Читать книгу Colonel Carter's Christmas and The Romance of an Old-Fashioned Gentleman - Francis Hopkinson Smith - Страница 6

Table of Contents

Fitz had not yet arrived when the Colonel in his eagerness stepped in front of me, and peered through the hole in the glass partition which divided Fitz’s inner and outer offices.

“Come inside, Colonel, and wait—expect him after a while,” was the reply from one of the clerks—the first arrival.

But the Colonel was too restless to sit down, and too absorbed even to thank the young man for his courtesy or to accept his invitation. He continued pacing up and down the outer office, stopping now and then to note the heap of white ribbons tangled up in a wicker basket—records of the disasters and triumphs of the day before—or to gaze silently at the large map that hung over the steam-heater, or to study in an aimless way the stock lists skewered to the wall.

He had risen earlier than usual and had dressed himself with the greatest care and with every detail perfect. His shoes with their patches, one on each toe, were polished to more than Chad’s customary brilliancy; his gray hair was brushed straight back from his forehead, its ends overlapping the high collar behind; his goatee was twisted to a fish-hook point and curled outward from his shirt-front; his moustache was smooth and carefully trimmed.

The coat—it was the same old double-breasted coat, of many repairs—was buttoned tight over his chest giving his slender figure that military air which always distinguished the Virginian when some matter of importance, some matter involving personal defence or offence, had to be settled. In one hand he carried his heavy cane with its silver top, the other held his well-brushed hat.

“What has kept Fitz?” he asked with some anxiety.

“Nothing, Colonel. Board doesn’t open till ten o’clock. He’ll be along presently,” I answered.

Half an hour passed and still no Fitz. By this time I, too, had begun to feel nervous. This was a day of all others for a man in Fitz’s position to be on hand early.

I interviewed the clerk privately.

“Stopped at the Bank,” he said in an undertone. “He took some cats and dogs up with him last night and is trying to get a loan. Going to rain down here to-day, I guess, and somebody’ll get wet. Curb market is steady, but you can’t tell anything till the Board opens.”

At ten minutes before ten by the clock on the wall Fitz burst into the office, pulled a package from inside his coat, thrust it through the hole in the glass partition, whispered something to a second clerk who had just come in, and who at Fitz’s command grabbed up his hat, and with three plunges was through the doorway and racing down the street. Then Fitz turned and saw us.

“Why, you dear Colonel, where the devil did you come from?”

The Colonel did not answer. He had noticed Fitz’s concentrated, business-like manner, so different from his bearing of the night before, and had caught the anxious expression on the clerk’s face as he bounded past him on his way to the street. It was evident that the situation was grave and the crisis imminent. The Colonel rose from his seat and held out his hand, his manner one of the utmost solemnity.

“I have heard all about it, Fitz. I am here to stand by you. Let us go inside where we can discuss the situation quietly.”

Fitz looked at the clock—it was a busy day for him—shook the Colonel’s hand in an equally impressive manner, glanced inquiringly at me over his shoulder, and we all three entered the private office and shut the door: he would give us ten minutes at all events. What really perplexed Fitz at the moment was the hour of the Colonel’s visit and his reference to the “stand-by.” These were mysteries which the broker failed to penetrate.

The Colonel tilted his silver-topped cane against Fitz’s desk, put his hat on a pile of papers, drew his chair close and laid his hand impressively on Fitz’s arm. He had the air of a learned counsellor consulting with a client.

“You are too busy, Fitz, to go into the details, and my mind is too much occupied to listen to them, but just give me an outline of the situation so that I can act with the main facts befo’ me.”

Fitz looked at me inquiringly; received my helpless shrug as throwing but little light on the matter, and as was his invariable custom, fell instantly into the Colonel’s mood, answering him precisely as he would have done a brother broker in a similar case.

“It is what we call a ‘squeeze,’ Colonel. I’m through for the day, I hope, for my bank has come to my rescue. My clerk has just carried up a lot of stuff I managed to borrow. But you can’t tell what to-morrow will bring. Looks to me as if everything was going to Bally-hack, and yet there are some things in the air that may change it over night.”

“Am I right when I say that Mr. Klutchem is leadin’ the attack? And on you?”

“That’s just what he is doing—all he knows how.”

“And that any relief must be with his consent?”

“Absolutely, for, strange to say, some of my defaulting customers have been operating in his office.”

The Colonel mused for some time, twisting the fish-hook end of his goatee till it looked like a weapon of offence.

“Is he in town?”

“He was yesterday afternoon.”

The Colonel rose from his chair with a determined air and pulled his coat sleeves over his cuffs.

“I’ll call upon him at once.”

Fitz’s expression changed. Once start the dear Colonel on a mission of this kind and there was no telling what complications might ensue.

“He won’t see you.”

“I have thought of that, Fitz. I do not forget that I informed him I would lay my cane over his back the next time we met, but that mattuh can wait. This concerns the welfare of my dea’est friend and takes precedence of all personal feelin’s.”

“But, Colonel, he would only show you the door. He don’t want talk. He wants something solid as a margin. I’ve sent it to him right along for their account, and he’ll get what’s coming to him to-day, but talk won’t do any good.”

“What do you mean by somethin’ solid, Fitz?”

“Gilt-edged collateral—5.20’s or something as good.”

“I presume any absolutely safe security would answer?”

“Yes.”

“And of what amount?”

“Oh, perhaps fifty thousand—perhaps a hundred. I’ll know to-morrow.”

The Colonel communed with himself for a moment, made a computation with his lips assisted by his fingers, and said with great dignity:

“You haven’t had my ‘Garden Spots’ bonds printed yet, have you?”

“No.”

“Nothin’ lookin’ to’ards it?”

“Yes, certainly, but nothing definite. I’ve got the proposition I told you about from the Engraving Company. Here it is.” And Fitz pulled out a package of papers from a pigeon-hole and laid the letter before the Colonel. It was the ordinary offer agreeing to print the bonds for a specified sum, and had been one of the many harmless dodges Fitz had used to keep the Colonel’s spirits up.

The Colonel studied the document carefully.

“When I accept this, of co’se, the mattuh is closed between me and the Company?”

“Certainly.”

“And no other party could either print or receive the bonds except on my written order?”

“No.” Fitz was groping now in the dark. Why the Colonel should have suddenly dropped Consolidated Smelting to speak of the “Garden Spots” was another mystery.

“And I have a right to transfer this order to any one I please?”

“Of course, Colonel.” The mystery was now impenetrable.

“You have no objection to my takin’ this letter, Fitz?”

“Not the slightest.”

The Colonel walked to the window, looked out for a moment into the street, walked back to Fitz’s desk, and with a tinge of resignation in his voice as if he had at last nerved himself for the worst, laid his hand on Fitz’s shoulder:

“I should never have a moment’s peace, Fitz, if I did not exhaust every means in my power to ward off this catastrophe from you. Kindly give me a pen.”

I moved closer. Was the Colonel going to sign his check for a million, or was there some unknown friend who, at a stroke of his pen, would come to Fitz’s rescue?

The Colonel smoothed out the letter containing the proposition of the Engraving Company, tried the pen on his thumbnail, dipped it carefully in the inkstand, poised it for an instant, and in a firm round hand wrote across its type-written face the words: