The Fortune Hunter
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Louis Joseph Vance >> The Fortune Hunter
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He found himself shortly after eight at pause by the gate to the Bohun
place. The night was dark and murmurous with a sibilant wind that sent
the leaves drifting, softly clashing one with another. At the far end
of the straight brick walk, up through the formal grounds, he could
just see the glimmer of the stately columns, and, between them, to one
side, a little twinkling light. The gate was closed, but he tried it
and found it on the latch. He entered and scuffled up the walk, ankle
deep in fallen leaves. His footfalls as he crossed the porch sounded
startlingly loud by contrast; he even fancied a note of indignation in
the cavernous echoes of the knocker on the front door. He waited with a
thumping heart, aware that he was venturing where even fools would fear
to tread.
An aged negro butler, one of the freed slaves brought from Virginia by
the Bohuns, admitted him to the hall and took his card, smothering his
own wonderment. For in those days nobody disturbed the silence and the
peace of decay of the Bohun mansion save its master. And Duncan had
long to wait in the wide, gloomy, musty hall before the servant
returned.
"Cunnul Bohun will see yo', suh," he said, and ushered him into the
library--a great, high-ceiled, shadowy room illuminated by a single
lamp, tenanted by the old colonel alone.
Bohun received the young man standing: he was as courteous beneath his
own roof as he was impossible away from it. A quaint old figure, with
his grey hair tousled and his dressing-gown draped grotesquely from his
shoulders, he stood by the fireplace, Duncan's card between his
fingers, and bowed ceremoniously.
"Mr. Duncan, I believe?"
Nat returned the bow. "Yes, sir," he said. "Will you be good enough to
pardon this intrusion, Colonel Bohun, and spare me five minutes of your
time?"
The colonel nodded. "At your service, sir," he replied, and waited
grimly--perhaps not unsuspicious of the nature of his visitor's errand,
since he could not have been ignorant of his place in Radville.
Duncan had his own way of getting at things--generally more circuitous
than now, though he struck on a tangent sufficiently acute momentarily
to puzzle Bohun.
"May I inquire, sir, if you are acquainted with the firm of L.J.
Bartlett & Company of New York?"
"I have heard of it, Mr. Duncan, through the newspapers."
"You know that it ranks pretty high, then, I presume?"
"I understand that such is the case."
"Then would you mind doing me the favour of writing to Mr. Henry
Kellogg, the junior partner, and asking him about me?"
The colonel stiffened. "May I ask why I should do anything so
uncalled-for?"
"Because it isn't uncalled-for, sir. I mean, you won't think so after
I've explained."
Bohun inclined his head, searching Nat's face with his keen, bright
eyes.
"You see, sir, it's this way: I want you to entrust me with a
considerable sum of money, and naturally you wouldn't do that without
knowing something about me."
"I incline very much to doubt that I should do it in any event, Mr.
Duncan."
"Oh, don't say that. You don't know the circumstances, as yet." Nat
jerked his head earnestly at the colonel. "You see, you're said to be
one of the richest men in town, and I'm certainly one of the poorest,
so of course I turn to you in a case like this."
"In a case like what, Mr. Duncan?" Something in the young man's manner
seemed to tickle the colonel; Duncan could have sworn that the eyes
were twinkling beneath the savagely knitted brows.
"Well, you must understand I'm in business here in Radville--a partner
in a growing and prospering concern--ah--doing--very well, in point of
fact."
"Yes?"
"But we haven't any spare capital; in fact, we haven't got any capital
worth mentioning. But the business is entirely sound and solvent."
"I congratulate you, sir."
"Thank you very much.... Now I'm interested in a rather singular
case: that of a young woman--a girl, I should say--daughter of my
partner. She's a good girl and wonderfully sweet and fine, sir. She
comes of one of the best families in these parts--"
"On her mother's side," suggested the colonel drily.
"So I'm told, sir. But she's been neglected. Circumstances have been
against her. She hasn't had a real chance in life, but she ought to
have it, and I'm going to see that she gets it, one way or another."
