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CHAPTER V

Two evenings after this memorable interview between husband and wife, Carrington and Morton were closeted with Hamilton in his library. To anyone who had chanced to look in on the group, it would have seemed rather an agreeable trio of friends passing a sociable evening of elegant leisure. Hamilton alone, as he sat in the chair before the table, displayed something of his inner feelings by the creases between his brows and the compression of his lips and a slight tensity in his attitude. Morton was stretched gracefully in a chair facing that of his host and prospective victim, while Carrington was close by, so that the two seemed ranked against the one. A close student of types would have had no hesitation in declaring Morton to be much the more intelligent and crafty of the two visitors. He appeared the familiar shrewd, smooth, well-groomed New Yorker, excellently preserved for all his sixty-five years; one who could be at will persuasive and genial, or hard as steel. In his evening dress, he showed to advantage, and his manner toward Hamilton was gently paternal, as that of an old family friend who has chanced in for a pleasant hour with the son of a former intimate. Carrington, on the contrary, was of the grosser type of successful business man. A frock-coat sufficed him for the evening always. There was about him in every way a heaviness that indicated he could not be a leader, only a follower after the commands of wiser men. But, in such following, he would be of powerful executive ability.

"Do you know," Morton was saying, "it's really a great personal pleasure for me to come here, Hamilton, my boy. It reminds me of the many times when I used to sit here with your father." As he ceased speaking, he smiled benevolently on the young man opposite him.

Hamilton nodded, without much appearance of graciousness. He was more than suspicious as to the sincerity of this man's kindly manner.

"Yes, I know," he said. "You and he had many dealings together, I believe, didn't you, Mr. Morton?"

"Oh, yes, indeed," came the ready answer; "many and many. He was a shrewd trader, was your father. It's a pity he cannot be here to know what a promising young man of business his son has become. He would be proud of you, my boy."

"Thank you, Mr. Morton," Hamilton responded. "For that matter, I myself wish that Dad were here just now to help me."

Again, the visitor smiled, and with a warm expansiveness that was meant to indicate a heart full of generous helpfulness.

"You don't need him, my boy," he declared, unctuously. "You are dealing with an old friend."

Carrington nodded in ponderous corroboration of the statement.

"Of course not, of course not!" he rumbled, in a husky bass voice.

Hamilton let irritation run away with discretion. He spoke with something that was very like a sneer:

"I thought possibly that was just why I might need him."

Morton seemed not to hear the caustic comment. At any rate, he blandly ignored it, as he turned to address Carrington.

"You remember Hamilton, senior, don't you?" he asked.

"Very well!" replied the gentleman of weight. His red face grew almost apoplectic, and the big body writhed in the chair. His tones were surcharged with a bitterness that he tried in vain to conceal. Morton regarded these signs of feeling with an amusement that he had no reluctance in displaying. On the contrary, he laughed aloud in his associate's face.

"Well, yes," he said, still smiling, "I fancy that you ought to remember Hamilton, senior, and remember him very well, too. But, anyhow, by-gones are by-gones. You weren't alone in your misery, Carrington. He beat me, too, several times."

Hamilton smiled now, but wryly.

"So," he suggested whimsically, yet bitterly, "now that he's dead, you two gentlemen have decided to combine in order to beat his son. That's about it, eh?"

Carrington, who was not blessed with a self-control, or an art of hypocrisy equal to that of his ally, emitted a cackling laugh of triumph. But Morton refused to accept the charge. Instead, he spoke with an admirable conviction in his voice, a hint of indignant, pained remonstrance.

"Ridiculous, my dear boy – ridiculous! Just look on me as being In your father's place. No, no, Hamilton, there's room for all of us. There's a reasonable profit for all of us in the business – if only we'll be sensible about it."

