Newspapers / The Roanoke Beacon and … / Dec. 7, 1923, edition 1 / Page 2
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Copyright by The Bobbs-Merrill Co. "DOESN’T IT BO EE YOU FRANTIC f’ "Really. though, except as a show, to look at now and then, doesn't it bore you frantic? The whole thing, I mean—our sort of thing—the sort of people we are?" "I don't know any of you very well,” he said, lamely. "I’m not bored now.” "You keep going,” she said. "from the time you're quite small, thinking that life's going to open out. somehow, like a door. And then some day you wake up and realize you're thirty-five or so, and that it doesn't mean to open out at all; there isn't any door—not to the thing you’re in. And then you hear about somebody who s never been shut up, in anything; somebody the whole world’s always been open to. And you try to get people to tell you about him, John and Jimmy Wallace and Henry and Margaret Craven— Margaret’s funny about you. You wonder what that kind of free dom feels like. 1 should think you’d feel,” she looked around at him suddenly, “ivith us, you know, like a big moose, or something, that finds itself shut up in our pasture with the Halsteins.” These two talking are Joe Greer and Mrs. John Williamson, about whom Henry Kitchell Webster’s fine story, "Joseph Greer and His Daughter" revolves. It’s their first meeting. Greer is a latter-day pirate of the Chicago business world who has fought his way up from the bottom. Violet Williamson is the wife of a society millionaire who is backing Joe in the promotion of an invention. Joe has in California a wife who is planning to divorce him, and a nineteen-year-old daughter, Beatrice, whom he has never seen. He is taking his daughter away from her mother and planning to force her into Chicago society. Beatrice turns out to be as individual and dynamic as her father—an interesting feature of the story is their clash of wills and the resulting adventures that fall to Beatrice. Joe and Violet are irresistibly attracted to each other with results that lead them to the very brink of destruction more than once. There are other strong characters—Jennie MacArthur, for instance, Joe's 100 per cent efficient secretary. And these strikingly individual men and women go ahead and work out their own story, apparently without guidance from the master craftsman who has created them. For beyond question Webster is a master craftsman In the con struction of the modern novel of American life. And his life story reads like one of his own romances. He began his writing at twrfnty four in Evanston, III., in 1899 in collaboration with Samuel Merwin, who has also achieved popularity as a novelist. Their "Calumet K” (1901) was a big success, as were other joint stories. Then Webster had a sort of intellectual shell shock and in the hope of recovering from it traveled all over the world. In desperation he made a complete change in his literary methods. He dictated fifteen “howler" stories that he sold readily under a pseudonym that he will not reveal. And his hand and brain regained their cunning—witness his latest novel, “Joseph Greer and His Daughter." I. CHAPTER I The Pawn. On the face of It, John Williamson's Invitation to lunch was nothing that Henry Craven need especially won der, let alone worry, about. It was unusual—Henry couldn’t remember. Indeed, that It had ever happened be fore in just these circumstances—but surely one needn’t feel on that account that there was anything ominous about It. The manner of giving it had been a little overbearing, perhaps; high-handed, anyhow. But that was John Williamson’s way, and no doubt his place In Chicago’s financial world entitled him to It. Henry had been dictating a letter— around eleven o’clock this was—when one of the bank’s more Important cus tomers spoke to him from across the marble rail. Evidently the man didn't care to come inside, so Henry went to the rail to see what was wanted. His telephone rang while he stood talking with the customer and, of course, his stenographer answered it. He heard her sny. ‘‘Yes, Mr. Williamson.” And then, “He's right here. Sha’n’t I call him?” But John, evidently, hadn’t thought it necessary to wait, even a minute. There was another pause while she made a notation on a pad, and finally, “Very well, Mr. William son, I’ll tell him.” What Henry’s stenographer had written on her pad was: “Be at J. W.’s office at twelve-thirty. Lunch.” No “lfs” at all. Not even an “If pos sible." Well, of course there were no “lfs.” John was one of two or three Olym pians who, among their other cloudy vast affairs, directed the policies of this great bank, in which his cousin by marriage, Henry Craven, after six teen years of faithful service, had re cently been promoted to be one of the assistant cashiers. Naturally, then, If John wanted him for any reason, big or little, Henry would come. It was unlikely, wasn't It, that the thing was of any serious importance’ It mightn’t be a business matter at all. ?ome little domestic problem or other. Violet (she war John’s wife and Henry’s cousin) had a birthday coming next week. It was possible that Henry’s cultivated taste was go ing to he requisitioned to pick out a present for her. Only would John have wusted a priceless lunch hour— the most important hour of his hard