When Winn reached his room that evening, a letter from Jack Nickerson and a clipping from theMarket Newswas awaiting him. The letter said: "Come at once to the city, but keep shady when you arrive. Go to a hotel and send for me. Rockhaven is up to ten, the street is all short of it, and a bear panic may come any day. Have held your stock to unload at top price. May do it to-morrow, but come anyway."
The clipping was as follows: "As we predicted weeks ago, Rockhaven, in spite of countless rumors put forth by the bears, has crept steadily upward. Most of it is in the hands of conservative investors who know its value, and some day those who sold it so freely for five and six will be bidding fifteen and twenty for it. It is a safe purchase now on any weak spot, and good for ten points more."
And Winn, fresh from the spell of Mona's eyes and the tender mood of that afternoon, felt that he had reached a turning-point in his life and that independence and the end of his suspense were in sight. Go to the city he must, and at once, that was certain, and perhaps a small fortune was almost within his grasp! The thought made his pulses leap. All his life long he had been hardly more than a cipher, a poorly paid menial, and now possible freedom and escape from serfdom was near. Then another impulse came, which was a natural sequence of the others. He had never, since boyhood days, felt that he had a home. His aunt's was but a free boarding place, and irksome at that; the city and its ways were not congenial to him—even the thought of going there now was obnoxious; and as this realization grew, there came to him, much like the sound of church bells, the sincerity, the honest friendship, the simple truth of those people he had for three months lived among. And into this appreciation also entered—Mona.
Like all men, he aspired to some wealth and the protection it means; and now, when a little of it seemed within his grasp, there followed a nobler impulse, and that the home-building one. Then when he thought of the city once more, with its social hypocrisy, its vain display of wealth, its cold, heartless life, where none seemed ready to extend a hand to him, he felt more than ever it never was and never could be a home for him. And then in sharp contrast to one city product, Ethel Sherman, came a thought of the girl who that morning had decked the cave with ferns and flowers, that it might seem more worthy of him. And now herself and her life passed in review. He saw her at home, patient with her mother's whims, helping when and where she could; at church bowing in reverence to the simple devotions and joining in the singing; and in the wild gorge where she hid herself away to practice. This last touch of romance seemed to affect him more than all else, and as he thought of those eyes, into which no shadow of falsehood ever entered, and how all that was beautiful in nature, from the roses that grew between the granite ledges of the island to the boundless ocean beating against its cliffs, appealed to her as to him; insensibly, and quite beyond his power to check, came the sweet illusion of love. Gone for the moment was the memory of Ethel Sherman and the bitterness she had meted out to him, and in its place opened a new world. Gone, too, was the influence of the one man who, above all others, had forced his cynicism upon Winn and taught him distrust of womankind. Almost, but not quite, did this gentle thraldom win, and then—the reaction came.
"I will tell Mona, as a big brother should," he thought, "all she has a right to know, and leave the island as I came. I may return and I may not."
But Winn, of wayward impulse and changeful nature, now buoyant, now despondent, knew not his own heart nor its needs, and understood not at all how some straw, some pebble of chance, would inevitably swerve him in spite of all resolution.
It is thus with us all.
And now came the business side of his dilemma.
"It goes without sayin' ye best do as yer friend says," advised Jess, when Winn had read the letters to him, "'n' the sooner the better. Sell yer own stock fust, if ye kin, an' then mine if ye hev the chance, but don't worry if ye can't. I'll take keer o' matters here while ye're gone, an' when ye git back, we'll haul in the net 'n' see whar we stand."
"But how about the others here?" queried Winn, who had worried about them fully as much as about himself. "I must see that they are taken care of."
"Wal," answered Jess, slowly, "ye go ahead 'n' see how the land lays, 'n' mebbe I'll follow ye if ye send me word; 'n' if ye don't, an' things go to smash, I'll see none on 'em here is loser."
And this was Jess Hutton, the man above all others whom J. Malcolm Weston had urged his dupe to sell stock to! Never before did Winn feel so ashamed that he came there as manager for the Rockhaven Granite Company.
"Mr. Hutton," he said earnestly, "I shall always be thankful that I told you from the start how matters stood, and if the worst comes, you will know it was no fault of mine."
"I knowed ye war honest, the fust time I sot eyes on ye," responded Jess, cordially, "an' now ez ye're goin' soon, it won't do ye no harm to tell ye. An' more'n that, I'll tell ye I never doubted from the start this boss o' yourn was a rascal, an' the only reason I bought a little stock was 'cause I liked ye 'n' wanted to help ye."
Winn felt more ashamed than ever.
When he returned to his room late that evening, the moon, now a few days past its full, was just rising over Norse Hill and silvering the dark and silent houses along the way. No one was up, and so still was the village that his footsteps on the plank walk seemed to echo across the island. When he came to where Rock Lane joined the street, he paused. Just beyond he could see the little church and back of it the silent village of the dead, each stone distinct and ghostly in the moonlight, to the left the motionless harbor, a glittering field of silver, and beyond the old tide mill, spectral and solemn. And faintly whispered in the stilly night the ocean voice.
Many times afterward that picture returned to his memory.
The next day seemed to Winn almost like preparing for a funeral.
"I wish you would go over to the gorge with me this afternoon," he said to Mona that morning, "I must leave here to-morrow, and I want to bid the spot good-by."
And she, busy among the sweet williams, pinks, and marigolds that were her daily care, felt her heart sink.
And Winn, believing it his last day on the island, went his way, first to the quarry that had been his everyday duty for almost three months. Only four men were retained, and those were to be kept at work until he returned, or until Jess ordered otherwise. To no one could he say his departure was final. Then he wandered about among the wharves that had so interested him the first day on the island, and spoke with the few fishermen busy there. All knew him, and each had a pleasant word and nod. He watched them at their work, salting the fish they had split and were packing, one upon another, in a large tank, or spreading cured ones on racks to dry, and packing up in bundles those that were dried. He sniffed the pungent odor and looked out seaward, where the fishing craft, with all sail set, were departing. Then he strolled inward to where the little steamer made landing. She had left for that day and her wharf was deserted. Winn thought that on her next trip he would be a passenger leaving the island for good. Strange to say, as he passed on he noticed with peculiar interest the sign, "Coffins and Caskets" on a small shop just back of a house. Then he followed the sandy shore of the inner harbor past an old, dismantled fishing smack, beached high and dry, on the stern of which the name "Nancy Jane" was still legible, and then on up to the tide mill. Here he paused again, looking into the dark interior where only the sills remained, and below them a space through which the tide ebbed. And he thought of the girl who had ended her life there.
Somehow, all that morning these sad reminders of life and death on the island seemed to thrust themselves before him. The mood they engendered was with him when that afternoon he, with Mona for companion, started for the gorge. And she was almost as silent as the old mill.
