ONE LAST CHANCE
Bojo came away from the telephone with a face so grave that Granning
greeted him with an involuntary exclamation:
"Good heavens, Bojo, what's wrong?"
"The Atlantic Trust has gone under. The Clearing House refused to clear.
You know what that means."
"But, I say, you're not affected. You've been out of the market for
months. I say, you didn't have anything up."
"No, no," said Bojo grimly. He went and sat down, his head in his hands.
"I'm not thinking of myself. Some one else. I can't tell you; you must
guess. It will probably all be out soon enough. By George, this is a
cropper."
"I think I understand," said Granning slowly. He sat down in turn,
kicking his toes against the twisted andirons on the hearth. "The
Atlantic Trust--and a billion--who knows, a billion and a half deposits!
What the deuce are we coming to? It will hit us all--bad times!"
Bojo got up heavily and went out. Hardly had he stepped from the leafy
isolation of the Court into the strident conflict of Times Square when
he felt the instant alarm that great disasters instantaneously convey
to a metropolitan crowd. Newspaper trucks were screaming past, halting
to fling out great bunches of the latest extras to fighting, scrambling
groups of street urchins who dispersed, screaming their shrill evil in
high-pitched, contagion-spreading voices. Every one was devouring the
last panic-ridden sheet, some hurrying home, others stopping in their
tracks spellbound to read to the end. He bought an extra hastily from a
strident newsboy who thrust it in his face. The worst was true. The
great Atlantic Trust had been refused clearance. Darkest suspicions were
thrown upon its solvency. The names of other banks, colossal
institutions, were linked under the same awful rumors. The morrow would
see a run on a dozen banks such as the generation had not witnessed. He
hailed a taxicab and hurried uptown. Drake had told him that everything
depended upon the Atlantic Trust. Now that this had gone under did this
mean his absolute ruin? Patsie was already waiting for him as he drew up
before the great gray stone mansion. She flung herself in his arms,
trembling and physically unnerved. He was afraid that she was going to
collapse completely and began solicitously to whisper in her ear many
deceptive words of hope and comfort.
"It may not be so bad. Your father--have you seen your father? How do
you know what he has done? Perhaps he has come to some agreement this
afternoon. Perhaps he has saved himself by some bold stroke. I believe
him capable of anything."
She stopped the futile flow of words with her fingers across his lips.
"Oh, how happy we were this afternoon," she said, for the moment almost
breaking down. But immediately the Spartan courage which was at the
bottom of her character prevailed. She drew herself up, saying so
quietly that he was surprised:
"Bojo, we mustn't deceive ourselves. This is the end, I know it.
Whatever is to come we must help immediately."
"Yet I still feel, I can't help it, that something may have happened. He
may have been able to do something to-day."
"I wish I could feel so," she said sadly.
With her hand still in his she led the way into the great library, which
seemed a region of mystifying and gloomy things, lit only by the lights
of the desk lamps.
"All we can do is to wait," she said.
"Have you seen your mother?" he said at last.
She shook her head. "It is useless. I have no influence over her. Doris
perhaps, or Doris' husband; she might do something for fear of what
others might think of her, but she wouldn't do it for me."
"I can't understand it at all," he said, shaking his head.
"I can," she said quietly. "My mother doesn't love him. She has never
loved him. She married him just as Doris and Dolly married, for money,
for position."
"But even then--"
"Yes, even then," she took up with a laugh that had tears in it.
"Wouldn't you think that for the sake of the family name and honor, out
of just simple ordinary gratitude for what had been given her, she would
part with the half, even a third of her fortune? But you do not know my
mother. When she has made up her mind nothing will ever change it."
"Let us hope you are wrong."
She laughed again and began walking up and down, her hands clenched,
trying to think of some way out.
"Poor Dad, just when he needs all his courage to go on fighting! This,
too, has broken him up. That's the only sort of a blow he couldn't get
over."
The butler came in at this moment, announcing dinner.
"No, no; not for me," she said. "I couldn't; but you, perhaps?"
