"It's hard to tell just where he stands. I suspect that a hopeful
temperament and fondness for round numbers have always caused him to
set his figures beyond his actual worth. I don't say that he's been
dishonest about it, but he's had a loose way of estimating his assets;
he's reckoned his wealth on the basis of his capital, and some of his
capital is borrowed. He's lost heavily by some of the recent failures,
and there's been a terrible shrinkage in his values. I don't mean
merely in the stock of paint on hand, but in a kind of competition
which has become very threatening. You know about that West Virginian
paint?"
Corey nodded.
"Well, he tells me that they've struck a vein of natural gas out there
which will enable them to make as good a paint as his own at a cost of
manufacturing so low that they can undersell him everywhere. If this
proves to be the case, it will not only drive his paint out of the
market, but will reduce the value of his Works--the whole plant--at
Lapham to a merely nominal figure."
"I see," said Corey dejectedly. "I've understood that he had put a
great deal of money into his Works."
"Yes, and he estimated his mine there at a high figure. Of course it
will be worth little or nothing if the West Virginia paint drives his
out. Then, besides, Lapham has been into several things outside of his
own business, and, like a good many other men who try outside things,
he's kept account of them himself; and he's all mixed up about them.
He's asked me to look into his affairs with him, and I've promised to
do so. Whether he can be tided over his difficulties remains to be
seen. I'm afraid it will take a good deal of money to do it--a great
deal more than he thinks, at least. He believes comparatively little
would do it. I think differently. I think that anything less than a
great deal would be thrown away on him. If it were merely a question
of a certain sum--even a large sum--to keep him going, it might be
managed; but it's much more complicated. And, as I say, it must have
been a trial to him to refuse your offer."
This did not seem to be the way in which Bellingham had meant to
conclude. But he said no more; and Corey made him no response.
He remained pondering the case, now hopefully, now doubtfully, and
wondering, whatever his mood was, whether Penelope knew anything of the
fact with which her mother went nearly at the same moment to acquaint
her.
"Of course, he's done it on your account," Mrs. Lapham could not help
saying.
"Then he was very silly. Does he think I would let him give father
money? And if father lost it for him, does he suppose it would make it
any easier for me? I think father acted twice as well. It was very
silly."
In repeating the censure, her look was not so severe as her tone; she
even smiled a little, and her mother reported to her father that she
acted more like herself than she had yet since Corey's offer.
"I think, if he was to repeat his offer, she would have him now," said
Mrs. Lapham.
"Well, I'll let her know if he does," said the Colonel.
"I guess he won't do it to you!" she cried.
"Who else will he do it to?" he demanded.
They perceived that they had each been talking of a different offer.
After Lapham went to his business in the morning the postman brought
another letter from Irene, which was full of pleasant things that were
happening to her; there was a great deal about her cousin Will, as she
called him. At the end she had written, "Tell Pen I don't want she
should be foolish." "There!" said Mrs. Lapham. "I guess it's going to
come out right, all round;" and it seemed as if even the Colonel's
difficulties were past. "When your father gets through this, Pen," she
asked impulsively, "what shall you do?"
"What have you been telling Irene about me?"
"Nothing much. What should you do?"
"It would be a good deal easier to say what I should do if father
didn't," said the girl.
"I know you think it was nice in him to make your father that offer,"
urged the mother.
"It was nice, yes; but it was silly," said the girl. "Most nice things
are silly, I suppose," she added.
She went to her room and wrote a letter. It was very long, and very
carefully written; and when she read it over, she tore it into small
pieces. She wrote another one, short and hurried, and tore that up
too. Then she went back to her mother, in the family room, and asked
to see Irene's letter, and read it over to herself. "Yes, she seems to
be having a good time," she sighed. "Mother, do you think I ought to
let Mr. Corey know that I know about it?"
"Well, I should think it would be a pleasure to him," said Mrs. Lapham
judicially.
