Читать книгу Ainslee's magazine, Volume 16, No. 3, October, 1905 - Various - Страница 4

The brownstone house on Madison Avenue suggested the solid and respectable affluence of its owner, Mr. Livingstone Wade, in that quieter old New York way which preceded Millionaire’s Row, and which, on account of that precedence, Mr. Livingstone Wade considered immeasurably superior.

Nor was this suggestion a mere exterior effect.

The somber elegance of its interior furnishings showed in every detail that Mr. Wade’s conservatism to earlier ideals was unfaltering.

The ormolu clock on the drawing-room mantel was flanked by a pair of tall vases, Sèvres, as a matter of course, standing equidistant with the precision of sentinels.

His pictures included a Landseer, a Meissonier, a Bouguereau, and some excellent copies of Raphael. He was fond of calling your attention to the fact that all of these gentlemen could draw, and that their figures “stood out.”

The books in his library showed a strong tendency to run in sets, with modern fiction conspicuously absent. And as for his dinner services, they were complete, and he considered odd sets of plates as a fad which had its origin in economy or inefficient housekeeping.

He rated l’art nouveau with nouveaux riches, considered impressionism as a cloak for defective draughtsmanship, declined to admit anything made as far west as Rookwood to the companionship of the Capodamonte and Meissen in his cabinets, and would have banished to his stables the most priceless Indian basket ever made.

West of New York he considered that the wilderness howled, impelled to such mournful vocalization by a dawning sense of its own abnormal crudities.

In business, however, Mr. Wade consented to compromise with the spirit of the times. No out-of-date methods characterized the bank of which he was president, nor, on the other hand, did any up-to-date crook contrive to outwit the keen-eyed, white-haired, thin-lipped old gentleman, who held himself as erect ethically as he did physically.

His wife, born a Van Dorn, christened in Grace Church and married in the same, had died at fifty-seven, childless – a course of conduct which Mr. Wade, while he preserved a high silence, felt as deeply as a European monarch might have done. It was not a mere personal question, but the continuation of the Wade line would have been for the good of the country at large.

As for his only nephew, he had done his duty by him. Not extravagantly, to spoil the young man, or delude him with unfounded hopes of heirship; but by a college course, Columbia bien entendu! and when he determined to become an architect, the Beaux Arts was naturally the only correct place.

When he read John Carrington’s letter, with its phrase “since you have no direct heir,” Mr. Livingstone Wade experienced a very primitive bitterness, which resolved itself into a determination to make his nephew heir to that particular piece of property at least; to recall him from Paris, and to insist upon his going out to Michigan and becoming thoroughly conversant with the mine as soon as possible.

Having begun the accomplishment of this design, Mr. Livingstone Wade began to feel a consciousness of benevolence in acting so generously toward the young man, which resulted, very naturally, in his regarding his nephew with more affection than even Mr. Wade himself would have thought possible.

As they sat together in the well-ordered library, Mr. Wade said to himself that he had done well.

“When the mine came to us with that tangle of collateral from the Riley failure, I found that it was paying dividends regularly; and Richards, the manager, wrote me that they could be doubled easily if he was allowed a free hand to cut down expenses and exercise his own judgment. He has done it, too, and the mine is a splendid property. And it is yours, my boy, when you have made yourself thoroughly conversant with it.” Mr. Wade’s tone was complacently benevolent.

“Do you mean that you want me to take a course in mining engineering?” said Hastings, and his voice was carefully expressionless.

“No,” said his uncle; “I want you to go out to the mine itself, put yourself in Richards’ hands, and get a good working knowledge of the proposition, so that Richards will know you are master. He wouldn’t try any tricks with me, because it is pretty well known that men who have tried have repented it; but with a young fellow like you, it’s different, of course. I shall not expect you to spend all your time there. Perhaps for a year or so you’d better stay on the ground. Then come East, open your architect’s office, and go West once a year on a tour of inspection.”

Hastings’ face cleared.

“It is more than good of you, sir. I’ll try to deserve it,” he said, frankly.

“There is only one condition,” Mr. Wade went on, “and your word is sufficient for that. You are not to sell the mine without my consent. The very fact that John Carrington is so anxious to get hold of it is one of the best points in its favor.”

“Carrington?” said Hastings, mechanically, wondering if the name so constantly in his thoughts had begun to repeat itself audibly.

