That aerial kiss proved more intoxicating to Quin than all the more tangible ones he had ever received.  It sent him swaggering through the next few months with his head in the air and his heart on fire.  Nothing could stop him now, he told himself boastfully.  Old Bangs was showing him signal favor, Madam Bartlett was his staunch friend, Mr. Ranny and the aunties were his allies, and even if Miss Nell didn’t care for him yet, she didn’t care for anybody else, and when a girl like Miss Nell looks at a fellow the way she had looked at him

At this rapturous point he invariably abandoned cold prose for poetry and burst into song.

Almost every week brought him a letter from Eleanor not the romantic, carefully penned epistles she had indited to Harold Phipps, but hasty scrawls often dashed off with a pencil.  In them she described her absurd attempts at housekeeping in the little two-room apartment; her absorbing experiences in the dramatic school; all the ups and downs of her wonderful new life.  She was evidently enjoying her freedom, but Quin flattered himself that between the lines he could find evidences of discouragement, of homesickness, and of the coming disillusionment on which he was counting to bring her home when her six months of study were over.

It was only when Rose read him Papa Claude’s lengthy effusions that his heart misgave him.  Papa Claude announced that Eleanor was sweeping everything before her at the dramatic school, where her beauty and talent were causing much comment, and that he had not been mistaken when he had foreseen her destiny, and, “single-handed against the world,” forced its fulfilment.

Usually, upon reading one of Papa Claude’s pyrotechnical efforts, Quin went to see Madam Bartlett.  After all, he and the old lady were paddling in the same canoe, and their only chance of success was in pulling together.

As the end of the six months of probation approached, Madam became more and more anxious.  Ever since Eleanor’s high-handed departure she had been undergoing a metamorphosis.  Like most autocrats, the only things of which she took notice were the ones that impeded her progress.  When they proved sufficiently formidable to withstand annihilation, she awarded them the respect that was their due.  Eleanor’s childish whim, heretofore crushed under her disapprobation, now loomed as a terrifying possibility.  The girl had proved her mettle by living through the winter on a smaller allowance than Madam paid her cook.  She had shown perseverance and pluck, and an amazing ability to get along without the aid of the family.  In a few months she would be of age, and with the small legacy left her by her spendthrift father, would be in a position to snap her fingers in the face of authority.

“If it weren’t for that fool Phipps I’d have her home in twenty-four hours,” Madam declared to Quin.  “She’ll be wanting to take a professional engagement next.”

Quin tried to reassure her, but his words rang hollow.  He too was growing anxious as the months passed and Eleanor showed no sign of returning.  He longed to throw his influence with Madam’s in trying to induce her to come back before it was too late.  The only thing that deterred him was his sense of fair play to Eleanor.

“You let Miss Nell work it out for herself,” he advised; “don’t threaten, her or persuade her or bribe her.  Leave her alone.  She’s got more common sense than you think.  I bet she’ll get enough of it by May.”

“Well, if she doesn’t, I’m through with her, and you can tell her so.  I meant to make Eleanor a rich woman, but, mark my word, if she goes on the stage I’ll rewrite my will and cut her off without a penny.  I’ll even entail what I leave Isobel and Enid.  I’ll make her sorry for what she’s done!”

But with the approach of spring it was Madam who was sorry and not Eleanor.  Quin’s sympathies were roused every time he saw the old lady.  Her affection and anxiety fought constantly against her pride and bitterness.  For hours at a time she would talk to him about Eleanor, hungrily snatching at every crumb of news, and yet refusing to pen a line of conciliation.

“If she can do without me, I can do without her,” she would say stubbornly.

Quin’s business brought him to the Bartlett home oftener than usual these days.  For twenty years Madam and Mr. Bangs, as partners in the firm of Bartlett & Bangs, had tried to run in opposite directions on the same track, with the result that head-on collisions were of frequent occurrence.  Since Randolph Bartlett’s retirement from the firm, Quin had succeeded him as official switchman, and had proven himself an adept.  His skill in handling the old lady was soon apparent to Mr. Bangs, who lost no time in utilizing it.

