The Hidden Places | Page 7

had no time to think about things like that. But I remember writing you
to sell, even at a sacrifice."
"Yes, yes. Quite so," Mr. Lewis agreed. "I recall the whole matter very
clearly. Conditions at that time were very bad, you know. It was
impossible to find a purchaser on short notice. Early in 1917 there was
a chance to sell, at a considerably reduced figure. But I couldn't get in
touch with you. You didn't answer our cable. I couldn't take the
responsibility of a sacrifice sale."
Hollister nodded. In 1917 he was a nameless convalescent in a German
hospital; officially he was dead. Months before that such things as
distant property rights had ceased to be of any moment. He had
forgotten this holding of timber in British Columbia. He was too full of
bitter personal misery to trouble about money.
"Failing to reach you we waited until we should hear from you--or from
your estate." Mr. Lewis cleared his throat as if it embarrassed him to
mention that contingency. "In war--there was that possibility, you
understand. We did not feel justified; so much time had elapsed. There
was risk to us in acting without verifying our instructions."
"So this property is still to be marketed. The carrying charges, as I
remember, were small. I presume you carried them."
"Oh, assuredly," Mr. Lewis asserted. "We protected your interests to
the very best of our ability."
"Well, find me a buyer for that limit as soon as you can," Hollister said
abruptly. "I want to turn it into cash."
"We shall set about this at once," Mr. Lewis said. "It may take a little
time--conditions, as a result of the armistice, are again somewhat
unsettled in the logging industry. Airplane spruce production is
dead--dead as a salt mackerel--and fir and cedar slumped with it.
However we shall do our best. Have you a price in mind, Mr. Hollister,

for a quick sale?"
"I paid ten thousand for it. On the strength of your advice as a specialist
in timber investments," he added with a touch of malice. He had taken
a dislike to Mr. Lewis. He had not been so critical of either men or
motives in the old days. He had remembered Lewis as a good sort.
Now he disliked the man, distrusted him. He was too smooth, too sleek.
"I'll discount that twenty percent, for a cash sale."
Mr. Lewis made a memorandum.
"Very good," said he, raising his head with an inquiring air, as if to say
"If that is all----"
"If you will kindly identify me at a bank,"--Hollister rose from his chair,
"I shall cease to trouble you. I have a draft on the Bank of B.N.A. I do
not know any one in Vancouver."
"No trouble, I assure you," Lewis hastened to assent, but his tone
lacked heartiness, sincerity.
It was only a little distance to the bank, but Lewis insisted on making
the journey in a motorcar which stood at the curb. It was plain to
Hollister that Mr. Lewis disliked the necessity of appearing in public
with him, that he took this means of avoiding the crowded sidewalks,
of meeting people. He introduced Hollister, excused himself on the plea
of business pressure, and left Hollister standing before the teller's
wicket.
This was not a new attitude to Hollister. People did that,--as if he were
a plague. There came into his mind--as he stood counting the sheaf of
notes slide through a grill by a teller who looked at him once and
thereafter kept his eyes averted--a paraphrase of a hoary quotation, "I
am a monster of such frightful mien, as to be hated needs but to be
seen." The rest of it, Hollister thought grimly, could never apply to him.
He put the money in his pocket and walked out on the street. It was a
busy corner on a humming thoroughfare. Electric cars rumbled and

creaked one behind another on the double tracks. Waves of vehicular
traffic rolled by the curb. A current of humanity flowed past him on the
sidewalk.
Standing there for a minute, Hollister felt again the slow rising of his
resentment against these careless, fortunate ones. He could not say
what caused that feeling. A look, a glance,--the inevitable shrinking. He
was morbidly sensitive. He knew that, knew it was a state of mind that
was growing upon him. But from whatever cause, that feeling of
intolerable isolation gave way to an inner fury.
As he stood there, he felt a wild desire to shout at these people, to curse
them, to seize one of these dainty women by the arms, thrust his
disfigured face close to hers and cry: "Look at me as if I were a man,
not a monstrosity. I'm what I am so