“He is a – a boor – who owns the adjoining mine,” Mr. Wade classified him. “He offered to buy the Tray-Spot. Of course I declined. And he had the insolence to charge Richards with flooding his mine with water from ours, instead of pumping it to the surface. Threatened us with a lawsuit if we didn’t put in additional pumps. He said his men were not educated to the luxury of free baths as yet, and that swimming was an unpopular sport on the eleventh level.”

“But if it was true?” said Hastings.

“Of course it wasn’t,” said Mr. Wade, testily. “I wrote Richards, and he said Carrington was just trying to get hold of the mine, and wouldn’t stop at anything to do it, because his, the Star, is down so deep it is about worked out. Do you know,” Mr. Wade went on, “this John Carrington had the audacity to say that, since I’d never been West, he didn’t suppose I’d care to begin such trips at my age, and that, as I had no son, he should think a reasonable proposition to sell ought to interest me.”

Mr. Wade intended to suggest only John Carrington’s breach of good manners, but in spite of himself his voice showed where the taunt stung. And Hastings had a sudden comprehension of his uncle’s sudden benevolence, which in its very humanness quickened him from his heavy sense of indebtedness for benefits received, into that warmer loyalty of the ties of blood, into that sense of inter-dependence which this was the first emergency to rouse.

He began to feel ashamed of the sense of injury he had had in the abrupt summons to quit Paris, to put away his chosen profession for a time. He began to feel ashamed of the lagging gratitude with which he had received a gift which would make him a rich man; of that involuntary wish that his uncle’s generosity had taken another form.

A realization of the loneliness of age bound him to the older man with bonds of sentiment stronger far, with warmhearted, generous youth, than all those the government has seen fit to issue.

But Carrington? Though there might be dozens of Carringtons who owned mines in the West.

“We’ll take Holliday’s car – he’s offered it to me time and again – and go out there. We can live on the car the few days I am here, and you’re young and can manage to make yourself comfortable afterward. I shall be proud to introduce you as my nephew, Laurence.” Mr. Wade was tasting victory in prospect, and the taste was palatable. “Carrington has only one son, and he’s daubing canvas in Paris.”

Then this was Elenore’s father. Hastings foresaw complications to come.

“Ned Carrington and his sister were two of my best friends in Paris, sir,” he said, firmly. “I knew their father was a mine owner somewhere in the West.”

“Has this young Carrington any business ability?” demanded Mr. Wade. His tone was quick and keen. He was getting at an important factor.

Hastings smiled in spite of himself.

“Not a scrap,” he said, amusedly, “but he’s a genius. He’ll be a new ‘old master’ one of these days.”

Mr. Wade’s countenance relaxed amiably.

“These erratic young fellows are always going to do wonders,” he said, indulgently. “For all the help he’ll be to his father, he might as well be a girl. One of these days you will be buying out John Carrington on your own terms.”

Nor did he dream that in the silence that followed, as he sat comfortably certain of the discomfiture of the man who had flung at him the two-edged taunt of age and childlessness, his nephew was saying to himself that surely Elenore’s father must be a reasonable man, that there must be some rational basis on which he and John Carrington could meet as friends. More, he saw himself with an assured income. Then could he not, by virtue of that future friendship, gain a remarkably valuable ally in that siege of the marvelous citadel – invulnerable, indeed, save to a certain small sportsman who bends his bow to no man’s dictation, and yet for love of valor, or from mere caprice, ranges himself at the unlikeliest moment with the besieging force, and wins with a single well-sped shaft?

Whatever emotions the arrival of Mr. Wade and his nephew at Yellow Dog excited in Richards, his outward attitude was one of bluff heartiness.

“You can’t stay on your car, though, Mr. Wade,” he said, decisively, looking over its comfortable appointments with an appraising eye. “The miners at the Star are too lawless. You’ll have to put up with the hotel.” (“About twenty-four hours of the Raegan House will start them for New York,” he thought, with grim humor.)

“Do you mean to tell me that they would dare attack a private car?” Mr. Wade demanded, aghast.

Richards shrugged his shoulders.

“There isn’t much they wouldn’t dare,” he said, coolly, wondering how thick it would be safe to pile it on, “but they’re more interested in people than property. The car’s safe enough as long as you aren’t in it, but if a stick of dynamite happened to drop under it some night when you were – ”

“What has made such bad feeling between the mines?” Hastings asked, quietly.

