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Correct several letter semantic errors
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<p>Lena raised the lid of an old empty case that had once contained canned corn and got out a sheet of paper and a piece of pencil. She was going to write a letter to her mamma. Tommy Ryan was going to post it for her at Ballinger’s. Tommy was seventeen, worked in the quarries, went home to Ballinger’s every night, and was now waiting in the shadows under Lena’s window for her to throw the letter out to him. That was the only way she could send a letter to Fredericksburg. <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Maloney did not like for her to write letters.</p>
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<p>The stump of the candle was burning low, so Lena hastily bit the wood from around the lead of her pencil and began. This is the letter she wrote:</p>
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<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
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<p><span epub:type="salutation">Dearest Mamma:</span>—I want so much to see you. And Gretel and Claus and Heinrich and little Adolf. I am so tired. I want to see you. Today I was slapped by <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Maloney and had no supper. I could not bring in enough wood, for my hand hurt. She took my book yesterday. I mean “Grimm’s Fairy Tales,” which Uncle Leo gave me. It did not hurt anyone for me to read the book. I try to work as well as I can, but there is so much to do. I read only a little bit every night. Dear mamma, I shall tell you what I am going to do. Unless you send for me tomorrow to bring me home I shall go to a deep place I know in the river and drown. It is wicked to drown, I suppose, but I wanted to see you, and there is no one else. I am very tired, and Tommy is waiting for the letter. You will excuse me, mamma, if I do it. <span epub:type="valediction">Your respectful and loving daughter,</span> <span epub:type="z3998:signature">Lena</span>.</p>
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<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dearest Mamma:</span>—I want so much to see you. And Gretel and Claus and Heinrich and little Adolf. I am so tired. I want to see you. Today I was slapped by <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Maloney and had no supper. I could not bring in enough wood, for my hand hurt. She took my book yesterday. I mean “Grimm’s Fairy Tales,” which Uncle Leo gave me. It did not hurt anyone for me to read the book. I try to work as well as I can, but there is so much to do. I read only a little bit every night. Dear mamma, I shall tell you what I am going to do. Unless you send for me tomorrow to bring me home I shall go to a deep place I know in the river and drown. It is wicked to drown, I suppose, but I wanted to see you, and there is no one else. I am very tired, and Tommy is waiting for the letter. You will excuse me, mamma, if I do it. <span epub:type="z3998:valediction">Your respectful and loving daughter,</span> <span class="signature">Lena</span>.</p>
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</blockquote>
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<p>Tommy was still waiting faithfully when the letter was concluded, and when Lena dropped it out she saw him pick it up and start up the steep hillside. Without undressing she blew out the candle and curled herself upon the mattress on the floor.</p>
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<p>At 10:30 o’clock old man Ballinger came out of his house in his stocking feet and leaned over the gate, smoking his pipe. He looked down the big road, white in the moonshine, and rubbed one ankle with the toe of his other foot. It was time for the Fredericksburg mail to come pattering up the road.</p>
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@ -90,7 +90,7 @@
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<p>The story is splendidly constructed; its style is strong and inimitable, and its action and character-drawing deserve the highest praise. As a story per se it has merit beyond anything that we have read for some time. But, as we have said, it fails to come up to some of the standards we have set.</p>
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<p>Could you not rewrite the story, and inject into it the social atmosphere, and return it to us for further consideration? It is suggested to you that you have the hero, Van Sweller, drop in for luncheon or dinner once or twice at ⸻<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-10" id="noteref-10" epub:type="noteref">10</a> or at the ⸻<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-11" id="noteref-11" epub:type="noteref">11</a> which will be in line with the changes desired.</p>
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<footer>
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<p epub:type="valediction">Very truly yours,</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:valediction">Very truly yours,</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:sender">The Editors</p>
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</footer>
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</blockquote>
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@ -77,10 +77,10 @@
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<header>
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<p>El Señor Don Santos Urique,</p>
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<p>La Casa Blanca,</p>
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<p epub:type="salutation">My Dear Sir:</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:salutation">My Dear Sir:</p>
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</header>
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<p>I beg permission to inform you that there is in my house as a temporary guest a young man who arrived in Buenas Tierras from the United States some days ago. Without wishing to excite any hopes that may not be realized, I think there is a possibility of his being your long-absent son. It might be well for you to call and see him. If he is, it is my opinion that his intention was to return to his home, but upon arriving here, his courage failed him from doubts as to how he would be received. <span epub:type="valediction">Your true servant,</span></p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:signature">Thompson Thacker.</p>
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<p>I beg permission to inform you that there is in my house as a temporary guest a young man who arrived in Buenas Tierras from the United States some days ago. Without wishing to excite any hopes that may not be realized, I think there is a possibility of his being your long-absent son. It might be well for you to call and see him. If he is, it is my opinion that his intention was to return to his home, but upon arriving here, his courage failed him from doubts as to how he would be received. <span epub:type="z3998:valediction">Your true servant,</span></p>
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<p class="signature">Thompson Thacker.</p>
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</blockquote>
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<p>Half an hour afterward—quick time for Buenas Tierras—Señor Urique’s ancient landau drove to the consul’s door, with the barefooted coachman beating and shouting at the team of fat, awkward horses.</p>
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<p>A tall man with a white moustache alighted, and assisted to the ground a lady who was dressed and veiled in unrelieved black.</p>
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@ -58,8 +58,8 @@
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<p>“Some letters just came,” said Adkins. “I thought you might like to glance at them before you go.”</p>
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<p>Let us look over his shoulder and read just a few lines of one of them:</p>
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<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
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<p><span epub:type="salutation">My Dear, Dear Husband</span>: Just received your letter ordering us to stay another month. … Rita’s cough is almost gone. … Johnny has simply gone wild like a little Indian … Will be the making of both children … work so hard, and I know that your business can hardly afford to keep us here so long … best man that ever … you always pretend that you like the city in summer … trout fishing that you used to be so fond of … and all to keep us well and happy … come to you if it were not doing the babies so much good. … I stood last evening on Chimney Rock in exactly the same spot where I was when you put the wreath of roses on my head … through all the world … when you said you would be my true knight … fifteen years ago, dear, just think! … have always been that to me … ever and ever,</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:signature">Mary.</p>