"You haven't finished?" said the colonel coldly, as he paused for
breath and thought.
"Not quite, sir," said Duncan. "Good sign!" he told himself: "he hasn't
ordered me thrown out yet." And he hurried on, speaking quickly in the
semi-humorous style he had, more arresting to the attention than
absolute gravity would have been.
"To come down to cases, sir, she ought to be sent to a good
boarding-school for a few years. It'll make a new woman of her--a woman
to be proud of. She's got that in her--it only needs to be brought
out."
"And before you leave, sir," said the colonel with significant
precision, "will you be so kind as to inform me why you think this
should interest me?"
"No," said Duncan candidly; "I haven't got the nerve to. But what I
wanted to propose was this: that you lend me five hundred dollars to
cover the expense of the first year, on condition that I represent the
money as coming from the profits of the business and, in short, keep
the transaction between ourselves absolutely quiet. If you'll inquire
of Mr. Kellogg he'll tell you I can be trusted to keep my word.
Furthermore"--he galloped, suspecting that his time was perilously
short and desiring to get it all out of his system--"I'll guarantee you
repayment within a year, and that you shan't be annoyed this way a
second time."
Bohun looked him over from head to foot, bowed in silence, and
turning--both had stood throughout this passage--grasped a bell-rope by
the chimney, and pulled it violently.
Duncan turned to the door, hat in hand, realising that he had his
answer and was lucky to get away with one so mild. Only the emergency
could have spurred him to the point of so outrageous an impertinence.
In the desolate fastnesses of that dreary house somewhere a bell
tinkled discordantly. A moment later the white-headed darky butler
opened the door.
"Suh?" he said.
Colonel Bohun essayed to speak, cleared his throat angrily, and
indicated Duncan with a courteous gesture.
"Scipio," said he, "this gentleman will have a glass of wine with me."
"Yassuh!" stammered the negro, overcome with astonishment.
Bohun turned to his guest. "Won't you be seated, Mr. Duncan?" he said.
"You have interested me considerably, sir, and I should be glad to
discuss the matter with you."
Speechless, Duncan gasped incoherently and moved toward a chair as the
servant reappeared with a tray on which was a decanter of sherry and
two old-fashioned, thin-stemmed crystal glasses. He placed this on the
library table, filled the glasses, and at a sign from Bohun retired.
"Sir," said the colonel, indicating the tray, "to you."
"I--I thank you, sir." Duncan lifted one of the glasses. Bohun took up
the one remaining, and held it toward his guest with the gracious
gesture of a bygone day.
"I hold it a privilege, sir," he said, "to drink to the only gentleman
of spirit it's been my good fortune to meet this many a year."
By way of an aside, it should be mentioned that this was the first and
only drink Duncan took while he lived in Radville.
XVII
TRACEY'S TROUBLES
Probably nothing ever gave rise to more comment in Radville than Betty
Graham's departure to spend the winter at a boarding-school near
Philadelphia. Hardly anyone knew anything about it--in fact, the rumour
of it was just being noised about and contemptuously discredited on all
hands--when Tracey galloped down Main Street Monday morning with the
news that she had left on the early train. He himself had remained in
ignorance of the impending event until requested to carry Betty's bag
down to the station....
She left under convoy of a certain Mrs. Hamilton, who lived in
Philadelphia and had been visiting her cousin, Mrs. Will Bigelow.
Duncan had met this lady at a church sociable and, apparently, taken a
liking to her; for he prevailed upon her, via Sam Graham and Will
Bigelow, to see the girl safely to her school, after superintending the
purchase of a suitable wardrobe in Philadelphia.
So Betty was gone--herself, I believe, no less surprised and
incredulous than the rest of us.
