THE WESTLAKES DECIDE TO INVEST
Miss Hastings did not exactly snub Sam in the morning, but she was
surprisingly indifferent to him after all her previous cordiality, and
even went so far as to forget the early morning constitutional she was
to have taken with him; instead she passed him coolly by on the porch
right after an extremely early breakfast, and sauntered away down
lovers' lane, arm in arm with Billy Westlake, who was already looking
very much comforted. Sam, who had been dreading that walk, released it
with a sigh of intense satisfaction, planning that in the interim until
time for his drive, he would improve his tennis a bit with Miss
Westlake. He was just hunting her up when he met Bob Tilloughby, who
invited him to join a riding party from both houses for a trip over to
Sunset Rock.
"Sorry," said Sam with secret satisfaction, "but I've an engagement
over at Hollis Creek at ten o'clock," and Tilloughby carried that
information back to Miss Westlake, who had sent him.
An engagement at Hollis Creek at ten o'clock, eh? Well, Miss Westlake
knew who that meant; none other than her dear friend, Josephine
Stevens! Being a young lady of considerable directness, she went
immediately to her father.
"Have you definitely made up your mind, pop, to take stock in Mr.
Turner's company?" she asked, sitting down by that placid gentleman.
Without removing his interlocked hands from their comfortable
resting-place in plain sight, he slowly twirled his thumbs some three
times, and then stopped.
"Yes, I think I shall," he said.
"About how much?" Miss Westlake wanted to know.
"Oh, about twenty-five thousand."
"Who's to get it?"
"Why, I thought I'd divide it between Billy and you."
Miss Westlake put her hand on her father's arm.
"Say, pop, give it to me, please," she pleaded. "Billy can take the
next stock you buy, or I'll let him have some of my other in exchange."
Mr. Westlake surveyed his daughter out of a pair of fish-gray eyes
without turning his head.
"You seem to be especially interested in this stock. You asked about
it yesterday and Sunday and one day last week."
"Yes, I am," she admitted. "It's a really first-class business
investment, isn't it?"
"Yes, I think it is," replied Westlake; "as good as any stock in an
untried company can be, anyhow. At least it's an excellent investment
chance."
"That's what I thought," she said. "I'm judging, of course, only by
what you say, and by my impression of Mr. Turner. It seems to me that
almost anything he goes into should be highly successful."
Mr. Westlake slowly whirled his thumbs in the other direction, three
separate twirls, and stopped them.
"Yes," he agreed. "I'm investing the money in just Sam myself,
although the scheme itself looks like a splendid one."
Miss Westlake was silent a moment while she twisted at the button on
her father's coat sleeve.
"I don't quite understand this matter of stock control," she went on
presently. "You've explained it to me, but I don't seem quite to get
the meaning of it."
"Well, it's like this," explained Mr. Westlake. "Sam Turner, with only
a paltry investment, say about five thousand dollars, wants to be able
to dictate the entire policy of a million-dollar concern. In other
words, he wants a majority of stock, which will let him come into the
stock-holders' meetings, and vote into office his own board of
directors, who will do just what he says; and if he wanted to he might
have them vote the entire profits of the concern for his salary."
"But, father, he wouldn't do anything like that," she protested,
shocked.
"No, he probably wouldn't," admitted Mr. Westlake, "but I wouldn't be
wise to let him have the chance, just the same."
"But, father," objected Miss Hallie, after further thought, "it's his
invention, you know, and his process, and if he doesn't have control
couldn't all you other stock-holders get together and appropriate the
profits yourselves?"
Mr. Westlake gave his thumbs one quick turn.
"Yes," he grudgingly confessed. "In fact, it's been done," and there
was a certain grim satisfaction at the corners of his mouth which his
daughter could not interpret, as he thought back over the long list of
absorptions which had made old Bill Westlake the power that he was.
"But--but, father," and she hesitated a long time.
"Yes," he encouraged her.
"Even if you won't let him have enough stock to obtain control, if some
one other person should own enough of the stock, couldn't they put
their stock with his and let him do just about as he liked?"
"Oh, yes," agreed Mr. Westlake without any twirling of his thumbs at
all; "that's been done, too."
"Would this twenty-five thousand dollars' worth of stock that you're
buying, pop, if it were added to what you men are willing to let Mr.
Turner have, give him control?"
Again Mr. Westlake turned his speculative gray eyes upon his daughter
and gave her a long, careful scrutiny, which she received with downcast
lashes.
"No," he replied.
"How much would?"
"Well, fifty thousand would do it."
"Say, pop--"
"Yes."
Another long interval.
"I wish you'd buy fifty thousand for me in place of twenty-five."
"Humph," grunted Mr. Westlake, and after one sharp glance at her he
looked down at his big fat thumbs and twirled them for a long, long
time. "Well," said he, "Sam Turner is a fine young man. I've known
him in a business way for five or six years, and I never saw a flaw in
him of any sort. All right. You give Billy your sugar stock and I'll
buy you this fifty thousand."
Miss Westlake reached over and kissed her father impulsively.
"Thanks, pop," she said. "Now there's another thing I want you to do."
"What, more?" he demanded.
"Yes, more," and this time the color deepened in her cheeks. "I want
you to hunt up Mr. Turner and tell him that you're going to take that
much."
Mr. Westlake with a smile reached up and pinched his daughter's cheek.
"Very well, Hallie, I'll do it," said he.
