Dynasty of Death

by Taylor Caldwell

  Both brothers were bachelors; Nicholas with hints of a dead youthful romance (when speaking to voters of a sentimental turn), and Gregory without any explanation at all. Though neither suspected it, they had one powerful thing in common: a thirst for money and power. Nicholas recognized this in himself, and used every effort to gratify the thirst; Gregory did not recognize it.

  Their father had built himself a tremendous stone house with gray square stone pillars on a large rise of ground that, though it was not near the river, did by virtue of its height command a very fine distant view of it. It had gardens and gigantic trees, stables and horses, dogs in profusion, grooms, maidservants, cooks and gardeners. Wings had been added wherever one could be built on without necessitating cutting of trees, and so the house had a rather weird shape without a parallel in geometry. So it happened that the second story of the servants’ quarters stared squarely at the first story of the family quarters, due to the fact that the former quarters had had to accommodate itself to a lower level of ground, and because of the proximity of trees, had been added at a right angle. Ivy covered the gray walls in the summer, very impressively, and the trees interlaced over it and about the house, enveloping it in green gloom and slashes of sunlight. It was a house built for many children and many parties and much gaiety, for the hearths were tremendous, the rooms of a good shape and capacity, the windows large, the gardens, old-fashioned though they were, really beautiful in their informality.

  Gregory did not need such a large house and such a retinue of servants, for Nicholas was rarely home. Gregory had only a small and choice circle of friends in Windsor, for he was bitterly exclusive and feudal. However, he would not shut off a single room of the great house nor dismiss one of the horde of servants. His pride lived in every room, walked in every hall. He could not cut it off by so much as a cubbyhole. It was expensive to run, also. Nicholas agreed with his brother, on one of the rare occasions when they did agree, for during the summer he liked to bring (at different times, of course), his Tory Washington friends there to impress them with the order and spaciousness and grace and dignity and fineness which they worshipped, and his more uncouth Democratic colleagues to impress them with his democracy, hospitality, “simplicity of table and countrified life.” (No airs, gentlemen, no airs!) When one of his more homespun friends jocosely prophesied that this house would one day be known as a secondary White House, Nicholas protested, but with secret elation.

  Gregory despised Nicholas, and Nicholas detested Gregory. Yet the brothers were invariably polite and considerate of each other, respecting each other’s privacy of thought and life, listening with apparent deference to each other’s opinions. If they argued, they did it coolly and without acrimony. They kept up a tradition between them of brotherly accord and dignity, helped each other, were honest with each other. If necessary, they would have died for each other. For in fundamental things they had much in common, such as their rapacity, disillusion, irony, and hatred for their inferiors.

  It was toward this family that Ernest Barbour turned his nineteen-year-old face one fine morning. It was like the turning of the face of destiny, but only Ernest had even the dimmest awareness of this.

  George Barbour had done all negotiations with The Sessions Steel Company himself, and then only through Gregory’s assistant, one John Baldwin, a hardbitten and ruthless Man Faithful. George stood in awe of the Sessionses, for they were the feudal family of Windsor, and George had the Englishman’s ancient reverence for “gentry” and position. The fame of the family, the fact that Nicholas was a Senator and had been the Mayor, their reputed wealth and seclusiveness and pride, were common talk in Windsor. What the Sessionses did was history, matter for excited talk, even if it were only the purchase of a new carriage or the death or hiring of a servant. Once George, waiting humbly in an anteroom in the Sessions office, had been informed by John Baldwin that Gregory was expected any moment, and George had risen in sheer panic and had fled. Later, he actually did see the great man, who had nodded to him absentmindedly; this nod was enlarged by George into gracious conversation and interest, and not a little flattery. Only his wife, Daisy, believed this, and she was fond of telling her acquaintances for months thereafter that Mr. Gregory had extended a very civil invitation to Mr. George and his family to visit the Sessions home.

  Once or twice Joseph Barbour had offered to visit the Sessions factory in George’s stead, but this had so horrified his brother that he never again offered it. Had he suggested visiting the King of England George would have thought it hardly more blasphemous.

  But Ernest Barbour determined today to visit the Sessions factory.

  A lesser young man would have carefully arrayed himself in his best fawn-colored broadcloth coat, his best though most discreetly flowered satin waistcoat, his tightest light pantaloons and shiniest polished boots, would have selected a cane with painful care and tenderly brushed his Sunday “stove-pipe” hat. But Ernest, the frigidly astute, knew better than this. He approached the sooty Sessions factory in his plain dark coat and light brown decent pantaloons and dull boots; he walked in his plainness and respectability with the simplest of dignity and pride. Joseph possessed a sturdy chaise and a smart brown mare now, but even this Ernest did not use. He entered the gritty dimness of the office with an air at once so austere and calm that John Baldwin involuntarily rose to his feet.

  “I,” said Ernest, looking at him directly, “am Ernest Barbour of Barbour & Bouchard. I should like to speak to Mr. Gregory Sessions.”

