CHAPTER VIIICALEB CONOVER STORMS A RAMPART
Caleb Conover was finishing a solitary breakfast in his room; the morning after his return from the Capital. He had eaten heartily, even as he had slept well; and was neither outwardly nor inwardly the worse for his “wakeful day” at State House and engine-throttle. A slightly puffed underlip and a double set of discolored knuckles were his only mementoes of the attack upon Blacarda.
In honor of his victories, the Fighter had allowed himself an extra half-hour’s sleep and a steak for breakfast. It was nine o’clock so he pushed back his chair from the deal table that had held his morning meal. He lighted a heavy cigar, rose, stretched himself in the lazy luxury of perfect strength, and prepared to go to the day’s work.
Conover, in the early years, when he was fighting tooth and nail to lift the moribund C. G. & X. Railroad to a paying basis, had had a room and bath fitted up for his personal use, directly to the rear of his private office in the station. Here he had lived, his entire life centering about his toil.
Here he still dwelt, now that success was his. The man whose wealth had already passed the millionmark and was rocketing toward far higher figures, was simpler in his personal tastes and surroundings than was the poorest brakeman on his road. An iron cot bed, a painted pine bureau with flawed mirror, an air-tight stove, a shelf with fourteen books, the deal table and two chairs formed the sum of his living-room furniture. One of the station scrubwomen kept the place in order. The few personal guests he had were received in the private office outside.
One such visitor, Conover had been informed ten minutes earlier, was even now awaiting him there. At least Caleb, reading the card, “Mr. John Hawarden, Jr.,” judged the caller to have come on a personal matter of some sort rather than on railroad business.
With mild curiosity as to what could have brought the son of Desirée’s chaperone to see him, Conover lounged in leisurely fashion to the office.
On his appearance, a tall, slender youth rose and greeted him with nervous cordiality.
“Sit down,” grunted Conover, scowling under the vigorous grip of the lad’s hand. “What can I do for you?”
The caller twisted his neck somewhat uneasily in its amazing height of collar, fought back a gulp and fell to drawing his tan gloves through his fingers. Caleb noted that the hands were slim, the fingers long and tapering. He also noted that the boy, despite his almost effeminate delicacy of contour and feature, was square of jaw and steady of eye. The Fighterwas, from these signs of the Brotherhood of Strength, amused rather than irritated at the other’s nervousness. He even felt a vague desire to set Hawarden at his ease.
“First time you an’ me have come together, ain’t it?” he asked, less gruffly.
“Yes, sir,” answered Hawarden pleasantly. “I know you by sight,—and of course by reputation,—but it’s hardly likely you’d have noticedme. My parents have had the pleasure of meeting you.”
“Pleasure, hey?” queried Caleb. “That’s whattheycalled it?”
Hawarden flushed painfully, as at some not wholly glad memory.
“Never mind thinkin’ up a comeback,” grinned Caleb. “Us two don’t speak quite the same language. My mistake. Now,” dropping into the office manner habitual to him, “What do you want? I take it you’re not makin’ a round of social calls an’ choosin’ this for the first stoppin’ place. What can I do for you? Come to the point quick, please. I’m li’ble to be pretty busy to-day.”
Hawarden smiled back in an engaging fashion that held no hint of fear. For this, Caleb again felt somewhat drawn to him.
“I’m on a horribly cheeky errand,” began the youth, “And, to tell you the truth, I’m scared stiff. I came to speak to you on a rather delicate subject.”
“I never saw the ‘delicate subject’ that wasn’tthe better for being dragged out into the fresh air. Get to the point, son. I’m busy.”
“I am here, sir,” said the boy with a labored formality that spoke of much rehearsal, “to speak to you of Miss Desirée Shevlin. You are her guardian, I understand.”
Caleb’s glare of utter and displeased astonishment checked the speaker for the briefest instant. But, swallowing hurriedly, he continued his set speech:
“I have the honor—the undeserved honor, sir,—to request your leave to ask Miss Shevlin to be my wife.”
It was out! Hawarden relaxed the knuckle-whitening grip of his fists. His forehead grew moist. So did his palms. Nor did Caleb’s attitude lessen the awkwardness of the moment. With open mouth the Fighter sat staring at his guest. At last he found words—just a few of them.
“Well I’ll be damned!” he sputtered.
“It seems to me,” said Hawarden, taking new hold of his sliding courage. “It seems to me a more honorable thing to ask your consent,—as Miss Shevlin’s guardian—before daring to offer myself to her.”
