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Clark's Field, a novel by Robert Herrick |
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Chapter 18 |
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_ CHAPTER XVIII There were many similar items added to the account during the next fortnight. It seemed that Mr. Ashly Crane had nothing better to do with his European vacation than to give Miss Clark and her companions a good time, or, as he intimated to Miss Comstock, "to get into closer touch with the company's ward." Naturally he was a godsend to the Comstock girls, for he could take them to places where without a man they could not go. There was a mild orgy of motoring, dining, and theater. Pussy Comstock, experienced campaigner that she was, made no objection to this junketing. A fixed principle with her was to let any man spend his money as freely as he was inclined to. Yet she skillfully so contrived that the young banker had few opportunities of solitary communion with his ward. At first Mr. Crane did not understand why the Glynn girl or one of the Paul sisters was always in the way, and then he comprehended the artful maneuver of the woman and resented it. One afternoon, when he had taken the party up the river, he announced bluntly after tea that he and Adelle were going out in a punt together. Leaving Miss Comstock and the three other girls to amuse themselves as they could, he stoutly pulled forth from the landing and around a bend in the river. Thereafter his efforts relaxed, and he had Adelle to himself for two long hours. And Adelle, reclining on the gaudy cushions under an enormous pink sunshade, was not unenticing. Her air of indolent taciturnity was almost provoking. Mr. Ashly Crane quite persuaded himself that he was really in love with the young heiress. Oddly enough he chose this opportunity to discuss with her her business affairs, which was the excuse he had tossed Miss Comstock for abstracting the ward from the rest of the party. He found that she knew almost nothing about the source of her fortune--that lean stretch of sandy acres known as Clark's Field. He related to her the outline of the story of the Field as it has been told in these pages. Adelle listened with a peculiarly blank expression on her pale face. She was in fact trying hard to recall certain distant images of her early life--memories that were neither pleasant nor painful, but very odd to her, so strange that she could not realize herself as having once been the little drudge in the rooming-house on Church Street, with the manager of the livery-stable as the star roomer. While the banker was relating the steps by which she had become an heiress, she was seeing the face of the liveryman and that of the probate judge, who had first taken an active part in her destiny and turned it into its present smooth course.... "So," Mr. Crane was saying, "the bank was finally able to make an arrangement by which the long deadlock was broken and Clark's Field could be sold--put on the market in small lots, you know. Owing to a very fortunate provision, you are the beneficiary of one half of the sales made by the Field Associates, as the corporation is called--whenever they dispose of any of it they pay us for you half the money!" (He neglected to state that this "fortunate provision" was due solely to the shrewdness and probity of Judge Orcutt; that if he and the trust company's president had had their way she would have been obliged to content herself with a much more modest income than she now enjoyed. But doubtless Mr. Crane felt that was irrelevant.) "So you see, little girl," he concluded, in a burst of unguarded enthusiasm, "we are piling up money for you while you are playing over here." As something seemed to be expected of her, Adelle remarked lamely,-- "That is very nice." "Yes," Mr. Crane continued with satisfaction. "You can congratulate yourself on having such good care of your property as we give it.... And let me tell you it didn't look promising at first. There were no end of legal snarls that had to be straightened out--in fact, if I hadn't urged it strongly on the old man I doubt if they would have taken hold of the thing at all!" "Oh," Adelle responded idly, "what was the trouble?" "Why, those other heirs--that Edward S. Clark and his children. If they had turned up we should have been in a pretty mess." "Oh!" "It would have upset everything." "Why?" He had just explained all this, but thinking that women never understood business matters until everything had been explained several times, and anxious to impress the girl with the benefits that she had derived from the guardian which the law had given her, also indirectly from himself, he patiently went all over the point again. "Why, your great-grandfather Clark had two sons, and when he died he left a will in which he gave both of his sons an undivided half interest in this land. But the elder son had disappeared--they could never find him." "Edward," observed the girl, remembering her uncle's frequent curses at the obstinate Edward. "Yes, I know. He went to Chicago and got lost." "Afterward he went to St. Louis, but beyond that no trace of him or his family can be found." "I suppose some day he will turn up when he hears that there's some money," Adelle remarked simply. The banker scowled. "Well, I hope not!... Edward isn't likely to now: he must be a young thing of eighty-seven by this time." "Well, his children, then." "They would have difficulty in proving their claim. You see there's been a judicial sale, ordered by the court, and every precaution taken.... No, there's no possibility of trouble in that quarter." "Then they won't get their money?" Adelle remarked, thinking how disappointed these hypothetical descendants of Edward Clark must be. "No," agreed the trust officer with a laugh. "They're too late for dinner." Adelle, who did not understand the mental jump of a figure of speech, stared at him blankly. "It's too bad," she observed placidly at last. "Yes, it is decidedly too bad for them," the banker repeated ironically. "But it's life." After this profound reflection they paddled idly for a few moments, and then the trust officer resumed, nearer to his theme. "So you see, Miss Clark, you're likely to be a pretty rich woman when you come of age. The old leases on the estate are running out, and as fast as they can the managers of the Clark's Field Associates sell at a good price or make a long lease at a high figure and everything helps to swell the estate, which we are investing safely for you in good stocks and bonds that are sure to increase in value before you will want to sell them." "How much money is there?" Adelle demanded unexpectedly. This was her opportunity to discover the size of her magic lamp. "I couldn't say off hand," the banker replied cautiously. "But enough to keep you from want, if you don't spend too much making jewelry." He added facetiously,--"You don't feel cramped for money, do you?" "No-o," the girl admitted dubiously. "But you can't always tell what you may want." "If you don't want much more than you do at present, you're safe," Mr. Crane stated guardedly. "That is, if nothing goes wrong--a panic, and that sort of thing." After a pause he said,-- "But you should have some one look after your property, invest it for you--a woman can't do that very well." "The bank does it, don't it?" "I mean after you are of age and have control of your own property." "Oh," the girl murmured vaguely, running her hand through the ripples of river water. "That's a good ways off!... I suppose I shall be married by that time, and he will look after it for me." She said this in a thoroughly matter-of-fact voice, but the banker almost jumped from his seat at the words. "You aren't thinking of getting married yet!" he exclaimed hastily. "I suppose I shall some day," she replied. "Of course you'll marry sometime," he said with relief; and ran on glibly,--"That is the natural thing. Every girl should get married early. But you must take good care, my dear girl, not to make a mistake. You might be very unhappy, you know. He might not treat you right." And with a sense of climax he exclaimed,--"He might lose all your money--ruin you!" "Yes, he might," Adelle agreed with composure. "They do that sometimes." She looked at him from her open gray eyes undisturbed by the prospect, as if, womanlike, she was aware of this unpleasant fate in danger of which she must always be. Mr. Ashly Crane knew that this was the point when his love-making should begin, but suddenly he felt that Adelle Clark was a very difficult person to make love to. "Perhaps you've been thinking of the man?" he opened clumsily. She shook her head thoughtfully. "No, I haven't." "But you could love some one?" "I suppose so," she answered in such a matter-of-fact tone that for the moment he was baffled. The present situation, he decided, was unfavorable for love-making, and searched desperately within for his next words. "I wonder what they look like," Adelle mused aloud. "Who look like--husbands?" "No, Edward's children--the other heirs," she explained. "Perhaps there aren't any," he snapped. And under his breath Mr. Ashly Crane consigned Edward S. Clark and all his offspring to perdition. _ |
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