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<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">My Dear, Dear Husband</span>: Just received your letter ordering us to stay another month. … Rita’s cough is almost gone. … Johnny has simply gone wild like a little Indian … Will be the making of both children … work so hard, and I know that your business can hardly afford to keep us here so long … best man that ever … you always pretend that you like the city in summer … trout fishing that you used to be so fond of … and all to keep us well and happy … come to you if it were not doing the babies so much good. … I stood last evening on Chimney Rock in exactly the same spot where I was when you put the wreath of roses on my head … through all the world … when you said you would be my true knight … fifteen years ago, dear, just think! … have always been that to me … ever and ever,</p>
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<p class="signature">Mary.</p>
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</blockquote>
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<p>The man who said he thought New York the finest summer resort in the country dropped into a café on his way home and had a glass of beer under an electric fan.</p>
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<p>“Wonder what kind of a fly old Harding used,” he said to himself.</p>
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@ -17,8 +17,8 @@
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<p>Again, there was, on the beauty page, a complete answer to a young lady inquirer who desired admonition toward the securing of bright eyes, rosy cheeks and a beautiful countenance.</p>
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<p>One other item requiring special cognizance was a brief “personal,” running thus:</p>
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<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
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<p><span epub:type="salutation">Dear Jack</span>:—Forgive me. You were right. Meet me corner Madison and ⸺th at 8:30 this morning. We leave at noon.</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:signature">Penitent.</p>
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<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear Jack</span>:—Forgive me. You were right. Meet me corner Madison and ⸺th at 8:30 this morning. We leave at noon.</p>
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<p class="signature">Penitent.</p>
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</blockquote>
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<p>At 8 o’clock a young man with a haggard look and the feverish gleam of unrest in his eye dropped a penny and picked up the top paper as he passed Giuseppi’s stand. A sleepless night had left him a late riser. There was an office to be reached by nine, and a shave and a hasty cup of coffee to be crowded into the interval.</p>
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<p>He visited his barber shop and then hurried on his way. He pocketed his paper, meditating a belated perusal of it at the luncheon hour. At the next corner it fell from his pocket, carrying with it his pair of new gloves. Three blocks he walked, missed the gloves and turned back fuming.</p>
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@ -42,11 +42,11 @@
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<p>At the end of a year the situation of <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Ralph Spencer was this: he had won the respect of the community, his shoe-store was flourishing, and he and Annabel were engaged to be married in two weeks. <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Adams, the typical, plodding, country banker, approved of Spencer. Annabel’s pride in him almost equalled her affection. He was as much at home in the family of <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Adams and that of Annabel’s married sister as if he were already a member.</p>
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<p>One day Jimmy sat down in his room and wrote this letter, which he mailed to the safe address of one of his old friends in <abbr>St.</abbr> Louis:</p>
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<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
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<p epub:type="salutation">Dear Old Pal:</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear Old Pal:</p>
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<p>I want you to be at Sullivan’s place, in Little Rock, next Wednesday night, at nine o’clock. I want you to wind up some little matters for me. And, also, I want to make you a present of my kit of tools. I know you’ll be glad to get them—you couldn’t duplicate the lot for a thousand dollars. Say, Billy, I’ve quit the old business—a year ago. I’ve got a nice store. I’m making an honest living, and I’m going to marry the finest girl on earth two weeks from now. It’s the only life, Billy—the straight one. I wouldn’t touch a dollar of another man’s money now for a million. After I get married I’m going to sell out and go West, where there won’t be so much danger of having old scores brought up against me. I tell you, Billy, she’s an angel. She believes in me; and I wouldn’t do another crooked thing for the whole world. Be sure to be at Sully’s, for I must see you. I’ll bring along the tools with me.</p>
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<footer>
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<p epub:type="valediction">Your old friend,</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:signature">Jimmy.</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:valediction">Your old friend,</p>
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<p class="signature">Jimmy.</p>
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</footer>
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</blockquote>
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<p>On the Monday night after Jimmy wrote this letter, Ben Price jogged unobtrusively into Elmore in a livery buggy. He lounged about town in his quiet way until he found out what he wanted to know. From the drugstore across the street from Spencer’s shoe-store he got a good look at Ralph D. Spencer.</p>
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@ -41,7 +41,8 @@
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<p>“It sometimes changes a good man into a bad one,” said the tall man. “You’ve been under arrest for ten minutes, ‘Silky’ Bob. Chicago thinks you may have dropped over our way and wires us she wants to have a chat with you. Going quietly, are you? That’s sensible. Now, before we go on to the station here’s a note I was asked to hand you. You may read it here at the window. It’s from Patrolman Wells.”</p>
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<p>The man from the West unfolded the little piece of paper handed him. His hand was steady when he began to read, but it trembled a little by the time he had finished. The note was rather short.</p>
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<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
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<p><span epub:type="salutation">Bob</span>: I was at the appointed place on time. When you struck the match to light your cigar I saw it was the face of the man wanted in Chicago. Somehow I couldn’t do it myself, so I went around and got a plain clothes man to do the job. <span epub:type="z3998:signature">Jimmy</span>.</p>
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<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Bob</span>: I was at the appointed place on time. When you struck the match to light your cigar I saw it was the face of the man wanted in Chicago. Somehow I couldn’t do it myself, so I went around and got a plain clothes man to do the job.</p>
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<p class="signature">Jimmy.</p>
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</blockquote>
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</section>
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</body>
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@ -31,10 +31,10 @@
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<p>“De gent says he’s had de ski-bunk put on him widout no cause. He says he’s no bum guy; and, lady, yer read dat letter, and I’ll bet yer he’s a white sport, all right.”</p>
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<p>The young lady unfolded the letter; somewhat doubtfully, and read it.</p>
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<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