Richards’ eyes narrowed slightly.

“Miners take the tone of their manager,” he said, significantly.

Simple as question and answer were, antipathy quickened in that instant between the two men.

Richards resented a certain something in Hastings’ tone, and Hastings made up his mind that Richards was overplaying.

Mr. Wade was regretting with exceeding heartiness that he had come at all. Being blown to bits in this desolate-looking hole was furthest from his desire.

Trusting himself to the horrors of a wilderness hotel seemed about as hazardous an alternative. As for leaving his nephew in such a place, was it not virtually condemning him to a more or less lingering death? And Mr. Wade had grown amazingly fond of him during the last few months, in the companionship which had resulted from their many-times delayed expedition westward.

He was half inclined to make a formal tour of inspection, announcing Hastings as the future owner, and then take him back and let him open his architect’s office at once. But Mr. Wade hated retreat.

“Then I am sure that you have men equally vigilant in repelling any attacks upon property or persons,” Hastings said, smoothly. “However, it doesn’t matter to me. I should have to come to the hotel, anyway, later, when you have gone back, sir.”

“Going to stay with us a while?” Richards asked him.

“Permanently,” said Hastings, pleasantly.

Richards swung a questioning face toward Mr. Wade.

“The mine would have been my nephew’s at my death, naturally, Richards,” Mr. Wade explained, with some dignity. “He is coming into his own a little sooner, that is all. And if he chooses to remain – ”

“As he does,” Hastings laughed, genially, “and to learn all about his mine from its competent manager.”

Mr. Richards’ face did not express any extreme joy.

“If you’ll take my advice, you’ll go home with your uncle and leave your mine in my hands, Mr. Hastings,” he said, bluffly. “It’s a rough country, and hard, dangerous work – work that you don’t know anything about, and that it will take you years to learn. And – I beg your pardon, but I’ll speak plainly – while you are learning you’ll want to give orders, and you’ll make bad mistakes – expensive mistakes. They’re easy to make and hard to right. Not that it will be your fault. I should if I tried to run Mr. Wade’s bank. If you want your mine to keep on being a good paying proposition, leave it in the hands of men who made it one. Isn’t that business, Mr. Wade? I’ve satisfied you, haven’t I?” His manner had a certain brusque appeal.

“Perfectly,” said Mr. Wade, suavely.

Then he looked at Hastings. He was standing by the table heaped with books and magazines, and there was something in the alertness of his virile figure, well poised enough for a soldier; something in the lines of his well-cut features, something in the steadiness and frankness of the cool gray eyes, that suggested not only the strength of youth, but the strength of the spirit. It came to Mr. Wade suddenly that he was going to miss him, that the young fellow ought to have a chance to live with his own class.

“And my nephew may suit himself,” Mr. Wade went on, steadily. “The mine is his without condition” – he spoke the words slowly – “and if he chooses to leave it in your hands, and return East with me, he is quite at liberty to do so.”

Hastings smiled at him cheerfully.

“I shall stay, of course,” he said, decidedly. “But I’ll try not to make my mining education too expensive.”

“I’ve got a carriage outside,” said Mr. Richards, rising abruptly. “I s’pose you’d like to drive around town and out to the mine, to look around a little. Then if you’ll take dinner with me at the Raegan House, you’ll have quite an idea what it’s like out here.”

Mr. Livingstone Wade surveyed the landau into which he stepped with scant favor; and the look which he gave to the ragged darky who held the reins was only equaled by the one he bestowed on the two battered equines who were to serve as their means of locomotion.

As they swung into the main street of the little town, Hastings laughed with a perfectly genuine amusement.

“I might open an architect’s office here, on the side,” he said. “They certainly need it.”

Mr. Wade’s eyes were upon an up-to-date trap, drawn by a well-matched, high-stepping pair. The middle-aged man who was driving turned on them a look of amused curiosity as they passed.

“Whom do those horses belong to?” demanded Mr. Wade, sharply.

“Belong to Carrington,” said Richards, shortly. “That was his man. That’s his house at the other end of the street – that big one on the hill.” He jerked his head to indicate that it was back of them, and they turned to see it. It had a large, comfortable, hospitable look, more suggestive of the South than of the North.

