Roden's Corner

by Henry Seton Merriman

Roden turned in his leisurely way, and looked over his shoulder towards the paper. Von Holzen glanced at Dorothy. He had no desire to keep her in suspense, but he wished to know how much she knew. She looked into the fire, treating his conversation as directed towards her brother only.

“I tried for ten years in vain to get this,” continued Von Holzen, “and at last a dying man dictated it to me. For years it lived in the brain of one man only—and he a maker of it himself. He might have died at any moment with that secret in his head. And I,”—he folded the paper slowly and shrugged his shoulders—“I watched him. And the last intelligible word he spoke on earth was the last word of this prescription. The man can have been no fool; for he was a man of little education. I never respected him so much as I do now when I have learnt it myself.” He rose and walked to the fire. “You permit me, Fräulein,” he said, putting the logs together with his foot.

They burnt up brightly, and he threw the paper upon them. In a moment it was reduced to ashes. He turned slowly upon his heel, and looked at his companions with the grave smile of one who had never known much mirth.

“There,” he said, touching his forehead, with one finger; “it is in the brain of one man—once more.” He returned to the chair he had just vacated. “And whosoever wishes to stop the manufacture of malgamite will need to stop that brain,” he said, with a soft laugh. “Of course there is a risk attached to burning that paper,” he continued, after a pause. “My brain may go—a little clot of blood no bigger than a pin's head, and the greatest brain on earth is so much pulp! It may be worth some one's while to kill me. It is so often worth some one's while to kill somebody else, even at a considerable risk—but the courage is nearly always lacking. However, we must run these risks.”

He rose from his chair with a low and rather pleasant laugh, glancing at the clock as he did so. It was evidently his intention to take his leave. Dorothy rose also, and they stood for a moment facing each other. He was a few inches above her stature, and he looked down at her with his slow, thoughtful eyes. He seemed always to be making a diagnosis of the souls of men.

“I know, Fräulein,” he said, “That you are one of those who dislike me, and seek to do me harm. I am sorry. It is long since I discarded a youthful belief that it was possible to get on in life without arousing ill feeling. Believe me, it is impossible even to hold one's own in this world without making enemies. There are two sides to every question, Fräulein—remember that.”

He brought his heels together, bowed stiffly, from the waist, in his formal manner, and left the room. Percy Roden followed him, leaving the door open. Dorothy heard the rustle of his dripping waterproof as he put it on, the click of the door, the sound of his firm retreating tread on the gravel. Then her brother came back into the room. His rather weak face was flushed. His eyes were unsteady. Dorothy saw this in a glance, and her own face hardened unresponsively. The situation was clearly enough defined in her own mind. Von Holzen had destroyed the prescription before her on purpose. It was only a move in that game of life which is always extending to a new deal, and of which women as onlookers necessarily see the most. Von Holzen wished Cornish, and others concerned, to know that he had destroyed the prescription. It was a concession in disguise—a retrograde movement—perhaps pour mieux sauter.

Percy Roden was one of those men who have a grudge against the world. The most hopeless ill-doer is he who excuses himself angrily. There are some who seem unconscious of their own failings, and for these there is hope. They may some day find out that it is better to be at peace with the world even at the cost of a little self-denial. But Percy Roden admitted that he was wrong, and always had that sort of excuse which seeks to lay the blame upon a whole class—upon other business men, upon those in authority, upon women.

“It is excused in others, why not in me?”—the last cry of the ne'er-do-well.

He glanced angrily at Dorothy now. But he was always half afraid of her.