The second day of January, 1913, was marked by the installation of
Samuel Gunterson as underwriting head of the Guardian and by the
announcement of a radical separation rule by the combined companies of
the Eastern Conference. Each was likely to have a far-reaching effect.
Smith read the news with stolid eyes. He did not credit O'Connor with
having had sufficient influence to carry the separation act through the
Conference, but all that the astute President of the Salamander had
hoped for, and in anticipation of which had laid his plans, had come to
pass--the Guardian was out of the Conference, the separation rule was
to take effect almost immediately--and Gunterson was at the wheel.
Smith well knew what a leverage would be used against his company. He
was still brooding over the fateful item when Mr. Wintermuth sent for
him.
"Have you met your new chief yet?" asked the President, in a friendly
manner.
"Yes," said the other, shortly. He held out the paper. "Have you seen
this yet?" he inquired, in turn.
"_The Journal of Commerce_? No. Is there anything especial in it?"
For answer Smith laid the paper open on the desk, pointing silently to
the item which meant so much to the Guardian--and to every company
outside the Conference.
Mr. Wintermuth adjusted his glasses and read the article carefully.
"Well, well!" he said thoughtfully. "So they passed it, after all! I
never believed they would dare. It's a little too much like a
boycott--it gives them too much the appearance of a combination in
restraint of trade. Tariff and rate-making associations are proper and
necessary, but to attempt to dictate to agents what companies they
shall not represent--or at any event penalize them for so doing--is
going pretty far. No, I didn't think they'd dare."
"Three months ago perhaps they wouldn't have," Smith suggested. "It
looks like a reprisal aimed at us, more than any one else. All the
other outsiders are old hands and can take care of themselves, but we
haven't gotten acclimated--we're liable to have a bad time. And I
think I know who accelerated the whole movement, sir."
"Yes--I understand whom you mean," said the President, compressing his
lips. "No doubt this was part of his plan. Well, you seem to have
followed this thing pretty closely, Richard--what do you think we had
better do?"
"Isn't that rather a matter for Mr. Gunterson to decide now, sir? I
don't want him to start with the idea that I am trying to dictate the
underwriting policy of the company. Of course, I have my own idea of
what would best serve the interest of the company to do--although in
some ways I'd hate to see us do it."
"And what may it be?"
"Go back into the Conference."
"What! Go limping back with our tail between our legs? Put O'Connor
in a position where he could say that we were strong enough to go out
and stand alone when he was with us, but after he left we were too weak
to stick it out? Never! I won't go back into the Eastern Conference,
if it costs the Guardian every agency in the field. . . . Boy, ask Mr.
Gunterson if he will be so good as to step here a moment."
In the brief interval before the new Vice-President put in his
dignified appearance, neither of the occupants of the office spoke.
"Ah, Mr. Gunterson. Good morning once more. You know Mr. Smith, our
General Agent, I believe?"
Mr. Gunterson bowed with urbanity. Courtesies exchanged--a matter of
some little time--the President again spoke.
"Did you notice, in this morning's _Journal_, that the Eastern
Conference has passed a separation rule, Mr. Gunterson? I do not know
whether you are aware that the Guardian is not a member of the
Conference; shortly before the resignation of your predecessor we
withdrew--largely upon his recommendations. There is no reasonable
doubt that at the time Mr. O'Connor believed such a rule would go into
effect, and very likely he was more or less instrumental in getting it
adopted. At all events it is clear that he wanted us to get out, and
here we are--out! And almost any time, now, we are likely to be put
out of nearly every agency in the East where Conference companies
predominate--which means ninety per cent of our agencies."
"I see," observed Mr. Gunterson, sagely. "I see."
"Now the question is: what are we going to do? Mr. Smith here advises
that we confess our inability to operate in an open field without the
invaluable assistance of our late Vice-president, and go back into the
Conference. By merely sacrificing our self-respect we could save our
Eastern agency plant. I have put you in charge of the underwriting of
the Guardian, Mr. Gunterson, and I would like your advice on this."