Radville was at first stupefied, then clamorous; but there was little
information to be got out of old Sam. I found him busy working on his
new model and much preoccupied with that. When interrogated and given
to understand that I would not be put off, he roused a bit, but beyond
being unquestionably a very happy man, seemed himself slightly dazed by
the amazing circumstances. I learned from him that Nat had evidently
made all his plans in advance, but had withheld his announcement of
them until the Saturday prior to that Monday; and then he had fairly
whirled Betty and her father off their feet and left them no time to
think or to raise objections.
"There's no use at all arguing with that boy," Sam told me, with the
fond smile that I was beginning to recognise as the invariable
accompaniment of his thoughts about Nat; "when he says a thing must
be, it must. When he first came here I told him he was a wonderful
business man, and he laughed at me, but now I know he is. Why, he gave
Betty a hundred dollars to buy clothes with in Philadelphia, and said
he'd have more for her by Christmas, besides paying all the expenses of
that school--which must be considerable. I don't see how the store's
going to stand the strain--though it's doing splendidly since he came
in, splendidly!--but he says it's all right, and so it must be...."
Duncan himself refused to be interviewed. He told everybody who had
the impudence to mention the matter to him, that it was Mr. Graham's
affair: Mr. Graham was a substantial business man, he said, and if he
chose to send his daughter away to school he had a perfect right to do
so. I don't believe even Josie Lockwood got more than that out of him,
for if she had we would have heard of it; and Josie was unmistakably a
little jealous, and undoubtedly questioned Nat.
One direct result of it all was to hasten Josie's own leave-taking. It
would never do to let the Grahams eclipse the Lockwoods, you see. Josie
had been talking of going to a school in Maryland, but Betty's move to
a fashionable centre like Philadelphia made her change her mind; and
arrangements were made by which Josie was able to go Betty one better:
a young ladies' seminary in New York City itself received Josie. She
left us bereaved about a week after Betty vanished from our ken, but
promised to be back for the Christmas holidays--an announcement which
Duncan received with expressions of chastened joy, as he did her
promise to write to him regularly, in return for his covenant to
respond promptly.... Betty, by the way, had made no such arrangement;
but she wrote twice a week to old Sam, and I understand she never
failed to include a message to Nat.
Betty was happy, she protested in every communication, and wholly
content. She was getting along. The other girls liked her and she liked
them (these statements being made in the order of their relative
importance). Lots of them, of course, were frightfully swell (Betty
annexed "frightfully" at school, by the by) and had all sorts of
clothes; but Betty was perfectly content with her modest outfit, and
none of the other girls seemed to mind how she dressed. They were all
kind and nice, and she'd never had such a good time.... I quote these
expressions from memory of Sam's digest of her letters.
Of Josie I heard less; I know that Graham and Duncan's mail seldom
lacked a personal communication to Duncan, postmarked at New York; our
postmaster told me so. But Duncan was reticent, and the Lockwoods said
little. I gathered an impression that Josie was not altogether happy
in her new surroundings.... One inferred there was a difference between
New York and Philadelphia, that one was less friendly and sociable
than the other.
Josie kept her promise and came home for Christmas. She was reticent as
to her impressions of the New York seminary, but seemed extremely glad
to be home, notwithstanding the fact that Nat had apparently contracted
no disturbing alliances with the other belles of our village. And
Roland remained true--a reliable second string to Josie's bow. Roland
was working hard at the bank, with an application that earned Blinky
Lockwood's regard and outspoken approbation; and his Christmas raiment
proved the sensation of the season. But none of us believed he had any
chance against Duncan: Josie's attitude toward the latter was such
that we confidently anticipated the announcement of their engagement
before she went away again. But it didn't come, for some reason. We
bore up under the disappointment bravely, all things considered,
sustained by a very secure feeling that the proclamation couldn't be
long deferred.
In passing, I should mention that Betty didn't come home once
throughout the entire school term. The Christmas and Easter holidays
she spent with a girl friend at her Philadelphia home.
