The Saturday Evening Post/The Dollar Chasers/Chapter 1
I
IT WAS a lovely, calm evening in San Francisco, and the sun was going down on Simon Porter's wrath. An old habit of the sun's—often it rose to find Simon in an equally turbulent mood, for twenty years of daily newspaper editing had jangled Simon's nerves and wrath sprang eternal in his human breast.
He crossed the city room in his quest of the youngest—and, as it happened, the ablest—of his reporters. The boy he sought was seated before one of the copy-desk telephones, gazing fondly into the transmitter and speaking honeyed words.
“Say, that's mighty kind of you, Sally.… No, haven't heard about it yet, but I probably will.… Tomorrow night at six. Pier 99. I'll be there. And I may add that in the interval, time will go by on lagging feet. No, I said lagging. It's poetry. See you tomorrow, Sally. Good-by.”
He turned to meet the chill eye of his managing editor.
“Ah,” Simon Porter said, “so you call her Sally.”
“Yes, sir,” Bill Hammond answered respectfully. “It saves time.”
“Does old Jim Batchelor know how you address his only child?”
“Probably not. He's a busy man.”
“He'll be a lot busier when he hears about you. He'll have you boiled in oil. A newspaper reporter at fifty a week!”
“A mere pittance,” Bill Hammond agreed, and would have pursued that topic further.
“All you're worth,” added the editor hastily. “I suppose the girl told you. I begin to see now. The whole idea came from her.”
“She mentioned a delightful possibility,” said the boy. “However, I take my orders from you.”
Simon Porter relapsed into wrath.
“Gives me about enough reporters to get out a good high-school magazine,” he cried. “And then sends one of them off on a picnic to please a girl!”
“Yes, sir,” put in Bill Hammond brightly.
“I'm speaking of our respected owner. He's just called up—you're to go aboard Jim Batchelor's yacht for a week-end cruise to Monterey. Golf at Del Monte and Pebble Beach; and if there's anything else you want, ask for it. The launch will be at Pier 99 tomorrow evening at six. But you appear to know all this.”
“It sounds more authentic when you say it, sir.”
“Bah! It's an assignment. I don't suppose she told you that.”
“No, sir. She didn't mention sordid things.”
“There's been an Englishman named Mikklesen afflicting this town for the past week. He's just back from ten years in the Orient and he isn't fond of the Japs. Neither is Jim Batchelor. Neither is our beloved owner. You're to listen to Mikklesen talk and write up his opinions.”
“Sounds easy,” commented Bill Hammond.
“It's a cinch. Listening to Mikklesen talk is what those who hang round with him don't do nothing else but. All rot though. With real news breaking every minute—and me short of men!”
He started to move away.
“Er—I presume I don't come in tomorrow,” suggested the reporter.
His chief glared at him.
“Who says you don't? That line you got off about time going by on lagging feet—you spoke too soon. It won't lag. I'll attend to that—personally. You report tomorrow as usual.”
“Yes, sir,” answered Bill Hammond meekly. A hard man, he reflected.
“And listen to me.” The managing editor retraced his steps. “About this Sally Batchelor—I suppose she's easy to look at?”
“No trouble at all.”
“Well, you keep your mind on your work.” His expression softened. “Not a chance in the world, my lad. Old Jim Batchelor couldn't see you with the telescope over at Lick Observatory. It's money, money, money with him.”
“Well, You Keep Your Mind on Your Work.” His Expression Softened. “Not a Chance in the World, My Lad”
“So I've heard.”
“He's still got the first dollar he ever earned. He'll show it to you. Where is the first dollar you earned?”
“Somebody,” said Bill Hammond, “got it away from me.”
“Precisely. That's where you and old Jim are different. I'm telling you. I don't want to see a good reporter go wrong.”
“A good reporter, sir?”
“That's what I said.”
Bill Hammond smiled. It brightened the corner where he was.
“Tomorrow,” he ventured, “is Friday—the day before the pay check.”
“I'll give you an order on the cashier,” said Simon. He wrote on a slip of paper and handed it over.
