Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 52, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 March 1915 — Page 3

BUSINESS PLOT THAT COLLAPSEO

How Henry’s Scheme to Grab the Darbey Company Was Frustrated. WAS REVEALED BY ACCIDENT Dishonest Agent of the Trust Was Exposed and Compelled to Take Some of His Own Medicine. By RICHARD SPILLANE. (Copyright, McClure Newepaper Syndicate.) Mr. Darbey considered the Darbey Manufacturing company bls own. although he owned only one-third of the >IOO,OOO stock. He had started the concern, carried It along some troublesome years, put up the buildings in which Its product was made and personally engaged every man employed by the company. He was hard-working and rather obstinate. He made knives, forks, spoon's, etc. Flat ware is the trade term for such stuff, as distinguished from hollow ware, the name applied to metal pitchers, urns, cups, etc. Some years the company paid dividends. Some years It did not. When the trust was formed Mr. Darbey had a chance to be taken in, but, despite the advice of some of his stockholders, he declined. The tertns offered by the trust were not attractive. In addition, he preferred to be Independent. He objected to trusts. Mr. Darbey looked after the manufacturing end and the selling end. He tried to look After everything. Some men are that way. Business was none too good for him. after the trust got well under way. He felt its competition keenly. He had trouble occasionally in meeting, his pay roll. Frequently he had to ask the Indulgence of the banks. The more he went to his bankers, the more they shook their heads and advised him to reduce the cost of production or economize so that he would not have to borrow. When Mr. Darbey went out on a selling trip he usually visited New York. One of the men at the Hardware club was Peter Henry. They discussed the condition of the trade, had luncheon together and occasionally visited a show. They were quite congenial. Every time Darbey came to New York Henry suggested that Darbey make him selling agent for the manufacturing company. Wanted to Be Selling Agent “You ought to give all your time and attention to the manufacturing end,” he would say. “You are a good salesman, but you ought to stay at your factory. I can do better for you at the selling end than you can do for yourself.” • Darbey would smile, but would not answer. .This went on for several seasons, Henry all the time becoming more and more pressing in his suggestion abput the selling agency. Darbey had a suspicion that Henry had a connection with the trust, but was not quite sure. Henry never would admit It One spring when Darbey started on his usual selling trip he and Henry met as was customary. Darbey was rather downcast. His banks had warned him they would not carry him much longer unless conditions Improved. Conditions were not Improving and there were no signs that they would. Darbey spoke without reserve and explained the whple situation to Henry. That gentleman said little until Darbey finished. Then he spoke plainly.

"You cannot go on this way, Darbey,” he said. “You will have to do as I have told you many times. You must devote your attention to the manufacturing end. You will have to make me the New York selling agent. I will take over all your product and market it That will Relieve you in money matters. "I will make prompt payments and, if necessary, make such advances as you require. The way you are going there is nothing but disaster to result. It is all very well for you to think you can run this concern in the old way, but you cannot. You will have to conform to modern methods. You personally cannot both manufacture and 5e11.,. You are a'U right for manufacturing, but you are not all right for selling. Now we had better talk over the arrangements for marketing your stuff through me.” Henry Had Bought Control. Darbey didn’t like the tone of Henry’s speech and said so. "You are talking as if you were string orders instead of advice/’ he said. ” Henry smiled enigmatically. “I am giving orders,* he said. “I have a right to.” " "What!” exclaimed Darbey. "That is what I said,’* was Henry’s rejoinder. "I have bought control of your company. I have been picking up the stock for some time. I got it cheap. You-are working for me now and I want this business conducted according to my ideas.” Darbey gasped. Henry continued: "I mean to conduct this business on business lines, not as a one-man concern. Youcan look after the shop up. in Connecticut. I will look after things down here. You will be rehered of all anxiety. I am going to charge 20 per cent for selling. How does that strike your "It is outrageous,” said Darbey. “It

