William Holton spoke the truth to Amzi when he said that he had had no warning of his brother's return. William, with all his apparent prosperity, was not without his troubles, and he took it unkindly that this brother, who for sixteen years had kept out of the way, should have chosen so unfortunate a moment for reintroducing himself to his native town. He had not set eyes on Jack since his flight with Lois Kirkwood, though Samuel had visited the Western coast several times on business errands and had kept in touch with him. William had been glad enough to forget Jack's existence, particularly as the reports that had reached him—even those brought back by the sanguine Samuel—had been far from reassuring as to Jack's status in Seattle.
Jack's return meant a recrudescence of wounds which time had seemingly healed, with resulting discomforts that might have far-reaching consequences. Mrs. William had a pride of her own, and it was unjust to her for a man who had so shocked the moral sensibilities of the town to thrust himself back upon his family, especially when he had chosen to present himself first at the domicile of the head of a house against which he had so grossly sinned.
William took Jack home and put him to bed; and when Charles followed a little later with Mrs. Holton, the prodigal slept the sleep of weary intoxication in her guest chamber.
The next day the town buzzed, and the buzzing was loud enough to make itself heard at the desk of the president of the First National Bank. William had left word at home that when Jack came to himself, he was to be dispatched to the bank forthwith. He meant to deal with this unwelcome pilgrim upon a business basis strictly, without any softening domestic influences. The honor of the Holtons was touched nearly and Jack must be got rid of. Mrs. Holton telephoned at eleven o'clock that Jack was on his way downtown, and William was prepared for the interview when his brother strolled in with something of his old jauntiness.
The door of the directors' room closed upon them. The word passed along Main Street that Jack and William were closeted in the bank. Phil, walking downtown on an errand, with the happiness of her party still in her eyes, was not without her sense of the situation. At the breakfast-table her father, deeply preoccupied, had brought himself with an effort to review the happier events of the party. Knowing what was in his mind Phil mentioned the untoward misfortune that had cast Jack Holton of all men upon the threshold of her uncle's house.
"It really didn't make any difference, daddy,—that man's coming. Everybody tried to forget it. And some of the young people didn't know him at all."
"No; it didn't matter, Phil. Your Uncle Amzi is a fine gentleman: I never fully appreciated his goodness and generosity as much as I did last night."
Phil did not know that Amzi had sought Kirkwood in the den where the lawyer had gone to take counsel with himself, and had blown himself purple in the face in his kind efforts to make light of the incident. The two men had never been drawn closer together in their lives than in that meeting.
"It wasn't Uncle Amy's fault that the William Holtons were asked to the party; I think it was Aunt Kate who started that. And when I heard of it, it was all over and the invitations had been sent," Phil said.
Kirkwood repeated his assurance that it made no difference in any way. And Phil remembered for a long time a certain light in his gentle, candid eyes as he said:—
"We get over most of our troubles in this world, Phil; and I want you to know that that particular thing doesn't hurt me any more. Only it was a shock; the man had aged so and his condition and the suddenness of it—But it's all over and it didn't spoil the party; that's the main thing."
Phil was immensely relieved, for she knew that her father told the truth.
Jack Holton greeted a number of old friends on his way to the bank, but the president emeritus of the college cut him. The cold stare he received from this old man, who had been president of Madison College for forty years, expressed a contempt that hurt. Mrs. King, in whose yard he had played as a boy, looked over his head, though he was confident she knew him. His nostrils caught no scent of roast veal in the familiar streets. At his brother's house his sister-in-law, whom he had never seen, had not appeared when he went down for his breakfast.
He followed his brother into the directors' room in a defiant humor. They took account of each other with a frank curiosity begotten of their long separation.
"You haven't changed much, Will. You've grown a little stouter than father did, but dear old Sam never lost his shape, and you're like him."
There was little resemblance between the two men. William's face, clean-shaven save for a mustache, showed few lines, though his hair had whitened at the temples. Jack's hair and mustache were well sprinkled with gray, and his crown was bald. He fingered a paper-weight on the table nervously. A history of dissipation was written legibly in his eyes and he had a disconcerting way of jerking his head.
"Damn it all! I guess you're not tickled to death to see me. And I need hardly say that if I hadn't been drunk, I wouldn't have turned up at old Amzi's on the night of that kid's coming-out party. Drunk when I struck town—hadn't been feeling well, and fell in with some old friends at Indianapolis and filled up. Hope you'll overlook my little indiscretions. Reckon the town would have found out I was here soon enough and there's nothing like coming right out in the open. When they told me at your house you were at Amzi's, I couldn't believe it and I was just drunk enough to want to investigate."