“Son!” observed Caleb, profoundly, “If you had a little more sense you’d be half-witted!”
The boy got to his feet.
“It is your right, I suppose,” he answered stiffly, “to insult me. You are an older man than I, and I come to you as an applicant for—”
“You read all that in a book,” snorted Caleb.“Cut it out and get down to sense. No one’s insultin’ you and no one’s stompin’ on your buddin’ dignity. You can’t wonder I was took aback when you sprung that mine on me. I ain’t up in the by-laws an’ constitootion of p’lite s’ciety. If it’s the usual thing to come over with a line of talk like you just got out of your system—, why I’m sorry if I acted rough. There! Now, sit down and talk sense. So it’s the custom to ask a girl’s guardian before askin’her? Nice, ree-fined idee. But I guess if ev’rybody did it there wouldn’t be a terrible lot of work for the marriage license clerks. An’—why, you’re just akid!” he broke out. “What in blazes are you babblin’ about marryin’ for? Desirée’s—”
“I shall be twenty-two next month!” answered the boy proudly. “I think I am entitled to be treated as a man. Not a—”
“Oh, all right! all right!” chuckled Caleb. “I was the same way. Used to tickle me to death at twenty to be called ‘Old Man.’Now, I’d give five dollars to anyone who’d call me ‘My Boy.’ So you think I ought to treat you like a grown man, hey? All right!”
He was enjoying the scene hugely. He liked the boy’s pluck. Fighter-like, he was minded to test it to the full. As a possible husband for Desirée, he did not give Hawarden a thought. As a momentary means of amusement to himself, he was willing to prolong the interview.
“We’ll s’pose you’re a man, then,” he continued.“An’ you want to marry my ward. Your fam’ly’s as good as hers. Maybe better, as you folks count such things. So much for that. Now, what’s your income? There, don’t look like I’d made a face at you! The question’s in order. Maybe you think money don’t count in matrimony? Well, it does. Respectability ain’t on the Free List. Not by a long shot. A fam’ly costs three times as much to keep as a chorus girl. What’s your income? Speak up!”
“I—I hardly know, exactly,” faltered Hawarden, “When I was in college, my father allowed me $1,500 a year. He still keeps it up. But as I’m living at home now, it costs me less to get on. Then, after I finish the law-school next year, I’ll be making a good salary myself very soon. With Miss Shevlin to work for—”
“To put it plain,” interrupted Caleb, “You’re earnin’ nothin’ just now, with a golden outlook of earnin’ a little less in a year or two.”
“I have my allowance,” protested Hawarden, “and—”
“We’ll cut out the ‘allowonce’ part,” said Caleb. “That’s just what your father pays as part of his fine for bringin’ you into the world. He’s li’ble to get sore on you any time an’ stop playin’ the alloorin’ role of Human Meal Ticket. What’ll you do then?”
“You don’t quite understand,” protested Hawarden. “In a year from now I shall be earning my own living and shall not be dependent on my father. There is good money in law and—”
“There is!” assented Caleb. “I’ve put a lot of it there, myself, from time to time. But blamed few lawyers manage to get it out. The rest go to work on street cars or—”
“I shall make my way,” averred the lad stoutly, “and even if I don’t succeed at the law, I always have my literary work to fall back on.”
“Your what?”
“My literary work. I was Yale correspondent for theStarall the time I was at college. And more of my stories are being accepted all the time by papers and magazines. And,” seeking mightily to subdue the thrill of sublime pride in his voice and to speak in a matter-of-fact tone, as he played his trump card, “Last month I had a seven-page story inScribner’s.”
“Where?” asked Caleb, genuinely curious.
“InScribner’s” repeated Hawarden modestly.
“Where’s that?” inquired Caleb.
“It’s,—whyScribner’s Magazine,” explained the boy, in dire misery. “I got eighty dollars for it,” he added with a pitiful clutch at his vanishing self-respect.
Caleb’s eye brightened. He looked at Hawarden with a new interest.
“Eighty dollars?” he repeated. “How long’d it take you to write it out?”
“About three days, I think,” answered the boy, puzzled at the question.
“H’m! Not so bad. Hundred an’ sixty dollars aweek; with Sunday off. Why don’t you stick to that instead of messin’ around with the law?”
