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himself, "I'm not whipped. I'm still young. I'll get out of this in some way yet. Certainly I will. I'll
find some way out."
And so, cogitating heavily, wearily, he began to undress. Finally he sank upon his bed, and in a
little while, strange as it may seem, with all the tangle of trouble around him, slept. He could do
that--sleep and gurgle most peacefully, the while his father paced the floor in his room, refusing
to be comforted. All was dark before the older man--the future hopeless. Before the younger
man was still hope.
And in her room Lillian Cowperwood turned and tossed in the face of this new calamity. For it
had suddenly appeared from news from her father and Frank and Anna and her mother-in-law
that Frank was about to fail, or would, or had--it was almost impossible to say just how it was.
Frank was too busy to explain. The Chicago fire was to blame. There was no mention as yet of
the city treasurership. Frank was caught in a trap, and was fighting for his life.
In this crisis, for the moment, she forgot about the note as to his infidelity, or rather ignored it.
She was astonished, frightened, dumbfounded, confused. Her little, placid, beautiful world was
going around in a dizzy ring. The charming, ornate ship of their fortune was being blown most
ruthlessly here and there. She felt it a sort of duty to stay in bed and try to sleep; but her eyes
were quite wide, and her brain hurt her. Hours before Frank had insisted that she should not
bother about him, that she could do nothing; and she had left him, wondering more than ever
what and where was the line of her duty. To stick by her husband, convention told her; and so
she decided. Yes, religion dictated that, also custom. There were the children. They must not be
injured. Frank must be reclaimed, if possible. He would get over this. But what a blow!
Chapter XXXI
The suspension of the banking house of Frank A. Cowperwood & Co. created a great stir on
'change and in Philadelphia generally. It was so unexpected, and the amount involved was
comparatively so large. Actually he failed for one million two hundred and fifty thousand dollars;
and his assets, under the depressed condition of stock values, barely totaled seven hundred
and fifty thousand dollars. There had been considerable work done on the matter of his balance-
sheet before it was finally given to the public; but when it was, stocks dropped an additional
three points generally, and the papers the next day devoted notable headlines to it.
Cowperwood had no idea of failing permanently; he merely wished to suspend temporarily, and
later, if possible, to persuade his creditors to allow him to resume. There were only two things
which stood in the way of this: the matter of the five hundred thousand dollars borrowed from
the city treasury at a ridiculously low rate of interest, which showed plainer than words what had
been going on, and the other, the matter of the sixty-thousand-dollar check. His financial wit had
told him there were ways to assign his holdings in favor of his largest creditors, which would
tend to help him later to resume; and he had been swift to act. Indeed, Harper Steger had
drawn up documents which named Jay Cooke & Co., Edward Clark & Co., Drexel & Co., and
others as preferred. He knew that even though dissatisfied holders of smaller shares in his
company brought suit and compelled readjustment or bankruptcy later, the intention shown to
prefer some of his most influential aids was important. They would like it, and might help him
later when all this was over. Besides, suits in plenty are an excellent way of tiding over a crisis
of this kind until stocks and common sense are restored, and he was for many suits. Harper
Steger smiled once rather grimly, even in the whirl of the financial chaos where smiles were few,
as they were figuring it out.
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