Sincerely, Willis Wayde (44 page)

Willis nodded understandingly but he did not answer. It was far better to let Mr. Bryson go on talking.

“Roger was delighted,” Mr. Bryson said, “when I told him I had heard from you.”

“I am very pleased that Mr. Roger reacted that way,” Willis said. “Of course I will always have a warm spot in my heart for the Harcourt Mill.”

“There is such a thing as sentiment even in business, isn't there?” Mr. Bryson said. “It is like old times talking to you, Willis. I had half forgotten what good friends we used to be, and how you used to come over to see Bill and Bess.”

“It will be a great pleasure to see Bess this evening,” Willis said, “and I hope that Bill is well.”

“Bill.” Mr. Bryson laughed exactly as he had long ago when Bill's name was mentioned. “He's down in Bermuda now. Ever since he married Anne Gresham they stay at her family's place there for most of the winter. I keep trying to talk mill to him but he'd rather work for his father-in-law. Let's see, Willis, how old are you?”

“I'll be thirty-four in November, sir,” Willis said.

“Just Bill's age. I should have remembered.” Mr. Bryson laughed again. “It must be great to mention your age at your next birthday so happily.”

Willis felt uneasy for the first time since they had been talking. He did not realize that he had been so transparent.

“Well, it is surprising how time marches on,” Mr. Bryson said, “and you're married too. I remember now—to a girl Bill used to know in Cambridge, the daughter of a professor at Harvard.”

“Yes, sir,” Willis answered, “Sylvia Hodges.”

“Well,” Mr. Bryson said again, “time certainly marches on, but there is one thing that puzzles me.”

“What's that, sir?” Willis asked.

“You know,” Mr. Bryson said, “Father always used to tell me not to exhibit undue curiosity when I was talking business. He used to say to let the situation develop without forcing it, but I can't help being curious. If you don't want a job, why have you come up here to see me, Willis?”

Willis waited for a moment, deliberately, because he wanted to be sure of Mr. Bryson's full attention, and the time had come to put things into very simple terms.

“Well,” Willis said, and he tried to speak slowly, “I don't want to startle you, sir, and maybe this whole thing should have something more of an introduction.” He checked himself and sat up straighter. “I was wondering if you would be interested in buying the Rahway Belting Company, Mr. Harcourt.”

It was the most decisive thing that he had ever said. The words were out in the room and all his imaginary talks with Mr. Bryson were swept away.

“Good God!” Mr. Bryson said.

“Just a minute,” Willis said. “Please do not turn it down without thinking of it, Mr. Harcourt. You see, there would be no cash involved, only a negotiated exchange of stock. You could call the whole thing Harcourt Associates, if you wanted, and if you want, you can get me with the deal. I don't see why I couldn't manage both the Rahway plant and the Harcourt Mill.”

Mr. Bryson sighed.

“I wish Roger were here,” he said, “but as long as he isn't, you had better begin at the beginning, Willis.”

Past associations were so strong, as Willis gave his explanations, that it was hard to remember that he was no longer Mr. Henry Harcourt's assistant engaged in explaining, at Mr. Harcourt's request, another business detail to Mr. Bryson.

“Frankly, Willis,” Mr. Bryson said, “I'm looking for fewer and not more complications and I don't exactly see how any sort of combination could possibly simplify any of our problems.”

“I think I can show you,” Willis said—and it was not hard for him to present his ideas, because he had rehearsed them so often—“that things will be much simpler and that you will have much less personal responsibility. Do you remember what Benjamin Franklin said—at least I think it was Franklin, check me if I'm wrong—when the Declaration of Independence was being signed?”

Mr. Bryson frowned and shook his head.

“Let's see,” he said—“the Declaration of Independence? No, I don't seem to remember at the moment.”

“Well, I don't know if I've got it straight myself,” Willis said. It was not a time to appear too bright, and his age was a handicap in talking with Mr. Bryson. “I think Benjamin Franklin said that if we don't hang together we will hang separately.”

“That's right,” Mr. Bryson said, “but I don't see what it has to do with the subject.”

