XII
Whenever a full realization of the fact that he had actually embarked upon a business career came to him, Allen was completely overpowered by his sense of its importance. He blessed books and book agents, since they had been the indirect means to this much-desired end. His chance had come to him just when his optimism had begun to waver, with the hydra's heads multiplying beyond belief; and he proposed to show Alice especially, and Mr. Gorham incidentally, that he was no mere callow youth idly waiting by the wayside. There could be no doubt whatever regarding his intentions, but a captious critic might have suggested that it would have been the part of wisdom to allow himself ample time for demonstration. Rome was not built in a day, nor does history record that youth ever acquired the experience of ripe middle age in a like space of time; but Allen's instructors at college would have given testimony that he was not strong in history. So it was that he bruised his head frequently at first against the stone wall of precedent and practice, in this particular instance made less yielding by the fact that the vice-president of the Consolidated Companies distinctly resented his addition to the office force.
These first busy weeks were giving Allen ample opportunity to gain experience. The impetuosity of youth would require time before it became tempered to the degree which would make it wholly reliable; but his enthusiasm, his indefatigable energy, and, above all, his absolute belief in and loyalty to the head of the Companies and the corporation itself were elements of genuine promise. There were moments which tried the patience, but Allen's mistakes were so much the result of over-eagerness and consequent over-reaching that Gorham's annoyance was always short-lived. Even the errors gave evidence that underneath the boyish irresponsibility lay excellent material for the elder man to mould.
"Once upon a time"—Gorham put the words in the form of a parable—"there was a boy who was ambitious to jump a very long distance. On the day of the contest, in order to make sure of accomplishing his purpose, he took an extra long start, and ran so hard that when he reached the mark from which he was to jump he had spent his strength."
Stephen Sanford had not disappointed Gorham in the attitude he took when he first learned that Allen had been given a position with the Consolidated Companies. The letter which he wrote to his old friend contained accusations of the basest treachery which one man could show toward another: Gorham had deliberately planned to separate father and son; he had discovered the boy's rare business qualifications and taken advantage of them for his own personal ends. The act was in keeping with the basis upon which his whole company was founded. Gorham's good-nature was taxed to its utmost, but he fully realized how deeply his old friend was wounded; and the knowledge that his own interest in Allen was in reality a genuine service to Sanford himself served to blunt the force of the attack.
Allen, oblivious to everything except the present opportunity to prove himself to Alice and to be near Alice, plunged ahead until Gorham was forced to change his words of caution into actual commands.
"You are trying to put the head of the wedge in first, my boy," the older man told him. "You are using twenty pounds of steam to do the work of two, and that does no credit to your judgment."
Covington was negatively antagonistic from the start in that quiet, skilful way which kept his animosity from any specific expression. Allen felt it, and reciprocated the feeling with an intensity not lessened by the knowledge that Covington and Alice were thrown together almost daily by this business arrangement which seemed to him the height of absurdity. He did not approve of the business manners which the girl delighted to assume with him when they chanced to meet, and he watched for an opportunity to tell her so.
As the opportunity seemed slow in coming, with characteristic energy he made one to order. Gorham required some important papers which he had left at his house the night before, and the boy so arranged his arrival that he had the pleasure of seeing Covington depart, although he himself was unobserved. He found Alice deep in the mysterious detail of her growing responsibility, but not at all disturbed to be discovered at her work. The desk which had been placed in her father's library was as near a duplicate of his in reduced size as could be found. A bunch of letters covered one end of it, while a neatly arranged pile of checks directly in front of her showed that the contents of her mail had proved profitable. She told Riley to bring Allen here, and the boy stood regarding her for a moment before she looked up.
"Don't let me disturb you, Miss—Manager," he said, loftily, as he caught her eye. "We magnates become peeved by interruptions—I always do myself."
Alice laughed as Allen unlocked the drawer in Gorham's desk and placed the desired papers in his pocket.
"Isn't it fun?" she asked, merrily.
"Isn't what fun?" was the unresponsive reply. "I haven't burst any buttons off my waistcoat watching you and Mr. Covington do the turtle-dove act while I drag out a tabloid existence in a two by twice hall bedroom, and stay tied down to my desk all day. Where does the fun come in?"
The girl looked at him in complete surprise. "What in the world—" she began.
"Oh, I mean it—every word!" he insisted. Now that he had plunged in there was no retreating. "I say, are you going to marry him?"
