Greaves and Henshaw were silent, and he went on talking.
“Now, you are not only asking me to raise the money, or most of it, while I make it possible for you to raise the rest, but to pay you to construct the line and then afterward operate it jointly with you. If that is what is really in your minds, of course we need not talk any further, for I am not interested. What I might do would be to take over your lb30,000 option, provided it gave me full control of the road, and possibly leave you the lb10,000 you have paid in and your contract to build, but not more than that. For in addition to all this, as I know, there are lb60,000 of consols, carrying interest at 4 per cent, which have to be looked after.”
Jarkins and Randolph were beginning to feel by now that they had in some way mishandled all of this. At the same time, Greaves and Henshaw, sensing that they had overreached themselves in a situation where they might have profited, gazed at each other dubiously.
“Very well,” said Greaves, finally. “You are your own best judge, Mr. Cowperwood. But we want you to understand clearly that there isn’t a sounder proposition in the world. London is the ideal field for undergrounds. It has no united system, and lines like this are absolutely necessary, and will come. The money will be found for them.”
“Possibly,” said Cowperwood, “but as for myself, if after again looking over the situation you still find yourselves unable to work out your plan and are willing to accept mine, you may say so in writing, and I will then consider it. However, if I decide to become interested, it would have to be with an option to close on my own terms. That, of course, would not mean that I would disturb you in the matter of your construction contract. That could stand, I think, provided your specifications were satisfactory.”
He drummed on his desk with his fingers as if to indicate that the interview was over, and then paused to add that since there was no proposition before him now that he could consider, he would take it as a favor if no publicity of any kind resulted from what he had said. Then he signaled Jarkins to remain, and the moment the others had gone, turned to him and said:
“The trouble with you, Jarkins, is that you never completely grasp an opportunity even when it’s in your hands. Look what’s happened here today! You bring me two men, who, according to your story and theirs, control an important traction proposition in London, which, if rightly handled, might readily lead to much larger things for everyone concerned. Yet they come here with no conception of the way I do business. You know what that is: full control for myself. I doubt if even now they have any clear knowledge of my experience in this field and what I could do with such a project. They thought they could sell me a half-interest in something which they and their friends would control. I tell you, Jarkins,” and here he glared with a finality which sent chills up and down the spine of Mr. Jarkins, “if you’re to be of any service to me in this matter, I would advise you not to bother with this particular proposition but to look into the entire London underground situation and see what can be done with that. And furthermore, I want you to keep all of your private speculations in regard to me and my affairs to yourself. If you had gone to London before bringing these men to me, and ascertained all there was to know about them, you would not have wasted my time and theirs.”
“Yes, sir,” said Jarkins, who was fat and forty, a very model of sartorial excellence, and, at the moment, because of nervousness, wet with perspiration. He was a flabby, waxlike man, with black, acquisitive eyes, below which a small, pointed nose stuck out, and below that a soft, puffy mouth. He was forever dreaming of some speculative coup which would make him a multimillionaire, and a well-known figure at first nights at the theater, polo games, dog shows, and other society functions. In London he had as many friends as he had in New York.
In consequence, Cowperwood had the feeling that he might have some use for him, and yet, at the moment, he was not willing to do more than throw out vague hints, knowing that they would, in all probability, cause him to go tearing after Greaves and Henshaw to set himself right with them, and, who knows, he might even go over to London, where . . . well, what better press agent could he have than Mr. Jarkins?
Chapter 15
And true enough, it was not many days after Greaves and Henshaw had departed for London that Jarkins also sailed, all aquiver with the expectation of becoming a part of an enormous adventure which might lead to those dreamed-of millions.
And while this preliminary move in connection with Greaves and Henshaw and their Charing Cross line appeared to have ended less definitely than Cowperwood had hoped, it made no change in his determination to proceed. For there was the information provided by Sippens, and because of that he was determined to get control of some underground line, if not the Charing Cross. And so there were not only consultations, but a number of dinners at his home, from which latter Aileen took the impression that her husband was at least a little interested in the old life which had made her early days in Chicago with him her most colorful and happy memory. She was beginning to wonder whether, by some strange turn of fate, the Chicago failure might not have sobered him, so that he had decided to accept, if not necessarily relish, the old-time outward relationship, which, little as it meant to him, could still be so comforting to her.
But the truth was that Cowperwood was becoming more and more intrigued by the temperament of Berenice. There was about her a certain playful and inventive whimsy, which, combined with her practical as well as poetic and rhapsodic moods, delighted him. In fact, he was never weary of studying her, and in the comparatively short period since she had arrived in Chicago, he had come to experience and relish the equivalent of a mental fever in regard to her.
One of Berenice’s fancies, and one which had affected Cowperwood most profoundly, had occurred more recently in Chicago. One late afternoon they had driven out for dinner to the inn where they had dined a couple of evenings previously. But before entering, she had led him to the nearby woods, where in a snow-flecked patch of scrub oak and pine stood a snow figure in his own image, part caricature and part an arresting likeness. She had driven out alone early that very morning and shaped it. For the eyes she had used two bright gray-blue stones, and for the mouth and nose, small pine cones of different sizes. She had even brought out one of his hats and placed it jauntily atop the snowman’s head, thus serving to emphasize the likeness. Suddenly confronted with this figure at dusk, a wintry wind whispering among the trees and the last rays of a blood-red sun spearing through, Cowperwood was startled.
“Why, Bevy! Of all the odd things to do! When did you do this, you pixie?” And he laughed at the touch of the comic, for she had placed one eye the least bit askew, and the nose was a little exaggerated.
“I did it this morning. I drove out here alone and made my lovely snowman!”
“It does look like me, by Jove!” he said, amazedly. “But, Bevy, how long did it take you to do it?”
“Oh, perhaps an hour,” and she stepped back and eyed it appraisingly. Then, taking his cane from him, she placed it against one of the snowman’s pockets, which were indicated by small stones. “Now, see how perfect you are! All snow and cones and stone buttons!” and she reached up and kissed the mouth.
“Bevy! If you’re going to do that, come here!” and he seized her in his arms, feeling that there was something here that was eerie, elfin. “Berenice, dear, I swear you puzzle me. Have I a real flesh-and-blood girl, or a sprite, a witch?”
“Didn’t you know?” and she turned and spread out her fingers at him. “I’m a witch, and I can turn you into snow and ice,” and she came eerily toward him.
“Berenice, for heaven’s sake! What nonsense! Sometimes I think you are the one who is bewitched. But you may witch me all you care to, only don’t leave me,” and he kissed her and held her tight in his arms.
But she drew