by Bret Harte
CHAPTER I
A strong southwester was beating against the windows and doors ofStacy's Bank in San Francisco, and spreading a film of rain between theregular splendors of its mahogany counters and sprucely dressed clerksand the usual passing pedestrian. For Stacy's new banking-house hadlong since received the epithet of "palatial" from an enthusiasticlocal press fresh from the "opening" luncheon in its richly decorateddirectors' rooms, and it was said that once a homely would-be depositorfrom One Horse Gulch was so cowed by its magnificence that his heartfailed him at the last moment, and mumbling an apology to the elegantreceiving teller, fled with his greasy chamois pouch of gold-dust todeposit his treasure in the dingy Mint around the corner. Perhaps therewas something of this feeling, mingled with a certain simple-mindedfascination, in the hesitation of a stranger of a higher class whoentered the bank that rainy morning and finally tendered his card to theimportant negro messenger.
The card preceded him through noiselessly swinging doors and acrossheavily carpeted passages until it reached the inner core of Mr. JamesStacy's private offices, and was respectfully laid before him. He wasnot alone. At his side, in an attitude of polite and studied expectancy,stood a correct-looking young man, for whom Mr. Stacy was evidentlywriting a memorandum. The stranger glanced furtively at the card with acuriosity hardly in keeping with his suggested good breeding; but Stacydid not look at it until he had finished his memorandum.
"There," he said, with business decision, "you can tell your people thatif we carry their new debentures over our limit we will expect a largermargin. Ditches are not what they were three years ago when miners werewilling to waste their money over your rates. They don't gamble THAT WAYany more, and your company ought to know it, and not gamble themselvesover that prospect." He handed the paper to the stranger, who bowed overit with studied politeness, and backed towards the door. Stacy took upthe waiting card, read it, said to the messenger, "Show him in," andin the same breath turned to his guest: "I say, Van Loo, it's GeorgeBarker! You know him."
"Yes," said Van Loo, with a polite hesitation as he halted at the door."He was--I think--er--in your employ at Heavy Tree Hill."
"Nonsense! He was my partner. And you must have known him since atBoomville. Come! He got forty shares of Ditch stock--through you--at110, which were worth about 80! SOMEBODY must have made money enough byit to remember him."
"I was only speaking of him socially," said Van Loo, with a deprecatingsmile. "You know he married a young woman--the hotel-keeper's daughter,who used to wait at the table--and after my mother and sister came outto keep house for me at Boomville it was quite impossible for me to seemuch of him, for he seldom went out without his wife, you know."
"Yes," said Stacy dryly, "I think you didn't like his marriage. But I'mglad your disinclination to see him isn't on account of that deal instocks."
"Oh no," said Van Loo. "Good-by."
But, unfortunately, in the next passage he came upon Barker, who with acry of unfeigned pleasure, none the less sincere that he was feeling alittle alien in these impressive surroundings, recognized him. Nothingcould exceed Van Loo's protest of delight at the meeting; nothinghis equal desolation at the fact that he was hastening to anotherengagement. "But your old partner," he added, with a smile, "is waitingfor you; he has just received your card, and I should be only keepingyou from him. So glad to see you; you're looking so well. Good-by!Good-by!"
Reassured, Barker no longer hesitated, but dashed with his oldimpetuousness into his former partner's room. Stacy, already deeplyabsorbed in other business, was sitting with his back towards him, andBarker's arms were actually encircling his neck before the astonishedand half-angry man looked up. But when his eyes met the laughing grayones of Barker above him he gently disengaged himself with a quickreturn of the caress, rose, shut the door of an inner office, andreturning pushed Barker into an armchair in quite the old suppressivefashion of former days. Yes; it was the same Stacy that Barker lookedat, albeit his brown beard was now closely cropped around his determinedmouth and jaw in a kind of grave decorum, and his energetic limbsalready attuned to the rigor of clothes of fashionable cut and stillmore rigorous sombreness of color.
"Barker boy," he began, with the familiar twinkle in his keen eyes whichthe younger partner remembered, "I don't encourage stag dancing among myyoung men during bank hours, and you'll please to remember that we arenot on Heavy Tree Hill"--
"Where," broke in Barker enthusiastically, "we were only overlooked bythe Black Spur Range and the Sierran snow-line; where the nearest voicethat came to you was quarter of a mile away as the crow flies and nearlya mile by the trail."
"And was generally an oath!" said Stacy. "But you're in San FranciscoNOW. Where are you stopping?" He took up a pencil and held it over amemorandum pad awaitingly.
"At the Brook House. It's"--
"Hold on! 'Brook House,'" Stacy repeated as he jotted it down. "And forhow long?"
