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The Moneychangers

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He went at once to Hegan's office, in the building of one of the
great insurance companies downtown. He made his way through
corridors of marble to a gate of massively ornamented bronze, behind
which stood a huge guardian in uniform, also massively ornamented.
Montague generally passed for a big man, but this personage made him
feel like an office-boy.

"Is Mr. Hegan in?" he asked.

"Do you call by appointment?" was the response.

"Not precisely," said Montague, producing a card. "Will you kindly
send this to Mr. Hegan?"

"Do you know Mr. Hegan personally?" the man demanded.

"I do," Montague answered.

The other had made no sign, as far as Montague could make out, but
at this moment a dapper young secretary made his appearance from the
doors behind the gate. "Would you kindly state the business upon
which you wish to see Mr. Hegan?" he said.

"I wish to see Mr. Hegan personally," Montague answered, with just a
trifle of asperity, "If you will kindly take in this card, it will
be sufficient."

He submitted with what grace he could to a swift inspection at the
secretary's hands, wondering, in the meantime, if his new spring
overcoat was sufficiently up-to-date to entitle him, in the
secretary's judgment, to be a friend of the great man within.
Finally the man disappeared with the card, and half a minute later
came back, smiling effusively. He ushered Montague into a huge
office with leather-cushioned chairs large enough to hold several
people each, and too large for any one person to be comfortable in.
There was a map of the continent upon the wall, across which Jim
Hegan's railroads stretched like scarlet ribbons. There were also
heads of bison and reindeer, which Hegan had shot himself.

Montague had to wait only a minute or two, and then he was escorted
through a chain of rooms, and came at last to the magnate's inner
sanctum. This was plain, with an elaborate and studied plainness,
and Jim Hegan sat in front of a flat mahogany desk which had not a
scrap of paper anywhere upon it.

He rose as the other came in, stretching out his huge form. "How do
you do, Mr. Montague?" he said, and shook hands. Then he sat down in
his chair, and settled back until his head rested on the back, and
bent his great beetling brows, and gazed at his visitor.

The last time that Montague had met Hegan they had talked about
horses, and about old days in Texas; but Montague was wise enough to
realise that this had been in the evening. "I have come on a matter
of business, Mr. Hegan," he said. "So I will be as brief as
possible."

"A course of action which I do my best to pardon," was the smiling
reply.

"I want to propose to you to interest yourself in the affairs of the
Northern Mississippi Railroad," said the other.

"The Northern Mississippi?" said Hegan, knitting his brows. "I have
never heard of it."

"I don't imagine that many people have," the other answered, and
went on to tell the story of the line.

"I have five hundred shares of the stock myself," he said, "but it
has been in my family for a long time, and I am perfectly satisfied
to let it stay there. I am not making this proposition on my own
account, but for a client who has a block of five thousand shares. I
have here the annual reports of the road for several years, and some
other information about its condition. My idea was that you might
care to take the road, and make the proposed extension to the works
of the Mississippi Steel Company."

"Mississippi Steel!" exclaimed Hegan. He had evidently heard of
that.

"How long ago did you say it was that this plan was looked into?" he
asked. And Montague told him the story of the survey, and what he
himself had heard about it.

"That sounds curious," said Hegan, and bent his brows, evidently in
deep thought. "I will look into the matter," he said, finally. "I
have no plans of my own that would take me into that neighbourhood,
but it may be possible that I can think of someone who would be
interested. Have you any idea what your client wants for the
thousand shares?"

"My client has put the matter into my hands," he answered. "The
matter was only broached to me this morning, and I shall have to
look further into the condition of the road. I should advise her to
accept a fair offer--say seventy-five per cent of the par value of
the stock."

"We can talk about that later," said Hegan, "if I can find the man
for you." And Montague shook hands with him and left.

He stopped in on his way home in the evening to tell Lucy about the
result of his interview. "We shall hear from him soon," he said. "I
don't imagine that Hegan is a man who takes long to make up his
mind."

"My prayers will be with him," said Lucy, with a laugh. Then she
added, "I suppose I shall see you Friday night at Mr. Harvey's."

"I shan't come out until Saturday afternoon," said he. "I am very
busy these days, working on a case. But I try to find time to get
down to Siegfried Harvey's; I seem to get along with him."

"They tell me he goes in for horses," said Lucy.

"He has a splendid stable," he answered.