“Twenty-five dollars!” Bill Hammond read. “And I was thinking of a yachting suit!”
Simon Porter smiled grimly.
“You take your other shirt and go aboard. Your rôle is not to dazzle. I've just got through telling you.”
And he strode away to the cubby-hole where he did his editing.
His departure left Bill Hammond alone in the city room, for this was an evening paper and the last edition was on the street. Jim Batchelor's prospective guest remained seated by the copy desk. He was, to judge from his expression, doing a bit of thinking. Some of his thoughts appeared to be pleasant ones, while others were not so much so. The grave mingled with the gay, and this had been true of his reveries ever since that exciting day when he first met Sally Batchelor.
Sent by his paper to cover a charity fête for the benefit of some orphanage, he had caught his first glimpse of Sally's trim figure while she was yet afar off. Instantly, something had happened to his heart. It had been, up to that moment, a heart that had lain singularly dormant in the presence of the opposite sex. But now it leaped up, threw off its lethargy and prepared to get into action. It urged him to fight his way at once to this young woman's side.
Arrived in that pleasant neighborhood, he realized that his initial impression, startling and vivid as it had been, had not done the poor girl justice. She smiled upon him, and his heart seemed to say that this was the smile it had been waiting for. She was selling flowers, her prices were exorbitant; but the soft, lovely voice in which she named them made them sound absurdly reasonable. The somewhat unsteady Bill Hammond became her steady customer. Gladly he handed her all the money he had; and in other ways, too, it would have been evident to an onlooker that he was ready and willing to take her as his life's companion. If not, why not?
The answer was not slow in coming. Some busybody insisted on introducing them, and at mention of her name Bill Hammond knew that this girl was, alas, not one of the orphans. True, she had at the moment only one parent—but what a parent! Jim Batchelor, president of the Batchelor Construction Company, was the sort of man who never let an obstacle stand in his way; but as an obstacle he himself had, off and on, stood firmly in the way of a good many other people. And he would certainly make the stand of his life in the path of any practically penniless young man who had the audacity to admire his daughter.
This bitter thought clouded the remaining moments Bill Hammond spent in the girl's company, and presently he left the charity fête, resolved never to speak to her again. But as time went on it began to appear that the afternoon had been more eventful for him than for any one else, the orphans included. He had fallen in love.
Love comes to many as a blessed annoyance, and so it came to Bill Hammond. Up to that moment he had been happy and carefree; which is to say, he had been young in San Francisco, no more appropriate city in which to spend one's youth having as yet been built by man. Now he had a great deal on his mind. Should he give up all thought of the girl and go his way a broken man? Or should he get busy and acquire such wealth that his own paper would speak of the subsequent marriage as the union of two great fortunes? Generally, he favored the latter course, though the means to wealth did not appear to be at hand, as any one who has worked on a newspaper will appreciate.
Meanwhile he was accepting dinner and dance invitations of the sort he had previously eluded. If his plan was to avoid Sally Batchelor, it did not work. She was frequently among those present, and, seemingly unaware of the vast difference in their stations, she continued to smile upon him. A sort of friendship—nothing more, of course—grew up between them. She accepted his escort occasionally, had tea with him at the St. Francis. And now she had arranged for him to go on this yachting trip and meet her famous father. He was to beard the mighty lion in his palatial floating den.
He was, there in the dusk of the city room, a bit appalled at the idea. Ridiculous, of course. Why should he fear Jim Batchelor? As far as family went, he had all the better of it. His ancestors had been professional men and scholars, while Jim Batchelor's were neatly placing one brick in close juxtaposition to another. But money—ah, money. Those few bonds his father had left him, the paltry additional bunch that would be his when Aunt Ella died—chicken feed in the eyes of Batchelor, no doubt. In this cold world only cash counted.
