CHAPTER XXIII.
The “Dutchman’s Mill” and What It Ground.
We sat in conclave about the table. I saw by the lined faces of Elkins and Hinckley that I had come back to a closely-beleaguered camp, where heavy watching had robbed the couch of sleep, and care pressed down the spirit. I had returned successful, but not to receive a triumph: rather, Harper and myself constituted a relief force, thrown in by stratagem, too weak to raise the siege, but bearing glad tidings of strong succor on the way.
It was our first full meeting without Cornish; and Harper sat in his place. He was unruffled and buoyant in manner, in spite of the stock in the Grain Belt Trust Company which he held, and the loans placed with his insurance company by Mr. Hinckley.
“I believe,” said he, “that we are here to consider a communication from Mr. Cornish. It seems that we ought to hear the letter.”
“I’ll read it in a minute,” said Jim, “but first let me say that this grows out of a talk between Mr. Cornish and myself. Hinckley and Barslow know that there have been differences between us here for some time.”
“Quite natural,” said Harper; “according to all the experience-tables, you ought to have had a fight somewhere in the crowd long before this.”
“Mr. Cornish,” went on Mr. Elkins, “has favored the policy of converting our holdings into cash, and letting the obligations we have floated stand solely on the assets by which they are secured. The rest of us have foreseen such rapid liquidation, as a certain result of such a policy, that not only would our town receive a blow from which it could never recover, but the investment world would suffer in the collapse.”
“I should say so,” said Harper; “we’ll have to look closely to the suicide clause in our policies held in New England, if that takes place!”
“Well,” said Jim, continuing, “last Tuesday the matter came to an issue between us, and some plain talk was indulged in; perhaps the language was a little strong on my part, and Mr. Cornish considered himself aggrieved, and said, among other things, that he, for one, would not submit to extinguishment, and he would show me that I could not go on in opposition to his wishes.”