driven nay—upon a trifle like that? It was Inconceivable. The lunch-table was Just where men like John talked over and arrived at their major de cisions. Yet what major decision of John’s could Imaginably concern Henry? Dn leau—unless It was a question of Hen ry’s own Job In the bank. They weren’t going to promote him again; they’d Just done that. But suppose—suppose they felt he hadn’t made good, and had decided to do the other thing. WonldnT It bo broken to him lust like | this, genially, over the lunch-table' He pulled himself up with a jerk and shot a glance at his stenographer. Had his moment of panic been legible to her In his face? But she was gaz ing out nowhere in the sort of trance that is one of the accomplishments oi her profession. "What’s the last thing I said?” lie demanded. Then as the girl startec to read, “No, give me the whole thin* from the beginning.” He didn’t need it, but he did neec another minute or two In which t< take possession of himself. That feai —that damnable black dog of a fear had slunk at his heels since his firs day at the bank. It had been natural enough at first when he was bruised and bewilderei by a sudden tragic change in tin whole prospect of his life. John ha< given him this job out of charity, or if you preferred putting it so, by wa; of meeting an obligation he had as sumed on marrying into the Crave] family. He’d come into the bank a a lame duck. There was, though, no reasonable doubt that he stayed and advanced oi his merits. All the evidence leane< that way. But the fear persisted Not, of course, as a constant compan ion. There were days, weeks of then together sometimes, when he neve thought of it. But at some triflin; enigma, fancied very likely, in thi conduct of one of his superiors, som conversation unavoidably half over heard, some smile Hiat he felt glance' his way, the thing would seize hin like a spasm of pain from an injurei nerve. He knew it was a weakness. H made valiant attempts to conquer 11 He grew ashamed of it. He devel oped the corollary fear that It wouli be discovered. His latest promotion had, he'd sup posed, worked a cure. An assistan cashier was one of the officers of th bank. "If ever they make me an off; cer,” he’d said to himself a thousan times, "then I’ll know I'm safe.” An Indeed, during the three months sine it had occurred, he’d been breathin deeper, luxuriating in a new seeuritj But now, for no better reason tha: that his Cousin John had invited hit to lunch, he was quaking at the pit o his stomach like a schoolboy who’ been told to report to the principa It was absurd. A desire came floodin over him as he sat upon that straigh chair in John Williamson’s outer ol flee—-a passionate desire to do some thing unexpected, wicked quite possl bly, but successful, immense; to th effect that telephone girls shouh stand in awe of him and private sec rotaries treat him with respect. Through an open transom Henr; could hear loud laughter as a heav; voice rumbled through a story and 1)1 angei, that he should be kept waltini under such circumstances, rose. Hi was about to have the girl teiephom to John that he waa waiting when thi door into Mills’ office was brusquely opened. Henry heard young Mills, evidently at the other door, say, "You can get out this way, Mr. Greer.’’ The man addressed stood there In an attitude of arrested motion, grin ning back into the room. And Henry, while he stared at the sight of him, held his breath. All his fidgety an noyances were forgotten, swallowed up in the sensation which the man's appearance produced. His beard was the first thing you saw. It was cut round and short—not fashioned at all—and it was hlack, as black as if it had been-drawn upon his face with India ink. His hair was just ns hlack and thick, and it war cut quite short enough to hide a ten dency to curl. Against this blackness of jowl and brow the gieara of his teeth and the whites of his eyes made a dazzling contrast. But indeed, as you took him in, you saw that he was a bundle of contrasts; the lightness of his poise, as he stood there holding the door, against the burly breadth of those shoulders and the bull-neck : the look of geniality that you got from his smile, contradicted by his nose, wnich jutted out in so bluntly nggressh e a manner as to be—piratical almost, Henry felt. He had answered Rollie Mills by saying in his peculiarly resonant voice that he always thought he was lucky, coming to a place like tills, if he could get out the same door he’d come in by; and he continued for a minute rubbing this in. All these rob ber barons of finance had, he sup posed, a chute down which the unwary visitor, having been shorn, was per mitted to plunge. John looked absent-minded when he appeared a moment later. He did not come out of his abstraction until just as they were turning into the club; then he took Henry by the arm. “Did you know that fellow?” he asked. "The man who was up in my office?” “No," Henry said. “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen him before. I’m sure he’s not one of the customers over at the bank.” "His name’s Greer,” said John. “Joseph Greer. Ever heard of him?” “The name’s vaguely familiar, per haps, but I can’t place it. I’ll be glad to look him up for you, if you like.” “We’ve looked him up,” said John. | “I guess we know