William muttered something that Jack preferred to ignore.
"Well, I wasn't so drunk I didn't take in Kirkwood. Old Tom has held his own pretty well; but he's the type Time don't batter much. I'd thought a good deal about what might happen if we ever met—had rather figured on a little pistol work; but Lord! it's funny how damned soon we get over these things. Trifles, Will, trifles—bubbles of human experience that vanish in thin air. Damn it all! life's a queer business. We put our faith in women and they're a bad investment, damned uncertain and devilish hard to please, and shake you when the night falleth and you need a prop to lean on. By the way, your own consort ducked me this morning; I had to have breakfast alone, with only one of Africa's haughty daughters to break my eggs. I hope madam your wife is well. By the way, has she given any hostages to fortune? Thought I hadn't heard of it. You've treated me in a hell of a little brotherly fashion, Will. If it hadn't been for Sam, who was a true sport if I know one, I shouldn't have known anything about you, dead or alive."
William had listened with an almost imperceptible frown while he minutely studied his brother. The items he collected were not calculated to inspire confidence or quicken fraternal feeling. Jack, whom he remembered as fastidious in old times, was sadly crumpled. The cuffs of his colored shirt were frayed; there were spots on his tie, and his clothes looked as though they had been slept in. The lining of the ulster he had thrown across a chair had been patched, and threads hung where his legs had rubbed it. The impressions reflected in William's eyes were increasingly disagreeable ones, as he diagnosed moral, physical, and financial decrepitude. It was nothing short of impudence on Jack's part to intrude himself upon the town and upon his family. It was with a slight sneer that William replied to his brother's long speech by ejaculating:—
"Well, I like your nerve! You come back drunk just when the community had begun to forget you, and wander into the last house in the world where you ought to show yourself. Your being drunk doesn't excuse you. Why didn't you tell me you were coming?"
Jack smiled ironically.
"Suppose you climb off your high horse for a little bit. If I have to get a permit from my only brother to come back to the town where I was born, things have come to a nice pass. Better cut all that out."
"You're certainly a past-master at making a mess of things," William continued. "Your coming back that way fits neatly into your departure. You needn't think people have forgotten that you ran off with another man's wife. And your coming back right now, just when the Montgomerys had buried the hatchet, was calculated with the Devil's own mind."
"So that's the tune, is it?" said Jack, stretching his arms upon the table and clasping his fingers to subdue their nervous twitchings.
"That's just the tune! This town isn't big enough to hold you and the rest of us. You've cost me a lot of money first and last. You made it necessary for us to pull away from Amzi and start all over again, and there was a prejudice against me from the start that I've just about lived down."
Jack grinned unpleasantly.
"Oh, the bank hasn't been terribly prosperous, then!"
William blinked at the thrust. He had given the conversation an unfortunate turn, and he sought uncomfortably for another line of attack. Jack unwittingly opened the way for him.
"You were the good boy of the family and used to be a pillar in the church. I have a distinct though melancholy impression that when I took myself hence you were passing the basket in Center Church every Sunday morning. I don't recall that I ever saw you do it, but it was a matter of common knowledge in this town, Will, that you did that very thing. And being a Christian, just how do you square your effusive brotherly welcome with the gospel? The only reason God makes sinners is to give 'em a chance to repent. Without repentance what do you suppose would become of your churches anyhow?"
"I don't see any repentance in you; and I want to know right now what you've done with that woman?"
Jack blinked, then smiled and gave a laugh expressive of disdain and contempt.
"If you please, which woman?"
William's frown deepened. The one woman was certainly enough, and his rage was increased by the leer that accompanied the question.
"Oh, I dare say there have been enough of them! I mean the one you took away from here; I mean Lois Kirkwood."
"Oh, Lois!" He spoke as though surprised that she should be chosen for particular attention, and his lip curled scornfully. "When a man goes wrong, Will, he pays for it. Take it from me that that's one gospel truth that I've proved to my entire satisfaction. It's queer, Will, how soon a bonfire burns out—the bigger the fire the quicker it goes. I went plum crazy about that girl. She'd married the one particular man on earth who was least likely to make her happy. He bored her. And I guess her baby bored her, too,—she wasn't a domestic animal,—no pussy cat to sit by the fire and play with the baby and have hubby's slippers toasting when he came home to supper. And I had time to play with her; I wasn't so intellectual as Tom, but my nature was a damned sight more sympathetic. It looked as though we had been made for each other, and I was fooled into thinking so. And I was bored myself—this silly little town, with nothing to hold anybody. Lois and I were made for a bigger world—at least we thought so: and by Jove, it was funny how we fooled each other—it was altogether too damned funny!"