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<p><span epub:type="salutation">Dear <abbr>Dr.</abbr> Arnold</span>: I want to thank you for your most kind and opportune aid to my daughter last Friday evening, when she was overcome by an attack of her old heart-trouble in the conservatory at <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Waldron’s reception. Had you not been near to catch her as she fell and to render proper attention, we might have lost her. I would be glad if you would call and undertake the treatment of her case.</p>
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<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear <abbr>Dr.</abbr> Arnold</span>: I want to thank you for your most kind and opportune aid to my daughter last Friday evening, when she was overcome by an attack of her old heart-trouble in the conservatory at <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Waldron’s reception. Had you not been near to catch her as she fell and to render proper attention, we might have lost her. I would be glad if you would call and undertake the treatment of her case.</p>
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<footer>
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<p epub:type="valediction">Gratefully yours,</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:signature">Robert Ashburton.</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:valediction">Gratefully yours,</p>
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<p class="signature">Robert Ashburton.</p>
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</footer>
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</blockquote>
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<p>The young lady refolded the letter, and handed it to the boy.</p>
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<p>At the supper table Louisa handed me some letters that had come during my absence. Several of them contained rejected manuscript. Ever since I first began going to Heffelbower’s my stuff had been coming back with alarming frequency. Lately I had been dashing off my jokes and articles with the greatest fluency. Previously I had labored like a bricklayer, slowly and with agony.</p>
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<p>Presently I opened a letter from the editor of the weekly with which I had a regular contract. The checks for that weekly article were still our main dependence. The letter ran thus:</p>
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<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
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<p epub:type="salutation">Dear Sir:</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear Sir:</p>
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<p>As you are aware, our contract for the year expires with the present month. While regretting the necessity for so doing, we must say that we do not care to renew same for the coming year. We were quite pleased with your style of humor, which seems to have delighted quite a large proportion of our readers. But for the past two months we have noticed a decided falling off in its quality. Your earlier work showed a spontaneous, easy, natural flow of fun and wit. Of late it is labored, studied, and unconvincing, giving painful evidence of hard toil and drudging mechanism.</p>
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<p>Again regretting that we do not consider your contributions available any longer, we are, yours sincerely,</p>
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<p class="signature">The Editor.</p>
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<blockquote>
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<p>I handed this letter to my wife. After she had read it her face grew extremely long, and there were tears in her eyes.</p>
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<p>“The mean old thing!” she exclaimed indignantly. “I’m sure your pieces are just as good as they ever were. And it doesn’t take you half as long to write them as it did.” And then, I suppose, Louisa thought of the checks that would cease coming. “Oh, John,” she wailed, “what will you do now?”</p>
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<p>For an answer I got up and began to do a polka step around the supper table. I am sure Louisa thought the trouble had driven me mad; and I think the children hoped it had, for they tore after me, yelling with glee and emulating my steps. I was now something like their old playmate as of yore.</p>
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<p>“The theatre for us tonight!” I shouted; “nothing less. And a late, wild, disreputable supper for all of us at the Palace Restaurant. Lumpty-diddle-de-dee-de-dum!”</p>
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<p>And then I explained my glee by declaring that I was now a partner in a prosperous undertaking establishment, and that written jokes might go hide their heads in sackcloth and ashes for all me.</p>
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<p>With the editor’s letter in her hand to justify the deed I had done, my wife could advance no objections save a few mild ones based on the feminine inability to appreciate a good thing such as the little back room of Peter Hef—no, of Heffelbower & Co’s. undertaking establishment.</p>
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<p>In conclusion, I will say that today you will find no man in our town as well liked, as jovial, and full of merry sayings as I. My jokes are again noised about and quoted; once more I take pleasure in my wife’s confidential chatter without a mercenary thought, while Guy and Viola play at my feet distributing gems of childish humor without fear of the ghastly tormentor who used to dog their steps, notebook in hand.</p>
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<p>Our business has prospered finely. I keep the books and look after the shop, while Peter attends to outside matters. He says that my levity and high spirits would simply turn any funeral into a regular Irish wake.</p>
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</blockquote>
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</blockquote>
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<p>I handed this letter to my wife. After she had read it her face grew extremely long, and there were tears in her eyes.</p>
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<p>“The mean old thing!” she exclaimed indignantly. “I’m sure your pieces are just as good as they ever were. And it doesn’t take you half as long to write them as it did.” And then, I suppose, Louisa thought of the checks that would cease coming. “Oh, John,” she wailed, “what will you do now?”</p>
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<p>For an answer I got up and began to do a polka step around the supper table. I am sure Louisa thought the trouble had driven me mad; and I think the children hoped it had, for they tore after me, yelling with glee and emulating my steps. I was now something like their old playmate as of yore.</p>
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<p>“The theatre for us tonight!” I shouted; “nothing less. And a late, wild, disreputable supper for all of us at the Palace Restaurant. Lumpty-diddle-de-dee-de-dum!”</p>
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<p>And then I explained my glee by declaring that I was now a partner in a prosperous undertaking establishment, and that written jokes might go hide their heads in sackcloth and ashes for all me.</p>
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<p>With the editor’s letter in her hand to justify the deed I had done, my wife could advance no objections save a few mild ones based on the feminine inability to appreciate a good thing such as the little back room of Peter Hef—no, of Heffelbower & Co’s. undertaking establishment.</p>
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<p>In conclusion, I will say that today you will find no man in our town as well liked, as jovial, and full of merry sayings as I. My jokes are again noised about and quoted; once more I take pleasure in my wife’s confidential chatter without a mercenary thought, while Guy and Viola play at my feet distributing gems of childish humor without fear of the ghastly tormentor who used to dog their steps, notebook in hand.</p>
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<p>Our business has prospered finely. I keep the books and look after the shop, while Peter attends to outside matters. He says that my levity and high spirits would simply turn any funeral into a regular Irish wake.</p>
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</section>
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</body>
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</html>
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<p>At midnight she wrote this letter:</p>
