Show V JOSEPH epa GREER and d er e r ir 0 jais la 15 DAUGHTER A U r ier ENRY C H ELL W WEBSTER C COPY 0 P RIGHT by the 6 0 B ea MERRI LL CO I 1 SYNOPSIS CHAPTER I 1 joseph greer ft a black bearded pirate of furty having halsne als ov ered a process of extracting fiber from I 1 rori flax straw is made mad director of 0 a bis corporation for years trusting distrusting dis men of 0 affairs breer has ha s played a lone h hand now holding what he considers con lder the winning cards h he la Is willing to sublet hl his wits to wealth to protect bis bill own wn interests joe has hai foisted his own secretary upon the company henry craven a bank clerk related to john milhas son the million millionaire alre backer ot of greers now new company Is installed BS As treasurer ot of the now new company wilh with the gon orally understood purpose of I 1 greer joe cultivates his hi 8 na hi h p CHAPTER II 11 joe tells jennie johnl t that t he has a wife in california aa aad that she he Is about to divorce him am in addition adl he discloses disclose that he has ha a d daughter au aak now nin nineteen oteen years old whom h be has never been but whom he Is determined to have come and live with wit him aad enter society by means of oll his hl money moner CHAPTER III to pave the wa way or his daughters appearance in society ty joe goes out to a ad party at William williamsons sons hue house where he meets meet violet johns john wife and aad 1 strongly drawn to her ber while he finds Ms a to be v very friend y when at home CHAPTER IV beatrice arrives and to be a handsome but spoiled very mach uke her father joes jo atik to have her form social nodal are not well received by ki 0 who wh displays vast eno mis of oc oti CHAPTER T tin in at his mck of polish joe turns to Wili lanason ills his partners partner wife far ak I 1 Is S strongly attracted attract od h by jua je presently thoy they mhd d deeply involved in a biaton chieh to Is halted by greer when en a a the tae brink of destruct cetru cUon ilon violet fw hejsek se scorned seo raed orned becomes infura a ral so 84 t see foe and tho the lat latter plans re ardow ty Beatel beatrices ces enolal career appear CHAPTER VI joe returns unexpectedly P from a trip out ot of town to wit to ond beatrice has been going a fast pace going home unannounced he catches his bis daughter daught cr drunk having been rescued from a beach party where all ali were drinking heavily by his chauffeur george burns greer suspects george of taking too keen an interest in beatrice and discharges him and I 1 installs jennie in his flat as chaperon for his daughter jennie tries to win the girls affections by putting her on her honor and refusing to spy on her CHAPTER vir VH Jean jennies les methods with beatrice fall the latter meets i george clandestinely and discusses 0 marriage with him burns obtains a job as a mall mail flyer then the nj joe Is run un down by an automobile and badly hurt url lie he worries over some papers that were ivere lost loft when when he was senseless but they are returned by a man and beatrice finds out they comprise a detective gencks agen gen cys report of her meetings with the chauffeur in spite of her fathers dangerous wounds she has IL hot argument with him and packs up and leaves him for good go id and elopes with george georg e to cleveland CHAPTER VIII joe recovers HI his resentment toward his daughter turns turn his hill thoughts in violets direction again A chance weeting geeting between them renews the old flirtation they skate on thin ice and return to the dangerous grounds of intimacy where they left off before when they quarreled violet meets joe clandestinely in now york tork and he tries to get her to elope with him to south america she finally izes that going with joe will mean the i loss lose of 0 her social position and all her I 1 friends and suddenly returns to her husband in chicago and surprises him with the intensity of her affection now rell reawakened wakened in full force within it a week of jennies return to chicago joe conceived an attractive project hed go straight to new york from liere here by way of 0 the soo and close ills his contracts tor for the years output of raw linen before he came back october first it would be fun to see their faces jennies and Ilen henrys rys long and solemn enough when lie came in change when lie he tossed down doan those papers on his desk before their eyes that would show them whether he was the old joe or not I 1 the other not quite acknowledged halt half of the picture was an accidental meeting with violet ater ner dorothys boat had sailed slie she had let him know what boat it was it would be easy enough to manage since lie he knew the hotel the WIIIIam sons were mere addicted to in new york both talked about it lie ile go near her ter ini deed hed take pains to avoid ft a chance meeting until the child was out of the way but the possibilities offered by the subsequent handful of hours were nere n ere breathtaking breath taking especially esp it if by that time lie he had his signed contracts in his pocket ne ile felt no serious doubt of his success in this but from the start on monday morning lie he met unforeseen difficulties ile he found plenty of people who were glud glad to talk with blivin but these were tile the hirelings experts and