She patted him affectionately on the bald spot.
"Good for you," she said. "Be sure you see him this morning, though,
and before half-past nine."
"You're particular about that, eh?"
"Yes, it's rather important," she admitted, and blushed furiously.
Westlake patted his daughter on the shoulder.
"Hallie," said He, "if Billy only had your common-sense business
instinct, I wouldn't ask for anything else in this world; but Billy is
a saphead."
Mr. Westlake, thinking that he understood the matter very thoroughly,
though in reality overunderstanding it--nice word, that--took it upon
himself with considerable seriousness to hunt up Sam Turner; but it was
fully nine-thirty before he found that energetic young man. Sam was
just going down the driveway in a neat little trap behind a team of
spirited grays.
"Wait a minute, Sam, wait a minute," hailed Westlake, puffing
laboriously across the closely cropped lawn.
Sam held up his horses abruptly, and they stood swinging their heads
and champing at their bits, while Sam, with a trace of a frown, looked
at his watch.
"What's your rush?" asked Westlake. "I've been hunting for you
everywhere. I want to talk about some important features of that Marsh
Pulp Company of yours."
"All right," said Sam. "I'm open for conversation. I'll see you right
after lunch."
"No. I must see you now," insisted Westlake. "I've--I've got to
decide on some things right this morning. I--I've got to know how to
portion out my investments."
Sam looked at his watch and was genuinely distressed.
"I'm sorry," said he, "but I have an engagement over at Hollis Creek at
exactly ten o'clock, and I've scant time to make it."
"Business?" demanded Westlake.
"No," confessed Sam slowly.
"Oh, social then. Well, social engagements in America always play
second fiddle to business ones, and don't you forget it. I'll talk
about this matter this morning or I won't talk about it at all."
Sam stopped nonplussed. Westlake was an important factor in the
prospective Marsh Pulp Company.
"Tell you what you do," said he, after some quick thought. "Why can't
you get in the trap and drive over to Hollis Creek with me? We can
talk on the way and you can visit with your friends over there until
time for luncheon; then I'll bring you back and we can talk on the way
home, too."
Miss Hallie and Princeman and young Tilloughby came cantering down the
drive and waved hands at the two men.
"All right," said Westlake decisively, looking after his daughter and
answering her glance with a nod. "Wait until I get my hat," and he
wheeled abruptly away.
Sam fumed and fretted and jerked his watch back and forth from his
pocket, while Westlake wasted fifteen precious minutes in waddling up
to the house and hunting for his hat and returning with it, and two
minutes more in bungling his awkward way into the buggy; then Sam
started the grays at such a terrific pace that, until they came to the
steep hill midway of the course, there was no chance for conversation.
While the horses pulled up this steep hill, however, Westlake had his
opportunity.
"I suppose you know," he said, "that you're not going to be allowed
over two thousand shares of common stock for your patents."
"I'm beginning to give up the hope of having more," admitted Sam.
"However, I'm going to stick it out to the last ditch."
"It won't be permitted, so you might as well give up that idea. How
much stock do you think of buying?"
"About five thousand dollars' worth of the preferred," said Sam.
"Which will give you fifty bonus shares of the common. I suppose of
course you figure on eventually securing control in some way or other."
"Not being an infant, I do," returned Sam, flicking his whip at a weed
and gathering his lines up quickly as the mettled horses jumped.
"I don't know of any one person who's going to buy enough stock to help
you out in that plan; unless I should do it myself," suggested
Westlake, and waited.
Sam surveyed the other man long and silently. Westlake, as the largest
minority shareholder, had done some very strange things to corporations
in his time.
"Neither do I," said Sam non-committally.
There was another long silence.
"If you carry through this Marsh Pulp Company to a successful
termination, you will be fairly well fixed for a young man, won't you?"
the older man ventured by and by.
"Well," hesitated Sam, "I'll have a start anyhow."
"I should say you would," Westlake assured him, placing his hands in
his favorite position for contemplative discussion. "You'll have a
good enough start to enable you to settle down."
"Yes," admitted Sam.
"What you need, my boy, is a wife," went on Mr. Westlake. "No man's
business career is properly assured until he has a wife to steady him
down."
"I believe that," agreed Sam. "I've come to the same conclusion
myself, and to tell you the truth of the matter I've been contemplating
marriage very seriously since I've been down here."
"Good!" approved Westlake. "You're a fine boy, Sam. I may tell you
right now that I approve of both you and your decision very heartily.
I rather thought there was something in the wind that way."
"Yes," confessed Sam hesitantly. "I don't mind admitting that I have
even gone so far as to pick out the girl, if she'll have me."
Mr. Westlake smiled.
"I don't think there will be any trouble on that score," said he. "Of
course, Sam, I'm not going to force your confidence, or anything of
that sort, but--but I want to tell you that I think you're all right,"
and he very solemnly shook hands with Mr. Turner.
They had just reached the top of the hill when Westlake again returned
to business.
"I'm glad to know you're going to settle down, Sam," he said. "It
inspires me with more confidence in your affairs, and I may say that I
stand ready to subscribe, in my daughter's name, for fifty thousand
dollars' worth of the stock of your company."
"Well," said Sam, giving the matter careful weight. "It will be a good
investment for her."
Before Mr. Westlake had any time to reply to this, the grays, having
just passed the summit of the hill, leaped forward in obedience to
another swish of Sam's whip.