Part 4

"Yes," interrupted Fosdick; "it's true, once in a while there's a big enough howl to frighten a few weak brothers. But not Josiah Fosdick, and not the O.A.D. We keep books better than we did before the big clean-up. A lot of good those clean-ups did! As if anybody could get up any scheme that would prevent the men with brains from running things as they damn please."

"You're right there," said Armstrong. He had thought out the beginnings of a new course. "Well, if you put Hugo in, I suggest you give him my place as chairman of the finance committee. My strong hold is executive work. Let those that know finance attend to taking care of the money. I want to devote myself exclusively to getting it in."

Armstrong saw this suggestion raised not the shadow of a suspicion in Fosdick's mind that he was trying to get rid of his share in the responsibility for the main part of the "technically illegal" doings of the controllers of the company. "You simply to retain your _ex officio_ membership?" said he reflectively.

"That's it," assented Armstrong.

"If you urge it, I'll see that it is considered. Your time ought all to be given to raking in new business and holding on to the old. Yes, it's a good suggestion. Of course, I'll see that you get your share of the profits from our little side deals, just the same."

"Thank you," said Armstrong. He concealed his amusement. In the company there were rings within rings, and the profits increased as the center was approached. He knew that he himself had been put in a ring well toward the outside. His profits were larger than his salary, large though it was; but they were trifling in comparison with the "melons" reserved for the inner rings, were infinitesimal beside the big melon Josiah reserved for himself, as his own share in addition to a share in each ring's "rake off." The only ring Josiah didn't put himself in was the outermost ring of all--the ring of policy holders. There was another feature in which insurance surpassed railways and industrials. In them the controller sometimes had to lock up a large part of his own personal resources in carrying blocks of stock that paid a paltry four or five or six per cent interest, never more than seven or eight, often nothing at all. But in insurance, the controller played his game wholly with other people's money. Josiah, for instance, carried a policy of ten thousand dollars, and that was the full extent of his investment; he held his power over the millions of the masses simply because the proxies of the policy holders were made out in blank to his creatures, the general agents, whom he made and, at the slightest sign of flagging personal loyalty, deposed.

Fosdick was still emitting compliment and promise like a giant pinwheel's glittering shower when the boy brought Armstrong a card. He controlled his face better than he thought. "Your daughter," he said to Fosdick, carelessly showing him the card. "I suppose she's downtown to see you, and they told her you were in my office."

"Amy!" exclaimed Fosdick, forgetting his manners and snatching the card. "What the devil does _she_ want downtown? I'll just see--it must be important."

He hurried out. In the second of Armstrong's suite of three offices, he saw her, seated comfortably--a fine exhibit of fashion, and not so unmindful of the impression her elegance was making upon the furtively glancing underlings as she seemed or imagined herself. At sight of her father she colored, then tossed her head defiantly. "What is it?" he demanded, with some anxiety. "What has brought _you_ downtown to see me?"

"I didn't come to see you," she replied. "I sent my card to Mr. Armstrong."

"Well, what do you want of him?" said Josiah, regardless of the presence of Armstrong's three secretaries.

"I'll explain that to _him_."

"You'll do nothing of the sort. I can't have my children interrupting busy men. Come along with me."

"I came to see Mr. Armstrong, and I'm going to see him," she retorted imperiously.

Her father changed his tactics like the veteran strategist that he was. "All right, all right. Come in. Only, we're not going to stay long.

"I don't want you," she said, laughing. "I want him to show me over the building."

"Lord bless my soul!" exclaimed Fosdick, winking at the three smiling secretaries. "And he the president! Did anybody ever hear the like!" And he took her by the arm and led her in, saying as they came, "This young lady, finding time heavy on her hands uptown, has come to get you to show her over the building."

Armstrong had risen to bow coldly. "I'm sorry, but I really haven't time to-day," said he formally.