such the big people to a degree were inaccessible they like williamson only worse before the file week was over lie he was wag Nil wishing shing he had john there as an ally lie ile spent saturday morning alone in AM room ills weeks campaign had ended perforce on friday when everybody who could be any good to him disappeared from the haunts of trade at any rote rate for the weekend week end it had got him nowhere nut hut it 7 no ko neater nearer his goal certainly yet he be could not quite ignore an linare impression aslon he had caught from the last man he had talked to this man pleasant enough and not too obviously in it a hurry burry to be rid of him lied had once or twice at som some t assertion asger assert Uon Ign ot 0 joes pt pr witted himself fo to smile le faintly an and d a little impatiently as if he knew there here was be dreaded from hla his competitors was wag this bland noncommittal attitude he had bad been ing everywhere a thins thin agreed upon it wits was not a pleasant sort of hunch to get ills expectation of meeting violet was doomed to be unrealized instead lie he ran into tier her husband lius band at the little hotel the Wililam gons made it a habit to stop at and john told him that they had changed their plans at the last minute and lie he hau come down to see sec dorothy off leaving violet at home at lube lake forest they took inner dinner together and john asked him what luck lie he was having in marketing his raw linen lie ile said henry had told him that lie he and miss macarthur were both worrying a lot loi allcut that phase of the business what im down here on said eald joe but the trouble with me Is that I 1 dont know my way about ive been getting an idea the last day or two to that these different people ive been talking to are in cahoots john stared at him great scott man lie said of course they are host of the industries that are administered from new york are pretty well tied together inside themselves but the textiles I 1 well I 1 dont know anything about that thai joe grumbled out of my bent beat I 1 guess it looked like a 1 perfectly straight merchandising propose proposition to me I 1 hit had something good that they wanted put hut this inside stuff look I ook here williamson I 1 dont see why this be put up tip to you why dont you stay on for two or three days and earn your dai deeds ue he managed to throw in it smile with this but it ft d ant take ok off much of the edge of his wordy words you can play this pussyfoot game you know all the inside stuff im afraid I 1 cant take it on n john said ive got to be home monday holiday morning for an important meeting ine eting the lightness combined with the fifi finality allty of his 6 tone owe stun stuns g joe to a flare dare of temper look here williamson lie he said leaning suddenly forward half across the table this Is serious weve got of thirty million pounds of that stuff coming in that weve neve got to buy at an agreed price its be beginning inning to come in now weve got to sell it or were nere swamped swain ped jolin john moved his chair a few inches hack back from the table and leaned back in it do you mean inc in to say lie naked quietly quiet lyv that youve committed yourself as deep as that without having made any arrangement whatever ever in advance for turning the stuff mer or for carrying it youre in a ver very y serious position it if the case 11 youve known that that was the case from froin the lie beginning joe sald said ite ile was as quiet now as jolin john anil very alert you made no criticism of that plan at the april meeting 1 I certainly it led that your program involved taking care of your commitments jolin john assured him steadily after a moment lie went on oil times have changed a lor since april that wits was tile end of a boom tills this tiling thing on us now Is the hie beginning of a panic I 1 think the general expectation here in new york anyhow I 1 very much doubt if you can sell that las flax here before the alio first of tile the bear ear and not then unless times change for the better well it you are right about that toe joe said after a thoughtful Fi silence filience it takes us over into your lie de nt 11 my depatti department nent 1 I mean wet well have to be carried up to now I 1 have carried my end of the load ive made thirty million pounds of raw linen out of stuff that farmers were burning in the fields there it Is its good useful stuff its got value theres no arguin argument ent labout that and now I 1 say its lour our turn plain enough isn t it were till all in the same boat if our position john answered mildly of course well ell have to take some action on it its much too important a matter for me to deal with offhand come up to my office say wednesday afternoon oh about four and it 1 cl I have something in the way fly of a program to utter offer 11 aie gut got to run along im taking the century tills this afternoon you arent taking that train tire are you joe shook ills head waiting over till monday I 1 think he said eald all right wednesday afternoon at four then joe went back to ills his hotel a modest i little one lit in the upper twenties withdrew to his own room where already he had passed tile the morning drank the whisky he needed telegraphed ills his address dr to jennie and said she could look