Meanwhile, life in our town simmered gently. Things went on much as
they might have been expected to. I don't recall much essential to this
narrative, in the way of events; and part of the ground I've covered on
earlier pages. Duncan continued to make progress: for one thing, I
recall that he put in hot soda with whipped cream, which helped a lot
to hold the trade regained in the summer from Sothern and Lee. And he
bought a new soda fountain, a very magnificent affair, installing it in
the early spring. Graham and Duncan's, in short, became a town
institution: to it Radville pointed with pride....
He remained reserved, retiring, inconspicuous, and puzzling to our
understanding. In his effort (never very successful) to strike off the
shackles of modern slang, he fell into a way of speech that bewildered
those unable to realise what an abiding sense of humour underlay it--as
water runs beneath ice--more, I think, a matter of intonation and
significant silences, than a mere play upon words and phrases; which,
coupled with an unshakable sobriety of demeanour, furnished us with
wonder and some admiration, but no resentment. We liked him pretty
well and mostly unanimously: he was a good fellow, if queer; entitled
to his idiosyncrasy, if he chose to keep one....
There was a certain night, by way of illustration--a bitter night,
along toward the first of January--when trade was dull, as it always is
after Christmas, and there was nobody in the store save Nat and Tracey.
Each had their task, whatever it may have been, and each was busied
with it, but of the two Tracey seemed the more restless. His ample, if
low, forehead was decidedly corrugated; his always rosy face owned an
added trace of scarlet--a flush of perturbation; his chubby hands were
inexpert, clumsy. He stumbled, fumbled, forgot and (in our homely
phrase) flummoxed generally; his mind was elsewhere, and his hands and
feet went anywhere but where they should have gone: a condition which
eventually excited Duncan's attention.
He broke a long silence in the store. "What's the trouble, Tracey?"
Tracey pulled up with a stare of confusion. "I--I dunno, Mr. Duncan; I
was thinkin', I guess."
"Anything gone wrong?"
"Not yet." Niobe would have made the response with a greater show of
cheer.
Duncan looked up curiously, struck by the boy's tone. "Somebody been
demonstrating that your doll's stuffed with sawdust, Tracey?"
"No-o, but..."
"Well?"
"Say, Mr. Duncan--" Tracey's confusion became terrific.
"Say on, Mr. Tanner."
The interjection diverted Tracey's train of thought to an
inconsiderable siding. "I only called you Mr. Duncan," he said,
aggrieved, "'cause you're my boss."
"That's a poor excuse, Tracey. You call Mr. Graham 'Sam,' and he's
likewise your boss."
"I know. But it's diff'runt."
"I don't see it. Even Nats have their place in the cosmic system,
Tracey."
"I dunno what that is, but you ain't like Sam."
"The loss is mine, Tracey. Proceed."
"But, Mr. Duncan..."
"I beg of you, speak to me as to a friend."
Tracey struggled perceptibly. The words, when they came, were blurted.
"Ah... I was only thinkin' 'bout Angie."
"Do you ever think about anything else?"
"No," Tracey admitted honestly, "not much. But I was wonderin'--"
"Well?"
"Are you stuck on Angie, Mr. Duncan?" demanded Tracey desperately.
"Great snakes! I hope not!" Duncan cast an anxious glance about him,
and discovered the poster depicting the gentleman in strange attire
vainly endeavouring to free his overcoat (I believe it's his overcoat)
from the bench upon which a pot of glue has been spilled. He lifted a
reverent hand to the card. "Tracey," he said solemnly, "I swear to you
that not even that indispensable article of commerce could stick me on
Angie."
The boy sighed. "Thank you, Mr. Duncan. I was only worryin' because you
and Angie is singin' together in the choir, now Josie Lockwood's gone
to school, an'--an' Angie's the purtiest girl in town--and I was 'fraid
't you might like her best, when Josie's away. An' I wanted to ask you
to pick out s'mother girl."
Duncan chuckled silently. "Tracey," he said presently, "it strikes me
you must be in love with Angie."
The boy gulped. "I--I am."
"And I think she's rather partial to you."
"Do you, really, Mr. Duncan?"