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<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
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<p epub:type="se:letter.dateline">“<span epub:type="z3998:recipient"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Beriah Hoskins</span>, Harmony, Vermont.</p>
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<p>“<span epub:type="salutation">Dear Sir</span>: Henceforth, consider me as dead to you forever. I have loved you too well to blight your career by bringing into it my guilty and sin-stained life. I have succumbed to the insidious wiles of this wicked world and have been drawn into the vortex of Bohemia. There is scarcely any depth of glittering iniquity that I have not sounded. It is hopeless to combat my decision. There is no rising from the depths to which I have sunk. Endeavor to forget me. I am lost forever in the fair but brutal maze of awful Bohemia. Farewell.</p>
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<p>“<span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear Sir</span>: Henceforth, consider me as dead to you forever. I have loved you too well to blight your career by bringing into it my guilty and sin-stained life. I have succumbed to the insidious wiles of this wicked world and have been drawn into the vortex of Bohemia. There is scarcely any depth of glittering iniquity that I have not sounded. It is hopeless to combat my decision. There is no rising from the depths to which I have sunk. Endeavor to forget me. I am lost forever in the fair but brutal maze of awful Bohemia. Farewell.</p>
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<p class="signature">Once Your Medora.”</p>
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</blockquote>
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<p>On the next day Medora formed her resolutions. Beelzebub, flung from heaven, was no more cast down. Between her and the apple blossoms of Harmony there was a fixed gulf. Flaming cherubim warded her from the gates of her lost paradise. In one evening, by the aid of Binkley and Mumm, Bohemia had gathered her into its awful midst.</p>
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<blockquote>
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<p>His Nibs skedaddled yesterday per jackrabbit line with all the coin in the kitty and the bundle of muslin he’s spoony about. The boodle is six figures short. Our crowd in good shape, but we need the spondulicks. You collar it. The main guy and the dry goods are headed for the briny. You know what to do.</p>
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<footer>
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<p epub:type="z3998:sender">Bob</p>
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<p class="signature" epub:type="z3998:sender">Bob</p>
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</footer>
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</blockquote>
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<p>This screed, remarkable as it was, had no mystery for Goodwin. He was the most successful of the small advance-guard of speculative Americans that had invaded Anchuria, and he had not reached that enviable pinnacle without having well exercised the arts of foresight and deduction. He had taken up political intrigue as a matter of business. He was acute enough to wield a certain influence among the leading schemers, and he was prosperous enough to be able to purchase the respect of the petty officeholders. There was always a revolutionary party; and to it he had always allied himself; for the adherents of a new administration received the rewards of their labours. There was now a Liberal party seeking to overturn President Miraflores. If the wheel successfully revolved, Goodwin stood to win a concession to 30,000 manzanas of the finest coffee lands in the interior. Certain incidents in the recent career of President Miraflores had excited a shrewd suspicion in Goodwin’s mind that the government was near a dissolution from another cause than that of a revolution, and now Englehart’s telegram had come as a corroboration of his wisdom.</p>
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<p>The major smiled, but the examiner only bowed coldly, and abruptly quitted the bank. They saw him travel diagonally across the street in a straight line and enter the Stockmen’s National Bank.</p>
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<p>Major Tom sat down at his desk, and drew from his vest pocket the note Roy had given him. He had read it once, but hurriedly, and now, with something like a twinkle in his eyes, he read it again. These were the words he read:</p>
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<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
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<p epub:type="salutation">Dear Tom:</p>
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<p epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear Tom:</p>
|
||||
<p>I hear there’s one of Uncle Sam’s grayhounds going through you, and that means that we’ll catch him inside of a couple of hours, maybe. Now, I want you to do something for me. We’ve got just $2,200 in the bank, and the law requires that we have $20,000. I let Ross and Fisher have $18,000 late yesterday afternoon to buy up that Gibson bunch of cattle. They’ll realise $40,000 in less than thirty days on the transaction, but that won’t make my cash on hand look any prettier to that bank examiner. Now, I can’t show him those notes, for they’re just plain notes of hand without any security in sight, but you know very well that Pink Ross and Jim Fisher are two of the finest white men God ever made, and they’ll do the square thing. You remember Jim Fisher—he was the one who shot that faro dealer in El Paso. I wired Sam Bradshaw’s bank to send me $20,000, and it will get in on the narrow-gauge at 10.35. You can’t let a bank examiner in to count $2,200 and close your doors. Tom, you hold that examiner. Hold him. Hold him if you have to rope him and sit on his head. Watch our front window after the narrow-gauge gets in, and when we’ve got the cash inside we’ll pull down the shade for a signal. Don’t turn him loose till then. I’m counting on you, Tom.</p>
|
||||
<footer>
|
||||
<p epub:type="valediction">Your Old Pard,</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:signature">Bob Buckley</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:valediction">Your Old Pard,</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Bob Buckley</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<i>Prest. Stockmen’s National</i>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -81,7 +81,11 @@
|
||||
<p>For several years the Nopalito had been making experiments with an English breed of cattle that looked down with aristocratic contempt upon the Texas longhorns. The experiments were found satisfactory; and a pasture had been set aside for the blue-bloods. The fame of them had gone forth into the chaparral and pear as far as men ride in saddles. Other ranches woke up, rubbed their eyes, and looked with new dissatisfaction upon the longhorns.</p>
|
||||
<p>As a consequence, one day a sunburned, capable, silk-kerchiefed nonchalant youth, garnished with revolvers, and attended by three Mexican vaqueros, alighted at the Nopalito ranch and presented the following businesslike epistle to the queen thereof:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
|
||||
<p><abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Yeager—The Nopalito Ranch: <span epub:type="salutation">Dear Madam:</span> I am instructed by the owners of the Rancho Seco to purchase 100 head of two and three-year-old cows of the Sussex breed owned by you. If you can fill the order please deliver the cattle to the bearer; and a check will be forwarded to you at once. <span epub:type="z3998:valediction">Respectfully</span>, <span epub:type="z3998:signature">Webster Yeager</span>, Manager the Rancho Seco.</p>
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="z3998:recipient"><abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Yeager</span>—The Nopalito Ranch: <span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear Madam:</span> I am instructed by the owners of the Rancho Seco to purchase 100 head of two and three-year-old cows of the Sussex breed owned by you. If you can fill the order please deliver the cattle to the bearer; and a check will be forwarded to you at once.</p>
|
||||
<footer>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:valediction">Respectfully</p>,
|
||||
<p class="signature">Webster Yeager, Manager the Rancho Seco.</p>
|
||||
</footer>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>Business is business, even—very scantily did it escape being written “especially”—in a kingdom.</p>
|
||||
