________________________________________________
_ Coincident with these public disturbances and of subsequent hearing
upon them was the discovery by Editor Haguenin of Cowperwood's
relationship with Cecily. It came about not through Aileen, who
was no longer willing to fight Cowperwood in this matter, but
through Haguenin's lady society editor, who, hearing rumors in the
social world, springing from heaven knows where, and being beholden
to Haguenin for many favors, had carried the matter to him in a
very direct way. Haguenin, a man of insufficient worldliness in
spite of his journalistic profession, scarcely believed it.
Cowperwood was so suave, so commercial. He had heard many things
concerning him--his past--but Cowperwood's present state in Chicago
was such, it seemed to him, as to preclude petty affairs of this
kind. Still, the name of his daughter being involved, he took the
matter up with Cecily, who under pressure confessed. She made the
usual plea that she was of age, and that she wished to live her
own life--logic which she had gathered largely from Cowperwood's
attitude. Haguenin did nothing about it at first, thinking to
send Cecily off to an aunt in Nebraska; but, finding her intractable,
and fearing some counter-advice or reprisal on the part of Cowperwood,
who, by the way, had indorsed paper to the extent of one hundred
thousand dollars for him, he decided to discuss matters first.
It meant a cessation of relations and some inconvenient financial
readjustments; but it had to be. He was just on the point of
calling on Cowperwood when the latter, unaware as yet of the latest
development in regard to Cecily, and having some variation of his
council programme to discuss with Haguenin, asked him over the
'phone to lunch. Haguenin was much surprised, but in a way relieved.
"I am busy," he said, very heavily, "but cannot you come to the
office some time to-day? There is something I would like to see
you about."
Cowperwood, imagining that there was some editorial or local
political development on foot which might be of interest to him,
made an appointment for shortly after four. He drove to the
publisher's office in the Press Building, and was greeted by a
grave and almost despondent man.
"Mr. Cowperwood," began Haguenin, when the financier entered, smart
and trig, his usual air of genial sufficiency written all over
him, "I have known you now for something like fourteen years, and
during this time I have shown you nothing but courtesy and good
will. It is true that quite recently you have done me various
financial favors, but that was more due, I thought, to the sincere
friendship you bore me than to anything else. Quite accidentally
I have learned of the relationship that exists between you and my
daughter. I have recently spoken to her, and she admitted all
that I need to know. Common decency, it seems to me, might have
suggested to you that you leave my child out of the list of women
you have degraded. Since it has not, I merely wish to say to
you"--and Mr. Haguenin's face was very tense and white--"that the
relationship between you and me is ended. The one hundred thousand
dollars you have indorsed for me will be arranged for otherwise
as soon as possible, and I hope you will return to me the stock
of this paper that you hold as collateral. Another type of man,
Mr. Cowperwood, might attempt to make you suffer in another way.
I presume that you have no children of your own, or that if you
have you lack the parental instinct; otherwise you could not have
injured me in this fashion. I believe that you will live to see
that this policy does not pay in Chicago or anywhere else."
Haguenin turned slowly on his heel toward his desk. Cowperwood,
who had listened very patiently and very fixedly, without a tremor
of an eyelash, merely said: "There seems to be no common intellectual
ground, Mr. Haguenin, upon which you and I can meet in this matter.
You cannot understand my point of view. I could not possibly adopt
yours. However, as you wish it, the stock will be returned to
you upon receipt of my indorsements. I cannot say more than that."
He turned and walked unconcernedly out, thinking that it was too
bad to lose the support of so respectable a man, but also that he
could do without it. It was silly the way parents insisted on
their daughters being something that they did not wish to be.
Haguenin stood by his desk after Cowperwood had gone, wondering
where he should get one hundred thousand dollars quickly, and also
what he should do to make his daughter see the error of her ways.
It was an astonishing blow he had received, he thought, in the
house of a friend. It occurred to him that Walter Melville Hyssop,
who was succeeding mightily with his two papers, might come to his
rescue, and that later he could repay him when the Press was more
prosperous. He went out to his house in a quandary concerning
life and chance; while Cowperwood went to the Chicago Trust Company
to confer with Videra, and later out to his own home to consider
how he should equalize this loss. The state and fate of Cecily
Haguenin was not of so much importance as many other things on his
mind at this time.