"It only remains to decide as to the sensible course, then," Hamilton rejoined, coldly. "I suppose, in this instance, it means that I should decide to follow the course you have outlined for me. Now, I have your offer before me on this paper. Briefly stated, your proposition to me is that you will take all the boxes I am able to deliver to you – that is to say, you agree to keep my factory busy. For this promise on your part, you require two stipulations from me as conditions. The first is that I shall not sell any boxes to the Independent Plug Tobacco Factory; the second is that I shall sell my boxes to you at a regular price of eleven cents each. I believe I have stated the matter accurately. Have I not?"

"You have stated it exactly," Morton assured the questioner. "That is the situation in a nutshell."

"Unfortunately," Hamilton went on, speaking with great precision, "it's quite impossible for me to make any such agreement with you – utterly impossible." He looked his adversary squarely in the eye, and shook his head in emphatic negation.

Carrington merely emitted a bourdon grunt. Morton, however, maintained the argument, undeterred by the finality of Hamilton's manner.

"But, my dear boy," he exclaimed quickly, "we're not asking you to do anything that you haven't done already. Why, you furnished me with one lot at nine cents."

"At a loss, in order to secure custom against competition," was the prompt retort. "It costs exactly eleven cents to turn out those boxes."

Morton persisted in his refusal to admit the justice of the young man's refusal to accept the terms offered.

"But, my dear boy," he continued, "take your last four bids. I mean the bids that you and Carrington made before we bought out Carrington. The first, time, Carrington bid eleven cents; while you bid fourteen. On the second lot Carrington bid thirteen; and you bid nine."

"You illustrate my contention very well," Hamilton interrupted. "At eleven cents a box, Carrington hardly quit even. It was for that reason he bid thirteen on the following lot; while I, because I was bound to get a look in on the business, even at a loss – why, I bid nine cents. The result was that I got the order, and it cost me a loss of just two cents on each and every box to fill it." A contented rumble from the large man emphasized the truth of the statement.

Nothing daunted, Morton resumed his narrative of operations in the box trade.

"On the third lot, Carrington bid eight cents, while you bid eighteen."

Carrington's indignation was too much for reticence.

"Yes, I got that order," he roared, wrathfully. "It was a million box order, too – " The withering look bestowed on the speaker by Morton caused him to break off and to cower as abjectly in his chair as was possible to one of his bulk.

"His success in being the winner in that bout cost him three cents each for the million boxes," Hamilton commented. "Well?"

"Well," Morton said crisply, "for the fourth and biggest order, Carrington bid seventeen, and you bid sixteen."

"Yes, yes!" Carrington spluttered, forgetful of the rebuke just administered to him. "And, on the four lots, Hamilton, you cleaned up a profit, while I lost out – so much that I had to sell control of my plant. And you call that fair competition!"

Morton grinned appreciation. The young man regarded the ponderous figure of Carrington with something approaching stupefaction over the sheer bravado of the question.

"Was that your motive in joining the trust," he demanded ironically: "to get fair competition?"

Again, Morton laughed aloud, in keen enjoyment of the thrust.

"You're your own father's son, Hamilton," he declared, gaily.

Hamilton, however, was not to be cajoled into friendliness by superficial compliment.

"Probably," he said sternly, "I might not have been able to do so well, if you had not been clever enough to let both Carrington and myself each see the figures of the other's secret bid as a great personal favor."

As the words entered Carrington's consciousness, the ungainly form sat erect with a sudden violence of movement that sent the chair sliding back three feet over the polished floor. The red face darkened to a perilous purple, and the narrow, dull eyes flashed fire. He struggled gaspingly for a moment to speak – in vain. Morton's eyes were fixed on the man, and those eyes were very clear and very cold. Carrington met the steady stare, and it sobered his wrath in a measure, so that presently he was able to utter words intelligibly. But, now, they were not what they would have been a few seconds earlier:

"You – you told him what I bid?"

Hamilton took the answer on himself.

"Surely, he did, Carrington." The young man spoke with cheerfulness, in the presence of the discomfiture of his enemy. "He told you what I bid; and, in just the same way, he told me what you bid – every time!"