The attitude to be assumed by the Vice-president was too obvious to be
creditable to his sense of perception.
"I would not give them the satisfaction of seeing us reverse our policy
and confess ourselves defeated--surrender before a gun was fired. We
can fight and win," said Mr. Gunterson, promptly.
It was rudimentary cleverness; a babe could have perceived what reply
Mr. Wintermuth desired.
"Good!" said that gentleman, much encouraged. "I'm glad to hear you
say so. That's exactly the way I feel about it, myself. I'll see
O'Connor damned before I'll let him think he has forced our hand. I
think your attitude is quite correct, Mr. Gunterson--I like the way you
begin."
"Thank you, sir," said the Vice-president, modestly; then,
deprecatingly nodding toward Smith:--
"Probably from a strictly conservative viewpoint Mr. Smith's advice is
good. And the Guardian is a conservative company. But a little
properly placed radicalism is not a bad thing at times--is not that
true, Mr. Wintermuth?"
To which Mr. Wintermuth assented with a smile.
"At all events the fight, if there is one, will be confined to the
smaller places. They can't touch us in the big cities, can they?"
pursued Mr. Gunterson, following up his advantage.
"No," said Smith, shortly. "The rule won't affect us here in New York,
nor in Boston, nor Philadelphia, nor Buffalo, nor Baltimore. At least
those places, and some others, have always been excepted cities--making
their own rules. Unless the local agents through the local boards vote
for separation, we're safe there. I'd hate to see a fight started in
those towns, though."
"You seem a little reluctant to get into any controversy, Richard,"
said Mr. Wintermuth, kindly. "To be sure, you haven't been through so
many as we have. But sometimes it is necessary to fight--and fight
hard, too."
"He has not weathered as many storms as you, sir," Gunterson
interpolated with a smile. "Nor," he added, "as many as I myself,
perhaps."
"Perhaps not," said Smith, dryly. "Is there anything else you want of
me, sir?" he turned to the President. "If not, I guess I'll get back
to my mail."
"Go ahead," returned his chief. "Mr. Gunterson and I will plan this
thing out together."
And Smith left the office with as much numb despondency in his heart as
he had ever felt in his thirty-odd years. He knew--what the others did
not seem fully to appreciate--that there was an animus in this attack
of O'Connor's which would stick at nothing. He saw, or he believed he
saw, the excepted cities of Boston, Philadelphia, and the rest, under
the polite coercion of the Eastern Conference, passing similar
separation rules of their own. He foresaw the Guardian forced out of
Graham and Peck's agency in Philadelphia, out of the Silas Osgood
office in Boston, and losing its long established connections in other
cities where the Guardian's business was as well selected and
profitable as that of any company of them all. He looked gloomily down
a long vista of losses and disappointments, and it appeared to him
there could naturally be but one end. However, it was no doing of his.
He was there to obey orders and to transact the company's business as
the management desired it to be done, and in the press of other
crowding matters he was glad to forget everything but the tasks before
him.
The days succeeding the Conference announcement brought very little in
the way of further developments. So still was the insurance stage,
indeed, that Mr. Gunterson began to think that there would be no
trouble, after all, and Smith to speculate on the ominous stillness and
on what new moves would flash from behind this seeming curtain of
inaction.
Almost at the very time of this speculation on his part, a train was
carrying toward Boston no less a person than F. Mills O'Connor of the
Salamander. Almost at the very hour of a Tuesday morning, when Mr.
Gunterson was gravely assuring Mr. Wintermuth that he believed he would
be able, in spite of the Eastern Conference, to preserve the company's
agency force without the loss of a single important agent, Mr.
O'Connor, after more or less indirect preliminary conversation, was
presenting his desires quite bluntly to Mr. Silas Osgood.
