Part 14

"I forgot a little matter," explained Westervelt confusedly. And he went uncertainly into his private office, had his secretary put the three ledgers and account books together and wrap them up. "Now," said he, "take the package down to Mr. Fosdick's office. I'll go with you."

As they emerged into the outer room, he glanced furtively and nervously at Armstrong; Armstrong seemed safely absorbed in his dictation. Just as the two reached the hall door, Armstrong, without looking up, called, "Oh, by the way, Mr. Westervelt--just a moment."

Westervelt jumped. "Go on with the books," said he in an undertone to his secretary. "I'll come directly."

Armstrong was looking at the secretary now. "Just put down the package, please," he said carelessly. "I wish to speak to the comptroller about it."

The young man, all unsuspicious of what was below the smooth surface, obediently put down the package. Armstrong drew Westervelt aside. "You are taking those three books, and the one I see bulging in your pocket, down to Mr. Fosdick, aren't you?"

"Yes," said Westervelt.

"Take my advice," said Armstrong. "Don't."

"It's merely a little matter I wish to go over with him--a few minutes," stammered Westervelt.

"I understand perfectly," said Armstrong. "But is it wise for you to put yourself in _anybody's_ power? Don't hand all your weapons to a man who could use them against you--and, as you well know, would do it if he felt compelled. I could stop you from making off with those books. I'm tempted to do it--curiously enough, for your own sake. _I_ don't need them."

Westervelt was studying Armstrong's frank countenance in amazement. "He expects me," he suggested uncertainly.

"Don't leave the books with him," repeated Armstrong. "Don't put yourself in his power." He looked at Westervelt with an expression like that of a man measuring a leap before taking it. "Take the books home," he went on boldly. "Fosdick has been cheating you for years. I will come to see you at your house to-morrow morning." And he returned to his dictation, leaving the old man hesitating in the doorway, thoughtfully fumbling in his long white whiskers with slow, stealthy fingers.

In the corridor, Westervelt said to his secretary, "I think I'll work over the matter at home. I'm not so sick as they seem to imagine. Jump into a cab and drive up to my house, and give the package to my wife. Tell her to take care of it."

When Fosdick saw him empty-handed, he was instantly ablaze. "Has that scoundrel----"

"No, no," explained his old friend, "I got the books, all right."

"Where are they?"

"I sent them uptown--up to my house."

"What the hell did you do that for?" cried Fosdick.

"I thought it best to have them where I could personally take care of them," said Westervelt, his heart bounding with delight. For Fosdick's unguarded tone had set flaming in him that suspicion which thoroughly respectable men always have latent for each other, in circles where respectability rests entirely upon deeds that in the less respectable or on a less magnificent scale would seem quite the reverse of respectable. They know how dear reputation is, how great sacrifices of friendship and honor even the most honorable and generous men will make to safeguard it.

"Well, well," said Fosdick, heaving but oily of surface, and not daring to pursue the subject lest Westervelt should suspect him. "You sent them by safe hands?"

"By my secretary, and to my wife," said Westervelt.

They kept up a rather strained conversation for half an hour, chiefly devoted to abuse of Armstrong--Westervelt's abuse was curiously lacking in heartiness, though Fosdick was too busy with his own thoughts to note it. He suddenly interrupted himself to say: "Oh, I forgot. Excuse me a moment." And he went into the next room. He was gone three quarters of an hour. When he came back, he said, with not very convincing carelessness, "While I was out there talking with Waller, it occurred to me that, on the whole, the books'd be safer in my vaults. So I took the liberty of sending him up to get them. Your wife knows him."

Westervelt smiled in such a way that his white hair and beard and patriarchal features combined in an aspect of beautiful benevolence. "I fear he won't get them, Josiah," said he, chuckling softly.

"Then you'd better telephone her," said Fosdick.

"I have, Josiah," said his old pal, with a glance at the telephone on Fosdick's desk.

The veterans looked each at the other, Josiah reproachfully. "Billy, you don't trust even me," he said sadly.

"I trust no one but the Lord, Josiah," replied Westervelt.

*XVI*

*HUGO SHOWS HIS METTLE*

Fosdick did not go up to parley with the insurgent until after lunch, until he had thought out his game. He went prepared for peace, for a truce, or for war. "Horace," he began, "there are many phases to an enterprise as vast as this. You can't run it as you would a crossroads grocery. You have got to use all sorts of men and measures, to adapt yourself to them, to be broad and tolerant--and diplomatic. Above all, diplomatic." And he went on for some time in this strain of commercial commonplaces, feeling his way carefully. "Now, it may be true--I don't know, but it may be true," he ended, "that Westervelt, in conducting his part of the affairs, has taken wider latitude than perhaps might be tolerated in a man of less strength and standing. We must consider only results. On the other hand, it is just as well that we should know precisely what his methods have been."

