Show ae VIRGINIA ERMINIE kivee illustrations 6 LAUPEN TOUT cower cow wr ay flisa corway CHAPTER I 1 the crash failed ejaculated john valiant blankly and the hat he held dropped to the claret colored rug like a huge white splotch of sudden fright the corporation failed 1 the young man was the glass of taah lon from the silken ribbon on the spotless panama to his pearl gray gaiters and well favored a lithe stalwart figure with wide set hazel ayea and strong brown hair waving back from a candid forehead never had bis innocuous and but ter fly existence known a surprise more startling he bad swung into the room with all the nonchalant habits the ingrained certitude of the man born with achievement ready made in bis hands and a single curt statement like the ruthless blades of a pair of shears had snipped across the one splendid scarlet thread in the woof that constituted life as be knew it he had knotted his lavender scarf that morning a vice president of the valiant corporation one ot the great est and most successful of modem day organizations he eat now in the fading afternoon trying to realize that the huge fabric without warning bad toppled to its fall how solid and changeless it had always seemed that great business fabric woven by the father be could so dimly remember his own invested fortune bad been derived from the great corporation the elder valiant had founded and controlled until bis death with almost unprecedented earnings it bad stood as a very gibraltar of finance a type and sign of brilliant organization now on the heels of a trusts dissolution which would be a nine days wonder the vast structure had crumbled up like a cardboard the rains had descended and the floods bad come and it bad fallen the man at the desk had wheeled n bis revolving chair and was looking at the trim athletic back blotting the daylight with a smile that was little short of a covert sneer he was one of the local managers of the corpora alon whose ruin was to be that days sensation a colorless man who bad acquired middle age with bis first long trousers and had been dedicated to the commercial treadmill before be had bought a safety razor he despised all loiterers loiter ers along the primrose paths and john valiant was but a decorative fig valiant started as the other spoke at his elbow he had come to the win dow and was looking down at the pavement how quickly some news spreads for the first time the young man noted that the street below was filling with a desultory crowd he distin a knot of italian laborers talk ing with excited gesticulations a it very good living abroad theres a boat leaving tomorrow smudged plasterer tools in hand clerks some bailess and with thin alpaca coats all peering at the voiceless front of the great building and all he imagined with a thriving fear in their faces As he watched a worn an coarsely dressed ran across the street her handkerchief pressed to her eyes the notice has gone up on the door said the manager I 1 sent word to the police crowds are ugly sometimes valiant drew a sudden sharp breath the corporation down in the mire with crowds at its doors ready to clamor for money entrusted to it the aggregate savings of widow and or phai the piteous boarded sums earned by labor over which pinched sickly faces bad burned the midnight oil the older man had turned back to the desk to draw a narrow typewrite type writ te slip of paper from a pigeonhole here he said is a list of the bonds of the subsidiary companies recorded in your name these are all of course engulfed in the larger failure you have however your private tor tune it you take my advice by the way he added significantly you 11 make sure of keeping atiat what do you meant john valiant faced him quickly the other laughed shortly A word to the wise be quoted its very good living abroad there a a boat leaving tomorrow A dull red sprang into the younger face you mean look at that crowd down there you can hear them now there II 11 be a legislative investigation of course and the devil 11 get the hindmost lie struck the desk top with bis band have you ever seen the bills tor this furniture do you know what that rug under your feet cost twelve thousand its an old persian what do you suppose the papers will do to that do you think such things will seem amusing to that rabble down there his hand swept toward the window its been going on tor too many years I 1 tell youl and now some one 11 pay the piper the light ning won t strike me I 1 m not tall enough you re a vice president do you imagine that I 1 knew these things that I 1 have been a party to what you seem to believe has been a deliberate wrecking 9 valiant towered over him his breath coming fast hie bands clenched hard you the manager laughed again an unpleasant laugh that scraped the others quivering nerves like hot sandpaper oh lord no how should you youve been too busy playing polo and winning bridge prizes how many board meeting have you at tended this year your vote Is led as regular as clockwork but you re supposed to know the people down there in the street won t ask questions about patent leather pumps and ponies they 11 want to bear about such things as rotten irrigation loans in the stony river valley to market an alkali desert that Is the personal property of the president of this cor por atlon valiant