The Lockwood Concern (20 page)

month." "Five hundred a month? Is that everything?" "Don't you think that's a lot of money?" "No. I wouldn't think so if it was over and above the upkeep of my house, the servants. Five hundred a month, my dear, I have children to educate, all sorts of expenses to meet. I could do it on a thousand a month." "I thought you had a buyer for your house." "I have, but that money doesn't come from you." "Oddly enough, I consider that it does," he said. "But I won't go into that now." "Do go into it," she said. "Let's be brutally frank." "Well, I might have been able to take the house away from you. It was bought with money stolen from me." "You know better than that. I've owned the house for years. How could you ever prove it was bought with your money?" "I think it could be done, but since I don't intend to try, the question needn't come up." "But it has come up." She paused. "I see. You consider the house a sort of a settlement. Well, I don't. Harry gave me the house, but on the other hand, I turned my money over to him to invest. Your claim would surely never take precedence over mine." "It's a point of law that neither of us know much about. My impression is that if Harry had lived he'd have had to make restitution, and that if I could show that he had transferred title to you after he'd committed a crime, the transfer wouldn't be valid in court. But there's a question of ethics that should concern you." "Ethics? What about your ethics toward your mistress? Whatever's gone before, my dear, I'm your mistress." "Yes, but you could end that any time you felt like it." "I can, and how I do. I warned you, my dear. I asked you if you could afford me. I said to you, in these exact words: 'Locky, are you that rich?' And you said you weren't going to court me with greenbacks. Woo me, I think you said. And you said you couldn't buy what you wanted from me. What did you mean by that? I was never certain." "I don't know." "I took it as a great compliment." "That was how I meant it." "Then what has changed? Your greenbacks couldn't woo me, but did you expect to have me as your mistress for nothing? What was your idea of a mistress? A woman that you hid away somewhere and went to bed with when you wanted to? There are those. Harry had one. But who will ever know how much money he spent on her? A lot more than five hundred a month. If I had your money and you were my fancy man, I'd give you more than five hundred a month. Oh, it's a good thing we had this conversation now." "Yes, it is. I thought we loved each other." "Of course we do, Locky my dear. And I thought I would never give myself to another man. But you're so frugal. Just because I'm a lady is no reason why I must live in Manayunk and do my own housework, send my children to the public schools. You don't seem to understand any of this. I didn't even marry Harry for love-in-a-cottage, you know, and I'm much too old and wise for that now. I'd rather give pleasure to some old man, and I know a few. Can't you give me a million dollars?" "No." "Oh, I thought you could. I always thought you could. I was so happy that day, that first time. A man who could make me want to give myself to him, and who was going to make me safe and secure. You misled me, Locky - but I forgive you. Fortunately I'm at an age when no one man can ruin my life, at least not because we've shared certain pleasures. I've always had a great curiosity about men, and they've always been attracted to me." "Yes, it was a very good thing we had this conversation." "You must be careful." "Well, your curiosity. It could get you into trouble." "My dear, I'm in mourning." "What's that got to do with it?" "A widow can see as many men as she pleases, until she starts seeing one too often. That's when the gossip starts... Oh, my friend is back from his trip around the world. I had a note from him." "The doctor?" "I never said he was a doctor. That was your guesswork." "Truthfully, Locky, aren't you a little bit relieved that we can chat like this? We've been as intimate as two people can be, but now that it's over, isn't it a relief? I never did like you, remember. I trusted you, and I did love you, but this is the first time I ever felt that I liked you. There are two dear old people here in Philadelphia that have a wonderful friendship, and I've always heard that years ago they had a passionate love affair. Got over it, rode out the scandal, so to speak, and now they're just the dearest friends. You and I might be that kind of friends some day." "No, I'll never think of you as a friend." "Well, all right. I don't think our paths will cross much anyway, once I settle down." "Settle down to what?" "Settle down to the arrangement I thought I had with you. Well, I hear my cousin moving around and I think it would be polite if I went up and chatted with her. Goodbye, Locky dear. I'm sorry you won't stay to lunch." He was eased out with such finesse that on the sidewalk he did not know which way