  John Baldwin, as he said later, “was floored.” The impudent young pup! he said. And yet, he added, that phrase certainly did not suit young Barbour. He was not impudent; he had stated his name as one would say: I am Bonaparte. Neither was his request impudent; it seemed perfectly natural and proper that such as he should demand audiences with kings. It was true that his features were large and uncompromising rather than refined, and his voice too autocratic and harsh for the graciousness of a born gentleman. But his manner overcame all these, subjugated, for a moment, even John Baldwin. At least that gentleman, without further question, and to his own amazement, found himself announcing Ernest Barbour. Gregory said that he would see the gentleman in a few moments; so John, still under the compulsion of Ernest’s will, asked the young man to be seated until Gregory could see him.

  Ernest sat down, and with perfect poise looked quietly about him. The room was dim and unaired, and smelled of old papers, dust and mice and coal oil. John Baldwin sat at a splintered desk near the windows, which blazed with the yellow glory of sunlight. Through the golden haze of the glass Ernest could see the swift slope to the river, the bright glitter of the water, the wooden dock that ran out to meet it. A brown flatboat was tied up at the dock and several workmen were rapidly loading ingots and other metal shapes on the broad low deck. From a funnel aft a lazy plume of smoke floated to and fro, seemingly attached to the funnel. There was no foliage in this blasted area, but on the opposite shore the autumn burned in scarlet and bronze and golden trees. Ernest could not see the factory through these windows, for it lay to the side and behind the office, but he could feel and hear its low and steady throbbing and the voices of the men.

  The view through the windows was restful and quiet, for all of the pigmy activity of the men on the docks, for the sky was the dark blazing blue of frosty October days, the clouds were extraordinarily pure and white and close, and the river, the same glittering blue as the heavens, carried drowsy flatboats and smaller river craft upon it. But there was no rest in Ernest Barbour, only the repose of one who pauses for a while, grimly, to lay plans and gather strength. He was too discerning and intelligent not to notice the beauty of the river and sky and autumn trees, but this notice had nothing of emotion in it. He appreciated it with his mind, and therefore remained unstirred and untroubled. He was more interested, too, in every detail of the office room, and more acutely in John Baldwin.

  He studied that man carefully and thoroughly. John was lean and withered
and brown and stringy, but nervously alert. His dark cheeks were sunken and heavily furrowed, his forehead bony, his small bright eyes sunken but agile as a monkey’s, his lips splayed and tightened and livid, his nose a prow. He had an extraordinarily large skull, brown and bald, and fringed with a longish edge of black-gray hair, and the effect of this skull, and the shrivelled, sagacious, ruthless face below it was that of a mummy that had come to life. He was only about forty-five, but appeared ageless. He gave the impression of implacable devotion, of an integrity that was not without its malice and its cunning. There was no doubt about his intellect: it showed itself in every deep discolored crease in his face, in the shining gauntness of his immense forehead. A bachelor like his employer, he had dedicated his life to him, not consciously, but because men such as he fasten avidly and immovably on the first object their youth detects. Now he was no longer young, but he clung, and worked as no one else had ever worked for the Sessions Company. He knew the business far better than did Nicholas Sessions, and only a little less than did Gregory. There were no hours too long, no days too tiring, no illness too incapacitating, to cause him to flag. There was less of loyalty in his devotion than egotism.

  He did not look through the window with an awakened eye. If he did look, it was with a frown at what he considered the slowness of the workmen. Once or twice he muttered impatiently to himself, shifted his long cadaverous legs and shuffled his bony feet. The sun blazed on his skull giving some of its yellowness to it. Then John happened to look up, alertly, to see that Ernest was watching him; he gathered a swift impression that the young man had been so regarding him for a long time. He was annoyed, as if he had been caught partially undressed.

  John Baldwin frequently boasted that there was no face that he could not read. But he could not read this quiet and rigid face. It seemed to him that there was no expression whatsoever in those light intent eyes, beyond the mere expression of cold interest. It was like looking at the face of a statue. It gave him, John said later, “quite a turn.” His antagonism stirred, and then, amazingly, died away. To his own surprise he felt a sudden surge of interest for the young man, a sudden respect. He was only a beardless brat, after all; but somehow John was not convinced by his own thought. He wetted his lips.

  “Fine day,” he said.

  “Yes. It’s getting cool, though,” replied Ernest.

  “You’re English, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.” Ernest smiled. “Any objection to that?”

  John’s dry mouth twisted. “No. My granddad was an Englishman Right from the old sod. Baldwin’s an old English name. Folks hereabouts don’t care much for the English, though. And you can’t blame ’em; they never did anything to build up this country, but now they come to grab.”

  If Ernest was offended he gave no sign of it. He merely listened with that cold interest that had so disconcerted John Baldwin.

  “There’s lots of building yet to do in this country,” he replied after a long pause. “And you mustn’t forget that Englishmen were here before your Revolution, and that Englishmen made your Constitution, and that English laws, morals and religion rule your country. In fact,” he added, and now he smiled again, coldly, “this is an English country, English language and all. You’ll have a lot to be thankful for if only Englishmen come in the future.”