"I do. Do you want to marry her?"
"Gee! I can't hardly wait!... Only," Tracey continued, disconsolate,
"it ain't no use, really. She's so purty and swell and old man
Tuthill's so rich--not like the Lockwoods, but rich, all the same--an'
I'm only the son of the livery-stable man, an' fat an'--all that--an'--"
"Nonsense, Tracey!" Nat interrupted firmly. "If you really want her and
will follow the rules I give you, it's a cinch."
"Honest, Mr. Duncan?"
"I guarantee it, Tracey. Listen to me...." And Duncan expounded
Kellogg's rules at length, adapting them to Tracey's circumstances, of
course; and throughout maintained the gravity of a graven image. "You
try, and you'll see if I'm not right," he concluded.
"Gosh! I b'lieve you are!" Tracey cried admiringly. "I'm just going to
see how it works."
"Do, if you'd favour me, Tracey."
Tracey was quiet for a time, working with the regularity of a mind
relieved. But presently he felt unable to contain himself. Gratitude
surged in his bosom, and he had to speak.
"Sa-y, lis'en...."
"Proceed, Tracey."
"Say, Mist--Nat, you've treated me somethin' immense."
"Your mistake, Tracey. I haven't treated anybody since I've been here:
I'm on the wagon."
"I mean just now, when we was talkin' 'bout me an' Angie. I'd--I'd like
to help you the same way, if I could."
"You would?" Duncan eyed the boy apprehensively, wondering what was
coming.
"Yes, indeedy, I would. An' p'rhaps I kin tell you somethin' that
will."
"Speak, I beg."
"You--er--you're tryin' to court Josie Lockwood, ain't you?"
"Oh!" said Nat. "So that was it! That's a secret, Tracey," he averred.
"All right. Only, if you are, she's your'n."
"Just how do you figure that out?"
"Oh, I kin tell. She was in here to-night with Roland."
"To-night?"
"Yes, just afore you come home from prayer-meetin'. She was lookin'
for you, and when she seen you wasn't here, she wouldn't wait for no
soda nor nothin'. Said she had a headache an' was goin' home. Roland
went with her, but she didn't want him to. You just missed seein'
her."
"Heavens, what a blow!"
"But Roland's takin' her home needn't upset you none."
"Thank you for those kind words, Tracey." Nat sighed and passed a
troubled hand across his brow. "You're a true friend."
"I'm tryin' to be, Nat, same's you are to me." Tracey thought this
over. "But you ain't foolin' me, are you?" he asked presently. "I mean
'bout bein' a true friend?"
"Why should I?"
"Ah, I dunno. You're so cur'us, sometimes. I ain't never sure whether
you mean what you're sayin' or not."
"Oh, don't say that."
"Well, I ain't the only one. Everybody in town says they don't
understand you, half the time."
Duncan left his counter and moved over to that at which Tracey was
occupied. His face was entirely serious, his manner deeply
sympathetic. "Tracey," he said, dropping a hand on the boy's shoulder,
"do you know, nothing in life is harder to bear than not to be
understood?"
Tracey wrestled with this for a moment, but it was beyond him.
"Then why the hell don't you talk so's folks'll know what it's about?"
he demanded heatedly.
"Because... _Hm_." Duncan hesitated, with his enigmatic smile.
"Well, because the rules don't require it."
"What d'you mean by _that_?" Tracey exploded.
Nat couldn't explain, so he countered neatly. "This is one of your
Angie... evenings, isn't it, Tracey?"
"Yep, but--"
"Well, you hurry along. I'll close up the shop."
Tracey had slammed on his hat and was struggling into his overcoat
almost as soon as the words were out of Nat's mouth.
"Kin I?" he cried excitedly.
"Yes," said Nat, watching the boy turn up his collar and button his
overcoat to the throat, "I haven't got the heart to keep you."
"Ah, thanks, Mr. Duncan."
"But, Tracey..."
The boy paused at the door. "What?"
