The Eternal Masculine; Stories of Men and Boys (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text, images, or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1913. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... THE CAPTAINS THE CAPTAINS 1 HERE was consternation in the great offices of Marcus Trefethen, for the chief had given an order that could not be understood. It was a sentence of twelve words, but its result, carried out, would be the sacrifice of more dollars than might be calmly contemplated. Beside infinite further consequences --throwing away, for instance, the glory, now almost in reach of these offices, of seeing their head the richest man on earth; that was a probable result if the twelve words went into action. It is easier to knock things to pieces than to build them. A great fortune assured, a great place in the financial world won, a future tremendous enough for a Dumas romance lying a few steps on--and the man who had done the work was tossing these immensities from him like playthings. What did it mean? Three men skilled in affairs, in touch with the delicate pulse of business life, bent their heads together and discussed it. Friday the policy of the office had been in the full vigor of its unhurrying, unrelenting swing. Saturday the chief had been restless, and had gone away and left things in a plastic form which needed his master-touch--an action out of character. And the first thing on this Monday was the extraordinary order. As long as they dared they discussed it, Compton and Barnes and Haywood, the three who stood next the throne, and at length, not overcagerly, Compton knocked and went into the inner room of the great man and closed the door. He emerged five minutes later with a slight dizziness in his air. He answered the inquiry of his associates' attentive silence. "It's so," he said. "The order is to be carried out. He's gone clean mad. 'All negotiations as to the Southwestern road to be stopped at once.'" In the inner room a man ...