It was a childish sort of maneuvering but at the same time it was effective, and there was a grim menace in that statement about hanging separately.

“Please don't think,” Willis said, and he laughed heartily, “that I am offering any threat to the Harcourt Mill. It is larger and stronger, of course, than the little show I'm running. I am only stating a business axiom, Mr. Harcourt, in rather theatric terms—only saying that if two businesses combine they are much stronger in the face of competition. Small businesses don't have the chance they had a few years ago.”

“I know,” Mr. Bryson said. “That's what Roger is always saying—we're losing money and we ought to sell out. He hasn't any sense of responsibility.”

Willis nodded and watched Mr. Bryson gravely.

“Mr. Harcourt,” he said, “what I'm about to say comes from the bottom of my heart. I think I know the belting business. I ought to because my father and your father taught it to me.”

He stopped, and when he went on the conviction of his own voice impressed him.

“I'll guarantee that none of us will lose money if we can get together, and if Mr. Henry Harcourt were here he would be the first to agree with me.”

Willis had been a good salesman even before his final training at Beakney-Graham. There was no trouble, he always said, in selling anything to anyone, whether it was an article or an idea, provided you believed in the thing you wished to sell—but belief should be harnessed with knowledge. Willis had never believed in anything as fully as he had in joining the Harcourt Mill with Rahway Belt. He had his facts so clearly that eloquence was not necessary. All he needed was patience. One always had to be patient with Mr. Bryson. Willis went over the facts very slowly and he asked for a pencil and paper so that he could set down figures.

If you thought of selling as a form of sport, it could be the most fascinating game in the world. Willis could turn his mind, if he wanted to reminisce, to some of his outstanding achievements in salesmanship which were as tangible to him as a big-game hunter's trophies, but nothing had ever been as perfect as the Harcourt-Rahway Belt promotion. It had not been difficult in detail, because Mr. Bryson had been with him all the way.

The beauty of the whole thing lay in what you might call the
rapport
, to use a French word. Right from the beginning, he and Mr. Harcourt were in tune and in step. Mr. Bryson was confused and weary of the details of the Harcourt Mills. He had never wanted to be the head of it, and he had assumed the leadership only as a family duty. The beauty of the Rahway-Harcourt promotion was that Willis and Mr. Bryson desired two different things which fitted together like a jigsaw puzzle. Willis wanted a chance to move forward, while Mr. Bryson wanted to move back. It was a very pretty problem of balance. It was beautiful to see Mr. Bryson react to every stimulus.

“I really think you have something, Willis,” Mr. Bryson said. “Of course I'm not much of a judge of these things, but the further we go into this the better it seems to look.”

The time had come to draw back slightly. Willis paused for a moment seemingly lost in thought. His hesitation was a little like Tom Sawyer's reluctance to allow the other boys to paint the fence, and it also resembled Antony's feigned alarm when he had aroused the Roman mob.

“I agree with you, Mr. Harcourt,” he said, “but I think we both ought to remember that there may be some sort of catch in this thing that neither of us sees, and fortunately we both have plenty of time to think it over.”

“I'm glad we have time,” Mr. Bryson said, “because I can see that this is pretty complicated. It does take thinking over.”

“It certainly does,” Willis said, “and I can't tell you how glad I'll be to get someone else's reaction. I may as well tell you frankly that I haven't discussed this with any of our people at Rahway—in fact, not even with my wife.” Willis laughed. He had thought of everything and now as the time for a lighter, friendlier touch. “Of course Sylvia isn't in a position to be interested right now. She's just back from the hospital with our second child.”

It always paid to bring family into such discussions. If any proof of stability was needed, there it was, with Sylvia just back from the hospital.

“Really?” Mr. Bryson said. “Is it a boy or a girl?”

“A boy,” Willis said. “He's actually our second boy. The first one's Al, named after my father. “Al's quite a little rascal—always pulling things off tables and things like that. But, honestly, I didn't mean to bring the little fellows in to interrupt this talk.”

Willis laughed but he immediately became serious. “I'm sorry I digressed, because the beauty of our situation lies in the fact that we are both thinking out loud and that neither of us is committed to anything whatsoever. In fact, it may very well be that our majority stockholder, Mrs. Jacoby, may be entirely against the whole transaction.”