“The hotel’s good enough for me,” said Richards, dryly.

Mr. Wade wondered why this sentiment, which had seemed so admirable to him in New York, lost its flavor here on the ground.

As they passed a blacksmith’s shop, the smith was shoeing a Kentucky thoroughbred, who looked at them with an airy unconcern.

“Carrington’s,” said Richards to Mr. Wade’s uplifted eyebrows.

The expression on Mr. Wade’s face was a curious one. Your tourist in Europe now and then wears its twin, on discovering that the United States is renting a second-rate building for an embassy, when other governments own pretentious ones.

“Tell you what,” said Hastings, suddenly. “I think I shall buy a neat little touring car to run around here. Pretty bad grades, but there are half a dozen makes that could take them easily.”

Mr. Wade looked at him with the ever-growing conviction that he was the kind of nephew to have. In spite of his conservatism, he had adopted the auto as he had the telephone.

“Quite right, Laurence,” he said, complacently. “When you order the one you prefer, have the bill sent to me.”

“Going to import a show-fure?” queried Richards, with ironic pleasantry.

Hastings shook his head.

“Never saw one I couldn’t run yet,” he said, cheerfully, “and when I do I’ll send it back to the factory as defective.”

“If he’ll just put in his time running it, it’s all I’ll ask of him,” communed Richards with himself.

* * * * *

At two o’clock of that day Mr. Wade had concluded that all he had ever heard of the enormities of the West was far below the actual fact.

His first grievance had been the dilapidated conveyance; his second the fact that Richards, who for reasons of his own had not tried to make the expedition a bed of roses, had insisted on his getting out a dozen times to see certain offices, the shaft house, and a number of other buildings, about whose use he was extremely hazy. And these pilgrimages had necessitated his walking through fine red dust, which not only reduced his immaculate footgear to its lowest terms, but bordered the bottom of his pale gray trouser legs with a deep red band, which Richards assured him was indelible.

But the crowning enormity came with the dinner at Raegan’s Hotel, which invitation Mr. Wade had felt he could hardly refuse in courtesy.

At the moment they entered the dining room Richards was called to the phone.

“Take these gentlemen down to my table, Maggie,” he said to the head waitress as he turned away.

Mr. Wade regarded this young woman disapprovingly. The curve of her pompadour and the curves of her figure were too aggressively spherical. That her overgenerous bulk could be compressed to the dimensions of her waist seemed to indicate that whalebone had been unduly overlooked in modern mechanics. It hinted, too, though not to Mr. Wade, of a forcefulness of spirit which, seeing in a handkerchief-sized, knife-pleated white apron a legitimate adornment, adjusted the physical, Spartan-like, to its requirements. But Mr. Wade’s mere passive and impersonal dislike quickened to an active rage in that awful moment when she tucked her arm comfortably in his, and promenaded him the length of the dining room to an untidy looking table already occupied by a portly Hibernian, who was engaged in extensive molar exploration with a diminutive wooden pick.

“Friends of Mr. Richards, Mr. O’Shaughnessy,” she said, glibly, and Mr. Wade felt himself released from her muscular arm only to feel the front of a chair pressed with energetic purpose against the back of his knees.

As certain muscles automatically relaxed to enable him to be seated, his stunned sense of propriety recovered consciousness enough to enable him to decide that of all outrages ever perpetrated on a gentleman, this last was the worst.

“Mr. Richards’ friends are my friends,” responded Mr. O’Shaughnessy, cordially.

Mr. Wade looked at Hastings, who was seating himself with outer sobriety and inward hilarity. He comforted himself by taking that sobriety for disgust.

“I suppose you are not out here for your health?” Mr. O’Shaughnessy opined, genially.

“No,” said Mr. Wade, icily.

“What line ar-re you in?” Mr. O’Shaughnessy pursued.

“I fail to understand you,” said Mr. Wade, stiffly.

“What house are you thravelin’ for? What are you selling?” Mr. O’Shaughnessy explained.

That he, Mr. Livingstone Wade, should be taken for a traveling salesman!

“I am a banker,” said Mr. Wade. He felt it due to himself to say as much as that.

