Wheels within Wheels

by Alec Waugh

  For a couple of hours he sat among his papers; then he drafted a cablegram to Bergheim.

  “Will buy up to a third total value.”

  He had come to the same decision as innumerable other financiers. He had decided to sell gilt-edged securities at par, rather than realize depreciated stock; and to use those gilt-edged securities as a defence of uncertain investments.

  • • • • •

  The news that Newton was prepared to take on no more than a third of the Syndicate’s obligations reached Bauer on the Monday morning. It coincided with the news that the market was breaking again; that after the temporary recovery of the Friday and Saturday and the lull of the week-end with its series of pronouncements from high authority that there was nothing to be alarmed about; that the fundamental condition of the country was basically sound; the tide had again set in. Steel was down, Allied Chemicals, General Electric. Bauer was very near to panic.

  Was it really true that the prosperity which innumerable articles and speeches had extolled as the proof of America’s superiority over the rest of the world was crumbling: that America could not and did not stand apart from the world: that she was just one large boulder in an avalanche that was hurtling to destruction? Would he be wise to sell out all he had: to let his stocks go even at their absurd present level: to make certain of something: to invest what little remained in gilt-edged bonds?

  Such an action was opposed to every principle that had been inculcated into him since childhood. That was the English, the European way: to regard capital as a nest egg; not as the means to further capital; to shut it away, let it bring in its five per cent.: never adventure with it: never see big: live on your income in Bath or Cheltenham; or if you couldn’t afford that, in a Riviera pension. He had heard lecturers make fun of that kind of cowardice. He wasn’t going to do that. No, sir, he wasn’t. And yet he was frightened of all this whispering about collapse that he heard on every side of him. It was like a top going round inside his head.

  It was three o’clock in the afternoon when he got the news from Bergheim. He had a couple of appointments that afternoon. But the news had so disturbed him that he felt he would be unable to give them his full attention.

  “Tell them I’m feeling sick,” he told his secretary.

  He would go back and see his mother. No, he wouldn’t: he’d go back to Caroline. He’d have a long drink of rye, and listen to the radio. Caroline was good to look at. She’d cheer him up. It would be a surprise for her, his coming back like this.

  • • • • •

  It was more of a surprise for her than he had fancied. Caroline was entertaining. A tall, blond-haired young man in a rather shabby suit was lounging back among the cushions. His face was a little flushed. A highball three-quarters empty was on the table at his side; in the ash-tray were a number of cigarette ends, less than half of which bore the red smear which proved they had been smoked by Caroline.

  “He’s been here a long time,” thought Roy.

  • • • • •

  Lester had been there in actual fact for a couple of hours. Caroline had promised to lunch with him; he had arranged to call for her. If there was time they would go to a picture afterwards. But they had not gone to a picture; they had not gone out to lunch; they had not lunched, even; they had sat there talking; there had been so much to talk about.

  At a first glance Caroline had known that something was the matter. She had become familiar, during their half year’s friendship, with many moods. She had seen him tired, she had seen him excited; she had seen very often the abstracted, pent-up look of one whose thoughts are somewhere else. She had related those moods to his business; to the mysterious activities by which men set such store and which to her were as tedious as they were trivial. With that she was familiar. But not with this pallid, exhausted, beaten look: the look of some one who was through.

  She looked anxiously at him.

  “Are you ill?”

  “I wish I were.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’d like that to be all that’s wrong with me.”

  She made no reply. She had learnt that men when they are in sympathetic company prefer to tell their secrets in their own way, in their own time.

  “I’ll fix you a drink,” she said.

  He sat on the divan, silent, while she in the kitchenette busied herself with ice pick and white rock. He lit a cigarette, took a few whiffs at it, then stubbed its glowing end against the ash-tray. He took a quick gulp at the glass she handed him, shook his head as one does in the morning to rouse oneself from a heavy sleep, rose to his feet, put down his glass, began to walk backwards and forwards, up and down the room. She sat watching him, till suddenly he checked his stride and with his hands thrust deep into his trouser pockets, swung round and stood facing her.

  “Honey, I’m cleaned right out.”

  She made no answer. So that was the explanation of that pent-up look. Like all the rest, he had played the market. Like so many others, he had been let down.

  “Not a cent. Wiped right out. And last Wednesday I was worth thirteen thousand dollars.”

  “What!”

  She was astounded. She had had no idea he had any money at all. She had been so anxious not to let him spend his money on her: had put herself to all kinds of inconveniences to save him a seventy-five cent taxifare; all the time he had thirteen thousand.

  “Thirteen thousand dollars,” he repeated. “I’d made it in the six months since I knew you. All I had then was five hundred dollars; tucked away in bonds; in case I should be ill or anything. I took that, I took every penny I could save or borrow. I bought on margin. I had friends in Wall Street. They were clients at Renter’s. Now and again I got inside tips. It was so easy. Everything I bought went up. Even in that September break I was on the lucky side. I got out quick, and got in on the ground floor. I was making right up to the beginning of last week. At the pace I was making, I saw myself with a hundred thousand before Christmas. I’d always heard it was the first thousand that was hardest to earn: that after that it was like a snowball. One stood and watched it. I’d made that first thousand. By Christmas-time I told myself….”