"It was good of Ollie to bring him round," said she. "I have
certainly jumped into the midst of things. What do you think I'm
going to do to-morrow?"

"I have no idea," he said.

"I have been invited to see Mr. Waterman's art gallery."

"Dan Waterman's!" he exclaimed. "How did that happen?"

"Mrs. Alden's brother asked me. He knows him, and got me the
invitation. Wouldn't you like to go?"

"I shall be busy in court all day to-morrow," said Montague. "But
I'd like to see the collection. I understand it's a wonderful
affair,--the old man has spent all his spare time at it. You hear
fabulous estimates of what it's cost him--four or five millions at
the least."

"But why in the world does he hide it in a studio way up the
Hudson?" cried Lucy.

The other shrugged his shoulders. "Just a whim," he said. "He didn't
collect it for other people's pleasure."

"Well, so long as he lets me see it, I can't complain," said Lucy.
"There are so many things to see in this city, I am sure I shall be
busy for a year."

"You will get tired before you have seen half of them," he answered.
"Everybody does."

"Do you know Mr. Waterman?" she asked.

"I have never met him," he said. "I have seen him a couple of
times." And Montague went on to tell her of the occasion in the
Millonaires' Club, when he had seen the Croesus of Wall Street
surrounded by an attending throng of "little millionaires."

"I hope I shan't meet him," said Lucy. "I know I should be
frightened to death."

"They say he can be charming when he wants to," replied Montague.
"The ladies are fond of him."

On Saturday afternoon, when Montague went down to Harvey's Long
Island home, his brother met him at the ferry.

"Allan," he began, immediately, "did you know that Lucy had come
down here with Stanley Ryder?"

"Heavens, no!" exclaimed Montague. "Is Ryder down here?"

"He got Harvey to invite him," Oliver replied. "And I know it was
for no reason in the world but to be with Lucy. He took her out in
his automobile."

Montague was dumfounded.

"She never hinted it to me," he said.

"By God!" exclaimed Oliver, "I wonder if that fellow is going after
Lucy!"

Montague stood for some time, lost in sombre thought. "I don't think
it will do him much good," he said. "Lucy knows too much."

"Lucy has never met a man like Stanley Ryder!" declared the other.
"He has spent all his life hunting women, and she is no match for
him at all."

"What do you know about him?" asked Montague.

"What don't I know about him!" exclaimed the other. "He was in love
with Betty Wyman once."

"Oh, my Lord!" exclaimed Montague.

"Yes," said Oliver, "and she told me all about it. He has as many
tricks as a conjurer. He has read a lot of New Thought stuff, and he
talks about his yearning soul, and every woman he meets is his
affinity. And then again, he is a free thinker, and he discourses
about liberty and the rights of women. He takes all the moralities
and shuffles them up, until you'd think the noblest role a woman
could play is that of a married man's mistress."

Montague could not forbear to smile. "I have known you to shuffle
the moralities now and then yourself, Ollie," he said.

"Yes, that's all right," replied the other. "But this is Lucy. And
somebody's got to talk to her about Stanley Ryder."

"I will do it," Montague answered.

He found Lucy in a cosy corner of the library when he came down to
dinner. She was full of all the wonderful things that she had seen
in Dan Waterman's art gallery. "And Allan," she exclaimed, "what do
you think, I met him!"

"You don't mean it!" said he.

"He was there the whole afternoon!" declared Lucy. "And he never did
a thing but be nice to me!"

"Then you didn't find him so terrible as you expected," said
Montague.

"He was perfectly charming," said Lucy. "He showed me his whole
collection and told me the history of the different paintings, and
stories about how he got them. I never had such an experience in my
life."

"He can be an interesting man when he chooses," Montague responded.

"He is marvellous!" said she. "You look at that lean figure, and the
wizened-up old hawk's face, with the white hair all round it, and
you'd think that he was in his dotage. But when he talks--I don't
wonder men obey him!"

"They obey him!" said Montague. "No mistake about that! There is not
a man in Wall Street who could live for twenty-four hours if old Dan
Waterman went after him in earnest."

"How in the world does he do it?" asked Lucy. "Is he so enormously
rich?"

"It is not the money he owns," said Montague; "it's what he
controls. He is master of the banks; and no man can take a step in
Wall Street without his knowing it if he wants to. And he can break
a man's credit; he can have all his loans called. He can swing the
market so as to break a man. And then, think of his power in
Washington! He uses the Treasury as if it were one of his branch
offices."

