Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1927-08-28


ing her, except by the bell. two feet
| over his head
The clock licked past o'clock.
| Ten minutes later Henry McComas
heard the doorbell ring. If Mrs. Cor.
coran was in the kitchen, she would
| hear it, too Op the contrary, if she
was in her room, with the door shut,
she would hear nothing.
| He waited, listening intently for the
sound of footsteps. A minute passed
Two minutes. The bell rang again.
Mrs. Corcoran" he cried desper-
ately.
Sweat began to roll from his fore
head. Again he made a last, mighty
effort to kick his limbs into life. Not
a movement. not a sound, except n
third peal of the bell, impatient and
sustained this time, singing like a
trumpet of doom in his ear.
| X X r
| Tor a year and half Henry Nc
Comas lay in darkened rooms and
| fought his way back to life. A special
| list explained that certain nervous sys-
| TENS were so constituted that only the
| individual could judge what was or
| wasn't q strain. The specialist real
| lied that a host of hypochondriacs
| imposed upon this fact to nurse and
| pamber themselves through life, when
| in reality they were as hardy as the
| policeman on the corner, but it was,
nevertheless, a fact. Henry McComas'
| large, lazy body had been the protec-
| ton and insulation of a nervous inten-
| sity as fine and taut as a hair-wire.
| With proper rest, it functioned brill
| liantly for three or four hours a day
| fatigued ever so slightly over the dan
ger line, it snapped like a straw.
Stella listened, her face wan and
white. Then she went to Ted Drink
water and told him what the specialist
had said Drinkwater remarked that
specialists were paid to invent non
sense. He was sorry, but business
| must go on, and he thought it best
that the partnership be dissolved. He
didn't blame Henry, but he couldn't
forget that, because his partner didn't
see fit to keep in condition. they had
missed the opportunity of lifetime.
After a year Henry McComaS found
that he could move his arms. From
that hour onward he grew well. In
1919 he went into business for him.
self, with very little except his abili-
ties and his good name. In 1926 his
name alone was good for several mil
lions dollars.
X X X
WHAT follows is another story.
w There are different people in it.
and it takes place when Henry Nc
Comas' personal problems are more
or less satisfactorily solved. Yet it
belongs to what has gone before. 1t
concerns Henry McComds' daughter.
Honoria was 10. with her fathers
yellow hair, her mothers small.
pointed chin. and eyes that she might
have invented herself. deep-set yellow
eyes, with short, stiff eyelashes that
sprang from them like the emanations
from a star in picture. She eX-
pected to be married in the Fall.
Whom to marry was another mat
ter There was a man who Travelled
between London and Chicago, playing
in golf tournaments. If she married
him, she would be sure of seeing her
husband every time he passed through
New York. There was Max Van Camp,
unreliable, she thought, but cookbook
ing in a brisk. sketchy way. There
was dark man named Stranger, who
played polo and would probably beat
her with a riding crop. And there
was Russell Goldman, her fathers
right hand man, whom she liked best
Of all.
He was not unlike her father In
MANY ways-sloW in thought, leisurely
and inclined to stoutnesS-and these
qualities had first brought him to
Henry McComas' favor. He had
genial manner and hearty. confident
smile, and he had made up his mind
about Honoria three years before. But
he hadn't asked her to marry him,
and though this annoyed HOnoria. she
IL. s.. -hn ~ TNf nd n
secure and successful before ne asked
her to share his life.
Max Van Camp. on the other hand,
had asked her a dozen times. He was
a uuick-witted young man of the new
school. continually bubbling over with
new schemes that never got beyond
McComas' waste paper basket-one of
those curious VagabOndS of business
who drift from position to position and
vet manage to keep moving in an up
ward direction all their lives. He had
in McComaS' office the year
before, bearing an Introductory letter
from q friend.
He got the position. Neither he nor
his employer, nor any one in the office, |
was quite sure what the position was. |
McComas was interested in exporting !
in real estate developments, and. as a
venture. in the possibilities of carry
ing the chain-Store idea into new |
fields.
Van Camp wrote advertising, inves- |
tigated properties and accomplished |
such vague duties as might come I'M !
der the phrase. "We1l get Van Camp |
to do that" He gave the effect al |
ways of putting much more clamor |
and energy into a thing than it re-
uuired and there were those who, |
because he often wasted himself like |
an unemployed dynamo, called him 2
bluff and pronounced that he was |
usually wrong.
whats the matter with you young
Henry McComas said to
him. You seem to think business is
some sort of trick game, discovered |
about 1910, that nobody ever heard of |
before Business sense IS just COM
mon sense with your personal re-
behind it-nothing more"
1--WE heard Mr.. Goldman say that"
agreed Max Van Camp meekly.
Hes probably right. See here
he looked at Van Camp. "How would
YOU like a little competition with that
I'll put up bonus of
$500 on who comes in ahead"
I'D like nothing better. Mr.. Nc
Comas.'
"Al right Now listen. We've got
retail hardware stores in every city
Of over a thousand population in Ohio
md Indiana. Some fellow named Nc
league is horning in on the idea
he's taken the towns of twenty thou !
sand, and now he's got a chain as
ong as mine. l want to fight him in
he towns of that size. Codman's gone
10 Ohio. Suppose you take Indiana.
Stay six weeks. Go to every town of
over twenty thousand in the State and
ouy up the best hardware stores in
sight"
Suppose can get only the second
Oest?"
DO what you can. There isn't any
lime to waste. because McTeague's
cot a good start on u.s." II