For a long minute, Morton stared on at his underling whom he had betrayed. Under that look, the unhappy victim of a superior's wiles, sat uneasily at first, in a vague effort toward defiance; then, his courage oozed away, he shifted uneasily in his seat, and his eyes wandered abashedly about the room. Convinced that the revolt was suppressed, Morton turned again to the young man opposite him.

"All that is done with now." The tone was sharp; the mask of urbanity had fallen from the resolute face, which showed now an expression relentless, dominant. "Hamilton, what are you going to do?" The manner of the question was a challenge.

"I can't make money selling boxes at eleven cents," Hamilton answered wearily. "Nobody could."

"At least, you won't lose any," was the meaning answer. Then, in reply to Hamilton's half-contemptuous shrug, Morton continued frankly. "After all, Hamilton, you can make a profit. It won't be large, but it will be a profit. This is the day of small profits, you must remember. It will be necessary for you to put in a few more of the latest-model machines, and to cut labor a bit. In that way, you will secure a profit. You must cut expense to the limit."

The young man regarded Morton with strong dislike.

"What you mean," he said angrily, "is that I must put my factory on a starvation business. Now, I don't want to cut wages. It's a sad fact that the men at present don't get a cent more than they're worth. Besides that, some of them have been working in the factory for father more than thirty years."

"There is no room for such pensioners in these days of small profits," Morton declared, superciliously. "However, it's no business of mine. Remember, though, it's your only chance to keep clear."

"No," Hamilton announced bravely, "I'll not cut the wage-scale. I'll sell to the trade, at thirteen. It's mighty little profit, but it's something."

Morton shook his head.

"The Carrington factory," he said threateningly, "will sell to the trade for ten cents, until – "

" – Until I'm cleaned out!" Hamilton cried, fiercely.

Morton lifted a restraining hand. He was again his most suave self.

"My dear boy," he said gently, "I liked your father, and I esteemed him highly. He was a shrewd trader: he never tried to match pennies against hundred-dollar bills… The moral is obvious, when you consider your factory alone as opposed to certain other interests. So, take my advice. Try cutting. The men would much rather have smaller wages than none at all, I'm sure. Think it over. Let me know by Saturday… The Carrington factory is to issue its price-list on Monday."

Hamilton was worn out by the unequal combat. He hesitated for a little, then spoke moodily:

"Very well. I'll let you know by Saturday."

When, at last, his guests had departed, the wretched young man dropped his head on his arms over the heap of papers, and groaned aloud… He could see no ray of hope – none!

CHAPTER VI

It was a half-hour after the breaking up of the conference when Hamilton at last raised his head from his arms. He looked about him dazedly for a little while, as if endeavoring to put himself in touch once again with the humdrum facts of existence. Then, when his brain cleared from the lethargy imposed by the strain to which it had so recently been subjected, he gave a sudden defiant toss of his head, and muttered wrathfully: "Go broke, or starve your men!" He got out of his chair, and paced to and fro swiftly for a little interval, pondering wildly. But, of a sudden, he reseated himself, drew a pad of paper to him, and began scrawling figures at the full speed of his pencil. And, as he wrote, he was murmuring to himself: "There is a way out – there must be!"

It was while the husband was thus occupied that the door opened softly, without any preliminary knock, and the wife stepped noiselessly into the room. The anxiety that beset her was painfully apparent in her bearing and in the expression of her face. Her form seemed drooping, as if under shrinking apprehension of some blow about to fall. The eyes of amber, usually so deep and radiant, were dulled now, as if by many tears; the rich scarlet of the lips' curves was bent downward mournfully. She stood just within the doorway for a brief space, watching intently the man who was so busy over his scrawled figures. At last, she ventured forward, walking in a laggard, rhythmic step, as do church dignitaries and choir-boys in a processional. By such slow stages, she came to a place opposite her husband. There, she remained, upright, mute, waiting. The magnetism of her presence penetrated to him by subtle degrees… He looked up at her, with no recognition in his eyes.

"They've gone, dear?" She spoke the words very softly, for she understood instinctively something as to the trance in which he was held.