<p>That night the 100 head of cattle were driven up from the pasture and penned in a corral near the ranch-house for delivery in the morning.</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -11,9 +11,7 @@
|
||||
<h2 epub:type="title">Holding Up a Train</h2>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="epigraph">
|
||||
<p><b>Note.</b> The man who told me these things was for several years an outlaw in the Southwest and a follower of the pursuit he so frankly describes. His description of the modus operandi should prove interesting, his counsel of value to the potential passenger in some future “holdup,” while his estimate of the pleasures of train robbing will hardly induce anyone to adopt it as a profession. I give the story in almost exactly his own words.</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">
|
||||
<abbr>O. H.</abbr>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
<cite><span class="signature"><abbr>O. H.</abbr></span></cite>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<p>Most people would say, if their opinion was asked for, that holding up a train would be a hard job. Well, it isn’t; it’s easy. I have contributed some to the uneasiness of railroads and the insomnia of express companies, and the most trouble I ever had about a holdup was in being swindled by unscrupulous people while spending the money I got. The danger wasn’t anything to speak of, and we didn’t mind the trouble.</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -9,8 +9,14 @@
|
||||
<section id="one-dollars-worth" epub:type="volume se:short-story">
|
||||
<h2 epub:type="title">One Dollar’s Worth</h2>
|
||||
<p>The judge of the United States court of the district lying along the Rio Grande border found the following letter one morning in his mail:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter"><p epub:type="salutation">Judge</p>:
|
||||
<p>When you sent me up for four years you made a talk. Among other hard things, you called me a rattlesnake. Maybe I am one—anyhow, you hear me rattling now. One year after I got to the pen, my daughter died of—well, they said it was poverty and the disgrace together. You’ve got a daughter, Judge, and I’m going to make you know how it feels to lose one. And I’m going to bite that district attorney that spoke against me. I’m free now, and I guess I’ve turned to rattlesnake all right. I feel like one. I don’t say much, but this is my rattle. Look out when I strike.</p><footer><p epub:type="valediction">Yours respectfully,</p><p epub:type="z3998:signature">Rattlesnake.</p></footer></blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:salutation">Judge:</p>
|
||||
<p>When you sent me up for four years you made a talk. Among other hard things, you called me a rattlesnake. Maybe I am one—anyhow, you hear me rattling now. One year after I got to the pen, my daughter died of—well, they said it was poverty and the disgrace together. You’ve got a daughter, Judge, and I’m going to make you know how it feels to lose one. And I’m going to bite that district attorney that spoke against me. I’m free now, and I guess I’ve turned to rattlesnake all right. I feel like one. I don’t say much, but this is my rattle. Look out when I strike.</p>
|
||||
<footer>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:valediction">Yours respectfully,</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Rattlesnake.</p>
|
||||
</footer>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>Judge Derwent threw the letter carelessly aside. It was nothing new to receive such epistles from desperate men whom he had been called upon to judge. He felt no alarm. Later on he showed the letter to Littlefield, the young district attorney, for Littlefield’s name was included in the threat, and the judge was punctilious in matters between himself and his fellow men.</p>
|
||||
<p>Littlefield honoured the rattle of the writer, as far as it concerned himself, with a smile of contempt; but he frowned a little over the reference to the Judge’s daughter, for he and Nancy Derwent were to be married in the fall.</p>
|
||||
<p>Littlefield went to the clerk of the court and looked over the records with him. They decided that the letter might have been sent by Mexico Sam, a half-breed border desperado who had been imprisoned for manslaughter four years before. Then official duties crowded the matter from his mind, and the rattle of the revengeful serpent was forgotten.</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -87,7 +87,7 @@
|
||||
<p>“Get a chair, if you can find one,” said Dawe, “while I hunt up pen and ink. Hello, what’s this? Here’s a note from Louise. She must have left it there when she went out this morning.”</p>
|
||||
<p>He picked up an envelope that lay on the centre-table and tore it open. He began to read the letter that he drew out of it; and once having begun it aloud he so read it through to the end. These are the words that Editor Westbrook heard:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
|
||||
<p>“<span epub:type="salutation">Dear Shackleford</span>: By the time you get this I will be about a hundred miles away and still a-going. I’ve got a place in the chorus of the Occidental Opera <abbr>Co.</abbr>, and we start on the road today at twelve o’clock. I didn’t want to starve to death, and so I decided to make my own living. I’m not coming back. <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Westbrook is going with me. She said she was tired of living with a combination phonograph, iceberg and dictionary, and she’s not coming back, either. We’ve been practising the songs and dances for two months on the quiet. I hope you will be successful, and get along all right! Goodbye.</p>
|
||||
<p>“<span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear Shackleford</span>: By the time you get this I will be about a hundred miles away and still a-going. I’ve got a place in the chorus of the Occidental Opera <abbr>Co.</abbr>, and we start on the road today at twelve o’clock. I didn’t want to starve to death, and so I decided to make my own living. I’m not coming back. <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Westbrook is going with me. She said she was tired of living with a combination phonograph, iceberg and dictionary, and she’s not coming back, either. We’ve been practising the songs and dances for two months on the quiet. I hope you will be successful, and get along all right! Goodbye.</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:sender">“<span class="signature">Louise</span>.”</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>Dawe dropped the letter, covered his face with his trembling hands, and cried out in a deep, vibrating voice:</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -27,15 +27,15 @@
|
||||
<p>Keogh dipped his pen, and wrote at Johnny’s dictation. With many pauses, filled in with smoke and sundry travellings of the bottle and glasses, the following reply to the Dalesburg communication was perpetrated:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="letter">
|
||||
<p><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Obadiah Patterson, Dalesburg, Ala.</p>
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="salutation">Dear Sir</span>: In reply to your favour of July 2nd, I have the honour to inform you that, according to my opinion, there is no place on the habitable globe that presents to the eye stronger evidence of the need of a first-class shoe store than does the town of Coralio. There are 3,000 inhabitants in the place, and not a single shoe store! The situation speaks for itself. This coast is rapidly becoming the goal of enterprising business men, but the shoe business is one that has been sadly overlooked or neglected. In fact, there are a considerable number of our citizens actually without shoes at present.</p>
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear Sir</span>: In reply to your favour of July 2nd, I have the honour to inform you that, according to my opinion, there is no place on the habitable globe that presents to the eye stronger evidence of the need of a first-class shoe store than does the town of Coralio. There are 3,000 inhabitants in the place, and not a single shoe store! The situation speaks for itself. This coast is rapidly becoming the goal of enterprising business men, but the shoe business is one that has been sadly overlooked or neglected. In fact, there are a considerable number of our citizens actually without shoes at present.</p>
|
||||
<p>Besides the want above mentioned, there is also a crying need for a brewery, a college of higher mathematics, a coal yard, and a clean and intellectual Punch and Judy show. I have the honour to be, sir,</p>
|
||||
<footer>
|
||||
<p epub:type="valediction">Your Obt. Servant,</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:sender">John De Graffenreid Atwood,</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:valediction">Your Obt. Servant,</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature" epub:type="z3998:sender">John De Graffenreid Atwood,</p>