One afternoon in April, when Quin was busily employed at his desk, his eyes happened to fall upon a calendar, the current date of which was circled in red ink.  The effect of the discovery was immediate.  His energetic mood promptly gave way to one of extreme languor, and his gaze wandered from the papers in his hand across the grimy roof tops.

This time last year he and Miss Nell had made their first pilgrimage to Valley Mead.  It was just such a day as this, warm and lazy, with big white clouds loafing off there in the west.  He wondered if the peach trees were in bloom now, and whether the white violets were coming up along the creek-bank.  How happy and contented Miss Nell always seemed in the country!  She had never known before what the outdoor life was like.  How he would like to take her hunting for big game up in the Maine woods, or camping out in the Canadian Rockies with old Cherokee Jo for a guide!  Or better still, here his fancy bolted completely, if he could only slip with her aboard a transport and make a thirty days’ voyage through the South Seas!

It was at this transcendent stage of his reveries that a steely voice at his elbow observed: 

“You seem to be finding a great deal to interest you in that smokestack, young man!”

Quin descended from his height with brisk embarrassment.

“Anything you wanted, sir?” he asked.

Mr. Bangs looked about cautiously to make sure that nobody was in ear-shot, then he said abruptly: 

“I want you to come out to my place with me for overnight.  I want to talk with you.”

Quin’s amazement at this request was so profound that for a moment he did not answer.  Surmises as to the nature of the business ranged from summary dismissal to acceptance into the firm.  Never in his experience at the factory had any employee been recognized unofficially by Mr. Bangs.  To all appearances, he lived in a large limousine which deposited him at the office at exactly eight-thirty and collected him again on the stroke of four.  Rumor hinted, however, that he owned a place in the suburbs, and that the establishment was one that did not invite publicity.

“Very well, sir,” said Quin.  “What time shall I be ready?”

“We will start at once,” said Mr. Bangs, leading the way to the door.

On the drive out, Quin’s efforts at conversation met with small encouragement.  Mr. Bangs responded only when he felt like it, and did not scruple to leave an observation, or even a question, permanently suspended in an embarrassing silence.  Quin soon found it much more interesting to commune with himself.  It was exciting to conjecture what was about to happen, and what effect it would have on his love affair.  If he got a raise, would he be justified in putting his fate to the test?  All spring he had fought the temptation of going to New York in the hope that by waiting he would have more to offer.  If by any miracle of grace Miss Nell should yield him the slightest foothold, he must be prepared to storm the citadel and take possession at once.

The abrupt turn of the automobile into a somber avenue of locusts recalled him to the present, and he looked about him curiously.  Mr. Bangs had not been satisfied to build his habitation far from town; he had taken, the added precaution to place it a mile back from the road.  It was a somewhat pretentious modern house, half hidden by a high hedge.  The window-shades were drawn, the doors were closed.  The only signs of life about the place were a porch chair, still rocking as if from recent occupation, and a thin blue scarf that had evidently been dropped in sudden flight.

Mr. Bangs let himself in with a latch-key, and led the way into a big dreary room that was evidently meant for a library.  A handsome suite of regulation mahogany furniture did its best to justify the room’s claim to its title, but rows of empty bookshelves yawned derision at the pretense.

Mr. Bangs lit the electrolier, and, motioning Quin to a chair, sat down heavily.  Now that he had achieved a guest, he seemed at a loss to know what to do with him.

“Do you play chess?” he asked abruptly.

“I can play ’most anything,” Quin boasted.  “Poker’s my specialty.”

For an hour they bent over the chess-board, and Quin was conscious of those piercing black eyes studying him and grimly approving when he made a good play.  For the first time, he began to rather like Mr. Bangs, and to experience a thrill of satisfaction in winning his good opinion.

Only once was the game interrupted.  The colored chauffeur who had driven them out came to the door and asked: 

“Shall I lay the table for two or three, sir?”

