The Midnight Passenger, Richard Henry Savage [best reads of all time txt] 📗

reach the secret of all this strange behavior. The old man seems unwilling to let me go out of his control, and yet he has tied me down to this ironclad money mill - as a slave rubbing the lamp for him." It opened a gloomy future to him, this dreary hour of introspection.

Randall Clayton had not lost all the opportunities of his New York life for a peep behind the metropolitan scenes. He knew that there was an inside view to be had of the clubs, the great hotels, the show life of the smart set, the pretentious apartment houses, the banks and theaters, the ambitious schemes of business and professional men.

One by one the shams had yielded to his prying gaze, and, but too well, he knew the truth of Tom Moore's trite remark, "False the light on glory's plume!"

But, straightforward and sincere, he had never watched his own environment. The loss of his mother in his childhood and his father's lonely struggle to retrieve his fallen fortunes had left the boy without happy memories of boyhood, with no family history to aid him, and the embarrassment of his dependence upon Hugh Worthington had robbed him of the confidences incident to young manhood.

Only in his books had he learned of the passionate, hot hearts beating behind the silken armor of womanhood.

For who had noticed the dependent, the poor, plodding college boy?

Worthington's Detroit home was a mere social machine-shop, a place of vanished glories during the adolescence of Miss Alice, and no Diana had stooped to kiss the forgotten young Endymion sleeping in the Lethe of a New York business obscurity. Clayton's life had been gilded by few joys.

His whole nature rose up in a sudden rebellion against this "personally conducted" career in life. "I am to be a mere hoodwinked worker in this millionaire's treadmill. A bond slave to one of the great Trusts which are chaining the whole American population to the galley-oar for life.

"I must be fairly paid, decently dressed, sufficiently fed, to play my part as a decent workman; that is all. We will see!"

He had now crushed out all lingering remnant of a friendly feeling for Ferris.

Even the last social invitation rankled in his mind. "I suppose that he wanted to pump me, at ease, under the guise of a homelike hospitality. If there is any little game being played around me, I will now take a hand in it."

As he moved to the door, the memory of that bewitching woman's face rose up once more to thrill the very core of his lonely heart. "She looked lonely. Perhaps she is, like myself, a solitary sail on Life's lonely ocean. And I shall never see her again! Lost in New York's human flood. But I'll buy that picture, if I live till Monday. It will call her back to me; bring back her vanished loveliness."

A motley crowd was pouring into the various doors of the huge hostelry, for the evening trains were depositing the flotsam and jetsam of humanity into busy Gotham.

Prosperous tourists, crafty schemers, brazen politicians, overdressed drummers, and flashy sporting men were pouring in to seek the "first aid to the weary," which the nearest available hotel affords to the cramped and jaded traveler.

Even the sidewalks were now thronged with anxious-eyed women, some of them with wildly-beating hearts, awaiting the kind "gentleman friend" who so often mysteriously appears at the cross-roads of Life.

From the Forty-second Street Station the "new departure" of many a life has begun, the radial lines often curving downward into the sheer depths of ruin of the Morgue, or the darkened abysses of the Tenderloin.

Alas! That no angel with a flaming sword stands ready to warn away the helpless from the gates which close behind the unwary with a deadly clang.

Randall Clayton drew back as a stalwart traveler jostled him, only to spring forward in the ardor of mutual recognition.

"Jack Witherspoon, by all the gods," cried the delighted New Yorker. "What brings you here?"

"The Chicago Limited, my boy!" coolly answered the jovial Westerner as he dragged his friend back into the café. "I do confess the need of an 'eye-opener' after my meal of cinders."

In ten minutes Clayton knew all the salient facts of Jack's career.

Their lives had diverged at the college gates, and the bustling Witherspoon, now the lawyer of a great Michigan railway company, was on his way to Europe for a six-months' tour.

Clayton's spirits vastly rose in their reminiscent chat, and, in ten minutes, the two ex-collegians were on their way to Clayton's apartment. Members of the same fraternity, it was natural that Witherspoon should gladly accept the offered hospitality of his old-time comrade,

"I am tied down to business," said Clayton, "but I can put you up here far better than Room 999 of any Broadway hotel. We can have our nights together, at least, until the 'Fuerst Bismarck' takes you out on the blue."

They had returned from a jolly supper, after dismissing the carriage, and the pipes were lit before Witherspoon found time to go into his friend's affairs. The memories of old days were still upon them when the Detroit lawyer, after a close study of his friend's face, demanded flatly, "And are you satisfied here?"

"You see my surroundings, Jack," replied Clayton. "I've told you about where I stand."

"But," protested his friend, "your life is too lonely. You know what a genial circle we have in Detroit. You would have already risen to be a man of mark among us! And our old set are now rising to be the men in power. You were easily our leader."