"Oh, a day or two. You see, Kitty"--
Stacy checked him with a movement of his pencil in the air, and thenwrote down, "'Day or two.' Wife with you?"
"Yes; and oh, Stacy, our boy! Ah!" he went on, with a laugh, knockingaside the remonstrating pencil, "you must listen! He's just thesweetest, knowingest little chap living. Do you know what we're going tochristen him? Well, he'll be Stacy Demorest Barker. Good names, aren'tthey? And then it perpetuates the dear old friendship."
Stacy picked up the pencil again, wrote "Wife and child S. D. B.," andleaned back in his chair. "Now, Barker," he said briefly, "I'm comingto dine with you tonight at 7.30 sharp. THEN we'll talk Heavy Tree Hill,wife, baby, and S. D. B. But here I'm all for business. Have you anywith me?"
Barker, who was easily amused, had extracted a certain entertainment outof Stacy's memorandum, but he straightened himself with a look of eagerconfidence and said, "Certainly; that's just what it is--business. Lord!Stacy, I'm ALL business now. I'm in everything. And I bank with you,though perhaps you don't know it; it's in your Branch at Marysville. Ididn't want to say anything about it to you before. But Lord! youdon't suppose that I'd bank anywhere else while you are in thebusiness--checks, dividends, and all that; but in this matter I felt youknew, old chap. I didn't want to talk to a banker nor to a bank, but toJim Stacy, my old partner."
"Barker," said Stacy curtly, "how much money are you short of?"
At this direct question Barker's always quick color rose, but, with anequally quick smile, he said, "I don't know yet that I'm short at all."
"But I do!"
"Look here, Jim: why, I'm just overloaded with shares and stocks," saidBarker, smiling.
"Not one of which you could realize on without sacrifice. Barker, threeyears ago you had three hundred thousand dollars put to your account atSan Francisco."
"Yes," said Barker, with a quiet reminiscent laugh. "I remember I wantedto draw it out in one check to see how it would look."
"And you've drawn out all in three years, and it looks d----d bad."
"How did you know it?" asked Barker, his face beaming only withadmiration of his companion's omniscience.
"How did I know it?" retorted Stacy. "I know YOU, and I know the kind ofpeople who have unloaded to you."
"Come, Stacy," said Barker, "I've only invested in shares and stockslike everybody else, and then only on the best advice I could get:like Van Loo's, for instance,--that man who was here just now, thenew manager of the Empire Ditch Company; and Carter's, my own Kitty'sfather. And when I was offered fifty thousand Wide West Extensions,and was hesitating over it, he told me YOU were in it too--and that wasenough for me to buy it."
"Yes, but we didn't go into it at his figures."
"No," said Barker, with an eager smile, "but you SOLD at his figures,for I knew that when I found that YOU, my old partner, was in it; don'tyou see, I preferred to buy it through your bank, and did at 110. Ofcourse, you wouldn't have sold it at that figure if it wasn't worth itthen, and neither I nor you are to blame if it dropped the next week to60, don't you see
?"
Stacy's eyes hardened for a moment as he looked keenly into his formerpartner's bright gray ones, but there was no trace of irony in Barker's.On the contrary, a slight shade of sadness came over them. "No," he saidreflectively, "I don't think I've ever been foolish or followed out myOWN ideas, except once, and that was extravagant, I admit. That wasmy idea of building a kind of refuge, you know, on the site of our oldcabin, where poor miners and played-out prospectors waiting for a strikecould stay without paying anything. Well, I sunk twenty thousanddollars in that, and might have lost more, only Carter--Kitty'sfather--persuaded me--he's an awful clever old fellow--into turning itinto a kind of branch hotel of Boomville, while using it as a hotel totake poor chaps who couldn't pay, at half prices, or quarter prices,PRIVATELY, don't you see, so as to spare their pride,--awfully pretty,wasn't it?--and make the hotel profit by it."
"Well?" said Stacy as Barker paused.
"They didn't come," said Barker.
"But," he added eagerly, "it shows that things were better than I hadimagined. Only the others did not come, either."
"And you lost your twenty thousand dollars," said Stacy curtly.
"FIFTY thousand," said Barker, "for of course it had to be a largerhotel than the other. And I think that Carter wouldn't have gone into itexcept to save me from losing money."
"And yet made you lose fifty thousand instead of twenty. For I don'tsuppose HE advanced anything."
"He gave his time and experience," said Barker simply.
"I don't think it worth thirty thousand dollars," said Stacy dryly. "Butall this doesn't tell me what your business is with me to-day."
"No," said Barker, brightening up, "but it is business, you know.Something in the old style--as between partner and partner--and that'swhy I came to YOU, and not to the 'banker.' And it all comes out ofsomething that Demorest once told us; so you see it's all us threeagain! Well, you know, of course, that the Excelsior Ditch Company haveabandoned the Bar and Heavy Tree Hill. It didn't pay."