: V W'> Is a shame. You have taken advantage of me, undermined me, takon my business away from me. Twenty per cent is little short of—” “That is enough,” said Henry. "It was all very well for you to do as you pleased so long as you were in control, but I’m the boss now. You either do as I say or I’ll take over not only the selling end, but the manufacturing.” Darbey went back to Connecticut a much depressed man. He was bitter and hard against Henry. But he saw no way out of his difficulty. He settled down to his factory work. He plodded along tdn or twelve hours a day and tried to conform himself to the new conditions. When he needed money he advised Henry. That gentleman made advances. Occasionally Henry paid a visit to she plant and looked things over. He tried to be kindly and gracious, but Darbey was not to be deceived. He knew Henry was not satisfied and he also knew the business was not improving. After a year or so Henry did not respond to money calls so promptly as before. When he did send money a complaining letter accompanied the check. The cost of production was too high, he insisted. Darbey must cut down expenses. Henry could not meet competition. Darbey got rid of a man here and there, saved every penny he could for the company and watched every Item of expenditure closely. He reported all these things to Henry and at the same time pointed out that the heaviest load that the company had to bear was that frightful 20 per cent selling cost that Henry exacted. Henry’s replies on this score were sharp. He made it plain to Mr. Darbey that if Mr. Darbey would attend to the manufacturing end he would have plenty to do. It was not for Darbey to criticize. His Scheme Discovered.

One day a most unusual thing happened. A silverware dealer in a neighboring town called Darbey up on the phone. He wanted a gross of a certain class of goods, and In describing the articles he mentioned the price per dozen, $5.75. That particular class of goods did not sell at that

price, but much below, and Darbey thought the dealer had made a mistake. The dealer said he had not; that was the price he had been paying. Darbey told him that all the product of the factory was handled through Mr. Henry in New York and he would wire him to forward the goods at once, but meanwhile he, Darbey, would like to see the dealer and he would go to the dealer's town that afternoon to have a personal conversation with him. The dealer said he would be glad to see him. Darbey made the visit. He had a confidential chat with the dealer and the dealer showed to him the bills he had from Henry. The goods were sold to the dealers lor 15.75. The return made by Henry to the Darbey Manufacturing company was $3 a dozen. Darbey got all those bills from the dealer and took them home with him. A little later he met one of the former salesmen of Mr. Henry. The salesman was none too well disposed toward Henry. When Darbey, in the course of discussion about business, remarked that things were going none too well, the salesman blurted out the statement that they couldn’t go well; that Henry was selling the Darbey product only to such dealers as would pay prices much above those of the trust, and that Henry was really an agent forthetrust and handling a lot of the trust’s goods. Before those two men parted, Darbey got a lot of details of the prices at which that man acting for Henry had sold the Darbey products. The man gave names, dates and figures. Darbey made a memorandum of each and every item.

Darbey Had Whip Hand. Thereafter, when Mr. Henry, as usual, complained about the factory costs and insisted upon further and further economies. Darbey very bluntly declared he could not make the stuff any cheaper. He had cut things down to the bone. He told Mr. Henry he thought his criticisms were unwarranted. The real economies ought to be Introduced in the selling end. This brought some sharp retorts from the New York office, and sharper ones from the Connecticut end. Mr. Henry lost all patience with the manufacturer and summoned him to New York. Mr. Darbey refused to make the trip. He was too busy in the factory, he said. If Mr. Henry wanted to see him he could go to Connecticut Mr. Henry did so promptly. He was

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN, RENSSELAER, IND.