At this Armstrong's impassive face showed a gleam of interest. "That's what _I_ thought," said he.

"But it wouldn't do--it wouldn't do at all, Horace, for us to let an outsider like Brownell, at one jump, into the secrets of the company. Why, there's no telling what he would do. He might blackmail us, or sell us out to one of our rivals."

"What have you to propose?" said Armstrong, impatient of these puerile preliminaries. Fosdick was as clever at trickery as is the cleverest; but at its best the best trickery is puerile, once the onlooker, or even the intended victim, is on the alert.

"We must give the accounts a thorough overhauling," answered Fosdick. "But it must be done by our own people. I propose the ordinary procedure for that sort of thing--different men doing different parts of it piecemeal, and sending their reports to one central man who collates them. In that way, only the one man knows what is going on or what is found out."

"Who's the man?" asked Armstrong.

"It struck me that Hugo, being one of the fourth vice-presidents and so in touch with the comptroller's department, would most naturally step into Westervelt's place while he was away."

"Certainly," said Armstrong cordially. "Hugo's the very person."

Fosdick had not dismissed Westervelt's suggestion that Armstrong might be countermining so summarily as he had led Westervelt to believe; he did dismiss it now, however. "The young fool," he decided, "just wanted to show his authority." To Armstrong he said, "You and Hugo can work together."

"No, leave it to Hugo," said Armstrong. "I am content so long as it is definitely understood that I am not responsible. Let the Executive Committee meet and put Hugo formally in charge during Westervelt's absence."

Fosdick went up to Westervelt's house to see him a few days later; to his surprise the old bulwark of public and private virtue seemed completely restored. And Fosdick, with a blindness which he never could account for, was content with his explanation that he had been thinking it over and had reached the conclusion that his interests were perfectly secure, so long as he had the four books. Without a protest he acquiesced in the appointment of Hugo. And so it came peacefully about that Hugo, convinced that no one had ever undertaken quite so important a task as this of his, set himself to investigating the whole financial department of the O.A.D. That is to say, he issued the orders suggested by his father, issued them to subordinates suggested by his father, and brought to his father the reports they made to him.

On the third or fourth day of Westervelt's "illness," Fosdick caught a cold which laid him up with a ferocious attack of the gout. Most of the reports which the subordinates brought to Hugo he did not understand; but he felt that it was his duty to examine them, and spent about three of the four hours he gave to business each day in marching his eye solemnly down the columns of figures and explanations. And thus it came about that he discovered Armstrong's "crime"--twenty-five thousand dollars, which had been paid to Horace Armstrong on his own order and never accounted for; a few months later, a second item of the same size and mystery; a few months later, a third; a fourth, a fifth, a sixth and so on, until in all Armstrong had got from the company on his own order no less than three hundred and fifty thousand dollars for which he never accounted. "A thief!" exclaimed Hugo. "I might have known! These low-born fellows of no breeding, that rise by impudence and cunning, always steal."

Hugo did not go to his father with his startling discovery of this shameful raid on the sacred funds of the widows and orphans of the O.A.D. "I'll not worry the governor when he's ill," he reasoned. "Besides, he's far too gentle and easygoing with Armstrong. No, this is a matter for me to attend to, myself. When it's all over, the governor'll thank me. Anyhow, it's time I showed these people downtown that I understand the game and can play it." And Hugo sent for Armstrong.

Not to come to him at his office; but to call on him at his apartment on the way downtown: "Dear Sir--Mr. Hugo Fosdick wishes you to call on him at the above address at nine to-morrow morning"--this on his private letter paper and signed by his secretary.

Hugo had taken an apartment in a fashionable bachelor flathouse a few months after he became a fourth vice-president. He was not ready to get married. There were only a few women--nine girls and two widows--in the class he deemed eligible, that is, having the looks, the family, and the large fortune, all of which would be indispensable to an aspirant for his hand. And of these eleven, none had as yet shown a sufficient degree of appreciation. Four treated him as they did the other men in their set--with no distinguishing recognition of his superiority of mind and body. Five were more appreciative, but they were, curiously and unfortunately enough, the least pleasing in the three vital respects. However, while he must put off marriage until he should find his affinity, there was no reason why he should continue in the paternal leading strings; so, he set up an establishment befitting his rank and wealth. He took the large flat with its three almost huge general rooms; and, of course he furnished it in that comfortless splendor in which live those of the civilized and semicivilized world in whom prosperity smothers all originality or desire for originality. For Hugo was most careful to do everything and anything expected of his "set" by the sly middle-class purveyors who think out the luxuries and fashions by which they live off the vanities and conventionalities of the rich.

