SOME DISCOURTESIES
Sidney Prale obtained accommodations in a prominent hostelry on Fifth
Avenue, bathed, dressed, ate luncheon, and then went out upon the
streets, walking briskly and swinging his stick, going about New York
like a stranger who never had seen it before.
As a matter of fact, he never had seen this New York before. He had
expected a multitude of changes, but nothing compared to what he found.
He watched the crowds on the Avenue, cut over to Broadway and
investigated the electric signs by daylight, observed the congestion of
vehicles and the efforts of traffic policemen to straighten it out. He
darted into the subway and rode far downtown and back again just for the
sport of it. After that he got on an omnibus and rode up to Central
Park, and acted as if every tree and twig were an old friend.
He made himself acquainted with the animals in the zoo there, and
promised himself to go to the other zoo in the Bronx before the end of
the week. He stood back at the curb and lifted his head to look at new
buildings after the manner of the comic supplement farmer with a straw
between his teeth.
"Great--great!" said Sidney Prale.
Then he hurried back to the hotel, dressed for dinner, and went down to
the dining room, stopping on the way to obtain a ticket for a musical
revue that was the talk of the town at the moment.
Prale ordered a dinner that made the waiter open his eyes. He made it a
point to select things that were not on the menus of the hotels in
Honduras. Then he sat back in his chair and listened to the orchestra,
and watched well-dressed men and women come in and get their places at
the tables.
But the dinner was a disappointment to Prale after all. It seemed to him
that the waiter was a long time giving him service. He remonstrated, and
the man asked pardon and said that he would do better, but he did not.
Prale found that his soup was lukewarm, his salad dressing prepared
imperfectly, the salad itself a mere mess of vegetables. The fish and
fowl he had ordered were not served properly, the dessert was without
flavor, the cheese was stale. He sent for the head waiter.
"I'm disgusted with the food and the service," he complained. "I rarely
find fault, but I am compelled to do so this time. The man who has been
serving me seems to be a rank amateur, and twice he was almost insolent.
This hotel has a reputation which it scarcely is maintaining this
evening."
"I'll see about it, sir," the head waiter said.
Prale saw him stop the waiter and speak to him, and the waiter glared at
him when he brought the demi-tasse. Prale did not care. He glared back
at the man, drank the coffee, and touched the match to a cigar. Then he
signed the check and went from the dining room, an angry and disgusted
man.
"Another thing like that, and I look for the manager," he told himself.
He supposed that he was a victim of circumstances--that the waiter was a
new man and that it happened that the portions he served were poor
portions. His happiness at being home again prevented Sidney Prale from
feeling anger for any length of time. He got his hat and coat and went
out upon the street again.
He had an hour before time to go to the theater. He walked over to
Broadway and went toward the north, looking at the bright lights and the
crowds. He passed through two or three hotel lobbies, satisfied for the
time merely to be in the midst of the throngs.
At the proper time, he hurried to the theater and claimed his seat. The
performance was a mediocre one, but it pleased Sidney Prale. He had seen
a better show in Honduras a month before, had seen better dancing and
heard better singing and comedy, but this was New York!
The show at an end, Prale claimed his hat and coat at the check room and
walked down the street toward a cabaret restaurant. He reached into his
overcoat pocket for his gloves, and his hand encountered a slip of
paper. He took it out.
There was the same rough handwriting on the same kind of paper, and
evidently with the same blunt pencil.
"Remember--retribution is sure!"
"This thing ceases to be a joke!" Prale told himself.
His face flushed with anger, and he turned back toward the theater. But
he had been among the last to leave, and already the lights of the
playhouse were being turned out. The boy in charge of the check room
would be gone, Prale knew.
He thought of Kate Gilbert again, and the bit of paper she had dropped
as she got into the limousine down on the water front. Surely she could
have no hand in this, he thought. What interest could Kate Gilbert, a
casual acquaintance and reputed daughter of a wealthy house, have in him
and his affairs?
"Somebody is making a mistake," he declared to himself, "or else it is
some sort of a new advertising dodge. If I ever catch the jokesmith who
is responsible for these dainty little messages, I'll tell him a thing
or two."
