A PLEASURE RIDE WITH MISS STEVENS
The morning train was due at ten o'clock. At ten o'clock also Sam was
due at Hollis Creek to take his long deferred drive with Miss Stevens.
It was a slight conflict, her engagement, but the solution to that was
very easy. As early in the morning as he dared, Sam called up Miss
Josephine.
"I've some glorious news," he said hopefully. "My kid brother will
arrive at Restview on the ten o'clock train."
"You are to be congratulated," Miss Stevens told him, with an echo of
his own delight.
"But you know we've an engagement to go driving at ten o'clock," he
reminded her, still hopefully, but trembling in spirit.
There was an instant of hesitation, which ended in a laugh.
"Don't let that interfere," she said. "We can defer our drive until
some other time, when fate is not so determined against it."
"But that doesn't suit me at all," he assured her. "Why can't you be
ready at nine in place of ten, let me call for you at that time and
drive over to Restview with me to meet Jack?"
"Is that his name?" she asked in blissfully reassuring tones. "You've
never spoken of him as anybody but your 'kid brother.' Why of course
I'll drive over to Restview with you. I shall be delighted to meet
him."
Privately she had her own fears of what Jack Turner might turn out to
be like. Sam was always so good in speaking of him, always held him in
such tender regard, such profound admiration, that she feared he might
prove to be perfect only in Sam's eyes.
"Good," said Sam. "Just for that I'm going to bring you over some
choice blooms that I have been having the gardener save back for me,"
and he turned away from the telephone quite happy in the thought that
for once he had been able to kill two birds with one stone without
ruffling the feathers of either.
Armed with a huge consignment of brilliant blossoms, enough to
transform her room into a fairy bower, he sped quite happily to Hollis
Creek.
"Oh, gladiolas!" cried Miss Josephine, as he drove up. "How did you
ever guess it! That little bird must have been busy again."
"Honestly, it was the little bird this time. I just had an intuition
that you must like them because I do so well," upon which naïve
statement Miss Josephine merely smiled, and calling her father with
pretty peremptoriness, she loaded that heavy gentleman down with the
flowers and with instructions concerning them, and then stepped
brightly into the tonneau with Sam.
It was a pleasant ride they had to Restview, and it was a pleasant
surprise which greeted Miss Josephine when the train arrived, for out
of it stepped a youth who was unmistakably a Turner. He was as tall as
Sam, but slighter, and as clean a looking boy as one would find in a
day's journey. There was that, too, in the hand-clasp between the
brothers which proclaimed at once their flawless relationship.
Miss Stevens was so relieved to find the younger Turner so presentable
that she took him into her friendship at once. He was that kind of
chap anyhow, and in the very first greeting she almost found herself
calling him Jack. Just behind him, however, was a little, dried-up man
with a complexion the color of old parchment, with sandy, stubby hair
shot with gray, and a stubby gray beard shot with red. His lips were a
wide straight line, as grim as judgment day. He walked with a slight
stoop, but with a quick staccato step which betokened great nervous
energy, a quality which the alert expression of his beady eyes
confirmed with distinct emphasis.
"Hello, Creamer!" hailed Sam to this gentleman. "I didn't expect to
see you here quite so soon."
"You had every right to expect me," snapped the little man querulously.
"After all the experimenting I have done for you boys, you had every
reason to keep me posted on all your movements; and yet I reckon if I
hadn't been in your office yesterday evening when Jack said he was
coming down here, you would not have notified me until you had your
company all formed. Then I suppose you'd have written to tell me how
much stock you had assigned to me. I'm going to be in on the formation
of this company, and I'm going to have my say about it!"
"Will you never get over that dyspepsia?" chided Sam easily. "There
was no intention of leaving you out."
"Just what I told him," declared Jack, turning from Miss Stevens to
them. "I have been swearing to him that as soon as we had found out
to-day what we were to do I would have wired him at once."
"You were quite right, Jack," approved Sam, opening the door of the car
for them, "and as a proof of it, Creamer, when you return to your
office you will find there a letter postmarked yesterday, telling you
our exact progress here, and warning you to be in readiness to come on
telegram."
"All right, then," said Mr. Creamer, somewhat mollified, "but since
that letter's there and I'm here, you might as well tell me what you've
done."
Sam stopped the proceedings long enough to introduce Creamer to Miss
Stevens after he had closed the door upon them and had taken his own
seat by the chauffeur.
"All right," he then said to Mr. Creamer, "I'll begin at the beginning."