"I've been bidding good-by to the island all the morning," he said, when they reached the top of Norse Hill, "and I hate to go away."
"But you are coming back, aren't you?" she asked, with a note of pain.
"Oh, yes," he said cheerfully, "I hope so, but I can't tell. You know why I go, and my business here may be at its end. But if it is, I shall visit the island next summer, if I live.
"Come, dear," he added, when the gorge was reached and he had assisted her down, "let's leave the violin here and hunt for sea-shells. I want some to carry away." And like two children they clambered over the rocks the tide had left bare, picking up the starfish, chill to the touch, sea-urchins, snail shells, sailors' money purses, tossed above the tide level and dried black and hard, and watching the anemones and crabs left prisoners in pools between the rocks. Overhead the gulls circled and far to seaward the white sails of coasters and fishermen gleamed in the sunlight, and beside Winn, following wherever he went, Mona, with her appealing eyes. They talked of nothings, as usual, and he stole covert looks at her face, noting how the sea winds played havoc with her loosened hair.
Later they sought the cave where the ferns and flowers she had brought the day before lay withered.
"I am going to leave all but one each of the starfish and shells we have gathered," he said, "here in our little nook, and see if we will find them when I come back."
"We shall," she replied, "for no one ever comes here but me, and I will watch them."
It was a child's thought, but there are moments in our lives when to act like children is a relief.
"I hope you will come here often," he added, "and feel this is our playhouse, and when I think of you I shall always see you as you are now and in this cave. And you must keep up your practice and I shall send you some new music and write to you, and if you have a picture of yourself, I should like it."
"I have only one, taken when I was a little girl," she answered, "but you shall have it."
He could have had her heart, and soul even, had he asked it.
"Now play for me, dear," he said very gently, "some of the old songs you play best."
And once again, as many times before, Winn visited the banks of "Bonnie Doon" and the fields of heather over which the tartan-clad ranks marched to the tune of "The Blue Bells of Scotland" and "The Campbells are Coming." And he heard the pipes droning and saw "Bonnie Dundee" with waving plume and the sweet lassie "Comin' thro' the Rye," and heard the love plaint of "Robin Adair," "Auld Robin Grey," and the undying heart-cry of sweet "Annie Laurie."
And into these was blended the low lullaby of the ocean.
When it was all ended and the twilight had come, without a word he held out his hand, and slowly and in silence gently guided her footsteps out of the gorge. Along the devious way among the ledges he led her, a drooping flower, thirsting for one drop of the water of life, one word of love, ay, one word of pity!
The purple shade of coming night had crept in from the wide ocean ere they reached the old stone tower, and here he paused. Full well he knew what every impulse of his own heart called upon him to utter, and yet his lips were dumb. Full well he knew how the girl who stood beside him felt, and the heartache that was her portion.
And still he was silent!
The chill night breeze from the sea swept over the hill. Suddenly the girl shivered.
And then, as he looked out upon the darkening sea and heard the solemn requiem sounding below the cliff, the voice of eternity and life and death speaking there unsealed his lips.
The next moment Mona was clasped in his arms.
"God help me, little girl," he said, "I love you."
Later, the moon, smiling approval, rose out of the ocean, and when the two, now one, turned to go, once more he gathered her close to his heart.
"You will come back now, won't you?" she said.
And looking into the tear-wet eyes upraised to his, he kissed her once, twice, thrice.
"Surely," he answered, "my heart is here now."
In Wall Street, the most gigantic gambling Mecca the world knows, where millions change hands every hour of the five of howling delirium that constitute a stock-exchange day, the two parties, "bulls" and "bears," wage a financial war.
Each has its general, recognized leader as well as a dozen lesser ones, who organize pools and cliques, manipulate news, issue statements that are pure fiction, pay for items in the press that are fairy tales, gather their moneyed forces into aggregation for practical robbery of others, and bend all energies of brain, experience, and knowledge of conditions to one focal point, and that either to depress or enhance the value of securities. Each main army has its general method, controls its banks, pays enormous tolls to telegraph companies, fixes rates of interest at will, pays for and colors the daily utterances of its own newspapers, and buys truth and falsehood with equal readiness at so much per line.
This describes the two parties generally; yet the men who constitute them are daily changing, and out of a thousand who may be among the bears to-day, half might be found with the bulls a week hence. Some may be on both sides at once, pushing one stock up and another down, a kaleidoscopic jumble of half insane human beings, whose statements as to value, conditions, and their own intentions bear no relation to the truth and are not expected to do so. It is a contest of cunning, a war of falsehood, a battle of deception. And those who fall by the wayside excite no pity, receive no consideration, and if they rise not by their own exertion, they are kicked out of the way.
Professionally speaking, lawyers have been called legal liars, but compared to stock manipulators they are walking examples of truth and veracity. A lawyer may lie and can if necessary, but a stock operator lies all the time; from sheer force of habit. A lawyer might lie to judge, jury, or his own client, but there is some chance that he may tell the truth to a brother lawyer; while stock brokers will lie to each other on all occasions, and if necessary swear to it.
And this is business in Wall Street!
A few other great cities have their lesser Wall streets, and where Weston & Hill, like a deadly upas tree, flourished for a time, a mimic Wall Street existed. It had its clique of bulls and bears, itsMarket News, its leaders, large and small, its daily contest of lies and money power, and though Weston & Hill were not among its members, their broker, Simmons, was—an active and unscrupulous mouthpiece, ready to fleece all fellow-brokers, or the firm he acted for, if necessary. He had bought or sold Rockhaven stock, as its prime mover, Weston, directed; circulated lies galore for three months; and by the occult process of manipulation had slowly worked the price up from one to ten dollars per share, and had so colored his lies and so managed the deal—now selling a thousand shares quietly, then buying them back ostentatiously—that, as the phrase goes, "the street was kept guessing all the time."
Some believed it was a good investment; more felt sure it was a "wildcat," and that soon or late the bubble would burst and the stock go down to rise no more. Only Simmons and Weston knew what was to be the outcome, but neither was likely to tell. More than that, they knew how much stock was in actual circulation or held by the street, and beyond that, a close approximation of how great a short interest had accrued. Each day since Rockhaven had been quoted at all, Simmons had made entry of all recorded sales, and knowing how much had been issued and how much bought in by himself, endeavored to keep track of it. It was fallacious, for the same stock might be bought and sold a hundred times, and the long and short disparity remain the same. One thing he knew,—how much had actually been sold, and out of this (a matter of thirty thousand) fully twenty thousand, he believed, would never be heard of on the street.
But he reckoned without Winn Hardy.
