The Lockwood Concern (21 page)

live as I liked to live. All that new money, that extra money, was a responsibility, and put together with the other money, the whole thing became responsibility, if you see what I mean. Until then, it was my fortune, that had come to me from my father. But when I inherited from my mother, the two fortunes becomes one, and all my responsibility. Not only did I stop thinking of it as wherewithal, money to pay my bills. But it was suddenly not my money at all. I was only the custodian of it. There were my children to think of. The very least I could do was take care that that money went to them intact. Stewardship, they call it in the Bible." He smiled. "The first thing I did, the first thing that happened to me, soon after I came into the second inheritance - I became stingy. All my life I'd been given, or bought, the best of everything. I'd been raised, as they say, in the lap of luxury. But overnight I became stingy, and that lasted for a couple of years. Although I was twice as rich as I'd ever been, I didn't buy a new suit of clothes, a new pair of boots, a new hat, for two years. I went over household bills with a fine-tooth comb. Why was our meat bill so high last month? When did we drink all that wine? That sort of thing. We'd always paid our bills quarterly, but for two years I paid them annually so that I'd have the benefit of that interest. For almost two years I gave no money to any new charity, only charities that I'd been contributing to and that my mother had contributed to in her lifetime. It wasn't that I didn't want to be thought an easy mark. It was just that I couldn't bear to spend money. "Then I began to see what the trouble was. I was afraid of that money. Afraid of money? No. Afraid of the responsibility. Afraid I would do something wrong or foolish. And then I realized that I had been doing something very foolish, if not exactly wrong. In my stingy period I had also been so timid that I hadn't been investing my income. One of my managers - I have several who managed various things for me - finally came to me and pleaded with me. Invest that cash, he said. Money that's not promptly reinvested is dead money. Dead. Dead. Dead, he kept repeating. And then he made me realize that instead of accepting my responsibility, I'd been shirking it. He proved to me that my timidity, my caution and stinginess, had cost me several hundred thousand dollars, at least. He knew what I'd been going through. A man named Leon Spruance, a very understanding fellow. 'Morris,' he said. He knows me well enough to call me by my first name. Worked for my father. 'Morris, it's time you did something constructive with this money.' And then he showed me that I not only had failed to make proper use of my income from my own point of view, but that I'd been retiring large sums of money from the general welfare of the country. That was some years after Cooke's failed, but greenbacks were still untrustworthy, and Spruance showed me that I was unpatriotic not to put my cash to work. Unpatriotic, and taking a risk with those greenbacks. Property, that was the thing. Property, not cash. Property, whether it was securities, real estate, mortgages. But property, not cash. "Ever since then I've known what I want to do, and more or less how to do it. Reinvest, reinvest. No risky speculations, but keep putting the money back to work. I wouldn't go into Nichols Sugar with you, Locky. I can afford not to speculate, but I know you're not satisfied with what you have, so you must take some chances. Right?" "Right." "When you have as much as you want, the goal you've set for yourself, I might be able to let you in on some less speculative things that come our way now and then. But I think I'm correct in assuming that you haven't quite reached your goal. What is it? Five million?" "A bull's eye," said Abraham Lockwood. His goal until that moment had been three million, but he was in a mood to flatter Morris Homestead. "Meanwhile we'll be overjoyed to have you as a client. I always hoped you'd come with us some day," said Morris Homestead. "I'm going to make sure to send you those cigars." The promise of the cigars was as shocking as a slap in the face. There were so many large and small things Morris Homestead could have offered Abraham Lockwood: a partnership in the Homestead firm, an invitation to join the Philadelphia Club, an invitation to his house for a weekend - all sorts of things. A box of cigars was exactly the present that Abraham Lockwood sent to the Swedish Haven police chief at Christmas. But on the way home the sting went out of the slap; Morris Homestead was Morris Homestead, and the bestowal of his confidences regarding money was, for Morris a high compliment; the box of cigars belonged in another context; and as for the partnership or the club membership or the weekend invitation, they would never be forthcoming, and. now Abraham Lockwood knew it. The knowledge had an oddly satisfactory effect; it more firmly fixed his base in Swedish Haven. He was no longer a young man, and quite by accident he had been shown where he belonged for the rest of his life. He had reached the point of unprecedented intimacy with Morris Homestead, and he soon understood that Morris never would have guessed that his friend Locky was waiting to be asked to become a part of the Philadelphia