"To be perfectly frank, Mr. Osgood, the Salamander has never gotten the
premium income it should get from Boston, and worse than that, it has
always lost money. Now you've got a place for us in your office, and
it's the Guardian's place. No--hold on a minute--let me finish. I
know that Mr. Wintermuth is an old friend of yours, but Mr. Wintermuth
is about finished with the fire insurance business. Now you know that
your relations with Gunterson, who is a hopeless incompetent, will
never be satisfactory, and you also know that Gunterson will probably
put the company out of business within two years. You appreciate also
that the Salamander is a bigger company than the Guardian--it has twice
the Guardian's premium income--"
"And half the Guardian's surplus," interrupted Mr. Osgood, softly.
"No matter about the surplus. Edward E. Murch and his people are back
of us, we've got the premium income, and we're in the game to stay,
while you as a practical insurance man know, no matter how far your
sympathies may go in the opposite direction, that the days of the
Guardian are numbered. I'm offering you the chance to take on one of
the livest companies in the field to-day in place of a concern that's
headed for oblivion by the most direct route. It's a chance I would
jump at if I were in your place, but I understand the sentimental
consideration enters in,--it does credit to your heart, Mr. Osgood, and
I respect you for it,--and in view of all that sort of thing I came
here prepared to give you certain inducements to switch the Guardian's
business to the Salamander."
"Inducements? Of what sort do you mean?" inquired Mr. Osgood, mildly,
although his face was a little flushed.
"Well, increased latitude on lines and classes--a larger authorization
in the congested district--those are some things. Possibly also," he
suggested delicately, "a little extra allowance--let us say an
entertainment fund--to be used in cultivating brokers with an
especially desirable business."
"But," said Mr. Osgood, "we are members of the Boston Board. We cannot
offer any greater inducements to brokers than any of our fellow members
offer."
O'Connor saw his suggestion had not been taken kindly.
"Of course not," he agreed. "Although I know one Boston agent who once
a month plays cards with his best broker, and curiously enough he
always loses exactly five per cent of that broker's account with him
for the previous month. Such things are sickening--and they put at a
disadvantage those of us who live up to our agreements. But I don't
suppose any Board could make a rule preventing an agent from taking a
good customer out to dinner and perhaps the theater once in a
while--that was all I meant to suggest."
Mr. Osgood, who felt considerable doubt as to this innocent limitation,
rose.
"I presume you would like my decision, Mr. O'Connor," he said, in a low
voice.
"Why, yes--as soon as convenient--the sooner the better," the other man
replied easily.
"Well, then, I will give it to you now," said the Bostonian. "Mr.
O'Connor, I am an old man; I have lived in this city for nearly seventy
years, and during those years I do not think I ever made a bargain
which I would have been ashamed for the world to have seen. I am too
old to begin to be either disloyal or dishonest now--for I do not see
what else you can call what you have proposed but disloyalty to my
friend Mr. Wintermuth and his company and dishonesty to my associates
in the Boston Board. If I thought you intended to insult me, I would
ask you to leave my office, but I do not think you intended your
proposal as an insult, for I do not believe that by your own code you
are doing anything which that code would condemn."
His visitor started to voice a protest, but the other man stopped him.
"Let me finish," he said. "I have known your former chief, Mr.
Wintermuth, considerably more than half my lifetime. When I resign the
Boston agency of the Guardian, it will be either at his request or
because my day in the insurance world is over and I can no longer give
the company a sufficient business. That is all. And now, Mr.
O'Connor, I do not ask you to leave my office, but I hope you will
never come into it again so long as I am here."
The President of the Salamander got to his feet, and his eyes narrowed.
"All right, Mr. Osgood," he said. "Don't worry--I won't stay where I'm
not wanted. But my offer was made in good faith, it would have been
advantageous to your firm, and I'm sorry you turned it down. I wanted
to give you a chance, in a way that I admit would have been a good
thing for me, to keep your own office organization intact--for the
impression seems to be gaining ground that the Boston Board will pass a
separation rule, and in that event you will have to give up the
Guardian agency, anyway."
