The Brand of Silence. Harrington Strong

Prale, with the suspicion of a sneer in his voice. "Very well, sir! I'll see that the deposit is transferred before night. Perhaps I can find banks that will be glad to take the money and treat me with respect. And I shall remember this, sir!"

      "I—er—have no choice in the matter," the banker said.

      "Can't you explain what it means?"

      "I have nothing to say—nothing at all to say," stammered the financier. "We took the money because of our Honduras correspondent, but we'll appreciate it very much if you do business with some other institution."

      "You can bet I'll do that little thing!" Prale exclaimed.

      He left the office angrily and stalked from the building. Were the big financiers of New York insane? A man with a million in cold cash has the right to expect that he will be treated decently in a bank. Prale walked down the street and grew angrier with every step he took.

      Before going to Honduras he had worked for a firm of brokers. He hurried toward their office now. He would send in his card to his old employer, Griffin, he decided, and ask his advice about banking his funds, and incidentally whether the financier he had just left was an imbecile.

      He found the Griffin concern in the same building, though the offices were twice as large now, and there were evidences of prosperity on every side.

      "Got an appointment?" an office boy demanded.

      "No, but I fancy that Mr. Griffin will see me," said Prale. "I used to work for him years ago."

      Then he sat down to wait. Griffin would be glad to see him, he thought. Griffin was a man who always liked to see younger men get along. He would want to know how Sidney Prale got his million. He would want to take him to luncheon and exhibit him to his friends—tell how one of his young men had forged ahead in the world.

      The boy came back with his card. "Mr. Griffin can't see you," he announced.

      "Oh, he's busy, eh? Did he make an appointment?"

      "No, he ain't busy," said the boy. "He's got his feet set up on the desk and he's readin' about yesterday's ball game. He said to say that he didn't have time to see you this mornin', and that he wouldn't ever have time to see you."

      "Don't be discourteous, you young imp!" Prale said, his face flushing. "You're sure you handed Mr. Griffin my card?"

      "Oh, I handed it to him—and don't you try to run any bluff on me!" the boy answered. "From the way the boss acted, I guess you don't stand very high with him!"

      The boy went back to his chair, and Sidney Prale went from the office, a puzzled and angry man. There probably was some mistake, he told himself. He'd meet Griffin during the day and tell him about the adventure.

      He was anxious to meet some of the men with whom he had worked ten years before, but he did not know where to find them. He'd have to wait and ask Griffin what had become of them. Then, too, he wanted to transfer his funds.

      Prale got another taxicab and started making the rounds of the banks he knew to be solid institutions. Within a few hours he had made arrangements to transfer the account, using four financial institutions. He said nothing, except that the money had been transferred to the trust company from Honduras, because the company had a correspondent there.

      His funds secure, Prale went back uptown and to the hotel. The clerk handed him a note with his key. Prale tore it open after he stepped into the elevator. This time it was a sheet of paper upon which a message had been typewritten.

      "You can't dodge the law of compensation. For what you have done, you must pay."

      Sidney Prale gasped when he read that message, and went back to the ground floor.

      "Who left this note for me?" he demanded of the clerk.

      "Messenger boy."

      "You don't know where he came from?"

      "No, sir."

      Prale turned away and started for the elevator again. A bell hop stopped him.

      "Manager would like to see you in his office, sir," the boy said. "This way, sir."

      Prale followed the boy, wondering what was coming now. He found the manager to be a sort of austere individual who seemed impressed with his own importance.

      "Mr. Prale," he said, "I regret to have to say this, but I find that it cannot be avoided. When you arrived yesterday, the clerk assigned you to a suite on the fifth floor. He made a mistake. We had a telegraphic reservation for that suite from an old guest of ours, and it should have been kept for him. You appreciate the situation, I feel sure."

      "No objection to being moved," Prale said. "I have unpacked scarcely any of my things."

      "But—again I regret it—there isn't a vacant suite in the house, Mr. Prale."

      "A room, then, until you have one."

      "We haven't a room. We haven't as much as a cot, Mr. Prale. We cannot take care of you, I'm afraid. So many regular guests, you understand, and out-of-town visitors."

      "Then I'll have to move, I suppose. You may have the suite within two hours."

      "Thank you, Mr. Prale."

      Prale was angry again when he left the office of the manager. It seemed that everything was conspiring against his comfort. He got a cab, drove to another hotel, inspected a suite and reserved it, paying a month in advance, and then went back to the big hotel on Fifth Avenue to get his baggage. He paid his bill at the cashier's window, and overheard the room clerk speaking to a woman.

      "Certainly, madam," the clerk was saying. "We will have an excellent suite on the fifth floor within half an hour. The party is just vacating it. Plenty of suites on the third floor, of course, but, if you want to be up higher in the building——"

      Sidney Prale felt the blood pounding in his temples, felt rage welling up within him. He felt as he had once in a Honduras forest when he became aware that a dishonest foreman was betraying business secrets. He hurried to the office of the manager, but the stenographer said the manager was busy and could not be seen.

      Prale whirled away, going through the lobby toward the entrance. He met Kate Gilbert face to face. She did not seem to see him, though he was forced to step aside to let her pass.

CHAPTER IV

       Table of Contents

A FOE AND A FRIEND

       Table of Contents

      After settling himself in the other hotel, Prale ate a belated luncheon. For the first time that day, he looked at the newspapers. He had remembered that a New Yorker reads the papers religiously to keep up to the minute; whereas, in Honduras, it was the custom for busy men to let the papers accumulate and then read a week's supply at a sitting.

      Aside from his name in the list of arrivals, Prale found no word concerning himself, though there was mention of other men who had come on the Manatee, and who had no special claim to prominence.

      "I don't amount to much, I guess," said Prale to himself. "Don't care for publicity, anyway, but they might let the world know a fellow has come home."

      He went for another walk that afternoon, returned to the hotel for dinner, and decided that, instead of going to a show that evening, he would prowl around the town.

      He walked up to the Park, went over to Broadway, and started down it, looking at the bright lights again, making his way through the happy, theater-going throngs toward Times Square. In the enjoyment of the crowds he forgot, in part, the discourtesies of the day, but he could not forget them entirely.

      Why