Clayton uneasily replied, for he saw the questioning glances of his friend's eyes, "I have very little time to throw away. And I have had Arthur Ferris with me here."

"In your position you should have already married and settled down," resolutely contended Witherspoon. "Besides, you'll lose Ferris soon. He's slated to marry Alice Worthington, I hear."

The smoking-table between them went over with a crash as Clayton sprang to his feet.

"Impossible!" cried the cashier. "Ferris never told me anything of it."

"Certainly not," calmly replied Jack Witherspoon, as Clayton busied himself with the wreck and ruin. "It's not in his game to do anything but hoodwink you. What did he tell you now of this Western trip?" Clayton frankly unbosomed himself to his visitor, pacing up and down in a sudden indignation.

"All that story of Miss Worthington's illness is mere moonshine," confidently answered the Western lawyer. "Hugh Worthington is one of the coldest business calculators in America."

"Our road and its allies are naturally inside of all the secrets of the big cattle trust. I have watched the old Croesus' career for years. It's only since I got into possession of the law business of this branching-out railroad that I have been able to fathom old Worthington's designs.

"He has used young Ferris for years to quietly gather in all the loose stock of his unsuspicious partners. You may not know that Arthur Ferris is the favorite nephew of Senator Durham, Chairman of the Committee on Interstate Commerce.

"This Western visit of old Worthington's is only a betrothal trip for Ferris and Miss Alice. The Senator and his friends will put up the legislation.

"Worthington is craftily frightening out all his Western partners and Mr. Arthur Ferris will bob up at the annual election with a stack of proxies and a power of attorney from Worthington.

"The new deal will follow the annual election, old Hugh captures the whole concern, Mr. Ferris will be not only Hugh's son-in-law but the new managing vice-president in the East. The trick will double old Hugh's fortune. Once husband of the old miser's only child, he can be trusted to guard his own. So, look out for yourself!" Clayton's eyes burned with a sudden anger.

"You asked me why I did not marry," he fiercely cried. "I have a fair salary. True; but at a word, on a single telegram from old Hugh, out I go. Dropped, cast off like a squeezed lemon." Clayton's eyes gleamed in a sudden rage.

"Have you saved much?" demanded his friend. Clayton shook his head. "I have a couple of thousand in bank, that's all."

"Then you are dependent upon this old skinflint's bounty," answered the lawyer, "for you have no profession, no backing, no capital. He wished to leave you helpless in his hands; I see it all. The crafty old fox! To watch you during your boyhood, to railroad you away from Michigan, and to hoodwink you as to your possible rights. Never mind, old man; I will be back in three months, and if you will confide in me, we may frighten a good sum out of Worthington.

"But you must let this annual election go on undisturbed. Smile and keep your counsel. Let this sleek ferret Ferris, go on and marry the girl, for I, alone, can aid you. Worthington fears me. I know too much of his secret operations.

"When I get you a slice of your lost patrimony, you can break loose, find yourself a fitting mate, and lead the life of a man, and not a galley-slave. Oh! It has been a beautifully worked scheme. The parchment-faced old wretch!"

"What do you mean? Explain yourself! Have I been tricked like a dog my whole life?" cried Randall Clayton, the hidden espionage and Ferris' duplicity returning to arouse him into a glow of rage.

"I mean only this," coolly answered Jack Witherspoon, "our railroad has just agreed to pay Hugh Worthington two millions of dollars for two hundred acres of outlying city lands, to be used as our lumber and ore and stock-handling depots. The lake commerce has increased a thousand fold.

"I had still supposed it was only railroad rivalry which caused our people to keep the purchase secret and to record only a ninety-nine year lease, when they had Hugh Worthington's guarantee deed in their possession.

"He takes the whole purchase price out in freights, paid in to him by your cattle trust, and with this same money he buys the majority of the outlying stock."

"How does this touch me?" cried the now thoroughly angered Clayton.

"Because your father deeded all the real estate holdings of Clayton & Worthington to his partner before the old trouble came on. Only this, a then valueless, tract was forgotten.

"In honor and equity you are entitled to one-half as Everett Clayton's heir."

The young cashier clenched his fists in anguish, as Witherspoon sadly said: "But he has had twenty-one years' unbroken possession. You were of age seven years ago, and he allowed it to be sold for taxes every year, and has also secretly bought up all the tax titles. It is too late. But wait, keep silent, and trust to me."


CHAPTER III.

IN MAGDAL'S PHARMACY.


Randall Clayton and his friend heard the "chimes at midnight" after the disquieting disclosures. Witherspoon finally allayed Clayton's sudden distrust. The Detroit lawyer succeeded in lamely explaining his own delay in making the fraud known.

"You see, Randall," he finally said at parting for the night, "I must live my life in Detroit under the heel of these great operators.

"I intended to take this