The Fortune Hunter | Page 3

an explanation was due you, as the latest to suffer through his misplaced interest in me."
"Perhaps," said Spaulding, "I am beginning to understand. Go on: I'm interested. About the fish-market?"
"Oh, I just happened to think of it as a sample experience--and the last of that particular brand. I got nine dollars a week and earned every cent of it inhaling the atmosphere. My board cost me six and the other three afforded me a chance to demonstrate myself a captain of finance--paying laundry bills and clothing myself, besides buying lunches and such-like small matters. I did the whole thing, you know--one schooner of beer a day and made my own cigarettes: never could make up my mind which was the worst. The hours were easy, too: didn't have to get to work until five in the morning.... I lasted five weeks at that job, before I was taken sick: shows what a great constitution I've got."
He laughed uncertainly and paused, thoughtful, his eyes vacant, fixed upon the retrospect that was a grim prospect of the imminent future.
"And then--?"
"Oh--?" Duncan roused. "Why, then I fell in with Kellogg again; he found me trying the open-air cure on a bench in Washington Square. Since then he's been finding me one berth after another. He's a sure-enough optimist."
Spaulding shifted uneasily in his chair, stirred by an impulse whose unwisdom he could not doubt. Duncan had assuredly done his case no good by painting his shortcomings in colours so vivid; yet, somehow strangely, Spaulding liked him the better for his open-hearted confession.
"Well...." Spaulding stumbled awkwardly.
"Yes; of course," said Duncan promptly, rising. "Sorry if I tired you."
"What do you mean by: 'Yes, of course'?"
"That you called me in to fire me--and so that's over with. Only I'd be sorry to have you sore on Kellogg for saddling me on you. You see, he believed I'd make good, and so did I in a way: at least, I hoped to."
"Oh, that's all right," said Spaulding uncomfortably. "The trouble is, you see, we've nothing else open just now. But if you'd really like another chance on the road, I--I'll be glad to speak to Mr. Atwater about it."
"Don't you do it!" Duncan counselled him sharply, aghast. "He might say yes. And I simply couldn't accept; it wouldn't be fair to you, Kellogg, or myself. It'd be charity--for I've proved I can't earn my wages; and I haven't come to that yet. No!" he concluded with determination, and picked up his hat.
"Just a minute." Spaulding held him with a gesture. "You're forgetting something: at least I am. There's a month's pay coming to you; the cashier will hand you the cheque as you go out."
"A month's pay?" Duncan said blankly. "How's that? I've drawn up to the end of this week already, if you didn't know it."
"Of course I knew it. But we never let our men go without a month's notice or its equivalent, and--"
"No," Duncan interrupted firmly. "No; but thank you just the same. I couldn't. I really couldn't. It's good of you, but ... Now," he broke off abruptly, "I've left my accounts--what there is of them--with the book-keeping department, and the checks for my sample trunks. There'll be a few dollars coming to me on my expense account, and I'll send you my address as soon as I get one."
"But look here--" Spaulding got to his feet, frowning.
"No," reiterated Duncan positively. "There's no use. I'm grateful to you for your toleration of me--and all that. But we can't do anything better now than call it all off. Good-bye, Mr. Spaulding."
Spaulding nodded, accepting defeat with the better grace because of an innate conviction that it was just as well, after all. And, furthermore, he admired Duncan's stand. So he offered his hand: an unusual condescension. "You'll make good somewhere yet," he asserted.
"I wish I could believe it." Duncan's grasp was firm since he felt more assured of some humanity latent in his late employer. "However ... Good-bye."
"Good luck to you," rang in his ears as the door put a period to the interview. He stopped and took up the battered suitcase and rusty overcoat which he had left outside the junior partner's office, then went on, shaking his head. "Much obliged," he said huskily to himself. "But what's the good of that. There's no room anywhere for a professional failure. And that's what I am; just a ne'er-do-well. I never realised what that meant, really, before, and it's certainly taken me a damn' long time to find out. But I know now, all right...."
Outside, on the steps of the building, he paused a moment, fascinated by the brisk spectacle afforded by lower Broadway at the hour when the cave-like offices in its cliff-like walls begin to empty themselves, when the overlords and their lieutenants close