"I'm not so sure of that the way I should have to tell him. I should
begin by giving him a scolding. Of course, he meant well by it, but
can't you see that it wasn't very flattering! How did he expect it
would change me?"
"I don't believe he ever thought of that."
"Don't you? Why?"
"Because you can see that he isn't one of that kind. He might want to
please you without wanting to change you by what he did."
"Yes. He must have known that nothing would change me,--at least,
nothing that he could do. I thought of that. I shouldn't like him to
feel that I couldn't appreciate it, even if I did think it was silly.
Should you write to him?"
"I don't see why not."
"It would be too pointed. No, I shall just let it go. I wish he
hadn't done it."
"Well, he has done it." "And I've tried to write to him about it--two
letters: one so humble and grateful that it couldn't stand up on its
edge, and the other so pert and flippant. Mother, I wish you could
have seen those two letters! I wish I had kept them to look at if I
ever got to thinking I had any sense again. They would take the
conceit out of me."
"What's the reason he don't come here any more?"
"Doesn't he come?" asked Penelope in turn, as if it were something she
had not noticed particularly.
"You'd ought to know."
"Yes." She sat silent a while. "If he doesn't come, I suppose it's
because he's offended at something I did."
"What did you do?"
"Nothing. I--wrote to him--a little while ago. I suppose it was very
blunt, but I didn't believe he would be angry at it. But this--this
that he's done shows he was angry, and that he wasn't just seizing the
first chance to get out of it."
"What have you done, Pen?" demanded her mother sharply.
"Oh, I don't know. All the mischief in the world, I suppose. I'll
tell you. When you first told me that father was in trouble with his
business, I wrote to him not to come any more till I let him. I said I
couldn't tell him why, and he hasn't been here since. I'm sure I don't
know what it means."
Her mother looked at her with angry severity. "Well, Penelope Lapham!
For a sensible child, you ARE the greatest goose I ever saw. Did you
think he would come here and SEE if you wouldn't let him come?"
"He might have written," urged the girl.
Her mother made that despairing "Tchk!" with her tongue, and fell back
in her chair. "I should have DESPISED him if he had written. He's
acted just exactly right, and you--you've acted--I don't know HOW
you've acted. I'm ashamed of you. A girl that could be so sensible
for her sister, and always say and do just the right thing, and then
when it comes to herself to be such a DISGUSTING simpleton!"
"I thought I ought to break with him at once, and not let him suppose
that there was any hope for him or me if father was poor. It was my
one chance, in this whole business, to do anything heroic, and I jumped
at it. You mustn't think, because I can laugh at it now, that I wasn't
in earnest, mother! I WAS--dead! But the Colonel has gone to ruin so
gradually, that he's spoilt everything. I expected that he would be
bankrupt the next day, and that then HE would understand what I meant.
But to have it drag along for a fortnight seems to take all the heroism
out of it, and leave it as flat!" She looked at her mother with a smile
that shone through her tears, and a pathos that quivered round her
jesting lips. "It's easy enough to be sensible for other people. But
when it comes to myself, there I am! Especially, when I want to do what
I oughtn't so much that it seems as if doing what I didn't want to do
MUST be doing what I ought! But it's been a great success one way,
mother. It's helped me to keep up before the Colonel. If it hadn't
been for Mr. Corey's staying away, and my feeling so indignant with him
for having been badly treated by me, I shouldn't have been worth
anything at all."
The tears started down her cheeks, but her mother said, "Well, now, go
along, and write to him. It don't matter what you say, much; and don't
be so very particular."
Her third attempt at a letter pleased her scarcely better than the
rest, but she sent it, though it seemed so blunt and awkward. She
wrote:--
DEAR FRIEND,--I expected when I sent you that note, that you would
understand, almost the next day, why I could not see you any more. You
must know now, and you must not think that if anything happened to my
father, I should wish you to help him. But that is no reason why I
should not thank you, and I do thank you, for offering. It was like
you, I will say that.
Yours sincerely, PENELOPE LAPHAM.