|
||||
<p>U. S. Consul at Coralio.</p>
|
||||
</footer>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:postscript"><abbr>P.S.</abbr>—Hello! Uncle Obadiah. How’s the old burg racking along? What would the government do without you and me? Look out for a green-headed parrot and a bunch of bananas soon, from your old friend</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:sender">Johnny</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature" epub:type="z3998:sender">Johnny</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>“I throw in that postscript,” explained the consul, “so Uncle Obadiah won’t take offence at the official tone of the letter! Now, Billy, you get that correspondence fixed up, and send Pancho to the post-office with it. The <i epub:type="se:name.vessel.ship">Ariadne</i> takes the mail out tomorrow if they make up that load of fruit today.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The night programme in Coralio never varied. The recreations of the people were soporific and flat. They wandered about, barefoot and aimless, speaking lowly and smoking cigar or cigarette. Looking down on the dimly lighted ways one seemed to see a threading maze of brunette ghosts tangled with a procession of insane fireflies. In some houses the thrumming of lugubrious guitars added to the depression of the triste night. Giant tree-frogs rattled in the foliage as loudly as the end man’s “bones” in a minstrel troupe. By nine o’clock the streets were almost deserted.</p>
|
||||
@ -84,7 +84,7 @@
|
||||
<p>Keogh left, feeling that he could be of no use. Johnny laid a handful of cigars on a table and stretched himself in a steamer chair. When the sudden daylight broke, silvering the harbour ripples, he was still sitting there. Then he got up, whistling a little tune, and took his bath.</p>
|
||||
<p>At nine o’clock he walked down to the dingy little cable office and hung for half an hour over a blank. The result of his application was the following message, which he signed and had transmitted at a cost of $33:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote>
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="salutation">To Pinkney Dawson</span>, Dalesburg, Ala.</p>
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">To Pinkney Dawson</span>, Dalesburg, Ala.</p>
|
||||
<p>Draft for $100 comes to you next mail. Ship me immediately 500 pounds stiff, dry cockleburrs. New use here in arts. Market price twenty cents pound. Further orders likely. <span class="signature">Rush.</span></p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -22,7 +22,7 @@
|
||||
<p>Turpin’s suspicions were allayed for the time. But one day soon there came an anonymous letter to him that read:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
|
||||
<p>Watch your wife. She is blowing in your money secretly. I was a sufferer just as you are. The place is <abbr>No.</abbr> 345 Blank Street. A word to the wise, <abbr>etc.</abbr></p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:signature">A Man Who Knows.</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">A Man Who Knows.</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>Turpin took this letter to the captain of police of the precinct that he lived in.</p>
|
||||
<p>“My precinct is as clean as a hound’s tooth,” said the captain. “The lid’s shut down as close there as it is over the eye of a Williamsburg girl when she’s kissed at a party. But if you think there’s anything queer at the address, I’ll go there with ye.”</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -89,7 +89,7 @@
|
||||
<p>At midnight a horseman rode into the rangers’ camp, blazing his way by noisy “halloes” to indicate a pacific mission. Sandridge and one or two others turned out to investigate the row. The rider announced himself to be Domingo Sales, from the Lone Wolf Crossing. he bore a letter for Señor Sandridge. Old Luisa, the <i xml:lang="es">lavendera</i>, had persuaded him to bring it, he said, her son Gregorio being too ill of a fever to ride.</p>
|
||||
<p>Sandridge lighted the camp lantern and read the letter. These were its words:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear One:</span> He has come. Hardly had you ridden away when he came out of the pear. When he first talked he said he would stay three days or more. Then as it grew later he was like a wolf or a fox, and walked about without rest, looking and listening. Soon he said he must leave before daylight when it is dark and stillest. And then he seemed to suspect that I be not true to him. He looked at me so strange that I am frightened. I swear to him that I love him, his own Tonia. Last of all he said I must prove to him I am true. He thinks that even now men are waiting to kill him as he rides from my house. To escape he says he will dress in my clothes, my red skirt and the blue waist I wear and the brown mantilla over the head, and thus ride away. But before that he says that I must put on his clothes, his <i xml:lang="es">pantalones</i> and camisa and hat, and ride away on his horse from the jacal as far as the big road beyond the crossing and back again. This before he goes, so he can tell if I am true and if men are hidden to shoot him. It is a terrible thing. An hour before daybreak this is to be. Come, my dear one, and kill this man and take me for your Tonia. Do not try to take hold of him alive, but kill him quickly. Knowing all, you should do that. You must come long before the time and hide yourself in the little shed near the jacal where the wagon and saddles are kept. It is dark in there. He will wear my red skirt and blue waist and brown mantilla. I send you a hundred kisses. Come surely and shoot quickly and straight. <span epub:type="valediction">Thine Own</span> <span epub:type="z3998:signature">Tonia</span>.</p>
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear One:</span> He has come. Hardly had you ridden away when he came out of the pear. When he first talked he said he would stay three days or more. Then as it grew later he was like a wolf or a fox, and walked about without rest, looking and listening. Soon he said he must leave before daylight when it is dark and stillest. And then he seemed to suspect that I be not true to him. He looked at me so strange that I am frightened. I swear to him that I love him, his own Tonia. Last of all he said I must prove to him I am true. He thinks that even now men are waiting to kill him as he rides from my house. To escape he says he will dress in my clothes, my red skirt and the blue waist I wear and the brown mantilla over the head, and thus ride away. But before that he says that I must put on his clothes, his <i xml:lang="es">pantalones</i> and camisa and hat, and ride away on his horse from the jacal as far as the big road beyond the crossing and back again. This before he goes, so he can tell if I am true and if men are hidden to shoot him. It is a terrible thing. An hour before daybreak this is to be. Come, my dear one, and kill this man and take me for your Tonia. Do not try to take hold of him alive, but kill him quickly. Knowing all, you should do that. You must come long before the time and hide yourself in the little shed near the jacal where the wagon and saddles are kept. It is dark in there. He will wear my red skirt and blue waist and brown mantilla. I send you a hundred kisses. Come surely and shoot quickly and straight. <span epub:type="z3998:valediction">Thine Own</span> <span class="signature">Tonia</span>.</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>Sandridge quickly explained to his men the official part of the missive. The rangers protested against his going alone.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’ll get him easy enough,” said the lieutenant. “The girl’s got him trapped. And don’t even think he’ll get the drop on me.”</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -113,12 +113,12 @@
|
||||
<p>The succeeding days saw the Talbots restored to peace and ease. Miss Lydia’s face lost its worried look. The major appeared in a new frock coat, in which he looked like a wax figure personifying the memory of his golden age. Another publisher who read the manuscript of the “Anecdotes and Reminiscences” thought that, with a little retouching and toning down of the high lights, he could make a really bright and salable volume of it. Altogether, the situation was comfortable, and not without the touch of hope that is often sweeter than arrived blessings.</p>
|
||||
<p>One day, about a week after their piece of good luck, a maid brought a letter for Miss Lydia to her room. The postmark showed that it was from New York. Not knowing anyone there, Miss Lydia, in a mild flutter of wonder, sat down by her table and opened the letter with her scissors. This was what she read:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
|
||||
<p epub:type="salutation">Dear Miss Talbot:</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear Miss Talbot:</p>
