The Lion and The Mouse Part 37

The financier smiled grimly as he answered:

"Your family in general--me in particular, eh? I gleaned that much when I came in." He looked towards the door of the room in which Shirley had taken refuge and as if talking to himself he added: "A curious girl with an inverted point of view--sees everything different to others--I want to see her before she goes."

He walked over to the door and raised his hand as if he were about to knock. Then he stopped as if he had changed his mind and turning towards his son he demanded:

"Do you mean to say that she has done with you?"

"Yes," answered Jefferson bitterly.

"Finally?"

"Yes, finally--forever!"

"Does she mean it?" asked Ryder, Sr., sceptically.

"Yes--she will not listen to me while her father is still in peril."

There was an expression of half amus.e.m.e.nt, half admiration on the financier's face as he again turned towards the door.

"It's like her, d.a.m.n it, just like her!" he muttered.

He knocked boldly at the door.

"Who's there?" cried Shirley from within.

"It is I--Mr. Ryder. I wish to speak to you."

"I must beg you to excuse me," came the answer, "I cannot see you."

Jefferson interfered.

"Why do you want to add to the girl's misery? Don't you think she has suffered enough?"

"Do you know what she has done?" said Ryder with pretended indignation. "She has insulted me grossly. I never was so humiliated in my life. She has returned the cheque I sent her last night in payment for her work on my biography. I mean to make her take that money. It's hers, she needs it, her father's a beggar.

She must take it back. It's only flaunting her contempt for me in my face and I won't permit it."

[Photo, from the play, of Mr. Ryder holding out a cheque to Shirley.]

"So I contaminate even good money?"--Act IV.

"I don't think her object in refusing that money was to flaunt contempt in your face, or in any way humiliate you," answered Jefferson. "She feels she has been sailing under false colours and desires to make some reparation."

"And so she sends me back my money, feeling that will pacify me, perhaps repair the injury she has done me, perhaps buy me into entering into her plan of helping her father, but it won't. It only increases my determination to see her and her--" Suddenly changing the topic he asked: "When do you leave us?"

"Now--at once--that is--I--don't know," answered Jefferson embarra.s.sed. "The fact is my faculties are numbed--I seem to have lost my power of thinking. Father," he exclaimed, "you see what a wreck you have made of our lives!"

"Now, don't moralize," replied his father testily, "as if your own selfishness in desiring to possess that girl wasn't the mainspring of all your actions!" Waving his son out of the room he added: "Now leave me alone with her for a few moments. Perhaps I can make her listen to reason."

Jefferson stared at his father as if he feared he were out of his mind.

"What do you mean? Are you--?" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.

"Go--go leave her to me," commanded the financier. "Slam the door when you go out and she'll think we've both gone. Then come up again presently."

The stratagem succeeded admirably. Jefferson gave the door a vigorous pull and John Ryder stood quiet, waiting for the girl to emerge from sanctuary. He did not have to wait long. The door soon opened and Shirley came out slowly. She had her hat on and was drawing on her gloves, for through her window she had caught a glimpse of the cab standing at the curb. She started on seeing Ryder standing there motionless, and she would have retreated had he not intercepted her.

"I wish to speak to you Miss--Rossmore," he began.

"I have nothing to say," answered Shirley frigidly.

"Why did you do this?" he asked, holding out the cheque.

"Because I do not want your money," she replied with hauteur.

"It was yours--you earned it," he said.

"No, I came here hoping to influence you to help my father. The work I did was part of the plan. It happened to fall my way. I took it as a means to get to your heart."

"But it is yours, please take it. It will be useful."

"No," she said scornfully, "I can't tell you how low I should fall in my own estimation if I took your money! Money," she added, with ringing contempt, "why, that's all there is to _you!_ It's your G.o.d! Shall I make your G.o.d my G.o.d? No, thank you, Mr. Ryder!"

"Am I as bad as that?" he asked wistfully.

"You are as bad as that!" she answered decisively.

"So bad that I contaminate even good money?" He spoke lightly but she noticed that he winced.

"Money itself is nothing," replied the girl, "it's the spirit that gives it--the spirit that receives it, the spirit that earns it, the spirit that spends it. Money helps to create happiness. It also creates misery. It's an engine of destruction when not properly used, it destroys individuals as it does nations. It has destroyed you, for it has warped your soul!"

"Go on," he laughed bitterly, "I like to hear you!"

"No, you don't, Mr. Ryder, no you don't, for deep down in your heart you know that I am speaking the truth. Money and the power it gives you, has dried up the well-springs of your heart."

He affected to be highly amused at her words, but behind the mask of callous indifference the man suffered. Her words seared him as with a red hot iron. She went on:

"In the barbaric ages they fought for possession, but they fought openly. The feudal barons fought for what they stole, but it was a fair fight. They didn't strike in the dark. At least, they gave a man a chance for his life. But when you modern barons of industry don't like legislation you destroy it, when you don't like your judges you remove them, when a compet.i.tor outbids you you squeeze him out of commercial existence! You have no hearts, you are machines, and you are cowards, for you fight unfairly."

"It is not true, it is not true," he protested.

"It is true," she insisted hotly, "a few hours ago in cold blood you doomed my father to what is certain death because you decided it was a political necessity. In other words he interfered with your personal interests--your financial interests--you, with so many millions you can't count them!" Scornfully she added: "Come out into the light--fight in the open! At least, let him know who his enemy is!"

"Stop--stop--not another word," he cried impatiently, "you have diagnosed the disease. What of the remedy? Are you prepared to reconstruct human nature?"

Confronting each other, their eyes met and he regarded her without resentment, almost with tenderness. He felt strangely drawn towards this woman who had defied and accused him, and made him see the world in a new light.

"I don't deny," he admitted reluctantly, "that things seem to be as you describe them, but it is part of the process of evolution."