to turn, and when he got his bearings and headed east he had a bewildering sense of having been the loser in a financial transaction, although his intelligence told him that the reverse was true. He had lunch alone in an oyster-house and later paid a call on Morris Homestead, with whom he was opening an account. "I saw you at the station," said Morris Homestead. "You and Martha Downs and your boys. I had to leave my boy and hurry down here. No chance to stop for a chat. How is Martha? We haven't seen her." "She seemed well. Bright in spirits." "You can always count on that with Martha. And brighter than ever, now that a certain eminent physician has returned to town. No one has any illusions left about old Harry, but Martha has a few things to answer for too. Did she behave herself this summer? She was a neighbor of yours, wasn't she?" "It's a very quiet, unfashionable place. No high life." "Martha can supply it if it isn't there. I've always said about Martha that where there's so much smoke, there must be some fire, and I don't think Kingsland Rawson was the first to feel the, uh, glowing embers. I never trusted myself with her." "Is that so, Morris?" "Nothing you could put your finger on, but always that sly look, that double-entendre. Sometimes the double-entendre was put in such a way that I'd have a hard time remembering the innocent meaning. I don't know. One of these days Martha's going to go too far, and she'll find that things you say and do as a young woman aren't always very becoming in an older one. Her family aren't going to pick up after her forever." "I guess I hardly know her well enough to comment." "You don't, and you're fortunate. Now you take Alice Sterling. Do you know Alice Sterling? Cousin of Martha's? Cousin of mine, for that matter." "I've only heard of her. Never been introduced to her." "Alice is eccentric, we all know that. Drinks like a fish. Has some of the oddest birds for friends, that sponge off her in every way possible. And yet Alice through it all is a perfect lady, and she doesn't antagonize people as Martha does. Alice became a widow very young, and it wouldn't surprise me if she'd had a lover or two in her day. Out of loneliness, don't you know? Oh, nobody knows what goes on there, or what Alice really thinks. But everybody knows what Martha thinks. She says whatever comes into her head, cruel things, sometimes, and indiscreet when they're not cruel. I know I'd never trust Martha with any secret of mine, and poor old Harry had to take up with that woman in New York just to have someone to confide in, to talk to." "There was more to it than that, though, wasn't there, Morris?" "Well, of course I assume so. You mean the primrose path of dalliance. Yes. That, too. But poor old Harry was driven to it. Companionship that he never got from Martha, but could get from Mrs. What's-Her-Name in New York." "Oh, I thought Harry and Martha were very companionable." "If you got that impression you must have got it from Martha." "I did." "Not from Harry." "Harry never mentioned Martha to me." "Too much of a gentleman. He never mentioned her to me, either, but of course I could see for myself. Will you take a cigar, Locky?" "Yes, I'd enjoy a cigar, thank you." He took a cigar out of the proffered humidor, ran it across his upper lip. "Ah, this isn't one of your toofers." "Toofers?" "Two for a nickel." "Oh. Oh, no. Mr. Middleton keeps me supplied. I'll send you a box of them next month, if I may. Mr. Middleton gets a shipment of the leaf once a month, and these are made up to my special order. Hope you don't mind if the box has my name on it. Little personal touch, you know. Form of vanity, of course. Now then, down to business, Locky, eh?" "Down to business. Nichols Sugar. I want to buy some." "Nichols Sugar? Nichols Sugar. Oh, yes. Yes, I know of it. Let me see what we have on it." He reached for a little silver bell, but Abraham Lockwood stayed his hand. "I can tell you all about it. I've been studying it for quite some time. I meant to go into it last spring, but in the confusion of poor Harry's death I withdrew from trading, and that decision has cost me a nice potential profit in Nichols. Now I'm convinced that-." "Excuse me, Locky. Didn't the court rule against the Havemeyers last spring?" "Ah, you do know what's going on in sugar?" "I was naturally interested in the court decision that dissolved the sugar trust. A very important decision to all of us. How would you have stood to make money then?" "Nichols Sugar wasn't one of the companies in the trust, therefore not subject to the dissolution." "Disillusion would be a better word for it. These law courts have taken over the management of all industry and commerce in this country. Where are they going to stop, is the question." "Well, if I knew for sure I'd soon be a very rich man. As rich as you, Morris." "I'm not so sure that you're not this very minute," said Morris Homestead. "Between us, just between us, I didn't gain anything by