“It was the tenth story I’d sent them,” confessed Hawarden, heroically. “And it was the first one they took. That’s the trouble with literature. It—”
“So, as things stand now,” pursued Caleb, “you’ve no real money. No sure prospects. An’ you want to marry Dey Shevlin. You want her to share your nothin’-a-year. Or,” he grated, “maybe you think it’d be nice to live onhercash?”
“I think nothing of the sort!” flared Hawarden, scarlet with anger. “I’ll not stand that sort of talk even fromherguardian. I wouldn’t touch a penny of any woman’s money if I were starving! I—”
“That sounds kind of like a book, too,” commented Caleb. “But you mean it. I’m glad you do. I think I kind of like you. So instead of throwin’ you downstairs, I’m goin’ to waste a whole minute talkin’ to you. You’re a nice kid. You come here bristlin’ with book learnin’ an’ idees of honor an’ you make your little speech to the stony hearted guardian an’ stand ready to say ‘God bless you, sir, for them kind words!’ or ‘You’ve busted two young hearts!’ No, you needn’t squirm. It’s so. But you can rub both those remarks off the slate. Neither of ’em’ll be needed. You’ve the good sense to fall in love with the dandiest girl that ever happened. But what have you got to offer her? Besides your valuable self, I mean? You’re askin’ for the greatest thing in all this world. Do you give anything in exchange? Notyou. You want her,—her with her pretty ways, an’ clever brain an’ gorgeous little face. An’ you can’t even support her. You can’t even say: ‘I’ve got ten dollars a week of my own. I’ll give it all to her.’ You’ve no money—no prospects. An’ you want her to exchange herself forthat. Her that could marry a millionaire if she wanted to.”
“I’m—I’m willing that the engagement should be a long one,” hesitated the boy, battling futilely against the vulgar truth of Caleb’s words. “I wouldn’t ask her to marry me till I was able to support her,—to support herwell.”
“An’ in the meantime,” urged Conover, with merciless logic. “In the meantime, she’s to have the pleasure of sittin’ by, eatin’ her heart out, waitin’—waitin’—growin’ older ev’ry year,—losin’ good chances,—bein’ side-tracked at parties an’ so on, because she’s engaged an’ no longer in the marriage market,—waitin’ year after year—maybe till all her prettiness an’ her youth’s gone—just on the chance that you’ll some day be able to support a wife? You don’t mean to be crooked. You’re only just foolish. But look the thing in the eyes an’ tell me: Is it square? Is it an honest bargain you offer? Aren’t you cheatin’ the one girl in the world you ought to do most for?”
“But with such an incentive,” pleaded the boy, “I’dsurelymake my way quickly. In a year at most! I’d work—I’d work sohardfor her!”
Caleb leaned to one side and threw open the windowby his desk. With the warm, soft air of Spring rushed in the steam sibilance and clangor of the railway yards.
“Look down there!” ordered Conover, pointing out, “More’n a hundred men in that yard, ain’t there? Dirty-faced men with stooped shoulders an’ soiled clothes. Not a one of ’em that’s got a fam’ly resemblance to Romeo. What are they doin’?Workin’!Every mother’s son of ’em workin’ harder than you or any of your fam’ly ever worked or evercouldwork. How’d their faces get dirty an’ stoopid an’ their shoulders bent over? By workin’. An’ who are they workin’ for? For themselves? Not them. Each one of ’em’s workin’ for some woman. An’ most of ’em for a bunch of measly kids as well. Workin’ all day an’ ev’ry day, till they drop dead or wear out an’ go to the poorhouse. An’ the women they work for are workin’ too. Workin’ at washboard or scrub-brush to eke out the men-folks’ an’ brats’ livin’. Work! Work! Work! All their lives. But I don’t see any of ’em gatherin’ in front of the footlights an’ singin’ a chorus about how happy they are, or how their hard work has made their wives rich an’ lazy. Are you any better’n they are? Can you work any harder for Desirée thantheyare workin’ for the slatternly, slab-sided, down-at-heel women at home? Don’t you s’pose every one of those men once planned to make his wife a lady an’ to ‘cons’crate his toil’ to her? Think it over, son; an’ get a better argument than the silly fact that you’re willin’ to doyour dooty byworkin’for Desirée. Hell’s full of workers.”
“It all seems so horrible—so gross—so material!” muttered the boy. “But—but you’re right, sir. I can see it now. Still—”
He stretched his hands out before him in an impulsive gesture of despair.