  He paused.

  “I reckon you don’t need telling what it was that I wanted all that dough for.”

  She met his glance tranquilly. She had known him in many moods. But never in one like this. She let him talk.

  “It was for you I wanted it. I fell for you straightway. You don’t need telling that. I don’t know anything about you. But I saw this: that you’re the kind of person that must have money; that you need a swell apartment, a servant, plenty of dresses. You want to be able to go places and do things. However you might feel about me, I knew that I’d be no use to you till I could give you that. I knew that I’d have no right to ask to be anything but a friend till I could give you that. I said to myself,’ I’ll make money. I’ll make a hundred thousand. Other people have. Then I’ll come round to you and say, Now we can start.’”

  “You cared that much?”

  “You are the loveliest thing I’ve ever set my eyes on.”

  They were the words that she had longed to hear: that she had waited for through a long gold summer, and a rich brown autumn. She had pictured the moment and the place. She had seen her eyes closing to that music. She had seen herself engulfed and drowned in the moment’s rapture. She had pictured it that way. And now that it had come it could not have been more different. Instead of surrendering to ardour, she had to comfort grief. Instead of knowing the relief of weakness, she had to summon her reserve of strength.

  “Sit here,” she said, patting the cushions at her side. She took his hand in hers. She spoke slowly, consolingly, tenderly. Instead of listening, she had to talk. She drew his head upon her shoulder. Instead of surrendering into his arms, she took him into hers.

  “Don’t worry, little one,” she said.

  They sat quietly, talking: of the dream that had vanished: of what had
been: of how they had felt at this moment and that. In her dreams she had pictured herself in the lull that follows love comparing confidences: saying, “When did you first feel this about me?” “Did you wonder what I meant on such and such a day?” It was in that way that they talked now. But in how different a spirit; after a confession of failure, not after a triumphant wooing.

  • • • • •

  The afternoon was late when there came the sound of a key turning in the door. The young man rose to his feet as Bauer walked into the room. If he was shy, he did not show it. He had a truculent, awkward, determined look. His chin was firm.

  Caroline did not move from the cushions. She stretched out a hand lazily.

  “Roy, meet Mr. Lester. Mark, this is Mr. Bauer. I told you about Mr. Lester, Roy. He came round from Renter’s to see about a new setting for that emerald of mine.”

  “I see.”

  “We’ve been talking about the market. He tells me he’s thinking of leaving New York.”

  “Is he?”

  Roy Bauer fixed the young man with a look that seemed to suggest that he would be delighted if Mr. Lester began his vacating of New York by the vacating of that apartment.

  “Yes sir,” said Mark. “New York’s a grand place when things are going well. It’s the worst place in the world when things are bad.”

  “You think that, do you?”

  “Yes sir, New York is like the end of a weathervane. You feel it wobbling. It’s so far away from the centre where wealth is produced that it registers every movement. If things are a little good it rockets miles high. If things are a little bad it rockets miles low.”

  “So you think that?”

  “New York’s been the first place to crash: it’ll be the longest to recover.”

  “Mr. Lester’s thinking of going west,” Caroline interpolated. “To some place where things are produced: not where they are sold. Mr. Lester lost all the money he had saved.”

  “So did every elevator man and bellhop in Manhattan.”

  Bauer spoke impatiently. He could not stand the way in which Caroline kept repeating the name, “Mr. Lester.” He could not bear the admiring way in which she looked at Lester. And he didn’t like, for that matter, coming back to his girl’s apartment and finding her drinking highballs with a smart-Alick, wise-cracking young salesman whom she’d never have met if he hadn’t made her a present of a bangle. A pretty business. You send a salesman round with a tray of sparklers, just to show your girl what a grand guy you are, and you come back and find her thinking not you, but the salesman, the grand guy. Hell take it, but he’d show them.

  With a quick stride and his left thumb thrust into his belt, he walked backwards and forwards across the room.

  “A few bellhops have been washed out. Yes, I know. People who knew nothing of the market thought any fool could play it. They didn’t know that it was a profession like any other. They rushed in and because they were citizens of a big rich country thought they could gamble in stocks instead of the lottery tickets that they’d have bought in Europe: or the dimes that English colliers stake upon a horse or football game. Because they had real money to gamble with they sent prices up beyond their value; one or two big men lost their heads; when prices went back, they naturally went back with something of a rush. They went below what they were worth and the small investors were wiped out. Yes sir. And one or two big ones with them. But that doesn’t mean there’s anything unsound about this country. No sir; and the very fact that things have gone down so fast means that they’re coming up again pretty soon. It’s the sway of the pendulum.”

  He spoke impatiently, but authoritatively. He looked authoritative as he stood there, in his smart suit, his chest flung forward, his neck full and bulging over his collar. He might have posed for any of the numerous “Builders of our Commonwealth” series that ran in the popular magazines. He looked the typical business man: the type that had been held up to innumerable American children as the modern pioneer. He was impressive as he stood there; and he knew it. He was ready to be more impressive. He had a card to play that would wipe out Caroline’s callow admiration for this weakling who had been sucked in Wall Street and thought it was his country’s fault.

