The Steadfast Heart/Chapter 16
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
A month later, as the office clock was striking eight, Henry G. Woodhouse came out of Dave Wilkins’s printing office with Angus Burke and walked across the street to the bank. Chet Bowen, the cashier, and Gene Goff, bookkeeper, office boy, teller, janitor, and what-not, looked up as they entered. It was their custom to say good morning to their employer and to be greeted in return with a dignified, “Good morning, gentlemen.”
But this morning neither of the gentlemen behind the partition spoke. The sight of Angus Burke entering with Henry G. struck them dumb. It was as if the Angel Gabriel were to be seen in companionship with a burglar. Chet bent over his ledger, as one does in circumstances which require his delicacy to make pretense of blindness.
Instead of proceeding to his office, Mr. Woodhouse stopped before Chet’s window. “Good morning,” he said. “This is Angus Burke, as you doubtless know, Mr. Bowen. He comes to work for us to-day.”
Chet was stunned. He was shocked. He was bewildered. He stared at his employer and at Angus, and rather fancied himself to be the victim of some sort of evil dream. The thing was absurd, impossible! “Not—not here in the bank!” he exclaimed. It was a cry of expostulation.
“Yes,” said Mr. Woodhouse, “in the bank. His duties, in the beginning, will be those of my personal assistant.”
Leaving his horror-stricken employees, the old gentleman motioned Angus into his private office and closed the door. Chet turned his head slowly and peered at Gene, who returned the gaze open-mouthed.
“Well—” he said, and then words failed him.
“In the bank!” exclaimed Gene. “Right where folks deposits their money—where money’s a-layin’ around under foot, so to speak. Folks ’ll be drawin’ out as soon as they hear of it.”
“And him a murderer, too—for ’twa’n’t nothin’ but Craig Brownin’s cleverness got him out of it!… Reg’lar desperado—that’s what he was…. Think of us bein’ throwed with him all the time! Why, the’ hain’t nobody in town has anythin’ to do with him….”
“His father, he was a thief too. That’s what took Sheriff Bates out there to git himself killed…. Perty kittle of fish, that’s what I say.”
Gene slammed shut his ledger and Chet devoted himself to thumbing over a pile of notes and mortgages; but neither could set his mind on his work. Both were wondering what was going on behind Henry G. Woodhouse’s door….
In the privacy of that room the old gentleman motioned Angus to a chair, and the boy sat down diffidently. Mr. Woodhouse regarded him and felt a certain satisfaction—as if he had had something to do with arranging the boy’s features. They were highly satisfactory features—if only they were a trifle more mobile, a bit less grave—and if that set, almost strained expression could be made to disappear.
“Are you good at figures, Angus?” he asked.
“I’m not very quick, sir—but—” He hesitated.
“But in the end you generally get the right answer…. Is that what you were going to say?”
Angus moved his feet in embarrassment. “I—I almost always got my arithmetic right in school,” he said, “but sometimes it took me an awful long time. I’ve had to sit up—almost all night to work out an example.”
Mr. Woodhouse thought that this dogged determination, this laborious demand for accuracy was a quality not to be despised in a banker. He turned to his desk and began opening his mail. Angus coughed. There was a thing he wanted to say, something was on his mind, but he did not know how to commence.
“I—” he began.
“What is it?” Mr. Woodhouse asked, turning courteously.
“They don’t want me to work here.”
“Who doesn’t? What do you mean?”
“They—the two men out there.”
“Chet and Gene?”
“Yes, sir.”
Mr. Woodhouse frowned and considered. “How do you know?” he asked.
“It was—the way they looked—when you told them I was going to.”
Mr. Woodhouse reflected on this; he understood something of the unpleasantness of Angus’s life—understood the sensitiveness of the boy—how, always, he was on the outlook for hostile expression, for signs that he was not wanted. The old banker sighed, and put his hand on Angus’s shoulder.
“My boy,” he said, “suppose they do object? Suppose they try to make things unpleasant for you?”
Angus considered. He expected the cashier and his assistant would make things unpleasant for him. It was natural they should—everybody in Rainbow did. People who knew who he was always made things uncomfortable for him.
“I don’t know,” said Angus.
“Think it out,” said Mr. Woodhouse. “Have you a right to work here?”
Angus hesitated, then he said, “I would stay anyhow—if you kept on wanting me to.”
“Why?”
“Because—this is your bank. They can’t say who you shall hire unless you want them to. If I worked in a bank, and the man I worked for hired somebody I—didn’t want to work with, why, I’d stop working there. I got a right to do that. But if I stayed and worked I wouldn’t have a right to pick on the man…. I’ve got to work somewhere. I’m fit to work with folks. I’ve got to think that. I got to stand up for myself…. If I quit working here because they wanted me to—it wouldn’t be right. I’d be giving in. Maybe, everywhere I went to work, there’d be someone that didn’t want me…. I’ve got to begin staying some place. So I’ll stay here if you keep on wanting me.”
“I want you,” said Mr. Woodhouse simply. “I think I shall come to want you very much. Sit here a moment.”
He went into the banking office, closing the door after him, and stood a moment until he had the eyes of his employees.
“Gentlemen,” he said, “may I have your undivided attention for a moment?”
Their curiosity made them quick to respond.
“Angus Burke is coming here to work,” said Mr. Woodhouse in his grave, dignified, unhurried way. “He is coming to stay—I hope. It has occurred to me that you may share the absurd prejudice against him which seems to be so lamentably general in Rainbow—a prejudice not without a foundation in malice, and wholly without justification. What I wish to impress upon you now is this: Angus Burke must be treated as courteously and as fairly as you would treat me…. I am sure I shall be understood.”
They did understand; Mr. Woodhouse possessed the quality of making himself clear and impressive; no threat, no mentioned penalties were necessary….
Half an hour later Druggist Ramsay came in, lowered his voice, and glancing toward Mr. Woodhouse’s door, whispered: “’Tain’t so is it—the rumor that’s runnin’ around town? That young Burke’s hired to work in the bank?”
Chet nodded, his lips primly compressed.
“Wa-al, I snum!” exclaimed Mr. Ramsay. “I calc’late folks ’ll be some stirred when they know it’s true….” And with his tidbit of news he hurried away to the post office, where he knew it would find a ready welcome.
It did find a welcome. Before noon Rainbow seethed with it, boiled with it, steamed and bubbled with it. Rainbow was scandalized, affronted, the more so that Henry G. Woodhouse had put this thing upon them. There was a feeling of helplessness in their expostulations, for they stood in fear of the banker. There was nothing they could do about it—not even withdraw their deposits. They felt that Mr. Woodhouse was not a man who would tolerate their withdrawing their deposits, so they grumbled and vapored.
As for its effect on Angus Burke—Rainbow decided, that, unable to vent its displeasure upon Henry G., it would concentrate on Angus. Sentiment against him crystallized, became malignant. The town charged him with pushing himself in deliberately where he was not wanted; with flaunting himself before its eyes. The thing which had been vague and incoherent became clear and malign…. Judge Crane played his part in this, and Judge Crane had a following. Two motives inspired him—jealousy of Craig Browning and petty malice toward Angus…. Also the unpleasant fear which always came to him when anybody formed a relationship with Henry G. Woodhouse, whose fortune was destined to pass to Malcolm Crane, Junior…. Judge Crane determined to take active steps for the abolishment of Angus Burke.