“Still,” finished Caleb, “it hadn’t ought to be, hey? Most things hadn’t. But most things are. Now look here! I’ve wasted a lot of time an’ a lot of bad tastin’ truths over you. I don’t know why I did it, except that I always like to jaw after I’ve had a big fight on. It kind of lets off steam. Here’s the answer in a nutshell: I’m Miss Shevlin’s guardian. What Miss Shevlin wants, she’s goin’ to have, if I have to buy the White House for her. If she wants you she can have you. If she don’t want you—all the consent I could give wouldn’t amount to a hoot in Hades. Per’snally, I think you’d better wait till you grow up an’ get a job before you talk ’bout marryin’. But it’s her affair. Not mine. If she wants you she can have you. Put it up toher. It’s pastme. An’ now trot along. You’ve taken more of my time than you could pay for in a dozen seven-page stories. Don’t stop to thank me. Chase.”
“But I do thank you a thousand times!” exclaimed Hawarden, shaking hands with boyish vehemence. “I’m—I’m awfully obliged to you. When I came, I was afraid I’d meet some such fate as poor Mr. Blacarda.”
“What’s that?” snapped Caleb, all geniality wiped from his voice.
“About Mr. Blacarda?” asked the boy in perfect innocence. “Haven’t you heard? It was in the morning papers. It seems he was jumping on a moving street car, up at the Capital, yesterday afternoon, when his foot slipped on the steps and he was dragged along, face-downward, for nearly half a block. Two of his ribs were broken, and his body is covered with bruises. The papers say his face is battered almost beyond recognition.”
“Too bad!” remarked Conover drily. “Folks ought to be careful how they try to jump onto heavy-movin’ things. Sometimes there’s apt to be a surprise for the jumper. Now clear out! You can run an’ tell Dey what I said if you want to. No, don’t go thankin’ me again. It’s up to her, as I told you. Most likely, she’ll send you about your business. So long!”
Waving out the bewildered, delighted youth, Caleb threw himself back in his leather chair and fished from a case the ever-present cigar. A towering pile of work lay untouched on his desk. But he gave it no heed. With a queer, wholly inexplicable contraction at the heart he lay there thinking. At first he tried to laugh at the memory of the boy’s loftily worded pretensions. But somehow he could not. He recalled what Caine had said about Desirée marrying “the right man.” Hawarden came of good family. His parents were among the best people in Granite. Ashis wife, Desirée could probably take and hold any social position she chose. He was a nice boy, too. And some day he would grow up. There was much to be said for the match, preposterous as it had at first seemed. After all, why not—?
A clerk entered with a card. Conover’s mouth set in a grim smile as he glanced at it.
“Send him in,” he said, moving across to his desk chair, “I seem to be holdin’ a levee of the ar’stocracy this mornin’.”
Reuben Standish, gaunt, gray and stiff as ever, was ushered into the private office. The old man’s face was a monotone of drab, save for a ruddy patch on either cheek bone where consumption flaunted a no-surrender flag. Caleb greeted him with a nod and motioned him to a seat.
“I hope I have not broken in upon very important work,” began Standish glancing at the mountain of letters and papers on the desk.
“All my work’s important,” answered Caleb. “If it wasn’t I’d have an office boy do it while I loafed. Want anything especial?”
“First of all,” evaded Standish, in the courtly, old-world manner that Caleb always found so jarring, “permit me to congratulate you on your great victory at the Capitol yesterday. I read this morning that the Starke bill was defeated entirely through your own personal endeavors. It must be a great thing to wield so powerful an influence over one’s fellow men. I—”
“Say,” interposed Caleb. “Quit standin’ on the distant hilltop makin’ peace signs. Come on down an’ tell me what you want. Make it as short as you can.”
It appeared that Mr. Standish wanted much; though he did not seem to be able to condense his wishes to the degree Caleb suggested. This, however, was of little account, since the Fighter already foreknew the other’s mission. He listened with only perfunctory attention to a recital of the Aaron Burr Bank’s needs, of the stringency of deposits and the danger of a “run;” with still less heed to the tale of an unwonted depression in certain stocks wherein Mr. Standish’s interest was purely marginal. As the story ended, Conover said curtly:
“To sum it up, you’re broke. You want me to make deposits to-day in your bank an’ you want a pers’nal loan besides.”
Standish started to speak. Caleb motioned back the words.
“How much?” he asked. “How much in all? Don’t hem an’ haw, man. You’ve got the amount fixed in your mind, down to the last cent. You know how much you’ll ask for, how much I’m li’ble to give an’ how much you really need. Start off with the biggest sum first. How much?”