Rockhaven had been jeered and sneered at by the bear party; its backers, Weston & Hill, were known to be sharpers; their broker, Simmons, bore the same reputation; prediction that it was a wildcat and they unloading it on to the street had been repeated a thousand times; theMarket Newsitems were considered unreliable, and on the strength of all this hotbed of lies the knowing ones had sold the stock all the way up. Some had covered it at a loss, and smarting from that had sold again at a higher price, firmly believing it must fall some day; and when poor duped Winn, unconscious of the situation, was steaming toward the battleground, a dozen growling bears were selling Rockhaven at every point advance. Only bears sold to bears, however; for those who held what was out owned it at a lower price, and so long as it kept up they parted with none. It had opened that morning at ten and one-half, by noon rose to twelve and one-quarter, and at the delivery hour of two was firm at fourteen. Simmons had bought a few hundred when it had dropped a half point, just to cheer up the game, and knowing those who sold had none to deliver. A few bulls who owned it at five and six started a story that a corner had been engineered, and predicted that it would go to thirty inside a week. And when the gong sounded that day, and the market closed with Rockhaven at fifteen and one-quarter bid and sixteen asked, a few of the fur-coated liars looked askance at one another and went out and drank liberally to keep their courage up.
And that night Weston and Simmons held another conference. It was a vital one; for before it closed some ten thousand shares of general securities Weston & Hill either owned or held in trust passed into Simmons's possession, and when the two conspirators separated, one was richer by nearly two hundred thousand dollars, based on the market price of these securities, and the other gloating over the prospective robbery of his hated partner.
But a halt came the next day, for Simmons bid sixteen for a block of Rockhaven, a few conservative bulls unloaded and the price dropped two points, while the bears took courage.
It was early dawn when Winn stepped from his train and into the ceaseless babel of the city. Market wagons were crowding the streets, the army of workers hurrying in every direction, newsboys shouting, humanity elbowing and pushing, draymen seemingly ready to run over him,—and this was his welcome back into the monster hive he had left three months before. What a contrast to Rockhaven!
Then to a hotel, a bath, a barber; and, finally, when he had made himself somewhat more in keeping with the well-groomed if heartless city folk that he must now meet, he secluded himself in a corner of a dining room, where he breakfasted behind a morning paper. He first turned to the stock page, fully expecting to see the name "Rockhaven" staring him in the face; but he did not. Then his eye ran down the column of quotations until, among the unlisted securities, it rested on "Rockhaven," thirteen bid and fourteen asked. And strange to say, the thirteen seemed significant; and now he looked elsewhere, feeling sure that he would find the Rockhaven Granite's Company's advertisement, but failed. There were others equally alluring, and to his mind equally deceptive,—oil, mining, development, building, and every other sort of scheme confronting him, each promising safe and sure returns and assuring the reader in fervid language that "now is the time to invest." And so eager were these swindlers to catch the unwary, that some offered stock for five cents a share, and non-assessable at that. Never before had Winn realized that schemers could descend to such pitiful methods as to issue, sign, and keep record of stock at a nickel a share! A trap to catch even newsboys!
Turning in disgust to the column of market gossip, he read the following: "Out of the multiplicity of investment organizations now crowding each other on all sides, a late one, the Rockhaven Granite Company, has forged to the front, its stock having crept up from one to fourteen dollars per share. But little is known of this company, and conservative investors believe the unusually rapid advance in its stock solely due to manipulation."
In this great human hive and on the pages of this leading newspaper the million-dollar scheme of Weston & Hill was only entitled to one line in the list of quotations and a five-line news item.
And Winn thought himself and his troubles to be of small concern.
But his troubles enlarged rapidly when Jack Nickerson came to his room later on.
"Well, old man," said that cheerful sceptic, looking Winn over, "you don't seem to have the odor of fish or any barnacles about you. You have had a hair cut, I see; and now if you will visit a tailor, you will soon be one of us again."
"Yes," laughed Winn, sarcastically, "I'm back where clothes make the man and put thieves and honest men on the same footing. But how is Rockhaven coming on?"
"It's not only coming, but it is here,—at least its only honest supporter is," answered Jack. "Where is your old fiddling friend, Hutton? I expected you would bring him along to look us swindlers over."
"No, I left him down at Rockhaven at peace with all the world and philosophizing on human depravity," answered Winn; "he would be as much out of place here as you would be there."
"Well, you'd best send for him, or else all the stock you sold on the island," asserted Nickerson, "and do it now. Matters have reached a climax, as I wrote you, and Page wants to 'do' old Simmons. We have held your stock for that purpose, and we want all we can get besides. The street is all short of it; and when they get scared, as they will soon, and Simmons tries to unload on them, we propose to be in the dance. Can't you wire the island?"
And Winn, once more in touch with the active life of the city, paused to collect himself.
"I might wire Captain Roby," he said, "and reach the island to-night. But Roby has bought one hundred of this stock, and if he realized the situation, he'd faint."
"Well, let him," answered Jack, "he'll come to quick enough when he understands his stock is worth fourteen dollars to-day and may not be worth one cent to-morrow. My belief is, if you wired him the price now, he'd point his old boat for the city and shovel coal under the boiler all the way himself."
"He wouldn't do that," replied Winn, "but he'd start for the island at once, and in ten minutes every one would know it."
"Well, wire him," said Jack, "and do it now. Tell him to see your philosopher."
And Winn obeyed.
"Now," said Jack, "you are a prisoner here in this room until Page says otherwise. If ever Simmons or Weston learns you are in the city, it will upset our plans. When your old barnacle arrives, we'll lock him up also until the crash comes, and then take you both into the exchange and let you see the fun. He will be all the safer anyway. Some one might sell him a gold brick."
"Not much," answered Winn, stoutly. "Jess Hutton can't be buncoed. He was keen enough to see through Weston the moment he set foot in his store, while it took me three months to do it."
"Well, you're getting you eye teeth cut slowly," laughed Jack, "and in a year or two you'll know sheep from goats. I'm sorry you can't go to call on Ethel Sherman this evening, but you can't. It's just as well, for when she hears you have come out on top of Rockhaven and are worth a few thousand, she'll receive you with more warmth. She is back from the mountains, brown as an autumn leaf and looking out of sight. If I didn't know she was the most heartless and selfish hypocrite ever clad in petticoats, I'd make love to her myself."
And Jack Nickerson, the inveterate scoffer at all things, took himself away.
That day Rockhaven was bid up to twenty, the short interest more than doubled, and the two arch conspirators, Weston and Simmons, in the privacy of the latter's office that night, held a love feast, nudged each other in the ribs, and laughed and joked while they smoked costly cigars, feeling sure a small fortune was within sight.