pretty much all there is to know about him. Hq^s got a proposition we’re going to take up. Going into business with him. I’ll tell you the whole thing at lunch.” By this time Henry perceived that danger of his job being taken away from him did not exist and he breathed easy again. When the two men sat down to the table John launched into a description of Greer’s business. It seemed that the farmers of the coun try, who were growing plants for lin seed oil,- were throwing away the flax ■ straw from some two million acret of land every year and that Greer had discovered a process by which to make linen from it at a price that would permit America to compote with the cheap hand labor of Europe. John finally wound up his talk by telling Henry that he had pickeu him as treasurer of the new company at a salary of ten thousand a year. 1 Frankly, no stated, the directors had j "If Ever They Make Me art Officer." ! faith In Greer's ability in a practical ? way but they feared his handling huge ■ amounts of money without some »ort ) of a check being kept on him, and that 1 was to be Henry’s duty. John did not f press Henry for an immediate answer 3 and told him to sleep on it before giv . ing him his answer. ; The offer was a splendid one for t Craven after the fifteen years of ter - rible struggle on the part of himself - and his sister to keep up appearances. - His father had died when Henry was s a mere boy, leaving his family prae 1 tically penniless but the brother and - sister, aided by powerful friends of their father, had managed to keep up r the home. ' H^nry arrived home ahead of his i sister and when the buzzer announced a calter he rushed to the door, expect ing to see Margaret, although she usually carried a key. It wasn’t Margaret, though. There 'were two people coming up, and they 'proved to be Violet Williamson and young Dorothy. The latter, when she saw who was waiting for them, left her mother behind, took the remain ing flight of stairs two at a time, flung her arms around him, gave him a tight hug. and kissed him soundly. Just as she'd used to do when she was un equivocally a little girl. It was a heart-warming experience. The two foraged in the pantry and through the icebox for materials for tea. "I am practicing on you,” Dorothy admitted. “She wants me to.” “Your mother?” * The girl nodded. Henry was still speechless over this when he heard Margaret talking to Violet in the oth er room. It was only a moment later that his sister, without stopping to remove her wraps, swooped down upon them in the pantry. She kissed Doro thy enthusiastically and held her off in both hands. “Y’ou're a delicious-looking young thing,” she said. 1 » 1MI 1 IUUHCU Hive JUU, LHC gll I retorted, a little flushed but easily enough. "I always have, you know.” People had just one adjective for Margaret—good-looking. She fell short of beauty and there was nothing pret ty about her. She had regular fea tures, rather finely modeled, a good skin, and enough hair. Had her life run on in the channel that it had start ed In, she might have attained on ef fect of style, smartness anyhow. As It was what she had achieved was a crispness of movement and In flection, an air of adequacy to any situation that might arise, which men, in the main, found a little formidable. The men who liked her best were old er than she and married. But just this quality, it was easy to guess, was what young Dorothy admired. And you could not mistake the sincerity of what she had Just said. Abruptly, Margaret shooed them out into the sitting-room to keep Violet amused while she got the tea. Just as Margaret was coming In with the tray "Violet said, "It must seem strange to be leaving the bank, doesn’t it?” He answered quickly, “Margaret doesn’t know.” Then to his sister he went on, “John offered me a new' job at lunch today and I—I’m taking it.” Her eyebrows went up with an ex pression which betrayed nothing but good-humored surprise. Then she said, “It must be pretty good If you could make tip your mind as quickly as that to take it.” I “Well, I'm sure it must look good 'to John," Voilet observed. “The whole scheme, 1 mean. Because unless It had looked—well — marvelous, he’d never have gone in with that man.” "Greer, you mean,” Henry said, and turned once more to Margaret with explanations. "He’s an inventor and he’s found a way to make linen out of American flax straw. They’ve never been able to do it before and the farm ers have burned It—thousands, or maybe millions, of tons of it every year. I don’t understand Greer’s process In the least. I’m not even sure that John does. But he seems to have no doubt it works. John wants me to be treasurer of the new com pany," he concluded. "The inventor himself Is to be president.” “Have you met him yet?” Violet asked. 