turned a blank white face sedgwick yea you know his principle it s all right to be honest if you re not too damn honest he owns the stony river valley bag and baggage it was a big gamble and he lost valiant was staring at the other with a strange look emotions to which in all bis self indulgent life he had been a stranger were running through his mind and outre passions had him by the throat fool and doubly blind A poor pawn a raking the chestnuts for unscrupulous men whose ignominy he was now called on perforce to share in his pitiful egotism he had consented to be a figurehead and he had been made a tool A red rage surged over him no one had ever seen on john valiant s face such a look as grew on it now he turned and without a word opened the door the older man took a step toward him he bad a sense of dangerous electric forces in the air but the door closed sharply in his face he smiled grimly not crooked he said to himself merely callow A well meaning manicured young fop wholly surrounded by men who knew what they wanted he shrugged his shoulders and went back to his chair valiant plunged down in the eleva tor to the street he pushed past the guarded door and threading the crowd made toward the curb where his bulldog with a bark of delight leaped upon the seat of a burnished car rumbling and vibrating with pent up power there were those in the sullen anxious crowd who knew whose was that throbbing metal miracle the chauffeur spick and span from shining cap visor to polished brown puttees put tees and recognized the white face that went past belted pelted it with muttered o 0 but he scarcely saw or heard them as he stepped into the seat took the wheel from the chauffeur s band and threw on the gear he drove mechanically past a bun dred familiar things and places but he saw nothing till the massive marble fronts of the upper park side ceased their mad dance as the car halted before a tall iron grilled doorway with wide glistening steps between win dows strangely shuttered and dark he sprang out and touched the bell the heavy oak parted slowly the con secretary of the man be bad come to face stood in the gloomily doorway I 1 want to see mr sedgwick you can t see him mr valiant but I 1 will sharp passion leaped into the young voice he must speak to me the man in the doorway shook his head he won t speak to anybody any more he said mr sedgwick shot himself two hours ago CHAPTER II 11 vanity valiant the witness Is excused in the ripple that stirred across the court room at the examiners abrupt conclusion john valiant who had wl stood that pitiless ball of ques alons rose bowed to and eflowly crossed the cleared space to bli coun sel the chairman looked severely over hie eye glasses with his gavel lifted and a statuesque girl in the rear of the room laid her delicately gloved band on a companion a and smiled slowly without withdrawing her gaze and with the fa ineat tint of col or in her face katharine fargo neither smiled no flushed readily her smile was an in dex of her whole personality languid symmetrical exquisitely perfect the little group with whom she sat looked somewhat out of place in that mixed assemblage smartly groomed and palpably members of a set to whom john valiant was a familiar they had had only friendly nods and smiles for the young man at whom so many there bad gazed with jaundiced eyes to the general public which read its dally newspaper perhaps none of the gilded set was better known than vanity valiant the new danhard he drolte was the smartest car on the avenue and the collar on the white bulldog that pranced or dozed on its leather seat sported a diamond buckle to the of the social col burnns he had been a perennial inspire alon the patterns of his waistcoats and the splendors of bis latest bachelors dinner at pherrys Sher rys with such he had suddenly remembered that it wae hie twenty fifth birthday items the public had been kept clentry familiar to it he stood a perfect symbol of the elder ease and in display of inherited wealth and the great majority of those who had found place in that roomy cham ber to listen to the ugly tale of sequan dered millions looked to him with a resentment that was sharpened by bis apparent nonchalance long before the closing session it bad been clear that ae tar as indict ments were concerned the tion would be barren of result of individual criminality flight and su cide had been confession but more sweeping charges could not be brought home the gilded fool bad not brought into the embarrassing purview of the law the jostling crowd flocked out into the square among them a fresh faced girl on the arm of a gray bearded man in black frock coat and picturesque broad brimmed felt hat she turned ber eyes to his so that she said Is john ballanti Val lanti I 1 d almost rather have missed niagara falls I 1 must arie shirley dandradge about it I 1 m so sorry I 1 lost that picture of him that I 1 cut out of the paper 1 reckon be s not such a bad lot said ber uncle he balled a cab grand central station he directed with a glance at his watch and be quick about it wove just time to make our train some hours later n an inner office of a downtown sky scraper the newly appointed receiver of the valiant cor por atlon a heavy thick set man with narrow eyes sat beside a table on which lay a small black