"I think it's best to let 'em bid it up to about forty," said Simmons, in a self-confident tone, and as though the street were within his grasp, "and then I'll feed those hungry bears granite chips by the shovelful."
"I flatter myself," he continued, "that I have engineered this deal as but few could; and if this pious old hen, Mrs. Converse, attends strictly to foreign missions a few days longer, all will go well."
"No need to worry about her," responded Weston, whose spirits had also risen. "I, too, am fairly smooth, and have persuaded her to leave her stock with me to sell when the right time comes; and I have also subscribed five hundred toward a home for old ladies she is interested in. That's the way Iconversewith her."
And the two laughed at this poor pun.
Little did either realize that Nemesis, with three thousand shares in reserve, lurked in Broker Page's office, and that another thousand in the pocket of the "fossil who fiddled," as Weston had once called Jess Hutton, would be added to that avenging club, inside of twenty-four hours.
In response to Winn's summons, dressed in a somewhat faded and nondescript garb, with bell-crowned silk hat of ancient style, Jess Hutton reached the city.
And he was a picture!
His coat, a surtout with small gilt buttons, a reddish brown vest, trousers of gray mixed stuff, a high collar with black satin stock, and his ruddy brown face with fringe of gray beard and keen twinkling blue eyes made him conspicuous. He carried a cane, limping a little as always, and when he greeted Winn on the station platform, the latter felt that all Rockhaven had arrived.
"Ain't this aleetlesudden?" he said, when the two had shaken hands. "I sorter cac'lated ye'd send fer me, an' when I got the message I thought o' old Abner Tucker's tombstone. He'd allus been skeered o' lightnin', an' when he got hit his widder had his stun sot up 'n' put on't, 'I 'spected this, but not so soon.'"
"I'm glad you came," said Winn, heartily, "and hope you have brought all the stock I sold on the island."
"Oh, I fetched it all, even the parson's, 'n' he told me a blessin' went with hisn," responded Jess.
And then Winn, more light-hearted than ever before in his life, hurried the old man into a carriage.
"We are to keep in hiding," he said, "until my friends say the word, and then I'll take you to the stock exchange and we will see our stock sold."
"I don't see no use in hidin' in this 'ere jumble o' humanity," asserted Jess, as their vehicle became entangled in a street blockade, "the puzzle on't here 'ud be to find anybody ye wanted."
"It's best that we hide, however," replied Winn. "If Weston caught sight of either of us, he would know our errand here at once."
"I don't cac'late he'd 'member me," said Jess, "though I'd recklect them gray stun'sls o' hisn out o' a million."
And Winn, contrasting the old man's present raiment with what he usually wore, concluded he was right.
But that evening, when Page and Nickerson were ushered into the room where Jess was held in (to him) durance vile, there was a scene.
"I'm powerful glad to meet ye, gentlemen," Jess asserted, shaking the hand of each in a way that made them wince, "I'd a sorter cac'lated brokers had horns 'n' claws the way ye're spoken on, but ye look purty harmless. I suppose ye air brokers," looking from one to the other, "an' which sort air ye, bulls or bears?"
"Either one or the other, as occasion serves," answered Page, laughing heartily. "We get together and toss or claw one another, according to the market, and when the fracas is over, count our cash and go out and drink to each other's good luck."
And this, be it said, fairly expresses the financial warfare daily waged "on 'change."
"I've read 'bout yer doin's," continued Jess, "an' I allus cac'lated ye were all a purty slick crowd o' deceivers, an' best ter steer clear on. I'm a sort o' an old barnacle livin' on an island, 'n' when this 'ere Weston woke me up one day, I made a fairly good dicker with him, an' 'long come this young man, 'n' I'll own up I kinder took ter him, bein's I hadn't chick nor child 'n' nothin' fer company but an old fiddle, 'n' just ter help him out, bought a leetle stock. I got a few o' the rest to buy some, 'greein' I'd see they wasn't to lose by it. I fetched it 'long, 'n' I tell ye, Mr. Hardy, yer message has stirred up quite a fuss. I'll bet yer landlady, the Widder Moore, hain't slept a wink sense, 'n' if Roby hadn't been obligated to Uncle Sam, he'd 'a' started fer the mainland that night."
"You are just in time, Mr. Hutton," observed Page, interested in this honest old man at once, "and unless all signs fail, I'll sell your stock to-morrow at ten or twenty times its cost. How would you like to carry back five thousand dollars for yourself and double that to distribute among your friends?"
"They'd all hev fits," answered Jess, "an' 'ud quit fishin' an' start to quarryin' right away. But I don't cac'late ye will, Mr. Page, an' we'll all on us be satisfied to git our hats back. Hope ye may, though; but thar's no use in countin' chickens till they're hatched."
And Jess Hutton, the cool and collected philosopher that he was, did not for one moment hope even that he would more than receive his money back. In his understanding of the matter, this quoted price for the stock was a mere fiction, and he felt sure that when it was actually offered for sale, no one would buy. To him it seemed like selling so much air. Never in his life had he set foot in a stock exchange, and when the next day, just as the great clock in the exchange marked nine-fifty, and he with Winn and Nickerson took seats in the gallery, no hint of the coming turmoil came to Jess, and fortunately no suspicion of his or Hardy's presence in the city had reached Weston or Simmons.
Then the gong sounded and bedlam ensued.
In an instant, a hundred men who had been chatting with one another in the pit, and as many more, as if by magic, leaped out of hiding, and a howl went up. They gathered in knots around the poles, pushing, pulling, yelling like demons, waving their arms aloft with fingers open, closed, or separated—a deaf mute alphabet used by these delirious men to buy or sell; and as they screamed and screeched and pushed and swore in a mad scramble, fortunes melted away or were created.
And on one side of that fiscal arena, tall, gaunt, with a fringe of gray hair about his poll, and watching with eyes as merciless as a lynx ready to spring, stood Simmons.
On the other, as alert, but younger, with the easysang froidof one skilled in this battle of values, stood Page.
Full well he knew what his enemy's tactics would be, and that when the crowd began to rally around the Rockhaven pole, he would creep up like a panther, and at the right moment overbid the highest. None were buyers, for none wanted Rockhaven at its present price, except frightened bears seeking to cover, and well Simmons knew it.
And so did Page, with his four thousand shares, waiting for the bear panic sure to come.
Rockhaven's turn now came. It opened at sixteen, then up to seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, without a halt; a breathless trio in the balcony attentively watched the dial where its price was recorded, or Page, who held their fortunes in his hand.
And then came the panic; for it had reached twenty, and Simmons, like a spectre, advanced, bidding twenty-one for ten thousand shares!
Then two bears, short as much each at five and six, lost their heads.
Up, up it went by leaps of two, three, and five points, bid by these half-crazed speculators, while Page eyed Simmons.