life. Abraham Lockwood never ceased to wonder at the thinking and even the feeling that he believed to be his own, only to be duplicated by Morris Homestead's thinking and feeling. Morris Homestead's Concern was a protective position over what he already had, while Abraham Lockwood recognized his Concern for an acquisitive enterprise; nevertheless in both cases there was this desire for money for more than its own sake. Abraham Lockwood could see, as at a distance but now at least faintly discernible, the established dynasty, the sons of George and Penrose who would possess the same feelings of responsibility and noblesse oblige that governed the actions of Morris Homestead. Abraham Lockwood could even look back upon himself from the vantage point of the second generation to come, and see himself recognized as the major architect and builder of the dynasty. (At least they would so recognize him if they had any sense.) What was now his Concern would be an accomplished fact two generations hence. Of that he was certain, although ten years earlier he had been less confident that the scheme could be accomplished in such a comparatively short time. The change toward optimism was a result of several developments; the world in general was moving faster than ever before; and as he contrasted himself with his father there was already progress at so rapid a rate that it was very nearly incredible. In sum, the Lockwoods in three or four generations would have achieved the position that the Homesteads had reached in more than two centuries. Once again Abraham Lockwood saw the inevitability of his remaining in Swedish Haven. Several times he had been tempted by Philadelphia - or, more accurately, had weakened in his determination to remain in Swedish Haven. But some circumstance had always taken him back. A box of cigars, a grasping woman - these had redirected him homeward now. A small gesture of generosity became a kindly banishment, the demands of an exciting but expensive mistress had been a momentary threat to his fortune and thus to the welfare of the Concern, and he had retreated to Swedish Haven before the last syllable of "a million dollars" was out of her mouth. When the cigars arrived Abraham Lockwood wrote a carefully courteous note of thanks, then, in a rare moment of ironic humor, gave the cigars to Schissler, the night constable. Morris Homestead was something of a constable, in his way.

"We don't see much of you these days," said Morris Homestead. "No, Morris," said Martha Downs. "And I know you count the hours from one time to the next." "Well, no, hardly that," said Morris Homestead. "But you do seem to have disappeared." "I'm still in mourning," she said. "It's only seven months since Harry died. I've got five months to go." "Of course. You don't consider this a party?" "I consider it a bloody bore. Don't you? You must, or you wouldn't be driven to small talk with me." "Well, it isn't intended to entertain us. It's for the young people." "And it's a bloody bore. It is for you, and it is for me. Awkward, silly little girls. Pimply, ungainly boys. Except for that Lockwood boy. You know him, of course. Abraham Lockwood's son. The most interesting boy here, and the only new blood." "Why is he so interesting?" he said. "He's on the verge of handsome, but interesting? Why?" "Why is anybody interesting? He's different. He's good looking. He dances well." "You haven't proved your point." "I know. I'm just talking as a woman, looking at the new crop. You men do that. Perhaps you don't, Morris, but most men look at the young girls. Well, I look at the boys, in exactly the same way, with exactly the same thing in mind." "And come to the conclusion that if you were thirty years younger you'd set your cap for George Lockwood?" "My cap. My nightcap." "Very amusing, Martha. Luckily the boy is safe." "Yes, from me. But not from those daughters and nieces and cousins of ours. He isn't safe from them, yet." "Why not?" "Because he's still young enough to be unspoiled. To do a nice thing on an impulse. Instinctively. And without counting on any reward. What he did for my Sterling." "What did he do for your Sterling?" "Hasn't his father boasted about it to you? I'd have thought Locky would have told you all about it." "You don't like Locky?" "I don't dislike Locky, but I know what he is, and so do you." "Well - I suppose I do. But I've always liked Locky. What about the son?" "As soon as he heard about Harry, he asked Sterling to be his roommate at St. Bartholomew's this year. The other boys may have wanted to be nice to Sterling, but George Lockwood was the one who did something." "I hadn't known that. It's very difficult for boys to be nice to each other. They think it's a sign of weakness." "Of course they do. But George Lockwood was a little bit better than that. And it wasn't because Sterling was one of his best friends. Sterling as a matter of fact had been stand-offish toward George. But he was so touched that when he told me about it he cried. The one boy that he'd least expected to be nice to him. George Lockwood." "I had no idea," said Morris Homestead. "I also didn't know that it would matter so much to you." "No, you didn't. I believe that. You've always known all about me, haven't you, Morris? What do you do when you find that people refuse to be pigeonholed." "I don't know, Martha. What do you do?"

