Sonnie-Boy's People Part 6

"You may not like it."

"Maybe not, but we may as well have it now, Andie."

"I was to tell you that after this work is done there's another job waiting you on the west coast, just as important, just as needful of your supervision, and no more reward to it than this."

"Whee-eu!" whistled Necker. "The steamer captain had him right."

"Then I'm afraid"--Welkie turned to Necker--"it's off between us."

"Don't say that yet. Wait till you hear. What are you working for?

Leaving the money end out of it, which I know you don't care for and never will care for, what are you getting? You want recognition? And prestige? Do you get them? Not a bit. Who really knows of this work? A few engineers who keep tabs on everything, yes. Who else? n.o.body. The government, for good reasons of their own, don't want it mentioned in the press. Why, it's hardly mentioned in the engineering journals."

"Even so. It will go down in the records that I did it."

"Will it? Look here. I've been waiting for that." From his inside coat-pocket Necker drew out several typewritten sheets. "Mind you, I didn't want to produce this, but I'm forced to. My first interests are my company's. There is a copy of the last official report on this work.

Read what that says. The credit is given, you see, to who? To you? No, no. Not a mention of you except as a civilian engineer who a.s.sisted."

"But how did you get hold of this?" Welkie held the papers, but without showing any inclination to read them.

"Does how I got hold of it matter?"

"That's right, it doesn't matter."

Welkie offered the papers to Balfe.

Balfe waved them back. "I saw the original of that report in Washington.

What Mr. Necker says is so."

"There!" Necker brought his fist down on the table. "The man of all others to bear me out." He stepped close to Balfe. "I couldn't place you for a while. Thanks for that."

"Don't hurry your credit slip," snapped Balfe, with his eyes on Welkie.

Welkie silently pa.s.sed the papers back to Necker.

"You believe me now, Mr. Welkie?"

"I don't know's I doubted you, Mr. Necker. It caught me just a mite below the belt, and I had to spar for wind."

"But it wasn't I who hit you below the belt, remember. Neither did I want to destroy your illusions, but I did want to show you the facts--the truth, not the glittering romance, of life. Now they're offering you another job. Will you, or somebody else, get the credit for that? You? No, sir! You'll get neither money nor reputation out of it.

With us you'd get both."

"Probably that's so." Welkie spoke slowly. "But people in general will credit me with loyalty at least."

"Will they? Even where they know of your work, will they? When a man turns down an offer like ours, people in general will give him credit for little besides simple innocence. I'm telling you they'll be more likely to think you are controlled by some queer primitive instinct which will not allow you to properly value things. I'll leave it to your friend. What do you say to that, Mr. Balfe?"

"I think you're a good deal right."

"There! Your own friend agrees with me!" exclaimed Necker.

"You don't think that, Andie?" Welkie, puzzled, stared at Balfe.

"What I mean, Greg, and what Mr. Necker very well understands me to mean, is that surely there are hordes of people who never will believe that any man did anything without a selfish motive."

"That don't seem right, Andie."

"No, it doesn't, but it's so, Greg. But"--he set his jaw at Necker--"what if they do think so? Let them. Let them ride hogback through the mud if they will. Oceans of other people, oceans, will still be looking up to men like Greg Welkie here." He rested his hand on his friend's shoulder. "You stick to your aeroplaning in the high air, Greg."

"And chance a fall?" suggested Necker.

"And chance a fall!" snapped Balfe. "But there are no falls if the machine is built right and the aviator forgets the applause."

Marie Welkie's hand reached out and pressed one of Balfe's. He held it.

"It's all right--he's a rock," he whispered.

"I must say, Welkie"--Necker fixed his eyes on the floor and spoke slowly--"that the government in this case seems to be represented by a man of picturesque speech, a man with imagination. I can only handle facts, and in a matter-of-fact way. I ask you to consider this: you have a boy, and there is Miss Welkie, a lovely, cultured woman, and"--he jerked his head suddenly up--"but what's the use? Here's a contract, needing only your signature, and here's a check, needing only my signature. I said two thousand a month. Suppose we make it three? Here's pen and ink, and remember your boy is looking out on the battle-ships from his little bed up-stairs."

"You're right, Necker, he is in his little bed up-stairs and I've got to think of him." He turned to Balfe. "The President, Andie, just naturally expects me to tackle this new job?"

"I think he does, Greg."

"Then there's only one answer left, Mr. Necker. No."

"Wait again. Welkie, you've a G.o.d-given genius for concrete work. I came here to get you and I--sign now and I'll make it four thousand."

"No."

"No? Why, look here! Here's a check. See--I'm signing it in blank. I'm leaving it to you to fill it in for what you please. For what you please for your first year for us, and the contract to run five years at the same rate. Remember you've been trimmed once and you're likely to be trimmed again."

"Let them trim me and keep on tr.i.m.m.i.n.g me! The work is here and I did it. They know it and I know it. If n.o.body but myself and my G.o.d know, we know. And no official or unofficial crookedness can wipe it out."

"But that little fellow up-stairs with his face against the screen?"

"It's that little fellow I'm thinking of. He'll never have to explain why his father reneged on a job he was trusted to do."

"But you haven't promised anybody in writing?"

"No."

"And, as I make it out, you haven't even given your word?"

"No."

"Then what right has anybody to----"

"He don't need to have any _right_. He just thinks I'm the kind of a man he can count on, and, in a show down, that's the kind of a man I reckon I want him or any other man to think I am."

"Then it is finally no?"