library of Fortescue Deming there directly depended larger things than any of the men present might guess. "Food Products," otherwise the Deming Food Products Company, was an old and honorable concern with large mills which turned out all manner of delectables from raw flour to breakfast foods. The men who directed the destinies of this company now sat about the library table of their president, wondering what the devil Reese Armstrong and his lawyer were doing here.

Armstrong actually had a better comprehension of the company and its situation than anybody could have dreamed. The summons from Deming had caught him while dressing, and he was in his shirt sleeves; but his manner lacked the nervous anxiety of the others about him. They feared the blow that was about to fall, and dreaded its consequences. Armstrong could have told them exactly what was going to happen to Food Products and to them, within the next few moments. He did not know, however, just what the result of all this was going to be to himself.

Lawrence Macgowan alone might have told him that.

It was now more than a year since Reese Armstrong turned up in New York, quite unknown to fame. He was armed with some money, which he had made at various points between Manitoba and Evansville, and a lawyer's education; with a firm conviction in his own ability; and with a project for extracting the hoard from the well-known but mythical sock of the small investor. He had more than a project to this end; he had a positive genius, which he was quite willing to demonstrate.

Despite his age, which was still short of thirty, this genius found him a welcome. It was a cautious welcome; still, those who dream eternally of extracting that hoard from that sock would welcome Mephisto himself if he were to present himself for the purpose.

Armstrong was no Mephisto. He possessed qualities which did not appear on the surface. To the metropolitan eye, he was a green lawyer from the verdant West, who might possibly get somewhere. Yet, in reality, he had behind him the culminative and driving power of struggle.

He had worked himself through law school by the unusual method of playing the Italian harp, and playing it well. Farther back were two generations of Baptist circuit-riders, whose chief heritage to him was a stern and rigid standard of moral values, so far as his personal conduct was concerned, and an old-fashioned belief in legal ethics. Now, to play the harp one must be an idealist. To cherish a moral code, entails a sense of personal responsibility. These two qualities are rarely combined in one person; when the combination does appear, that person is either famous or infamous--he is never mediocre.

Besides all this, Armstrong had knocked about through Western Canada, thereby attaining to an extensive knowledge of his fellow man which did not appear in his ruddy and ingenuous countenance. He was blond and vigorous, with an eye whose peculiar steely acuity could be very disconcerting. A laugh came often to his lips, a smile rarely. His air was one of poise and confidence, of almost challenging assurance, and he had a knack of imparting this assurance to those who came into touch with him.

It is well known that the aforesaid metropolitan eye accepts a man at face value. This face value of Reese Armstrong was countersigned by a clean, alert, inspiring brain; it was untouched by the corroding fingers of greed or self-indulgence or crafty brooding. One instinctively perceived that this man held his given word above any minted pledge.

Armstrong had sought a letter of introduction to the best corporation lawyer in New York, and this letter brought him to Lawrence Macgowan.

After listening to all that Armstrong had to say, Macgowan took action. He put up Reese Armstrong at the Lawyers' Club, obtained a hearing from certain men of his acquaintance--and Consolidated Securities was incorporated. Armstrong held no office but retained a controlling interest. Macgowan became a director and remained as counsel. The other men, of whom Judge Holcomb and Findlater were the most prominent, became directors without salary, being paid outright in stock for their support. The first subsidiary was the Armstrong Company, purely a stock-selling concern.

Not blinded by this success, Armstrong knew that he was only on trial. None of these men had great confidence in his scheme. They were willing to take a chance, hoping that some day would appear Fortunatus, to loose for them the string that bound the sock of the small investor. Armstrong, to prove that he was the man, went to work.

About himself Armstrong gathered men devoted to him, an organization covering New York and adjacent cities. His chief helper was Jimmy Wren--impulsive, ardent, imaginative; not a half-way man. Somehow, into all these men Armstrong injected his own personality; or, perhaps, he picked them with extraordinary skill. In any event, he accomplished a miracle. Through them he reached out and touched the small investor, became acquainted with him, won his confidence, induced him to become part owner of Consolidated.

From its inception the struggle was aureated with success. Two small manufacturing concerns were taken over, reorganized, placed on a paying basis. Here again Armstrong showed his value as a judge of men. Consolidated Securities became a material fact, and prospered, and was ready to reach out anew.

At the end of the year's work, Armstrong went to Evansville to claim his bride.

He had met Dorothy Deming in New York, renewing an old acquaintance begun two years before in Evansville, and now upleaped between them a swift and spontaneous mutual knowledge that they were one. Almost from the first there was a complete comprehension, a deep and terrible kinship of spirit which, had there been barriers, would have borne them down. But there were no barriers to this love, save Armstrong's ambition for what he deemed final success; and this success came swiftly--all too swiftly, some said.

And now Armstrong, shirt-sleeved, sat at the library table of J. Fortescue Deming.

As he glanced at the faces around him, Armstrong awaited quietly the coming event. He knew as well as they--perhaps better--what to expect, but he had not imagined that it would come just yet, above all at this day and hour. Yet during the past few months he had seen it approach, with an inevitable certainty, nor could he hinder it. One does not, unfortunately, extend warnings of failure to a prospective father-in-law; not, at least, with any great success. Armstrong had refused to endanger his state of blessedness by attempting to pry open the lids of a blind man.

As he looked around, Armstrong could not repress, did not try to repress, the cold gleam in his eye. For the broken Deming who stood beside him fingering a telegram, he could feel pity; the others deserved no such feeling. They were either spoilers, or complacently inefficient fools, these men. All seven of them had together wrecked the Deming Food Products Company, though their work in this direction had not been by intent, but through folly, selfish calculation, through lack of all vision beyond self-interest. Deming, who had built up the old company, had lost his once strong grip on things, and his vision had overpowered his common sense. Although he could not realize it, he was not without his share of blame for this debacle.

And while Armstrong thus looked with unveiled scorn from man to man about the table, Lawrence Macgowan, by himself in one corner of the library, watched only Armstrong. If his gaze held any expression, it was hidden.

"Gentlemen," began Deming, with shaking voice, "I have hurriedly called you here to receive bad news. To get this message at such a moment is more than a blow to me; it is a humiliation. Yet I must face it."

He paused, his gaze sweeping the circle of faces. In them he read not the slightest hint of fortitude or sympathy; only weakness, fright, panicky comprehension. A single strong, calm pair of eyes might have bucked him up in this moment. He found none, save Armstrong's.

"This telegram," he blurted desperately, "is from the Northwestern Millers Corporation. Unless they receive ten thousand dollars to apply on our account before noon to-morrow, their attorneys are instructed to apply for a receiver and--and--" He paused, then went on. "My friends, I need not say that unless we wire this money, the Deming Company is a thing of the past. I ask your help."

Deming somehow fumbled himself into a chair, become an old man in ten minutes.

About the table reigned silence. Men looked one at another and dared not speak. Ried Williams, with a slight shrug, lighted a cigarette; his sallow features were very cynical. Slosson stared at Deming, at Armstrong, with surly anger in his eyes. One would have said that he hated this man for whom he worked, this man whose daughter he had failed to win, and the other man in shirt-sleeves who had won her.

Armstrong read that gaze, and smiled at the fright, the anger, the bitter venom, of it. Never did it enter his head that this Slosson was to be feared, or even remembered. Already his mind was turning upon other matters.

"Will nobody--" Deming looked up. The words faltered on his tongue, and died away. One or two of his directors shuffled uneasy feet, cleared their throats. No one replied.

Then Armstrong, pushing back his chair, rose to his feet.

A flash of vigor shook Deming. The man leaped up, held out his hand in restraint, and found passionate, eager words of protest.

"Not you, Reese!" His voice came like the snapping of a taut cord. "Not you! I did not summon you here for--to ask your charity! Now that you know the worst, I release you on Dorothy's behalf. You shall not marry the daughter of a pauper, a man who has not a cent, a man facing bankruptcy--"

"Be quiet, please," said Armstrong. Under his calm gaze, Deming's voice died again, and Deming stared at him, wondering, agonized, breathing hard.

"Don't intrude personalities into this; you cannot realize what your words portend," said Armstrong in that same level, quiet tone. "If you or any other man tries to come between me and Dorothy, he'll be set aside. Do you think I'm marrying for money? Do you think I give a tinker's damn whether you're rich or poor, an honest man or a thief--except for Dorothy's sake? Sit down and listen to me. I'm not talking charity. I'm talking business."

Deming dropped once more into his chair, an old man again. He shaded his eyes with his hand, and his fingers trembled. No one regarded him; every eye was now fastened upon Armstrong.

"I've very little time to talk with you, gentlemen," said the latter crisply. "More important matters await me downstairs and I want no arguments. I will make a proposal which you may either accept or refuse. I make it, understand, purely as a business proposition."

"Then you'll lend us the ten thousand?" asked a hopeful voice.

"I will not," said Armstrong. "Rather, I cannot."

"What do you mean, then?"

Armstrong stood silent a moment. This brief silence emphasized his dominance; every man there was listening intently for his proposal. When it came, it held an unspeakable bitterness.

"Gentlemen, we meet downstairs upon a social plane, but here I speak to you as a business man, without the least personal animas. I'll not lend this money for the same reason that no bank will lend it, for the same reason that you'll not lend it to yourselves. Your credit is totally exhausted. The loan would result in nothing.

"For the past year or more," he went on inexorably, "your company has gone from bad to worse. It has been made a dumping ground for wholly inefficient relatives and friends. Your sales department is a joke. Your purchasing department is topheavy with poor judgment and rotten with graft. Your advertising department is a byword in the trade for doing the wrong thing at the wrong time. Above all, your management is so absolutely hopeless that the entire organization is affected. I might better say, infected."

Some of the faces about the table flushed at these words; some turned pale. Deming did not move, until Armstrong uttered his final sentence. Then a slight quiver shook the man's shoulders. This was a confession, an admission, a realization. Ruin opens the eyes that prosperity has blinded.

Slosson, who was assistant general manager, leaped to his feet in a blaze of anger.

"You lie, when you say we've dumped worthless men--"

"Let me prove it," cut in the inflexible voice of Armstrong. "Two months ago, Mr. Slosson, you put two of your relatives at the head of the rolled oats department. One of those men was an accountant to whom no bonding house would furnish bond. The other had been a railroad clerk until you gave him a position of authority. Will you kindly sit down and let me finish, or do you wish further evidence?"

Slosson, rendered inarticulate by mingled fury and fear, sat down. Armstrong's minute knowledge came as a shock; it terrorized him, appalled him. Other men about the table showed how deeply they, too, were disconcerted.

"Mr. Williams," proceeded Armstrong calmly, "I believe you are the treasurer of Food Products. I understand that you recently obtained licenses from some thirty states to market under the blue sky law an issue of preferred stock to the amount of half a million. Is this correct?"

"That--why, yes, it is!" stammered Ried Williams. "That's so, Armstrong. We've had no opportunity to market the stock, of course; arrangements haven't been made. In the present condition of industrial depression, it is very hard to market--"

"Thank you," said Armstrong incisively. "Gentlemen, I propose to find this ten thousand dollars which you need urgently, on the following terms: The assets of your company will be appraised, and within thirty days your company will be purchased upon an appraised and agreed basis, by Consolidated Securities, who will thereafter own the business. I will require, on behalf of the Armstrong Company, a contract to act as your fiscal agent and to market this stock issue of yours.

"As a preliminary to this purchase of your company, I demand the resignation of the entire management and directorate of Food Products, in favor of men to be nominated by Consolidated; this to take effect within three days. Mr. Deming will remain as president, but without power to interfere in the management of the business. None other of the present officers will remain. Should you refuse this proposal, there is no alternative."

Armstrong sat down.

A silence of dismayed consternation, of incredulity pervaded by anger, greeted his words. Deming was the only man who seemed to make no mental protest. Wearily passing a hand across his brow, Deming looked up.

"Reese, you don't know just how badly involved the company is--"

"I do--and I know something you don't know. Your books show a hundred and fifty thousand in assets which are either padded or outright false, but which Consolidated will accept. In justice to our own stockholders, we shall write off these worthless assets at once. We are prepared to face this loss without demur."

A moment's pause. This revelation struck absolute fear into some of those present. Then some one spoke up roughly:

"How the hell do we know your company will do all this? Findlater is president of it, not you. How do we know Consolidated Securities will back you up?"

For the first time, the cold poise of Armstrong's features was broken. The faintest shadow of a smile curved his lips.

"Because," he answered, "I am Consolidated Securities."

A chuckle from Macgowan's corner gave this statement emphatic endorsement. That chuckle reached every man present. It dismayed them afresh, startled them, struck a chill into their very souls. Their faces contracted in furious anger, only to become impotent and vacant again. They were powerless to help themselves, to resent insults. Without Armstrong's help, they faced ruin.

Armstrong glanced at his watch.

"Speak up, please," he said. "I want a decision at once. Yes or no?"

"You can't market that stock!" broke out Ried Williams, a desperate gleam in his dark and crafty eyes. "Several companies have turned it down!"

"I'm not asking you to talk, but to vote," said Armstrong coldly. "If I contract to market that stock, it'll be done. Yes or no, Mr. Williams?"

"Yes," said Williams, speaking like a man of wood.

"And you, Mr. Slosson?"

Slosson glared, flushed, swallowed hard--nodded assent. So it went, with no dissenting voice, and came at last to Deming. He rose suddenly to his feet, his hand extended.