Two tigers of finance, cool, calculating, merciless!
The jam about the pole grew worse. A screaming, pushing, mad mass of beings, insane with greed!
Some on top, some under, and all cursing, yelling, a writhing monster, all heads and hands, the like of which can nowhere else be found. Thirty was bid, then thirty-two, four, six, eight!
Then forty!
And then Page, calculating to a nicety, leaped in!
In an instant, almost, the price fell twenty points, for Simmons, quick to see his enemy's offer to sell, lost his nerve and offered blocks of ten and twenty thousand shares down, down at any price!
And the scared bears, as quick as he to see the tide had turned, joined the downward bidding.
But Page had sold!
Winn and Jess were saved!
The bubble had burst!
Conscience, as in all great climaxes of human feeling, was a factor in the crash; for Simmons, knowing that he had once wronged and robbed Page, intuitively felt that a revenge was coming, and to save what he could out of the wrecked plot, joined the insane selling. For once in his life he played the coward.
After the financial delirium was over, there was a scene between him and Weston, over which it were best to draw the veil.
A more hilarious episode, however, occurred in Page's office, when all met there after the exchange closed.
"I didn't win out as I hoped," Page said to the rest, "for the market broke like an egg-shell. I unloaded the four thousand at an average of twenty, however, and had the pleasure of seeing Simmons gnash his false teeth and shake his fist at me, which was worth as much more." Then turning to Jess he added: "How did you enjoy the pow-wow?"
Jess smiled.
"I've seen a passel o' hungry hogs squealin' an' pawin' over a trough, an' two dogs fightin' over a bone. I've seen a cage o' monkeys all mad an' makin' the fur fly, an' if the whole kit 'n' boodle had been put in a pen 'n' sot a-goin', it wouldn't 'a' ekalled the fracas I've seen to-day. How any on 'em got out 'thout broken bones is more'n I kin see. I'd 'a' gin a hundred to 'a' held the nozzle o' a fire-engine hose 'n' squirted water on 'em."
"How would you have enjoyed being among them?" put in Nickerson, to whom the old man with his grotesque raiment and speech was a source of merriment.
"I wouldn't 'a' sot foot 'mong that crowd o' loony-tics fer a hundred dollars," answered Jess. "I cac'late they'd 'a' turned to 'n' bit me, same ez mad dogs."
"They'd have played foot-ball with your hat," responded Jack, who knew the ways of brokers, "and in two minutes you wouldn't have had a whole garment on you. I've seen them tie a man's legs and drag him around the room with a rope, then toss him in a blanket for a wind-up. They are a tough lot, and a stranger who gets into their hands meets hard usage."
"That's about the idee I had on 'em," said Jess; "they're wuss'n Injuns, an' ain't satisfied with takin' a man's money, they want his hair, hide, 'n' toe nails. If ever one on 'em comes ashore on Rockhaven 'n' I'm around, he'll think he's run into a hornet's nest. We'll use him wuss'n we did Abe Winty. He was a shiftless cuss that got out into the island somehow 'bout ten year ago, an' begun beggin' for a livin'. He 'lowed he had asmer an' heart troubles an' a tech o' liver complaint, 'n' jest couldn't do no liftin' or any sort o' hard work. He fooled us a spell, till we began missin' things 'n' found they were gittin' into the hands o' a low-down fellar who sold rum on the sly, 'n' then we held a sort o' indignation caucus, 'n' Abe wa'n't invited. We had diskivered by this time that Abe's heart 'n' liver was doin' business 'bout ez usual, 'n' the only thing that ailed him was downright laziness. We sorter compared idees at the meetin', an' the upshot on't was we concluded the island wa'n't big 'nuff for him. We'd tried all manner o' talk to shame him, but callin' names an' 'busin' him didn't hev no more 'fect than rain on a duck's back. We'd tried coaxin' an' cussin' to git him to work, but him 'n' work wus mortal enemies, 'n' when he couldn't beg 'nuff to eat he'd steal it. Suthin' had to be did, 'n' we did it. Fust we ketched 'n' shackled him 'n' locked him up in a fish-house fer two days, feedin' him on bread 'n' water,—mostly water at that,—an' when he'd got good 'n' hungry we sarved him a meal cooked with drug stuff, 'nuff in it to turn the stomach o' a Digger Injun. He was that starved he et it middlin' quick, an' then, to make the preceedin's more interestin' to Abe, the man that took the vittles to him told him pizen had been put in 'em 'n' he hadn't more'n an hour to live. Then we gathered round, peekin' in the door 'n' winders ez if cac'latin' to enjie Abe's dyin' agonies. It wa'n't long 'fore the drug stuff began workin', an' Abe, he got more scared than old Bill Atlas was when we sot the sea sarpint up to meet him. He hollered for mercy, an' when his vittles started to worry him he began prayin' an' took on woful, an' we just lookin' at him sober-like, ez if his end was clus to. The perceedin's lasted 'bout two hours, 'n' by that time Abe wus so weak he couldn't hold up his head. Then we straddled him on a rail 'n' carried him to the boat, 'n' Cap'n Roby sot him ashore."
"How would you like to serve Weston that way?" put in Winn when the story was ended.
"I wouldn't mind," answered Jess, chuckling at the thought, "though I cac'late we've come purty near gettin' square with him. I'd like to see him humsoever, jist about now, 'n' tell him old Rip Van Winkle hez woke up, 'n' if he wants any more quarries I'll 'commodate him if he'll come to Rockhaven."
Then when Page had made up the accounts of all three whose stock he had sold, handing each a check for their dues, all shook hands and separated.
And so warm was Winn's heart toward the old man who had "sorter took to him on sight" that he escorted him to the hotel and remained with him until he left for Rockhaven the next morning.
When the market closed that afternoon there was a scene in Simmons's office and an exchange of lurid language and mutual recrimination between Weston and himself unfit for publication.
Weston cursed Simmons for an arrant coward and a doddering old idiot, and Simmons abused Weston for a stupid fool who believed his dupe, Hardy, was blindly quarrying granite and selling stock to other dupes, when, instead, he had kept posted, come to the city in the nick of time, and tipped over their stock dish.
"The next time you pose for a great financier," said Simmons, with biting sarcasm, "and try to engineer a corner, you had better place half your stock in the hands of your office boy and tell him to attend the ball games each afternoon. Then advertise what your intentions are in the papers. It would be on a par with what you have done. You may be able to pray with a stupid old woman and hoodwink her, but as for doing business with men, you have mistaken your calling. You can't even deceive boys!"
And J. Malcolm Weston, realizing how he had failed on Winn, who he now knew was in the city, and had been in the exchange that day, hung his head in shame.
