At ten o’clock in the morning, Kit went quietly into the manager’s office. Perhaps it was strange, for until he talked to Mrs. Blake he had not faced a crisis, but he was calm. His rather boyish carelessness had vanished; his glance was steady and his step firm.
The chair Colvin gave him faced the window. Kit had expected something like that, and had thought to be embarrassed, but he was not. Meredith, the director who had talked to him about Jasper Carson, Colvin and Robbins, the head draftsman, occupied chairs at the table. Kit waited.
He had undertaken to see Mrs. Blake out, and he meant to do so, but the game was intricate. To clear Blake was all he wanted; he was not forced to entangle himself. To convict him was the company’s business.
For a moment or two he studied the others. Robbins was rather embarrassed, the manager’s look was grim, and Meredith, in the shadow, rested his face on his hand. Kit thought the old fellow’s arriving at ten o’clock significant. Although it looked as if Colvin wanted a victim, Kit imagined Meredith would be just.
“You are punctual, Carson. I don’t know if I altogether expected you,” Colvin remarked, meaningly.
Meredith looked up, as if he did not approve, and Kit’s eyes sparkled.
“My habit is to be punctual, sir.”
“I don’t know an occasion when Carson was not up to time,” said Robbins, and Kit thought him glad to urge something in his favor.
“Very well,” Colvin resumed, fixing his eyes on Kit. “I expect you know why I called you to the office?”
“Until I saw Mrs. Blake, I did not know.”
“I doubt if Mrs. Blake was entitled to inform you,” Colvin rejoined. “Well, when we got to work at the Mariposa’s boiler, you approved the first plan. In fact, you claimed the alterations Mr. Robbins sketched would not give as good results?”
“That is so,” said Kit, and Colvin turned to the others, as if he wanted them to note Kit’s agreement.
“It looks as if your claim was justified. Mrs. Blake, no doubt, told you our competitors’ boat has beaten the Mariposa and they used our boiler; but the pattern was the modified pattern we experimented with in the original plan. The plan you preferred!”
Kit saw where the other led. Colvin plainly meant to make him accountable.
“I suppose you have grounds to imagine the people did use our pattern, sir?”
“Our grounds are very good,” said Colvin, dryly. “All our competitors did not use was a fitting we patented. In fact, we are satisfied they got our plans——” He stopped and giving Kit a steady glance, resumed: “How did they get the plans?”
“I cannot tell you, sir.”
“Do you imply that you’re unable? Or that you’re not willing?”
Kit did not hesitate. When he arrived at the office, he saw his line, and it did not lead to his declaring he had cheated.
“I don’t know,” he said quietly.
Robbins gave him a reproachful glance. “You ought to help us, Carson. Our experiments cost the company much, and we must know whom we can trust. Very well; only you and Blake could get at the plans, and to make the drawings and calculations was your business. Don’t you see you must be frank?”
“The business was mine,” Kit agreed. “When I stopped work I locked the drawings in the cupboard.”
“Sometimes Blake was late at the office. When you were there was he about?”
“Perhaps three or four times,” said Kit. “All the same, he was not at my table; his is across the floor.”
“Was he at your table in the daytime?”
“So far as I remember, not when I was engaged on the boiler drawings. Besides, when the others were at work he could not make notes and copies.”
“I expect you see your clearing Blake implicates yourself?” Colvin remarked.
For a moment or two Kit was quiet. He knew Meredith studied him and Meredith knew Jasper Carson. Colvin was resolved to punish somebody, but he had fixed on Kit only because he thought him the proper man. In fact, Kit imagined all were willing for him to vindicate himself. Well, Blake’s eraser was in his pocket, and when he went to the boiler shop one evening and Tom was at the office he left his drawing-board on the table. When he came back, he heard steps, hurried steps he thought; but he was not going to talk about it. He had stated he did not sell the plans.
“Something like that is evident, sir,” he said to Colvin.
“You admit it was awkward, if not impossible, for Blake to make a copy,” Meredith remarked. “Since you see all it implies, your frankness carries weight; and we want to be fair. Do you urge nothing for yourself?”
“There’s nothing for me to urge, sir. I have stated I didn’t cheat you. That’s all.”
Colvin frowned. “Very well, we must weigh the evidence we have got, but you have not helped us much.” He looked at Meredith, and resumed: “When we see the line we ought to take we will let you know.”
Kit went out, and when he went through the office, looked straight in front and said nothing to the clerks. In the yard hammers beat and the riveters’ forges glimmered among the ships. Kit was keen about shipbuilding and had been happy at the yard; and he stopped for a moment in front of the wicket in the big doors. He had known ambition and had thought to make his mark, but he felt when the wicket shut it would shut him out for good. Mechanically he turned the handle and was in the street behind the high wall.
His train did not start for some time, and he went to Blake’s flat. Mrs. Blake was at home; he knew she expected him, and he sat down on a little shabby couch. Now the strain was gone he was dull and slack. Mrs. Blake leaned against the table and he thought she trembled.
“Well?” she said.
Kit smiled. “All’s straight and my news is good. Colvin and Meredith are satisfied Tom didn’t copy the drawings.”
“You satisfied them?” said Mrs. Blake in a hoarse voice. “Oh, Kit!”