satchel with a padlock on its handle whose con tents several bundles of crisp papers he had been turning over in his heavy hands with a look of incredulous amazement sheet containing a bags 0 figures and memoranda la among them the shock was detill on bis face when a knock came at the door and a man entered the newcomer waa gray haired slightly stooped and lean with a humorous expression on his lips he glanced in surprise at the littered table fargo said the man at the desk do you notice anything queer about me his friend grinned no duck he said judicially unless it s that neck tie it would stop dutch clock hang the haberdashery read this from young valiant he passed over a letter fargo read he looked up ties aggregating three millions he eald in a hushed voice V hy unless I 1 ve been misinformed that represents practically all bis private fortune the other nodded turned over to the corporation with his resignation as a vice president and without a blessed string tied to emi what do you think of that think its the most absurdly idiotic thing I 1 ever met two weeks ago before the investigation but now when its perfectly certain they can bring nothing home to him he paused of course I 1 suppose t II 11 save the corporation eh but it may be ten years before its securities pay dividends and this is real money where the devil does he come in meanwhile the receiver pursed his lips 1 knew his father he said he bad the same crazy quixotic streak lie gathered the scattered docu ments and locked them carefully with the satchel n a safe spectacular young ass he said I 1 should say so agreed fargo do you know I 1 used to be afraid my katharine had a leaning toward him dut thank god ashes a sensible girl dusk had fallen that evening when john Vali ants danhard turned into a cross street and circled into the yawn ing mouth of bis garage A little later the bulldog at bis heels he ascended the steps of his club where he lodged he had disposed of his bachelor apartments a fortnight ago the cavernous seats of the lounge were all occupied but he did not pause as he strode through the hall took the little pile of letters the boy handed him at the desk and went slowly up the stairway he wandered into the deserted libra ry and sat down tossing the letters on the magazine littered table he bad suddenly remembered that it was his twenty fifth birthday 1 in the reaction from the long strain he felt physically spent he thought of what he bad done that afternoon with a sense of satisfaction A re versal of public judgment in his own case bad not entered his head he knew his world its comfortable faculty of forgetting and the multitude of sins that wealth may cover to preserve at whatever personal cost the one noble monument bis fathers genius had reared and to right the wrong that would cast its gloomy shadow on his name that had been bis only thought what be bad done would have been done no matter what the outcome of the investigation but now he told himself no one could say the act had been wrung from him that he fancied would have been bis fathers way he smiled a elow smile of cence tor there had come to him at that moment the dearest of all those memories a play of his childhood he saw himself seated on a low stool watching a funny old clock with a moon face whose smiling lips curved up like military mustachios los and wish ing the lazy long bands would hurry he saw himself stealing down a long corridor to the door of a big room strewn with books and papers that through some baleful and mysterious spell could not be made to open at all hours when the hands pointed right however there was the open sesame his own secret knock two fierce twin raps with one little lonesome one afterward and this was un falling safe inside he saw himself standing on a big polar bear skin the door tight locked against all coners an expectant baby figure with hu lit tie hand clasped in his father s the white rug was the magic entrance to the never never country known only to those two he could hear his own shrill treble wishing house wishing house where are you then the deeper voice quite as his father s answering here I 1 am master here I 1 ami and instantly the room vanished and they were in the never never land and before them reared the big gest house in the world with a row of white pillars across its front a mile high john valiant felt an odd beating of the heart and a tightening of the throat tor he saw a scene that never faded from his memory it was the one hushed and horrible night when dread things bad been happening that be could not understand ben a big man with gold eye gladsea who smelled of some curious sickish sweet perfume came and took him by the hand and led him into a room where his father lay in bed very gray and quiet the white hand on the coverlet had beckoned to him and he had gone close up to the bed standing very straight bis heart beating fast and hard johni the word had been almost a whisper very tense and anxious very distinct john you re a little boy and father Is going away to to wishing house the gray lips had smiled then ever so little and sadly no john take me with you catheri take me with youl his voice had trembled then and he had had to gulp hard listen john tor what I 1 am say ing is very important you don t know what I 1 mean now but sometime |