He even forgot to stroke his "stun'sls," as Jess called his side whiskers.
But there was one solace left him, and he proceeded to carry it out. In fact, he had made preparation to do so already.
"We will close up our business now, Mr. Simmons," he said in a dejected tone, when the tirade of abuse had ceased, "and in future I will employ another broker."
"Yes, and you are d——d welcome to do it," asserted Simmons, whose wrath had not cooled. "You made a holy show of me to-day and let that upstart, Page, turn the tables on me, and I've had enough of you. You had better go and hold a prayer service with Mrs. Converse. With Rockhavens at nothing bid, she will be in a suitable mood for prayers. You might ring the changes on 'The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away' with her, but you won't bear any resemblance to the Lord in her estimation. Take your business and your schemes and hide yourself somewhere. I would suggest you go to Rockhaven and ask your 'old fossil fiddler' to play the 'Rogues' March' for you."
And, having thus relieved his mind, Simmons, turned to his desk, and after a half-hour of careful computation handed Weston a statement and check for one hundred and ten thousand dollars, which represented the net results of the securities Weston had turned over to him, after deducting the actual loss they had made on Rockhaven. For the money received from the sale of some thirty thousand shares at one dollar each, had more than been consumed in buying back stock at various prices to affect the market, in the quarrying operations, inMarket Newsitems, and various other outgoes.
What Weston did receive after over a year of scheming was less than the original capital Hill had put into the firm. Weston had previously checked out and pocketed the firm's own bank balance, and now he went the way he had for months planned to go, and that night left the city.
And his wife, who had shrewdly insisted that their residence be deeded to her, in case of business reverses, shed no tears.
It was a fitting climax to the life of a J. Malcolm Weston.
But there was another episode of equal interest, and that the outcome of Weston's robbery of Hill. And when that has been told, no more shall either of these despicable men taint this narrative.
All that day while Rockhaven was first shooting skyward and then downward, Hill sat in his office watching the ticker. He couldn't go on to the floor of the exchange; he knew Weston was with Simmons; and so, like a human hyena, he lurked in his own den, waiting for his share of the plunder. And when the tape recorded forty for Rockhaven and then down to nothing in less time than it can be told, Hill was the happiest of men. He knew the plan was for Simmons to sell at forty, and supposed that he had done so. And in his greedy joy he began figuring how much his share of the street's robbery would be.
No thought of the poor widow, whose child was even then at her work in his outer office, came to him. He knew this confiding woman had, at his suggestion, invested her all in Rockhaven, and that now it had been swept away. It mattered not. Neither did he think of Mrs. Converse, more especially Weston's dupe, and whose stock, now worthless, was locked in their safe. No thought of young Winn Hardy, their faithful helper, and his loss came. No thought of anybody who had lost by them and must suffer entered his narrow and backward-sloping cranium. He only thought of himself. And his deep-set eyes gleamed with the miser's joy, and his shallow conceit swelled with pride.
Now he was a great financier!
Now he was a power "on 'change"!
When the market closed and the now beggared stenographer and other office help had gone home, he still waited. Weston would surely come soon and acquaint him with the results of their great achievement.
But Weston came not.
And Hill still waited.
And as one hour and then another was ticked off by the office clock, he ceased computing his share of the coming gains, and an intuitive sense that all was not right came to him. He was naturally suspicious, and being a thief at heart himself, quick to suspect others.
And now he suspected Weston!
Little by little his distrust increased as Hill watched the office door and listened to the clock tick. Trifling remarks that Weston had made, half-concealed sneers he had let escape, returned to Hill as he watched and waited.
Certainly he should come and divide, as any honorable thief ought to.
But he did not!
Never before had Weston failed to return at the close of the exchange, where he was usually closeted with Simmons. Why not now?
And so the demon of suspicion grew.
When another hour had passed and the daily workers in stores were hurrying homeward, Hill could stand the suspense no longer, and taking his hat almost ran to Simmons's office.
As might be expected, it was closed.
Then in a frenzy he hurried back to his own office and rang up Weston's home on the telephone.
Weston was not there.
Then he tried Simmons's home, with the same result.
Then he went home.
From gloating over the prospective fortune he expected to share, he had in a few hours become almost insane with a dread suspicion. His supper was but half eaten; he wouldn't answer his patient wife's question; he couldn't read, or think of but one thing, and that the horrible doubt and suspicion consuming him.
That night his sleep was filled with fiendish dreams, and he saw Weston running away and leering back at him over his shoulder.
When morning came, he hurried to his office an hour earlier than usual. Only the office boy was there, sweeping out. Hill went to his desk, where the morning mail was left. But one letter was there, and that from Winn Hardy, dated in the city the night before and enclosing a check for two hundred and thirty dollars, with the information that it belonged to the firm and that he had severed his connection with them.
True to his nature, even in despair, Hill put it in his pocket, resolving to say nothing to Weston about it. Then, to kill time till Weston came, he opened the morning paper. On the front page was the staring headlines:—
And then cold beads of sweat gathered on the face of Carlos B. Hill! All the horrible suspicion of the day before was now proven true! He waited to read no more, but with a groan of despair rushed, hatless, out of the office and ran to that of Simmons. That icicle of a man was there, calmly reading his mail.
"Where is Weston," almost screamed the half-insane Hill, "and what does all this mean?"
"I haven't the least idea where Mr. Weston is," replied Simmons, calmly. "Neither do I care. I balanced our account with him yesterday at the close of business, at his request, and beyond that have no interest."
"But where is he? Tell me quick, for God's sake!" shouted Hill, now trembling with excitement and fear. "I must know! Oh, what does this mean!"
"You had better go back to your own office and read the papers," answered the imperturbable Simmons, in a tone of disgust. "And when you go out again, put your hat on. As for Weston, I've done with him, and good riddance. He made a mess of his scheme, an ass of me 'on 'change' yesterday, and I hope I'll never see him again." And the always cool Simmons turned to his mail. Nothing short of a panic on the street or an earthquake ever disturbed him.
"But where is all the money we made yesterday?" came from Hill, in strident voice. "I want it, and I want it now!"
And he did want it more than he wanted good name, fame, wife, home, life, health, or God even!
"We made no money out of Rockhaven," answered Simmons, too disgusted even to be polite; "and I told you once, I have squared my account with Weston and paid him all I owe him. If that is not enough, I'll sing it to you."
And Hill, too agonized to feel an insult even, turned away. Back to the office he ran and read the long account of how Rockhaven had gone up like a rocket and down like a stick. He also read how Simmons had, at the critical moment, been worsted by Page, and even a description of Jess Hutton, who was present to see the fiasco. For Page, not satisfied with his triumph, had called up a reporter, and it is small wonder that Simmons was thoroughly incensed. There was sarcastic reference to him in the article: Weston was ridiculed, and even Hill did not escape, for this sacrilegious scribe had suggested that he could cool his rage at being baffled by fanning himself with his own ears. It was a malicious thrust, for the one feature about himself that Hill was ashamed of was his enormous ears.