Standish tremulously blurted out his statement. When one was dealing with a boor like this Conover, there was surely no need for finesse. The fellow was as blind to the finer shades of business dealings as to the usages of gentle life. Therefore, why hesitate orleave him to guess the amount from adding up a series of delicate hints? A low-browed boor; though a decidedly convenient one to cultivate—at times. The present being most emphatically one of these times, Standish with ruffled dignity laid bare his financial soul.
And the big, red-haired man lolled back in the opposite chair watching his stately visitor from between alert, half-shut eyes. The Fighter had waited, worked, planned, for months, for this very interview. Had Standish been better versed in sign-reading, he might have seen marks of Conover’s passage all along the tortuous finance trail that had at last led to this private office and still more private confession.
But Standish had fallen not only into the trap but into the fatal mistake that had, a century earlier, in France, caused the severance of a goodly number of noble heads:—the error of underestimating a proletariat opponent. And now, unwittingly, he was about to pay the price.
“Well,” observed Caleb, when the facts stood forth, marshaled in their sorry array, “How does all this int’restme?”
“I beg your pardon?” halted Standish.
“I say, how does this int’restme? Why shouldIint’rest myself in doin’ this mighty big favor for you? Why don’t you turn to some of your own business associates—some men of your own class? Why do you come here?”
“I—you were so kind as to help me before—”
“An’ that gives me a license to do it again?” suggested Caleb. “That seems to be the rule all the world over. The rest of your crowd are either as bad off as you; or have too much sense to put cash into a sinkin’ enterprise, hey? So we come ’a runnin’ to the easy mark, Caleb Conover. He’ll be flattered to help us out.”
“Mr. Conover!” coughed the poor old man.
“That’s all right,” laughed Caleb. “I’m goin’ to help you out. So don’t get any grayer in the face than you are already. I’m goin’ to help you out for two reasons. First, because if I don’t, you’re ruined. Flat broke an’—”
“Oh, no, Mr. Conover!” exclaimed Standish, tremblingly. “Not in the very least. It is a temporary crisis which—”
“Which is goin’ to become perm’nent unless I sling out a life rope. What’s the use of lyin’ ’bout it?”
Standish laughed. The pitiful, mirthless laugh of the man who is insulted and dare not resent the affront; who compromises with trampled self-respect by grinning where he should curse.
“Good joke, ain’t it?” agreed Caleb, reading the broken aristocrat like an open page, “So much for my first reason. My second reason for helpin’ you out is because I want to do you a neighborly turn. Weareneighbors, ain’t we, Standish?”
“Why of course! Of course!” cried the other wholly puzzled as to the trend of Caleb’s words; yet unfeignedly happy—and therefore eager to be genial—overthe solution of his financial tangle. He coughed a pleasant acquiescence.
“But,” went on Caleb, “it just occurs to me I ain’t been as neighborly with you as I’d oughter.”
Absent-mindedly, as he talked, Conover drew forth his check book from a drawer and laid it open before him, fingering its long pink slips.
“No,” he continued, forestalling Standish’s perplexed reply, “I ain’t been so neighborly as I should. You’ve been around here to see me several times, now.—An’ I’ve never once returned any of your visits. It’s about up to me to come to see you. When’ll I come?”
“Why—by all means! By all means!” declared Standish with effusion. “Come and lunch with me, some day,—shall we say, at the Pompton Club? Why not to-day? I shall be delighted. If—”
“I don’t go out to lunch,” objected Conover. “Haven’t time. But I’d be glad to eat dinner with you.”
“Certainly. Why, of course. Any evening you say. The chef we have now at the Pompton Club—”
“I don’t want to dine at the Pompton Club,” said Caleb sulkily.
“At the Arareek, then. We’re both members there. What evening—?”
“Nor the Arareek, neither,” answered Caleb, “Eatin’ food with a man at his club ain’t what I call bein’ neighborly. I’ll just drop around on you for a home dinner some evenin’. I’ll like that better.”
“Why, ye—es,” coincided Standish, with all the cordiality he could muster against the shock, “That will be delightful. Certainly. Some evening when—”
“How’d Friday evenin’ of this week suit you?” asked Caleb, breaking in on the loosely strung speech of his guest.
“Friday?” echoed Standish, taken aback. “Why, why my family are to be at home that evening!”