"God bless you, Reese! Do it if you can, and thanks for your thought of me. But I'll not remain in the company. I've lost my grip of late years. I'll get out entirely, with whatever can be saved from the wreck. And for what you're doing--"

"I'm doing nothing," said Armstrong quietly. "Since this matter is now settled, I suggest that the meeting be adjourned until to-night at eight o'clock. Mr. Macgowan will represent me in all future negotiations."

"What about this loan?" Deming caught up the telegram. "It demands the cash--"

Armstrong nodded. "I'll have to borrow the money from Consolidated. Can you offer any security?"

"Nothing but notes," said Deming. "Will our paper for twenty-five thousand do?"

At this, the face of Lawrence Macgowan lighted suddenly, as though some unexpected exultation had flashed into the man's soul. Armstrong turned to him.

"Certainly. Lawrence, will you be good enough to attend to it? I'll sign a check at once. Obtain the money for me from Consolidated, and turn over the securities to Consolidated--the loan will be to the Armstrong Company. Mr. Williams can wire these people that a check is in the mails, and can send along my check. I believe you have all the papers necessary to settle things to-night with these gentlemen?"

Macgowan assented with a nod. Armstrong was turning from the table when up before him sprang Pete Slosson. The latter's face was livid with anger and wild suspicion.

"By the lord, Armstrong, I believe you had this all framed up!" shouted Slosson, his fist banging the table. "Did you and Macgowan come here meaning to take over this company? Did you have the damnable nerve to do this?"

Armstrong, regarding him coldly, made a slight gesture of assent.

"Certainly I did," he said. "I had not foreseen that the emergency had come to-day, but was prepared." He turned to Deming. "I had intended leaving Macgowan to talk things over with you and present this course as a future means of saving Food Products. Since this crisis has turned up to-day, I took occasion to present it myself. If you would prefer that I leave your company alone--"

Deming flushed, and took the arm of the younger man.

"Reese, you're worth all of us," he said simply. "If you can save my business reputation, let the rest go! Now, gentlemen, business is over; our guests await us downstairs. Suppose we return to a social status and account this meeting adjourned until to-night. I am sure that Mr. Macgowan will handle matters acceptably."

"He will," assented Armstrong, and left the room with Deming.

Chairs scraped back and men came to their feet, following. Macgowan, making some notes, and writing out the check for Williams, was the last to depart. At the door, he overtook Ried Williams, and put his hand on the arm of his cousin.

"I'll have Reese sign this check right away. Ried, we have just witnessed a very interesting psychological study--the intolerance of a young man. You observed it?"

Williams frowned. "You mean--Slosson?"

"I don't mean Slosson. I mean the young Napoleon who issued his dicta and made those dicta obeyed. That is the vice of the young, Ried; to lack sufferance of the errors that others make. In a young man, intolerance is a natural inheritance; in an older man, it is an unpardonable fault."

The sallow features of Williams flushed a little.

"He talked to us as though we were--niggers!" he rasped. The clasp of Macgowan's fingers tightened slightly on his arm.

"Exactly, my dear Ried," came the smooth accents. "But remember, he is a young man! His education is not yet finished."

With this cryptic remark, Macgowan hurried off to join the groom, leaving Williams to stare after him in frowning surmise.

Chapter III

Dorothy glanced up from the letter which she was eagerly devouring.

"Father writes that the company is completely reorganized and that he's retiring for good--and, Reese, he says to thank you for everything! Were things so bad as that?"

"Worse," said Armstrong laconically, then smiled as his wife's fingers crept into his.

This man, to whose lips a smile came so rarely, had of a sudden become a boy again, laughing from morning to night, adoring his bride with a strangely fearful veneration yet partaking with her in a joyous and exhilarating zest, a gayety unabashed and unashamed, a sheer reckless enjoyment of youth and life--and partnership.

Partnership, that was it! That was the mystery, oldest of the world's life, before which men and women fall down and worship in prayer and joyous laughter and exalted fear, the mystery wherein two becomes as one, one in faith and hope and tears and laughter, one for better or for worse; and each of them knowing with a deliberate surety that though all the sky crash down in ruin, there remains to welcome them one soul who cannot falter or fail--past life, past death, into hell or heaven itself.

It is not every couple, however, who perceive this sort of thing in marriage.

The honeymoon was ten days gone. Another four days and New York would loom up ahead, and the deep, far-flung line of the future's horizon would begin to circumscribe things and events and destiny for these two. Now, however, was no thought of the future. Around them hung the crisp, odorous freshness of the Carolina air; the long yellow hills with their furred throats of piney woods lifted into the sky and sang under the winds, and over the reaches of yellow sand, of creamy adobe mud, of desolate green-tinged hills, there was no hint that the summer had gone again and the days were shortening.

Dorothy laid aside her letter and looked up.

"That telegram, Reese? Was it anything important?"

"From Macgowan, dear. All arrangements have been made, and on the first of the month Food Products passes into our hands. The stock-selling campaign will start moving just as soon as I get back to New York and take things in hand. I think I'll spread this stock out over the whole country."

"Are you in a hurry to reach New York?"

Armstrong laughed, and pressed her fingers in his.

"Not a bit of it! From this day forth, lady, business comes second in my young life. For your sake, business is necessary; I'm going to give you the best there is in life, and to do that I make use of business. And I like it, too."

"You'll keep it your servant, dear?"

"You bet! Afraid you'll have a rival?" Armstrong caught her hand to his lips. "Never! By this hand I swear it!"

"Don't be silly--oh, be as silly as you like; I love you!" She broke into a clear trill of laughter. Then she sobered, and gave him a swift, grave look. "Tell me something, Reese. The day we were married--that meeting in father's library! Was it because of some emergency in his affairs that the wedding was delayed?"

Armstrong nodded. He had meant to speak of this before, but no opportunity had arisen.

"Sure, Dot. You may as well know that your father's business was in bad shape. Those fellows who were running things, Williams, and the rest, were heading to a smash--and the crisis happened to come that day. It's all over with, thank heaven! We've chucked 'em out and will run the business right."

"You're not going back to Evansville to manage it?"

Armstrong's gaze came to her suddenly, as he searched for the meaning behind her words.

"Listen, Dot; are we partners?"

"In everything, my dear. Why?"

"Then in business as in other things. Good! If Food Products had not been taken over by Consolidated, it would now be out of existence; we saved it from bankruptcy, and we'll make money by it. In order to keep faith with the stockholders, in order to let your father come clear and leave everything square and fair behind him, we have to dig pretty deep; some of the assets must be totally written off. Ultimately the company will be a good investment, but it won't be any exclusive affair for me, lady.

"You see, it's one of several companies owned and run by Consolidated--which is under my control. I can't attend to any one of these companies myself; I pay other men to do that. I attend to the loan and financing business, the stock-selling campaigns, which formed the prime object of Consolidated. So, you see, if I leave New York--"

Her hand fluttered swiftly over his mouth.

"I didn't mean that at all!" she exclaimed. "I go with you, my dear, not you with me! I'm not trying to get you back to Evansville, although of course I love it there. But, Reese, father's whole life has been bound up in Food Products; he was proud of it, proud to have the company carry his name, proud of its past! Was it necessary for him to leave the company?"

Armstrong was startled by some undertone of her voice. For a moment he met her grave, steady gaze; he wondered what thoughts were stirring behind those eyes of brilliant, steely blue, which could so quickly change to a deeper violet.

And again, he wondered at the clear beauty of her--beauty of golden hair, of skin like pink-and-white coral, beauty of thought and soul within. It brought an ache into his heart, an ache of sheer sweet joy that this woman had found him worthy of her. He must never fail her--ah! And if he did?

At least, she would never fail him.

Armstrong was smiling at this thought, when her words recurred to him and his brain darted upon the answer. Perhaps it was telepathy, for he reached down and took the letter from her lap. A newspaper clipping came into his fingers. Intuition had guided him aright.

He read the clipping thoughtfully:

"It is with great regret that we announce the retirement of J. Fortescue Deming from the active management of the Deming Food Products Company. To many this announcement will come as a shock. For a generation past, the name of J. Fortescue Deming has been identified with the growth of Evansville--"

Armstrong's brow creased slightly as he read on, but he made no comment. Then he picked up the letter, asked permission with a glance, and Dorothy nodded. He read very carefully what Deming had written, and folded up the letter again.

"Dot," he said slowly, "surely you don't believe that your father cherishes any resentment because--"

"Why--Reese!" she broke out impulsively. "Can you voice such a thought, after what he wrote there? Doesn't every word of that letter show that he thinks you splendid and generous, that he feels toward you only the warmest gratitude and appreciation? Don't be silly!"

"The letter and the newspaper clipping are two very different things, my dear," said Armstrong drily. "I wanted your father to remain in the company as titular president, _causa honoris_; he refused. I could not offer him control of the company, of course--"

"Listen to me, dear boy!" Dorothy compelled his eyes to hers, and he found them very grave and earnest. "Get it out of your foolish head, now and forever, that father could feel anything but the deepest gratitude--"

"It's not in my head," broke in Armstrong soberly. "It's in yours, I'm afraid."

"It's not! Why, the last thing before we left home that day, father--well, he wasn't there when I said good-by, and I found him upstairs, all by himself; and, Reese, he was praying--for us--"

She broke off for a moment, struggling with swift-starting tears.

"He spoke of you, Reese; he was happy, happy! I've never seen him so happy that I can remember. It seemed that a load was gone from him. And whenever I've thought of how he spoke and what he said of you, it's made me very humble to think that you were mine, my husband--"

Armstrong drew her to him, and their lips met. His stab of disturbing fear was quite gone; gladness surged through him and faith, and wonder at the woman who was his.

Even the austere Cæsar, men say, once was young.

Later that day, Reese Armstrong sat in the hotel lobby, before a glowing pyre of logs that swept the afternoon chill out of the air. He was alone, for Dorothy was answering her father's letter. As he stared into the flicker of the flames and thought once more of that newspaper clipping, he felt a lingering doubt. Somehow it spelled evil to him.

The tone of it, the unworded, tacit insinuation of it, held a barb that stung him deeply. He could see how the impression might go forth that he had forced Deming out of Food Products and had grabbed the company. That was not true; yet here lay the hint, very cleverly written.

"And written with intent, or I'm a Dutchman!" thought Armstrong.

He had not far to seek for enemies; the former directorate of Food Products hated him bitterly enough. He had himself to blame for this, since he had not hidden his scorn and despite of them; he realized now the insolence of his own manner. They would have preferred to let the company crash, rather than be saved by him--but their pride had given way before their selfish interests. No doubt one of them had been behind the publication of this innuendo in a local newspaper. Williams, it might be; that sallow, crafty scoundrel was the sort to do such a thing.

Armstrong did not know that Williams and Macgowan were cousins. Few people did know it.

The fact that this innuendo had come in Dorothy's letter from her father, hurt; though of course Deming had not perceived the hint in the clipping. Further, Armstrong was not unmindful of a slight rift within the Consolidated lute. Findlater, his nominal president, was taking a new and active interest in the company's affairs.

Findlater, like the other directors, was a figurehead. They had been paid flatly in stock and drew no salaries. With former bank connections, Findlater had been valuable to Armstrong, and was paid for that value. Now, finding that Consolidated was a big thing, Findlater was prying about and about, intruding here and there, sniffing like a dog on the scent of game. Armstrong's lip curled at the thought of Findlater, whom he had come to dislike cordially.

"He and the rest--all of 'em on the scent, except Macgowan," he reflected. "Looking for pickings! Well, they backed me, but I have the control. Consolidated is making money, they're making money, and our investors are making money. I wonder if this sly thrust from Evansville could have any throwback to Findlater and his crowd?"

He thought of wiring Macgowan to look into this, and decided in the negative. Mac need not be troubled with such petty things. This was only some little spite-work, not worth attention. Besides, Findlater as yet knew nothing about the inside of the Food Products affair. That lay between Armstrong and Macgowan and Jimmy Wren alone.

Macgowan! There was a man for you! Armstrong's face warmed at the bare thought of his friend. Only Macgowan, from the start, had gone into Consolidated with a firm and unshaken faith. Only Macgowan had fought past one crisis after another with all the power of his keen intellect. Only Macgowan had forced those other men to stay in line behind Armstrong.

Macgowan had seen the value of that queer and extraordinary idea which Armstrong brought with him to New York. The old notion of finance as a war, said Armstrong, had seen its day and was doomed. It was purely an Old Testament teaching, wherein one side was victor, the other side vanquished; it was a preachment of conquest, of destruction without compromise--of spoils. It was a doctrine of loot, and in the new world of to-day this old doctrine was as dead as Moses.

Instead, Armstrong brought forth a New Testament ideal; that, instead of war, there should be mutual advancement. He preached that finance was a successful and worth-while thing only when all parties to the transaction were gainers. And how they had laughed!

"A fine socialistic theory!" they said. "Mac, how much of a soviet retainer are you handling? Where'd you pick up this radical, anyhow?"

Macgowan did not laugh; he merely argued, on the basis of Armstrong's detailed plan of operations. When Lawrence Macgowan argued, the gods were themselves confounded. In this instance, Macgowan flung himself into the fight whole-heartedly, with amazing vigor and energy. One would have said that he fought for himself, rather than for Armstrong. Or, perhaps, he fought for Armstrong's ideal, which he was making his own.

At all events, Macgowan won the fight. Consolidated went through, and Armstrong found himself secure in the control of this holding company, free to embark upon the larger dream. Nor was he blind to the danger that now threatened. Macgowan had once or twice warned him that Findlater had scented blood, that the other directors were sniffing uneasily; all except old Judge Holcomb, who was true as steel. Jimmy Wren had perceived it, too.