“Let's see,” Mr. Bryson said, “who is Mrs. Jacoby?”

“The widow of the late president of Rahway Belt,” Willis told him. “Mrs. Jacoby has an excellent head for business. She is the daughter of the financier Seth Wilfred. I don't know whether you have ever heard of him.”

“Oh,” Mr. Bryson said, “was he the Wilfred that was mixed up with the Erie Railroad?”

Willis nodded. The mention of Mr. Seth Wilfred, he could see, gave Rahway Belt a new stability and a brighter background, but a disturbed look had come over Mr. Bryson.

“I can't understand why you haven't talked this over with Mrs.—er—Jacoby,” Mr. Bryson said. “It would seem to me that she is a key figure in your picture.”

Willis nodded in grave agreement and at the same time like a younger man acknowledging an older man's rebuke.

“I suppose I should have,” Willis said, “before I came up here to bother you about something which is so theoretical, but the truth is I was hoping I might get a little something more concrete to give Mrs. Jacoby when I finally did see her.” Willis shook his head slowly. “Frankly there has been no opportunity to take up any matter with her because of Mr. Jacoby's illness and death. His funeral was only a very short time ago.”

For a few seconds they both were gravely silent. The mention of death was often useful in pulling together the loose ends of a business conversation.

“I wish I had some way of predicting,” Willis said. “I hope Mrs. Jacoby will see things my way.”

He felt a sharp sense of elation as he glanced at Mr. Bryson Harcourt. There was no doubt of Mr. Bryson's concern now that he saw bright prospects moving away from him.

“I certainly hope she will,” Mr. Bryson said, “and I don't see why she shouldn't. Suppose we go on the assumption she agrees.”

“I think that is a very good idea, Mr. Harcourt,” Willis answered, “as long as we are just thinking out loud.”

“Good heavens!” Mr. Bryson said. “I haven't been so absorbed for a long while. It is quarter of seven o'clock and I hear voices. It must be Bess and Edward. You'll stay over tomorrow, won't you? I'd like to have you talk to Roger.”

“It would be a great pleasure, Mr. Harcourt,” Willis said, “as long as it is definitely understood that we are just thinking out loud.”

Willis was beginning to be interested in how the years had treated people. When Mr. Harcourt pulled open the sliding door, Willis could see that Mrs. Harcourt and Bess and Edward Ewing had already gathered around a tray of cocktails in the sitting room across the hall. Mrs. Harcourt had changed into a black velvet evening gown, and Bess was dressed in green. A green dress, as Willis had told her once, went particularly well with her greenish-blue eyes. Her hair, Willis could see in those seconds while he walked across the hall to the parlor, was still yellow but, like his own, darker. She looked taller than he remembered; and he could tell—because a man could always tell such things—that Bess Ewing had made a special effort for him. The gloss of her hair and its somewhat aggressive curly quality told very plainly that Bess had been to the beauty parlor that morning. It was pleasant of course, particularly under present circumstances, to realize that Bess wanted to look well on his account, but Willis was sure that his interest was now based on nothing but pure expediency.

When he had last seen Bess, his knowledge of young women had been confined only to her, to the few girls he had known at the Clyde High School, or had met in classes at Boston University, and to one or two of Bess's friends, who had seldom bothered to converse with him. It was very different now. Mrs. Harcourt and Bess, in her green satin and pearls, had a slightly provincial look. Sylvia, even in an old dress, would have attracted more attention than Bess Ewing. The truth was that Sylvia had lived in a real world, while Bess—and Edward Ewing too—had only existed under a permanent umbrella of financial protection.

Bess's voice had a high note which Willis had always associated with her when she was pleased and elated.

“Why, Willis,” she said, and she held out both her hands. “You don't look a bit different.”

He thought that her hands held his a moment longer than was necessary before they dropped away.

“I hope I've changed a little for the better,” Willis said. “This is a very great pleasure, Bess.”

“Well, you sound just the same,” Bess said. “You always did sound like Emily Post.”