Cynical thoughts, these; he put them from him. The spirit of adventure began to stir in his broad chest. Sally had been kind enough to arrange this party; she would find he was no quitter. He would go and meet this demon father face to face. He would discover what it was all about—the awe with which men spoke of the money king. Probably a human being, like anybody else. Yes, as Simon had suggested, he would take his other shirt
Suddenly his thoughts took a new and more practical turn. He pictured himself arrayed for dinner on the Batchelor yacht. In what? There was, he recalled, not a single clean dress shirt in his room, and his laundry would not be returned until Saturday. As for buying new linen, the dent in that twenty-five dollars would be serious. What to do?
He pondered. Beyond, in the cubby-hole known—secretly—among the reporters as the kennel, he saw Simon Porter frowning savagely over a rival paper's last edition. Should he ask more money from Simon? The profile was not encouraging. Then into his mind flashed the picture of a Chinese laundry on Kearny Street he had passed many times. It was, according to the sign, the establishment of Honolulu Sam, and a crudely lettered placard in the window bore this promise:
Laundry Left Before Eight a.m.
BACK SAME DAY
What could be fairer than that? Honolulu Sam solved the problem.
Bill Hammond rose, called a good night to the man in the cubby-hole and was on his way. It was his plan to go somewhere for a brief and lonely dinner, then hurry to his apartment, gather up his laundry and place it in the hands of the speedy Honolulu Sam at once. After which he would return home and get a good night's sleep. It had been a long time since he'd had one, and he felt the need of it.
But such resolutions are rarely kept in San Francisco. Men hurry to their work in the morning, promising themselves that it will be early to bed that night for them. And then, late in the afternoon, the fog comes rolling in, and vim and vigor take the place of that cold-gray-dawn sensation. As a consequence, another pleasant evening is had by all.
Bill Hammond met some friends at dinner, and when he finally returned to his apartment it was too late to disturb the Chinaman from Hawaii. He made a neat bundle of his proposed laundry, set his alarm clock for six and turned in.
“Get lots of sleep on the yacht,” he promised himself.
At 7:30 next morning he stood at the counter of Honolulu Sam.
“Back 5:30 this afternoon,” he ordered loudly.
“Back same day. Maybe seven, maybe eight.”
“Five-thirty,” repeated Bill Hammond firmly.
Sam stared at him with a glassy eye and slowly shook his head.
“Dollar extra for you if you do it,” added Bill, and laid the currency on the counter.
Sam appropriated it.
“Can do,” he admitted.
“All right,” said Bill. “I'll depend on you.” He had meant the dollar only as an evidence of good faith, to be paid later. But no matter. A Chinaman always kept his word.
He went out into what was practically the dawn, feeling confident of the future. With five clean shirts and other apparel in proportion, let them bring on their yacht. Easy, nonchalant, debonair, he would make himself the pride of the deep—and of Sally. Ah, Sally! At the corner of Post and Kearny, the flower venders were setting out their wares. Bill took a deep breath. Life was a garden of blossoms.
When he reached the office, Simon Porter robbed the garden of its fragrance by sending him on a difficult assignment. All day he was kept hustling, with no time for lunch. It was exactly 5:30 when he grabbed his suitcase and set out for the bounding wave. Simon met him at the door and bowed low.
“Bon voyage, little brother of the rich,” he said. “By the way, I've just heard you're to have a very distinguished fellow passenger.”
“Of course. The Prince of Wales.”
“Nobody so jolly—Henry T. Frost.”
“What? Old Henry Frost?”
“Our beloved owner, our dear employer, the good master who has it in his power to sell us all down the river—and would do it without batting an eye. Here's your chance. Make the most of it, win his love and respect, and when I die of overwork, as I certainly shall inside a week, maybe he'll give you my job.”
“I can't say I'm yearning to meet him,” admitted Bill Hammond.
“You're talking sense. I've met him at least three hundred times, and I've always had cause to regret it. You know, something tells me you'd better stay at home. You could develop whooping cough, and I could send one of the other boys.”
“Nonsense!”
“Today is Friday.”
“What of it?”
“Friday the thirteenth. Does that mean nothing to you?”
“Not a thing, sir. See you later.”
“Well, fools rush i” began Simon, but Bill Hammond had disappeared.