Small good it would do them! Armstrong's control was secure. The Armstrong Company, the selling organization through which he reached out to those thousands of investors, was devoted to him, was his alone. Jimmy Wren, its manager, held for Armstrong a dog-like trust and affection. The investors themselves were his; a supremely important fact, this! It was not the organization but Reese Armstrong whom they trusted.

Macgowan held a block of stock in Consolidated, and was content; he drew fees only for his services as Armstrong's personal attorney. In all the months of their close fellowship, Armstrong had never known his friend to ask an unworthy favor. There were no relatives to be given soft jobs. There were no hangers-on to be handed sinecures. Mac stood four-square.

A few short weeks before his marriage, when first arose this suspicion of loot-madness on the part of Findlater and his friends, Armstrong instructed Macgowan to handle the matter. He himself would be busy, would be away; he had more implicit confidence in Macgowan's ability to handle things smoothly than in his own.

"I'll take care of it," said the attorney. "But time has run along since we mapped out Consolidated's scheme of operations. That voting trust, for example."

Armstrong reflected briefly. At the formation of the selling company, the Armstrong Company, he had placed most of his common or voting stock of Consolidated Securities in a voting trust. Macgowan, Findlater and Jimmy Wren, who was secretary of consolidated as well as manager of the Armstrong Company, controlled this trust, all shares being pooled. Since Macgowan and Jimmy Wren were unalterably Armstrong's spokesmen, this let him control Consolidated without figuring too prominently in that control.

Now, as he stared into the log fire and remembered these things, Armstrong recalled verbatim that short conversation with Lawrence Macgowan.

"Then the trust has expired, Mac?"

"Two weeks ago."

"Renew it--say, until the end of next March, up to but not including the next annual meeting," directed Armstrong. "That leaves me free. You and Wren can handle anything that Findlater or his crowd may bring up. Send over the papers at once. Findlater won't object? He's rather puffed up over his job of president, these days."

"I'd like to see him object!" said Macgowan, drily.

Thus it had been arranged.

Now, watching visions in the ruddy flames, Armstrong's heart warmed to the thought of his friend. Few men had such a bar of steel at their back! Best of all, he had not bought Macgowan with gold. He had bought him with friendship, with the fairy coin of a mutual dream.

"I must be luckier than most," mused Armstrong. "They say that a man has only one person who'll never go back on him--his wife. But I have two. My wife, and Mac."

"A penny for your thoughts!" said a laughing voice in his ear.

Armstrong started, came to his feet, and smiled into the eyes of Dorothy.

"It'll take something better than a penny," he retorted gayly.

"Not here--not here in the lobby, you shameless creature!" Dorothy drew back hastily, her eyes dancing. "I'll pay, and with interest! What were you thinking about, as you sat there smiling into the fire?"

"About you," he answered promptly. "And how lucky I am to have both you and a friend! Your faith and love, and the friendship of Lawrence Macgowan."

He fancied that a faint shadow leaped into her eyes. The fancy was dissipated by her burst of hearty laughter.

"Oh! You should put it the other way--he's lucky to have you for a friend! Well, my letters are finished and I'm ready for a walk. Are you?"

"With you--always! I hope everybody in sight knows we're bride and groom!"

"They do, and I don't care a bit! Come on."

They went out arm in arm, laughing together.

Chapter IV

There are two dreams which every developed and normal woman cherishes. One, of wee hands at her breast. The other, that she may some day have either the building, or the complete rebuilding, of a home; and it is always more enjoyable to correct and profit by the mistakes of other folk than it is to make our own mistakes.

Aircastle Point fulfilled this latter dream for Dorothy Armstrong.

The point itself was private property, owned by the dozen men who had their homes here; around its islands and properties swept the sea-tides, with Long Island Sound opening out beyond. Lying within the corporate limits of a town once famed as being forty-five minutes from Broadway, Aircastle Point was both remote from the citied roar yet near enough to New York.

When Dorothy viewed this future home of hers, the delight that upsprang in her became a rapture, an ecstasy of eager planning, that fully verified Armstrong's choice of a location. She found an old Dutch farmhouse with wall panels, corner fireplaces and other treasures of a once comfortable and simple home life. On three sides, a lawn swept down to the sea, barred by a low wall of rough stone. Huge elms and oaks overshadowed the house, and across the lawn were flung old cedars and pines, contorted and blown by the salt winds into fantastic shapes.

Armstrong slyly suggested decorators, then refrained from further intrusion. He had certain ideas of his own, but watched unobtrusively to see what would happen. Thus, thinking to please him, Dorothy called in a gentleman from Fifth Avenue, who made two very accurately beautiful paintings of her home-interior as it should be. Reese accompanied his wife to view the results, and blandly expressed himself as charmed. Dorothy eyed him, then turned to the decorator with her sweetest air.

"These pictures are exquisite. I should like to buy them from you."

"You flatter us, Mrs. Armstrong!" came the unctuous response, with the usual simper. "We try to express an individualistic taste, of course--this dining room, for example. You will notice that it is entirely correct; Jacobean throughout. People are doing these things so much this season, of course! This touch of color over the buffet is a splendid bit of tapestry that I have in mind; really quite good, don't you think? An excellent bit of still life--game--"

"I'm sure your ideas are excellent," said Dorothy. "What is the price of these?"

"Oh, say fifty dollars for both pictures; we do not make a practice of selling these things, you know, and if you decide to confide the work to us, as I am confident you will, we shall be very glad to deduct the amount from our fee."

Dorothy paid for the two pictures. Something in her air aroused the decorator to questions, to an unfortunate probing. So Dorothy gave him the truth which he sought.

"You see," she explained sweetly, "I want them because they are really very nice, and also in order to show what we've escaped. My taste in decorating is quite hopeless, you know, for I want a home and not an inane color effect--"

Armstrong exploded in a burst of laughter and hastened to escort Dorothy from the outraged precincts. Safely in the car, she turned dancing eyes to him.

"Then you don't insist on a decorator?"

"No!"

A sigh of relief, and she settled back comfortably.

"I'm so glad! Just think of that absurd man, actually intending to tear out all those beautiful old panels! Reese, I'm going to spend some money, but in three weeks we'll have a home--a real home, too! It was good of you to wait and let me do it, instead of trying to surprise me with everything done."

"Go ahead, the sky's the limit," said Armstrong, who was hugely delighted by the whole affair.

Three weeks, in fact, saw them settled in the finished portion of the house, while a small army of workmen still struggled with unfinished rooms and grounds and garden, under Dorothy's direction.

Lawrence Macgowan was the first guest to view the new home, or rather the completed portion of it. Armstrong brought him down from the city over a week-end, and eagerly displayed the grounds and house. He was delighted by his friend's unchecked enthusiasm and endorsement of everything that was being done.

At dinner, Macgowan heard the story about the decorators, and roared over it. When they had adjourned to the living room and were discussing Dorothy's choice of rugs, Macgowan stood with his back to the log fire, fingering his cigar; then he turned impulsively to Dorothy, and spoke.

"My dear Dorothy, may I make a frank confession?"

Dorothy's smile belied the flash of steel in her glance. "Certainly, if Reese may be a party to it!"

"Oh, he's a part of it." Macgowan chuckled, in his odd manner of being inwardly amused over something unspoken. "You see, like every confirmed bachelor who beholds his best friend embarking on the wine-dark sea of matrimony, I have hitherto, my dear Dorothy, been ungallant enough to congratulate you--quite irrespective of your charming qualities--upon the acquisition of your husband."

He paused, regarding Dorothy with his slightly aggressive, straightforward gaze. His air was half reflective, half admiring.

"Well, where's the crime in that?" she demanded brightly. "Don't you suppose that women ever think they are fortunate? We're not all stuck-up prigs, grandly convinced of the blessings we bestow--not a bit of it!"

Macgowan waved his cigar.

"Ah, but I confess my error! It is Reese who deserves the congratulations which I now tender with all my heart, not with the lips alone! Wives are easily found, my dear fellow," turning to Armstrong, "but home-makers are rare, I assure you. So rare, indeed, that I--"

He ended with a sigh and a gesture, as though the rarity of home-makers accounted for his own single state. Then, with a sudden thrust of his cigar, he indicated the rooms beyond.

"Look at this place! Look at that burnt-ivory woodwork, those rugs, these bits of polished wood that we call furniture! Look at those bright yellow valences, those blue curtains, that pinkish splendor of a Kirman on the floor! Why, the raw fighting colors are as sweetly harmonious, as delicately blended, as the vivid hues of some old Chinese embroidery! Only an artist can blend raw colors.

"Thank the lord, there's no formality about this house. Good things in plenty, but no useless frippery made for effect and expenditure. When one comes in here, it's to find a home that's lived in, used, created for comfort and enjoyment. Reese, old man, you're to be congratulated! With the cynical egotism of one who is too largely surrounded by a world of sham, I say that I myself could have done no better with this house. It is perfection."

"And that's a huge compliment, Dot, for Lawrence Macgowan to pay!" exclaimed the beaming Armstrong. "He's a famous critic of the arts. Everybody up and down the Avenue looks to Mac to pass on worthy furniture, Serbian sculpture and all the professional forms of art! On the strength of this compliment, you can go into the house-decorating business and become rich in a month."

"Nonsense, I mean it!" protested Macgowan earnestly. "Absolutely."

"And I do thank you." Dorothy's eyes were dancing under the praise, yet the blue-steel gleam still lingered in their depths. "You make amends very pleasantly."

"Amends?" Macgowan's brows lifted. "For what, pray?"

"For a remark you made in Evansville, the day we were married. You remember?"

Macgowan regarded her, frowning slightly in puzzled retrospection.

"I'm afraid not," he said. "Surely, it was nothing to require amends?"

As he said this, his eyelids lowered the barest trifle. The movement was entirely involuntary. So trivial was it, so subtly evanescent, as to be almost imperceptible; only one watching him keenly would have observed this slight muscular reflex.

Dorothy observed it. If she knew it for the sign of a lie, she made no comment.

"Oh, not in the least!" she responded, a smile on her lips. "And I dare Reese to try dragging business into this home and spoiling it! Just to show that I'm not a bit afraid of the consequences, I want to ask you two men something about business."

Armstrong settled deeper into his chair and lighted his cigar.

"Fire away, Dot! Any time I don't drop business the minute I leave the office, just you jump on me. Want to invest some surplus cash, or what?"

She laughed. "No, thank you! You can play with other people's money all you like. I want to ask about Food Products, that's all--what you're doing with it. And do sit down, Lawrence. You make me nervous, handling that cigar like a baton; besides, you cut off all the beauty of the fire."

"Cruel lady!" sighed Macgowan. "Can you not appreciate the magnificence of such a fire-screen? Well, I obey. Reese, tell the lady all about Food Products."

He sat down, gazing at the ceiling, and puffed reflectively at his cigar. He appeared to be rather thoughtful about something.

"Well, Dot?" inquired Armstrong. "What do you want to know?"

"Oh, everything in general! Is that stock issue on the market?"

"We start the campaign in a couple of weeks; one thing and another has held us up. Our investors will eat it up, too. Consolidated is going to do big things for them--"

"Food Products, please!" Dorothy stuck to her point. "Is the plant at work?"

"Full capacity; it has never ceased work. Within the next month or two the reorganization will begin to show big results. We're going to work with a real advertising campaign. If you could see the difference between our operating cost-sheet and that of the old organization, you'd realize what one trouble back there has been."

"With father's company?" asked Dorothy, a little doubtfully.

"Exactly. By the way, Dot, I wrote your father to-day asking him to reconsider his resignation and come back into the company. I think he's been out of the harness long enough to realize that he'll rust out unless he keeps busy. I hope he'll accept."

"Good, good!" put in Macgowan heartily. "Glad to hear that, Reese! His name is worth a good deal to the company, as is his active interest. I don't imagine he'll accept, though, unless he's given real powers. This figurehead business may not appeal to him any more now than it did before--"

"Figurehead?" Dorothy glanced from one man to the other. "Just what does that mean? If he came back as president, wouldn't he have all the powers he always had?"

Macgowan started to speak, but was forestalled. Armstrong suddenly sensed what was in his wife's mind, and was startled. He leaned forward, giving a decisive thrust to his words.

"Dorothy, we want your father as president. Not with full powers, but to guide the company from a consultant position. I've pulled some of the best men in this country from their jobs, to work for Food Products. I've guaranteed these men a free hand, no interference. Your father can help them tremendously with his advice, his knowledge of the whole business; he would be an invaluable asset to us!"

"I see," murmured Dorothy, with a nod of comprehension. Her eyes rested for a moment on Macgowan, then returned to Armstrong. "Have you any idea when the sale of this stock issue will be completed?"

"Yes." Armstrong leaned back, relaxed, satisfied that she understood matters beyond any miscomprehension. "Within three or four months. The old directors failed to accomplish anything; they could not even start the ball rolling. With our investors to work on, nearly sixteen thousand of 'em, we'll put Food Products over."

"By the first of the year, eh?" Dorothy studied him a moment. "Why, I thought such things took a lot of time and work--a long campaign!"

Armstrong smiled. "Ordinarily they do. In this case, our organization is all ready to fall to work when the word comes. Besides, your father's company had the foundations laid; they got the blue sky licenses and so forth. We simply step in and sell."

