Читать книгу Gerald Cranston's Lady - Gilbert Frankau - Страница 28

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Long lunches were never Gerald Cranston’s habit. At two fifteen, leaving Grayford, Morrison, and his brother Harry still discussing—over fat cigars in the underground Palmerston—the impending prosecution for fraud of Edward Robert Sedgcumbe and the other directors of Coronation Cotton, he walked slowly along the tiled passage toward Old Broad Street. As he walked, his brain functioned at high pressure—mapping out further details of his scheme. “Have to put a really good man in charge,” he thought; and so thinking, encountered Tillotson.

“I was coming to find you, sir,” began Tillotson. “Something’s happening on the Exchange. They’ve marked our ordinaries up five shillings since one o’clock. And there’s a letter just come for you from Mr. Bewsher. It’s marked ‘Urgent and Confidential.’ ”

“Thanks, Tillotson.” Cranston took the typewritten envelope; and, thrusting it unopened into the pocket of his jacket, returned hotfoot to Pinner’s Court. The rise in the shares—Cranston ordinaries had a very limited market on the London Stock Exchange—needed elucidation. “Bewsher’s letter can wait,” he decided, returning to his sanctum and laying the envelope on his desk while he called his brokers.

The weather had cleared a little. Over the chimney-pots, through the three narrow windows, stole gleams of watery sunshine. Automatically, waiting for his call, Cranston switched off the desk-lamp. Then—his brokers pleading completest ignorance of the share transaction which had caused the rise—he switched the lamp on again, and, with his usual deliberateness, slit Bewsher’s envelope to read:

Dear Mr. Cranston.

On thinking over the policy discussed at to-day’s board-meeting, I am convinced that it is the wrong one. Will you therefore—if no embarrassment—let me resign my directorship? I find that I possess, in addition to my five-hundred pound (nominal) preferred share qualification, a little parcel of ordinaries. Should you care to relieve me of same, you would be doing a favor to

Yours sincerely,

Ephraim Bewsher.

P.S. To-day’s market-price would be quite satisfactory.

Cranston, his forehead wrinkling, read the note twice; wondered, for a second or so, whether it would be worth while offending the old man; decided it inadvisable; and called through his desk-transmitter to bring the shareholders’ register. According to that register, Ephraim Bewsher held three thousand two-pound ordinary shares, the value of which, since one o’clock, had appreciated by seven hundred and fifty pounds!

“There’s a catch somewhere,” thought Cranston; but before he could solve the problem, the telephone-bell tinkled and a girl’s voice asked: “Am I speaking to Mr. Gerald Cranston? ... Will you hold on a moment, please, sir? ... Mr. Bewsher wishes to speak with you.”

“Hallo!” A moment later Ephraim’s own voice came, cracked but confident, over the wire. “Hallo! Is that you, Mr. Cranston? Did you get my letter?”

“I’m just reading it now,” remarked Cranston, playing for time; and his brain hammered away at its problem while the cracked voice went on: “You understand that I don’t want to embarrass you by resigning in a hurry, especially with the market so firm. But I’m an old man, a very old man. And my solicitors don’t like my holding too many speculative shares. They say”—chuckle—“that if anything were to happen, ordinary shares would take a lot of realizing. Especially”—another chuckle—“ordinary shares in Cranston’s, Limited. If anything were to happen to me, they say, and my executors had to realize my holding, the loss on your shares might be as much as ten shillings apiece. That’s why I thought that, before doing anything in the matter, I’d offer them to you.”

“At market-price?” Suddenly—for now part of the catch was plain as daylight—Gerald Cranston’s eyes flickered for battle.

“Of course,” the old man came back at him; “London market price. Two and a half, five eighths, I think they are, or thereabouts.”

“For how many?”

“Let me see,” slowly. “How many have I got? Three thousand five hundred I think it is. Yes, that’s right, three thousand five hundred.”

At that, though his eyes still flickered for battle, Gerald Cranston knew himself already defeated. Thinking sixty thoughts to the second, he realized that Ephraim, by purchasing those extra five hundred shares in his “dinner-hour,” had purposely raised the price; that Ephraim’s talk about his solicitors was mere camouflage; that Ephraim, actually, was threatening to throw his entire ordinary holding on a limited market, and simultaneously to resign his directorship, unless he, the majority shareholder, bought him out at a profit.

For the fraction of a moment his gall rose; for the fraction of a moment he knew the impulse to let the Welshman carry out his unuttered threat, to counter it by buying against him on the Exchange. That move, however, would save no money. And, besides, the old man’s sudden resignation might prejudice the company with its bankers.

“Daylight robbery,” he thought: but in the end, nervous of offending a money-power greater than his own, decided to submit, doing so with a controlled: “Very well, Mr. Bewsher, I’ll take the little parcel at two and a half. You can have my check on delivery of the script. It’s understood, of course, that you won’t resign from the board or dispose of your director’s qualification until I can find somebody of equal standing to take your place.”

“You’ll have the script to-morrow.” Ephraim Bewsher chuckled over the wire. “All except the odd five hundred. Maybe they’ll take a day or so longer.”

“And what about the directorship?”

“There’s no hurry about that, Mr. Cranston. Suit your own convenience. Maybe”—a last chuckle—“if I hang on to the qualification shares a while, I’ll pay for another dinner out of them.”

The victimizer clicked off, and his victim summoned Tillotson. “Wonder what’s behind that?” thought Tillotson, watching the calm, unmoved face that dictated confirmation of the recent share deal.

Despite the outward calmness, however, Gerald Cranston could not quite conquer his gall. Ephraim’s last chuckle had rankled, and continued to rankle. He felt that he had been beaten, beaten ruthlessly out of nearly a thousand pounds. That the beating had been strictly in accordance with the rules of the game, he realized; yet, consciously a little, and subconsciously a great deal, it irritated him.

He, Gerald Cranston, had knuckled under to a power greater than his own!