Prale turned into the restaurant and found a seat at a little table at
one side of the room. The after-theater crowd was filling the place. The
orchestra was playing furiously, and the cabaret performance was
beginning. Sidney Prale leaned back in his chair and watched the show.
The waiter came to his side, and he ordered something to eat and drink.
Then he saw Kate Gilbert again, at a table not very far away from his.
She was dressed in an evening gown, as if she had just come from the
theater or opera. She was in the company of the elderly man who had met
her at the wharf, and a young man and an older woman were at the same
table.
Prale's eyes met hers for an instant, and he inclined his head a bit in
a respectful manner. But Kate Gilbert looked through him as if he had
not been present, and then turned her head and began talking to the
elderly man.
Prale's face flushed. He hadn't done anything wrong, he told himself. He
merely had bowed to her, as he would have bowed to any woman to whom he
had been properly introduced. She had seen fit to cut him. Well, he
could exist without Kate Gilbert, he told himself, but he wondered at
her peculiar manner.
He left the place within the hour and went back to the hotel and to bed.
In the morning he walked up the Avenue as far as the Circle, dropped
into a restaurant for a good breakfast, and then engaged a taxicab and
drove downtown to the financial district. He had remembered that he was
a man with a million, and that he had to pay some attention to business.
He went into the establishment of a famous trust company and sent his
card in to the president. An attendant ushered him into the president's
private office immediately.
"Sit down, Mr. Prale," said the financier. "I am glad that you came to
see me this morning. I was just about to have somebody look you up."
"Anything the matter?" Prale asked.
"Your funds were transferred to us by our Honduras correspondent," the
financier said. "Since you were leaving Honduras almost immediately, we
decided to care for the funds until you arrived and we could talk to
you."
"I shall want some good investments, of course," Prale said. "I have
disposed of all my holdings in Honduras, and I don't want the money to
be idle."
"Idleness is as bad for dollars as for men," said the financier,
clearing his throat.
"Can you suggest some investments? I have engaged no broker as yet, of
course."
"I--er--I am afraid that we have nothing at the present moment," the
financier said.
"The market must be good," Prale observed. "I never knew a time when
investments were lacking."
"I would not offer you a poor one, and good ones are scarce with us at
present," said the banker. "Sorry that we cannot attend to the business
for you. Perhaps some other trust company----"
"Well, I can wait for something to turn up," Prale said. "There is no
hurry, of course. Probably you'll have something in a few weeks that
will take care of at least a part of the money."
The banker cleared his throat again, and looked a trifle embarrassed as
he spoke. "The fact of the matter is, Mr. Prale," he said, "that we do
not care for the account."
"I beg your pardon!" Prale exclaimed. "You mean you don't want me to
leave my money in your bank?"
"Just that, Mr. Prale."
"But in Heaven's name, why? I should think that any financial
institution would be glad to get a new account of that size."
"I--er--I cannot go into details, sir," the banker said. "But I must
tell you that we'd be glad if you'd make arrangements to move the
deposit to some other bank."
"I suppose you don't like to be bothered with small accounts," said
Prale, with the suspicion of a sneer in his voice. "Very well, sir! I'll
see that the deposit is transferred before night. Perhaps I can find
banks that will be glad to take the money and treat me with respect. And
I shall remember this, sir!"
"I--er--have no choice in the matter," the banker said.
"Can't you explain what it means?"
"I have nothing to say--nothing at all to say," stammered the financier.
"We took the money because of our Honduras correspondent, but we'll
appreciate it very much if you do business with some other institution."
"You can bet I'll do that little thing!" Prale exclaimed.
He left the office angrily and stalked from the building. Were the big
financiers of New York insane? A man with a million in cold cash has the
right to expect that he will be treated decently in a bank. Prale walked
down the street and grew angrier with every step he took.
Before going to Honduras he had worked for a firm of brokers. He hurried
toward their office now. He would send in his card to his old employer,
Griffin, he decided, and ask his advice about banking his funds, and
incidentally whether the financier he had just left was an imbecile.
He found the Griffin concern in the same building, though the offices
were twice as large now, and there were evidences of prosperity on every
side.