"That's a fine boy you have, Locky," said Morris Homestead. The men were having cigars and a moment of male privacy at the St. Bartholomew's commencement. "Thank you, Morris. He is a good boy. I have high hopes for him." "I know you'll want to see him a Zeta Psi, but I hope you don't mind if we try to pledge him." "Thank you, Morris. But he's not going to be a Zeta Psi or St. Anthony either." "What have you got against fraternities? I've always thought you were a very loyal, Zete." "I have nothing against them. But George is going to Princeton." "To Princeton? By his choice, or yours?" "Mine, originally, but now he wants to go there, too. Penn is inbred, Morris." "I don't see how you can say that. You went there knowing nobody, and you made Zeta Psi and The Ruffes." "I made Zeta Psi because they thought I was one of the other Lockwoods. I never denied it. I let them go on thinking it." Morris Homestead laughed. "No. They let you go on thinking they were thinking it. We always knew you weren't one of those other Lockwoods. So Zeta Psi must have known it too." "Are you sure? All these years?" "I'm sure about us, and I'm almost sure about Zeta Psi. With us it was the first question that came up. 'Is he one of those Lockwoods?' All we had to do was to inquire, and we found out that - well, we found out too much, I guess." "About my father?" "Yes." "You've known that all these years and never mentioned it to me?" "Well, I shouldn't be mentioning it now, and I wouldn't if you hadn't first. I have never repeated anything that was said in The Hall." "Zeta Psi took me in spite of that. I'm very touched." "So did The Ruffes." "Did all the Ruffes know about my father?" "Some of them did. Those that belonged to St. Anthony certainly did, and I imagine those that belonged to Zeta Psi. Does this change your wanting to send your boy to Princeton?" "It would have, but it's too late now. The boy wants to go to Princeton and not to Penn." "You never quite understood some things, Locky. Shall I speak frankly?" "I wish you would. We have been." "Then I shall. Some years ago I made a few very tentative inquiries about putting you up for the Philadelphia Club. I wasn't very hopeful, but I thought you might like to be a member there. Well, the answer was no, so I never mentioned it to you." "Morris, will my boy make it?" Morris Homestead spoke gently. "No, Locky, he won't. You can spare him that, at least. I'd be very glad to help him elsewhere, but if he ever mentions the Philadelphia Club, discourage him. Memories are too long. When he has a son, the son will stand a good chance. The old-timers will be dead and gone, but some of the same men that don't want you will still be around to oppose your son." "You all knew about my father, all these years." "Yes. It's so easy, you know, Locky. We know all about each other, so that when someone like you comes along our curiosity is aroused and in a very short time we pool our information. I'm sure the same thing happens in Swedish Haven and Gibbsville." "Indeed it does. Well, thank you, Morris. I don't think I ever had any illusions about myself, but I could have embarrassed George." "I'm very fond of the boy, Locky, and I wouldn't want to see him embittered over a thing like that. Too many good qualities." "How do you know about his good qualities, Morris?" "Well, I could say that I've seen him take all these prizes here today. And I've noticed that he has good manners. Nice-looking. But best of all I like what he did for Sterling Downs." "You astonish me, the things you know. Where did you ever hear that?" "Oh, Philadelphia gossip isn't always mean, Locky." "But Sterling Downs will get in the Philadelphia Club, won't he? His father was a crook, a liar, and had a mistress in New York. My father - well, I guess I see it." "Harry was a bad egg, but that's the way he turned out. That isn't the way he was born. If your father had been one of those other Lockwoods, we wouldn't be having this conversation. You do see that, don't you?" Yes." "Furthermore, a lot of us liked Harry, and I was one of them. We don't like what he did, but we still like him. That's one of the nice things about Philadelphia. Some day your grandsons will benefit by that. Make haste slowly, Locky." "Why did you say that?" "Because you're right. We are inbred, and George or at least his son may furnish us some new blood." "That is not what I have in mind for him, Morris." "How interesting. Would you care to tell me more?" "No." "But there is a lot more. I feel sure of that." "Indeed there is, my friend. Indeed there is." "Well, good for you, Locky. Good for you." It was as though all of Abraham Lockwood's plans were laid out on the lawn before them, the whole Concern exposed to view, and Morris Homestead was too much of a gentleman to steal a look. "Adelaide is looking well," said Morris Homestead. "She must be very proud of George, too." "Yes, she is looking well." "Can't say the same for Martha, but then Adelaide's life and Martha's don't bear comparison." "No, I guess not." Morris Homestead smiled. "I should hope not. Martha's getting a little old for that sort of thing." "What sort of thing?" "She has an affinity, and everybody knows who it is but nobody will come right out and say it." "Then how do they know?" "That's the great mystery, how those things become known. My own theory is the way they sit together, and the way they avoid each other. An irregularity in conduct would cause talk, of course. Martha and her affinity would never go away together - on the same train, that is. But I've watched these two. At a party he'll never sit with her first, always with others first. Then when he does finally sit with her they're much too formal for two people that have known each other all their lives. When they're alone together at a party they seem to have nothing to talk about, but they have to sit together for a little