"Yes; nor does the company pay any dividends now. You ought to know,with fifty thousand of their stock on your hands."
Barker laughed. "But listen. I found that I could buy up their wholeplant and all the ditching along the Black Spur Range for ten thousanddollars."
"And Great Scott! you don't think of taking up their business?" saidStacy, aghast.
Barker laughed more heartily. "No. Not their business. But I rememberthat once Demorest told us, in the dear old days, that it cost nearlyas much to make a water ditch as a railroad, in the way of surveying andengineering and levels, you know. And here's the plant for a railroad.Don't you see?"
"But a railroad from Black Spur to Heavy Tree Hill--what's the good ofthat?"
"Why, Black Spur will be in the line of the new Divide Railroad they'retrying to get a bill for in the legislature."
"An infamous piece of wildcat jobbing that will never pass," said Stacydecisively.
"They said BECAUSE it was that, it would pass," said Barker simply."They say that Watson's Bank is in it, and is bound to get it through.And as that is a rival bank of yours, don't you see, I thought that ifWE could get something real good or valuable out of it,--something thatwould do the Black Spur good,--it would be all right."
"And was your business to consult me about it?" said Stacy bluntly.
"No," said Barker, "it's too late to consult you now, though I wish Ihad. I've given my word to take it, and I can't back out. But I haven'tthe ten thousand dollars, and I came to you."
Stacy slowly settled himself back in his chair, and put both hands inhis pockets. "Not a cent, Barker, not a cent."
"I'm not asking it of the BANK," said Barker, with a smile, "for I couldhave gone to the bank for it. But as this was something between us, I amasking you, Stacy, as my old partner."
"And I am answering you, Barker, as your old partner, but also as thepartner of a hundred other men, who have even a greater right to ask me.And my answer is, not a cent!"
Barker looked at him with a pale, astonished face and slightly partedlips. Stacy rose, thrust his hands deeper in his pockets, and standingbefore him went on:--
"Now look here! It's time you should understand me and yourself. Threeyears ago, when our partnership was dissolved by accident, or mutualconsent, we will say, we started afresh, each on our own hook. Throughfoolishness and bad advice you have in those three years hopelesslyinvolved yourself as you never would have done had we been partners, andyet in your difficulty you ask me and my new partners to help you out ofa difficulty in which they have no concern."
"Your NEW partners?" stammered Barker.
"Yes, my new partners; for every man who has a share, or a deposit, oran interest, or a dollar in this bank is my PARTNER--even you, with yoursecurities at the Branch, are one; and you may say that in THIS I amprotecting you against yourself."
"But you have money--you have private means."
"None to speculate with as you wish me to--on account of my position;none to give away foolishly as you expect me to--on account of precedentand example. I am a soulless machine taking care of capital intrusted tome and my brains, but decidedly NOT to my heart nor my sentiment. So myanswer is, not a cent!"
Barker's face had changed; his color had come back, but with an olderexpression. Presently, however, his beaming smile returned, with theadditional suggestion of an affectionate toleration which puzzled Stacy.
"I believe you're right, old chap," he said, extending his hand to thebanker, "and I wish I had talked to you before. But it's too late now,and I've given my word."
"Your WORD!" said Stacy. "Have you no written agreement?"
"No. My word was accepted." He blushed slightly as if conscious of agreat weakness.
"But that isn't legal nor business. And you couldn't even hold the DitchCompany to it if THEY chose to back out."
"But I don't think they will," said Barker simply. "And you see my wordwasn't given entirely to THEM. I bought the thing through my wife'scousin, Henry Spring, a broker, and he makes something by it, from thecompany, on commission. And I can't go back on HIM. What did you say?"
Stacy had only groaned through his set teeth. "Nothing," he saidbriefly, "except that I'm coming, as I said before, to dine with youto-night; but no more BUSINESS. I've enough of that with others, andthere are some waiting for me in the outer office now."
Barker rose at once, but with the same affectionate smile and tendergravity of countenance, and laid his hand caressingly on Stacy'sshoulder. "It's like you to give up so much of your time to me and myfoolishness and be so frank with me. And I know it's mighty rough onyou to have to be a mere machine instead of Jim Stacy. Don't you botherabout me. I'll sell some of my Wide West Extension and pull the thingthrough myself. It's all right, but I'm sorry for you, old chap." Heglanced around the room at the walls and rich paneling, and added, "Isuppose that's what you have to pay for all this sort of thing?"