"No, not until your father comes back."
The butler went out. Bojo held out his hand to her, saying: "Come here;
sit down by me." Worn out by the strain of emotions, she obeyed quietly.
She came to take a seat on the sofa beside him, looked a moment into his
eyes, saw the depths of tenderness and sympathy there and with a tired,
fleeting smile laid her head gratefully on his shoulder.
It was almost eleven o'clock before Drake came wearily in. They were
exhausted with the long tensity of their vigil, waiting for every sound
that would announce his arrival, but at his entrance they stood up,
vibrantly alert. One glance at Drake, at the hunted and harassed look
across his forehead told Bojo that the worst had happened. Patsie went
to her father bravely with a steady smile that never wavered and put her
arms around his neck.
"Pretty bad, isn't it, Dad?" she said.
He nodded, incapable for the moment of speech.
"I am so sorry. Never mind, even if we have to begin at the bottom we
will win out again."
Bojo had come up and taken his free hand, looking in his eyes anxiously
for the answer.
"I guess the game is up," said Drake at last. "There is only one chance,
and though I swore I never would do it--" he stopped a moment, running
his hand over Patsie's golden curls, "I guess I'll have to swallow my
pride," he said.
"You're going to her," said the daughter, shuddering.
"Once more," he said, grimly.
Leaving her he went to the little table by the desk and poured out a
stiff drink.
"Whew, what a day! Two hours more and I might have pulled through; I
thought I had it all fixed up, but that Clearing House mess ended that!
You can't sell men eggs at five cents a piece when they know to-morrow
they can get the same at three cents."
He tried to smile, but back of it all Bojo was alarmed to see the
disorder in the physical and moral man which had gained over him since
yesterday. Despite Drake's determination to assume a stoic attitude he
felt the biting bitterness and revolt that was gnawing at his soul.
Patsie wanted him to sit down to rest a moment, to have something, if
only a morsel, brought in, but he refused absent-mindedly.
"No, no, I must get it over with. I must know where I stand."
Still he delayed his departure, evidently revolting against the role
which he had determined to play.
"Your mother is home?" he said abruptly.
"She is home--in her room," said Patsie.
He took a final turn before at last making up his mind, then he gave a
short gesture of his hand towards them, saying:
"Wait."
The next moment he went out, not with the old accustomed swinging gait,
but with a lagging step as though already convinced of the futility of
his errand.
"He is doing it for his daughters," thought Bojo; "only that would make
him so humble himself." He felt with a little compunction that he had
judged Drake rather harshly, for in these last interviews it had seemed
to him at times that there had been an absence of that gameness which in
his mind he would like to have associated with the romantic figure of
the manipulator. Now with the secrets of the household laid bare to him
he felt strongly the inner vulnerability of such men. Able outwardly to
defy the great turns of fortune and present a smiling front to
adversity, yet unable to resist the mortal blow which strikes at the
vital regions in their sentiments and their affections. Implacable as he
had been, neither giving nor asking quarter in his struggles with his
own kind, Bojo at length realized the tenderness and pride amounting
almost to a weakness with which he idolized his own. What he had seen
working in the soul of the man in this last half hour made him feel more
than simply the ruin of his worldly possessions. The moment was too
tense for words, the issue too tremendous. They sat side by side, his
hand over hers, staring ahead, waiting.
Ten minutes, half an hour elapsed without a sound. He pictured to
himself to what arguments and entreaties the desperate father must
resort, trying through his inexperience to visualize the drama in one of
these domestic scenes which pass unguessed.
Patsie heard him first. She sprang up with a sharp intaking of her
breath. He rose less precipitately, hearing at last the sound of
returning footsteps. The next moment Drake came into the room and stood
gazing at the two erect figures of the young man and the young girl.
Then he tried to smile and couldn't. Her instinct guessed on the instant
what had happened. She went to him swiftly and put her arms about his
shoulders as though to support him.
"Never mind, Dad," she said bravely. "Don't you care, money isn't
everything in this world. Whatever happens, you've got me."