White spots leaped into view at either side of Caleb’s close shut lips, and something lurid flamed far back in his eyes. Had Blacarda—in his hospital room at the Capital—seen that look, he might have suffered relapse. But Standish was near-sighted,—except in the eyes,—and the expression passed unnoticed.
“I know your fam’ly’s to be home that night,” said Conover in a curiously muffled voice. “Also there’s a dinner party you’re givin’. An’ a musicle afterward. Twelve guests to the dinner. ’Bout two hundred to the musicle. I’m comin’ to both.”
“But my dear Mr. Conover!” cried Standish with forced gaiety. “You don’t quite see the point—Much as I—and all of us—would be delighted to have you as our guest at dinner that night, yet the laws of a dinner party are unpleasantly—perhaps ridiculously—rigid. For instance, this is to be a dinner for twelve. An extra man would spoil the balance—and—” with sudden inspiration—“it would make thirteen. So many people are foolishlysuperstitious! I confess, I am, for one. Now the next evening would—”
“The next evenin’,” said Conover, “you an’ your fam’ly are booked for the Hawarden’s theatre party. I read about it in theStar. You’d excuse yourself an’ stay at home an’ dine alone with me. An’ that’d be about as merry as a morgue for both of us. No, I’m comin’ Friday;—if you’ll be so good as to ask me.”
“But I’ve just told you—”
“You’ve just told me there was to be twelve guests. That’s all right. There’ll be only twelve. I’ll be one of the twelve. Blacarda was invited. He’s laid up in the hospital from a car acc’dent an’ can’t come. I’m helpin’ you out by takin’ his place. No inconvenience to anyone. Unless maybe you think your daughter an’ your sister-in-law won’t care to meet me?”
“Not at all! Nonsense!” fumed Standish, in fearful straits. “They’d be very glad indeed. But—”
“Then that’s settled,” decided Conover. “Thanks.”
He bent over the check book, pen in hand. Standish, at his wit’s end, made one more attempt to drag himself free of the dilemma.
“I know you won’t be offended,” he faltered, with another dry cough, “if I say frankly,—frankness is always best, I think,—that I—”
Caleb closed the check book with a snap and whirled his desk chair about, to face his visitor; so suddenly that the latter involuntarily started back.Not even Standish could now misread that dull, hot glint in Conover’s pale eyes.
“Look here, Mr. Standish,” said the Fighter. “Don’t ever make the blunder of thinkin’ a man can’t understand you just because you can’t understand him. If you’d said to one of your own crowd: ‘I can’t invite you to my house because my fam’ly’s goin’ to be there; because you ain’t fit to meet my women,’—if you’d said that to one of them, he’d a’ been your enemy for life. You wouldn’t a’dared insult him so. But you said it to me because you thought I wouldn’t understand. Well, I do. Shut up! I know what you want to say, an’ I don’t want to hear it. I’m not comin’ to your house for love ofyou; but I’m comin’ just the same—I guess I’ve bought my right to. If a man’s good enough to beg from, he’s good enough to treat civil. An’ you’re goin’ to treatmecivil. This afternoon I’m goin’ to get an invite to your dinner an’ the musicle. You ought to be grateful that I don’t insist on singin’ there. I’m goin’ on Friday, an’ you’re goin’ to pass the word around that I’m to be treated right, while I’m there. Just to make sure of it, I’ll date this check ahead to next Saturday.”
A last remnant of manhood flared up within the consumptive old bank president’s withered soul.
“I’m not to be bulldozed, Mr. Conover!” he said with a certain dignity. “Because you extend business favors to me, I am not obliged to admit a man of your character to my home. And I shall not. As for the loan—”
“As for the loan,” replied Conover, shrugging his shoulders, and tossing the check book back in the drawer, “I’m not obliged to stave off ruin from a man that thinks I’m not fit to enter his home. That’s all. Good-day.”
He slammed shut the desk drawer, and began to look over some of the opened letters before him.
The old man had risen to his feet, his eyes fixed on the closed drawer like those of a starved dog on a chunk of meat. His mouth-corners twitched and humiliation forced an unwonted moisture into his eyes.
“Mr. Conover,” he began, tentatively.
“Good-day!” retorted Caleb without raising his eyes from the papers he was sorting.
“Mr. Conover!” coughed Standish in despair, “I’ll—I’ll be very glad if you’ll dine with us on Friday night.”
Conover opened the drawer, tossed the check across the table and went on with his work.
“I’ll be there,” he grunted.