Far more serious were his cogitations with regard to a liaison he
had recently ventured to establish with Mrs. Hosmer Hand, wife of
an eminent investor and financier. Hand was a solid, phlegmatic,
heavy-thinking person who had some years before lost his first
wife, to whom he had been eminently faithful. After that, for a
period of years he had been a lonely speculator, attending to his
vast affairs; but finally because of his enormous wealth, his
rather presentable appearance and social rank, he had been entrapped
by much social attention on the part of a Mrs. Jessie Drew Barrett
into marrying her daughter Caroline, a dashing skip of a girl who
was clever, incisive, calculating, and intensely gay. Since she
was socially ambitious, and without much heart, the thought of
Hand's millions, and how advantageous would be her situation in
case he should die, had enabled her to overlook quite easily his
heavy, unyouthful appearance and to see him in the light of a
lover. There was criticism, of course. Hand was considered a
victim, and Caroline and her mother designing minxes and cats; but
since the wealthy financier was truly ensnared it behooved friends
and future satellites to be courteous, and so they were. The
wedding was very well attended. Mrs. Hand began to give house-parties,
teas, musicales, and receptions on a lavish scale.
Cowperwood never met either her or her husband until he was well
launched on his street-car programme. Needing two hundred and
fifty thousand dollars in a hurry, and finding the Chicago Trust
Company, the Lake City Bank, and other institutions heavily loaded
with his securities, he turned in a moment of inspirational thought
to Hand. Cowperwood was always a great borrower. His paper was
out in large quantities. He introduced himself frequently to
powerful men in this way, taking long or short loans at high or
low rates of interest, as the case might be, and sometimes finding
some one whom he could work with or use. In the case of Hand,
though the latter was ostensibly of the enemies' camp--the
Schryhart-Union-Gas-Douglas-Trust-Company crowd--nevertheless
Cowperwood had no hesitation in going to him. He wished to overcome
or forestall any unfavorable impression. Though Hand, a solemn
man of shrewd but honest nature, had heard a number of unfavorable
rumors, he was inclined to be fair and think the best. Perhaps
Cowperwood was merely the victim of envious rivals.
When the latter first called on him at his office in the Rookery
Building, he was most cordial. "Come in, Mr. Cowperwood," he said.
"I have heard a great deal about you from one person and another
--mostly from the newspapers. What can I do for you?"
Cowperwood exhibited five hundred thousand dollars' worth of West
Chicago Street Railway stock. "I want to know if I can get two
hundred and fifty thousand dollars on those by to-morrow morning."
Hand, a placid man, looked at the securities peacefully. "What's
the matter with your own bank?" He was referring to the Chicago
Trust Company. "Can't it take care of them for you?"
"Loaded up with other things just now," smiled Cowperwood,
ingratiatingly.
"Well, if I can believe all the papers say, you're going to wreck
these roads or Chicago or yourself; but I don't live by the papers.
How long would you want it for?"
"Six months, perhaps. A year, if you choose."
Hand turned over the securities, eying their gold seals. "Five
hundred thousand dollars' worth of six per cent. West Chicago
preferred," he commented. "Are you earning six per cent.?"
"We're earning eight right now. You'll live to see the day when
these shares will sell at two hundred dollars and pay twelve per
cent. at that."
"And you've quadrupled the issue of the old company? Well, Chicago's
growing. Leave them here until to-morrow or bring them back.
Send over or call me, and I'll tell you."
They talked for a little while on street-railway and corporation
matters. Hand wanted to know something concerning West Chicago
land--a region adjoining Ravenswood. Cowperwood gave him his best
advice.
The next day he 'phoned, and the stocks, so Hand informed him,
were available. He would send a check over. So thus a tentative
friendship began, and it lasted until the relationship between
Cowperwood and Mrs. Hand was consummated and discovered.
In Caroline Barrett, as she occasionally preferred to sign herself,
Cowperwood encountered a woman who was as restless and fickle as
himself, but not so shrewd. Socially ambitious, she was anything
but socially conventional, and she did not care for Hand. Once
married, she had planned to repay herself in part by a very gay
existence. The affair between her and Cowperwood had begun at a
dinner at the magnificent residence of Hand on the North Shore
Drive overlooking the lake. Cowperwood had gone to talk over with
her husband various Chicago matters. Mrs. Hand was excited by his
risque reputation. A little woman in stature, with intensely white
teeth, red lips which she did not hesitate to rouge on occasion,
brown hair, and small brown eyes which had a gay, searching, defiant
twinkle in them, she did her best to be interesting, clever, witty,
and she was.