The Bostonian turned back to his desk.
"That is too remote a contingency for me to discuss with you," he
replied, somewhat curtly. "Good-day, sir."
"Good-day, Mr. Osgood," said F. Mills O'Connor. He paused at the
threshold. "I don't believe you've heard the last of this yet," he
remarked, as he closed the door behind him.
It is a common saying with regard to any especially clever criminal:
what a great man he would have made of himself if only he would have
applied all this cleverness to legitimate ends! This is probably
untrue in nine cases out of every ten, and perhaps in even a larger
ratio, for the successful crook is successful only along crooked lines;
his mind will work only in forbidden channels; it needs the spice and
flavor of the illicit to stimulate its brilliancy. Let him address
himself to a legitimate problem, ethical or commercial, and his
efficiency evaporates--or rather it is non-existent.
Although not a criminal, F. Mills O'Connor was, to a limited degree, a
demonstration of this fact. Mr. O'Connor had been competent but never
particularly clever along strictly legitimate lines; it was always and
only along ways just a little devious, a little tricky, a little
sophistical, that his acumen mounted above the ordinary. His greatest
successes with the Guardian had always been gained by methods which had
been kept secret from his chief, for Mr. Wintermuth's keen sense of
business honor would have prevented the fruition of every one.
He was now in the right company. The Salamander took its key from its
leading director, and Mr. Murch's code of ethics briefly consisted of a
belief that it was advisable to "stay inside the law"--unless he were
absolutely certain that transgression would be undiscoverable or
unpenalized. Into this scheme of things Mr. O'Connor fitted like water
in a skin. Hence one need not have been astonished, half an hour
later, had he overheard one end of a conversation conducted from Mr.
Bennington Cole's private phone in the office of Silas Osgood and
Company.
"Yes--this is Mr. Cole."
"Yes--I know who is speaking."
"Yes--I presume I could come over. Young's Hotel, did you say?"
"I understand. Room forty-three. I'll be there in about twenty
minutes."
In twenty minutes room forty-three saw Mr. Cole being suavely greeted
by Mr. O'Connor, and then it proceeded to furnish the scene for a
little drama of business intrigue that would have been very interesting
to an audience of law-abiding Conference companies who believed in
living up to their pledges.
In the course of this undivulged conversation it developed that Mr.
O'Connor was satisfied with what had just gone before; that Mr. Osgood
had done exactly what both O'Connor and Cole had expected he would do,
making it possible for Cole, by the proper playing of his cards, to
succeed almost immediately to the management of the Osgood agency, and
that aided thereto by the fact that the scrupulous Mr. Osgood would
doubtless hesitate to interfere in any way with any act of his
successor, the fuse was all laid for the introduction of the Salamander
into the Osgood office by means of the passage of a separation rule in
Boston at the very next meeting of the local board. The interview must
have been a satisfactory one, for Cole's step, as he walked back to
Kilby Street, was buoyant, and Mr. O'Connor bore himself as a deeply
satisfied man.
Among the local agents in Boston there had never been any marked
sentiment either for or against the adoption of a separation scheme.
Some of the agents believed in it and some did not; but as most of the
principal offices represented, with a few unimportant exceptions, only
Conference companies, it had never been really a vital issue up to the
time Mr. O'Connor came to Boston for the Salamander. By what means he
contrived to bring the agents into line will never be known.
Undoubtedly the time was precisely ripe, and he had the very
influential cooperation of many of the strongest Conference companies.
At all events, however he went to work, that way proved efficacious.
The passage of the rule through the Board was assured. After its vote
on the coming Wednesday, no agent in Boston representing a Conference
company could, at the expiration of thirty days, continue to represent
an outsider.