"I'm glad you take a humorous view of it," replied William coldly. "Not satisfied with disgracing the family, you come back to rub it in. Where did you leave the woman? I suppose you've chucked her—the usual way."
Jack threw back his head and laughed.
"Well, I like that! You don't know what I had to put up with! She made me suffer, I can tell you! I don't believe she'd deny herself that she made it damned uncomfortable for me. She liked to spend money, for one thing, and I couldn't make it fast enough; and she wanted to mingle with the rich and gay, and our story had followed us, and it's funny, Will, what a lot of old-fashioned, stupid, Thursday-night-prayer-meeting and the-pastor-in-to-tea morality there is left in this fool world! It cut Lois up a good deal, being snubbed by people she wanted to stand well with. It gave me a jolt to find that I wasn't all-sufficient for her after all; which hurt some when we'd decided we could be happy alone together in the woods for the rest of our days. It's a long story, and I'm not going to talk about it. With the money I took away from here I began monkeying with real estate; it didn't seem that anybody out there could lose just then: but I was a bad guesser. In five years I had played in all my chips, and had to sneak around office buildings trying to sell life insurance, which wasn't dignified nor becoming in a member of the haughty house of Holton."
"Sam told me a different story. Why don't you tell the truth if you talk about it at all? You gambled and lost your money—that's what happened; and real estate speculation was only a side line. But Lois had money; I suppose you played that away, too. Sam never seemed quite clear about your relations with her."
"I guess he didn't! There's a queer woman, Will. The inscrutable ways of Providence were not in it with hers. She hated me, but she wouldn't let go of me; seemed to be her idea that shaking one man was enough and she wouldn't let me make her a widow a second time. By George, I couldn't shake her—I had to live off her!"
William shrugged his shoulders and scowled. It was incredible that this could be his own brother who spoke thus of the gravest relationships of life. And it was with a steady sinking of spirit that it was beaten in upon him that this man had come back to plant himself at his door. He was busy calculating the effect upon himself, his family, and his business of the prodigal's return. He was shocked, disgusted, alarmed.
His wife had told him in the long vigil that followed her return from Amzi Montgomery's house, when she learned that her brother-in-law was sleeping off his spree in her guest-room, that Jack had to go. She was proud and arrogant, and she had no idea of relinquishing her social pre-eminence—not too easily won—in the town to which William Holton had brought her to live out her life. One or two of the old families had never received her with any cordiality, clearly by reason of the old scandal. And where there are only seventeen thousand people in a town the indifference of two or three, when they happen to include a woman like Mrs. King, was not to be ignored or borne without rancor. William's indignation was intensified as he reviewed Jack's disclosures from the angle his wife had drawn for him in the midnight conference. His curiosity was sharpened, however, as to the subsequent relationship of Jack and Lois Kirkwood. Seattle is a long way from Montgomery and lines of communication few and slight. Samuel, returning from his visits to the coast, had usually been too full of his own schemes to furnish any satisfactory details of Jack and his wife. William dropped his plumb-line in a new spot where he fancied the water would prove shallow.
"You lived off her, didn't you, until you had lived up all she had? The gospel didn't neglect her; she got her share of the punishment."
"Look here, Will, you mustn't make me laugh like that! You know I used to think I understood human nature, but I never started with that woman. I did live at her expense,—I had to,—and she stood for it until I got to hanging round the saloons too much. She used to pay my dues in the club, damned if she didn't, until I got fired for too much poker in the chamber over the gate. I must say she was a good sport: as a fair-minded man, I've got to admit that. And she swung the lash over me—never laid it on, but made it sizz—whistle—till I'd duck and sniffle; and she did exactly what she pleased without caring a damn whether I liked it or not! By George, I knew she was a wonder when I took her off Kirkwood's hands, but she wasn't wonderful in just the way I thought she'd be. That was where the joke came in. And she made people like her; she could do that; and she got on, so that wherever she could go without me she was welcome. That was after people got sorry for her because she was hooked up to me; but most of 'em, I guess, liked her on her own account. A queer development, Will. For the past five years I've just been a piece of furniture, to be dusted and moved occasionally like an old rocking-chair that gets into a house, nobody knows exactly how, and is shoved around, trying corners where it won't be noticed much, until it winds up in the garret. But after all the corners had been tried,—she didn't have any garret; we lived mostly in hotels and flats,—I was gradually worked out on the second-hand man's wagon, and here I am."