wrathy when he entered Mr. Darbey’s office. ' “Mr. Darbey,” he said, "I do not like the tone of your letters to me and I do not like the way you have oeen handling my business. You never have seemed to recognize the fact that you have been dislodged from the control of this company. I thought you were a good manufacturer. I think so still, but I consider that your efficiency is impaired by reason of the feeling you have toward me. Now this thing has to end. I have come up here to make 'a proposition to you. This company cannot succeed under present conditions. If you want to sell your stock and get out, I will buy your shares. I will pay you ten cents on the dollar. If you want to remain here as my employee, as a sort of supervisor, I will give you twentyfive dollars a week. What about It?” Mr. Darbey hesitated for nearly half a minute, then he asked: “Is that the best you will do?” “Yes,” said Henry. “Ten cents on the dollar Is very little for shares of this company that I have been bound up In so long,” remarked Darbey. “Well, do you accept, or do you not?” Henry demanded. "I do not accept,” said Darbey. “Then,” said Mr. Henry, “although I am reluctant to do so, I will have to dispense with your services and put one of my own men in here, a man who will do what I want.”

“No,” said Darbey, “you •Won’t put a man in here. I won’t sell my shares and I won’t get out” “You won’t!” exclaimed Henry. "No,” said Darbey. Turning the Tables.

Then a hard look came Into Darbey’s face. “Look here, Mr. Henry,” he said, "the time has come for me to talk very plainly to you. You are a thief.” Henry started to jump up, but Darbey, who was a powerful man, pushed him back in his chair. “Don’t get excited,” he said. “I am ready to prove everything I say. You are a thief. You have robbed the Darbey Manufacturing company from the

“You Are a Thief.”

day you became the selling agent I have the evidence. I have been collecting it for nearly a year. I have all the reports that you made to this office and I have many of the bills that you rendered to customers. There is a wide difference between the amounts you reported and the moneys you obtained. You were not satisfied with your 20 per cent, outrageous as it was, but you have swindled this company out of many thousands of dollars'and have 'done it coldly, calmly and methodically for the purpose of bringing this company into a position where you could get the remaining stock at your own price and then, I suppose, sell the concern to the trust at a figure that would give a handsome profit to you. Maybe you have been acting for the trust all through this. I dfin’t know.” Then he told of the Incident of that dealer who telephoned the order to the factory instead of to the selling agent—-the order for the 15.75 goods. Next he told of what he had learned from salesmen of the Henry concern. "I placed all this evidence in the hands of one of my young friends, a lawyer named Davis,” lie said. "He tells me I can put you behind the bars if I am so disposed. The fact that yon own a majority of the stock of this company does not warrant you In robbing the company of its funds. My friend Davis has Interested some persons in this affair and between us we have made up our minds that we are going to take over the control of the Darbey Manufacturing company. Mr. Davis is in the outer room. He has all the bills, all of your statements, all the evidence. He also is ready to swear out a warrant for your arrest. I do not want to go so far unless it is necessary. I want to be very fair and decent with you. I want to make a proposition. I win buy the stock that yon hold in the Darbey Manufacturing company at 10 cents on the dollar. Do you accept, or shall I call in Mr. Davis?" The Darbey Manufacturing concern Is doing business today. It is not a hundred-thousand-dollar corporation any longer. Its capitalisation is $250,000. Mr. Henry is not among the stockholders. Mr. Darbey looks after both the manufacturing and the selling end. He visits New York two or three times -a year. At the Hardware club he sometimes sees Mr. Hen ry. but Mr. Henry has business elsewhere as soon as he catches sight at Mr. Darbey of Cunnsriiiwt.

CURIOUS CONDENSATIONS

Oil fields are being developed in German New Guinea. Nearly four hundred women applied for patents in England last year. Bricks made of peat are being successfully used In Sweden for small buildings. Barcelona, Spain, does a large business in the manufacture of paper drinking cups. American women yearly buy more than $10,000,000 worth of millinery supplies from France. , Pittsburgh repojts a 50 per cent decrease in the number of money orders sent to Europe. Grand Duchess Marie Adelaide, ruler of the Independent nation of Luxemburg, is only twenty years old. Merle Hyer, a Lewiston (Utah) high school student, age seventeen, grew 380 bushels of potatoes on half an acre. The Japanese, it is said, are producing more than 20,000,000 tons of coal a year from mines in Japan and South Manchuria. By keeping watch on the incoming mall the Syracuse (N. Y.) post office officials have found 80 different spellings of the name of that city, Another invasion which is causing trouble In France is that of hordes of wild boars which have appeared along the eastern frontier from the German forests. The consumption’ of the banana In the United States has grown from practically nothing thirty or forty years ago to 30,000,000 bunches of the fruit annually.