"It seems frightful," said Lucy. "And that old man--over eighty! I'm
glad that I met him, at any rate."

She paused, seeing Stanley Ryder in the doorway. He was evidently
looking for her. He took her in to dinner; and every now and then,
when Montague stole a glance at her, he saw that Ryder was
monopolising her attention.

After dinner they adjourned to the music-room, and Ryder played a
couple of Chopin's Nocturnes. He never took his eyes from Lucy's
face while he was playing. "I declare," remarked Betty Wyman in
Montague's hearing, "the way Stanley Ryder makes love at the piano
is positively indecent."

Montague dodged several invitations to play cards, and deliberately
placed himself at Lucy's side for the evening. And when at last
Stanley Ryder had gone away in disgust to the smoking-room, he
turned to her and said, "Lucy, you must let me speak to you about
this."

"I don't mind your speaking to me, Allan," she said; with a feeble
attempt at a smile,

"But you must pay attention to me," he protested. "You really don't
know the sort of man you are dealing with, or what people think
about him."

She sat in silence, biting her lip nervously, while Montague told
her, as plainly as he could, what Ryder's reputation was. All that
she could answer was, "He is such an interesting man!"

"There are many interesting men," said he, "but you will never meet
them if you get people talking about you like this."

Lucy clasped her hands together.

"Allan," she exclaimed, "I did my best to persuade him not to come
out here. And you are right. I will do what you say--I will have
nothing to do with him, honestly. You shall see! It's his own fault
that he came, and he can find somebody else to entertain him while
he's here."

"I wish that you would tell him plainly, Lucy," said Montague.
"Never mind if he gets angry. Make him understand you--once for
all."

"I will--I will!" she declared.

And Montague judged that she carried out her promise quickly, for
the rest of the evening Ryder gave to entertaining the company.
About midnight Montague chanced to look into the library, and he saw
the president of the Gotham Trust in the midst of a group which was
excitedly discussing divorce. "Marriage is a sin for which the
church refuses absolution!" he heard Stanley Ryder exclaiming.






CHAPTER III





A few days after these incidents, Montague was waiting for a friend
who was to come to dinner at his hotel. He was sitting in the lobby
reading a paper, and he noticed an elderly gentleman with a grey
goatee and rather florid complexion who passed down the corridor
before him. A minute or two later he happened to glance up, and he
caught this gentleman's eye.

The latter started, and a look of amazement came over his face. He
came forward, saying, "I beg pardon, but is not this Allan
Montague?"

"It is," said Montague, looking at him in perplexity.

"You don't remember me, do you?" said the other.

"I must confess that I do not," was the answer.

"I am Colonel Cole."

But Montague only knitted his brows in greater perplexity. "Colonel
Cole?" he repeated.

"You were too young to remember me," the other said. "I have been at
your house a dozen times. I was in your father's brigade."

"Indeed!" exclaimed Montague. "I beg your pardon."

"Don't mention it, don't mention it," said the other, taking a seat
beside him. "It was really extraordinary that I should recall you.
And how is your brother? Is he in New York?"

"He is," said Montague.

"And your mother? She is still living, I trust?"

"Oh, yes," said he. "She is in this hotel."

"It is really an extraordinary pleasure!" exclaimed the other. "I
did not think I knew a soul in New York."

"You are visiting here?" asked Montague.

"From the West," said the Colonel.

"It is curious how things follow out," he continued, after a pause.
"I was thinking about your father only this very day. I had a
proposal from someone who wanted to buy some stock that I have--in
the Northern Mississippi Railroad."

Montague gave a start. "You don't mean it!" he said.

"Yes," said the other. "Your father persuaded me to take some of the
stock, away back in the old days. And I have had it ever since. I
had forgotten all about it."

Montague smiled. "When you have disposed of yours," he said, "you
might refer your party to me. I know of some more that is for sale."

"I have no doubt," said the Colonel. "But I fancy it won't fetch
much now. I don't remember receiving any dividends."

There was a pause. "It is a curious coincidence," said the other.
"I, too, have been thinking about the railroad. My friend, Mrs.
Taylor, has just come up from New Orleans. She used to be Lucy
Dupree."

The Colonel strove to recall. "Dupree?" he said.

"Judge Dupree's daughter," said Montague. "His brother, John Dupree,
was the first president of the road."

"Oh, yes," said the Colonel. "Of course, of course! I remember the
Judge now. Your father told me he had taken quite a lot of the
stock."