1 JUSl £Ul a Vi lilllJy M-JLKiliiJ answered. “I hadn’t time to see any thing but his beard.” “That’s the man. all right,” Violet said, with a nod. And went on, since they were both visibly waiting for more: “Why, he sounds amusing to me; really attractive. Jimmie Wal lace likes him quite a lot. He likes to play with theatrical people—that’s how Jimmie knows him. Hut, or course, Jimmie himself isn’t exactly what you’d call—austere. He's got an apartment—Greer, I mean—up on Sheridan road, in the same building that Bella and Bill Forrester are in. Bella is quite an authority on him. Never met him, of course. But she meets up with him, accidentally, you know, every now and then, and they get very pally. She’s hoping, she says, that he’ll invite her to one of his par ties. They must be pretty terrific from all accounts.” “I got the impression,” Henry ob served, "from John’s biography of him that he’s a bachelor.” “I don’t know,” said Violet. “It comes to that, anyhow. He lives in that big apartment all by himself. At least—” she qualified, and broke off with a glance toward her daughter. "You needn’t mind me,” Dorothy said quietly. “I’m reading the Literary News. All the same,” the girl went on, looking up at Henry from the magazine her glance had Jallen upon, "I think that sort of Inventor would be a wonderful person to have nbout. Mostly they're so awfully noble and innocent, aren’t they, and about a hun dred years old? Or U that Just in the movies? Anyhow, I think you’ll like It a lot. I wish father would give me a Job In the new company ” She rose then, put down her cup, and, coming round behind her moth er’s chair, took her lightly by the Shoulders. "I was to drag you away by force at a quarter to six,” ahe said. m (Henry noted how she had evaded list ing any term of address.) "It’s nearly that now, and you haven’t done your errand yet.” “I’m having a dinner tomorrow night,” Violet explained to Margaret, “and as things have turned out, I’m simply gorged with men. Can I rteal you away from Henry? It’s going to be frightfully dull, I'm afraid.” Margaret thought she could come. Dorotny had come over to Henry and offered him her hand, “for luck.” He retained it as he turned to her mother and nsked, "How about nn even exchange? Or wouldn’t it he proper? Or are you going t» com mandeer Dorothy, too?” “Yes, it’s all right,” Margaret said, from her desk in the corner. “Love j to! Seven-thirty?” “Oh, Dorothy's perfectly—unattain able,” Violet told Henry. “She’s din ing and dancing somewhere tomorrow night. I don’t in the least remember where. All I know is I accepted eleven Invitations for her for Easter week.” “I’m desolated that I can’t dine with you,” Dorothy cried in the best ae “I'm Desolated That I Can’t Dine With You,” Dorothy Cried. cents of Vanity Fair. “It would be much more amusing.” “I call that,” Henry grumbled, after he had closed the door behind them, “an infernal outrage. Oh, not your going out to dinner 1” he added, for he had caught a look in his sister's face that startled him. "I meant the way she’s trying to spoil that lovely child. John said today that seventeen was a devilish age. He’s wrong. It’s thirty eight that is.” “I didn’t suppose you meant about the dinner,” she said, her voice com ing rather flat, “and I suppose you did mean Dorothy. But there was Just a chance, I thought, that you resented the way John had treated you.” “John! In offering me the new Job, you mean? That’s because you don’t know about It yet. Violet spoiled things, rather, making me tell it back ward. It’s ten thousand a year. Peg, to begin with—stock in the company— Independence again, If the thing goea right—something like old times.” She asked him abruptly, “When did you first hear about this?” “Why—Just today at lunch. Ton don’t think I'd keep a thing like that from you. I’m sorry I told Violet flrstj but it came up naturally, somehow, and then I took it for granted that she’d know anyway.” “And you accepted it finally—right there at the lunch-table?” *“No, of course not. As a matter of fact, John didn’t ask me to. He knew I’d want to think it over—talk it over with you.” “How long did he give you to de cide?” she asked. “Well, the meeting Is tomorrow aft ernoon,” said Henry, and all the wind went out of his sails on the admission. "They’ll want to know before then. I told John I’d call him up in the morning.” "That’s what I thought you might resent.” Her voice flattened down upon the words and, as she’d turned away from him, they were hardly audible. "I don’t feel I’m being unduly hur ried,” he assured her, “if that’s what you mean. I’ve already decided, un less you’ve some serious objection to urge, that I’ll take it.” “You haven’t decided anything,” she contradicted. “You haven’t had any chance to decide. You don’t know whether the process works or not. I don’t believe you know whether It’s ever been tried or is Just a theory. John’s decided it for you. He’s going to take a flier. He can afford to loae as well as not. He’s used you like a pawn in a game of chess—pushing yon in. It won’t matter to him whether you’re taken or not.” 17 'il “You’re the only stenographer in the world," he aald. (TO BE CONTINUED.) A mean man usually rejoices be cause of hia meanness. , PARKER’S HAIR BALSAM Removes Dandruff-8 tops Hair Falling Restores Color and Beauty to Gray and Faded Halt 600. and $1.00 at Drugglsta. Fhseox Chem. W ka. Patohog ae, W. T, HINDERCORN8 Removed Corns. Oel IOtises, etc., stops all pain, ensures comfort to the feet, makes walking easr. 1fta. by mall or at Drujr rists. Dlsoox Chemical works. Patchogne. N. 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The Roanoke Beacon and Washington County News (Plymouth, N.C.)
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Dec. 7, 1923, edition 1
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