“Faro and that face of yours ar-re twins the world over,” said Mr. O’Shaughnessy, genially, closing one eye and looking intelligently at Hastings through the other. Then he cast the toothpick on the floor. “Have a cigar?” he said, hospitably, throwing a couple carelessly on the table as he rose to depart. “Drop in and see me if you get thirsty while you’re here. The palm garden. Two doors up. The house is good for a few yet.”

He stopped to joke with the head waitress a moment on his way out.

Richards, returning, decided that Mr. Wade was pretty well fagged. He had become monosyllabic.

The catsup bottle in the middle of the table, the greasy, lukewarm soup in stone-china bowls, the tasteless profusion of canned vegetables, the dubious-looking water, and the muddy mixture, bitter from long boiling, which the Raegan House called coffee, were only additional affronts to a man already at the limit of his endurance.

His announcement of his intention to spend the rest of the day in the car, and to make it his headquarters during his stay, was delivered with a decision which left no possibility for protest.

What was mere dynamite to such indignities as these!

He stepped into the landau, which Richards had ordered round again, with a sensation of relief, heightened by that gentleman’s statement that he shouldn’t be able to see them again until morning. Richards found Mr. Wade rather exhausting, on his side.

“If you see a fellow in freak clothes on your way back, you can know it’s that son of Carrington’s,” he observed, as he stood on the sidewalk.

Hastings had his foot on the step of the landau, but he wheeled.

“Is Ned Carrington here?” he demanded.

“Been here all summer. Father broke his leg in a runaway and sent for him,” Richards growled.

“Then I think I’ll walk over and see him,” Hastings said promptly, “if you’ll excuse me, sir.”

He smiled confidently at his uncle.

“You shan’t go near him,” said Richards, fiercely, “with that shark of a father of his trying to swindle us every way he can.”

“Whatever his father is, Ned Carrington is a gentleman and my friend,” said Hastings, quietly.

“Tell him he can’t go,” Richards demanded of Mr. Wade. And his insistence was fatal. Mr. Wade would not have influenced his nephew at Richards’ dictation just now if Hastings had announced his intention of going to perdition.

Moreover, he trusted Hastings. And – this is an awful anti-climax – he wanted a nap.

“I hope you will find your friend home, Laurence,” he said, suavely. “Business quarrels can safely be ignored between gentlemen.”

Richards, watching the erect old figure disappearing in the landau toward the station, and the athletic young one striding off in the direction of the Star mine, hated them with an equal intensity.

* * * * *

John Carrington, dozing away on the great wicker divan on his broad veranda, in the warmth of a September afternoon, opened his eyes at the click of the gate.

The young man coming rapidly up the graveled walk was a stranger.

“Mr. Carrington?” he said, pleasantly.

“Yes, sir,” Carrington replied.

“Your son and I were friends in Paris, Mr. Carrington,” he went on. “My name is Hastings. I hope he is at home.”

Hastings! Paris! This was the young fellow whom Sarah had written about – who was so attentive to Elenore.

Carrington looked at him critically, and was pleased.

“Sit down, Mr. Hastings,” he said, cordially. “Ned just went in to order the horses for a little later. He will be out presently, and will be glad to see you.”

“I was surprised to hear that Ned was here, Mr. Carrington,” Hastings went on, seating himself. “He was to start for the East with Velantour the day I left Paris, and I supposed he was painting away for dear life somewhere in the Vale of Cashmere.”

“I didn’t even know he intended to go,” said Carrington, quietly.

“What!” said Hastings. “He hasn’t told you that Velantour asked him to go? It was the greatest opportunity he could ever have!” Then he thought. “Of course your illness was first with him,” he said. “I hope I haven’t been telling tales out of school.” He smiled frankly. Then “He’s a genius, though.” The praise burst out spontaneously. “They expect great things of him in Paris, Mr. Carrington.”

John Carrington did some rapid thinking. So the boy had put aside the biggest opportunity in his life to come back to him. Put it aside cheerfully. To gratify – John Carrington was hard on himself now – his father’s selfish pride. The need had not been imperative. He could have written him all the questions it was advisable to ask him. But he had been in pain, and harassed, and he had sacrificed the boy to it. Well, he should go back soon. He, John Carrington, was not so near senility that he couldn’t manage his own affairs. His jaw set squarely.