"I know Frank Cowperwood by reputation, anyhow," she exclaimed,
holding out a small, white, jeweled hand, the nails of which at
their juncture with the flesh were tinged with henna, and the palms
of which were slightly rouged. Her eyes blazed, and her teeth
gleamed. "One can scarcely read of anything else in the Chicago
papers."
Cowperwood returned his most winning beam. "I'm delighted to meet
you, Mrs. Hand. I have read of you, too. But I hope you don't
believe all the papers say about me."
"And if I did it wouldn't hurt you in my estimation. To do is to
be talked about in these days."
Cowperwood, because of his desire to employ the services of Hand,
was at his best. He kept the conversation within conventional
lines; but all the while he was exchanging secret, unobserved
smiles with Mrs. Hand, whom he realized at once had married Hand
for his money, and was bent, under a somewhat jealous espionage,
to have a good time anyhow. There is a kind of eagerness that
goes with those who are watched and wish to escape that gives them
a gay, electric awareness and sparkle in the presence of an
opportunity for release. Mrs. Hand had this. Cowperwood, a past
master in this matter of femininity, studied her hands, her hair,
her eyes, her smile. After some contemplation he decided, other
things being equal, that Mrs. Hand would do, and that he could be
interested if she were very much interested in him. Her telling
eyes and smiles, the heightened color of her cheeks indicated after
a time that she was.
Meeting him on the street one day not long after they had first
met, she told him that she was going for a visit to friends at
Oconomowoc, in Wisconsin.
"I don't suppose you ever get up that far north in summer, do you?"
she asked, with an air, and smiled.
"I never have," he replied; "but there's no telling what I might
do if I were bantered. I suppose you ride and canoe?"
"Oh yes; and play tennis and golf, too."
"But where would a mere idler like me stay?"
"Oh, there are several good hotels. There's never any trouble
about that. I suppose you ride yourself?"
"After a fashion," replied Cowperwood, who was an expert.
Witness then the casual encounter on horseback, early one Sunday
morning in the painted hills of Wisconsin, of Frank Algernon
Cowperwood and Caroline Hand. A jaunty, racing canter, side by
side; idle talk concerning people, scenery, conveniences; his usual
direct suggestions and love-making, and then, subsequently
The day of reckoning, if such it might be called, came later.
Caroline Hand was, perhaps, unduly reckless. She admired Cowperwood
greatly without really loving him. He found her interesting,
principally because she was young, debonair, sufficient--a new
type. They met in Chicago after a time instead of in Wisconsin,
then in Detroit (where she had friends), then in Rockford, where
a sister had gone to live. It was easy for him with his time and
means. Finally, Duane Kingsland, wholesale flour merchant,
religious, moral, conventional, who knew Cowperwood and his repute,
encountered Mrs. Hand and Cowperwood first near Oconomowoc one
summer's day, and later in Randolph Street, near Cowperwood's
bachelor rooms. Being the man that he was and knowing old Hand
well, he thought it was his duty to ask the latter if his wife
knew Cowperwood intimately. There was an explosion in the Hand
home. Mrs. Hand, when confronted by her husband, denied, of course,
that there was anything wrong between her and Cowperwood. Her
elderly husband, from a certain telltale excitement and resentment
in her manner, did not believe this. He thought once of confronting
Cowperwood; but, being heavy and practical, he finally decided to
sever all business relationships with him and fight him in other
ways. Mrs. Hand was watched very closely, and a suborned maid
discovered an old note she had written to Cowperwood. An attempt
to persuade her to leave for Europe--as old Butler had once
attempted to send Aileen years before--raised a storm of protest,
but she went. Hand, from being neutral if not friendly, became
quite the most dangerous and forceful of all Cowperwood's Chicago
enemies. He was a powerful man. His wrath was boundless. He
looked upon Cowperwood now as a dark and dangerous man--one of
whom Chicago would be well rid. _
Read next: chapter XXXII - A Supper Party
Read previous: chapter XXX - Obstacles
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