poor old Harry's manipulations. I'm sure that you lost some, but so did I, Locky. Never let friendship mix with business. I came to his rescue two years ago when you turned him down." "When I turned him down? But I never did turn him down. I refused to go into one or two things with him, but I never turned him down for a loan, if that's what you mean. Did he tell you that I refused to come to his rescue?" "Yes he did, and I took your part. But then I lent him a fair sum. Friendship. He had no right to expect you to do anything for him on that basis, and I told him so. My position was different. I was his closest friend, his oldest friend. You'd only known him as a classmate in college, not as boys together and so on. Now it appears that he lied to me." "Yes, he lied to you, as he did to me and apparently to a great many others." "We were victimized. Poor old Harry. A very good business man until he turned to evil ways, and then he didn't know how to be a crook." "I came to the same conclusion, although in a roundabout way. No, I never refused Harry a loan. I would have, mind you, but he never asked me for one. Knew better, I guess." "But why did he tell me that particular lie?" "I think I know, Morris. He wanted to prove to you that old friends are best. He'd tried to get money from a new friend, me, but that new friend hadn't come through." "Yes, that's it, Locky. A devil, wasn't he? Diabolically clever, to no good purpose. A bullet in the brain." "Would you object to telling me how much you lent him?" Morris Homestead hesitated. "If you'll treat this as confidential - seventy-five thousand dollars." The impression Homestead had been giving was that he had lost a sizable chunk of the Homestead millions. "Seventy-five thousand," said Abraham Lockwood. "Well, that didn't hurt you much, did it?" "Not judged as a sum of money, no. Not in relation to what I have left. But I've never experienced a total loss before, Locky. When I've been the loser I could always salvage something. I hate to lose money, that's why I never lend money unsecured. Never. Except to Harry, I did. And he proved the wisdom of my lifelong rule. Lend money unsecured, say goodbye to it then and there, all of it." "You give away a lot of money." "We do our share. But when we give away, let's say fifty thousand dollars, we know what the money's to be used for. We take a good long time before we decide, and the beneficiaries have to prove to us that the money isn't going to be wasted. So in a sense we retain control of the money, even when it's an outright gift. But if a man came to me for fifty thousand dollars, partly secured, I would refuse him. Unsecured, partly secured, or full secured, I seldom lend money, because money you lend becomes money that you relinquish control of. The borrower can do what he pleases with your money. And you might find that you'd lent a man money to destroy you. A man could borrow $50,000 from you, then use that money to, say, buy control of a company you were interested in." "Has that ever happened to you?" "Oh. no. It never has, but it could. It never will if I can help it. Money is power, Locky. You know that. But it's power that can be turned against you, even your money, if you don't control it. We've given money to charity in the form of securities, many times, but we always retain the voting rights. How easy it would be for some trustee to vote my stock against my best interest, and regrettably how many trustees there are that would do just that." Abraham Lockwood was full of new admiration and respect for his old friend. It was a pleasant as well as a vaguely chilling surprise to discover that Morris Homestead thought about money; pleasant, because it put them on common ground; chilling, because in the thirty years he had known Morris Homestead, Abraham Lockwood might easily have antagonized Morris in some money matter, and they would not now be where they were, about to get together in a business venture, "You're a very shrewd man, Morris," said Abraham Lockwood. "I have nothing else to do." "Nothing else to do? Why, you're a sporting man, and an art collector. A philanthropist. All those things. A social leader." "There are twenty-four hours in a day, Locky. Some of the activities I'm best known for take only a matter of minutes of my time. But uppermost in my mind is always - I've never talked about this. Well, I've said this much, I might as well finish. Our money, the family money, I've never thought of as my own, only my own. It came to me from both sides of my family, you know. When I was thirty-seven years old a very considerable sum was concentrated in my care. My capital was doubled, and it was no mean sum before. Until then you would have been right to say that I didn't care much for business affairs. I had more than ample means, more than enough for a man of my tastes and my few extravagances. But then I came into a second large inheritance, and the money ceased to be what it bad been - the wherewithal to