A Friendless Millionaire

Taranaki Daily News, 19 July 1933, Page 11

A Friendless Millionaire

(By

H. Lawrence Phillips)

CHAPTER I.— (Continued.) I found time to ponder on n Jour i ney homewards about Mr . had heard and seen nothing ot him, and certainly it was a revel^° n to find him to be a large shareholder In the establishment which I ado ™ ed I had always supposed that, like my father, he was a professiona man of small means. began to think of him, »' married, or whrt Us .7”TXSd Not even his address; for I supposea that the Temple was hjs huslness place, and that he had, J house in the suburbs. * ™ th^£ op ®!j that he was not acquainted with my failure in Lombard Street. This led me to ‘consider my future. In my nervousness I going among strangers. S were indeed strangers in a sense to me; for my nervous inprevented my putting *° rt .h taeles of friendship, «nd blinded me to- those extended to m®, if ®uch there were. Custom and habit had me less uneasy In their oO P? p t n l’ the dally routine had enabled me to endure it; but -I was to go f strangers, and to meet with people I had never seen before. I was a P , Pa ß e ut It had to be- Saturday eame< and I said good-bye to the office. The rumour of my departure had 5 3 abroad, ©nd as my colleagues for years left, some called a. careless goodbye, some added their good wishes, and one man, senior in years, hut not in P'°« lti on in the office, even wrung my hand end wished me the best of luck. I fancy that, incompetent himself, he had a fellow-feeling which led to this act of friendship. And so they went their ways with no more thought of me, eo little naa my association with them wrought for good or ill. I put on my hat and coat and departed in my turn, f e ®h n ® aad as I passed out for the last time through the doors of -a place I naa ■every morning dreaded to enter, but from which, such is the force ot habit, I was reluctant to go. My farewell to my landlady was trying. I had packed my belongings (I had gathered qriite a small library, for reading had been a great resource in my solitude), and arranged for ■them to be sent on when I had obtained lodgings, and on the Monday morning settled accounts and said a somewhat husky goodbye. For answer, to my amazement, she flung her arms around my neck and kissed me, say-. Ing with tears rolling down her Mned, kindly face—’ “Good-bye, my dear, and sorry I am to say it. You’ve been more like a son than a lodger, and never grumbled, nor stayed out late, and paid your bills regular, I’ll -say that for you, and I shall miss you.” ' I escaped from her motherly embrace and hastened to the station and boarded the train which was to. take me to my new sphere of operations.

I found myself, •with tne manager, (hb whole of the staff of the office, and we were more than sufficient for the business to be transacted. But ■this did not diminish the sense of importance that filled my new chief to overflowing, and with which he desired me to be duly impressed. When by' chance a new customer was added to the scanty list he became almost unbearable as he grew loquacious on the subject of his business abilities, and contrasted them with my deficiencies. These were so many and so constantly appearing that I feared that I should suffer the fate of final discharge. and entered the office every day with the dread filling my heart that a letter might be awaiting me to that effect. I was the more miserable because I knew that the manager’s summing up was true. “You are as inefficient as they make, them, just a dreamy dawdler without an ounce of business capacity in your composition. You lack initiative absolutely, and do nothing to advance the business of the bank. The burden of it is all on my shoulders, and,' in addition, I have to keep a careful watch lest your blunders should undo all that I am trying to do in the interests of the firm.” I knew that it was all correct; I hadno business initiative or energy, and in my solitude I lived more and more among books, and dwelt in the realms of fancy to which they conducted me. As he had told me more than once, I wasn’t worth my pay, and the sooner* I left its employ the better for the bank.

I tried to think of some other way of gettiiig a living, but I had no one to advise me, and my habitual diffidence and nervousness prevented my striking out upon untrodden ways of life. I was getting to feel more and more a down-trodden worm, without even the proverbial capacity to turn in my constitution. The time was drawing near when, in accordance with rule, my chief would be sending in his annual report oh my work. Upon it depended the "rise” in salary which those better qualified than I obtained as a matter of course. My chief was rather glad of the opportunity it gave him of speaking his mind concerning myself: it ministered to his vanity, and by this time he was genuinely (and I don’t wonder at it) desirous of getting rid of me. “In all fairness to the directors and myself I must speak the truth, Norrlsh,” he said, as he sealed his letter, "and I am afraid if they pay attention to what I advise —and it is due to me that they should— you must be prepared, for the worst.” I made my way back to my dingy lodging and shut myself up in my "bed-sitting" room, too epent to seek for my usual consolations after a day's toll, a pipe and a book. What could I do? Go down to the river and drown myself, I thought; nobody would miss me, and I should be out of a world that was too hard for one constituted as I was. It seemed to be only that, or selling all my belongings, taking to the road, and looking for manual labour: for I was fairly strong and healthy at least. I got through the next few miserable days, dreading the worst. The manager was even more difficult to please, and giMed at

CHAPTER 11.

