The Financier, a novel eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 732 pages of information about The Financier, a novel.

The Financier, a novel eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 732 pages of information about The Financier, a novel.

Immediately he began working on plans with young Ellsworth for his new house.  He was going to build something exceptional this time, he told Lillian.  They were going to have to do some entertaining—­entertaining on a larger scale than ever.  North Front Street was becoming too tame.  He put the house up for sale, consulted with his father and found that he also was willing to move.  The son’s prosperity had redounded to the credit of the father.  The directors of the bank were becoming much more friendly to the old man.  Next year President Kugel was going to retire.  Because of his son’s noted coup, as well as his long service, he was going to be made president.  Frank was a large borrower from his father’s bank.  By the same token he was a large depositor.  His connection with Edward Butler was significant.  He sent his father’s bank certain accounts which it otherwise could not have secured.  The city treasurer became interested in it, and the State treasurer.  Cowperwood, Sr., stood to earn twenty thousand a year as president, and he owed much of it to his son.  The two families were now on the best of terms.  Anna, now twenty-one, and Edward and Joseph frequently spent the night at Frank’s house.  Lillian called almost daily at his mother’s.  There was much interchange of family gossip, and it was thought well to build side by side.  So Cowperwood, Sr., bought fifty feet of ground next to his son’s thirty-five, and together they commenced the erection of two charming, commodious homes, which were to be connected by a covered passageway, or pergola, which could be inclosed with glass in winter.

The most popular local stone, a green granite was chosen; but Mr. Ellsworth promised to present it in such a way that it would be especially pleasing.  Cowperwood, Sr., decided that he could afford to spent seventy-five thousand dollars—­he was now worth two hundred and fifty thousand; and Frank decided that he could risk fifty, seeing that he could raise money on a mortgage.  He planned at the same time to remove his office farther south on Third Street and occupy a building of his own.  He knew where an option was to be had on a twenty-five-foot building, which, though old, could be given a new brownstone front and made very significant.  He saw in his mind’s eye a handsome building, fitted with an immense plate-glass window; inside his hardwood fixtures visible; and over the door, or to one side of it, set in bronze letters, Cowperwood & Co.  Vaguely but surely he began to see looming before him, like a fleecy tinted cloud on the horizon, his future fortune.  He was to be rich, very, very rich.

Chapter XIII

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The Financier, a novel from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.