Hamilton's abstraction was dissipated as the familiar music of Cicily's voice beat gently on his ears.

"Yes – oh, yes, they've gone." His voice was colorless. His eyes went out to the array of figures that sprawled recklessly over the sheet before him.

But the young woman was not to be frustrated in her intention by such indifference on his part. She spoke again, at once, a little more loudly:

"Tell me: Did you come out all right?"

Hamilton raised his head with an impatient movement. Evidently, this persistence was a distracting influence – a displeasing. There was harshness in his voice as he replied:

"Did I come out all right? Well, yes – since I came out at all. Oh, yes!" His voice mounted in the scale, under the impulse of a sudden access of rage against his enemies. He spoke with a savage rapidity of utterance: "And I can lick Carrington any day in the week. Why, I've already put him out. It's Morton – that old fox Morton who's got me guessing… What do you think? They even had the nerve to threaten me. Of course, it was in a round-about way; but it was a threat all the same. They threatened to close up the Hamilton factory. Gad! the nerve of it!"

"They threatened to close up your factory, Charles?" Cicily exclaimed, astonished and angry. "But you own the Hamilton factory. What have they to do with it? The impudence of them!"

"Yes, I own the factory, all right," the husband agreed. "But, you see – " Hamilton broke off abruptly, and was silent for a moment. When he spoke again, the liveliness was gone from his voice: it was become quietly patronizing. "Oh, let's forget it, dear. I must be going dotty. I'll be talking business with you, the first thing I know."

"I only wish you would!" Cicily answered, with a note of pleading in her tones.

"Nonsense!" was the gruff exclamation. "The idea of talking business with you. That would be a joke, wouldn't it?" He spoke banteringly, with no perception of the gravity in his wife's desire to share in this phase of his life. But he looked up from the papers after a moment into his wife's face. She had turned from him, and then had reclined wearily in the chair opposite him, whence she had been staring at him with a tormenting feeling of impotence. The expression on her face was such that Hamilton realized her distress, without having any clue to its cause.

"Now, sweetheart, what's wrong?" he questioned. He was half-sympathetic over her apparent misery, half-annoyed.

Cicily, with the intuitive sensitiveness of a woman to recognize a lover's hostile feeling beneath the spoken words, was acutely conscious of the annoyance; she ignored the modicum of sympathy. To conceal her hurt, she had resort to a fictitious gaiety that was ill calculated, however, to deceive, for the stress of her disappointment was very great.

"The matter with me?" she repeated, with an assumption of surprise. "Why, the matter with me is that I'm so happy – that's all!"

"Cicily!" Now, at last, the husband was both shocked and grieved over his wife's mood.

"Yes, that's it – happy!" the suffering girl repeated. "Why, I'm so happy – just so happy – that I could scream!"

Hamilton leaned forward in his chair, to regard his wife scrutinizingly. He was filled with alarm over the nervous, almost hysterical, condition in which he now beheld her.

"Cicily, are you well?" he asked. There was a distinct quaver of fear in his voice. "You look – strange, somehow."

"Oh, not at all!" came the flippant retort. "It's merely that you haven't really taken a good look at me lately – until just this minute. So, of course, I'd look a bit strange to you."

It must be remembered that Hamilton, although usually intelligent, had a clear conscience and no suspicion whatsoever as to any culpability on his part in his relations with his wife: thus it was that now he was wholly impervious to the sarcasm of her reference, which he answered with the utmost seriousness.

"My dear, I saw you this morning, last night – oh, heaps of times, every day."

"Oh, your physical eyes have seen; but your mind, your heart, your soul – the true you – hasn't seen me for I don't know how long."

This cryptic explanation was too subtle for Hamilton to grasp while yet his brain was fogged by the intricacies of his business affairs. He gazed on his wife in puzzled fashion for a few seconds, then abandoned the problem as one altogether beyond his solving. To clear up a vague suspicion that this might be some new astonishing display of a woman's indirect wiles, he put a question:

"My dear, do you want a new automobile, or a doctor?"