  “You think that New York’s played out. Well, I’ll show you how little I agree with you.”

  Lifting the receiver he dialed a down-town number.

  “Is that Mr. Bergheim’s office? Can I speak to him? Mr. Roy Bauer this end. Yes, I want to speak to Mr. Bergheim. Right. I’ll hold on. Ah, is that you? It’s Bauer. Well, first of all, about that oil field. Just because the fools in London have gotten cold feet, I’m not quitting. You cable him back that it’s O.K. with me: that I’m sticking where I was. And besides that, you know that money I’ve got locked up in English War Loan? Well, I don’t like the look of it. I don’t trust any of those European countries. They may deflate the currencies any day. Look at the way the French treated their War Loan people. I’d like to get out of that right away. You buy me some Kennecott. Yes, I know they’re low now: but they’ll be going up. Take as many as you can on margin. Fine! I’ll come and look you up one day.”

  Then he turned round to face the two young people. At the name “Bergheim” Caroline had started. Bauer had not seen that start. If he had he would not have understood it. He would never go into a Jew’s house except on business. He knew nothing of the large pent-house in the West Eighties, the radio, the highballs, the smart young Jews. By the time he turned round Caroline’s discomposure had gone entirely; had given way to a wondering admiration. She was impressed and the young man was impressed. There had been power behind Bauer’s orders.

  “He’s not much to look at, and he bores me stiff. But he’s not a tight wad, and he is a man,” Caroline thought.

  XII

  Within less than twenty-four hours of Bauer’s decision to take over the remnants of the oil well the market finally and conclusively broke.

  In London, unaware of the magnitude of the transatlantic landslide, in the one place where it is impossible for a man to avoid another, in, that is to say, the cooling-room of a Turkish bath, Major Martin Fortnum accosted Captain Stewart Fraser.

  “You are the very man I’ve been looking for.”

  “What a piece of luck.”

  “I’ve been ringing you up for days.”

  “I’ve not been at home much.”

  “So your man said. I left messages. I said it was important.”

  “So Ryman told me. But he got the name wrong.”

  “Funny, I made him repeat it.”

  “He’s a fool, that fellow. Ought to get rid of him, really. Went through the war with me. Don’t like to let the fellow go. Not in times like these.”

  “Quite.”

  “We all make mistakes.”

  “Exactly.”

  “I felt that if it really was important you’d be ringing up again.”

  “Well, it is important. It’s about that house.”

  “I thought it would be.”

  “How do you mean, you thought it would be?”

  “What else could it be?”

  “I know. What I meant was, how if you didn’t know it was me that was ringing, did you guess it would be about the house?”

  “I didn’t—then. When I saw you here and you told me you had been wanting to see me about something important, I knew it must be the house.”

  “I see.”

  The Major eyed his junior suspiciously. He was a belligerent fellow as he strutted down Pall Mall with his little pigeon-chest puffed out, his grey Homburg a-tilt upon his head, his cane swinging, his legs shooting out like a clockwork toy’s, his feet coming down heel-toe, heel-toe, upon the pavement. But oddly enough he looked even more belligerent as he lay wrapped in a sheet with the head protruding, the blue-veined scarlet of the cheeks and nose contrasting dramatically with the whiteness of the sheet, of the upcurled moustaches, of the faintly pink bald scalp. He was an intimidating figure. Captain Stewart
Fraser, in spite of his height and width and youth, felt himself no match for the mummified object who was eyeing him across the passage of their cubicle.

  The moment that the masseur had finished wrapping Captain Fraser round in sheet and towels, the Major returned to the assault.

  “Now, about this house.”

  “Yes, this house.”

  “Things have gone as far as they can with safety.”

  “Ah!”

  “They’ve actually drawn up documents for me to sign.”

  “Ah!”

  “I’ve run myself into thirty pounds worth of lawyer’s fees.”

  “You cleared in all a commission of one hundred and sixty pounds on the sale of Appleton.”

  “Precisely. At the same time….”

  The Major paused, fixing the Captain with the glance that had disturbed the repose of Oriental delinquents.

  “This has gone on for long enough. I refuse to be bothered any more.”

  “That’s easy. You just tell the house-agents that you’ve changed your mind.”

  “That would be most undignified.”

  “I don’t see what else you are to do.”

  The Major paused, rather in the manner of a golfer addressing his ball upon the tee. He knows exactly what he is going to do. But he is not going to be hurried.

  “When I agreed to lend my name to this proceeding, it was understood that you would provide a purchaser who would at the last moment overbid me. You have not found such a purchaser, I presume?”

  “I have not.”

  “So that instead of being in the position of being able to upbraid these agents for selling behind my back,—a gentlemanly position—I, after explaining to them that I am about to form an international club for film-lovers, have to tell them that I have changed my mind. That is not, Captain Fraser, a position in which a soldier cares to find himself.”