Fosdick's brow reddened and his eyes flashed. He had not expected Armstrong to offer to act as his daughter's guide; but neither had he expected this tone from an employee. "Don't be so serious, young man," said he, roughness putting on the manner of good nature. "Take my daughter round and bring her to my office when you are through."

To give Armstrong time and the opportunity to extricate himself from the impossible position into which he had rushed, Amy said, "What grand, beautiful offices these are! No wonder the men prefer it downtown to the fussy, freaky houses the women get together uptown. I haven't been here since the building was opened. Papa made a great ceremony of that, and we all came--I was nine. Now, Mr. Armstrong, you can count up, if you're depraved enough, and know exactly how old I am."

Armstrong had taken up his hat. "Whenever you're ready, we'll start," said he, having concluded that it would be impossible to refuse without seeming ridiculous.

When the two were in the elevator on their way to the view from the top of the building, Amy glanced mischievously up at him. "You see, I got my way," said she. "I always do."

Armstrong shrugged and smiled stolidly. "In trifles. Willful people are always winning--in trifles."

"Trifles are all that women deal in," rejoined she.

At the top, she sent one swift glance round the overwhelming panorama of peak and precipice and canon swept by icy January wind and ran back to the tower, drawing her furs still closer about her. "I didn't come to see this," she said. "I came to find out why you don't--why you have cut me off your visiting list. I've written you--I've tried to get you on the telephone. Never did I humiliate myself so abjectly--in fact, never before was I abject at all. It isn't like you, to be as good friends as you and I have been, and then, all at once, to act like this--unless there was a reason. I haven't many friends. I haven't any I like so well as you--that's frank, isn't it? I thought we were going to be _such_ friends." This nervously, with an air of timidity that was the thin cover of perfect self-possession and self-confidence.

"So did I," said Armstrong, his eyes on hers with a steadiness she could not withstand, "until I got at your notion of friendship. You can have dogs and servants, hangers-on, but not friends."

"What did I do?" she asked innocently. "Gracious, how touchy you are."

In his eyes there was an amused refusal to accept her pretense. "You understand. Don't 'fake' with me. I'm too old a bird for that snare."

"If I did anything to offend you, it was unconscious."

"Perhaps it was--at the time. You've got the habit of ordering people about, of having everybody do just what you wish. But, in thinking things over, didn't you guess what discouraged me?"

She decided to admit what could not be denied. "Yes--I did," said she. "And that is why I've come to you. I forgot, and treated you like the others. I did it several times, and disregarded the danger signals you flew. Let's begin once more--will you?"

"Certainly," said Armstrong, but without enthusiasm.

"You aren't forgiving me," she exclaimed. "Or--was there--something else?"

His eyes shifted and he retreated a step. "You mustn't expect much from me, you know," said he, looking huge and unapproachable. "All my time is taken up with business. You've no real use for a man like me. What you want is somebody to idle about with you."

"That's just what I don't want," she cried, gazing admiringly up at him. And she was sad and reproachful as she pleaded. "You oughtn't to desert me. I know I can't do much for you, but-- You found me idle and oh, so bored. Why, I used to spend hours in trying to think of trivial ways to pass the time. I'd run to see pictures I didn't in the least care about, and linger at the dressmakers' and the milliners' shops and the jewelers'. I'd dress myself as slowly as possible. You can't imagine--you who have to fight against being overwhelmed with things to do. You can't conceive what a time the women in our station have. And one suggestion you made--that I study architecture and fit myself to help in building our house--it changed my whole life."

"It was the obvious thing to do," said he, and she saw he was not in the least flattered by her flattery which she had thought would be irresistible.

"You forget," replied she, "that we women of the upper class are brought up not to put out our minds on anything for very long, but to fly from one thing to another. I'd never have had the persistence to keep at architecture until the hard part of the reading was finished. I'd have bought a lot of books, glanced at the pictures, read a few pages and then dropped the whole business. And it was really through you that I got father to introduce me to Narcisse Siersdorf. I've grown _so_ fond of her! Why is it the women out West, out where you come from, are so much more capable than we are?"

