Page:Barbour--Peggy in the rain.djvu/204

 feather the day I took up the paper and read that you'd started in to oust those Johnnies. I thought you'd forgotten all about it."

"No, but I funked it. Then—then something happened and I had to find something to do or—or jump into the river. Sb I did that. It was a good fight." Gordon smiled reminiscently. Then he sighed. "But it was easier than I thought it was going to be. Old Stimson disappointed me. He threw up his hands too early. As a matter of fact I suppose the Commerce Commission inquiry had them scared anyway."

"A good joke on them," chuckled Peter. "The Commission let us down darned easy, what?"

"Too easy by half. They ought to have made us sweat blood. The joke of it is that the Street still thinks the reorganization was a sop to the Government; that it was understood we were to make changes if the Commission would be lenient."

"That so? I say, Gordon, I'm not much of a business Johnnie, you know. What about these darned meetings? I got a notice last week of one. Do I have to trot back to New York?"

"No. Send in your proxy made out to me or Sewall. That'll do just as well."