"Yes, he was the prime mover in the enterprise."

"And who was that other gentleman?" said the Colonel, racking his
brains. "The one who used to be so much in his house, and was so
much interested in him--"

"You mean Mr. Lee Gordon?" said Montague.

"Yes, I think that was the name," the other replied.

"He was my father's cousin," said Montague. "He put so much money
into the road that the family has been poor ever since."

"It was an unfortunate venture," said the Colonel. "It is too bad
some of our big capitalists don't take it up and do something with
it."

"That was my idea," said Montague. "I have broached it to one."

"Indeed?" said the Colonel. "Possibly that is where my offer came
from. Who was it?"

"It was Jim Hegan," said Montague.

"Oh!" said the Colonel. "But of course," he added, "Hegan would do
his negotiating through an agent."

"Let me give you my card," said the Colonel, after a pause. "It is
possible that I may be able to interest someone in the matter
myself. I have friends who believe in the future of the South. How
many shares do you suppose you could get me, and what do you suppose
they would cost?"

Montague got out a pencil and paper, and proceeded to recall as well
as he could the location of the various holdings of Northern
Mississippi. He and his new acquaintance became quite engrossed in
the subject, and they talked it out from many points of view. By the
time that Montague's friend arrived, the Colonel was in possession
of all the facts, and he promised that he would write in a very few
days.

And then, after dinner, Montague went upstairs and joined his
mother. "I met an old friend of father's this evening," he said.

"Who was it?" she asked.

"Colonel Cole," he said, and Mrs. Montague looked blank.

"Colonel Cole?" she repeated.

"Yes, that was the name," said Montague. "Here is his card," and he
took it out. "Henry W. Cole, Seattle, Washington," it read.

"But I never heard of him," said Mrs. Montague.

"Never heard of him!" exclaimed Montague. "Why, he has been at the
house a dozen times, and he knew father and Cousin Lee and Judge
Dupree and everyone."

But Mrs. Montague only shook her head. "He may have been at the
house," she said, "but I am sure that I was never introduced to
him."

Montague thought that it was strange, but he would never have given
further thought to the matter, had it not been for something which
occurred the next morning. He went to the office rather early, on
account of important work which he had to get ready. He was the
first to arrive, and he found the scrub-woman who cleaned the office
just taking her departure.

It had never occurred to Montague before that such a person existed;
and he turned in some surprise when she spoke to him.

"I beg pardon, sir," she said. "But there is something I have to
tell you."

"What is it?" said he.

"There is someone trying to find out about you," said the woman.

"What do you mean?" he asked, in perplexity.

"Begging your pardon, sir," said the woman, "but there was a man
came here this morning, very early, and he offered me money, sir,
and he wanted me to save him all the papers that I took out of your
scrap basket, sir."

Montague caught his breath. "Papers out of my scrap basket!" he
gasped.

"Yes, sir," said the woman. "It is done now and then, sir,--we learn
of such things, you know. And we are poor women,--they don't pay us
very well. But you are a gentleman, sir, and I told him I would have
nothing to do with it."

"What sort of a looking man was he?" Montague demanded.

"He was a dark chap, sir," said the other, "a sort of Jew like. He
will maybe come back again."

Montague took out his purse and gave the woman a bill; and she
stammered her thanks and went off with her pail and broom.

He shut the door and went and sat down at his desk, and stared in
front of him, gasping, "My God!"

Then suddenly he struck his knee with an exclamation of rage. "I
told him everything that I knew! Everything! He hardly had to ask me
a question!"

But then again, wonder drowned every other emotion in him. "What in
the world can he have wanted to know? And who sent him? What can it
mean?"

He went back over his talk with the old gentleman from Seattle,
trying to recall exactly what he had told, and what use the other
could have made of the information. But he could not think very
steadily, for his mind kept jumping back to the thought of Jim
Hegan.

There could be but one explanation of all this. Jim Hegan had set
detectives upon him! Nobody else knew anything about the Northern
Mississippi Railroad, or wanted to know about it.

Jim Hegan! And Montague had met him socially at an entertainment--at
Mrs. de Graffenried's! He had met him as one gentleman meets
another, had shaken hands with him, had gone and talked with him
freely and frankly! And then Hegan had sent a detective to worm his
secrets from him, and had even tried to get at the contents of his
trash basket!

