Page:Man's Country (1923).pdf/341

 board, and Jason Weems would announce that he voted for the election of these names 43,625 shares. The rest was mere form. George Judson's automobile works would be gone.

"You take the chair, Chilton!" said President Judson, and arose and went out, not into his executive office, but into the private office.

The formal examination of proxies would take a few minutes longer; the reading of the annual report would take half an hour. For that few minutes and that half-hour George would still be president, and he wanted to be alone to reflect.

His private office was in the corner of the administration ell, and its windows afforded a sweeping view of the main plant. He was surprisingly calm. He stood biting his lip and gazing out the window upon the whole wide area of the shops, then slanting his eyes down to the busy come and go of traffic through the gates quite as he had seven years ago when the works had stopped so suddenly and the men had come streaming out with wonder or despair or sullen hate written on their features.

He had been sick with disappointment with himself then. Today his reflections were far more bitter. Then the business was in danger. Now it was himself. True, he was a rich man. There were somewhere between twelve and twenty millions of value in this property today,