XI
IN WHICH SUNDRY PEOPLE MAKE GREAT DISCOVERIES
"There were many private panics in Pointview. It was my privilege toobserve, under calm exteriors, a raging fever of excitement--charactersgoing bankrupt, collectors wandering in a fruitless quest. One littlerill that flowed into the swift river of national trouble issued fromthe bosom of my clerk, Mr. 'Cub' Sayles. It had been one of the mostplacid bosoms in Pointview. Now it was in the midst of what I havesince referred to as the 'Violet and Supper Panic of 1907.'
"Cub was a quiet, hard-working, serious-minded boy whose mother movedin the higher circles of Boston. He had a low, pleasant voice, atouch of Harry's dialect, and a sad face. He had asked for a highersalary, and I had asked for information.
"'You see every time I go to call on my girl I have to take a bunch ofviolets or a two-pound box of candy,' he said. 'Then if we go to thetheater her chaperon has to be with us--don't you know? She's a stoutlady who complains of faintness before the play ends, and I have toask them out to supper. Then I am always greatly alarmed, for younever can tell what will happen, sir, with two ladies at supper andonly twenty dollars in your pocket, and both ladies fond of game andcrab-meat. It's really very trying. I sit and tremble as I watch them,and go home with only a feeble remnant of my salary, and next day Ihave to pawn my diamond ring.'
"'All that isn't honest,' I said. 'You're getting her favor underfalse pretenses. You're trying to make her believe that you are asort of aristocrat with lots of money. Why don't you tell her thetruth--that you can't afford violets, that the two-pound box is aburden that is breaking your back, and that every theater-supper sendsyou to the pawnbroker's?'
"'I can't--she would throw me over,' he explained. 'The girls expectthose things. They like to show and talk about them--don't you know?It's the fashion. Our best young men do it, sir.'
"'Well, if you are willing to give up your honor for a lady's smileyou won't do for me,' I said. 'You must not only tell the truth, butlive it. You must be just what you are--a poor boy working for twentydollars a week. If the girl doesn't like it she's unfit to associatewith honest men. If you don't like it I don't like you.'
"Perspiration had begun to dampen the brow of Cub.
"'I--I hadn't seen it in that light, sir,' he said. 'But what am I todo, sir? I am heavily indebted to my tailor.'
"'What! Haven't you paid for those lovely garments?'
"'I had them charged, sir,' Cub sadly answered. 'My mother sent me ahundred dollars to pay for them, but I loaned it to Roger Daniels. Ishould be much obliged, sir, if you would collect it for me.'
"I went to Roger and made him pay the debt. He paid it in a curiousway--by going to his tailor and buying a hundred dollars' worth ofclothes for Cub and having them charged. It was compounding a felony,but my client was satisfied and Roger was grateful. He began to havesome regard for me. Not every lawyer had been able to make him pay.Within a day or so he came to consult me about a mortgage on hispatrimony.
"Roger had married and settled down immediately after his remarkablecruise. He had kept his party in ignorance of his financial troublesand returned with his reputation as an aristocrat firmly established.The gay young Bessie Runnymede had accepted him at once. He had becomejunior partner in a firm of brokers and had rented a handsomeresidence in Pointview.
"So they began their little play with ladies, lords, and gentlemen inthe cast, and with a country-house, a tandem, a crested limousine, anda racing launch for scenery. But Roger had what is known as a badseason. Well, you know, the moving-picture shows had got such a holdon the public.
"At first we concluded that he must have made another lucky play inthe market. Then, after six months or so, bills against Roger began toarrive for collection from sundry department stores in the city. Hewas a good fellow and had plausible excuses, and I declined to presspayment and returned the bills.
"One day, some eight months after the wedding, an urgent telegramfrom Roger brought me to New York. I found the young man in hisoffice, with his wife at his side. They were both in tears. I sat downwith them, and he told me this story:
"'The fact is, I'm a thief,' he began. 'I have confessed the truth tomy partners. Since my marriage I have taken about twenty thousanddollars--needed every cent of it to keep going. The fact is, Iexpected to make a killing in the market and return the money--hadinside information--but everything went wrong. Yesterday I was cleanedout.
"'I went home late in the evening. I hoped that my wife would be inbed, but she was waiting for me. She said that I looked sick, andwanted to know what was the matter. I told her that I had a headache,and got into bed as soon as possible; but I couldn't sleep. Long aftermidnight my wife rose and turned on the light and came to my bed andsaid that she knew I was troubled about something--that she had seenit in my face for weeks. She begged that I would let her help me bearit. Then I told her the truth, and discovered--for I didn't know herbefore--one of the noblest women in the world. She hid her face in thepillow, and then I had a bad moment.