When Armstrong appeared, Hugo had been shaved and bathed and massaged and manicured and perfumed and dressed; he was seated at a little breakfast table drawn near the open fire in the dining room, two men servants in attendance--a third had ushered Armstrong in. He was arrayed in a gray silk house suit, with facings of a deeper gray, over it a long grayish-purple silk and eiderdown robe. He was in the act of lighting a cigarette at the cut glass and gold lamp which his butler was holding respectfully.

"Ah--Armstrong!" he said, with that high-pitched voice and affected accent which makes the person who uses it seem to say, "You will note that I am a real aristocrat." Then to the butler, "I wish to be alone."

"Yes, sir," said the butler, with a bow. The other servant bowed also, and they left the room.

"Well, what is it, Fosdick?" said Armstrong, seating himself.

Hugo frowned at that familiarity, aggravated by the curt tone. "I shall not detain you long enough for you to be at the trouble of seating yourself," said he.

Armstrong reflected on this an instant before he grasped what Hugo was driving at. Then he smiled. "Go on--what is it?" he said, settling himself.

"I directed you to come here," said Hugo, "because I wished to avoid every possibility of scandal. I assume you understood, as soon as you got my note?"

Armstrong looked at him quizzically. "And I came," said he, "because I assumed you had some important, very private, message from your father. I thought perhaps your father would be here."

"My father knows nothing of this," said Hugo. "I thought it more humane to spare him the pain of discovering that a servant he regarded as faithful had shamefully betrayed him."

"I might have known!" exclaimed Armstrong with good-natured disgust, rising. "So you brought me here to discuss some trifle about your servants. Some day, if I get the leisure, my young friend, I'll tell you what I think of you. But not to-day. Good morning."

"Stop!" commanded Hugo. As Armstrong did not stop, he said, "I have discovered your thefts from the company."

Armstrong wheeled, blanched. He looked hard at young Fosdick; then he slowly returned to his chair. "I understand," he said, in a voice most unlike his own.

"And I sent for you," continued Hugo triumphantly, "to tell you I will permit you quietly to resign. You will write out your resignation at the desk in the next room. I shall present it to the Board, and shall see that it is accepted without scandal or question. Of course, so far as you are able, you must make good your shortage. But I shall not be hard on you. I appreciate that chaps like you are often tempted beyond their powers of resistance."

By this time Armstrong was smiling so broadly that Hugo, absorbed though he was in his own role of the philosophic gentleman, had to see it. He broke off, reddened, rose and drew himself to his full height--and a very elegant figure he was. Armstrong looked up at him from his indolent lounge in the big chair. "Did you pose that before a cheval glass, Hugo?" he said, in a pleasant, contemptuous tone.

"You will force me to the alternative," cried Hugo furiously.

Armstrong got up. "Go ahead, old man," he said. "Do whatever you please. Better talk to your father first, though." He glanced round. "You're very gorgeous here--too gorgeous for the hard-working, poor people who pay for it. I'll have to interfere." He smiled at Hugo again, but there was an unpleasant glitter in his eyes. "You are suspended from the fourth vice-presidency," he went on tranquilly. "And you will vacate these premises before noon to-day. See that you take nothing with you that belongs to the O.A.D. If you do, I'll have you in a police court. Be out before noon. Brownell will be up at that hour."

Hugo stood staring. This effrontery was unbelievable. Before he could recover himself, Armstrong was gone. He sat down and slowly thought it out. Yes, it was true, the flat had been taken nominally as an uptown branch of the O.A.D. home office; much of the furniture had been paid for by the company; several of the servants were on the pay roll as clerks and laborers; yes, he had even let the O.A.D. pay grocery and wine bills--was he not like his father--did not everything he did, everything he ate and drank, contribute to the glory and stability of the O.A.D.? He was but following the established usage among the powers that deigned to guard the financial interests of the people. Perhaps, he carried the system a little further, more frankly further, than some; but logically, legitimately. Still, Armstrong was president, had nominally the authority to make things unpleasant for him.

He looked at the clock--it was ten; no time to lose. He rushed into his clothes, darted into his waiting brougham and drove home. The doctor was with his father; he had to wait, pacing and fuming, until nearly eleven before he could get admission. The old man, haggard and miserable, was stretched on a sofa-bed before the fire in his sitting room. "Well, what do you want?" he said sharply.