SAID BY THE SAGES

As "unkindness has no remedy at law,” let Its avoidance be with you a point of honor. —Hosea Ballou.

The pleasures of the palate deal with us like Egyptian thieves, who strangle those whom they embrace. — Seneca. Memory Is the primary and fundamental power, without which there could be no other intellectual operation. —Johnson. If the wicked flourish, and thou suffer, be not discouraged. They are fatted for destruction; thou are dieted for health. —Fuller. Oh, that you could turn your eyes toward the napes of your necks and make but an Interior survey of your good selves. —Shakespeare. The fact that God has prohibited despair gives misfortune the right to hope all things, and leaves hope free to dare all things.-—Mme. Swetchine.

A faithful and true friend is a living treasure, Inestimable when gone. Nothing'is more common than to talk of a friend; nothing more difficult than to find one; nothing more rare than to improve by one as we ought— Anon. : X~ v-< ■

MISERLINESS

Miserliness is a form of insanity. Misers differ in cast of countenance from other persons. Disinclination to social intercourse is another characteristic. Hiding money in out-of-the-way places is a characteristic of misers. Some of the famous misers ate diseased meat and lived in filth, although they possessed hundreds of thousands of dollars. liii<i I One famous miser “played dead” for two days, thinking that his domestics would fast for that time, and thus save some expense.

HITS FROM SHARP WITS

There are no vacations in the school of experience. Some people are always disappointed because they expect too much. — Albany Journal. “When money talks.” remarked the Man on the Car, “nobody tells it to shut up.”—Toledo Blade. Nature was kind when she so constructed man that he cannot really kick himself. —Albany Journal. Many people give the closest attention to those who tai* about the most inconsequential things—themselves. ■ ■ listening to the passenger who knows it all is more entertaining than a newspaper on a street car.—Toledo Blade. Some men think they have silver tongues when, as a matter of fact, there is nothing but brass in their mouths. - -

Up a Hawaiian Volcano

CLIMBING the volcanic mountains of Hawaii is one of the greatest pleasures of tourists who remain any length of time in the islands. Owing to the fact that some of these volcanoes are by no means extinct, the ascent is Often exciting and sometimes rather dangerous. Very, recently Mauna Loa was ascended by Dr. A. S. Baker of Kealakekau and Rev. A. C. Bowdish of Paia. In spite of the light and smoke which proclaimed the fact that the volcano was in eruption again after a silence of seven years, it was a decidedly chilly and forbidding reception which awaited them as they came to the top of the once more active mountain. The snow is abundant one and a half miles down the sides from the crater, and the wind is saturated with a cold and dampness which penetrates even .heavy clothing. The second day out the explorers came within fifty feet of the crater immediately after sundown, struggling along through the heavy snow, but they were forced to descend at once below the snow line to find a camping place. Even though they hastened back down on the same trail, it was intensely dark before they could pause. Here during the night the thermometer registered 21 degrees, a temperature which was made much worse by the strong north wind that swept across the unbroken lava field.