He began at the beginning. He told Mr. Creamer all the steps in the
development of the company. He detailed to him the names of the
gentlemen concerned, and their complete commercial histories, pausing
to answer many pertinent side questions and observations from his
younger brother, who proved to be as keen a student of business puzzles
as Sam himself.
"That's all very well," said Mr. Creamer, "and now I'm here. I want to
get away to-night: Can't we form that company to-day? At what figure
do you propose offering the original stock?"
"The preferred at fifty, with a par value of a hundred," returned Sam
promptly.
"Common?" asked Mr. Creamer crisply.
"One share of common with each two shares of preferred."
"Eh! Well, I've twenty-five thousand dollars to put into this marsh
pulp business, if I can have any figure in the management. I want on
the board."
"It's quite likely you'll be on the board," returned Sam. "We shall
have a very small list of subscribers, and the board will not be
unwieldy if every investor is a director."
"Voting power in the common stock?"
"In the common stock," repeated Sam.
"Do you intend to buy any preferred?" asked Creamer.
"A hundred shares."
"How much common do you expect to take out for your patents?"
"Two hundred and fifty thousand," Sam answered without an instant's
hesitation.
"Never!" exclaimed Mr. Creamer. "The time for that's gone by, young
man, no matter how good your proposition is. It's too old a game. You
won't handle my money with control in your hands. I have no objection
to letting you have two hundred thousand dollars worth of common stock
out of the half million, because that will give you an incentive to
make the common worth par; but you shan't at any time have or be able
to acquire a share over two hundred and forty-nine thousand; not if I
know anything about it! Can you call a meeting as soon as we get
there?"
"I think so," replied Sam, with a more or less worried air. "I'll try
it. Tell you what I'll do. I'll run right on over to get Mr. Stevens,
who wants to join the company, and in the meantime Mr. Westlake or
Princeman can round up the others."
For the first time in that drive Miss Stevens had something to say, but
she said it with a briefness that was like a dash of cold water to the
preoccupied Sam.
"Father is over there now, I think," she said.
"Good," approved Mr. Creamer. "We can have a little direct business
talk and wind up the whole affair before lunch. What time do we arrive
at Meadow Brook?"
"Before eleven o'clock."
"That will give us two hours. Two hours is enough to form any company,
when everybody knows exactly what he wants to do. Got a lawyer over
there?"
"One of the best in the country."
Miss Stevens sat in the center seat of the tonneau. Sam, in addressing
his remarks to the others and in listening to their replies, was
compelled to sweep his glance squarely across her, and occasionally in
these sweeps he paused to let his gaze rest upon her. She was a relief
to his eyes, a blessing to them! Miss Stevens, however, seldom met any
of these glances. Very much preoccupied she was, looking at the
passing scenery and not seeing it.
There had begun boiling and seething in Miss Stevens a feeling that she
was decidedly _de trop_, that these men could talk their absorbing
business more freely if she were not there; not because she embarrassed
them, but because she used up space! Nobody seemed to give her a
thought. Nobody seemed to be aware that she was present. They were
almost gaspingly engrossed in something far more important to them than
she was. It was uncomplimentary, to say the least. She was not used
to playing "second fiddle" in any company. She was in the habit of
absorbing the most of the attention in her immediate vicinity. Mr.
Princeman or Mr. Hollis would neither one ignore her in that way, to
say nothing of Billy Westlake.
She was glad when they reached Meadow Brook. Their whole talk had been
of marsh pulp, and company organization, and preferred and common
stock, and who was to get it, and how much they were to pay for it, and
how they were going to cut the throats of the wood pulp manufacturers,
and how much profit they were going to make from the consumers and with
all that, not a word for her. Not a single word! Not even an apology!
Oh, it was atrocious! As soon as they drew up to the porch she rose,
and before Sam could jump down to open the door of the tonneau she had
opened it for herself and sprung out.
"I'll hunt up father right away for you," she stated courteously.
"Glad to have met you, Mr. Creamer. I presume I shall meet you again,
Mr. Turner," she said to Jack. "Thank you so much for the ride," she
said to Sam, and then she was gone.
Sam looked after her blankly. It couldn't be possible that she was
"huffy" about this business talk. Why, couldn't the girl see that this
had to do with the birth of a great big company, a million dollar
corporation, and that it was of vital importance to him? It meant the
apex of a lifetime of endeavor. It meant the upbuilding of a fortune.
