Obit for E. Harris

I

MR. GOTTFRIED FREY’S daily arrival at the bank one half hour before the other Vice Presidents was the symbol of his hostility toward that piece of damn foolishness, opening for business at ten o’clock. If these fellows would stop gallivanting at night and get to their beds, they could start up the bank at a decent hour. Back in the eighties when he’d started out, nobody’d ever have thought of making a customer wait till almost lunch time to draw out his own money.

With a rolling movement, as though on wheels, a gait suited to his short egg-shaped figure, he proceeded to his desk, sat, caressed his nose, which was spotted with blackheads, sniffed, and turned his Tribune to the obituaries. It was on this page that he was accustomed to look for news of his friends. They were going fast, and tidy estates they were leaving, too, for these fellows to pluck clean. In his day a man’s brother was good enough to execute his will, but now they had to have coexecutors and co-trustees and contingents and all kinds of damn nonsense.

For the past week, now, he had been resigned to its being just a matter of days before he’d find Ed’s name among the death notices. That young fellow Dunlop, Ed’s snippety grandson, had told him the day before the Fourth that there was no hope.

‘Is he conscious? Does he say anything?’ It hardly seemed the thing to ask right out if Ed was mentioning him.

’He’s rational part of the time,’ said Dunlop, ‘and he recognizes us. But all he seems interested in is whether some of his slow accounts have paid up. He’s always asking about collections.’

And why not? The bewilderment in Dunlop’s tone had upset Mr. Frey. What else but the business would his granddad be thinking of as he lay dying? Ed had given his whole life to E. Harris & Co. He’d built it up to be one of the best butter houses in New York. Why, in good times they’d sell at least two carloads in a morning!

Well, he was gone. ‘Harris, Edward. In his sixty-seventh year. Interment private.’ And in the middle of the page, a nice half column, ‘Butter Merchant Dies; Headed Commission House.’

Ed’s name right there in the death list stunned Mr. Frey for a minute. He’d been expecting it, of course — but, to begin with the age: if Ed was sixty-seven, so was he — and more.

And to think of Ed a corpse. Through.

He thought of how, in late years, he and Ed had eaten every day at the Rathskeller on Duane Street. And how Ed would rant if he thought the coffee had been boiled. He and Ed had always been chummy, but in the last few years, and particularly since Sam Best had been retired from the bank, they’d been very close.

Ed had started out in the Washington Market about the year ’81 standing behind a stall, selling butter, eggs, and cheese. The market was celebrating its one hundred and twenty-fifth anniversary this year. Gosh, Ed must have hated to miss that! Although he would hardly have approved of some of the doings — for example, having those CWA men paint pictures of the market and the oldest stall-keepers. A fine way to waste the taxpayers’ money!

Ed had been a success. In ’88 he’d dropped the stall and gone into butter, wholesale and commission. If you looked sharp — and Ed had — there was money in butter. Look at it this year — though maybe that was the drought. Ed would put butter away in storage in June; then just at the right time — say December — he’d take it out and sell it. Some years he’d make 100 per cent on his money. He’d never failed to make something. If you knew the butter market, it was a cinch compared to stocks, although sometimes Ed had had to keep his butter a couple of years to get his price.

Ed had been a sport, too. When those cooperatives sent their men East, then what spicy stories he had had to tell. And he’d liked a pretty leg; but no further — he was loyal to the Missus.

And how he’d fuss about his rates on loans. He’d always expect his money for a quarter under the market. But that was the way he’d made money. You had to be a quarter sharper at least than the other fellow. At any rate, that was the way they’d made money when it was being made; nowadays there was too damn much system to get anywhere in business.

Take this bank. Everybody grabbing titles; it was worse than a lodge. This fellow Taylor, walking in here at quarter past nine. He was Office Head, New York City Offices Head, Vice President, Chairman of this, Vice Chairman of that. Forty, fifty years ago a bank was run for the customers, not the officers. The President in those days was n’t hid away from everybody in a kind of throne room like he was God, nor was he making a hundred thousand a year. No! The President used to sit right out in the open with nothing but a brass rail between him and the clerks. They ’d all used the same cuspidor. And the Cashier used to help them balance.

