Masterman and Son   By: W. J. (William James) Dawson (1854-1928)

by

W. J. DAWSON

Author of "A Prophet in Babylon," etc.

NEW YORK CHICAGO TORONTO

Fleming H. Revell Company

LONDON AND EDINBURGH

Copyright, 1909, by

FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY

New York: 158 Fifth Avenue Chicago: 80 Wabash Avenue Toronto: 25 Richmond St., W. London: 21 Paternoster Square Edinburgh: 100 Princes Street

CONTENTS

PART ONE

ARCHIBOLD MASTERMAN

CHAPTER

I. THE MASTER BUILDER II. A DISCUSSION III. THE BIG STRONG BEAST IV. MRS. BUNDY V. THE MAGIC NIGHT VI. YOUNG LOVE VII. ENTER SCALES VIII. THE ACCUSATION IX. THE CONTEST X. THE FAREWELL

PART TWO

THE AMERICAN MADONNA

XI. NEW YORK XII. MR. WILBUR MEREDITH LEGION XIII. ADVENTURES OF AN INCOMPETENT XIV. HE FINDS A FRIEND XV. THE MILLIONAIRE XVI. KOOTENAY XVII. THE NEW LIFE

PART THREE

FATHER AND SON

XVIII. THE AMALGAMATED BRICK CO. XIX. THE FEAR XX. THE RETURN XXI. THE VERDICT XXII. MRS. BUNDY PHILOSOPHISES XXIII. THE LAST HOME XXIV. THE NEW WORLD

PART ONE

ARCHIBOLD MASTERMAN

I

THE MASTER BUILDER

Archibold Masterman, tall, heavily built, muscular, and on the wrong side of fifty, was universally esteemed an excellent specimen of that dubious product of modern commerce, the self made man. At twenty he was a day labourer, at thirty a jobbing builder, at forty a contractor in a large way of business. At that point may be dated the beginning of his social efflorescence. It was then that he began to wear broadcloth on week days, and insisted on a fresh shirt every other day. Hitherto careless of his appearance, he now took a quiet pride in clothes, and discovered the uses of the manicure. A little later he discovered that a man's position in society is judged by the kind of house he lives in, and that it is social wisdom to pay a high rent for a small house in a discreetly "good" locality, rather than a low rent for a much better house in a deteriorated suburb. That was the year in which he purchased Eagle House, a pompous, old fashioned residence standing in its own grounds in Highbourne Gardens.

Highbourne Gardens was one of those London suburbs which contrive to preserve a faint aroma of gentility for many years after the real gentlefolk have left it. It had many old houses of the plain and specious order, inhabited a century ago by great London merchants. In the floors of these houses might be found vast beams of some foreign wood, hard enough to turn the keenest chisel; in the gardens at their backs were copper beeches, mulberry trees, and an occasional cedar of Lebanon. Modern London, with its vast invasion of mean streets, stopped respectfully before the proud exclusiveness of Highbourne Gardens. It was one of the last localities to have roads which were marked "Private," guarded by locked gates, and to employ watchmen in faded liveries, who dwelt in tiny sentry boxes and at stated hours collected the letters of the residents.

It was precisely the kind of neighbourhood for such a man as Archibold Masterman to make his first social experiment, and he was quick to recognise its advantages. Eagle House, Highbourne Gardens, was a thoroughly respectable address; if it did not convey the impression of social distinction, it clearly did imply solid competence, which was a good deal better. Jones, the well known city tailor, lived there, and drove a pair of horses which any lord might envy; there were half a dozen brokers who kept as good tables as any man in London; and there was Loker, the famous manufacturer of soaps, whose rhymed advertisements met the eye in every railway carriage. According to the views of Archibold Masterman, in his present stage of social enlightenment, these illustrious persons composed a real aristocracy of solid merit.