"Because they're educated in much the same way as the men," replied he. "Also, I suppose the men out there aren't rich enough yet to tempt the women to become--odalisques. Here, every one of you is either an odalisque or trying to get hold of some man with money enough to make her one."

"What is an odalisque? It's some kind of a woman, isn't it?"

"Well--it's of that sex."

"You think I'm very worthless, don't you?"

"To a man like me. For a man with time for what they call the ornamental side of life, you'd be--just right."

"Was that why--the _real_ reason why--you stopped coming?"

"Yes."

He was looking at her, she at the floor, gathering her courage to make a reply which instinct forbade and vanity and desire urged. Hugo's head appeared in the hatchway entrance to the tower room. As she was facing it, she saw him immediately. "Hello, brother," she cried, irritation in her voice.

He did not answer until he had emerged into the room. Then he said with great dignity, "Amy, father wants you. Come with me." This without a glance at Armstrong.

"Would you believe he is three years younger than I?" said she to Armstrong with a laugh. "Run along, Hugo, and tell papa we're coming."

Hugo turned on Armstrong. "Will you kindly descend?" he ordered, with the hauteur of a prince in a novel or play.

"Do as your sister bids, Hugo," said Armstrong, with a carelessness that bordered on contempt. He was in no very good humor with the Fosdick family and Hugo's impudence pushed him dangerously near to the line where a self-respecting man casts aside politeness and prudence.

Hugo drew himself up and stared coldly at the "employee." "You will please not address me as Hugo."

"What then?" said Armstrong, with no overt intent to offend. "Shall I whistle when I want you, or snap my fingers?"

Amy increased Hugo's fury by laughing at him. "You'd better behave, Hugo," she said. "Come along." And she pushed him, less reluctant than he seemed, toward the stairway.

The three descended in the elevator together, Amy talking incessantly, Armstrong tranquil, Hugo sullen. At the seventeenth floor, Armstrong had the elevator stopped. "Good-by," he said to Amy, without offering to shake hands.

"Good-by," responded she, extending her hand, insistently. "Remember, we are friends again."

With a slight noncommittal smile, he touched her gloved fingers and went his way.

There was no one in Fosdick's private room; so, Hugo was free to ease his mind. "What do you mean by coming down here and making a scandal?" he burst out. "It was bad enough for you to encourage the fellow's attentions uptown--to flirt with him. You--flirting with one of your father's employees!"

Amy's eyes sparkled angrily. "Horace Armstrong is my best friend," she said. "You must be careful what you say to me about him."

"The next thing, you'll be boasting you're in love with him," sneered her brother.

"I might do worse," retorted she. "I could hardly do better."

"What's the matter, children?" cried their father, entering suddenly by a door which had been ajar, and by which they had not expected him.

"Hugo has been making a fool of himself before Armstrong," said Amy. "Why did you send him after me?"

"I?" replied Fosdick. "I simply told him where you were."

"But I suspected," said Hugo. "And, sure enough, I found her flirting with him. I stopped it--that's all."

Fosdick laughed boisterously--an unnatural laugh, Amy thought. "Do light your cigar, father," she said irritably. "It smells horrid."

Fosdick threw it away. "Horace is a mighty attractive fellow," he said. "I don't blame you, Mimi." Then, with good-humored seriousness, "But you must be careful, girl, not to raise false hopes in him. Be friendly, but don't place yourself in an unpleasant position. You oughtn't to let him lose sight of the--the gulf between you."

"What gulf?"

"You know perfectly well he's not in our class," exclaimed Hugo, helping out his somewhat embarrassed father.

"What is our class?" inquired Amy in her most perverse mood.

"Shut up, Hugo!" commanded his father. "She understands."

"But I do not," protested Amy.

"Very well," replied her father, kissing her. "Be careful--that's all. Now, I'll put you in your carriage." On the way he said gravely, tenderly, "I'll trust you with a secret--a part of one. I know Armstrong better than you do. He's an adventurer, and I fear he has got into serious trouble, very serious. Keep this to yourself, Mimi. Trust your father's judgment--at least, for a few months. Be most polite to our fascinating friend, but keep him at a safe distance."