The effect that such a rule would have on the local interests of the
Guardian was at once apparent. Representing, as the Osgood office did,
a number of Conference companies, three of which it had represented
almost as long as the Guardian, Mr. Osgood would have no practical
choice. It was a case of one against the rest--and naturally the one
would fall. Of all this, however, Mr. Osgood himself knew nothing as
yet, save for the vague menace conveyed by O'Connor's valedictory
address. Of this also the Boston insurance fraternity at large knew
almost nothing, for the matter was to be jammed through the Board, and
those behind it were sworn to secrecy.
Outside the inner ring who were back of the move, only one man in
Boston caught wind of the matter which now only waited the coming of
Wednesday to take its place among the rules of the Boston Board. This
man was Mr. Francis Hancher of the Boston _Index_, the most alert
insurance-news gatherer of New England. If anything of moment went on
in the insurance world that centers in Boston, without coming under the
attention of the inquisitive Mr. Hancher, it had to wear felt slippers
and move about only at night. He had as unerring an instinct for
insurance news as any ward boss for graft, and he was a man of humanity
and bonhomie besides. Into his ears came the first faint rumors of
things astir, and he began to work on the almost impalpable scent.
Silently he worked, craftily, without arousing suspicion in the minds
of those he questioned. Bit by bit, fragment by fragment, he gathered
the makings of a Story, until at last, on the Saturday morning before
the fateful Wednesday, he happened into the office of Silas Osgood and
gained the last link in his chain.
"What's new?" was his greeting to Mr. Osgood.
"Could there be anything new that you do not know?" replied the other,
with a smile.
"I see O'Connor's in town," said Hancher, abruptly, and his interest
quickened when he saw the sudden change of Mr. Osgood's expression.
"You've seen him, I suppose?" the journalist pursued nonchalantly.
"Yes," Mr. Osgood rather stiffly admitted.
Mr. Hancher took a sudden resolution. He drew up his chair a little
closer, and leaned forward.
"I think you'd better tell me what he's here for--all you know about
it," he said bluntly. "You know me--I won't use what you tell me
unless I have your permission. And I've got an idea that you ought to
know what's going on."
"I would very greatly prefer that it should not become common
knowledge," Mr. Osgood replied with some hesitation; "but I may tell
you, Mr. Hancher, that Mr. O'Connor came to see me with a proposal that
we take the agency of the Salamander and turn over the Guardian's
business to them. I told him--were you going to say anything?"
"No. That's it, then. Go on--what did you tell him?"
"I told him no. I didn't care to consider the matter," said the older
man, simply.
"Mr. Osgood," said the other, "you've given me what I need to make what
I suspected stand on a solid bottom. I can see the motive now for
what's being done. It's the fact that O'Connor wants the Guardian's
business. Now, I want to tell you something--or rather ask you
something. Do you think your refusal to consider his proposition
closed up the whole business completely?"
"Well, no," Mr. Osgood replied; "I suppose not. In fact, when he left,
he rather intimated that I might look for further developments."
"That was temper," Hancher commented judicially. "Not good judgment,
at all. Ordinarily he'd never have said such a thing. But he meant
it, all right--you can believe that. If he can't get the Guardian
business one way, he'll try it another. And the second way he has
chosen is this--after the meeting of the Boston Board next Wednesday
you will be obliged to choose between resigning either the Guardian or
all your other companies."
"You mean that a separation rule will be put through?" Mr. Osgood
inquired quickly.
"Surest thing you know," the journalist declared. "That is, unless
somebody puts a little sand on the slide pretty all-fired soon. I say,
Mr. Osgood,--I'm a non-combatant, but I like to see fair play,--why
don't you write the Guardian people?--or wire them? I think this is
something your friend Wintermuth ought to know."
Mr. Osgood reached toward the button that summoned his stenographer,
and then drew back his hand.
"No," he said slowly. "What's the use? If it's decided, I can't stop
it. And I fancy the best of my fighting days are over. That's for the
younger men to do. I'll talk to Cole about it, and see what he thinks
we'd better do."
The journalist glanced at him somewhat skeptically.
