“Bad omen for my trustee meeting to-night,” he muttered. “This air feels like Van Meter’s breath.”
He allowed four trains to pass, and at last boarded one worse crowded than the first. With a sigh for the end of chivalry, he pushed his way through the dense mass packed at the doors, wedging his big form roughly among the women, to the centre of the car, and mechanically seized a strap. He was so used to this leather-strap habit that he held on with one hand and, while reading, unfolded and folded his paper with the other.
He climbed the hill to his home in the face of a howling snow-storm.
Ruth looked at him intently.
“I am sorry I couldn’t get home earlier,” he said, “I’ve had a hard day.”
“But such pleasant help that you didn’t mind it, I’m sure. I heard Miss Ransom was assisting you. I went to the church and found you had gone out with her. I hear she is becoming indispensable in your work.”
“Come, Ruth, let’s not have another silly quarrel.”
“No; it’s a waste of breath,” she replied bitterly.
He slipped quietly out of the house after supper and hurried back to his study to collect his thoughts for the battle he knew he must wage with Van Meter. This one man had ruled the church with his rod of gold for twenty years. He had established a mission station on the East Side and gathered into it the undesirable people. He was the watchdog of the Prudential Committee guarding the door to membership.
This trustee meeting had for him a double interest. A panic in Wall Street had all but ruined Van Meter. He had attempted to corner the bread market. The wheat crop had been ruined by a hard winter, and the little black eyes, watching, believed the coup could be made.