|
||||
<p>I thought you might be glad to learn of my good fortune. I have received and accepted an offer of two hundred dollars per week by a New York stock company to play Colonel Calhoun in “A Magnolia Flower.”</p>
|
||||
<p>There is something else I wanted you to know. I guess you’d better not tell Major Talbot. I was anxious to make him some amends for the great help he was to me in studying the part, and for the bad humour he was in about it. He refused to let me, so I did it anyhow. I could easily spare the three hundred.</p>
|
||||
<footer>
|
||||
<p epub:type="valediction">Sincerely yours,</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:signature">H. Hopkins Hargraves,</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:valediction">Sincerely yours,</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">H. Hopkins Hargraves,</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:postscript"><abbr>P.S.</abbr> How did I play Uncle Mose?</p>
|
||||
</footer>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -19,11 +19,13 @@
|
||||
<p>Tonight John Perkins encountered a tremendous upheaval of the commonplace when he reached his door. No Katy was there with her affectionate, confectionate kiss. The three rooms seemed in portentous disorder. All about lay her things in confusion. Shoes in the middle of the floor, curling tongs, hair bows, kimonos, powder box, jumbled together on dresser and chairs—this was not Katy’s way. With a sinking heart John saw the comb with a curling cloud of her brown hair among its teeth. Some unusual hurry and perturbation must have possessed her, for she always carefully placed these combings in the little blue vase on the mantel to be some day formed into the coveted feminine “rat.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Hanging conspicuously to the gas jet by a string was a folded paper. John seized it. It was a note from his wife running thus:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="letter">
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="salutation">Dear John</span>: I just had a telegram saying mother is very sick. I am going to take the 4.30 train. Brother Sam is going to meet me at the depot there. There is cold mutton in the ice box. I hope it isn’t her quinzy again. Pay the milkman 50 cents. She had it bad last spring. Don’t forget to write to the company about the gas meter, and your good socks are in the top drawer. I will write tomorrow.</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<span epub:type="valediction">Hastily,</span>
|
||||
<span class="signature">KATY.</span>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Dear John</span>: I just had a telegram saying mother is very sick. I am going to take the 4.30 train. Brother Sam is going to meet me at the depot there. There is cold mutton in the ice box. I hope it isn’t her quinzy again. Pay the milkman 50 cents. She had it bad last spring. Don’t forget to write to the company about the gas meter, and your good socks are in the top drawer. I will write tomorrow.</p>
|
||||
<footer>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<span epub:type="z3998:valediction">Hastily,</span>
|
||||
<span class="signature">KATY.</span>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</footer>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>Never during their two years of matrimony had he and Katy been separated for a night. John read the note over and over in a dumbfounded way. Here was a break in a routine that had never varied, and it left him dazed.</p>
|
||||
<p>There on the back of a chair hung, pathetically empty and formless, the red wrapper with black dots that she always wore while getting the meals. Her weekday clothes had been tossed here and there in her haste. A little paper bag of her favorite butterscotch lay with its string yet unwound. A daily paper sprawled on the floor, gaping rectangularly where a railroad timetable had been clipped from it. Everything in the room spoke of a loss, of an essence gone, of its soul and life departed. John Perkins stood among the dead remains with a queer feeling of desolation in his heart.</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -58,12 +58,12 @@
|
||||
<p>Bill and I got paper and pencil and worked on the letter while Red Chief, with a blanket wrapped around him, strutted up and down, guarding the mouth of the cave. Bill begged me tearfully to make the ransom fifteen hundred dollars instead of two thousand. “I ain’t attempting,” says he, “to decry the celebrated moral aspect of parental affection, but we’re dealing with humans, and it ain’t human for anybody to give up two thousand dollars for that forty-pound chunk of freckled wildcat. I’m willing to take a chance at fifteen hundred dollars. You can charge the difference up to me.”</p>
|
||||
<p>So, to relieve Bill, I acceded, and we collaborated a letter that ran this way:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
|
||||
<p epub:type="salutation">Ebenezer Dorset, <abbr>Esq.</abbr>:</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:salutation">Ebenezer Dorset, <abbr>Esq.</abbr>:</p>
|
||||
<p>We have your boy concealed in a place far from Summit. It is useless for you or the most skilful detectives to attempt to find him. Absolutely, the only terms on which you can have him restored to you are these: We demand fifteen hundred dollars in large bills for his return; the money to be left at midnight tonight at the same spot and in the same box as your reply—as hereinafter described. If you agree to these terms, send your answer in writing by a solitary messenger tonight at half-past eight o’clock. After crossing Owl Creek, on the road to Poplar Cove, there are three large trees about a hundred yards apart, close to the fence of the wheat field on the right-hand side. At the bottom of the fence-post, opposite the third tree, will be found a small pasteboard box.</p>
|
||||
<p>The messenger will place the answer in this box and return immediately to Summit.</p>
|
||||
<p>If you attempt any treachery or fail to comply with our demand as stated, you will never see your boy again.</p>
|
||||
<p>If you pay the money as demanded, he will be returned to you safe and well within three hours. These terms are final, and if you do not accede to them no further communication will be attempted.</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:signature">Two Desparate Men.</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Two Desparate Men.</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>I addressed this letter to Dorset, and put it in my pocket. As I was about to start, the kid comes up to me and says:</p>
|
||||
<p>“Aw, Snake-eye, you said I could play the Black Scout while you was gone.”</p>
|
||||
@ -96,8 +96,8 @@
|
||||
<p>I waited an hour and then concluded the thing was square. I slid down the tree, got the note, slipped along the fence till I struck the woods, and was back at the cave in another half an hour. I opened the note, got near the lantern and read it to Bill. It was written with a pen in a crabbed hand, and the sum and substance of it was this:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:recipient">Two Desperate Men.</p>
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="salutation">Gentlemen</span>: I received your letter today by post, in regard to the ransom you ask for the return of my son. I think you are a little high in your demands, and I hereby make you a counter-proposition, which I am inclined to believe you will accept. You bring Johnny home and pay me two hundred and fifty dollars in cash, and I agree to take him off your hands. You had better come at night, for the neighbours believe he is lost, and I couldn’t be responsible for what they would do to anybody they saw bringing him back. <span epub:type="valediction">Very respectfully</span>,</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:signature">Ebenezer Dorset.</p>
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">Gentlemen</span>: I received your letter today by post, in regard to the ransom you ask for the return of my son. I think you are a little high in your demands, and I hereby make you a counter-proposition, which I am inclined to believe you will accept. You bring Johnny home and pay me two hundred and fifty dollars in cash, and I agree to take him off your hands. You had better come at night, for the neighbours believe he is lost, and I couldn’t be responsible for what they would do to anybody they saw bringing him back. <span epub:type="z3998:valediction">Very respectfully</span>,</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Ebenezer Dorset.</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>“Great pirates of Penzance!” says I; “of all the impudent—”</p>
|
||||
<p>But I glanced at Bill, and hesitated. He had the most appealing look in his eyes I ever saw on the face of a dumb or a talking brute.</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -15,25 +15,39 @@
