The Fighting Chance

Mortimer turned and hurried to the elevator, hoping to come up with Quarrier in the rotunda, or possibly in the street outside; but he was too late, and, furious to think of the time he had wasted with Plank, he crawled into a hansom and bade the driver take him to a number he gave, designating one of the new limestone basement houses on the upper west side.

All the way up town, as he jolted about in his seat, he angrily regretted the meeting with Plank, even in spite of the cheque. What demon had possessed him to boast--to display his hand when there had been no necessity? Plank was still ready to give him aid at a crisis--had always been ready. Time enough when Plank turned stingy to use persuasion; time enough when Plank attempted to dodge him to employ a club. And now, for no earthly reason, intoxicated with his own vanity, catering to his own long-smouldering resentment, he had used his club on a willing horse--deliberately threatened a man whose gratitude had been good for many a cheque yet.

"Ass that I am!" fumed Mortimer; "now when I'm stuck I'll have to go at him with the club, if I want any money out of him. Confound him, he's putting me in a false position! He's trying to make it look like extortion! I won't do it! I'm no blackmailer! I'll starve, before I go to him again! No blundering, clumsy Dutchman can make a blackmailer out of me by holding hands with that scoundrelly wife of mine! That's the reason he did it, too! Between them they are trying to make my loans from Plank look like blackmail! It would serve them right if I took them up--if I called their bluff, and stuck Plank up in earnest! But I won't, to please them! I won't do any dirty thing like that, to humour them! Not much!"

He lay back, rolling about in the jouncing cab, scowling at space.

"Not much!" he repeated. "I'll shake down Quarrier, though! I'll make him pay for his treachery--scaring me out of Amalgamated! That will be restitution, not extortion!"

He was the angrier because he had been for days screwing up his courage to the point of seeking Quarrier face to face. He had not wished to do it; the scene, and his own attitude in it, could only be repugnant to him, although he continually explained to himself that it was restitution, not extortion.

But whatever it was, he didn't like to figure in it, and he had hung back as long as circumstances permitted. But his new lodgings and his new friends were expensive; and Plank, he supposed, was off somewhere fishing; so he hung on as long as it was possible; then, exasperated by necessity, started for Quarrier's office, only to miss him by a few seconds because he was fool enough to waste his temper and his opportunity in making an enemy out of a friend!