"Remember what I told you. Don't you make too much love. Let Angie do
that."
"Gosh, that'll be the hardest rule of all for me!" A shadow clouded
Tracey's honest eyes. "But I got to do it that way, anyway. I can't
ask her to marry me yit. I can't afford to get married."
"It's a contrary world, Tracey, a contrary world!" sighed Nat in a tone
of deepest melancholy.
"What makes you say that? You kin git married's soon's you want to."
"You think so, Tracey?"
"All you got to do's ask Josie--"
"I'm almost afraid you're right."
"Why? Don't you want to git married?"
"Well"--Nat smiled--"no. Don't believe I do. Not just now, at any
rate."
"Well, you don't have to if you don't want to.... G'd-night."
"Yes, I do," Nat told Tracey's back. "The rules say so. If the girl
asks me, I must."
He grimaced ruefully beneath his wisp of a moustache. "Anyhow, I've got
a few months left...."
XVIII
A BARGAIN IS A BARGAIN
So the winter wore away.... And as spring drew nigh upon our valley,
Duncan seemed to grow perturbed, even as he had been in the autumn
before Betty went away. He was pondering another scheme for the
betterment of the condition of those he cared for, and gave it ample
consideration before he broached it to old Sam, after swearing him to
secrecy.
He had to propose nothing more or less than an abandonment of the old
Graham housekeeping quarters above the store and a removal of the
_menage_ bodily to a vacant house on Beech Street, near the store,
which could be rented, partly furnished, at a moderate rate.
To begin with (thus ran his argument) the store itself was growing too
small for the volume of business it commanded. More room was needed,
both for storage and laboratory purposes, to say nothing of
accommodation for Sam's models and work-bench. The latter had already
been moved upstairs for the winter, the shed in the backyard being too
cold to work in; and the laboratory end of the business was growing at
such a rate that it was crowding the prescription counter to the
wall--so to speak. You see, there really wasn't a more clever
analytical chemist in the northern part of the State than Sam Graham,
and now that the drug-store was becoming an influence in the
neighbourhood he was receiving commissions from physicians operating in
districts as far as fifty miles away. So a room was needed for that
branch of the business alone.
Moreover, a separate residence distinctly befitted the dignity of a
man who was at once a prominent inventor and one of Radville's leading
merchants (vide a "Personal" in the late issue of the Radville
_Citizen_), to say nothing of the social position of his
daughter--meaning Betty. And the house Duncan had his metaphorical eye
upon was large enough to shelter Nat himself in addition to the Graham
family. Thus they might pool their living expenses to the economical
advantage of each.
Finally, it would be a great and glad surprise for Betty on her
homecoming.
Graham fell in with the scheme without a murmur of dubiety or dissent.
Whatever Nat proposed in Sam's understanding was right and feasible;
and even if it wasn't really so, Nat would make it so.... They engaged
the house and moved. Miss Ann Sophronsiba Whitmarsh, a maiden lady of
forty-five or thereabouts, popularly known as "Phrony," had been coming
in by the day to "do for" old Sam in the rooms above the shop. She was
engaged as resident housekeeper for the new establishment, and entered
upon her duties with all the discreet joy of one whose maternal
instincts have been suppressed throughout her life. She mothered Sam
and she mothered Nat and she panted in expectation of the day when she
would have Betty to mother. Incidentally, she was one of the best
housekeepers in Radville, and cooperated with all her heart with Nat
in the task of making a home out of the new house. They arranged and
disarranged and rearranged and discarded old furniture and bought new
with almost the abandon of a newly married couple fitting out their
first home.... It was surprising what they managed to accomplish with
it; when they were finished, there wasn't a prettier nor a more
home-like residence in all Radville--and Phrony Whitmarsh was Nat's
slave, even as Miss Carpenter had been. She gave him all the credit for
everything praiseworthy about the place: and with some reason; for, as
a matter of fact, he had spared himself not at all in the business of
scheming and contriving to make the new home suitable for the
reception of Betty Graham....
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