"I see." Dorothy glanced again at Macgowan. "By the way, Lawrence, isn't Ried Williams some relation of yours? I think Pete Slosson spoke of it to me one day--"

Macgowan's gaze dwelt upon her for a moment. Undoubtedly, he recognized in the casualness of this question something beneath the surface. Perhaps he sensed attack.

"A distant cousin or something of the sort," he responded easily. "Nothing to be proud of in any case; eh, Reese? The relationship is so vague that it's only a matter of family mention. By the way, what has become of those two chaps, Williams and Slosson? They were rather bitter over our getting control and throwing them out. Do you ever hear from Pete Slosson, Dorothy?"

So nonchalant was the air of Macgowan that to Armstrong the words conveyed nothing. But to Dorothy they conveyed a declaration of war. From her wedding day, she had sensed Lawrence Macgowan as an enemy. She had ceased to grope in bewilderment for the cause, and accepted the fact itself; yet the fact did not cease to hurt.

"I can't possibly keep up with all my old flames," and she laughed. Then, rising, she dismissed the matter. "Thank you for the business information, gentlemen. Now, shall we have some music? Reese, kindly tune up that harp--you've hardly touched it since we were married!"

Macgowan heartily acclaimed the suggestion. With Dorothy at the piano, Armstrong got his harp in shape and they settled down for an hour of music, while Macgowan smoked and listened with critical appreciation, or discussed the vicissitudes of that harp.

"A man can never be known for what he really is," he exclaimed during a pause, "until he can be observed either at the height of fortune, or at the lowest point of disaster. Observing you, Reese, at the summit of success, I find you exactly the same person you were the first day you entered my office. Feel any different inside?"

"Not a bit."

Armstrong laughed. Nor was he ashamed of past days, for there was no petty snobbery in him. He spoke gayly of old times when his harp had boasted strings of cord or baling-wire, _faute d'argent_; or of how he had read Blackstone by day and troubadoured by night with his college friends. Far away were those days, but as he recalled them one could see that the memory was sweet within him.

Later, when they were alone in their own room, Dorothy came to her husband, arms out to his, and met his kiss with gravely serious gaze.

"Reese, dear, there's one thing I want you to promise me. Only one; but it means more to me than I can tell you."

"Anything in the world, dear lady," he promised, looking into her eyes and wondering what had caused their deep violet glow. "Speak! Your slave is ready."

"I'm serious. Am I really to be your partner in everything?"

"Not to be, but are."

"Well, I don't want you to drag business home with you. I want you to leave business behind and come to me and to your home. I don't want you to think that you have to retail to me every bit of business complexity that turns up. But--dear! I want to have a part in your dreams. I want you to come first to me, always, when you conceive some great ambition. Will you?"

"Always, dear lady! I promise--"

"Wait!" She checked him, finger on lips. "That's not what I want you to promise. I want something far more important to both of us! I want you to promise me just this one thing: That when some real business trouble comes to worry you, you will bring it to me. First to me, ahead of your friends, ahead of your lawyers, ahead of your business men. Not for my poor advice, perhaps, but just to let me share it with you first."

Armstrong, as he smiled at her, wondered why her face was so strained and anxious.

"I promise, lady. Why, dear--you don't think I'd take my troubles to Mac in preference to you?"

"Oh, I'm jealous of course, but that has nothing to do with it. There's a deeper reason that I'm not going to tell now." Her fingers tightened on his arms, tensely earnest. "It's a promise, now?"

"Surely, sweetheart," he said gravely. "Why--lady! You're crying--"

"Because I love you, that's all. Kiss me!"

Armstrong, rendered more than a little uneasy by her manner, was relieved to find that she said no more on the subject. He would not have been so relieved had he known how she lay awake that night, staring into the darkness, her brain struggling with the problem of Macgowan.

Intuition told her that the man was an enemy; she could not forget those words of his on her wedding-day. Against all this balanced his friendship and help for Armstrong, and weighed down the scales with fact. Yet she could not dismiss her fear of him; that it was baseless and apparently unfounded, only served to increase her hurt and anxiety. Still, she knew that she dare not so much as hint such a thing to her husband.

And to Armstrong himself, who was very sensitive to Dorothy's mental reactions, this incident recurred more than once. He was quite aware that marriage will seldom endure old comradeships. It was natural that Dorothy should feel a twinge of jealousy; had she not frankly admitted the fact? Down there in the city, it was Macgowan who was Armstrong's alter ego, who handled all Armstrong's affairs, who was friend and practically business partner as well. So far as the city was concerned, that was all very well.

"But I'll have to leave Mac in the city," thought Armstrong. "Dot is going to resent it if I bring him home too often. I'll bring Jimmy Wren down one of these days--he's pure boy and hasn't any of Mac's cynical loftiness. Dot has too many ideals to be enthralled by Mac's attitude, maybe."

Which was all very nice, and all entirely wrong. Like most men, Armstrong was blind to the inner motivations of the woman he loved.

Dorothy, seeing this, prayed that he might continue blind--for a time.

Chapter V

Macgowan swung into Armstrong's office one morning, bringing with him a keen breath of late November.

"Well, how goes the sales company?" he exclaimed breezily, flinging down his hat and coat. "Too busy to talk?"

"Not yet." Armstrong dismissed his secretary and set forth cigars. "Everything fine."

"Sure, but let's have details. I need 'em this morning." Macgowan chuckled as he surveyed his friend. "You're looking fit. How's the country estate?"

"Fine. What do you want details on--winter gardens or sales campaign?"

"Food Products, mostly. I'm curious to know what's going on."

Armstrong opened a drawer of his desk and brought forth some typed sheets.

Consolidated Securities occupied the three top floors of a building in the late thirties, but was cramped for room. Already Armstrong was planning the lease of an entire building in the forties--a lease to become ownership later. The New Year would be time enough to take that up. For the present, he wanted to get upon absolutely solid ground, financially. He had no ambition to be the center of a wild selling drive which would go smash upon the rocks of inflation.

His own office was quietly handsome without being ornate. Just as he wanted the business to be out of Wall Street and well uptown, so he wanted everything around him to be of the best without ostentation. The looks of a business, like the dress of a man, have a certain definite value; Armstrong did not make the error of either over- or under-estimating that value.

"Food Products," he responded, "is sold. The campaign is going well, and it'll be a profitable campaign for the Armstrong Company if it ends as well as it has begun. By the way, I'm going to merge the company into Consolidated later on. It's a bit loose; too much my own affair. I want everything in Consolidated."

"Isn't it merged enough now to suit you?"

"No. At present, I could draw the Armstrong Company out bodily, and I'm going to change that--say, next spring, after the annual meeting of Consolidated. But never mind that now. I have another and more immediate change afoot. I've determined to keep Food Products in the hands of our own original investors in this part of the country. The stock-selling organization is spread too far out."

"Isn't it doing the work?" Macgowan frowned slightly.

"Yes. But, Mac, do you realize that we had to dig deep in writing off those worthless assets? I want to save money."

"Yes, and that hurt." Macgowan chuckled. "Findlater was moaning about it the other day. Asked why we hadn't let those assets ride for a while."

Armstrong's eyes chilled, as they usually did at mention of Findlater.

"You told him?"

"That we were too cursed honest; or rather, you. If I'd been in your shoes, I'd have been tempted to do otherwise."

"Yes, you would!" Armstrong laughed. "You old rascal, you'd have been the first one to come clean! But see here, Mac. I'm cutting down my organization. I'm going to eliminate all the Pacific Coast, everything west of the Mississippi, in fact."

The broad, finely chiseled features of Macgowan underwent a certain change at this information--so decided a change that Armstrong wondered. For an instant he fancied that those piercingly aggressive eyes bored into him with a look bordering on suspicion.

"What the devil!" ejaculated the lawyer. "Why, only last week you spoke of branching out farther!"

Armstrong leaned back and drew at his cigar.

"Yes, but that was last week. Most of our old investors are here in the East, scattered between here and Chicago. Over fifteen thousand of 'em. Our schedule of operation is airtight. Consolidated, for example, owns Food Products, pockets some of the commission for selling the stock, profits by the operation of the company--and it all comes back to the investors. And our corporate funds are growing fast."

"Then what's to hinder the spread?" asked Macgowan, teeth clamped on cigar.

"Too much expense." Armstrong puffed thoughtfully. "We don't want to splurge, to go after the whole country and over-reach ourselves. I don't want to be classed with these birds who flood the country with stock not worth half its price. For next year, we'll play safe with what we have. We can lay out a big program, but hold back with it."

"You're selling stock on the coast now," argued Macgowan.

"Yes, but only a small allotment of Food Products is being handled there." Armstrong became crisp, decisive, closed to all protest. "I'm writing our men out there to-day, calling them in by the first of the year. The less they sell of Food Products out there, the better pleased I'll be; but if they can get rid of their allotment next month, all right."

Behind his veil of gray smoke, Macgowan's brilliant, arrogant eyes narrowed in reflection. One would have thought that this change of program on Armstrong's part, instead of being a mere detail of organization, was something that affected him vitally. Even Armstrong was mildly surprised that Macgowan should be so interested in this detail.

"You see, Mac," he explained, "I'm going to cut down all expenses. Food Products is the biggest thing we've taken over, and I'm getting stingy. The time to retrench is before the pinch comes. Some day, trouble will hit us; when it hits, I want the organization as compact and impervious as possible, and funds all in shape. We have competitors and--"

The lawyer threw up his hands.

"You're right, Reese, dead right! I suppose I'm like the others; a bit hypnotized by our success and the size of the bankroll. Then you'll not draw in your horns before the first of the year?"

"No."

Macgowan puffed for a moment in silence, nodding thoughtfully. Then he glanced up.

"You know there's a meeting of the Consolidated directors next week. Instruct me about that note of yours--whether to renew or take it up."

"What note?"

"Covered by the twenty-five thousand in Food Products' paper. You borrowed ten thousand from Consolidated, if you remember, on behalf of the Armstrong Company, and turned the money over to Deming."

"Oh, that!" Armstrong thought for a moment. "Why, I'll renew the loan to Food Products for another three months--to pay me now would rather handicap them. No use taking up the paper from Consolidated until Food Products can make good. Suppose you renew for three months--or better make it four months. Then Food Products will be on its feet."

Macgowan nodded.

"I'll tell Jimmy Wren, and if Findlater objects we'll show him who runs the voting Trust. By the way, you people going to be in town over Christmas, or not?"

"No, we'll be in Evansville. Dorothy's folks are going to Europe right after the holidays, and we'll spend Christmas with them, then bring 'em East. Christmas in Evansville listens good, Mac!" Armstrong's rare smile leaped out. "Real juleps, remember 'em? And the kind of turkey that isn't grown around here. And 'possum. And ladies with the Kentucky slur to their tongues--the soft slur that leaves mighty few bachelors in those parts! Better come along with us, old man. What say?"

Macgowan shook his head.

"Thanks, but I can't. Deming isn't doing anything?"

"No, he's definitely out of business. By the way, we had a caller at the house the other evening--that chap from Evansville who's a relative of yours. Ried Williams."

Macgowan glanced up in astonishment.

"Williams! Is he in town? Hope he doesn't look me up."

Armstrong laughed. "Why? Aren't you on good terms?"

"I suppose so." Macgowan shrugged lightly. "I never had much use for that chap; he's no good. Look how he cut up when we threw him out of Food Products!"

"While I never claimed to love him, I'd hate to insult your relatives, Mac," and Armstrong laughed cheerily. "His injured dignity has recovered; at least, he appeared very amiable. He's an old friend of Dorothy's; not a dear friend, but he forms a link with her home town, you know."

Macgowan stirred uneasily. "He isn't locating here, is he?"

"No." Armstrong leaned back. "He's in the brokerage business in Indianapolis, I gather. You recall that other man on the Food Products board, the one who looked like a dissipated Adonis, and who aspired to Dorothy? Pete Slosson?"

"Yep," grunted Macgowan. His eyes, under veiling lids, were very bright and keen.

"The two are in partnership and doing well, according to Williams. I always thought they both hated me like sin for dumping them out of Food Products, but they've gotten over it. Williams showed up pretty well, though I'd not trust him very far."

"Hope he leaves me alone in my glory," said Macgowan. Then his face cleared. "Say, one reason I dropped in was about Findlater. I think our merry little president is going to spring a motion at next week's meeting for salaried directors."

Armstrong's face tightened ominously.

"So he wants a cut of the melon?"

"Probably. He has some of the others with him, and figures that by springing a good argument he can get away with it. Judge Holcomb is dead against him, of course."

"Naturally; Holcomb's square. What's your advice?"

Macgowan's gaze searched Armstrong with a steady and appraising scrutiny.

"If it was my affair, Reese, I'd throw 'em out. Bounce them hard, get rid of them for good! They're under contract to serve for three years, without salary, in return for stock allotted them; we're where we can do without 'em, and we owe them no debt of gratitude for getting Consolidated under way. A bunch of real live men on the board would help us tremendously just now. I say, if they start any fuss, bounce them and begin over!"

Armstrong settled back in his chair, and shook his head slightly.

"Well, why not?" demanded Macgowan.

"For the very reasons you name." Armstrong stared out the window and puffed silently. This immobility irritated Macgowan.

"What reasons?" he exclaimed harshly.

"I do owe them a certain gratitude for backing me. They did it selfishly, but they did it. And I'm too darned human to forget that they did it."

"Too darned inhuman, you mean," interjected Macgowan cynically.