"Neither!" came the crisp reply; and for once the musical voice was almost harsh, "I want a husband!"

"Good Lord! Another?" Hamilton was pained and scandalized, as, indeed, was but natural before a confession so indecorous seemingly and so unflattering to himself.

"I don't want the one I have now," Cicily affirmed, with great emphasis. She rather enjoyed the manner in which the man shrank under her declaration. But he said nothing as she paused: he was momentarily too dumfounded for speech, "I want my first one back," Cicily concluded.

Hamilton gaped at his wife, powerless to do aught beyond grope in mental blackness for some ray of understanding as to this horrible revelation made by the woman he loved.

"You – you want your first one back!" he repeated stupidly, at last. Of a sudden, a gust of fury shook him. "God!" he cried savagely. "And I thought I knew that girl!"

Cicily rested unperturbed before the outbreak. She was absorbed in her own torment, with no sentiment to spare for the temporary anguish she was inflicting on her husband, which, in her opinion, he richly deserved.

"You did know me once," she answered, coldly. "That was before you changed toward me."

The injustice of this charge, as he deemed it, was beyond Hamilton's powers of endurance. He sprung from his chair, and stood glowering down on Cicily, who bore the stern accusation of his eyes without flinching. The pallor of her face was a little more pronounced than usual, less touched from within with the hue of abounding health, and her crimson mouth was less tender than it was wont to be. But she leaned back in her chair in a posture of grace that displayed to advantage the slender, curving charm of her body, and her eyes, shining golden in the soft light of the room, met the man's steadfastly, fearlessly.

"I – changed – to you!" Hamilton stormed. "Cicily! Cicily! What madness! You know – oh, absurd! Why, Cicily, I love you… I think of you always!"

"Oh, yes, you love me," Cicily agreed, contemptuously, "You think of me always – when your other love will let you."

"Cicily!"

"I mean it," came uncompromisingly, in answer to Hamilton's look of horror. "I mean every word of it!"

"Cicily," the husband besought, as a great dread fell on his soul, "remember, you are my wife – my love!"

"Yes, I'm one of them." The tone was icy; the gaze fixed on his face was unwavering.

But this utterance was too sinister to be borne. The pride of the man in his own faithfulness was outraged. His voice was low when he spoke again, yet in it was a quality that the young wife had never heard before. It frightened her sorely, although she concealed its effect by a mighty effort of will.

"That is an insult to you and to me, Cicily. It is an insult I cannot – I will not – permit."

It was evident to Cicily that she had carried the war in this direction far enough; she hastened her retreat.

"Oh, I didn't say that you were in love with another woman," she explained, with an excellent affectation of carelessness. "For that matter, I know very well that you're not." Then, as Hamilton regarded her with a face blankly uncomprehending, she went on rapidly, with something of the venomous in her voice: "Sometimes, I wish you were. Then, I'd fight her, and beat her. It would give me something to do." She paused for a moment, and laughed bitterly. "Oh, please, Charles, do fall in love with some other woman, won't you?"

Hamilton started toward the telephone in the hall.

"It's the doctor you want, not the automobile," he called over his shoulder.

"Nonsense!" Cicily cried. "Stop!" And, as he turned back reluctantly, she went on with her explanation: "No, it isn't the lure of some siren in a Paquin dress – or undress: it's the lure of the game – the great, horrid, hideous business game, which has got you, just as it's got most of the American husbands who are worth having. That's the lure we American women can't overcome; that's the rival who is breaking our hearts. You are the man of business, Charles – I'm the woman out of a job! That's all there is to it."

Hamilton listened dazedly to this fluent discourse, the meaning of which was not altogether clear to him. He frowned in bewilderment, as he again seated himself in the chair opposite his wife. He could think of nothing with which to rebuke her diatribe, save the stock platitudes of a past generation, and to these necessarily he had immediate recourse.

"You have the home – the house – to look out for, Cicily. That's a woman's work. What more can you wish?"