Mr. Bangs lifted his head long enough to give him one annihilating glance.

“I have but one guest,” he said significantly.  “Set the table for two.”

The dinner was one of the best Quin had ever tasted, and his frank enjoyment of it, and franker comment, seemed further to ingratiate him with Mr. Bangs, who waxed almost agreeable in discussing the various viands.

After dinner they returned to the library and lit their cigars, and Quin waited hopefully.

This time he was not to be disappointed.

“Graham,” said Mr. Bangs, “what salary are you drawing?”

“One hundred and fifty, sir.”

“How long have you been at the factory?”

“A year last February.”

“Not so long as I thought.  You are satisfied, I take it?”

Quin saw his chance and seized it.

“It’s all right until I can get something better.”

Mr. Bangs relit his cigar, and took his time about it.  Then he blew out the match and threw it on the floor.

“I am looking for a new traffic manager,” he said.

“What’s the matter with Mr. Shields?” Quin inquired in amazement.

“I have fired him.  He talks too much.  I want a man to manage traffic, not to superintend a Sunday-school.”

“But Mr. Shields has been there for years!”

“That’s the trouble.  I want a younger man one who is abreast of the times, familiar with modern methods.”

Quin’s heart leaped within him.  Could Mr. Bangs be intimating that he, Quinby Graham, with one year and four months’ experience, might step over the heads of all of those older and more experienced aspirants into the empty shoes of the former traffic manager?

The South Seas seemed to flow just around the corner.

“I have been considering the matter,” continued Mr. Bangs, catching a white moth between his thumb and forefinger and taking apparent pleasure in its annihilation, “and I’ve decided not to get a new man in for the summer, but to let you take the work for the present and see what you can do with it.”

Quin’s joy was so swift and sudden that even the formidable banks of Mr. Bangs’s presence could not keep it from overflowing.

“I can handle it as easy as falling off a log!” he cried excitedly.  “I know every State in the Union and then some.  Of course, I hate to see old Shields go, but he is a slow-coach.  I’ll put it all over him!  You’ll see if I don’t!”

“I am not so sure about that,” said Mr. Bangs.  “Shields had the sense to do what he was told without arguing the matter.”

Quin laughed joyously.  “Right you are!” he agreed.  “I’d have come out of the service with a couple of bars on my shoulders if I hadn’t argued so much.  I don’t know what gets into me, but when I see a better way of running things I just have to say so.”

“Well, I don’t want you to say so to me,” warned Mr. Bangs.  “There are certain business methods that we’ve got to observe, whether we like them or not.  Take the matter of listing freight, for instance.  That’s where Shields fell down.  He knows perfectly well that there isn’t a successful firm in the country that doesn’t classify its stuff under the head that calls for the lowest freight rates.”

“How do you mean?”

Mr. Bangs proceeded to explain, concluding his remarks with the observation that you couldn’t afford to be too particular in these matters.

“But it is beating the railroads, isn’t it?”

“The railroads can afford it.  They lose no chance to gouge the manufacturers.  It’s like taxes.  The government knows that everybody is going to dodge them, and so it allows for it.  Nobody is deceived, and nobody is the worse for it.  Human nature is what it is, and you can’t change it.”

“Does the traffic manager have to classify the exports?” Quin asked.

“Certainly; that and routing the cars is his principal business.  It’s a difficult and responsible position in many ways, and I have my doubts about your being able to fill it.”

“I can fill it all right,” said Quin, as confidently as before, but with a certain loss of enthusiasm.  Upon the shining brows of his great opportunity he had spied the incipient horns of a dilemma.

For the next two hours Mr. Bangs explained in detail the duties of the new position, going into each phase of the matter with such efficient thoroughness that Quin forgot his scruples in his absorbed interest in the recital.  It was no wonder, he said to himself, that Mr. Bangs was one of the most successful manufacturers in the South.  A man who was not only an executive and administrator, but who could make with his own hands the most complicated farming implement in his factory, was one to command respect.  Even if he did not like him personally, it was a great thing to work under him, to have his approval, to be trusted by him.

