“Mr. Ames,” the clerk began, “I––I have come to ask a favor––a great favor. I am having difficulty––considerable difficulty in securing stenographers, but––I may say––my greatest struggle is with myself. I––Mr. Ames, I can not––I simply can not continue to hire stenographers at the old wage, nine dollars a week! I know how these girls are forced to live. Mr. Ames, with prices where they are now, they can not live on that! May I not offer them more? Say, ten or twelve dollars to start with?”
Ames looked at him fixedly. “Why do you come to me with your request?” he asked coldly. “Your superior is Mr. Doan.”
“Yes, sir, I know,” replied the young man with hesitation. “But––I––did speak to him about it, and––he refused.”
“I can do nothing, sir,” returned Ames in a voice that chilled the man’s life-current.
“Then I shall resign, Mr. Ames! I refuse to remain here and hire stenographers at that criminal wage!”
“Very well, sir,” replied Ames in the same low, freezing tone. “Hand your resignation to Mr. Doan. Good day, sir.”
Again the guardian of the sanctity of private property was left alone. Again, as he lapsed into dark revery, his thought turned back upon itself, and began the reconstruction of scenes and events long since shadowy dreams. And always as they built, the fair face of that young girl appeared in the fabric. And always as he retraced his course, her path crossed and crossed again his own. Always as he moved, her reflection fell upon him––not in shadow, but in a flood of light, exposing the secret recesses of his sordid soul.
He dwelt again upon the smoothness of his way in those days, before her advent, when that group of canny pirates sat about the Beaubien’s table and laid their devious snares. It was only the summer before she came that this same jolly company had merged their sacred trust assets to draw the clouds which that autumn burst upon the country as the worst financial panic it had known in years. And so shrewdly had they planned, that the storm came unheralded from a clear sky, and at a time when the nation was never more prosperous.
He laughed. It had been rich fun!