  John scratched his wiry chin and stared. “Aye!” he exclaimed after a moment, as if struck. “Damned if you’re not right! We’re already getting in some queer stuff from Europe. But Sessions never will employ such truck. America for Americans. Mr. Gregory says these foreigners are a menace to the country, that they’ll make it like ancient Rome, enemies inside the gates. What do you think?”

  Ernest frowned slightly. He disliked idle conversation that did not lead to the matter at hand. His mouth jerked with impatience. Nevertheless he replied civilly enough.

  “I’m not certain. This country’s got to grow. None of us realize its possibilities yet. Look at all the frontiers to the west. Some day they’ll be gone, and it’ll be one busy nation from coast to coast. But you can’t do it on the handful of British descendants you have here, not if every family has ten children. Oh, perhaps you’d do it in a thousand years, but there’s something in the air of this country that won’t let you wait that long. The air hurries you, makes your blood boil. So, you’ll have to call immigrants in, to help you. There’s work to do here that your old settlers will soon be too proud to do. You’ll have to call in the immigrants, no matter where you get them. Thousands of them; hundreds of thousands of them. To draw your water and cut down your forests and fill your factories. And your cities.”

  John shook his head ominously. “It’ll be a sad day for America.”

  Again Ernest smiled. He did not answer for a long moment. Then he said: “Cheap labor. That’s how we’ll grow rich.”

  “Ah,” said John thoughtfully, still staring at him. Ernest held his hat on his knees, sitting upright. He contemplated the scene through the windows so pointedly that John was both irritated and abashed. He was not a loquacious man by nature, and indifferent to the business of other people. But something in Ernest’s attitude goaded him, made him force speech.

  “So you’re the son of Joe Barbour. Never saw him, but heard of him from your uncle, George Barbour.” Ernest’s eyes for the first time flickered, pointed. Baldwin saw this, gloated a little to himself, though he did not know as yet what had changed Ernest’s expression. “You’ve got a tidy little shop down there, so Mr. Gregory says. You buy a nice piece of our steel. But then, anyone who wants to build a reputation buys our steel. Why haven’t you been up here before?”

  “There was no need to,” answered Ernestly curtly. His pale cheeks had a little dull tinge in them.

  “And now there’s need, eh?”

  Ernest made no reply. He had studied Baldwin and did not underestimate him. He understood him thoroughly. He was annoyed that he found himself wasting time disliking him pointlessly.

  The office door opened, and Gregory Sessions called: “Send the young man in, John.” Ernest rose, without haste and yet with rapidity, and without a glance at Baldwin went into the inner office.

  Gregory, sitting indolently at his wide mahogany desk with his elbows upon it, was slightly surprised at the sight of Ernest. He inclined his thin long head graciously but unsmilingly. Everything about him, Ernest thought, was thin and long and elegant, from his hair, which flowed delicately to his collar and which was faintly waved and gray-touched, to his gaunt, ivory-tinted face and quick, narrow eyes and lips, to his slender pointed fingers and shining, pointed boots. He was dressed in sleek black broadcloth, his broadcloth shirt whitely pleated, his cravat elegantly folded and tied. But what Ernest noticed the most was the fact that even when he was unsmiling his face was carved with lines at once ironical and amused and faintly cruel, and his eyes, sharply blue were suspicious and cold.

  As the young man advanced across the floor toward the desk and an empty waiting chair, he felt vastly relieved. It was as if he had feared something, and finding it non-existent, could breathe more easily and with hope. He had encompassed, within a few seconds, not only Gregory Sessions and his character and possibilities, but the gritty smugness of the office and its air of surety. He knew that the rug under his feet, dusty yet rich, was worn thin, and that if it were not replaced it was not due to poverty but to indifference. Besides, it was the first office he had ever seen that had a rug, and he marked it in his mechanical mind as a very pleasant innovation. He sat down on the chair opposite Gregory Sessions and carefully laid his hat on the desk. The two men, one almost old, the other almost too young, regarded each other gravely.

  “Mr. Ernest Barbour, I believe?” asked Gregory at last with elaborate old-fashioned courtesy which even Ernest, the exigent, found agreeable. He could approve of this gracious dallying with unnecessary words, for he felt that Gregory had earned the time for dalliance.

  “Yes, I am Ernest Barbour,” he answered quietly, looking at the othe
r with his light and steadfast eyes.

  Gregory very indolently pushed forward a carved ivory box, long and narrow. “May I offer you one of my Virginia cheroots?” he said indifferently.

  “No, thank you. I do not smoke.” Ernest modulated his somewhat loud and harsh voice to correspond with the accents that fascinated him. He looked at Gregory earnestly as the latter put a taper in the fire near him and lit a cheroot. “Mr. Sessions, I never waste words. I am here to ask a favor of you.”