he opened a store. He went into business. If he'd been luckier, he might have been as rich as the Astors. I'm going in the candy business, and I'm not risking my life, as our ancestor did. I'm not even risking bankruptcy. I could spend this money on a boat, speaking of Astor, but I don't care that much about owning a boat. I'm doing something because I'd like to prove a point to my brother, and to you too, for that matter, Ray." "George, we're going to have our arguments. We won't be able to avoid it," said Turner. "Oh, I'm pretty adroit at avoiding arguments, Ray. I never argue to convince anybody. Only to learn something or to entertain myself." "Well, I hope you learned something today." "Thank you, I did," said George Lockwood. "Life is a fascinating enterprise. Twenty-four hours ago I was congratulating some Italian cabinetmakers on some beautiful work they did for me. And not one thing that's happened to me since then would I have been able to predict. Why, this time yesterday I had no intention of coming to New York." The three men agreed to meet again the next day, and George Lockwood walked up to Broadway and the office of Lockwood & Company. It was getting dark, and most of the office staff had gone home or were saying goodnight. Marian Strademyer was at her desk. "I have a message for you from your brother," she said, as George Lockwood was passing in front of her. "And that is?" said George Lockwood. "You and Mrs. Lockwood are dining at his house tomorrow evening, eight o'clock," she said. "Thank you, Miss Strademyer." "You and he were very chummy today," she said. "Were we? Unusually so, did you think?" "I thought so, arm-in-arm, going out to lunch," said Marian Stradernyer. "Oh, well, I suppose that was unusual, in the office at any rate. But we're very close," said George Lockwood. He turned his head in the direction of his brother's office, and continued, reflectively, "I don't know of anything I wouldn't do for him." "That's nice," she said, then, lowering her voice slightly: "I changed my mind about this afternoon, if you're still interested." "I said four o'clock. Now there isn't time," he said. "Oh, all right," she said. "You mustn't be disagreeable, Marian. I don't like disagreeable women. Have you any other messages?" "No," she said. She took her purse out of her desk drawer and angrily walked out. He went to his office and closed the door. "Miss Strademyer," he said aloud, "You are a nuisance." He seated himself at his desk and began speaking into the Dictograph, a summary of his conversation with Turner and Bohm. When he had finished he put the tube in his topcoat pocket. "I don't like you anymore, Miss Strademyer," he said, and lightly tapped the Dictograph. "Not one damn bit." The office was now deserted; the first of the cleaning women had not yet arrived. He went through Marian Strademyer's desk, carefully replacing everything he disturbed. None of the contents of the desk drawers interested him for long. He sat in her chair for a minute or two, and his next move was to the glass-partitioned bookkeeping room. He took down a large ledger stamped Payroll and placed it on a desk, and there before him was a complete record of Strademyer, Marian's, salary-and-bonus history at Lockwood & Company. He closed the book, and was about to return it to the shelf, but he reopened it, read the payroll accounts of several other employees, and discovered that Strademyer, Marian, had never had a deduction in her pay cheques for an advance salary payment. In this respect she was unique. No one else had managed to go through any single year without at least one salary advance; several employees on a slightly lower pay scale had seldom got through a fortnight without borrowing money from the petty cash account. Strademyer, Marian, had never borrowed a cent. She seemed to manage very well. George Lockwood wandered about the office, walking from room to room, smoking his pipe. Then abruptly he stopped walking and took
Similar Books