When Quin went up to his room at eleven o’clock, his head was whirling with statistics and other newly acquired facts, which he spent an hour recording in his note-book.

It was not until he went to bed and lay staring into the darkness that the mental tumult subsided and the moral tumult began.  The questions that he had resolutely kept in abeyance all evening began to dance in impish insistence before him.  What right had he to take Shields’s place, when he had said exactly the things that Shields had been fired for saying?  Did he want to go the way Shields had gone, compromising with his conscience in order to keep his job, ashamed to face his fellow man, cringing, remorseful, unhappy?

Then Mr. Bangs’s arguments came back to him, specious, practical, convincing.  Business was like politics; you could keep out if you didn’t like it, but if you went in you must play the game as others played it or lose out.  Five hundred a month!  Why, a fellow wouldn’t be ashamed to ask even a rich girl to marry him on that!  The thought was balm to his pride.

As he lay there thinking, he was conscious of a disturbing sound in the adjoining room, and he lifted his head to listen.  It sounded like some one crying not a violent outburst, but the hopeless, steady sobbing of despair.  His thoughts flew back to that blue scarf on the porch, to the inquiry about an extra seat at the table.  They were true, then, those rumors about the lonely, unhappy woman whom Mr. Bangs had kept a virtual prisoner for years.  Quin wondered if she was young, if she was pretty.  A fierce sympathy for her seized him as he listened to her sobs on the other side of the wall.  What a beast a man was to put a woman in a position like that!

His wrath, thus kindled, threw Mr. Bangs’s other characteristics into startling relief.  He saw him at the head of his firm, hated and despised by every employee.  He saw him deceiving Madam Bartlett, sneering at Mr. Ranny’s efforts at reform, terrorizing little Miss Leaks.  Then he had a swift and relentless vision of himself in his new position, a well trained automaton, expected to execute Mr. Bangs’s orders not only in the factory but in the Bartlett household as well.

He tossed restlessly on his pillow.  If only that woman would stop crying, perhaps he could get a better line on the thing!  But she did not stop, and somehow while she cried he could see nothing good in Bangs or what he stood for.  Hour after hour his ambition and his love fought against his principles, and dawn found him still awake, staring at the ceiling.

Going back to town after an early breakfast, he said to Mr. Bangs: 

“I’ve been thinking it over, sir, and if you don’t mind I think I’ll keep the position I’ve got.”

“What do you mean?” demanded Mr. Bangs.  “You decline the promotion?”

“I am afraid I am not the man for the job,” said Quin.

“That’s for me to decide.”

Quin was visibly embarrassed.  After his enthusiasm of the night before, his present attitude called for an explanation.

“Well, you see,” he said awkwardly, “it may be good business and all that, but there are some things a fellow can’t do when he feels about them the way I do.”

“Meaning, I suppose, that your standards are so much higher than those of the rest of us that you cannot trade in the market-place?”

“No, sir; I don’t mean anything of the kind,” Quin flashed back, hot at the accusations of self-righteousness, but unable to defend himself without criticizing his employer.

“And this is final?  You’ve definitely decided?”

“I have.”

“Very well; I am through with you.”  And Mr. Bangs unfolded his newspaper and read it the rest of the way to the city.

At the office door he was dismounting from the car with his silence still unbroken, when Quin asked nervously: 

“Shall I go on with my old job, sir?”

Mr. Bangs wheeled upon him, his eyes like fiery gimlets.

“No!” he thundered.  “You needn’t go on with anything!  For six months I have wasted time trying to teach you something about business.  I’ve pushed you along faster than your ability warranted.  I’ve given you a chance to quadruple your salary.  And what is the result?  You give me a lot of hot air about your conscience.  Why don’t you get a soap-box and preach on the street-corners?  You can draw your money and go.  There is no room on my pay-roll for angels!”

And, with a contemptuous shrug, he passed into the factory, leaving Quin standing dazed and appalled on the sidewalk.