Armstrong shrugged. "I'm not an automatic machine, and don't want the reputation of being one. It's because I'm human, Mac, that we've got nearly sixteen thousand investors on our books, letting us handle their money. Next year, twenty thousand. I don't believe in using a man for what you can get out of him, then kicking him off the pedestal. Findlater may be a fool and a crook, but he helped us. I don't care to be known as a business machine; can't afford it. The business of to-day and to-morrow isn't being run that way."

"Chivalric balderdash!" Macgowan growled and mouthed his cigar. "Ever hear of Don Quixote?"

Armstrong, eyeing his friend, burst suddenly into a laugh.

"What's got into you, Mac? Are you talking what you believe, or what you think is for my good?"

"For your own good, Reese! Damn it, I know this game better than you!" Macgowan's burst of words came with the fury of repressed energy. Now appeared the hitherto unguessed side of the man, the angry, passionate arrogance of his mind which was usually so well covered from sight. "Those fellows would kick you out this minute if they could--you and me both! That shyster Findlater would knife you in the back if he had a chance. The very thought of our earnings, of our funds, makes 'em sweat to get their paws on the money! You fool, you're in business! Why don't you realize it?"

Armstrong surveyed him with cheerful good humor, refusing to take this outburst seriously.

"Regular line of Old Testament bunk, Mac! And you don't mean a word of it. As you know very well, we're in business with a New Testament; a covenant of success to all, not merely to those who have the quickest gun."

Macgowan uttered a savage oath.

"You fool, I mean it, every word of it! Throw Findlater out or you'll be thrown out!"

"Nothing doing." Armstrong shrugged, but eyed his friend curiously. "You handle him with the voting trust, and avoid trouble. Be a diplomat."

"Diplomat, hell!" Macgowan leaped up, faced Armstrong with a bitter snarl. "Wake up! Are you a dursed weak-kneed idealist, blind to everything but your ideals? Can't you see that at times you have to be something else? Are you one of these temperamental cusses, strong one minute and up in the clouds the next? Cut out this drivel! I tell you, Findlater is a danger spot! Want to wake up and find you and your sentiment landed in the gutter, do you?"

Armstrong was stung. He leaned forward, suddenly tense, concentrated.

"Mac, are you trying to tempt me--trying to see if you can shake me? Don't try it. You know I brought a new creed into this investment game, and I'm here to play the game square and fair. Once I falter in that creed, once I begin to cheat at the game--good night! Now, quit calling me a fool. Look at it through the eyes of our investors. If they see me kick out Findlater, they'll think that it looks queer; you can't blame them! I'd think so too. It isn't time yet for fireworks. Wait until the annual meeting next April. Then we'll start the slate with a new crowd and go in for big things--honest things with honest men."

Macgowan drew a quick breath.

"Reese, you have a brain somewhere on the premises. I concede it. You're right, as usual. Say, do you sit up nights thinking of those investors?"

"Nope; daytimes only." Armstrong was too deeply stirred up to call a halt now. He went on with a growing earnestness and conviction. "It's those investors who have put Consolidated on its feet. Not a bunch of spoilers sitting around a directors' table, but those little investors. Their confidence in me is a terrible thing, Mac; it frightens me sometimes, it humbles me--why, Mac, it's their very faith which puts me over, makes me make good! This mass psychology is nothing new, even in business. We started out to get that very thing behind us. Now that we've got it, sometimes it frightens me by its very force. They talk about prayer and its effect--here's the same thing, man! When every investor in our lists is behind me, when I'm the apex of a triangle with every atom of force at my back, shoving me forward--do you think I can fail? Do you think anybody can rise up and whip me? Not much!"

Macgowan sat in spellbound silence. As he listened, a singular awe and wonder crept into his face. His eyes, fascinated by Armstrong's swordlike gaze, began to waver; an indefinite something showed there that might have gripped Armstrong's attention, had he only seen it. One never sees such expressions, however, when they are foreign to all that one is expecting to see. Armstrong went on rapidly, fired by his thought.

"That's what put Napoleon over--the knowledge that every man in his army knew he would win; and, damn it, he had to win! Same with me, Mac. You've made Consolidated airtight, you've left me nothing to fear at my back. I can look squarely ahead and can meet anything that comes. With the faith and will-power of sixteen thousand people at my back, what can beat me? Nothing! Nothing! It's not self-confidence; it's confidence in the power behind me, the power instilled into me! Can't you see that?"

Macgowan shifted his pose restlessly, before he came to his feet, jabbing at Armstrong with his cigar, an oath of admiration breaking on his lips. He seemed swept away, enthused beyond words, almost.

"Reese--oh, what's the use!" He made a despairing gesture. "I'm proud to have a share in your vision, proud to take orders from you. Now, if Findlater starts any fuss, you want him soft-pedaled. Is that it?"

Armstrong relaxed, nodding, a bit self-conscious and ashamed of his outburst.

"Yes. That's what you and Jimmy Wren have the voting trust for!"

"Oh! That reminds me--"

Macgowan was picking up his coat and hat and stick. He turned and came back to the desk, looking thoughtfully down at Armstrong.

"I nearly forgot something. About Wren."

Armstrong glanced up inquiringly. Wren was not only his right-hand man in the Armstrong Company, but was secretary of Consolidated. Although not so young in years, Jimmy Wren possessed that eternal buoyancy, that youthfulness of spirit, which older men envy. His imagination and impulsiveness added to his ability; he was all or nothing.

"What about Jimmy?"

Macgowan looked serious. "It may not be true. I just heard that, before Wren came to us, he was mixed up in a nasty affair back in Ohio. A small country bank, which went bust. Wren was cashier, and squeaked through, but it was close. Know anything about it?"

Armstrong squared himself in his chair.

"I know all about it."

"Good. Then I've no more to say."

"Hold on!" Armstrong's voice cracked out suddenly. "You _have_ something more to say, Mac. I want to know where this report came from."

Macgowan met those clear, angry eyes with unruffled mien.

"From a federal man. You know, I've a good many friends in Washington. One of them, in the revenue service, was going over some income tax returns with me. We got to talking about the company, and he mentioned this about young Wren. He knew few details."

"Then it was simply a friendly tip?"

"Sure."

Armstrong nodded. His face cleared.

"Then forget it, Mac. I'll go to the mat for Jimmy any day! That bank affair was no fault of his; the bonding company exonerated him absolutely. He came to me with the whole business when I sent for him to join me. I've known him for years, and he's true blue. By the way, Mac, who's the lady he's been shining up to lately? He keeps unusually mum on the subject, I notice. Weren't you in on the party the other day at the Biltmore?"

Macgowan chuckled, and shrugged.

"I saw your eagle eye fastened on us from across the room. Good lord, don't ask me! I just wandered in on that party, and we lunched together. Don't even recall her name--from the South, I think. She wasn't a bad sort at all. Well, I'll drift along. See you later!"

Macgowan departed.

Armstrong felt very glad of this conversation; he felt that it had cleared the air for him, had left him more cheerfully disposed, in better control of himself. When Findlater entered his office ten minutes later, Armstrong glanced up and nodded amiably.

"Good morning, Mr. President! What's on your mind?"

"This report." Findlater tapped the paper in his hand. "Have you examined it?"

Armstrong smiled. "My dear chap, I wrote it!"

Findlater, a New Yorker by birth, tried very hard to live up to the fact that his immediate ancestors had come from Boston. His grooming was perfect. A clipped red mustache, firm lips set in eternal repression, a coldly challenging gaze from a pink and chubby face--all went to make up an air of aggressive importance. Findlater studiously cultivated an aloof manner. One gathered that his fingers touched only supremely great things.

Armstrong, who detested this affectation, perhaps made the mistake of under-estimating the qualities which lay beneath it.

"What's wrong with the report?" he asked.

"I'm afraid it will give our investors a wrong impression," said Findlater, with his best judicial air. "We have poured a good deal of money into this Food Products concern. Instead of spreading our money among various enterprises, we are plunging on one or two things. The heavy surplus and corporate funds should be retained more carefully against a rainy day, and more carefully spread out."

Armstrong nodded. "We make money work for us," he said in perfect good humor. "We can't afford to have it lie idle, you know. As for Food Products, everything that we put in will come back with heavy interest; it'll be our finest property in course of time. You speak of spreading out our money. Have you some enterprise in mind?"

"Well," Findlater showed a bit of hesitation, "a very promising affair has been brought to my attention--a new process for refining and producing turpentine--"

"A going enterprise?" asked Armstrong quietly.

"Not exactly. A most promising invention--a friend of mine--"

Armstrong leaned back and regarded the other man amusedly.

"Too clumsy, Findlater; I'm really surprised! Of course, you'd like us to build a plant and experiment with your friend's invention. Perhaps we might buy the invention outright, eh? I'm afraid it won't do, Findlater. We're not a get-rich-quick concern at all. If you want to do any juggling with the funds of Consolidated, you'll do it when I'm no longer connected with the company. That's all."

Findlater's pink-and-white face grew very red; without a word, he turned and left the room. Armstrong smiled to himself and resumed his interrupted work.

Chapter VI

Dorothy went to the city on a Tuesday, in order to inspect some furniture that was being done over to suit her scheme of things, and also in order to do some early Christmas shopping. Armstrong knew nothing of her coming. When she dropped into the office about noon, she discovered that he was downtown on business and would not be back until later in the afternoon.

Jimmy Wren passed through the reception room, turned to her with a delighted greeting, and Dorothy at once commandeered him.

"Reese is somewhere downtown, and I want to take advantage of his absence to find him a Christmas present. You're a sensible young man, Jimmy, so I'll call on you for advice--if it'll not interfere. Can you get away to go shopping with me?"

"You bet!" exclaimed Wren heartily. "You've not lunched? Good. We'll get a bite to eat and then go sleuthing for something that'll make the old boy's eyes stand out when he lamps it Christmas morning. Eh? Fine! I'll be out in a second."

"If you're sure it won't interfere--"

"Not a bit of it! I wouldn't miss the chance for worlds--chance to spend your money, I mean--"

With a grin, Jimmy Wren rushed off for his hat and coat, and they went out together.

Dorothy liked Wren, liked his unspoiled enthusiasm; beneath his impulsive warmth there was a great fund of shrewdness and ability. None the less, he possessed a certain open ingenuousness of character, a wide-eyed confidence in people, as though his boyish illusions had never been shattered. In the office, Wren's whiplash keenness was all to the fore. Out of the office, he was himself--clean and frank and unafraid. Behind his black-rimmed spectacles, his gray eyes danced with energy and high humor. One liked Jimmy Wren at sight, and Jimmy either liked or disliked the other person with swift impulse.

They walked to the Biltmore, and were presently seated at a window-table _à deux_.

The order given, Jimmy lighted a cigarette. Dorothy observed that he was glancing about as though in search of some one, and suddenly his eyes lighted up eagerly. There was no mistaking this radiant delight, and she was not surprised when he excused himself for a moment to speak to some one, and rose.

Smiling, Dorothy glanced after him.

"Jimmy ought to marry and settle down," she reflected, with all the shameless match-making instinct of the happily married bride. "I wonder who she could be? He's never breathed a word to Reese, I'm sure--"

Dorothy's instinct was not at fault. As her glance followed the wide-shouldered figure of Jimmy Wren, it rested upon a table near the entrance. At this table sat two men and a woman, very handsomely gowned and furred in white, to whom Wren was speaking.

Both the men were unknown to Dorothy. The face of the woman was hidden until Wren turned to leave; then she had one swift, clear glimpse of the profile--a striking and unforgettable profile. The eyes of Dorothy widened suddenly, widened with astounded incredulity; and their steely blue was altered to a stormy violet.

Beaming all over, Jimmy Wren returned and slid into his chair.

"That friend of mine--by George, I wish you knew her!" he exclaimed enthusiastically. "A wonderful woman, Mrs. Armstrong, and from the South, too. Mrs. Bird Fowler of Paducah. Talk about your Kentucky belles! Perhaps you know her, though? Isn't Paducah somewhere near Evansville?"

Dorothy, smiling, shook her head.

"There are a number of Fowlers; the river-packets used to be named after them, you know, but I don't think I know your friend. Of course, one can't keep track of every member of a famous family."

"I suppose not," assented Wren.

"Is she a widow?"

"Yes. Had a frightful time with her husband, I understand. Poor girl!"

At this, Dorothy bit her lip.

"I caught a glimpse of the lady's face," she said sweetly. "She looked like some one I used to know in Evansville."

A peculiar nuance of her voice held Wren's attention.

"Eh? She's the same one?"

"Oh, of course not--merely a fancied resemblance," responded Dorothy with assurance. "You see, Jimmy, this Evansville girl was very unfortunate; Viola Bland was her name. She was a stunning beauty, and her mother forced her to marry for money, and--well, poor Viola just didn't care, I suppose!"

"How do you mean?" queried Wren, staring at her. Dorothy made an indescribable gesture.

"A terrible scandal, my dear Jimmy! She became quite the talk of the town. Finally she decamped with another lady's husband and there were divorces and everything. I always felt very sorry for poor Viola."

Jimmy Wren blushed faintly, but looked relieved.

"Mrs. Fowler might not be flattered by the resemblance, then," he said drily. "She's awfully keen on the proprieties and all that sort of thing."

"How did you come to meet her, if I may ask?"

"Came in here one day with Macgowan to luncheon, and met her; she was lunching with a chap he knew--that's the man over there now, with her; his back to us. Harry Lorenz. He's a broker or something that doesn't take work."

Dorothy nodded. She had heard Armstrong speak of Macgowan's intimacy with Harry Lorenz, and now she frowned slightly.

"Is she a friend of Lawrence Macgowan?" she enquired.