"Got an appointment?" an office boy demanded.
"No, but I fancy that Mr. Griffin will see me," said Prale. "I used to
work for him years ago."
Then he sat down to wait. Griffin would be glad to see him, he thought.
Griffin was a man who always liked to see younger men get along. He
would want to know how Sidney Prale got his million. He would want to
take him to luncheon and exhibit him to his friends--tell how one of his
young men had forged ahead in the world.
The boy came back with his card. "Mr. Griffin can't see you," he
announced.
"Oh, he's busy, eh? Did he make an appointment?"
"No, he ain't busy," said the boy. "He's got his feet set up on the desk
and he's readin' about yesterday's ball game. He said to say that he
didn't have time to see you this mornin', and that he wouldn't ever have
time to see you."
"Don't be discourteous, you young imp!" Prale said, his face flushing.
"You're sure you handed Mr. Griffin my card?"
"Oh, I handed it to him--and don't you try to run any bluff on me!" the
boy answered. "From the way the boss acted, I guess you don't stand very
high with him!"
The boy went back to his chair, and Sidney Prale went from the office, a
puzzled and angry man. There probably was some mistake, he told himself.
He'd meet Griffin during the day and tell him about the adventure.
He was anxious to meet some of the men with whom he had worked ten years
before, but he did not know where to find them. He'd have to wait and
ask Griffin what had become of them. Then, too, he wanted to transfer
his funds.
Prale got another taxicab and started making the rounds of the banks he
knew to be solid institutions. Within a few hours he had made
arrangements to transfer the account, using four financial institutions.
He said nothing, except that the money had been transferred to the trust
company from Honduras, because the company had a correspondent there.
His funds secure, Prale went back uptown and to the hotel. The clerk
handed him a note with his key. Prale tore it open after he stepped into
the elevator. This time it was a sheet of paper upon which a message had
been typewritten.
"You can't dodge the law of compensation. For what you have done, you
must pay."
Sidney Prale gasped when he read that message, and went back to the
ground floor.
"Who left this note for me?" he demanded of the clerk.
"Messenger boy."
"You don't know where he came from?"
"No, sir."
Prale turned away and started for the elevator again. A bell hop stopped
him.
"Manager would like to see you in his office, sir," the boy said. "This
way, sir."
Prale followed the boy, wondering what was coming now. He found the
manager to be a sort of austere individual who seemed impressed with his
own importance.
"Mr. Prale," he said, "I regret to have to say this, but I find that it
cannot be avoided. When you arrived yesterday, the clerk assigned you to
a suite on the fifth floor. He made a mistake. We had a telegraphic
reservation for that suite from an old guest of ours, and it should have
been kept for him. You appreciate the situation, I feel sure."
"No objection to being moved," Prale said. "I have unpacked scarcely any
of my things."
"But--again I regret it--there isn't a vacant suite in the house, Mr.
Prale."
"A room, then, until you have one."
"We haven't a room. We haven't as much as a cot, Mr. Prale. We cannot
take care of you, I'm afraid. So many regular guests, you understand,
and out-of-town visitors."
"Then I'll have to move, I suppose. You may have the suite within two
hours."
"Thank you, Mr. Prale."
Prale was angry again when he left the office of the manager. It seemed
that everything was conspiring against his comfort. He got a cab, drove
to another hotel, inspected a suite and reserved it, paying a month in
advance, and then went back to the big hotel on Fifth Avenue to get his
baggage. He paid his bill at the cashier's window, and overheard the
room clerk speaking to a woman.
"Certainly, madam," the clerk was saying. "We will have an excellent
suite on the fifth floor within half an hour. The party is just vacating
it. Plenty of suites on the third floor, of course, but, if you want to
be up higher in the building----"
Sidney Prale felt the blood pounding in his temples, felt rage welling
up within him. He felt as he had once in a Honduras forest when he
became aware that a dishonest foreman was betraying business secrets. He
hurried to the office of the manager, but the stenographer said the
manager was busy and could not be seen.
Prale whirled away, going through the lobby toward the entrance. He met
Kate Gilbert face to face. She did not seem to see him, though he was
forced to step aside to let her pass.