In those days everybody did an honest day’s work, and there was none of this system to keep them back, either. If a man wanted to borrow money he walked in and asked for it, and if his character was good he got it. Now anybody wanting a little credit had to bring in a certified audit big as the Bible with all kinds of fancy breakdowns of inventory and receivables. Next thing these fellows would be wanting to know if the petty cash was in quarters or halves. No wonder they needed thirty-five Vice Presidents and forty Assistant Secretaries.

He and Ed had hashed all that out many a time. That Dunlop, who could n’t tell Wisconsin butter from oleo, had a lot of uppity notions he’d got at Harvard Business School.

II

Well, Ed was gone. He would miss him, would miss him. And now he must write to Dunlop. He wanted to make it a good letter, a kind of personal letter, not like these damned samples in that new-fangled Manual of Correspondence.

‘Where’s my pen?’ he asked his secretary, peevishly.

‘I’m putting in a fresh point, Mr. Frey,’ she answered, gently.

He detested his secretary. She was a Vassar girl. Would n’t even let him answer his own telephone. ‘Mr. Frey’s desk. Who is calling Mr. Frey? Mr. Frey is ready; will you please put him on?’ If there was anything that made his stomach turn, it was to tell some prying girl all his business. By golly, when his friends called they wanted to talk to him and not her. Miss Camoys. He sniffed. He could n’t go to the men’s washroom without telling her — one of Taylor’s ideas. And she changed his letters till they were n’t a word he ’d dictated, and pestered him to death making memos on his calendar, giving him circulars on bookkeeping procedure to read, and even keeping a diary of everybody who called. . . .

‘Good morning, Mr. Frey.’

He looked up. It was Taylor.

‘Morning, Taylor.’

‘I see old Mr. Harris died last night.’

‘Yes.’

‘Is Dunlop going to run the business?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Is he pretty friendly to the bank? Do you think we can keep the account with the old man gone?’

‘No telling what he’ll do.’

‘Dunlop roomed at college with young Dennison, whose father is a pretty big officer over at the Second. We’d better do some intensive cultivating. Are you going to write a letter?’

‘Yes,’ said Mr. Frey. ‘I’m writing.’

‘Well, make it brief and very cordial, will you? And I would n’t say anything about Mr. Harris starting out in the market. I think Dunlop’s a little sensitive about that.’

But not too sensitive to spend Ed’s money, Mr. Frey thought, stroking his nose. And as for that fellow Taylor! Ed not cold yet, and already worrying about keeping the account. He held his pen up to the light and examined it carefully. Damned if he liked a new point — it never held the ink. He dipped the point in the well, wiped it with a cheesecloth duster, redipped it, and began his letter. He wrote on scratch paper, slowly, with some crossing out.

DEAR DUNLOP: —

It is not easy for me to find words to adequately express my sorrow on the occasion of the death of your grandfather, Edward Harris. My loss personally might be called small in comparison to what his passing will mean to the trade and those he worked with all his life. For though in his time he scaled great heights, he was never too proud or too busy to give of himself and his time to those who came to him for help out of his great volume of experience.

He stopped and read what he had written. He read it again. It satisfied him. Ed would have liked it.

From when I first knew him —

Miss Camoys spoke softly. ‘Here’s Mr. Best, Mr. Frey.’

In his surprise he looked up delightedly. ‘Well, sir, how do you do, Sam. How are you, my boy?’ Then his voice quavered as he remembered and asked, ‘Have you heard about Ed?’

‘Yes, Gottfried, that’s what brought me in this morning. Was it sudden?’

‘He had a stroke in April,’said Mr. Frey.

‘Soon we’ll all be gone,’ said Mr. Best mournfully. ‘Remember when we started out?’

‘Yes, Sam, I do,’ said Mr. Frey. ‘I remember when I came to the bank I got your job as runner, and you got promoted to the switchboard.’

‘A raise, too,’ said Mr. Best, smiling indulgently. ‘To thirty dollars a month.’ He offered Mr. Frey a cigar.

Air. Frey looked at the clock and shook his head.

‘No smoking between ten and three,’ he whispered, with a significant look.

‘Except with customers. One of that fellow’s ideas.’

Mr. Best tried to show his sympathy by attempting a whistle.

Mr. Frey hitched his chair closer to his friend. ‘Say, Sam, what did they give you when you retired?’