for him tuesday and then spent boxt of the afternoon writ inc a letter to violet it was tile the only balm he could apply I 1 to the burning pain of ills his disappointment the letter began stiffly it was as the first love letter lie had ever written to violet or to tiny any woman for that matter but after the first few sentences lie ceased to be conscious of it as a thing thine that must go through the post oilier in an em envelope elope to be read lit at luke lake forest on monday morning along alone with tile the rest of violets mail it became a amne release of a colled coiled spring of emotions IV which aich hat hall been wound up tip by walling waiting past the breaking point lie ile reproached pro ached ched her with having spoiled its his plan by not coming to new york and then reproached himself with having perhaps spoiled hers by not having cot coble lie to chicago ile he told lier her crudely how lie he wanted her and how unbearably too hard the Nal uniting ting had become ile he want her by crumbs and bits john WIllfam sons leavings lie he might come to chicago early inthe in alie week or he be might not but in no case would he come to her until she sent fon fori him slie she must know her mind by now there were sheets und and sheets of this the utter recklessness of dispatching a missive of this sort to it a woman who iho was nas II ahing ong upon tiny any sort of terms with her husband wits was apparent enough to him but it suited his bis mood ile he gathered the alie scrawled all and blotted sheets into an envelope addressed and stamped it took it out and it down tile the chute by tile alic elevator then he came back into ills his room lay down on the bed dressed dress ril ns as lie he wits zand almost at once fell deeply asleep i leep lie ile was awakened hours later by a on ills his door and when lie he opened it and angrily demanded what the devil dahll the row wits was about he was told by an obviously relieved bellboy that chicago wits was trying to get him on the telephone they had rung his bell several eral times without rousing him ile he was still in a halt half stupefied condition when nien ile he went to the telephone ile he inneo out that it was jennie MacArt macarthur bur who was calling him she was talking about some stock had lie he been selling any stock in what mint lie asked stock in tile greer compa company ity joe she told him ilive have you selling any of yours lie ile told her ter slie she must be crazy to ask him a tiling thing like that of course he what bad put such an idea into her head well theres a lot t of it for sale she told him up in fargo li irio ind and other places theres a lot of it sold already I 1 guess its the other crowd selling it then I 1 lie he asked her nn angrily efly what other crowd site she meant ill write iou ou all I 1 know about it tonight she told film in n rather odd sounding voice ill send it t special delivery so get it the bilut thing monday morning lie ile told tier lier this would be all right lie guessed and at that she hung up tip up ile undressed and it went en t back bach to bed ills memory of this incident when he awakened sunday morning was oddly enough perfectly clear and of course now that his was working again the In inference ferenee from what slie she had told him film was clear too for a long time he lay iny contemplating it it and other kotlier matters too in a sort of crystalline detachment williamson and corbett and crawford had sold out stood from under they hall had sold their stock right up there in tile the flax country too under his own min nose kut but why had they done it they were playing nut for a fool well lie was one lie if hed been quite unaccountably a fool for months blindly unaware of what ahat wit was going on about film had find started back to ro Claca chicago gro under tinder the he satisfied conviction that lie had been a fool lie waste inucci time trying to forecast the terms term of the me offer they would havi have ready for him wednesday afternoon the broad outline of the situation wits was plain pl aln enough in default of selling ills lias flax lie he would have to borrow the money to pay for it and as the price of finding the money tor for him they would exact their pound of flesh namely his share lit in the enter arit which his imagination had conceived and ills energy made real what particular form of hocus under tile polite name of reorganization they resorted to matter well lie was broad awake now certainly lip lie would need till all ills wits to meet tills this next weel no good wasting time going to chicago to listen to the terms of the bargain propose to him hed tell jennie to go to the meeting ile he wanted a drink that was the first tiling lie ile went over to the bag there stood the bottle but it was empty queer it had been practically full when lie had opened it on coining in from ills lunch with fill wll wit alamson ll amson and lie been out of tile the room except to walk don doia the lie corridor to mall mail that letter to violet the contents of eliat utter fritter forgotten until now began coming coining back into his mind as lie stood staring at the disordered desk and the empty whisky bottle lie he had bad been drunk ft lien hen lie he wrote that letter no getting away from that ile he had been drunk too |