The room marked "President," paneled in quartered oak much like the state apartment of a private car, contained a polished desk, six chairs with red morocco seats, a Turkish rug, and the portrait of a former president done in oil. Beneath the picture, upon a pedestal and protected by a dome of glass, stood a small machine which, from time to time, emitted jerky, nervous clicks, and printed mystic characters upon an endless paper tape.
The former president upon the wall smiled perpetually, with eyes directed to the plate-glass door, as though it pleased him to observe through it the double row of neat young men on lofty stools so well employed. Perhaps it pleased him better still to watch the little, brass-barred windows farther on, where countless faces came and went all day from ten till three—thin faces and fat, and old and young, and hands, innumerable hands, some to carry and some to fetch, but all to leave a tribute for whomever might be sitting at the polished desk.
"Please read this item, Mr. Wattles," said the president, indicating with a well-kept finger-nail a paragraph in the Morning Mercury, and, putting on his glasses, Mr. Wattles read:
"Conservative estimates place the fortune of Hiram Clatfield at seven million dollars."
At the same moment the small machine appeared to rouse itself.
"Con-ser-vat-ive—est-i-ma-tes—place—the—for-tune—of—Hi-ram—Clat-field—at——" it seemed to repeat deliberately, as for dictation, and stopped.
"S.e.v.e.n.m.i.l.l.i.o.n.d.o.l.l.a.r.s," concluded a typewriter in the counting-room beyond the plate-glass doors, and the sentence ended in the tinkle of the little bell which gives warning that a line is nearly finished.
Mr. Wattles, having laid the paper on the table, wiped his glasses with a pocket-handkerchief and held them to the light.
"Do you propose to take action in the matter?" he inquired. "Is there anything I can do?"
Mr. Clatfield moved to the center of the rug and thrust both hands into his trousers' pockets.