Before Stacy could reply, a waiting visitor was announced for the secondtime, and Barker, with another hand-shake and a reassuring smile to hisold partner, passed into the hall, as if the onus of any infelicity inthe interview was upon himself alone. But Stacy did not seem to be in aparticularly accessible mood to the new caller, who in his turn appearedto be slightly irritated by having been kept waiting over some irksomebusiness. "You don't seem to follow me," he said to Stacy after recitinghis business perplexity. "Can't you suggest something?"
"Well, why don't you get hold of one of your board of directors?"said Stacy abstractedly. "There's Captain Drummond; you and he are oldfriends. You were comrades in the Mexican War, weren't you?"
"That be d----d!" said his visitor bitterly. "All his interests arethe other way, and in a trade of this kind, you know, Stacy, that a manwould sacrifice his own brother. Do you suppose that he'd let up on asure thing that he's got just because he and I fought side by side atCerro Gordo? Come! what are you giving us? You're the last man I everexpected to hear that kind of flapdoodle from. If it's because yo
ur bankhas got some other interest and you can't advise me, why don't you sayso?" Nevertheless, in spite of Stacy's abrupt disclaimer, he left a fewminutes later, half convinced that Stacy's lukewarmness was due to someadverse influence. Other callers were almost as quickly disposed of, andat the end of an hour Stacy found himself again alone.
But not apparently in a very satisfied mood. After a few moments ofpurely mechanical memoranda-making, he rose abruptly and opened a smalldrawer in a cabinet, from which he took a letter still in its envelope.It bore a foreign postmark. Glancing over it hastily, his eyes atlast became fixed on a concluding paragraph. "I hope," wrote hiscorrespondent, "that even in the rush of your big business you willsometimes look after Barker. Not that I think the dear old chap willever go wrong--indeed, I often wish I was as certain of myself as ofhim and his insight; but I am afraid we were more inclined to be merelyamused and tolerant of his wonderful trust and simplicity than to reallyunderstand it for his own good and ours. I know you did not like hismarriage, and were inclined to believe he was the victim of a ratherunscrupulous father and a foolish, unequal girl; but are you satisfiedthat he would have been the happier without it, or lived his perfectlife under other and what you may think wiser conditions? If he WROTEthe poetry that he LIVES everybody would think him wonderful; for beingwhat he is we never give him sufficient credit." Stacy smiled grimly,and penciled on his memorandum, "He wants it to the amount of tenthousand dollars." "Anyhow," continued the writer, "look after him, Jim,for his sake, your sake, and the sake of--PHIL DEMOREST."
Stacy put the letter back in its envelope, and tossing it grimly asidewent on with his calculations. Presently he stopped, restored the letterto his cabinet, and rang a bell on his table. "Send Mr. North here,"he said to the negro messenger. In a few moments his chief book-keeperappeared in the doorway.
"Turn to the Branch ledger and bring me a statement of Mr. GeorgeBarker's account."
"He was here a moment ago," said North, essaying a confidential looktowards his chief.
"I know it," said Stacy coolly, without looking up.
"He's been running a good deal on wildcat lately," suggested North.
"I asked for his account, and not your opinion of it," said Stacyshortly.
The subordinate withdrew somewhat abashed but still curious, andreturned presently with a ledger which he laid before his chief. Stacyran his eyes over the list of Barker's securities; it seemed to him thatall the wildest schemes of the past year stared him in the face. Hisfinger, however, stopped on the Wide West Extension. "Mr. Barker will bewanting to sell some of this stock. What is it quoted at now?"
"Sixty."
"But I would prefer that Mr. Barker should not offer in the open marketat present. Give him seventy for it--private sale; that will be tenthousand dollars paid to his credit. Advise the Branch of this at once,and to keep the transaction quiet."
"Yes, sir," responded the clerk as he moved towards the door. But hehesitated, and with another essay at confidence said insinuatingly, "Ialways thought, sir, that Wide West would recover."
Stacy, perhaps not displeased to find what had evidently passed in hissubordinate's mind, looked at him and said dryly, "Then I would adviseyou also to keep that opinion to yourself." But, clever as he was, hehad not anticipated the result. Mr. North, though a trusted employee,was human. On arriving in the outer office he beckoned to one of thelounging brokers, and in a low voice said, "I'll take two shares of WideWest, if you can get it cheap."
The broker's face became alert and eager. "Yes, but I say, is anythingup?"
"I'm not here to give the business of the bank away," retorted Northseverely; "take the order or leave it."
The man hurried away. Having thus vindicated his humanity by alsopassing the snub he had received from Stacy to an inferior, he turnedaway to carry out his master's instructions, yet secure in the beliefthat he had profited by his superior discernment of the real reasonof that master's singular conduct. But when he returned to the privateroom, in hopes of further revelations, Mr. Stacy was closeted withanother financial magnate, and had apparently divested his mind of thewhole affair.