“I’m glad you told me, Mr. Hastings,” he said, calmly. Quick steps were coming through the hall. “Before he had a chance to head you off,” he concluded, smilingly. The eyes he turned toward the door were very proud. “Here’s a friend you’ll be glad to see,” he said, cheerily. Yet it seemed to him, and to Hastings, that the lad’s first impulse was toward recoil.

He certainly paled a little. And Hastings said to himself that Ned had, in some subtle way, changed indefinably, but certainly. His eyes did not carry out the comfortable familiarity of his attire. It appeared to Hastings that they were making some demand upon him – a demand that he could not understand.

But the next second young Carrington came forward with at least a surface cordiality.

“How did you find me out – Hastings?” he said, with a slight hesitation before the name, as perplexing as the characteristic grasp of his hand, familiar and unfamiliar at once, and the tinge of formality that obtruded itself unmistakably.

“I had no idea you were here until I heard it just now from Richards,” said Hastings, struggling with a vague sense of rebuff.

The name might have been the Medusa head.

Then “Richards?” John Carrington queried. Hastings flushed.

“My uncle, Mr. Wade, has given me the Tray-Spot mine,” he said, and his voice became formal in turn. “We lunched with our manager to-day.”

In spite of his annoyance, his lips twitched at the memory of it.

“It seems that there is war between the two mines, Mr. Carrington;” he turned to the older man. “I don’t know anything of mining, but there must be some way out of it which would be just both to your interests and to ours.”

For John Carrington had impressed him indelibly as an honest man.

Hastings’ tone was both dignified and frank. John Carrington liked it. But could good come out of anything connected with the Tray-Spot? It had always been a thorn in the flesh.

Ned had crossed the veranda quickly, to seat himself behind a book-laden table. Once so ensconced, he drew a long breath of relief. Then he began to look amused.

“We have suggested a way, but it did not meet with your uncle’s approval,” said John Carrington, quietly.

“I quite agree with my uncle that we do not care to sell,” said Hastings, calmly.

“Nor, I assume, do you care to discharge your manager,” John Carrington went on.

“No,” said Hastings, frankly again; “my uncle has always considered Richards an invaluable man.”

“He certainly has been,” Carrington commented, ironically. “Then, I think we can cut out mining as a topic of conversation, Mr. Hastings. You and Ned can gossip about Paris.”

“That’s where I differ with you, dad,” Ned broke in, spiritedly.

Hastings, stung, started to rise, but “Don’t be silly,” the lad said, impatiently, but with more friendliness than he had yet shown. “We may have a thousand pleasant things to say about Paris, but this is the important thing, and we had better keep at it.

“Laurence” – Hastings gave a little start; Ned had never called him Laurence – “is quite as much of a greenhorn about mines as I was a few months ago. It’s only fair to tell him just what our position is. He will at least hear a story of our grievances that hasn’t been garbled.” His tone was spirited.

“I should like that,” said Hastings, quietly.

Ned leaned forward eagerly. Then he settled his cravat with a peculiar twist, which Hastings recognized as Ned’s characteristic preliminary to discourse. He and Elenore had laughed over it many times together.

“Ours is the older and deeper mine,” Ned began. “That’s the first thing. And all the mines here strike the big bodies of water in sinking. That’s the second. Your manager has hit on the economical plan of doing without large pumps; and when you strike water, he lets it seep through to us, and we raise it for you. It increases our dangers and expenses and your dividends. How would you like it in our place?”

John Carrington watched him with a look of mingled pride and amusement.

“In the case you have stated, I shouldn’t like it at all,” Hastings stated, coolly. “But Richards has assured my uncle that this grievance of yours is imaginary; that the water you get comes from your own sinking. Isn’t there a possibility that may be so?”

“No,” said Ned, positively; “there isn’t.”

Hastings hesitated. That Ned believed what he was saying was obvious; but, after all, what did he know about it? Wasn’t he, save in his art, the most impractical soul living? Why shouldn’t it be quite as likely that Carrington’s men deceived him as that Richards deceived his uncle?

“There ought to be the simplest of ways of settling that,” he said, slowly. “Let a couple of your men go down our mine and satisfy themselves that we’re doing what’s right.”

John Carrington’s laugh was ironically amused.

“You might suggest that to Richards,” he said. Then his tone changed. “He won’t even give us a map of your workings,” he said, sharply. “As for letting anyone from the Star underground, he has announced pretty clearly that the man who tried it wouldn’t come up again. And though Richards’ word hasn’t any par value, I am willing to believe that for once he meant what he said.”