Couldn't she see that he and his brother were two lone youngsters
against all these shrewd business men, whose only terms of aiding them
and floating this big company was to take their mastery of it away from
them? Couldn't she understand what control of a million dollar
organization meant? He was not angry with Miss Stevens for her
apparent attitude in this matter, but he was hurt. He was not
impatient with her, but he was impatient of the fact that she could not
appreciate. Now the fat was in the fire again. He felt that. Under
other circumstances he would have said that it was much more trouble
than it was worth to keep in the good graces of a girl, but under the
present circumstances--well, his heart had sunk down about a foot out
of place, and he had a sort of faint feeling in the region of his
stomach. He was just about sick. He followed her in, just in time to
see the flutter of her skirts at the top of the stairway, but he could
not call without making himself and her ridiculous. Confound things in
general!
Mr. Stevens joined him while he was still looking into that blank hole
in the world.
"Glad I happened to be here, Sam," said Stevens. "Jo tells me that
your brother and Mr. Creamer have arrived and that you want to form
that company right away."
"Yes," admitted Sam. "Was she sarcastic about it?"
Mr. Stevens closed his eyes and laughed.
"Not exactly sarcastic," he stated; "but she did allude to your
proposed corporation as 'that old company!'"
"I was afraid so," said Sam ruefully.
Stevens surveyed him in amusement for a moment, and then in pity.
"Never mind, my boy," he said kindly. "You'll get used to these things
by and by. It took me the first five years of my married life to
convince Mrs. Stevens that business was not a rival to her affections,
when, if I'd only have known the recipe, I could have convinced her at
the start."
"How did you finally do it?" asked Sam, vitally interested.
"Made her my confidante and adviser," stated Stevens, smiling
reminiscently.
Sam shook his head.
"Was that safe?" he asked. "Didn't she sometimes let out your secrets?"
"Bosh!" exclaimed Stevens. "I'd rather trust a woman than a man, any
day, with a secret, business or personal. That goes for any woman;
mother, sister, sweetheart, wife, daughter, or stenographer. Just give
them a chance to get interested in your game, and they're with you
against the world."
"Thanks," said Sam, putting that bit of information aside for future
pondering. "By the way, Mr. Stevens, before we join the others I'd
like to ask you how much stock you're going to carry in the Marsh Pulp
Company."
"Well," returned Mr. Stevens slowly, "I did think that if the thing
looked good on final analysis, I might invest twenty-five thousand
dollars."
"Can't you stretch that to fifty?"
"Can't see it. But why? Don't you think you're going to fill your
list?"
"We'll fill our list all right," returned Sam. "As a matter of fact,
that's what I'm afraid of. These fellows are going to pool their
stock, and hold control in their own hands. Now if I could get you to
invest fifty thousand and vote with me under proper emergency, I could
control the thing; and I ought to. It is my own company. Seems to me
these fellows are selfish about it. You think I'm a good business man,
don't you?"
"I certainly do," agreed Mr. Stevens emphatically.
"Well, it stands to reason that if I have two hundred and sixty
thousand dollars of common stock that isn't worth a picayune unless I
make it worth par, I'll hustle; and if I make my common stock worth
par, I'm making a fine, fat profit for these other fellows, to say
nothing of the raising of their preferred stock from the value of fifty
to a hundred dollars a share, and their common from nothing to a
hundred."
"That's all right, Sam," returned Mr. Stevens; "but you'll work just as
hard to make your common worth par if you only have two hundred
thousand; and there's a growing tendency on the part of capital to be
able to keep a string on its own money. Strange, but true."
"All right," said Sam wearily. "We won't argue that point any more
just now; but will you invest fifty thousand?"
"I can't promise," said Stevens, and he walked out on the porch. Much
worried, Sam followed him, and with many misgivings he introduced Mr.
Stevens to his brother Jack and to Mr. Creamer. The prospective
organizers of the Marsh Pulp Company were already in solemn conclave on
the porch, with the single exception of Princeman, who was on the lawn
talking most perfunctorily with Miss Josephine. That young lady, with
wickedness of the deepest sort in her soul, was doing her best to
entice Mr. Princeman into forgetting the important meeting, but as soon
as Princeman saw the gathering hosts he gently but firmly tore himself
away, very much to her surprise and indignation. Why, he had been as
rude to her as Sam Turner himself, in placing the charms of business
above her own! Immediately afterward she snubbed Billy Westlake
unmercifully. Had he the qualities which would go to make a successful
man in any walk of life? No!