"She kept her money, then?" asked William with assumed indifference.
"Will," said Jack with a mockingly confidential air, leaning forward on the table, "after the first two or three years I never knew whether she had a cent or not, that's the straight of it. Considering that she had thrown away her reputation like an old shoe just for me, and that we lived along under the same roof, that was the most astonishing thing of all. She began by handing me out a hundred now and then when I was broke; then it dropped to ten, and then it got down to a dollar a week,—humiliating, Will, considering that I had given up my interest in the ancient and honorable firm of Montgomery & Holton, Bankers, just for her! But when she shook me for good, I'm damned if she didn't give me a clean thousand just as a consolation prize."
William was more interested in this phase of the relationship than in anything that had gone before. He was aware of the local belief that Jack had thrown away his wife's share of her father's estate in his real estate speculations in Seattle and that Amzi supported her dutifully by a regular allowance; in fact, the three sisters had encouraged this impression by characteristic insinuations.
"What's become of her? Where is she now?"
"That's where you've got me stung: how do I know where she is! After she slipped me the thousand and bade me a long and chilling farewell, I used to keep track of her in one way or another. She had a restless streak in her,—that's why she couldn't stand Tom and the rest of it,—and when it was all peach blossoms and spring with us she liked to take spurts over the world. We used to run down to San Francisco for little sprees, and then when that played out she shifted to New York. But I've lost her trail—I don't any more know where she is than if I'd never laid eyes on her. She went abroad a couple of times and she may be over there now. Say, if Amzi's putting up for her you will lose your main competitor one of these days! She'd bust the biggest bank in Wall Street, that woman! She's a luxurious little devil, and a wonder for looks. Even the harsh trial of living with me didn't wear her to a frazzle the way you might suppose it would. I guess if I hadn't poisoned the wells for her, she could have shaken me for most any man she liked. By George, I'll get to weeping on your neck in a minute, just thinking about her. I started in to tell you what a miserable little wretch she is and I'm winding up by bragging about her. She's got that in her! But she'll bust Amzi before she winds up. And I hope you appreciate the value of that news. Old Amzi, if he hasn't changed, is a fat-head who's content to sit in his little bank and watch the world go by. And I guess he's got a nice bunch of brothers-in-law on his hands. Poor old Amzi! There was always something amusing about the cuss, even when he was a smug little roly-poly as a boy. But I passed his bank this morning and it looked like an undertaker's office. The contrast between that old tomb and your plant pleases me, Will; it soothes my family pride. You are an able man and I congratulate you on your success. Sam liked to cut didoes on thin ice a little too well; but you're a born banker—inherited it from father; and I guess I didn't do you so ill a turn after all when I cut loose with Lois and broke up the old partnership. There wasn't enough room in Montgomery & Holton for all of us."
Several times William shifted his position uneasily. His brother's flattery merely paved the way to a demand—he was confident of this; and he had no intention of yielding to demands. To begin advances to this melancholy wreck would be to establish a precedent for interminable benefactions. It was better to deal with the matter at once. A clerk called him out to speak to a customer and when he came back, Jack was moodily glaring out upon the little court at the rear of the bank. William did not seat himself again, but stood by the table, as though to indicate his intention of terminating the interview.
"I can't give you any more time. Just what have you come back for? I'm entitled to know, and we may as well have it out."
"What have I come back for? I've come back to stay, that's what I'm back for! I want a job, that's all, and if you won't give me one, I'd like to know just where your brotherly heart expects me to go."
"You can't stay here, Jack. You've got to clear out. I don't mean to be hard on you, and I'll give you enough to take you wherever you want to go; but you can't camp here; you've got to move on. If you'd come back like a gentleman, it might have been different; but the whole town's upset. I'd just about lived you down, and here you come back and stir up the whole mess. The way you came back puts us all in the hole; the sympathy of the community was swinging round to our side a little, and even the Montgomerys were making it clear that they were willing to let bygones be bygones and here you come to spoil it all! And you've not only got to go, but you've got to go now, this very day by the first train."
This was received blinkingly. Jack shook his head as though in pity for his brother's harshness.