"Well, you needn't fight, yourself--let the Guardian people attend to
that. And if you take my advice, you'll write Wintermuth. Good-by."
Mr. Osgood wrote, and on Monday morning his letter came to the hand of
Mr. Wintermuth, whose eye brightened at the sight of his friend's
signature. But there was no pleasure in his tone when a moment later
he sent for Mr. Gunterson.
"Look here," he said, "I'm afraid these Eastern Conference people mean
trouble. We've been assuming that the excepted cities were
safe--nothing could happen there. Well, I don't believe they're as
safe as we thought. Read what Osgood says about Boston. Boston! where
we've got as fine a business as any company of our size in the field.
Look at that!"
With a dignified reticence Mr. Gunterson took the letter, and in a rich
silence he perused it. Then, with a calm smile, he gave his decision.
"Mr. Osgood's evident alarm may be well founded--perhaps not. But at
all events, I believe our interests at Boston should be protected by
some one of authority, and I shall go up myself on the five o'clock
this afternoon."
On the five o'clock Mr. Gunterson left New York, and at a seasonable
hour on Tuesday morning he started forth upon his travels from his
Boston hotel. In search of a target at which he could aim, he went
first to Mr. Osgood, to ask his aid in locating that target. Mr.
Osgood, who had hoped that Mr. Wintermuth himself would come, felt a
tremor of premonitory dismay at the sight of this deputy; and his
subsequent talk with Mr. Gunterson did nothing to allay his
apprehension. In fact, it was his covert reflection that if Hancher
was right, it was all over; the man whom Wintermuth sent was of no
assistance.
In point of truth, it _was_ all over. It was barely possible that a
strong and determined man could have effected something had he known
how to set about it--but Mr. Gunterson did not know how. No hack actor
suddenly confronted with a strange and difficult part felt more inept
than he. He conceived that within him was the power to deliver a
tremendous blow--but he could not find its mark. Aimlessly he
consulted his acquaintances along Kilby Street. The agents of the
influential Conference companies, primed to resist interviews, greeted
him affably, congratulated him on his new connection, and blandly
denied all knowledge of any radical move in process. That night Mr.
Gunterson, having accomplished absolutely nothing, returned to his
hotel with an uneasy feeling of dissatisfaction with the day.
Wednesday came. Gunterson, hesitant, undecided, in need of help, early
sought his only ally, Mr. Osgood. At the door of their offices he met
Mr. Osgood and Mr. Cole on their way to the meeting of the Board. The
Vice-President of the Guardian fell meekly into step. At the Board
rooms the agents were gathered; the meeting came to order; the order of
business began. After the transaction of a few routine affairs Mr.
Spence of Spence and Hardiwick rose and moved that the Eastern
Conference separation rule be extended to cover Boston. His motion was
seconded. There was no debate, and the only speaker was cut short by a
call for the question.
In the chorus of ayes, Mr. Osgood's negative went unheard and unnoted.
The motion was carried almost unanimously, Cole not voting, but
permitting the senior partner to cast the vote for the firm. And all
this time there sat at Mr. Osgood's side the restless but impotent form
of Mr. Gunterson. Twice he started to speak, and then repressed
himself, his face a little flushed with helpless shame. Beside Mr.
Osgood he sat until the meeting concluded, and not a word did he say.
The meeting adjourned. In the hum of conversation Mr. Osgood turned to
his junior partner.
"I'm through, Ben. You will have to go on without me. I cannot
dismember my whole office organization; but James Wintermuth is one of
my oldest and dearest friends, and when Silas Osgood and Company resign
the Guardian--some one else must be in command."
Cole did not answer. The three moved slowly toward the door, and there
in the doorway stood the author of their perplexity and distress.
O'Connor saw them coming, and held out his hand to the veteran
underwriter.
"How do you do, Mr. Osgood," he said. "I hope you don't bear any ill
will to me for what has just happened. I said I thought the rule would
go through, and you can see for yourself that it was passed almost
unanimously. Perhaps we may be able to do business together after all.
