Page:Harper's New Monthly Magazine - v109.djvu/208

192 everybody who ever worked for him, even after he's dead?"

"Well, that's Bowers, you know. He's like the turtle: when he once takes hold he 'never turns loose 'til it thunders,'—and Bowers is deaf to thunder. In the first place, he never forgave Boltwood for whatever it was they quarrelled about—"

"What was it?"

"Nobody has ever told. Probably something personal. They were life-long friends, you know. And then Boltwood added gall to the vinegar when he went straight to Chicago, as soon as ever the partnership business here was settled, and organized a competitive company. Old Boltwood was a fighter, too. By George! what a combination those two men would have made if they hadn't quarrelled! As it was, they fought, tooth and toe-nail, for ten years."

"But where does Mr. Welles come in?"

"He didn't come in much until Mr. Boltwood's death. I guess the old man depended upon him more or less for several years, though he's not been with them very long—not as long as I have with Mr. Bowers, by the way. Boltwood was a good deal like Bowers in one respect: as long as he lived he was the whole thing. So nobody heard much about Welles until the head of the firm died, a few months ago, when it was found that he had arranged to have Welles made manager of the business. It was a big step for him."

"Well, I think it's perfectly shameful!" Indignation snapped in Mrs. Jordan's eyes. "Why don't you go and work for the Boltwoods, too? Here is Mr. Welles, manager after just a little while, and here you are, not even a member of the firm, after slaving all your life for that evil-tempered old man. Ellery, I wouldn't endure it. Just see what other men do for their old employees!"

"Yes, Boltwood died," dryly responded her husband.

"Oh, well,—of course,—I didn't mean that exactly, but Mr. Bowers ought to do something for you. Would Mr. Welles give you a position if you asked him?"

"He might. Welles and I are old friends, but I don't want—"

"Oh, Ellery, listen! Why don't you get Mr. Welles to make you an offer, and then tell Mr. Bowers that unless he lets you have an interest in the firm you'll go to the Boltwoods?"

"He'd tell me to go and be eternally condemned! Why, Louise, when Welles took the management of that business he found that the Bowers company held certain patents that were very important to the Boltwood people. We don't use them, and they need them badly. He wrote a very civil letter to Bowers, asking for a conference on those and some other matters. Bowers refused to read the letter and refused to answer it, and when King and Jeffry and other members of the firm insisted that some reply must be made, all he would permit was a curt statement, in the third person, that the Bowers Manufacturing Company refused to consider, now or at any future time, any proposition made by George H. Boltwood and Company."

"Old tyrant! I don't care if it does make him cross; I'm glad the Welleses are coming to dinner to-night! It 'll do him good to be put where he'll have to be civil to some of the Boltwood connection. He would, wouldn't he, at our table?"

"Oh yes, I think so—if he couldn't get away. One of his redeeming traits is that whatever he may do or say among men, he is very courteous to women. That wouldn't prevent his firing me bright and early the next morning, however."

"Who cares?" Mrs. Jordan tossed her head in reckless defiance. "Mr. Welles would snap you up and be glad of the chance. Oh!" The reclouding of her husband's face brought a responsive shadow into hers, and a correspondingly swift change of mood ensued. "I forgot, dear! This dinner was to be the beginning of your campaign for a partnership, wasn't it?"

"Oh, well, never mind." Jordan's tone was weary. "That's all off now. Did you get your plates?"

"I will mind! Even if Mr. Bowers is an unappreciative old pachyderm, if you want a partnership with him you ought to have it. I've mixed things all up, but there must be some way out. Let's think."

Evidently inspiration did not wait upon reflection, for after a moment she broke