"I don't think he knows her, except casually," said Wren. Then he kindled. "I've been up to her place several times; she has a wonderful little apartment uptown, and gives small musical affairs there. She has the voice of an angel! She's thinking of giving some big recitals later in the season. Not for the money--she doesn't need that: but for some charity she's interested in. She knows all the big musical people. They say Caruso advised her to go into opera, but she won't do that."

Luncheon arrived. Wren was too absorbed in his subject to be observant, or he might have noticed a singular change in Dorothy's manner. Her careless gayety had quite departed. In its stead, there appeared an active and keen interest, a tense eagerness. She seemed suddenly all on the alert, as though she had glimpsed some antagonist and were seeking an opening for her weapons.

And so, in fact, she had.

"Do you know Macgowan well, Jimmy?" she asked presently.

"Not very much, outside the office. A wonderful chap, isn't he? Been splendid to me, too; put me up at clubs and that sort of thing. He's pretty deep, too."

"Just what do you mean by that?"

"Well, it's hard to say." Wren hesitated. "He seems to be all on the surface, but he's not. He knows more than you'd think. There are good solid depths to him."

Dorothy abruptly changed the subject.

When they rose to leave, the party of three near the entrance were still in place. Jimmy Wren was close behind Dorothy. As they passed the table, the woman who called herself Mrs. Bird Fowler glanced up, met the gaze of Dorothy--and into her eyes leaped sudden, startled recognition. Dorothy halted, with every appearance of delighted surprise.

"Dorothy Deming!" exclaimed the other woman, almost mechanically.

"Why, Viola Bland!" broke from Dorothy at the same instant. "Who on earth would have thought of meeting you here--and how well you're looking! I'm so glad to see you!"

"Won't you sit down--"

"Oh, my dear, I'm simply rushed to death! We're very late now--I daren't stop even for a minute. Call me up some day, won't you? Mrs. Reese Armstrong, you know--good-by!"

Dorothy swept on. At the entrance she turned to Jimmy Wren. His face was indescribable.

"Leave the wraps, Jimmy. Come and sit down. I want to talk with you."

He obeyed meekly, a man inwardly stricken. They turned into the lounge and Dorothy took possession of a sofa.

"Light a cigarette, Jimmy. You need it."

"I do," he assented bitterly, and drew a deep breath. "By gad! Isn't there a mistake?"

His very tone showed that he knew there was no mistake. Dorothy leaned back and in silence studied him for a moment or two. She was not enjoying her triumph; when Wren looked up and met her eyes, he realized this.

"Jimmy, it hurt," she said simply. "Can't you see why I did it? Because I like you. Because Reese likes you. I suppose she always wears white? Some people do; it seems to be a matter of necessity."

Wren started at that.

"It's not true!" he exclaimed, but his impulsive speech died in silence.

Dorothy shrugged. "My dear Jimmy, just stop and think what was said. I don't believe any argument is necessary."

Wren was in torment. He saw, clearly enough, the absolute finality of the whole thing. When "Mrs. Bird Fowler" gave vent to her recognition of Dorothy, she had been lost beyond any appeal of error. Now Dorothy continued coolly.

"If you have any doubts in the matter, take a trip to Evansville and ask questions. You might as well get it all in one blunt and brutal shock, and have it over. I'm sorry for your sake, Jimmy, but I'd be much sorrier if--if I had just let things go on."

Wren nodded miserably.

"People always seem to make a fool out of me," he said boyishly. "There was a bank back in Ohio--I was the cashier. Another fellow pulled some dirty work, and I came mighty close to going over the road. Only plain fool luck saved me! And now--"

"Reese doesn't think you're a fool, and neither do I," said Dorothy. "Forget all that silly talk, Jimmy! Don't blame yourself. You've made me terribly afraid, this morning--something you said--"

Her words fell off. Wren stared at her, puzzled.

"I've made you afraid? Of what?"

Dorothy smiled, but with an effort.

"I don't know; I can't say, Jimmy. Did you ever read _Othello_?"

"Shakespeare? Oh, sure. What's that got to do with it?"

"Nothing, perhaps. But there are some men like Iago, either in big or small ways. Do you believe that a man could have a corrosive touch--a touch that corrodes every one with whom he comes in contact, morally or in other ways? A man who makes use of everybody and twists them to his own desires, and leaves them all broken or rotted out behind him?"

Jimmy Wren frowned over this.

"Why, I suppose so," he answered vaguely. "I've read about women like that, in stories, but I never ran up against any men--"

Dorothy rose, with a silvery laugh.

"Oh, it was a passing fancy; never mind. Now look here, Jimmy Wren! You brace up and forget this. It's our secret, understand? If any more handsome widows from Kentucky show up on the horizon, let me know and I'll throw a party at a hotel up in the forties where there are loads of Kentucky people--and you'll see fireworks! Now, forget it."

"All right, I promise." Jimmy Wren forced a rueful grin. "Now, about the Christmas present for Reese--"

"Go get the wraps, please. I'll wait here."

Dorothy smiled to herself after Wren's departing figure, and this time her smile was not forced.

"Poor Jimmy!" she murmured. "He's not so badly hurt as he thinks he is; he'll forget all about it in a week. Macgowan and this Harry Lorenz and Viola Bland--hm! I don't like it. Maybe I'm all wrong, of course, but I don't like it. Now, why would Macgowan want to get poor Jimmy Wren in that crowd, I wonder? If only I could reason it out! I'd give a good deal to learn just how well Lawrence Macgowan knows Viola, and how long he's known her! I hope she will ring me up some day."

She never did. But she rang up Jimmy Wren about a little musicale; and Jimmy, having his full share of unspoiled human nature, did not refuse the invitation. His boyishness rather resented Dorothy's severe judgment of the other woman; after all, he considered, the world judges harshly, without knowing everything!

And he was gradually confirmed in this opinion. He did not consider it necessary to bring up the matter again with Dorothy, however.

Chapter VII

Armstrong had arranged to start for Evansville four days before Christmas. He and Dorothy were to leave New York by a night train.

That same morning, he learned something that staggered him, frightened him, yet filled him with a great veneration and joy. When he looked across the breakfast-table at Dorothy, when he met the consuming happiness of her eyes, she had suddenly become like another person to him--another and more wondrous woman.

"You're not afraid?" he asked.

"Afraid? Good heavens, no! Reese, I'm the happiest woman on earth! Aren't you glad? You don't look it. You look frightened."

"I am, for your sake," he said, and smiled. "Oh, I'm happy too! I want to tell every one--"

"Don't you dare!"

"Oh, I shan't. But I should think you'd dread the long months ahead, and all the pain and suffering--"

Dorothy silenced him with a peremptory gesture as the maid appeared. Then, when they were alone again, she laughed gayly at him.

"You funny man! Everything's going to be wonderful--even the suffering. It's all we need to make us really happy, to give us a real home! Now, don't say another word about it, or that maid will suspect. You pay attention to breakfast or you'll miss your train."

"Be sure to put my bag in the car when John drives you in," said Armstrong, after the meal was over and he was leaving. "Have him bring you to the office about six, and we'll get dinner somewhere before the train leaves. Good-by, lady!"

In their parting kiss at the door there was a new tenderness, born of the knowledge lying in their hearts.

All the way to town that knowledge kept pounding at Armstrong's brain. His first awe and fear passed into a burning joy. Little by little, he began to visualize how from this minute everything was changed, how his plans and Dorothy's must be made to conform with greater events, how their whole scheme of things must be brought to defer to the arrival of this welcome guest.

Armstrong was quite determined on one thing. He must expend every energy to insure Dorothy's peace of mind during the months to come. Physicians would take care of the body; he must make it his business to see that, when this baby arrived, it should have an heritage of untroubled nerves in the mother, and a peaceful spirit.

"And I'll do it," he told himself. "Thank God, she's got plenty of plain common sense, and doesn't go into hysterics every time a pin falls! She shan't have one troubled thought in the whole time, if I can manage it."

Upon this resolve, he reached his office.

Almost before he had gone through his mail, a memorandum was handed in from the president's office. To his irritated astonishment, Armstrong found this to be a proposal to finance the National Reduction Company--the same turpentine scheme which Findlater had previously broached in vain.

Armstrong reached for his desk telephone. "I'd like to see Mr. Findlater at once."

"Mr. Macgowan is with him just now, sir."

"Ask them both to come over to my office."

A moment later the door opened and Armstrong nodded to the two men.

"Good morning. I'd like to see you, Findlater, about this National Reduction affair. Sit down and make yourself comfortable."

Findlater, who appeared rather nervous, drew up a chair. Macgowan lighted a cigar and stretched himself on the lounge across the office. He seemed to anticipate what was coming and appeared to be enjoying himself hugely.

"That is merely a tentative outline, reduced to writing," began Findlater, indicating the paper in Armstrong's hand. "I felt that perhaps in speaking of it I had not presented the matter fairly to you."

Armstrong regarded him for a moment, then spoke crisply.

"We may just as well have an understanding here and now, Findlater. I see the proposal is that Consolidated shall spend over a hundred thousand to finance the ideas of an inventor. Our stockholders get nothing for their money except the chance of experimenting in turpentine reduction. That's the idea, isn't it?"

"Yes," said Findlater aggressively. "Add to that, the fact that the inventor is personally known to and vouched for by me. His invention is a proven success. Once a plant is built, it will make big money from the start."

Armstrong glanced at the paper again.

"I note here that the whole thing seems cut and dried. For example, this item about stock. Fifteen hundred shares of the proposed Reduction stock are to be divided among certain directors of Consolidated Securities, as a free personal bonus. A bonus for what, may I ask?"

Findlater took courage from this quiet manner.

"For service," he returned. "Five hundred shares to you, since the Armstrong Company will naturally peddle the stock. Five hundred to me, for my personal interest in the affair. The other five hundred will be divided among Macgowan, for legal services, and our other directors."

Armstrong shot a look at his friend.

"You in on this too?"

Macgowan waved his cigar. "Henry C. Findlater is making the proposal; I'm not! It's all news to me."

Armstrong turned his attention to Findlater.

"Let's see. We finance this plant out of Consolidated funds, which belong to the stockholders of Consolidated. My selling organization takes this stock out and sells it to our investors. A good many of them buy it on our unsupported word, because they have faith in us. They pay so much down, so much per month, all out of their savings. Correct?"

Findlater, a bit puzzled, nodded assent.

"In other words," went an Armstrong, "you propose that we take an extremely long chance with a hundred thousand of trust funds, and employ the confidence of our investors to draw their money into the scheme also. For doing so, we split fifteen hundred shares of the stock free. This, Findlater, is nothing short of bribery. The whole scheme is a misuse of confidence; or, if you prefer the word--theft."

Findlater came to his feet, his face purple.

"I won't stand such words, Armstrong!" he cried passionately. "I won't stand--"

"Then get out," snapped Armstrong, who was white with anger.

Findlater stood motionless, silent, under that unwavering gaze. His flushed features betrayed a tremendous effort to hold his anger in check.

"You'll be damned sorry for this!" he said slowly.

"Is that a threat?" asked Macgowan, sitting up.

Findlater whirled on him. "Shut up! I've had enough of your hectoring and bullying; you change your ways or I'll make trouble!"

"Look here, Findlater," cut in Armstrong's quiet voice, and the other turned again. "You're under a three year contract to serve this company as president, in consideration of a thousand shares of Consolidated common. Let's have it straight, now. You're threatening me?"

"No, I'm not," said Findlater, trembling with rage. "I'm saying that you'll be damned sorry if you turn down this proposition! Some one else will take it up and make big money."

"Oh," said Armstrong, and relaxed. "Let them have it and welcome. That's final. Now, may I ask how you'll make trouble for Macgowan?"

Findlater mastered himself, and made response in a calmer tone.

"I propose to be treated as a gentleman, that's all. Mac comes in and orders me about like a dog; and I want it to stop! As for making trouble, that meant nothing. I--I think my nerves are jangled this morning. Since you won't consider the matter at all, that ends it."

"Conceded," said Armstrong, and held out the paper.

Findlater took it, nodded, and left the room.

Armstrong looked at Macgowan and smiled thinly. "You seem to be on the gentleman's nerves, Mac. An obstinate devil, isn't he?"

"He climbed off his perch mighty quick," returned Macgowan. "I don't know when I've seen a better job of dismounting from a high horse! Well, I must run along. See you later. You're leaving to-night?"

Armstrong assented, and Macgowan left.

There would be no further trouble with the nominal president, at least for a while, felt Armstrong. Blocked in his efforts to vote directors' salaries, he had conceived this other scheme of looting; he would now, doubtless, turn his attention to matters outside Consolidated.

So Armstrong forgot the matter of the National Reduction Company.

He picked up Jimmy Wren for luncheon, and found himself immensely benefited by that young man's eager exuberance. The Armstrong Company was to all intents under the hand of Wren, who was given a free rein like other of Armstrong's chief men; this vastly aided their self confidence and sense of responsibility, and any interference by Armstrong was made indirectly. It was good for the company to have men like Jimmy Wren feel that their executive ability was recognized and given scope to work.

Armstrong tried to induce Wren to join the Christmas festivities at Evansville, but met with an embarrassed refusal which vaguely puzzled him. He knew nothing of Dorothy's encounter with "Mrs. Bird Fowler." He did know, however, that of late Jimmy Wren had been not quite himself, and appeared to be in need of a vacation. Upon returning from luncheon, Armstrong took Wren to his own office.

