"Wait a few months," he told Helen, "and well go off for a trip to Europe. When we return we'll settle down in the suburbs."
Helen smiled. She knew that they would never go to Europe. She also knew that they would never move out of town. Templeton dwelt in Wall Street. He lived it, he breathed it. Wall Street was New York to him.
However she wouldn't have changed him one iota. She loved him as he was, even though he pored over newspapers and reports all through his meals and sometimes passed a whole evening in her company without ever knowing she was with him.
That year was an important one for Templeton, for not only did he get married, but he decided to go into business for himself. With a pang of regret he severed his connections with Brown Brothers. The years he had spent with them had been splendid ones. He had been happy. He had learned much. It had been a liberal education. They wanted to keep him with them. They pleaded and argued, offered him an increase in wages but he shook his head. The time had come for him to strike out for himself. He longed for position, wealth, power.
He took a small suite of offices over Hazeltine's Restaurant on Broad Street. Helen had helped him to select the furniture for it.
"After all," she said, "a man's office is a sort of second home, and it ought to be as comfortable as possible."
She had insisted that he include in the furniture several bookcases and a mahogany library table, huge leather chairs and a smoking cabinet. Her own contribution was a few of the latest books, The Crisis by Winston Churchill, Kim by Rudyard Kipling, The Octopus by Frank Norris, The Making of an American by Jacob A. Riis and The First Men in the Moon by Herbert G. Wells.
"The books are fine," he drawled, "but who's going to read them?"
"I can help supply the setting," she laughed, "but I certainly can't supply the customers."
30