Mr. Best looked surprised. ‘You’re not expecting —’

Then, as Miss Camoys came over to the desk, he stopped and wobbled his cane with embarrassment.

‘I’m not on the new organization chart, though nothing’s been said yet.’

‘I got $18,000 cash when I left. Soak ’em, Gottfried.’

‘Leave it to me,’ said Mr. Frey. ‘After a man’s given his whole life to an organization.’

‘These young fellows have no heart,’ said Mr. Best. ‘Say, Gottfried, what do you do with your money these days?’

‘What can you do?’ asked Mr. Frey. ‘Even the savings banks won’t take it. I got $50,000 in my checking account right now I don’t know what to do with.’

‘My son-in-law’s bought pepper,’ said Mr. Best. ‘It keeps years, you know.’

‘If the Administration would just step back and give things a chance, everything would be all right. Stirring up labor, throwing away good food. Well, the NRA’s fizzling.’

Mr. Best nodded and got up slowly. ‘Well, Gottfried, I thought I must come down and see you when I heard about Ed. I know we’ll both feel it. A great fellow. You going to the funeral? ’

‘ I’d like to,’ said Mr. Frey, ‘ but the burial’s private, and Elizabeth’s a long trip just for the services.’

‘We could drive over,’ said Mr. Best, somewhat wistfully. ‘I’ve nothing else to do. Ben Fletcher had a wonderful funeral. I could n’t tell you who all was there.’

‘I’ll call you,’ said Mr. Frey. ‘I’m writing to Ed’s grandson now.’

He watched Mr. Best, tall, with stooped bony shoulders, wearing a white linen suit, walk stiffly through the lobby, and then picked up his pen and wrote rapidly, without any hesitation.

From when I first knew him I felt honored to be his friend, but in later years, as he and I have together seen so many of our fellow business men fall from the ranks of activity, his friendship came to be more precious to me than ever.

I can never forget the first time I saw him. He came into the old Produce Bank to borrow the money that he started the business of E. Harris & Co. with. He wore a white apron. It was spotted and greasy. I think that utter lack of pretense which was so dominant in his make-up was one of his finest qualities. Certainly I have never known a sturdier, truer character. His honesty and integrity have been a byword among his fellow produce men.

Only those who have had a friend like him will know the vacancy that exists when he is called Home.

Without reading it over, for he knew that it was good, he handed the letter to Miss Camoys.

‘Type this,’ he said, ‘and put it on the good stationery.’

She answered, ‘ Yes, sir,’ and took the letter.

III

Mr. Frey rubbed his nose idly and then went to the window and looked out. A truck load of cows was riding to slaughter. Across the street an old brownstone office building was being demolished. An ambulance shrieked for right of way. He peered to see the sun, but it was hidden by high offices. It was hot and the air was damp. He thought of Ed.

‘Here’s your letter,’ Miss Camoys said softly.

She handed it to him. He read it standing by the window. It was beautifully typed, on a heavy vellum-like paper with Gottfried Frey, Vice President, engraved in small roman to the left of the name of the bank.

DEAR DUNLOP : —

I am very sorry about your grandfather. His friendship has always meant a great deal to me, and I know how his advice and counsel will be missed among the trade.

His long relationship with our institution, dating from the days of the old Produce Bank, is something of which my associates and I are extremely proud. We hope that we may continue to serve you as we have always tried to serve him.

My fellow officers join with me in expressing to you and to your family our warmest sympathy.

Yours very sincerely,

Vice President

Mr. Frey read the letter. Then he read it again. That girl — that girl!

He pushed it away roughly. That was not the letter he had written. She had changed it. She had had no right to make it different. He would speak to her. He would tell her so. Ed Harris had been his friend — not hers. She must write the letter the way he wanted it. He would tell her so.

Well, what good would that do? She would go to Taylor.

Yes, but he’d go to Taylor first. He’d tell him how she changed the letter. He would show him the two letters, hers and his. Not an identical word. He would tell Taylor.

And what good would that do?

A little taffy from Taylor, perhaps, but after all, who’d put her there beside him? Taylor.

He leaned back in his chair and rocked a little on the spring. It squeaked. He felt very lonely.

Then he sat up, reached across the desk, and drew the letter toward him. Over the ‘Vice President’ he signed his name.