In the midst of this added agony, in walked a clerk from their bank to inform him the account of Weston & Hill was overdrawn ten thousand dollars, and to make it good inside an hour or legal proceedings would follow.
Then Hill, with a groan, staggered to their safe and opened the till where securities were kept.
It was empty!
Then ruined, robbed, insulted, and in utter despair, he who in all his long life of grasping greed never had had one kindly thought for others, or of their needs, locked himself in his private office.
And when, an hour later, an officer knocked upon the door, demanding admittance in the name of the law, a pistol's report was the only answer.
And Carlos B. Hill, a cowardly sneak in life, died a coward's death.
But the minister of his church uttered an eulogy over him, for so much had he bought and amply paid for, and a small cortège followed him to his last resting place.
And among those few there was not a single sincere mourner.
Not even his wife!
Out of all the many confiding investors who were robbed by Weston & Hill, only a few need be mentioned. Winn's aunt, Mrs. Converse, was the most flagrant case of pure theft, for she was deceived through the vilest of all methods, a religious one. Weston, a merciless wolf in sheep's clothing, a pew-holder in her church and plausible hypocrite, who talked the golden rule, but belonged to Satan's host, easily duped her by his professions, and worse than that, gave her no possible chance of escape. The widow whose only aid in the battle for existence was the scanty earnings of her child in the office of those two sharpers, was perhaps the most pitiful one, for she lost every dollar that stood between her and the poorhouse. There were others entitled to less consideration,—clerks in stores who, bitten by the gambling instinct, hazarded one or two months' wages and lost them; cashiers in two or three banks, tempted as usual, to use money not their own to speculate with; and men about town on the watch for a good chance to "take a flyer." Most of these latter lost their money in the bucket shops, and by almost as culpable methods as Weston & Hill, for those who were buyers of Rockhaven on a margin when it went up to forty and down to nothing in a few hours were not present in these robbers' dens to take their profits, and when the fiasco was over, were merely told its sudden fall had wiped them out. Those of more experience in the way of speculation, and who had "gone short of it," as the phrase goes, were of course sold out or closed out in Rockhaven's wild leap upward, and like most who trust their money in a bucket-shop keeper's hands, knew nothing about it until informed that they had lost all they invested.
And here and now it seems a duty to interpose a word of warning against bucket shops.
We enact and try to enforce laws against all forms of gambling; we claim the right to invade the privacy of homes, even, where card playing for money is an occasional evening's pastime, and the law says that a gambling debt is no debt at all. We even assist the loser in gambling by allowing him to sue and recover his loss, when, as a matter of morals, he is just as guilty as the one who wins; and yet we allow these stock-gambling offices to open on all sides.
There is not a city of ordinary size where half a dozen do not flourish, and hardly a country village that has not one or more, ready to tempt incipient speculators to invest in the gambler's chance. They all do business on the same basis, viz., bet against the fool who buys or sells on a margin. They do not actually buy or sell a share of stock; their managers are merely like the dealers in a faro bank, paid to run the game. Their sole stock in trade is a leased wire over which to receive quotations, a handsomely fitted office bearing the legend, "Bankers and Brokers" (it should be, Bankers and Breakers), a gilt-lettered fiction of capital invested—and unlimited nerve!
They know full well that the lambs who stray into their den, and by good luck secure a small profit, will at once grow vain of their speculative skill and invest again. Even if these dupes win twice or thrice, it only results in a greater exultation, and the end is the same—they lose.
It is as inevitable as the tides or the sun to the majority, and while now and then one by sheer luck may win at this great gambling game, nine out of ten will lose, and the keeper of the shop rides in an automobile while they walk!
If these parlors of temptation were open only to men who realized the chances they were taking and could afford to lose, it would be a different matter; but all who wish to gamble may enter, and the cashier of your bank, paid a pittance that is but a premium on dishonesty, is liable to be the first one. And when he, lured on and on by that elusive hope that next time his guess may be right, has falsified books and made ducks and drakes of your money, you wake up some fine morning to read the old, old story, and learn that he has journeyed abroad.
And the bucket-shop keeper across the way smiles softly to himself and says nothing.
And Puck, looking down upon us human ants, also smiles and says, "What fools these mortals be."
The Great Rockhaven Granite Company, only one out of a thousand others of similar end and aim, was but a mere ripple on the sea of speculation. It was active while it lasted, it brought sorrow and tears to many, a small fortune to a few, transferring to them the money of others, and left dishonor and disgrace in its wake. On "the street" it was a nine days' wonder how so colossal a scheme could be foisted upon them and carried so near a successful culmination, and then, as usual, it was forgotten. Others as transparent took its place, and so the mad wave of speculation rolled on in the city.
But on Rockhaven there was rejoicing.
When Winn bade good-by to Jess Hutton he realized for the first time how closely his life had become linked to Rockhaven. The old man, burdened with the responsibility of twenty thousand dollars safely tucked under his pillow the night before, had not closed his eyes in sleep. He seemed as much cast down as Winn. In truth, he was more so, for the hand of time had swept him beyond the influence of dollars, and human sympathy and his own feelings were of more account.
"We, all on us, owe ye more'n we kin ever pay back," he said when the moment of parting came, "an' if ye realize how ye stand with us on the island 'n' how glad we'll all be to hev ye back with us, ye won't be long in comin'. Ye had the chance to rob us, an' ye didn't. Instid ye did the best ye could to save our money 'thout thinkin' much about yer own, an' that, 'long o' what ye did for the men ez needed work 'n' wages, will give ye a warm welcome back. If we could know when ye was comin' (ez I hope ye will soon), thar ain't a man, woman, or child in Rockhaven ez wouldn't be on the dock to meet ye, 'n' the parson'd want 'em all to make for the church at onct and jine in singin' hymns."
"I am glad you will all think so kindly of me," answered Winn, his heart rising to his throat at this unexpected tribute, "and I hope soon to be with you. What I shall do now, I do not know. I have a good sum of money now that I can call my own, thanks to luck and Mr. Page, but as for future business or occupation, have no plans."
"Ye might come to Rockhaven an' start the quarry on yer own hook," responded Jess. "There's 'nuff on us ez'll be more'n glad to put money in, an' ye needn't be feared they won't hev confidence in ye. The hull island comes purty near bein' yourn now, fer the askin'."
And then the "all aboard," that ends so many partings, came.