"'"Why did you do it?" she asked as soon as she could speak.
"'And I said: "We've been foolish--trying to keep up with Harry andthe rest of them. It was my fault. I ought to have told you that Icouldn't go the pace."
"'She saw the truth in a flash, and the old-fashioned woman in her gotto work.
"'"Roger, get up and dress yourself," said she. "We will go and seeyour partners to-night. We will go together, for I am as guilty asyou. We will tell them the truth and beg for time. Maybe we can getthe money."
"'We started in our motor-car about one o'clock for the city, on darkand muddy roads. Some ten miles out we broke an axle and left car anddriver and went on afoot. My wife wouldn't wait. No trains wererunning. But we could get a trolley five miles down the road. So wewent on in the dark and silence. I put my arm around her, and not aword passed between us for an hour or so. I don't know what she wasthinking of, but I was trying to count my follies. It began to rain,and I felt sorry for Bess, and took off my coat and threw it overher.'
"'"I don't mind the rain," she said. "It will cool me."
"'We were a sight when we got to the trolley, and just before daylightwe rang the bell of the senior partner. Our weariness and muddy shoesand rain-soaked garments were a help to us. They touched his heart,sir. Anyhow, he gave me a week of grace in which to make good. I mustget the money somehow, and I want your advice about it.'
"'I'm glad of one part of it all,' I said--'that you have discoveredeach other and learned that you are human beings of a pretty goodsort. I've much more respect for both of you than I ever had before.'
"He looked at me in surprise.
"'Oh, you are a better man than you were three months ago!' I answeredhim. 'You happen to have run against the law, and it's shocked andfrightened you. But you are improving. Long ago you began to incurdebts which you couldn't pay, and you must have known that youcouldn't pay them. In that manner you became possessed of a large sumof money belonging to other people. It was used not for necessities,but to maintain a foolish display. That is the most heartless kind offraud. I've much more respect for you now that you see your fault andconfess it. I'm convinced now that you have a conscience, and thatyou will be likely to make some use of it in the future. I'mparticularly grateful to your wife. She has shown me that she is justa woman, and not an angel. I don't believe that it was at allnecessary for you to have groveled in aristocratic crimes in order towin her heart. The yacht cruise and the tandem and the violets and theFifth Avenue clothes and the ton of candy were quite superfluous. Youneeded only to tell her the truth, like a man, and say that you lovedher.'
"'It is true, Roger,' said the girl as she broke down again.
"'I did it all to please you, dear,' the boy answered, in his effortto comfort her.
"'And it did please me,' she said, brokenly, 'but I know that I shouldhave been better pleased if--'
"She hesitated, and I expressed her thought for her:
"'If he had centralized on m
anhood. There is something sweeter thanviolets and grander than fine raiment in a sort of character that aboy should offer to the girl he loves.'
"They were both convinced. It was easy to see that now, and I promisedto do what I could for them.
"I got a schedule of the young man's debts and found that he owed,among other debts, six thousand dollars to sundry shops and departmentstores in New York--the purchases of his wife in the eight months oftheir wedded life. I asked her how it could have happened.
"'He opened accounts for me and said I could buy what I wanted, andyou know it is so easy to say "Charge it,'" was her answer. 'Every onehas accounts these days, and they tempt you to buy more than youneed.'
"'It is true. Credit is the latest ally of the devil. It is the greattempter. It is responsible for half the extravagance of modern life.The two words 'charge it' have done more harm than any others in thelanguage. They have led to a vast amount of unnecessary buying. Theyhave developed a talent for extravagance in our people. They havecreated a large and growing sisterhood and brotherhood of dead-beats.They have led to bankruptcy and slow pay and bad debts. They haveraised the cost of everything we require because the tradesman compelsus to pay his uncollected accounts. They are added to your bills andmine, and the merchant prince suffers no impairment of his fortune.
"Bessie's bank-account was also overdrawn. That reminds me of a newsinner--the bank-check. It is so easy to draw a check--and, then,somehow, it's only a piece of paper. You let it go without a pangwhile you would be very thoughtful if you were counting out the moneyand parting with it.
"The check is another way of saying 'Charge it.'
"That evening I went to see Harry."