"For a man brought up by a Christian father and mother to point the door to a long-lost brother is painful, Will. It wounds me deeply. I tell you right now that I'm not going away from here until I get good and ready. Do you follow me?"
He rested the tips of his fingers on the table and bent toward his brother with a cold glitter in his eyes. Under the mockery of his phrases a hot anger lurked.
"All right," said William. "Stay, then. But you can't hang yourself around my neck. Understand that right here."
"You haven't heard all my story yet—"
"I've heard all I'm going to hear. I've heard enough to make me sick. I hope nobody else in this town will ever hear it. It's worse than I had ever imagined—you allowing that woman to support you! And it's nauseating to think that you don't realize the rottenness of it. But you seem to be incapable of any decent feeling about anything."
"Stop sentimentalizing and listen to me. I didn't come back here to enter upon a new social career; I came back on business. You remember, Will, that Sam came West when you and he were selling bonds in this Sycamore Traction line on which I rode proudly home last night. I helped Sam sell a pretty big bunch of those bonds out there. Sam could sell anything—Sam was a wonder! and he planted a big bunch of those things along the coast—my friends, you know. Sam's dead and gone now and I ain't going to knock him—but Sam was an exuberant chap and he overcalculated the cost of building the road. That was on the construction company, but you and Sam were in that—same old game of working both sides of the street. It was just a mistake in figures, of course, but some of those people out there hear the road ain't doing well, and they're friends of mine, Will, valued friends, and now that Sam's gone it's up to you and me to take care of 'em—do you follow me?"
"If that's what you're up to you've made a big mistake. That road's one of the most successful traction lines in the West, and pays its bond interest on the dot."
"Nothing easier; but I happen to know that the last payment was made with borrowed money. Of course, only a little temporary accommodation, but just the same it wasn't paid out of earnings. And, Will, you ought to be mighty careful—you oughtn't to advance bank funds for such a purpose; it's damned bad business; it's downright immoral; that's all! But how about the bonds your construction company got—that nice little margin between a fair profit for building the road and a big fat steal at the expense of the bondholders? And you authorized the sale of bonds at eighty to pay the construction bill, got ninety, and pocketed the difference. Oh, you needn't get white and blink at me. I know what he did with his share of the boodle—he had to take care of his political chums he got into other schemes. I know all about Sam—he was always borrowing, we will call it, from Peter to pay Paul, and most of it got into Sam's pocket. Now here's my position; right here's where I come in. I'm going to help you take care of this, but you've got to act white with me. I'm not going to be kicked out of town—not unless you go with me. Is that plain?"
"You're a fool. I understand nothing except that you're trying to blackmail me; and it won't go. Why, you ought to know that the thing you accuse Sam of doing would have landed him and me, too, in the penitentiary. What do you suppose the trustee for the bondholders was doing? What do you imagine the New York investors were thinking about?"
"They were asleep, Will," Jack replied, with a gleam of malignant humor. "And Sam was awful slick. Sam could sell winter underwear in hell. And I guess you could sell anthracite at a profit down there, too. You talk about the family dignity;—by George, I never started with you fellows! Running away with another man's wife is tame business compared with your grafting. And I've got a little more news for you. The clouds are gathering, you might say, in all parts of the horizon." He swept the room with a comprehensive gesture. "It's just one of those queer twists of the screw of fate that brings us all up against Tom Kirkwood. Tom's smart: he always was, and as straight a man as God Almighty ever put on the footstool, and he's prying into Sycamore Traction. I stopped off for a day or two in Indianapolis and got on to this. There was a lawyer and an officer of the Desbrosses Trust & Guaranty Company out here from New York to talk things over with Kirkwood,—he has some pull down there,—and they've employed him. While Sam lived he watched little things like that; filled up the accountants with champagne and took care of the statements, but I guess you are not quite as smart as Sam. I guess it's about all you can do to take care of the bank examiner when he drops in to shake hands."
William had listened intently, his arms folded, a smile of derision on his face.
"Just how much do you charge for this information?" he demanded coldly.
"I'm not going to charge you; I'm going to help you, Will. It's my duty as a brother to warn you and help you out of trouble. Family feeling is strong in me: I'm not a man to let my own brother go down if I can keep him up. I see it in your eye that—"
William flung round to the door and swung it open.
"Get out of here!"
"Oh, is that the answer? Then, all right!"
He picked up his hat, drew on his coat unhurriedly, walked calmly round the table and lounged out of the bank.