Fosdick could be wonderfully moving and impressive when he set himself to it; and he knew when to stop as well as what to say. Amy made no reply; in silence she let him tuck the robe about her and start her homeward.

*V*

*NARCISSE AND ALOIS*

When Amy thought of her surroundings again, she was within a few blocks of home. "I won't lunch alone," she said. "I can't, with this on my mind." Through the tube she bade the coachman turn back to the Siersdorf offices.

A few minutes, and her little victoria was at the curb before a brownstone house that would have passed for a residence had there not been, to the right of the doorway, a small bronze sign bearing the words, "A. and N. Siersdorf, Builders." Two women were together on the sidewalk at the foot of the stoop. One, Amy noted, had a curiously long face, a curiously narrow figure; but she noted nothing further, as there was nothing in her toilet to arrest the feminine eye, ever on the rove for opportunities to learn something, or to criticise something, in the appearance of other women. The other was Narcisse Siersdorf--a strong figure, somewhat below the medium height, like Amy herself; a certain remote Teutonic suggestion in the oval features, fair, fine skin and abundant fair hair; a quick, positive manner, the dress of a highly prosperous working woman, businesslike yet feminine and attractive in its details. The short blue skirt, for example, escaped the ground evenly, hung well and fitted well across the hips; the blue jacket was cut for freedom of movement without sacrificing grace of line; and her white gloves were fresh. As Amy descended, she heard Narcisse say to the other woman, "Now, please don't treat me as a 'foreign devil.' If I hadn't happened on you in the street, I'd never have seen you."

"Really, I've intended to stop in, every time I passed," said the other, moving away as she saw Amy approaching. "Good-by. I'll send you a note as soon as I get back--about a week."

"One of the girls from out West," Narcisse explained. "We went to school together for a while. She's as shy as a hermit thrush, but worth pursuing."

"You're to lunch with me," said Amy.

Narcisse shook her head. "No--and you're not lunching with me, to-day. My brother's come, and we've got to talk business."

Amy frowned, remembering that those tactics were of no avail with Narcisse. "Please! I want to meet your brother--I really ought to meet him. And I'll promise not to speak."

"He's a man; so he'd be unable to talk freely, with a woman there," replied Narcisse. "You two would be posing and trying to make an impression on each other."

"Please!"

They were in the doorway, Narcisse blocking the passage to the offices. "Good-by," she said. "You mustn't push in between the poor and their bread and butter."

Amy was turning away. Her expression--forlorn, hurt, and movingly genuine--was too much for Narcisse's firmness. "You're not especially gay to-day," said she, relentingly.

Amy, quick as a child to detect the yielding note, brought her flitting mind back to Armstrong and her troubles. "My faith in a person I was very fond of has been--shaken." There was a break in her voice, and her bright shallow eyes were misty.

"Come in," said Narcisse, not wholly deceived, but too soft-hearted not to give Amy the benefit of the doubt, just as she gave to whining beggars, though she knew they were "working" her. Anyhow, was not Amy to be pitied on general principles, and dealt gently with, as a victim of the blight of wealth?

Amy never entered those offices without a new sensation of pleasure. The voluntary environment of a human being is a projection, a reflection, of his inner self, is the plain, undeceiving index to his real life--for, is not the life within, the drama of thought, the real life, and the drama of action but the imperfect, distorted shadowgraph? The barest room can be most significant of the personality of its tenant; his failure to make any impression on his surroundings is conclusive. The most crowded or the gaudiest room may tell the same story as the barest. The Siersdorfs conducted their business in five rooms, each a different expression of the simplicity and sincerity which characterized them and their work. There was the same notable absence of the useless, of the merely ornamental, the same making of every detail contributory both to use and to beauty. One wearies of rooms that are in any way ostentatious; proclamation of simplicity is as tedious as proclamation of pretentiousness. Those rooms seemed to diffuse serenity; they were like the friends of whom one never tires because they always have something new and interesting to offer. Especially did there seem to be something miraculous about Narcisse's own private office. It had few articles in it, and they unobtrusive; yet, to sit in that room and look about was to have as many differing impressions as one would get in watching a beam of white light upon a plain of virgin snow.