"I'd be angry with you if you weren't so terribly amusing, Allen," she replied, smiling again after the first shock of his outburst. "Truly, you don't know how funny you are when you try to be serious. It doesn't fit."
Allen bit his lip. "I'm a joke still, am I?" he asked, without looking at her. "I thought it was the pater's prerogative to consider me that, but I see he didn't get it patented."
"Is it being a 'joke' when you ask questions which you have no right to ask?"
"If you knew how I feel inside you'd think I had a right."
The girl relented a little. "You know as well as I do that Mr. Covington comes here simply to help me in my business education."
"Business fiddlesticks!" he interrupted, crossly. "You're not engaged to him yet, are you?"
There was so pathetic a tone of entreaty in Allen's voice that Alice could not deny herself the pleasure of being mischievous.
"Not to him alone," she answered, demurely.
"What do you mean?" Allen demanded, now thoroughly alarmed.
"Don't you think it is better for a girl to make a number of men comparatively happy by being engaged to them than one man supremely miserable by marrying him?"
He looked at her aghast. "Who are some of the others?" he asked, with despair written on every feature. "Is Joe Whitney one of them?"
"Joe Whitney!" Alice laughed merrily. "Mercy, no! Joe is entirely without resources. If it wasn't for his family troubles, I shouldn't know what in the world to talk to him about."
Allen began to be suspicious. The girl's manner was far too flippant to be genuine, but he would not for the world give her the satisfaction of knowing that she had worried him.
"If you have so many, why can't you add me to the list?"
"You? Oh, that would never do! You would be sure to think I meant it, and the first thing I knew you would try to make me marry you."
"Of course I should. Don't you want to be married?"
"Marriage is an institution for the blind," she laughed back at him.
"Then that's where I want to be confined."
Alice sat up very straight. "Then you had better run right along and find your guardian," she urged. "We business women have no time for such trifles."
"So you shirk your responsibility, do you?" Allen looked at her so reproachfully, and spoke with such quiet firmness that she ceased her bantering.
"What responsibility am I shirking?" she demanded.
"Me; I am the greatest responsibility you have, and you are neglecting me shamefully."
Alice gave evidence of becoming amused again, but he gravely checked her.
"For once I am serious, if you can be made to believe it. When we met so accidentally in Washington—well, I was a joke then, I admit; but it's different now. You gave me some new ideas to think about, and the more I've thought about them the more I've seen things your way. And ever since then I've tried hard to do what I thought would please you. But now I'm sick of the whole thing. It may be all my fault; but, anyhow, I wish I were well out of it."
"Why, Allen Sanford!" Her voice showed astonishment and reproach.
"I do," he insisted. "I'd give a whole lot right now if I knew that I never had to go back to the office again."
Alice was genuinely shocked. "I can't understand you," she said, soberly. "If you had felt this way at the beginning, I shouldn't have been so much surprised; but now, just when you are getting to a point where you could be useful to father and to yourself, you begin to show the white feather."
"You mustn't say that, Alice," the boy replied, quickly, his tone showing that she hurt him. "It isn't quitting; it's a question of whether or not I am fitted for business—but you mustn't say that I am showing the white feather. I shan't let even you say that."
"Father says you are making a splendid start." She tried to atone in part for her severity. "That ought to mean a lot to you, for he is a hard man to satisfy."
"Did he say that?" Allen replied, temporarily mollified. "That does mean a whole lot to me; but it's all your doing, and you must take the responsibility. Good or bad, I'm your business creation, and you must stand by it."
"No, Allen; you mustn't put it that way. You settled the matter for yourself when you took the stand you did with your father. Of course I'm more than interested to see you make good, but it isn't for me to accept either the responsibility or the credit."
"We never should have had that scrap if it hadn't been for you. I shouldn't have had the nerve."
"Oh, don't say that," she begged.
"It was a good thing all right," he hastened to reassure her. "Except for that, I should still be wearing pinafores, and it's as much better for the pater as it is for me to have shed them. I'd probably like business all right if I understood the blamed thing; but it isn't the whole show, you know."
"Isn't the business end enough?" she asked, quietly. "It is for me. I can't tell you how much real pleasure I'm getting out of this little scheme father has turned over to me. It makes all the other things which I had tired of seem more interesting."
