Part 23 (1/2)
to be trouble on the stock exchange to-morrow. We have a lot of our street-railway stocks around at the different banks. If we don't look sharp they'll be callin' our loans. We have to 'tend to that the first thing in the mornin'. Cowperwood has a hundred thousand of mine with him that he wants me to let stay there, and he has some money that belongs to Stener, he tells me.”
”Stener?” asked Owen, curiously. ”Has he been dabbling in stocks?” Owen had heard some rumors concerning Stener and others only very recently, which he had not credited nor yet communicated to his father. ”How much money of his has Cowperwood?” he asked.
Butler meditated. ”Quite a bit, I'm afraid,” he finally said. ”As a matter of fact, it's a great deal--about five hundred thousand dollars.
If that should become known, it would be makin' a good deal of noise, I'm thinkin'.”
”Whew!” exclaimed Owen in astonishment. ”Five hundred thousand dollars!
Good Lord, father! Do you mean to say Stener has got away with five hundred thousand dollars? Why, I wouldn't think he was clever enough to do that. Five hundred thousand dollars! It will make a nice row if that comes out.”
”Aisy, now! Aisy, now!” replied Butler, doing his best to keep all phases of the situation in mind. ”We can't tell exactly what the circ.u.mstances were yet. He mayn't have meant to take so much. It may all come out all right yet. The money's invested. Cowperwood hasn't failed yet. It may be put back. The thing to be settled on now is whether anything can be done to save him. If he's tellin' me the truth--and I never knew him to lie--he can get out of this if street-railway stocks don't break too heavy in the mornin'. I'm going over to see Henry Mollenhauer and Mark Simpson. They're in on this. Cowperwood wanted me to see if I couldn't get them to get the bankers together and have them stand by the market. He thought we might protect our loans by comin' on and buyin' and holdin' up the price.”
Owen was running swiftly in his mind over Cowperwood's affairs--as much as he knew of them. He felt keenly that the banker ought to be shaken out. This dilemma was his fault, not Stener's--he felt. It was strange to him that his father did not see it and resent it.
”You see what it is, father,” he said, dramatically, after a time.
”Cowperwood's been using this money of Stener's to pick up stocks, and he's in a hole. If it hadn't been for this fire he'd have got away with it; but now he wants you and Simpson and Mollenhauer and the others to pull him out. He's a nice fellow, and I like him fairly well; but you're a fool if you do as he wants you to. He has more than belongs to him already. I heard the other day that he has the Front Street line, and almost all of Green and Coates; and that he and Stener own the Seventeenth and Nineteenth; but I didn't believe it. I've been intending to ask you about it. I think Cowperwood has a majority for himself stowed away somewhere in every instance. Stener is just a p.a.w.n. He moves him around where he pleases.”
Owen's eyes gleamed avariciously, opposingly. Cowperwood ought to be punished, sold out, driven out of the street-railway business in which Owen was anxious to rise.
”Now you know,” observed Butler, thickly and solemnly, ”I always thought that young felly was clever, but I hardly thought he was as clever as all that. So that's his game. You're pretty shrewd yourself, aren't you?
Well, we can fix that, if we think well of it. But there's more than that to all this. You don't want to forget the Republican party. Our success goes with the success of that, you know”--and he paused and looked at his son. ”If Cowperwood should fail and that money couldn't be put back--” He broke off abstractedly. ”The thing that's troublin' me is this matter of Stener and the city treasury. If somethin' ain't done about that, it may go hard with the party this fall, and with some of our contracts. You don't want to forget that an election is comin'
along in November. I'm wonderin' if I ought to call in that one hundred thousand dollars. It's goin' to take considerable money to meet my loans in the mornin'.”
It is a curious matter of psychology, but it was only now that the real difficulties of the situation were beginning to dawn on Butler. In the presence of Cowperwood he was so influenced by that young man's personality and his magnetic presentation of his need and his own liking for him that he had not stopped to consider all the phases of his own relations.h.i.+p to the situation. Out here in the cool night air, talking to Owen, who was ambitious on his own account and anything but sentimentally considerate of Cowperwood, he was beginning to sober down and see things in their true light. He had to admit that Cowperwood had seriously compromised the city treasury and the Republican party, and incidentally Butler's own private interests. Nevertheless, he liked Cowperwood. He was in no way prepared to desert him. He was now going to see Mollenhauer and Simpson as much to save Cowperwood really as the party and his own affairs. And yet a scandal. He did not like that--resented it. This young scalawag! To think he should be so sly.
None the less he still liked him, even here and now, and was feeling that he ought to do something to help the young man, if anything could help him. He might even leave his hundred-thousand-dollar loan with him until the last hour, as Cowperwood had requested, if the others were friendly.