Let us consider this as two sensible business men. Of course I'm glad
the rule went through; but please don't think that I did it. I don't
own the Boston Board."
The other man regarded him steadily.
"Probably you are right, Mr. O'Connor," he replied. "I do not seem to
have correctly estimated the sentiment of to-day. No doubt you used
your influence on the side of your company's interests. But I do not
care to do business with you, sir--on that point my mind is unchanged."
"Well, I'm sorry you feel that way about it," said the other, with the
good nature which as victor he could afford to maintain. "Good-day,
Mr. Osgood."
Mr. Osgood passed through the doorway, but Gunterson, following him,
smitten with vague valor and sudden fury, turned.
"You--you!" was all he said, at a loss for words in his anger, and the
President of the Salamander met him with a smile of humorous contempt.
"Why, hello!" he said, "here's Gunterson! Come to Boston to find a new
agent, I suppose. So did I, to tell the truth. Good luck, old man."
Mr. Gunterson turned his back on his tormentor, and passed on. He
could think of no appropriate retort. But the situation could not be
saved by any degree of repartee. Boston had voted for separation;
Silas Osgood and Company must resign the Guardian; and Samuel Gunterson
had made a humiliating failure of his quest.
Into his throbbing brain, however, a new idea had come, suggested by
O'Connor's taunt. A new agent! Why not? If the Osgood office,
consisting largely of Conference companies, was obliged to resign the
Guardian, there must be some other agency where non-Conference
companies predominated and where he could place the Guardian upon the
withdrawal of a Conference company. After all, the Osgood office was
not the only good agency in Boston. A new vigor fortified him--he
would find an agent for the Guardian who should excel the Osgood
connection as the sun outshines the moon.
In one office of perhaps more notoriety than prominence, though Mr.
Gunterson knew it not, at that very moment the matter was being
discussed.
"Well, Jake," said Sternberg, of Sternberg, Bloom, and McCoy, "they've
passed it."
"What did I tell you?" demanded Jake Bloom. "Didn't I tell you them
Conference companies would get what they wanted? They got it, all
right. Now the question is, what do we get out of it?"
"What do you mean?" asked Sternberg, slowly. He was large and bald,
and had a dead-white, soft-looking, pock-marked face, while Bloom was
short, black, and untidy.
"Well, I mean for one thing, the Guardian gets thrown out of the Osgood
agency. They're on the street. Why shouldn't we get 'em?"
"Sure! Why not?" Sternberg rejoined with enthusiasm. "We've got to
get some one else in here before long or we'll be up in the air. I'm
afraid we've been salting some of our people too hard. It sort of
jarred me when the Spokane left us. We've got to do something pretty
quick. Now, how will we get at Gunterson? He don't know us."
"And a blame good thing he don't," said McCoy, with perfect frankness.
"A swell chance we'd have of landing the Guardian if we'd had the
Elsass-Lothringen! There's no use of talking--we've been writing too
freely. We must cut out the skates. Now, let's get together and land
Gunterson."
"That's all right, too. But if we cut out the skates, what'll we have
left? Anyhow, the main question is how'll we land Gunterson?"
Sternberg persisted. The mind of this large man moved as slowly as a
house in a small town being transported from one lot to another by one
mule, a rope, and a windlass. McCoy's mind more resembled the agile
and evasive flea.
"I bet my cousin Billy Gallagher knows him. Come to think of it, Billy
was special agent up here for the Florida Fire and Marine at the time
Gunterson was running them. We can square Billy all right, and I
believe Billy can put it over."
"It looks like a cinch to me," said Bloom, lighting a cigarette.
"It is," said McCoy, briefly.