“Aren’t you painting Richards in rather too black a color?” Hastings protested. “Aren’t you unduly prejudiced against him? Premeditated murder, now?”

“Accident, my dear sir,” John Carrington said, ironically, “and underground accidents are almost too easy.”

Hastings hesitated. He looked at Ned.

The lad made a Gallic gesture that sent his hands far apart. “What would you?” it signified.

There was a tinge of mockery in his friendly smile. Yet something of confidence, too.

“My dear Hastings,” he said; “it is decidedly up to you. Our word or Richards’.”

Hastings flushed.

“My dear Ned,” he said, steadily, “that I should doubt your good faith is impossible. Nor,” he flared, “do I think you doubt mine. I have been thrust suddenly, through the great generosity of an uncle to whom I am as loyal as you are to your father, into a situation that I know nothing about. I have a manager in whom my uncle, a cautious man, has believed implicitly. You tell me this man is a rogue. But you may be wrong. I can’t condemn him unheard. One thing is certain,” he went on. “I shall find out. And if there has been anything crooked about our management, it shall be righted.” The line of his lips straightened. The muscles of his jaw grew tense. It was impossible to doubt that he meant what he said.

Both listeners believed him. Both admired him. But John Carrington looked his admiration frankly, and young Carrington dropped his eyelids satisfiedly over his.

“That is all we could ask,” said John Carrington, approvingly. “Now let me hear you youngsters chat about Paris.”

But Hastings was impatient to be off now.

“I must get back to my uncle,” he said, lightly. “It has been a hard day for him, and I suggested that I would serve as secretary for once.”

“Then, order the horses round for Mr. Hastings, Ned,” said John Carrington, and as the lad disappeared, and Hastings protested: “They are standing harnessed in the stable,” he said, decisively. “You mustn’t insist on our being too inhospitable.”

And as Hastings capitulated, John Carrington followed out a sudden impulse.

“You will explain to your uncle that this half-mended leg of mine will prevent my calling on him,” he stated, feeling suddenly that Hastings’ uncle must have some good points, “but I shall be glad to put my horses at his disposal while he is here. Ned will come over to your car in the morning, and say so gracefully.”

He smiled confidently at the returning lad.

There was a queer, contented look lurking in the lad’s eyes. “As gracefully as he can,” he laughed, lightly. “I’ll walk down to the gate with you,” he added.

It was on the way to the gate that Hastings asked the question which was really the mainspring of his call.

“Where is your sister now? Did she go to Brittany?”

Young Carrington seemed amused.

“Elenore’s plans were rather upset this summer,” he said, lightly, “as well as mine. She’s far from Brittany, in a curious little place you never heard of in France.” He was rather proud of the way that sentence was turned. “She’s with a friend, and enjoying herself, though she says it’s all queer.”

Hastings had a mental vision of Elenore in some far-off corner of France, making gay over all its out-of-the-way absurdities in that companionable way of hers.

“I wish she were here,” he said, suddenly.

“Oh, well, I dare say she’d rather be where she is than anywhere else,” Ned rejoined, carelessly.

Which was cold comfort to Hastings.

“By the way,” he said, turning, as he was about to step into the trap, “I suppose we’re perfectly safe to make our headquarters in the car here?”

“Safe as the Waldorf, if you’re on a siding,” Ned laughed. “If you stay on the main track the cars will hit you.”

Hastings mentally swore at himself. The question had sounded idiotic.

“See you in the morning,” Ned called, as Hastings drove off. But he walked back to the house rather slowly.

“Pretty tired, dad?” he asked, cheerfully.

“Ned,” said John Carrington, slowly, “when you children were little I’m afraid I loved Elenore best. But no daughter can be to a man what his son is.”

There was a little silence. John Carrington lay with his eyes closed. He was tired.

“Do you think Elenore was interested in that young fellow?” he asked, finally.

“If she was, she never said so,” young Carrington replied. He was looking off in the direction of the Tray-Spot.

“If I were a girl, I’m inclined to think he could have me,” John Carrington announced.

Young Carrington’s laugh was lightly amused.

“If I were a girl, I’d lead him on a bit, myself,” he announced.