Astounding News.

more blundering than ever. At last the blow fell. One morning I found two letters awaiting me, which the manager handed to me with a grin on his face, for he had opened the office letler &nd knew what was contained In at least one of mine. I took them and scarcely heeded the second letter though a vague question flashed acres my mind as to the identity of my other correspondent. The letter from. head office I opened with trembling hands, and read: — “Dear Sir, —In view of my very unfavourable report received from i i Maxwell, the manager, and your general record of work, the directors request me to inform you of their desire to terminate your engagement witn them at the expiration of ,®ne month from date.—Yours truly, J. m. hidbard, General Manager.” I laid my head on my hands on my desk, and I think that Maxwell even was touched at the eight of my distress, for he put his hand on my shoulder and said in quite subdued tones—. "I am -beastly sorry for yon, Norrlsh, and hope that yoq won’t take it too much to heart. , I hope that your friends ” , , ~ "I have none,” I broke In, shaking his hand from my shoulder, “neither friends nor relatives, and soon neither food nor lodging.” “Oh! I say I” he began. “Don’t think that I blame you. I know that I am miserably inefficient, and I suppose I always-shall be. I must try and get a Job sweeping the roads.” “Oh! something will turn up, and in spite of all the past I will say the best I can for you if you like to give my name as a reference. My position would be a great help to you. Why don't you try school-mastering ?—you are fond of books and I should think It an easy job. But we can’t stop chatting here; it’s nearly time to open, and the ledgers have to be checked. Read your other letter, and then let me And out how many mistakes you have made,” and he turned away to his own work, and left me wondering as I read the contents of my second letter. "Dear Sir,” it ran, “we regret to inform you of the death of our respected client, Mr George Haytor, who died on the 16th instant. The funeral is on Saturday next, and it was his desire that you should attend, and later we will take the opportunity of having a conversation with you on matters of business. —Yours truly, Harrow and Gedge.” - In my wonder whs.t it all me&nt» I paid little heed to Maxwell as h« Indulged in his usual habit of pointing out the stupidity of my mistakes and cleverness in discovering them; and for a time it put out of my mind mj black and desolate future.

Maxwell readily, almost thankfully, rave me leave when I asked, merely remarking, "I thought you had no friends, and now you ask to go off to bury one.” “I didn’t say that he was my friend, only that the lawyers ask me to attend his funeral." “Ah well! I hope it means a fat legacy for you; you could do with it •now, I expect. I’ll try and prevent the business going to pieces during ‘four absence; you need not worry. So off I went, in a state of bemused epeculation as to what it all meant. I was fortunately punctual, and upon inquiry wag ushered into the private office of the principal, Mr Kedge. As I passed through the outer offices I fancied that I was the object of the close scrutiny and whispered comment of the staff—the business seemed a fairly large one judging from their numbers—-but told myself that this was only my nervous selfconsciousness at work. Mr Kedge, a middle-aged, cleanshaven man, rather spare in build, rose from his chair and greeted me cordially. , , . "Good-day, Mr Norrjsh; I am glad to make your acquaintance, but could have wished that we had met on a less dismal occasion.’,’ I returned his handshake, reddening in my usual stupid fashion, and dropping my hat in the process. “You wished to see me on business, I believe," I iiXfuired. “Yes. But that must wait until after the funeral; then, if you will return with me, we can talk things over. Come along to Mr Haytor's chambers; they are ready to start as soon as we get there, and I am glad that you have not kept us waiting." Reaching for his hat, ha hustled me out of the office, and we made our way to the Temple,-which was not far off. "Ah! they’ve got the coffin in and are waiting, I see. Good! We lose no time,” and I found myself deposited in a mourning coach, of which we were the only occupants. “Are there no other people coming but ourselves?” I asked. “Ourselves only—a duet, eh?" He began to chuckle, then checked himself and concealed his lapse by a cough. “If you hadn't come,” he went on, “it would have been a sold.” “Was Mr Haytor without any friends, then?” I inquired, my sympathy aroused. “Very few, if any. A most eccentric man, most eccentric. But I'll tell you all about that later on.”

Then we began talking on Indifferent subjects, and, unless I was greatly mistaken, he began pumping me, inquiring concerning my past and present prospects. He seemed very goodnatured and sympathetic, and I was tempted to tell him of my discharge from the bank, and to ask for his advice as to my future, but I refrained with my usual shyness. We reached the cemetery at last, and found ourselves conducted, with three or four other mourning parties, to ‘he chapel, where an overworked-looking clergyman read the first part of the servlcs at breakneck gabble; then we waited at the grave until he came rushing along from another part of the ground to read the final prayers. "Well, that's wejl over," said Mr Kedge, putting on his hat as soon as the parson had finished and flown off in. .finother direction tqp.a fefaVla,;

ceremony; “they seem to do things on t he wholesale scale here. Come along, we must get back ta the office; we have much to talk about. I’ve ordered a taxi to take us it will be quicker.”