"Come in and go over this Food Products campaign," he said. "There are one or two points I'd like to discuss--hello!"

He threw open the office door to disclose the figure of Macgowan, striding up and down the room. Macgowan swung around hastily and showed a disturbed countenance.

"Ha, Reese! I had to see you at once--something infernally bad! Come along, Jimmy; you're in on it too."

The manner of Macgowan was startling. Armstrong threw off hat and coat, and Macgowan went on speaking rapidly.

"It's a good thing this turned up before you left, Reese. I don't know just what to make of it. Either this is an outrageous lie, or there's something queer going on."

Advancing to Armstrong's desk, he spread out a letter. The other two men leaned over, reading it with incredulous eyes. It was addressed to Macgowan, was written from Seattle, and was signed by one Elmer Lewis, junior partner in a Seattle law firm.

"Lewis is an old friend of mine," said Macgowan. "He's straight."

The letter set forth that the Armstrong Company salesmen on the coast were using everything but violence in the effort to unload Food Products, were sticking at no misrepresentation. It went on:

"I am writing this, Mac, so you may stave off trouble. These Armstrong salesmen are using your name freely, in connection with obviously untrue statements.

"Since these stock sales appear to be managed from New York by mail, the matter may become serious. I understand that complaints have already been made to Washington, and that an investigation by the postal authorities may be under way."

Jimmy Wren straightened up with a grunt of disgust.

"This guy Lewis had better get investigated for mental chaos! Did you ever see anything to beat this?"

Armstrong looked up, frowning.

"Mac, what the devil can it mean?"

"How do I know?" Macgowan shrugged. "All I know is right there. If these men of yours are getting into trouble and making use of my name--"

"It's a lie from start to finish!" snapped Armstrong.

"There's something queer about this letter. Jimmy, do your coast reports show any such situation out there?"

"Not a thing," said Wren promptly. "The entire allotment of Food Products stock will be sold out before the coast men quit work, the first of the year. They are furious because we're quitting the territory. Looks like all they do out there is to show the prospect where the dotted line is. This letter is bunk!"

"It's not that," returned Armstrong thoughtfully. "It's written by a friend who wants to save Mac from trouble. It's possible that some disgruntled investor has raised some kind of howl--"

"In such case," interposed Wren with some heat, "can't he turn in his stock and get his money back? Haven't we a standing agreement to protect every dissatisfied investor? Is there the least excuse for anybody running to the postal authorities?"

Armstrong shook his head. "It's past me. What about it, Mac?"

Macgowan had entirely lost his nervous air. He was watching Armstrong closely. Now he lighted a cigar, flourished the match, and responded with some deliberation.

"As you say, it's possible that some one has sent in a complaint; perhaps to a newspaper which has played the matter up strong. Maybe Lewis saw something in the paper and wrote me without knowing all the circumstances. Of course, the whole thing is absurd--"

"Your friend Lewis does not substantiate his statements," said Armstrong. "But if the authorities are starting any investigation, we want to know it! There's no foundation for anything of the kind, but the fact that we're under investigation will hurt us. There's no protection except by going direct to the source."

He sat down at the desk and took up the telephone.

"Get me the Dorns Detective Agency. I want Robert Dorns personally."

Macgowan swung around as though he had been shot.

"Wait! Give me a word first!"

At this swift, imperative command, Armstrong's eyes widened. He had never heard Macgowan use such a tone. He told the operator to hold up the call.

"What is it, Mac?"

"Just this. If you call Dorns into the matter, he may cause trouble--"

"He's the biggest detective in the country, absolutely responsible."

"Sure. At the same time, the matter can be better handled from the inside. I'll run down to Washington to-night. You know, I have a good many friends there, Federal men and others. If any investigation is going on, I can check it quicker than Dorns could."

"I don't want it checked!" said Armstrong angrily. "I want everything wide open! And I want these reports run down to the ground!"

"Leave that to me," returned Macgowan, with assurance. "Wren can give me all his letters and instructions to agents. I'll guarantee to satisfy the postal men in an hour's time. Then I'll take up the letter itself with Lewis and see what's back of it; I'll wire him at once, in fact. You'll do better to keep these things in the family, Reese, than to call in any outside help."

Armstrong considered this, and found it good. That any breath of suspicion should be cast on his methods, angered him intensely; on the other hand, there was so obviously some inexplicable mistake involved that it behooved him to go slow.

His business was founded upon confidence. The only way in which Consolidated could be attacked, the only way in which Armstrong himself could be attacked, was by attacking the confidence of the thousands of investors. That this letter from Seattle indicated any such attack, never for an instant occurred to him.

"All right," he said at length. "Take care of it in your own way, Mac. Advise me at Evansville just what's behind this, or what's going on."

Macgowan assented briefly, and seized his things. If he were to catch the Washington flyer that night, he had much to do. When he had departed, Jimmy Wren frowned and lighted a dead cigar.

"Mac was sweating. All worked up; notice it? Hope he'll handle things right. I'm off to wire the coast. If I get any answers before you leave, I'll let you know."

Armstrong found himself alone.

Gradually his indignation died away. Nothing so stings the soul of a man as injustice, and the entire content of that Seattle letter was false to the core--falser even than Armstrong dreamed at the moment. It was not the threatened trouble which hurt, not the warning sent Macgowan, but the black falsity of the whole affair.

Armstrong laughed at the thought of heading off the threatened inquiry. Any probe into the methods of Consolidated or of the Armstrong Company, would only result in exoneration. That the salesmen were misrepresenting Food Products was ridiculously untrue. Armstrong knew his salesmen.

"Yet that letter worries me," thought Armstrong. "I wish now that I'd gone ahead and employed Dorns. Why the devil was Mac so worried over a Federal inquiry? We've nothing to fear from that end. Something queer about it all; I don't savvy it."

At this moment he remembered the promise he had made to Dorothy.

The thought disturbed him. That request had not been empty words. When she asked for his promise, she meant exactly what she said; perhaps, he reflected, that request of hers had some unguessed reason behind it.

Armstrong frowned. He realized that now he must either break his promise to her, or keep it. Some such emergency as this, some such threat of trouble, was just what she must have had in mind when she had extracted the promise. Business was no overwhelming mystery to her. Yet this letter from Seattle--nonsense! There was no trouble here. The whole thing was absurd. Nothing could come of this; there was no basis. And just now the important thing was to keep Dorothy's peace of mind secure and serene.

"I wouldn't bother her now if the whole organization were collapsing--which it's not!" thought Armstrong.

At four-thirty Jimmy Wren appeared beaming, and displayed a telegram from the Seattle sales manager, branding the report as wholly false. There was not a single dissatisfied investor in the coast territory, so far as was known.

"Want to stop Macgowan?" asked Wren. "I can catch him at his office."

"Let him go," said Armstrong. "If there's anything at all in this, he'd better ferret it out and kill it. You wire the Seattle manager to investigate Elmer Lewis. That letter looks queer to me. Let me know at Evansville what you learn."

When Armstrong met Dorothy for dinner, he had dismissed the affair from his mind, and said nothing to her about it.

Chapter VIII

Christmas in Evansville to some degree reflected the warm holiday celebration of the South, which is not individual but general in scope, not personal but social; making up in its own way for the lack of snow and more vigorous Northern traditions.

Dwindling stores of sherry and bourbon were opened with unreserved bounty, while "white mule" from across the river had its own share in affairs. Old recipes provided for egg-nogg, smooth as silk and strong as black-label Bacardi, or for fruit-cake whose fragrance was an almost forgotten memory, to be passed about by more skilled or fortunate housewives to others. In such matters Dorothy was busy almost from the moment of her arrival, for these delicately adjusted recipes were not left to the hands of servants.

Armstrong found himself engulfed in a whirl of hospitality whose spontaneous gayety and open-hearted sincerity took him back to college days, and banished worry. Having heard nothing from Macgowan, he knew that all was well behind him, and forgot his troubles.

Both Williams and Slosson came down over the holidays from Indianapolis, where their brokerage business was thriving, and called at the Deming residence. Their greeting to Armstrong was heartily cordial, and all the former ill feeling seemed past and forgotten. For this, Dorothy was grateful. Not that she particularly cared for either man, but she did want Armstrong's memories of Evansville to be untroubled by contact with any who were not warm-hearted friends. She need not have worried; Armstrong gave not a second thought to either Slosson or Ried Williams.

The winter of Dorothy's discontent and unrest, however, was ushered in with the dinner dance at the Country Club. It was Friday night, with Christmas only a day away.

The club was in gala dress, with fireplaces blazing merrily, a "string band" of darkies whose music made the toes tingle, a huge tree, and a repast to make Epicurus envious. In the course of the evening, Dorothy was captured by one Joel Giddings, an antique beau who was very deaf, and whose dancing was execrable. Being quite accustomed to requests that he "sit out" a dance, Giddings yielded amiably to Dorothy's wishes and guided her to a very secluded nook behind the Christmas tree.

They sat there, almost hidden from sight, while Giddings rattled on about nothing. Then, as Dorothy listened, she heard another voice--a voice which came from close by, although the glittering tree hid the speaker from sight.

"Armstrong doesn't worry much about showing up here," it said. "I suppose he figures that nobody knows just how he got control of Food Products, anyhow! What I can't understand is why Deming endures him, after the way he chucked Deming out of his own business!"

Dorothy felt the red come flooding into her cheeks, while Joel Giddings rattled obliviously along. She did not need to seek, to know that the voice belonged to Ried Williams. After some inaudible response, it came again, fairly burning into her.

"Perhaps Deming never suspected--there was a good deal he didn't know about the frame-up that Armstrong put over. I shouldn't wonder if he still thinks Armstrong was his best friend that day! It was the same day of Dorothy's wedding, you know. The whole affair was mighty cleverly done, if you ask me! No, of course she never knew anything about it; Armstrong kept the machinery all out of sight. He sure did have it running smooth, too."

The voice died away, as the speaker moved off. Dorothy leaned forward to see with whom Williams had been talking, but she was too late.

Here, then, was the old dreadful thought actually put into words!

She had never entertained a definite suspicion, despite Macgowan's words to her before the wedding. She had never even dared to think of such a thing as had now been bluntly laid before her mind. Her first impulse was to seek Williams, denounce him as a liar, publicly settle this calumny before every one. The fact that his hatred of Armstrong still persisted, for all his hypocritical friendliness, infuriated her.

The impulse was swiftly killed. Doubt killed it; her first doubt of her husband.

Her mind flew back to the wedding-day, to those words from Macgowan, to the honeymoon and the little Armstrong had ever said about the manner in which he had taken over Food Products. She found herself recalling little things, hitherto unnoted; words, acts, looks. Could there be some truth, after all, in the calumny? Had Armstrong really put her father out of the company--was that why he had persistently remained out? Williams ought to know, if any one did.

Shame flamed into her--shame, anger at herself for allowing such thoughts entrance in her mind. Of course it was a lie, a calumny! All of it!

For the remainder of that evening, Dorothy was in turmoil. She made no mention of all this to Armstrong. Later, while he slept, she lay beside him wide-eyed and sleepless, and there fought out the decision within her own heart.

It did not occur to her that Ried Williams might have directed those words at her ear, instead of being ignorant that she overheard them.

It was perhaps unfortunate for Dorothy that she had never been one of the "wise virgins" who predominate in social life. She was not one of those charmingly sophisticated damsels who find in wedded life nothing very new or startling, and who are almost as conversant with the symptoms and experiences of motherhood before the fact as they are after it. Dorothy's education and nurture had all trended in the other direction; in the direction of old-fashioned delicacy, of hopelessly antiquated reverence for the facts of life. With all the charm of her upbringing, the moderns could have argued that she had been left a little too ignorant, for to her there were yet countless mysteries unguessed and depths unfathomed.

Convinced of her own expectant motherhood, it was perhaps for this reason that she found herself a prey to shrinking timidity, to a mental fear and terror which had small basis in actual fact. On some unremembered occasion, from some half-understood conversation, she had received an implanted seed which now blossomed and bore dark fruit. She firmly believed that a woman in a "delicate condition" was liable to strange mental reactions, was subject to delusions and obsessions. She had a terrible fear lest some such delusion take hold upon her.

She did not know that this fear might in itself provoke the thing that was feared.

"I must say nothing of all this to Reese," she thought, firmly pressing the resolve into her whole self, as she lay there staring into the darkness. "I must dismiss it, forget it! I know that it is a contemptible lie. I must never think of it again. It is too low, too utterly despicable, too unclean, ever to gain harborage in my mind. So is that man Williams. I shall never think of him again. I shall shut my mind to the whole thing; it is unworthy of me, unworthy of Reese! Unless I do, it may become an obsession, it may make me cruel and unjust and may hurt the little one--"

She drew a deep breath, closed her eyes, forced herself by sheer exertion of will into calm. And presently she fell asleep, secure in her resolution.

One cannot, unfortunately, altogether eject a lodger from the cells of the brain, however unwelcome that lodger may be, as the Freudian experiences of St. Anthony bear witness. Its presence may be forgotten; it may be lulled into sleep; but no writ of ejection is valid when issued against the brain.

Upon the following morning Deming went downtown to take care of some last-minute purchases. He went by street car, since Mrs. Deming had need of the limousine to distribute her quota of egg-nogg and fruit cake.

Dorothy was to aid in this laudable task, and Armstrong volunteered to accompany them and to serve as burden-bearer. It was nearly eleven when he helped the chauffeur carry out the baskets and beribboned packages to the car. Dorothy and her mother were already leaving the house.