"Don't forgit us, 'n' what I've told ye," said Jess, with a slight tremble in his voice, as he once more shook Winn's hand, while his eyes grew moist; "don't forgit—any on us."
Then the train bore him away.
And Winn, conscious now that a friend as good and true as his own father had once been, had opened his heart to him, turned away, his own eyes also misty. And for days, weeks, and months after, the last words of Jess Hutton were tender in his memory.
But the consciousness that he had now twenty thousand dollars safely on deposit, soon lifted him into a cheerful mood again, and when he reached his aunt's home, his spirits were at top notch.
The most surprised and elated person in the city was that same worthy and excellent aunt. Not a hint, even, had she received of Winn's arrival in the city, and the great fiasco "on 'change" the day before was also unknown to her. When Winn, using his own latch-key, walked into the sitting room, she sat by her little table reading the latestZion's Herald, while near by her pet lap-dog slumbered in a rocking chair.
"Why, Winn," she exclaimed, springing to her feet and kissing him fondly, "what has brought you to the city, and why didn't you tell me you were coming? Or did you want to surprise the old lady?"
And Winn, a little proud of his financial success, answered: "I came here two days ago to surprise Weston & Hill, and succeeded. So much so that Weston has left for parts unknown, and I am twenty thousand dollars richer for the surprise. I had to keep in hiding two days to do it, however."
And then a greater surprise came to Winn.
"Mr. Weston run away," gasped his aunt, growing pale and oblivious to Winn's twenty-thousand-dollar assertion. "What do you mean, Winn?"
"I mean," he answered coolly, "just what I say. Weston has robbed his partner and left the town! The Rockhaven Granite Company gone to smash! Stock not worth a copper, and there you are! But I'm all right, auntie," he added cheerfully, "you can't lose me."
And then a scene came.
For a moment Winn's aunt looked at him, her eyes dilated, mouth open.
"The—company—gone—to—smash!" she exclaimed slowly, as the awful news forced its way into her brain. Then she seemed to reel a moment, and the next sank to her knees beside a chair, her face in the cushion.
"Oh, my God," she moaned, "I am ruined, ruined, ruined!"
And Winn, half guessing the cause of his aunt's despair, was beside her in an instant.
"What do you mean, auntie?" he begged. "What do you mean?"
"All my money," she sobbed, "all my money has gone! Twenty thousand, all I had, gone, gone, gone!" And she moaned again.
Winn, rising, glanced at the table where only magazines and religious papers lay, and at his aunt, still sobbing at his feet, and then a light came to him. And it must be recorded, a curse as hearty as it was profane rose to his lips, and the name of J. Malcolm Weston was linked with it.
For Winn had known how his aunt had trusted and believed in Weston, and now the outcome of it was plain.
A moment more only did he look at the woe-begone woman at his feet, and then he turned and left the room, and went to his own upstairs.
Many of us in this world do selfish things, a few of us do mean ones; but not to one in a thousand does the chance come to do a heroic one, and when it comes, not one in ten is equal to it. We think, we excuse, we evade, we haggle with our conscience and selfish impulses, and in the end self wins the day.
But Winn, fresh from the island, where simple good will to all men ruled supreme, and the heart-offering of Jess Hutton still warming his own, was in the spirit for heroism. As he sat down to think in his own room, all the years that this good aunt had been a mother to him came back. She was simple, she was over-pious, she believed all to be like herself,—good, kind, and true. And to Winn she had been all that a motherly woman could be.
Only for a moment did he hesitate, and then he wrote a check for the small fortune he owned for a day, and descending the stairs, handed it to his aunt.
"Come, auntie," he said cheerfully, "don't shed any more tears over that accursed Weston. You have been a good mother to me for many years, and here is your money back."
Then he swallowed a lump in his own throat and turned away.
Over the scene that followed a veil shall be drawn.
That evening at the tea-table, Winn, almost beyond praise now in his aunt's estimation, told the story of his summer on Rockhaven and what manner of people he found there, their ways of living, and all about them, even to their dress. The little church and its poorly paid minister, whose simple and touching prayers had reached Winn's heart as none had before, were also mentioned; even the two bells answering one another across the island at eventide, and the new influence upon his life and thoughts they had wrought, were spoken of. Quaint old Jess with his fiddle came in for a share, and the ancient tide mill and its history as well. The old tower, the bold, frowning cliffs, and the gorge with the Devil's Oven opening into it were described. All the island, in fact, and all it contained, except—Mona. And when, late that evening, Winn's aunt kissed him good night and retired to her room, she knelt down and thanked God, who had opened her heart to care for this son of her dead sister.
In a different mood when he reached his room, and conscious that his life's fortunes had yet to be wrought, Winn sat down and wrote to Mona. And so strange a love letter was it, and so misunderstood by her, that it must be given here.
"Dear little Sweetheart," he wrote, "my life and hopes seem to have come to a full stop and I do not know what to say to you. My summer's work, and all my ambitions, as I feared, have ended in one grand crash. Out of this I saved your uncle and those on the island who bought stock. I also saved myself, or, as it turned out, my aunt's fortune, for unbeknown to me she had been led to invest in Rockhaven stock and lost all. As she has given me all that I have known of home since boyhood, I should have been more than ungrateful had I not taken care of her."What my future plans are, I cannot say. The world is wide, and some place in it for me will be found. Where it is, or what doing, I know not."It is but a few days since I left the island, hoping soon to return, and now it seems months. I recall all the charming hours we have passed together with keen interest, and yet they seem to-night like an old, old memory, returning even as the scenes of my boyhood return when I am despondent."
"Dear little Sweetheart," he wrote, "my life and hopes seem to have come to a full stop and I do not know what to say to you. My summer's work, and all my ambitions, as I feared, have ended in one grand crash. Out of this I saved your uncle and those on the island who bought stock. I also saved myself, or, as it turned out, my aunt's fortune, for unbeknown to me she had been led to invest in Rockhaven stock and lost all. As she has given me all that I have known of home since boyhood, I should have been more than ungrateful had I not taken care of her.
"What my future plans are, I cannot say. The world is wide, and some place in it for me will be found. Where it is, or what doing, I know not.
"It is but a few days since I left the island, hoping soon to return, and now it seems months. I recall all the charming hours we have passed together with keen interest, and yet they seem to-night like an old, old memory, returning even as the scenes of my boyhood return when I am despondent."
More than this he wrote, but it need not be quoted, being merely tender phrases and without point.
Mona, trying to read between the lines, as well she might, imagined it to be a farewell message and a good-by to herself.
Reading thus, and a false reading at that, she betook herself to the old tower, and there, all alone with her heartache, while the stars looked down in pity and the ocean moaned close by, she cast herself upon the cold stones and cried her heart agony away.
And the letter was never answered.