"How _do_ you do it!" Amy exclaimed, as she seated herself. She almost always made the same remark in the same circumstances. "But then," she went on, "_you_ are a miracle. Now, there's the dress you've got on--it's a jacket, a blouse, a belt and a skirt. But what have you done to it? How do you induce your dressmaker to put together such things for you?"

"You have to tell a dressmaker what to do," replied Narcisse, "and then you have to tell her how to do it. If she knew what to make and how, she'd not stop at dressmaking long. As I get only a few things, I can take pains with them. But you get so many that you have to accept what somebody else has thought out, and just as they've thought it out."

"And the result is, I look a frump," said Amy, half believing it for the moment.

"You look the woman who has too many clothes to have any that really belong to her," replied Narcisse, greatly to Amy's secret irritation. "There's the curse of wealth--too many clothes, to be well dressed; too many servants, to be well served; too many and too big houses, to be well housed; too much food, to be well fed." Then to the office boy for whom she had rung, "Please ask my brother if he's ready."

Soon Siersdorf appeared--about five years younger than his sister, who seemed a scant thirty; in his dress and way of wearing the hair and beard a suggestion of Europe, of Paris, and of the artist--a mere suggestion, just a touch of individuality--but not a trace of pose, and no eccentricity. He was of the medium height, very blond, with more sympathy than strength in his features, but no defined weakness either. A boy-man of fine instincts and tastes, you would have said; indolent, yet capable of being spurred to toil; taking his color from his surroundings, yet retaining his own fiber. He was just back from a year abroad, where he had been studying country houses with especial reference to harmony between house and garden--for, the Siersdorfs had a theory that a place should be designed in its entirety and that the builder should be the designer. They called themselves builders rather than architects, because they thought that the separation of the two inseparable departments was a ruinous piece of artistic snobbishness--what is every kind of snobbishness in its essence but the divorce of brain and hand? "No self-respecting man," Siersdorf often said, "can look on his trade as anything but a profession, or on his profession as anything but a trade."

During lunch Amy all but forgot her father's depressing hints against Armstrong in listening as the brother and sister talked; and, as she listened, she envied. They were so interested, and so interesting. Their life revealed her own as drearily flat and wearily empty. They knew so much, knew it so thoroughly. "How could anyone else fail to get tired of me when I get so horribly tired of myself?" she thought, at the low ebb of depression about herself--an unusual mood, for habitually she took it for granted that she must be one of the most envied and most enviable persons in the world.

Narcisse suddenly said to her brother, "Whom do you think I met to-day? Neva Carlin." At that name Amy, startled, became alert. "She's got a studio down at the end of the block," Narcisse went on, "and is taking lessons from Boris Raphael. That shows she has real talent, unless--" She paused with a smile.

"Probably," said Alois. "Boris is always in love with some woman."

"In love with love," corrected Narcisse. "Men who are always in love care little about the particular woman who happens to be the medium of the moment."

"I thought she was well off," said Alois; and then he looked slightly confused, as if he was trying not to show that he had made a slip.

Narcisse seemed unconscious, though she replied with, "There are people in the world who work when they don't have to. And a few of them are women."

"But I thought she was married, too. It seems to me I heard it somewhere."

"I didn't ask questions," said Narcisse. "I never do, when I meet anyone I haven't seen in a long time. It's highly unsafe."

With studied carelessness Amy now said: "I'd like to know her. She's the woman you were talking with at the door just now, isn't she?"

"Yes," said Narcisse.

"She looked--unusual," continued Amy. "I wish you'd take me to see her."