My family?
I confess they have not risen to my level or to the opportunities I have made for them. Naturally, with great wealth, the old simple family relationship was broken up. That was to be expected—the duties of people in our position do not permit indulgence in the simple emotions and pastimes of the family life of the masses. But neither, on the other hand, was it necessary that my wife should become a cold and calculating social figure, full of vanity and superciliousness, instead of maintaining the proud dignity of her position as my wife. Nor was it necessary that my children should become selfish, heartless, pleasure-seekers, caring nothing for me except as a source of money.
I suppose I am in part responsible—my great enterprises have left me little time for the small details of life, such as the training of children. They were admirably educated, too. I provided the best governesses and masters, and saw to it that they learned all that a lady or a gentleman should know; and in respect of dress and manners I admit that they do very well, indeed. Possibly, the complete breaking up of the family, except as it is held together by my money, is due to the fact that we see so little of one another, each having his or her separate establishment. Possibly I am a little old-fashioned, a little too exacting, in my idea of wife and children. Certainly they are aristocratic enough.
My son James is the thorn in my side. And, whenever I have a moment’s rest from my affairs, I find myself thinking of him, worrying over him. The latest development in his character is certainly disquieting.
He was twenty-five years old yesterday. He was educated at our most aristocratic university here, and at one in Europe of the same kind. It was his mother’s dream that he should be “brought up as a gentleman”; and that fell in with my ideas, for I did not wish him to be a money-maker, but the head of the family I purposed to found upon my millions, which are already numerous enough to secure it for many generations. “There is no call for him to struggle and toil as I have,” I said to myself. “The sort of financial ability I possess is born in a man and can’t be taught or transmitted by birth. He would make a small showing, at best, as a business man. As a gentleman he will shine. He only needs just enough business training to enable him to supervise those who will take care of his fortune and that of the rich woman he will marry.” I was determined that he should marry in his own class—and, indeed, he is not a sentimentalist, and, therefore, is not likely to disregard my wishes in that matter.
When he was eighteen I caught him in a fashionable gambling-house one night when I thought he was at his college. I could not but admire the coolness with which he made the best of it: stood beside me as I sat playing faro, then went over to a roulette table and lost several hundred dollars on a few spins of the ball. But the next day I took him sharply to task—it was one thing for me to play, at my age and with my fortune, I explained, but not the same for him, at his age, and with nothing but an allowance.
He shrugged his shoulders indifferently. “Really, governor,” he said, “a man must do as the other fellows in his set do. Didn’t you see whom I was with? If you wish me to travel with those people I must go their gait.”
That was not unreasonable, so I dismissed him with a cautioning. At twenty he went abroad, and, a year after he had returned, his bills and drafts were still coming. I sent for him. “Why don’t you pay your debts, sir?” I demanded, angrily, for such conduct was directly contrary to my teaching and example.
He gave me his grandest look—he is a handsome, aristocratic-looking fellow, away ahead of what Judson must have been at his age. “But, my dear governor,” he said, “a gentleman pays his debts when he feels like it.”
“No, he don’t,” I answered, furiously, for my instinct of commercial promptness was roused. “A scoundrel pays his debts when he feels like it. A gentleman pays ’em when they’re due.”