Climbing Exhaust* the Mule*. During the night Doctor Baker was quite sick and incapable of further effort But it was determined that an early start for the top be made by Mr. Bowdish and the younger guide. The mules were quite exhausted with their two days of work, closing with the supreme effort of the night before, and were scarcely rested for another effort when it was by no means sure that they could get through to the rim of the crater. It is a constant rise to the very edge of the great cavity. Mr. Bowdish and the guide felt well repaid tor their daring' attempt to cross that barrier of.snow, for they saw one cone still active, throwing lava up 150 feet or more, while near by was a "bowl'’ that was boiling, splashing lava to the height of 50 feet or more. Just beyond these to the south was a narrow line of fire where a stream of lava had not fully cooled on the surface. There was smoke issuing at a dozen or more places in comparatively small volumes, but no fire was visible or other cones in sight. The whole floor was a vast black surface with practically no unevenness, barring the chilled walls of 4ava streams apparently no longer active. " '

The active cone was from fifty to one hundred and fifty feet high, and the display of white-hot lava was like the illumination of a gigantic "flower pot" in fireworks. The lava was thrown up three times the distance of the height of the cone above its crest. The lava lost its color before it reached the highest point and became black against the blanket of snow which was on the slope of the farther side of the erater. Except for this relatively small slope all that the party could see from their location was perpendicular walls on all sides. - > Trail Through Lava Flows. The party required two days to make the ascent and a half day les* for the return, during the short winter days. They had had no bad weather except a drizzling rain the first afternoon and night TJiis dear weather was indeed fortunate, for the complicated trail must be followed to avoid the later flows of lava, like great clinkers, which are impassable few animals and must be avoided. For 25 miles or more the unbroken billows and cross streams of black lava are Irregularly covered by Ine .later and impassable flows, making a labyrinth of the trail which only the initiated can follow.

For hours the trail was up and up over level after level of the unending lava. Glimpses of the snow-crowned peak led one to believe that it was not far distant. Then perhaps after another hour of climbing up from one level to another apparently the top was farther away than ever. And the long detour around the impassable places grew wearisome in the extreme. The party was under the guidance of the Gaspars, who have in the past so successfully piloted large and small parties to the top. Doctor Baker and Mr. Bowdish both feel that the chances run during an ascent in the winter months amount to great hazard because of the vast miles of unbroken lava which a mist or storm would render terra incognita and the constant danger of falling into holes or of breaking through the crust —contingencies which could not bo guarded against As it was, Mr. Bowdish’s mule twice broke through, once causing him to be thrown off.

“THE ADVENTURE OF LIFE"

Allegory Showing That Even In Ito Precariousnes* Sweetness Is Found. There is an old and strange eastern allegory of a man wandering in the desert; he draws near to a grove of trees, when he suddenly become* aware that there is a lion on his track, hurrying and bounding Along on the scent of his steps. The man flee* for safety- into the grove; he sees there a roughly built water tank of stone, excavated Jn the ground, and built up of masonry much fringed with plants. He climbs swiftly down to where he sees a ledge close on the water; a* he does this, he sees that in the water lies a great lizard, with open jaws, watching him with wicked eyes. He stops short, and he can just support himself among the stones by holding on to the branches of a plant which, grows from a ledge above him. While he thus holds on, with death behind him and before, be feds the branches quivering, and sees above, out of reach, two mice, one black and one white, which are nibbling at the stem* he holds and will soon sever them. He waits despairingly, and while he does so he sees that there are drops ot honey on the leaves which he holds; he puts his lips to them, licks them off and finds them very sweet, Arthur C. Benson writes in the Century. The mice stand, no doubt, for night and day, and the honey is the sweetness of life, which It is possible to taste and relish even when death is before and behind; and it is true that the utter precariousness of life does not, as a matter of fact, distract us from the pleasure of it, even though the strands to which we hold are slowly parting. It is all, then, an adventure and an escape; but even In the worst insecurity we may often be surprised to find that it is somewhat sweet.

Activities of Women.

New York city is to have a house of detention for women. Oregon has three woman lumber dealers and two female carpenters. Philadelphia has over 20,000 females employed in clerical positions. Scores of distinguished women attended the recent sessions of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, ’held In Philadelphia. Madam Bakhemeteff, wife of the Russian ambassador to the United States, has one of the finest collections of jewels Inthe world. Twenty-four per cent of nearly six million women and children employed In stores, laundries, factories and telephone exchanges in New Orleans re* celve an average wage of les* than four dollars per week.