"Business is all right, of course," he admitted. "You don't get much idea of it just going through those letters, but the real thing is the biggest kind of a game you ever saw. It's a finesse here and a forcing of the opponent's hand there, but it can never be the whole game with me."
"It ought to be. You have your chance right before you now, and you ought not to need anything else to urge you on. Just think, you've got to make good to justify your own position and to keep daddy from having made a mistake."
The boy rose from the arm of the great chair on which he had been resting and advanced to the little desk behind which Alice sat. With his hands on the end, he leaned forward until his face was near hers, looking straight into her eyes.
"Perhaps I don't need anything else," he said in a low, firm tone, "but it wouldn't be honest not to tell you that the same something which I had in mind before I started in business has been there ever since. The game is enough in itself, of course, if that's all it can be. But don't you see what a different proposition it is when a fellow sees a dear girl's face ahead of him in the distance just beyond each obstacle which he has to meet? Don't you know how much better you always play a game when there's something up on it?"
Alice was plainly disappointed. "But you are playing for high stakes always, Allen; there's success for the winner and failure for the loser."
"With a big side wager in the dear girl's face just ahead," he added. "I've got to keep that hope in my heart, Alice, to help me to make good quickly; even though you tell me not to, I can't help it. Why, I have done it so long that even if I knew this minute you were going to marry that Covington person, I believe I'd keep right on—hoping to get a chance to be your second husband."
This was too much for the girl's equilibrium, and she laughed in spite of herself. She failed to sense the personal side of Allen's declaration. He was developing, and this to her was only a phase.
"You are simply impossible," she replied; "but we might as well understand each other right now. I have no idea of marrying any one. Perhaps some day I shall change my mind if the man comes along who is enough stronger than I am to sweep away all the objections."
"Does Mr. Covington seem likely to be that man?" Allen asked, pertinently.
"I have no more idea of marrying him than he has of marrying me," Alice stated, flatly. "I admire him extravagantly. He is a self-made man—"
"The good Lord must be pleased to be relieved of that responsibility,"
Allen interrupted, ill-naturedly.
"You mustn't be so prejudiced against him," she reproved him. "He is one of the ablest business men in New York—daddy has told me that—yet, out of respect to my father and kindness to me, he is giving me more of his time, I know, than he can spare. I am very grateful to him."
"Well"—Allen started to take his departure—"we don't seem to have made much progress; but, at any rate, you know where I stand. I shan't buy any crêpe until I receive the wedding cards, and in the mean time"—he bowed very low—"please don't overlook the fact that yours truly is your greatest responsibility, and one which you can't shake off."
Standing in the hall at the foot of the stairs, Allen discovered a figure militant awaiting his descent. Patricia was indignant and excited.
"Hello, Lady Pat!" cried Allen. "What's happened?"
Patricia stamped her foot. "Alice is a naughty, naughty girl," she cried, with tears in her eyes. "I don't love her any more."
"Tut, tut." Allen sat on the lowest step and soothed the child. "Alice is all right."
"No, she isn't," Patricia insisted. Then she pulled away from him and again stood very straight, immaculate in her white frock. "I've been listening up-stairs."
"Oh, ho!" Allen shook his finger reproachfully. "Was that a nice thing to do?"
"It was my duty," the child responded, impressively. "I always do that, and I heard what she said; but I will make it up to you."
"That's awfully good of you, Lady Pat."
"You may kiss me." She held her face forward, with her hands still behind her.
Allen drew her into his lap. "There's one for the lips, and one for each eye, and one for each cheek," suiting the action to the word. Patricia worked herself free.
"Now we're engaged," she announced. "You may marry me as soon as you like."
Allen concealed his amusement. "I can't marry you because I've made a vow to marry Alice, and it would never do to break a vow, would it?"
"But if the lady won't marry you, then you are released from your vow," Patricia explained, showing perfect familiarity with the laws of chivalry.
"Not until she marries some one else," he corrected.
"That's all right," the child assented, cheerfully; "until then you can be my Knight." Then she majestically untied the ribbon in her hair and held it out to him.
"What's this for?" he inquired.
"For you—to wear always. Every knight in my Round Table book has a token from his lady-love."
"I shall wear it next my heart," Allen told her. "And now, fair Lady
Pat, good-bye."
The child made a magnificent courtesy. "Good-bye, Sir Launcelot, 'til death asunder."