Hugo did not pause to choose words. "I found in the books," said he, "where Armstrong had taken three hundred and fifty thousand dollars from us--from the company. I thought I'd not worry you with it. So I sent for him to come to my rooms."

"What!" yelled Fosdick, getting his breath which had gone at the first shock. "What the damnation! You sprung _my_ trap! You _fool_!"

"I ordered him to resign," Hugo hastened on. "And he refused, and ordered me to vacate my rooms before noon--because the lease stands in the name of the company. And he suspended me as vice-president."

"Good, good!" shouted Fosdick, his thin, wire-like hair, his gaunt face, his whole lean body streaming fury. "Why has God cursed me with such a son as this! How dare you! You wretched idiot! You have ruined us all!"

Hugo cowered. Making full allowance for his father's physical pain and violent temper, there was still that in the old man's face which convinced Hugo he had made a frightful blunder. "I'll vacate," he said, near to whimpering, "I'll do whatever you say."

"Give me that telephone!" ordered the old man.

Fosdick got the O.A.D. building and Armstrong's office. And soon Armstrong's voice came over the wire. "Is that you, Armstrong--Horace--? Yes, I recognize your voice. This is Fosdick. That fool boy of mine has just told me what he did."

"Yes," came in Armstrong's noncommittal voice.

"I want to say you did perfectly right in ordering him to vacate."

"Thanks."

"He'll be out by the time you set. His resignation as vice-president is on the way downtown. I'm sending him to apologize to you. I want to do everything, anything to show my deep humiliation, my deep regret."

No answer from the other end of the wire.

"Are you there, Horace?"

"Yes."

"Have I made myself clear? Is there anything I can do?"

"Nothing. Is that all?"

"Can you come up here? It's impossible for me to leave my bedroom--simply out of the question."

"I'm too busy this morning."

"This afternoon?"

"Not to-day. Good-by."

The ring-off sounded mockingly in the old man's ear. With an oath he caught up the telephone apparatus and flung it at Hugo's head. "Ass! Ass!" he shouted, shaking his cane at his son, who had barely dodged the heavy instrument. "Vacate that apartment! Take the first steamer for Europe! And don't you show up in town again until I give you leave. Hide yourself! Ass! Ass!"

Hugo scudded like a swallow before a tempest. "Is there any depth," he said when he felt at a safe distance, "_any_ depth to which father wouldn't descend, for the sake of money--and drag us down with him?" He admitted that perhaps he had not acted altogether discreetly. "I oughtn't to have roused Armstrong's envy by letting him see my rooms." Still, that could have been easily repaired. Certainly, it wasn't necessary to grovel before an employee--"and a damned thief at that." By the time he reached his apartments, he was quite restored to favor with himself. He hurried the servants away, telephoned for a firm of packers and movers to come at once. As he rang off, a call came for him. He recognized the voice of Armstrong's secretary.

"Is that Mr. Hugo Fosdick? Well, Mr. Armstrong asks me to say that it won't be necessary for you to give up those offices uptown to-day, that you can keep them as long as you please."

"Aha!" thought Hugo, triumphant again. "He has come to his senses. I knew it--I knew he would!" To the secretary he simply said, "Very well," and rang up his father. It was nearly half an hour before he could get him; the wire was busy. At his first word, the old man said, "Ring off there! I don't want to hear or see you. You take that steamer to-morrow!"

"Armstrong has weakened, father," cried Hugo.

"What!" answered the old man, not less savage, but instantly eager.

"He has just telephoned, practically apologizing, and asking me not to disturb myself about the apartment. I knew he'd come down when he thought it over."

A silence, then his father said in a milder tone: "Well--you keep away from the office. Don't touch business, don't go near it, until I tell you to. And don't come near me till I send for you. What else did Armstrong say?"

"Just what I told you--nothing more. But when I see him, he'll apologize, no doubt."

"See that you don't see him," snapped the old man. "Keep away from anybody that knows anything of business. Keep to that crowd of empty-heads you travel with. Do you understand?"

"Yes, father," said Hugo, in the respectful tone he never, in his most supercilious mood, forgot to use toward the custodian and arbiter of his prospects.

*XVII*

*VIOLETTE'S TAPESTRIES*

Armstrong would not have protested Raphael's favorite fling at the financial district as "a wallow of dishonor"; and Boris's description of him as reeking the slime of the wallow was no harsher than what he was daily thinking about himself.