"The home! The house!" The exclamation was eloquent of disgust. "Ah, yes, once on a time, it was a woman's work – once on a time! But, then, you men were dependent on us. Marriage was a real partnership. Nowadays, what with servants and countless inventions, so that machinery supplies the work, the home is a joke. The house itself is an automatic machine that runs on – buttons, push-buttons. You men can get along without us just as well. You don't really depend on us for anything in the home. Your lives are full up with interest; every second is occupied. Our lives are empty. My life is empty, Charles. I'm lonely, and heart-hungry, I've no ambition to go in for bridge. I'm not a gambler by choice. I don't wish to follow society as a vocation. I'm not eager even to be a suffragette. I want to be an old-fashioned wife – to do something that counts in my husband's life. I want him to depend on me for some things, always. I want to be my husband's partner." Little by little, while she was speaking, the coldness passed from the woman's voice; in its stead grew warmth; there was passionate fervor in the final plea. It moved Hamilton to pity, although he was ignorant as to the means by which he might assuage his wife's so great discontent. Manlike, he attempted to overcome emotion by argument.

"Cicily," he urged, "just now, I'm up to my ears and over in work. They are crowding me mighty hard. There's dissatisfaction at the mill – danger of a strike. Morton is heading a syndicate – a trust, really – trying to absorb us. I'm fighting for my very life – my business life… Cicily, you wouldn't throw obstacles in my way now, would you?"

"Obstacles! No; I want to help you."

"In business?" Hamilton queried, astounded. "You – help me – in business?"

"Yes," Cicily answered, steadily. "I can do something, I know." There was intensity of purpose in the glow of the golden eyes, as they met those of her husband; there was intensity of conviction in the tones of her voice as she uttered the assurance. She realized that the crisis of her ambition was very near at hand.

"You can do nothing." The man's blunt statement was uttered with a conviction as uncompromising as her own. The egotism of it repelled the woman. There was a hint of menace in her manner, as she replied:

"Take care, Charles. Don't shut me out. You're making a plaything of me – not a wife… And I – I won't be your plaything!"

"You mean – ?"

"I mean," went on the wife relentlessly, "that this is the most serious moment of our married life. If you put me off now, if you shut me out of your life now – out of your full life – I can't answer for what will happen."

There followed a long interval of silence, the while husband and wife stared each into the other's eyes. In these moments of poignant emotion, the profound feeling of the woman penetrated the being of the man, readied his heart, and touched it to sympathy – more: it mounted to his brain, which it stimulated to some measure of understanding. That understanding was fleeting enough, it was vague and incomplete, as must always be man's inadequate knowledge of woman. But it was dominant for the time being. Under its sway, Hamilton spoke in gracious yielding, almost gratefully.

"Very well. You can help."

The young wife sat silent for a time, thrilling with the joy of conquest. The roses of her checks blossomed again; the radiance of her eyes grew tender; the scarlet lips wreathed in their happiest curves. At last, she rose swiftly, and seated herself on the arm of her husband's chair. She wound her arms about his neck, and kissed him fondly on cheek and brow and mouth.

Hamilton accepted these caresses with the pleasure of a fond bridegroom of a year, and, too, with a certain complacency as the tribute of gratitude to his generosity. But, when she separated herself again from his embrace, he was moved to ask a question that was calculated to be somewhat disconcerting.

"What can you do?" he demanded.

"Oh, I don't know," Cicily answered, nonchalantly; "but something. I shall do something big! You see, you've done so much. Now, I must do something too – something big!"

"But what have I done?" the husband questioned, perplexed anew by this charming wife of many moods.

"What have you done?" Cicily repeated, joyously. "Why, you've made me the happiest woman in the world – a partner!" Again, the rounded arms were wreathed about his neck; her face was hidden on his shoulder.

Hamilton's eyes were turned ceilingward, as if seeking some illumination from beyond. He listened, stupid, bemused, to that word echoing wildly through his brain: "Partner!" He understood fully at last, and with understanding came utter dismay. "Partner!.. Oh, Lord!"