It was. And so it came about that in the forenoon of the following day
a solemn trio of men, two Hebrews and an Irishman, were bowing a polite
welcome to the distinguished Vice-President of the Guardian of New
York, who, in company with his friend Mr. Gallagher, now an independent
loss adjuster, had honored them with a call. Mr. Gunterson confessed
that he was considering a change in the Guardian's Boston
representation; he had not gone so far as to commit himself, but he was
looking around--of course among the few agents with whom non-Conference
companies predominated.
It had been agreed by the trio that McCoy should do the talking for the
firm, and McCoy came from an island where the art of persuasive
conversation is far from extinct.
"Well, Mr. Gunterson, I want to say right off the reel that Sternberg,
Bloom, and McCoy would like very much to take on the Guardian. The
Guardian's got a good name, and its policy sells well; and in the last
few weeks, especially--" he threw out suggestively.
"What's the last few weeks got to do with it?" inquired the innocent
and obliging visitor.
"Well, I meant the company's desirability from the agent's point of
view. You see, they've never had a really broad-gauge man directing
their underwriting before you took charge. Nice people, but narrow,
you understand--not a company that an agent would feel drawn to.
O'Connor never had no nerve--or if he did, Wintermuth never let him
show it. Now, no really progressive agent can do business with a petty
piker. To get the best results you've got to let your agent run his
field. Take your time, make the best appointment you can, and then
give your agent a free hand--that's the only way to get a liberal
income and make money too."
To these sage but scarcely original observations Sternberg and Bloom
gravely assented.
"In case you found a place for us in your office, what kind of an
income do you think we might expect?" Mr. Gunterson asked.
"Well, we wouldn't take you at all unless we could satisfy you,"
replied McCoy. "And I swear I don't quite see how we could take on
another company just now. How much are you getting now from Osgood?
Well, if we couldn't do better than that, we'd rather pass you
up--although I don't know of any company that looks better to me than
the Guardian under its present management. How about it, Jake?"
Mr. Bloom considered deeply.
"New business of the class this office writes is hard to get," he said
thoughtfully. "It don't fall off the trees into your lap. But we
might do it if we gave up a couple of our smaller companies. If we
threw out the German National and the Spokane Fire, we might do
something."
The two companies named had removed their policies and supplies from
the office only the previous day, their respective special agents,
after an underwriting experience too painful to describe, having
descended in grief and rage upon their Boston representatives when
patience had ceased to be a virtue and self-preservation had become the
salient motive.
"There's thirty thousand apiece, easy--say sixty thousand the first
year. Yes, we could let them two go, and if you were in any kind of
way liberal--if you wrote a fair line in the congested district--we
could guarantee you sixty thousand, and I believe we'd make it
seventy-five."
Mr. Gunterson calculated this with deliberation. It was a great deal
more than the Guardian had been receiving from Silas Osgood and
Company; it sounded too good to be real.
"What kind of a record have you had?" he asked cautiously.
"Record? Well, good for some of our companies and not so good for
others. We've had some pretty hard knocks, but we don't write
practically nothing but first-class business, and of course we write
pretty good-sized lines; and when some sprinkled risk or a brick
apartment house or a wool storage warehouse makes a total loss, it hits
us pretty hard. Still, if you keep on taking on the best business,
you're bound to make money in the long run. I suppose we turn down two
thirds of what's offered to us over the counter."
"What commission would you expect?" Mr. Gunterson inquired.
"Whatever you're paying now is all right with us," McCoy responded
promptly. "And we'll guarantee you a liberal increase in premiums the
first year."
The heart of the Guardian's Vice-President swelled in his breast when
he anticipated O'Connor's chagrin over this development.
"The Spokane's man is in town," Bloom said, as if by an afterthought.
"Put it in the form of a contract, Mr. Gunterson, and I'll notify him
to-day that we're holding his supplies subject to his order."
The contract was promptly drawn, signed, and witnessed, each party
retaining a copy, and Samuel Gunterson, with the sting of defeat
removed by this brilliant achievement, and with his self-esteem and
confidence wholly restored, turned blithely toward the South Station on
his way to New York.