while, because not to would be too obvious, too." "I wouldn't know what to talk about with Martha." "But you'd find something, and in any event I'd expect you to have to make conversation with Martha. Not so with those two, who've known each other for over forty years." "How are her finances?" "Why did you ask that? You've touched on the very thing." "Just curious. Why?" "Well, Martha's finances took a sudden upturn. That's how I happened to know about her and her affinity. It corroborated my other evidence, my observations. But I also happen to know that Martha has all the money she needs to meet her expenses." "How much, for instance?" "Well, I can only guess, but on her present scale of living, she must spend close to a thousand a month." "Would the gentleman give her, say, a large settlement? Securities? "Twelve thousand a year is two hundred thousand at six percent. Would he settle that much on her? Two hundred thousand?" "He could. I don't know that he has. In our small world it might be wise to, instead of paying her by the quarter or semi-annually. A good-sized settlement, a quarter of a million, would be better than having to pay her bills several times a year. No use reminding people to be suspicious." "What if she took that money and then told her affinity to go to hell?" "Oh, never! He can do that to her, but she wouldn't dare do it to him. No one would ever speak to her if she did that. She'd have to move away, to New York. Harry was a crook, but we were and still are fond of him. But for Martha to do a thing like that would be unthinkable. Unthinkable. Not very practical, either." "Oh, I don't know," said Abraham Lockwood. "The bird in the hand? No, Locky. There may be more than two birds in that bush. What I'm implying is that she may stand to get more than twice two hundred thousand, eventually." "He couldn't just put it in his will." "Nothing as broad as that. But if the happy relationship continues, from year to year he can quietly take care of her." "It's a doctor, you told me." "Yes, but all his money didn't come from healing sick people. Oh, you'd recognize the name. If you gave a little thought to it you could probably guess." "Isaac Wickersham." "What a beautiful spring day. True, it's almost summer." "And I hit the nail on the head, first try." "Beautiful spring day." "Oh, of course. Dr. Wickersham belongs to St. Anthony." "Finished your cigar, Locky? We'd better be getting back to the women." "All right, let's get back to the women. So that's who it is? I've been introduced to that old fart at least once a year for the last thirty. I used to think he was a Doctor of Divinity, he looked at me so disapprovingly." "He's not so very old, Dr. Wickersham. Sixty. And they all live forever, that family. His father's still alive, which disproves the old wives' tale that port wine shortens your life. Comforting thought." "A good screw never hurt a man, either." "Why limit it to men? Well, here comes a man that could have had better luck. Arthur Francis Ferris. Wonder if he ever buggered any of our boys." "You come out with the damnedest things." "I know. It's being away, I guess. That, and feeling more at ease with you." "You at ease with me? I was always the one that was ill at ease with you." "I know. Isn't it a pity? Hello, there, Arthur. Very good show you put on today." "Thank you, Morris. Good afternoon, Mr. Lockwood." "Good afternoon, Father Ferris. Guess this place will seem very quiet and empty tomorrow." "Ah, yes. But September will soon be around, and we have Penrose with us then. I hope he does as well as George. Quite a mark to shoot at." "Don't expect too much of Penrose." "I gather Penrose is more like my offspring," said Morris Homestead. "Your boy wouldn't have given us any trouble if he'd been a little less like his father and a little more like his mother." "That's the kind of thing you think fathers like to hear, Arthur. The fact of the matter is that I was always a very conscientious student, all through school and college, and you can go to hell." "Have a little respect for my cloth, Morris. And besides, Mr. Lockwood may not understand." "I delight in taking you down a few pegs, old boy. You're so confounded deistic, if that's the word I mean." "It isn't. Proving what a conscientious student you were." "Well, you're a dear old thing, and I wouldn't have your job for ten million dollars." "Let's not speak of money, Morris. I'm saving that topic for luncheon, which is almost ready, by the way. I see you gentlemen have already had your cigars." "Yes, we know only too well what were going to get for lunch. Chicken in library paste as usual, I suppose. Vary the menu next year, Arthur, and you may find us more generous." "Be more generous, and I'll vary the menu," said Arthur Francis Ferris. "And now, Morris, run along, will you please? I'd like to have a word with Mr. Lockwood." "Well, what's he done that the Rector has to take him aside?" Morris Homestead, genuinely mystified, left them. "I thought I ought to speak to you beforehand, Mr. Lockwood. The fact is - your wife and Mrs. Downs have had words. My sister, Mrs. Haddon, is acting as hostess today, and she was there for part of it. Took place upstairs in the Rectory. Constance wouldn't tell me what was said, but apparently it was rather unpleasant. A rather unpleasant exchange, in fact. I'm telling you this now because I wanted you to understand why we've changed your places at table. George and Sterling Downs and their two families were scheduled to sit next door to each other, but we've separated you. I'm very sorry this had to happen today of all days, but I gather from what my sister told me that whatever the cause, it's been coming to a head for some time. So I thought it best to forewarn you. The boys are going to expect to be seated near each other, but you'll know why we've changed that." "Very unfortunate," said Abraham Lockwood.