There was only one resort that Montague could think of, in a case so
perplexing. He sat down and wrote a note to his friend Major
Venable, at the Millionaires' Club, saying that he was coming there
to dinner, and would like to have the Major's company. And two or
three hours later, when sufficient time had elapsed for the Major to
have had his shave and his coffee and his morning newspaper, he rang
for a messenger and sent the note.

The Major's reply was prompt. He had no engagement, and his stores
of information and advice were at Montague's service. But his gout
was bad, and his temper atrocious, and Montague must be warned in
advance that his doctors permitted him neither mushrooms nor meat.

It always seemed to Montague that it could not be possible for a
human face to wear a brighter shade of purple than the Major's; yet
every time he met him, it seemed to him that the purple was a shade
brighter. And it spread farther with every step the Major took. He
growled and grumbled, and swore tremendous oaths under his breath,
and the way the headwaiter and all his assistants scurried about the
dining-room of the Club was a joy to the beholder.

Montague waited until the old gentleman had obtained his usual dry
Martini, and until he had solved the problem of satisfying his
appetite and his doctor. And then he told of his extraordinary
experience.

"I felt sure that you could explain it, if anybody could," said he.

"But what is there to explain?" asked the other. "It simply means
that Jim Hegan is interested in your railroad. What more could you
want?"

"But he sent a detective after me!" gasped Montague.

"But that's all right," said the Major. "It is done every day. There
are a half dozen big agencies that do nothing else. You are lucky if
he hasn't had your telephone tapped, and read your telegrams and
mail before you saw them."

Montague stared at him aghast. "A man like Jim Hegan!" he exclaimed.
"And to a friend."

"A friend?" said the Major. "Pshaw! A man doesn't do business with
friends. And, besides, Jim Hegan probably never knew anything about
it. He turned the whole matter over to some subordinate, and told
him to look it up, and he'll never give another thought to it until
the facts are laid upon his desk. Some one of his men set to work,
and he was a little clumsy about it--that's all."

"But why did he want to know about all my family affairs?"

"Why, he wanted to know how you were situated," said the other--"how
badly you wanted to sell the stock. So when he came to do business
with you, he'd have you where he wanted you, and he'd probably get
fifty per cent off the price because of it. You'll be lucky if he
doesn't have a few loans called on you at your bank."

The Major sat watching Montague, smiling at his naivete. "Where did
you say this road was?" he asked. "In Mississippi?"

"Yes," said Montague.

"I was wondering about it," said the other. "It is not likely that
it's Jim Hegan at all. I don't believe anybody could get him to take
an interest in Southern railroads. He has probably mentioned it to
someone else. What's your road good for, anyway?"

"We had a plan to extend it," said Montague.

"It would take but one or two millions to carry it to the main works
of the Mississippi Steel Company."

The Major gave a start. "The Mississippi Steel Company!" he
exclaimed.

"Yes," said Montague.

"Oh, my God!" cried the other.

"What is the matter?"

"Why in the world did you take a matter like that to Jim Hegan?"
demanded Major Venable.

"I took it to him because I knew him," said Montague.

"But one doesn't take things to people because one knows them," said
the Major. "One takes them to the right people. If Jim Hegan could
have his way, he would wipe the Mississippi Steel Company off the
map of the United States."

"What do you mean?"

"Don't you know," said the Major, "that Mississippi Steel is the
chief competitor of the Trust? And old Dan Waterman organised the
Steel Trust, and watches it all the time."

"But what's that got to do with Hegan?"

"Simply that Jim Hegan works with Waterman in everything."

Montague stared in dismay. "I see," he said.

"Of course!" said the Major. "My dear fellow, why don't you come to
me before you do things like that? You should have gone to the
Mississippi Steel people; and you should have gone quietly, and to
the men at the top. For all you can tell, you may have a really big
proposition that's been overlooked in the shuffle. What was that you
said about the survey?"

And Montague told in detail the story of the aborted plan for an
extension, and of his hunting trip, and what he had learned on it.

"Of course," said the Major, "you are in the heart of the thing
right now. The Steel people balked your plan."

"How do you mean?" asked the other.

"They bought up the survey. And they've probably controlled your
railroad ever since, and kept it down."

"But that's impossible! They've had nothing to do with it."

"Bah!" said the Major. "How could you know?"

"I know the president," said Montague. "He's an old friend of the
family's."

"Yes," was the reply. "But suppose they have a mortgage on his
business?"

"But why not buy the road and be done with it?" added Montague, in
perplexity.

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