“I wasn’t forced to use much argument. The job was mine, and Tom had nothing to do with the boiler.”
“But you didn’t admit you sold the plans?”
“I did not,” said Kit. “All I wanted was for Colvin to see he mustn’t suspect Tom. Who did steal the plans is another thing, and my business is not to find out. If Colvin solves the puzzle, he’s cleverer than I thought——”
He stopped, for although he had played up, his part was hard. It looked as if Mabel doubted Tom, but Kit did not really know. Anyhow, she would not let her husband down and he agreed that she ought not.
“But suppose Colvin thinks you the man? He’d refuse to take you back,” she said.
Kit smiled, and his smile was easier, for he was now on ground he knew.
“After all, to leave the yard would not bother me much. Shipbuilding gets monotonous and perhaps I have a talent for music. Anyhow, I like to play the fiddle, and when I’m in the vein, I’m not a bad clown. Labor’s dreary and people like a joke and a merry tale; sometimes they reward the joker. Well, I think I’ll copy the old minstrels and take the road with my pack and lute.”
“To let a good post go is not a joke,” said Mrs. Blake. “You must think soberly!”
“If Colvin has no more use for me, thinking won’t help, and one can be sober when one is old. Then, if a musician’s not foolishly modest he need not starve. A pal of mine in America got a good push off because he could play in the band. The town didn’t pay the bandsmen, but somebody found them soft jobs. A soft job and leisure to study the drum or the cornet is about my mark.”
Mrs. Blake smiled. When Kit joked one was forced to smile, but tears were near her eyes and her hands were not still.
“Oh, Kit!” she said, “your pluck is very fine!”
“I wonder——” said Kit. “On the whole, I think I’d sooner trust my luck. But I mustn’t philosophize; I must get my train.”
Mrs. Blake gave him his hat and stopped for a moment at the door.
“Evelyn is fortunate. You are stanch and true as the steel you used,” she said, and kissing Kit, gently pushed him out.
When the train started, Kit, in a third-class smoking compartment, speculated about Mrs. Blake. She was a very good sort and her kiss had braced him. He thought she knew much, and perhaps she knew all. Mabel was not shabby, but she was a woman, and her code was a woman’s code. Her proper part was to stick to her husband and see him out; Kit thought she would not shrink.
Then he mused about Evelyn. Mabel declared she was fortunate but Kit doubted. If Colvin did not take him back, Evelyn would get a nasty knock. All the same, they were young, and Evelyn had known Jasper would probably send him to a Canadian engineering works. Now he might be forced to start for Canada sooner than they had thought, but since Evelyn knew he must go, it was perhaps not important. Kit fixed on Canada because the Carsons went to the Dominion, although he did not think he would take Jasper’s help.
In the meantime, he resolved to say nothing. He did not yet know if Colvin meant to dismiss him. After all, he thought the manager saw it was possible somebody at the boiler shop had given the company’s competitors a useful hint, and Kit reckoned on his making cautious inquiries about the workmen. On the whole, he imagined some days might go before Colvin saw his line, and he might admit that he was baffled. Kit was not hopeful, but there was no use in brooding.
When he arrived at Netherhall the afternoon was hot and Mrs. Carson and the others were on the shady terrace; but for Kit to see Evelyn was not about was some relief.
“You are soon back,” Alan Carson remarked with a friendly smile. “I was afraid the manager might cut short your holiday.”
“I may not get as long as I expected; I don’t know yet,” said Kit, and Mrs. Carson looked up.
Kit’s voice was careless, but she thought carelessness cost him something, and he frowned. Mrs. Carson knew he was not the joyous young fellow who started for the shipyard the evening before, but she must not yet indulge her curiosity. Then Ledward gave Kit an interested glance.
“Well, did you get a fresh important job?”
“I did not,” Kit replied rather grimly, for he sensed a sneer. “In fact, there was some trouble at the yard——” He turned to Mrs. Carson. “Where is Uncle Jasper?”
Mrs. Carson said Jasper was called away by a telegram, and Kit went to his room. He did not want to talk, and when tea was served he would meet Evelyn. Before he did so he must brace up, and to brace up was rather hard. If the company had no use for him, he ought perhaps to let Evelyn go. He frankly dared not think about it, and he tried to picture his relations’ line.
Alan Carson was kind and might sympathize; he would know Kit had not cheated the shipyard company, but Mrs. Carson ruled her husband. She was old-fashioned, parsimonious and conventional, and Kit imagined she had not from the beginning approved his making Netherhall his home. At all events, if he went to Canada, she would be resigned. Her favorite was Harry Ledward.
Jasper was older than Alan, and Kit had thought he acknowledged his nephew’s claim, but he was inscrutable and marked by baffling humor. His word went, and people reckoned Jasper rich. Kit did not see his line, but he thought he saw Mrs. Haigh’s.
Kit knew her frugal, calculating and ambitious. In fact, he had thought her allowing him to cultivate Evelyn strange. If he lost his post, he was persuaded she would force her daughter to break her conditional engagement, and Evelyn dared not rebel. Mrs. Haigh was firm. On the whole, Kit admitted she would be justified and he must agree.
He got up and went to the window. A servant carried tea to a table at a shady spot and he must go down.