”Well, father,” said Owen, after a time, ”I don't see why you need to worry any more than Mollenhauer or Simpson. If you three want to help him out, you can; but for the life of me I don't see why you should. I know this thing will have a bad effect on the election, if it comes out before then; but it could be hushed up until then, couldn't it? Anyhow, your street-railway holdings are more important than this election, and if you can see your way clear to getting the street-railway lines in your hands you won't need to worry about any elections. My advice to you is to call that one-hundred-thousand-dollar loan of yours in the morning, and meet the drop in your stocks that way. It may make Cowperwood fail, but that won't hurt you any. You can go into the market and buy his stocks. I wouldn't be surprised if he would run to you and ask you to take them. You ought to get Mollenhauer and Simpson to scare Stener so that he won't loan Cowperwood any more money. If you don't, Cowperwood will run there and get more. Stener's in too far now. If Cowperwood won't sell out, well and good; the chances are he will bust, anyhow, and then you can pick up as much on the market as any one else. I think he'll sell. You can't afford to worry about Stener's five hundred thousand dollars. No one told him to loan it. Let him look out for himself. It may hurt the party, but you can look after that later.
You and Mollenhauer can fix the newspapers so they won't talk about it till after election.”
”Aisy! Aisy!” was all the old contractor would say. He was thinking hard.
Chapter XXV
The residence of Henry A. Mollenhauer was, at that time, in a section of the city which was almost as new as that in which Butler was living. It was on South Broad Street, near a handsome library building which had been recently erected. It was a s.p.a.cious house of the type usually affected by men of new wealth in those days--a structure four stories in height of yellow brick and white stone built after no school which one could readily identify, but not unattractive in its architectural composition. A broad flight of steps leading to a wide veranda gave into a decidedly ornate door, which was set on either side by narrow windows and ornamented to the right and left with pale-blue jardinieres of considerable charm of outline. The interior, divided into twenty rooms, was paneled and parqueted in the most expensive manner for homes of that day. There was a great reception-hall, a large parlor or drawing-room, a dining-room at least thirty feet square paneled in oak; and on the second floor were a music-room devoted to the talents of Mollenhauer's three ambitious daughters, a library and private office for himself, a boudoir and bath for his wife, and a conservatory.
Mollenhauer was, and felt himself to be, a very important man. His financial and political judgment was exceedingly keen. Although he was a German, or rather an American of German parentage, he was a man of a rather impressive American presence. He was tall and heavy and shrewd and cold. His large chest and wide shoulders supported a head of distinguished proportions, both round and long when seen from different angles. The frontal bone descended in a protruding curve over the nose, and projected solemnly over the eyes, which burned with a shrewd, inquiring gaze. And the nose and mouth and chin below, as well as his smooth, hard cheeks, confirmed the impression that he knew very well what he wished in this world, and was very able without regard to let or hindrance to get it. It was a big face, impressive, well modeled. He was an excellent friend of Edward Malia Butler's, as such friends.h.i.+ps go, and his regard for Mark Simpson was as sincere as that of one tiger for another. He respected ability; he was willing to play fair when fair was the game. When it was not, the reach of his cunning was not easily measured.
When Edward Butler and his son arrived on this Sunday evening, this distinguished representative of one-third of the city's interests was not expecting them. He was in his library reading and listening to one of his daughters playing the piano. His wife and his other two daughters had gone to church. He was of a domestic turn of mind. Still, Sunday evening being an excellent one for conference purposes generally in the world of politics, he was not without the thought that some one or other of his distinguished confreres might call, and when the combination footman and butler announced the presence of Butler and his son, he was well pleased.
”So there you are,” he remarked to Butler, genially, extending his hand.
”I'm certainly glad to see you. And Owen! How are you, Owen? What will you gentlemen have to drink, and what will you smoke? I know you'll have something. John”--to the servitor---”see if you can find something for these gentlemen. I have just been listening to Caroline play; but I think you've frightened her off for the time being.”
He moved a chair into position for Butler, and indicated to Owen another on the other side of the table. In a moment his servant had returned with a silver tray of elaborate design, carrying whiskies and wines of various dates and cigars in profusion. Owen was the new type of young financier who neither smoked nor drank. His father temperately did both.
”It's a comfortable place you have here,” said Butler, without any indication of the important mission that had brought him. ”I don't wonder you stay at home Sunday evenings. What's new in the city?”
”Nothing much, so far as I can see,” replied Mollenhauer, pacifically.
”Things seem to be running smooth enough. You don't know anything that we ought to worry about, do you?”