A screech of brakes from the street caused Armstrong to turn. He saw a taxicab dash wildly to the curb before the house, the driver snatching at a greenback extended from the car window. The door flew open, and a figure fairly leaped from the cab and began to run up from the street to the house.

"Hey, Jimmy!" shouted Armstrong in astonishment. "Jimmy Wren! Come around to the side!"

Wren halted, stared about, changed his direction. Armstrong, here getting his first sight of the man's face, was inexpressibly shocked. Wren was white as a sheet, hollow-eyed, upon his countenance the look of one who has been plunged into some living hell.

"Glad to see you, Jimmy!" exclaimed Armstrong, meeting him with extended hand. "But what's the matter with you, old man? Sick?"

"Got to see you--quick--alone!" panted Wren. Panic was in his eyes, and fright, as they roved about. For a moment Armstrong thought him drunk.

"Brace up," he commanded sharply. "Here's Mrs. Deming--mother, this is my friend Jimmy Wren. You've heard me speak of him--"

Wren removed his hat, mumbled something, looked at Dorothy with terrified eyes, and then turned upon Armstrong a glance of terrible and unutterable appeal.

"Must see you--quick!"

"I'll give up the trip," said Armstrong to Mrs. Deming. "Something must have come up; Wren has news for me. You'll excuse me? Come into the house, Jimmy."

They started inside. Dorothy, after a word to her astonished mother, joined them in the doorway.

"I'm staying home too,"' she said simply. "Has something happened, Jimmy?"

Wren uttered a groan.

Chapter IX

Jimmy Wren refused to utter a word until behind closed doors. Armstrong led him upstairs to the library, while Dorothy, discovering that Wren had eaten nothing since the previous day and had just come in on the morning train, ordered Uncle Neb to fetch something after them.

In the library, Armstrong procured a bottle of whisky, poured a stiff drink for Wren, and forced him to swallow it. Dorothy closed the doors.

"All set, Jimmy," said Armstrong, watching Wren calmly. "What is it?"

"Trouble," blurted Wren, desperation in his face. "Federal investigation--indictments! We're all going to be indicted--you and me, all of us! By this time there's been a fraud order issued against us. The business is wrecked. We'll be arrested--"

From Armstrong broke a laugh of angry incredulity.

"Man, are you drunk? What's wrong with you?"

Wren stared at him from terrible eyes.

"What's wrong with me? I don't know--except that, maybe, I've always trusted you, Armstrong! If you've lied to us, deceived us, then you'll land us all in jail. Nothing's wrong with me if--if you're straight. Nobody knows that except you. Because I had faith in you, believed in you, I came straight here--Macgowan didn't want me to, and said he might get things settled without bothering you--but it's gone too far. If they close up the business--"

Armstrong's hand gripped his shoulder and set him back in the chair from which he had half risen in his excited burst of speech.

"Sit down, Jimmy. There must be a cursed good explanation of what you've just said! Take it easy, now. Start at the beginning of all this nonsense. Let's have all that has happened. Did Macgowan go to Washington the night I left New York?"

"Yes. He didn't know what Findlater was up to. Nobody did."

Armstrong's eyes glinted. "Findlater! What's he done?"

"I guess he was back of that letter from Seattle."

At this moment Dorothy interposed. She had been watching Jimmy Wren, a pallor rising in her face. Now she looked at Armstrong and spoke.

"What letter do you mean?"

Armstrong was burning with anxiety to hear what had happened. The business wrecked, indictments in the air, Jimmy Wren in wild panic--all this meant some disaster out of the blue. Something inconceivable had been going on in New York. He was profoundly stirred by Wren's almost incoherent words.

It was characteristic of Armstrong that, apparently cool as ever, he now turned to Dorothy and quietly told her of the letter Macgowan had received from Seattle. His poise had an immediate effect on Jimmy Wren.

"Why did you keep all that from me?" asked Dorothy. "Did you forget that promise you made me, Reese?"

She checked herself. Something in her eyes frightened Armstrong; some singular quality in her voice startled him.

"It was not worth bothering you with, dear," he responded. "It seemed too trivial, too small! It was evidently some mistake. It's impossible that there could be anything back of it. Now, Jimmy--ah, here's Uncle Neb!"

Armstrong rose, brought in the tray of food, set it before Wren. He returned to his own chair and lighted a cigar, repressing his impatience anew.

"Get a bite to eat, Jimmy, and straighten up. Then let's have the whole thing."

Wren obeyed, for he was dominated by Armstrong. After a few bites, he turned from the tray, to the anxious eyes fastened upon him.

"Mac came back from Washington and said everything was cleared up," he began, speaking more calmly now. "Then, two days ago, Findlater came into the office and took off the roof. He had received a letter from Spokane, like the one Mac got, and he also had a letter from Washington. It seems that his name had been used out West, and he was wild about it--going to sue the Armstrong Company and so forth.

"While we were arguing with him, Macgowan and I, a postal inspector came in and ordered all our books opened to him. An investigation is going on this minute, Reese! Findlater is behind it all, we think--"

"Hold on," cut in Armstrong coolly. "The postal authorities don't investigate any one without cause, Jimmy. You know, and I know, that they have no just cause to go after us."

"But they have!" burst out Wren. "They have! There are a dozen complaints, letters from investors! They say the stock was misrepresented, that they've been tricked into buying it, that it was sold them by absolute fraud! Findlater is trying to have all the officers of the Armstrong Company indicted for perjury and fraud; he says he'll spend his last cent to keep his name clear of our doings! He was going to file suit against the company when I left--why, he told me he'd land every one of us in jail!"

Armstrong regarded his friend with judicial calm.

"Jimmy, is everybody in the office as badly stirred up as you are?"

"Just about." Wren made a despairing gesture. "Nobody knows what to think. Macgowan is working hard to protect us. Findlater swears that you've double-crossed the company, that you've deceived every one and are playing a crooked game--"

"Looks to me," said Armstrong, with a slight smile, "as though Findlater had sort of got your goat, Jimmy! I suppose he's been rubbing it in pretty hard, eh? Doing a lot of talking, eh? Well, you listen to me for a minute. First, when a man talks as much as all that, he's not particularly dangerous. Second, what does an indictment amount to anyway? Not a thing. Anybody can trump up charges and get an indictment."

Jimmy Wren's eyes widened at this.

"But, Reese! It means ruin--"

"It means nothing," said Armstrong crisply. "If Findlater is out to fight us, he can't do any real harm. What if he does get indictments issued? He can't get convictions--and indictments without convictions mean absolutely nothing. What does Mac say about it?"

"Mac is scared."

"What?" Armstrong was astounded and showed it. Wren continued quickly.

"Mac thinks that Findlater and his friends went to work and procured those complaints, and are behind the whole business. He thinks they started the investigation."

"But--did you say that Mac is scared?"

Wren nodded, miserably. "He told me so. That's what got me going. If Mac says we're up against it, then we are! You know it, too. Mac says that Findlater must have made all his plans a long time ahead, to take advantage of your absence right now, and that he wouldn't have started this thing unless he had the cards up his sleeve to finish it. I tell you, Mac is all up in the air! By this time a fraud order may be out against us, and if that's the case, Findlater can get us all indicted in no time!"

Armstrong glanced at his watch. It was eleven thirty. He looked up, regarded Jimmy Wren with a slight smile, and motioned toward the food.

"Eat, Jimmy; don't say another word, but listen hard. There's a train north at twelve five, connecting at Terre Haute with the Pennsylvania limited for New York. You're going to be back in New York to-morrow. I hate to make you travel on Christmas Day, but it's got to be done. Eat, now, and listen."

Indescribably impressed by Armstrong's manner, dominated by this cool refusal to find his news very terrifying, Wren obeyed the order. Dorothy sat in silence, her gaze fastened upon her husband.

Armstrong went on speaking, with that same calm deliberation which acted upon Jimmy Wren like a settling acid that reduced all his chaotic panic to order.

"There's nothing to be worried over, Jimmy. Stop and think. You'll realize that I have no secrets; the business of the company is entirely open, and the postal inspector is welcome to pry until Judgment Day. The farther he goes, the more convinced he'll be that we're all right.

"The stock has not been misrepresented by our men. Anybody can go out and find some stockholders who can be made to think that they've been deceived and robbed. Findlater is a fool to start anything of this sort; he's settled his own hash, that's all. Don't worry about his having any cards up his sleeve. He has nothing, unless it's more fraud. You go back and tell Lawrence Macgowan to keep his head."

Wren stared. "Aren't you coming?"

"Later." Armstrong smiled. He perceived that his own confidence and quiet certitude had already worked wonders in Wren's heart. "You go back and call a meeting of the directors of Consolidated Securities for Wednesday at eleven. Give no reason and tell no one that you've seen me--"

"But they all know I came to see you!"

"Never mind. Keep your mouth shut, Jimmy. Tell Macgowan and nobody else that I shall be present at that meeting on Wednesday morning. I want Findlater's resignation as president and director. I want every share of his stock bought up or taken away from him. You and Mac will use the voting trust to that end. In the meantime, tell Mac that if he can logically connect Findlater with this faked-up trouble, to start suit against him for conspiracy or anything else that's possible. Those are your orders."

"Good!" said Wren, his mouth full. "Fine! I'll do it. But I haven't any money, Reese; I haven't the price of a ticket back! I came away in a rush--"

Armstrong laughed, and glanced at Dorothy.

"Dear, will you be good enough to get my pocketbook? I think it's on the dresser."

Dorothy nodded, rose, and left the room. Armstrong's manner had had its effect upon her too; her pallor had departed, and as she left, she threw a reassuring smile back at Jimmy Wren.

Suddenly the latter started, looking up at Armstrong with new consternation.

"Reese--I forgot about it--meant to write you! It has nothing to do with this affair, but it's something you ought to know. I found it out the day after you left, while I was going through everything, trying--"

"Cool off, Jimmy. What is it?" Armstrong passed a cigar across the table. "Light that first, then spill the news. Discovered something?"

Wren nodding, lighted his cigar.

"You remember that when we put Food Products stock on the market, we simply went ahead and used the issue that Deming's directors had arranged for? They had secured licenses from the blue sky commissioners everywhere, you know."

Armstrong silently assented, his gaze on Wren.

"Well, I found something. In getting those licenses, Deming's directorate had sworn to facts regarding the financial condition of the old company which were untrue. About those assets we wrote off, among other things. They concealed the real shape of the company, in other words."

A whistle broke from Armstrong.

"Sure of that, Jimmy?"

"Positive. Nobody knows it, and probably it won't amount to anything. I asked Mac about it. He said to keep mum; that the Armstrong Company was not involved, and that we couldn't be held responsible for what Deming's directors had done. Besides, he thought there would never be any fuss made over it."

"Mac spoke the truth that time." Armstrong smiled. "This is the first I ever knew of it, but there's nothing to be done. That directorate was a sweet bunch of crooks, all right! We've nothing to fear from that angle, fortunately. Well, forget it! You get back to New York and don't let any one but Mac know that I'll be there Wednesday morning."

"Throw Findlater out, eh?" queried Wren, his eyes snapping excitedly.

"Neck and heels. Clear into the alley."

Dorothy returned, and Armstrong handed Wren a roll of bills.

"I've ordered a taxi," said Dorothy. "It'll be here in five minutes."

"Good for you, Mrs. Armstrong!" Jimmy Wren broke into a laugh. "I'm mighty sorry for the way I must have startled you. I was in a panic, that's all."

"Got over it now?" demanded Armstrong, his eyes twinkling.

"You bet! I must have been a fool to let Findlater work me up that way."

Armstrong accompanied Jimmy Wren to the station, and saw him off. The last state of that young man was considerably better than the first; whereas he had arrived an hour previously in the depths of violent and nervous panic, he departed beaming, radiating assured optimism.

"Jimmy's all right," thought Armstrong, as he went home from the station. "That devil Findlater simply knew how to drive him frantic, and did it! No wonder the whole office bunch is scared. The threat of indictment is enough to scare anybody who isn't absolutely sure of his standing. We'll soon show Findlater where he gets off!"

When Armstrong reached home, Dorothy was waiting for him, and drew him back upstairs to the library. He perceived that she was very serious; but not until they were alone behind the closed doors did she speak. Then, turning to him, she took his hands in hers and looked into his eyes.

"Well?" he asked, smiling. "Jimmy hasn't scared you, too?"

"No. Reese, there's something I must say to you now--no, I shan't sit on your lap! I have to keep my head clear, and if your arms are around me I can't think of anything else. Listen, dear! Do you remember our wedding day?"

"I hope so," returned Armstrong whimsically. "Don't you?"

But her serious, grave eyes did not respond to his flippancy.

"Macgowan was talking to me, Reese, just before that meeting here in the library. He went out of his way to say something to me that was quite needless. Now, it wasn't at all what he said, but what I could read in his mind as he said it that made me afraid of him. What he said, made me cry. What I could sense in his thought and his soul, frightened me!"

Armstrong was frowning. "Why, lady, this is the first time you ever mentioned such a thing! Surely Mac didn't--"

"He said nothing that was wrong, dear; but from that day I have feared him. Intuition, if you like. And now I want to warn you against him. That man is no friend of yours, Reese. He's using you for his own purposes. Don't trust him! Don't let him know your secrets! Be on your guard against him, always!"

Armstrong looked into her eyes, and for a moment her intense earnestness shook him to the very depths. Then his reason asserted itself. He remembered other things. Could this be a touch of jealousy? It could be nothing else.

"Dear lady," he said gently, claspi