|
||||
<i>Extracts from a letter from the first vice-president of the Republic Insurance Company, of New York City, to Frank Goodwin, of Coralio, Republic of Anchuria.</i>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="salutation">My Dear <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Goodwin</span>:—Your communication per <abbr>Messrs.</abbr> Howland and Fourchet, of New Orleans, has reached us. Also their draft on N. Y. for $100,000, the amount abstracted from the funds of this company by the late J. Churchill Wahrfield, its former president. … The officers and directors unite in requesting me to express to you their sincere esteem and thanks for your prompt and much appreciated return of the entire missing sum within two weeks from the time of its disappearance. … Can assure you that the matter will not be allowed to receive the least publicity. … Regret exceedingly the distressing death of <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Wahrfield by his own hand, but … Congratulations on your marriage to Miss Wahrfield … many charms, winning manners, noble and womanly nature and envied position in the best metropolitan society …</p>
|
||||
<p><span epub:type="z3998:salutation">My Dear <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Goodwin</span>:—Your communication per <abbr>Messrs.</abbr> Howland and Fourchet, of New Orleans, has reached us. Also their draft on N. Y. for $100,000, the amount abstracted from the funds of this company by the late J. Churchill Wahrfield, its former president. … The officers and directors unite in requesting me to express to you their sincere esteem and thanks for your prompt and much appreciated return of the entire missing sum within two weeks from the time of its disappearance. … Can assure you that the matter will not be allowed to receive the least publicity. … Regret exceedingly the distressing death of <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Wahrfield by his own hand, but … Congratulations on your marriage to Miss Wahrfield … many charms, winning manners, noble and womanly nature and envied position in the best metropolitan society …</p>
|
||||
<footer>
|
||||
<p epub:type="valediction">Cordially yours,</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:sender">Lucius E. Applegate</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:valediction">Cordially yours,</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature" epub:type="z3998:sender">Lucius E. Applegate</p>
|
||||
<p>First Vice-President</p>
|
||||
<p>The Republic Insurance Company.</p>
|
||||
</footer>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<h3 epub:type="title">
|
||||
<span>The Vitagraphoscope</span>
|
||||
<span epub:type="subtitle">(Moving Pictures)</span>
|
||||
</h3>
|
||||
<h4 epub:type="title">The Last Sausage</h4>
|
||||
<p><b>Scene</b>—<i>An Artist’s Studio.</i> The artist, a young man of prepossessing appearance, sits in a dejected attitude, amid a litter of sketches, with his head resting upon his hand. An oil stove stands on a pine box in the centre of the studio. The artist rises, tightens his waist belt to another hole, and lights the stove. He goes to a tin bread box, half-hidden by a screen, takes out a solitary link of sausage, turns the box upside-down to show that there is no more, and chucks the sausage into a frying-pan, which he sets upon the stove. The flame of the stove goes out, showing that there is no more oil. The artist, in evident despair, seizes the sausage, in a sudden access of rage, and hurls it violently from him. At the same time a door opens, and a man who enters receives the sausage forcibly against his nose. He seems to cry out; and is observed to make a dance step or two, vigorously. The newcomer is a ruddy-faced, active, keen-looking man, apparently of Irish ancestry. Next he is observed to laugh immoderately; he kicks over the stove; he claps the artist (who is vainly striving to grasp his hand) vehemently upon the back. Then he goes through a pantomime which to the sufficiently intelligent spectator reveals that he has acquired large sums of money by trading pot-metal hatchets and razors to the Indians of the Cordillera Mountains for gold dust. He draws a roll of money as large as a small loaf of bread from his pocket, and waves it above his head, while at the same time he makes pantomime of drinking from a glass. The artist hurriedly secures his hat, and the two leave the studio together.</p>
|
||||
<h4 epub:type="title">The Writing on the Sands</h4>
|
||||
<p><b>Scene</b>—<i>The Beach at Nice.</i> A woman, beautiful, still young, exquisitely clothed, complacent, poised, reclines near the water, idly scrawling letters in the sand with the staff of her silken parasol. The beauty of her face is audacious; her languid pose is one that you feel to be impermanent—you wait, expectant, for her to spring or glide or crawl, like a panther that has unaccountably become stock-still. She idly scrawls in the sand; and the word that she always writes is “Isabel.” A man sits a few yards away. You can see that they are companions, even if no longer comrades. His face is dark and smooth, and almost inscrutable—but not quite. The two speak little together. The man also scratches on the sand with his cane. And the word that he writes is “Anchuria.” And then he looks out where the Mediterranean and the sky intermingle, with death in his gaze.</p>
|
||||
<h4 epub:type="title">The Wilderness and Thou</h4>
|
||||
<p><b>Scene</b>—<i>The Borders of a Gentleman’s Estate in a Tropical Land.</i> An old Indian, with a mahogany-coloured face, is trimming the grass on a grave by a mangrove swamp. Presently he rises to his feet and walks slowly toward a grove that is shaded by the gathering, brief twilight. In the edge of the grove stand a man who is stalwart, with a kind and courteous air, and a woman of a serene and clear-cut loveliness. When the old Indian comes up to them the man drops money in his hand. The grave-tender, with the stolid pride of his race, takes it as his due, and goes his way. The two in the edge of the grove turn back along the dim pathway, and walk close, close—for, after all, what is the world at its best but a little round field of the moving pictures with two walking together in it?</p>
|
||||
<h4>Curtain</h4>
|
||||
<section id="the-vitagraphoscope-1" epub:type="chapter">
|
||||
<header>
|
||||
<p>The Vitagraphoscope</p>
|
||||
<p>(Moving Pictures)</p>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<section id="the-vitagraphoscope-1-1" epub:type="subchapter">
|
||||
<header>
|
||||
<p>The Last Sausage</p>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<p><b>Scene</b>—<i>An Artist’s Studio.</i> The artist, a young man of prepossessing appearance, sits in a dejected attitude, amid a litter of sketches, with his head resting upon his hand. An oil stove stands on a pine box in the centre of the studio. The artist rises, tightens his waist belt to another hole, and lights the stove. He goes to a tin bread box, half-hidden by a screen, takes out a solitary link of sausage, turns the box upside-down to show that there is no more, and chucks the sausage into a frying-pan, which he sets upon the stove. The flame of the stove goes out, showing that there is no more oil. The artist, in evident despair, seizes the sausage, in a sudden access of rage, and hurls it violently from him. At the same time a door opens, and a man who enters receives the sausage forcibly against his nose. He seems to cry out; and is observed to make a dance step or two, vigorously. The newcomer is a ruddy-faced, active, keen-looking man, apparently of Irish ancestry. Next he is observed to laugh immoderately; he kicks over the stove; he claps the artist (who is vainly striving to grasp his hand) vehemently upon the back. Then he goes through a pantomime which to the sufficiently intelligent spectator reveals that he has acquired large sums of money by trading pot-metal hatchets and razors to the Indians of the Cordillera Mountains for gold dust. He draws a roll of money as large as a small loaf of bread from his pocket, and waves it above his head, while at the same time he makes pantomime of drinking from a glass. The artist hurriedly secures his hat, and the two leave the studio together.</p>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
<section id="the-vitagraphoscope-1-2" epub:type="subchapter">
|
||||
<header>
|
||||
<p>The Writing on the Sands</p>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<p><b>Scene</b>—<i>The Beach at Nice.</i> A woman, beautiful, still young, exquisitely clothed, complacent, poised, reclines near the water, idly scrawling letters in the sand with the staff of her silken parasol. The beauty of her face is audacious; her languid pose is one that you feel to be impermanent—you wait, expectant, for her to spring or glide or crawl, like a panther that has unaccountably become stock-still. She idly scrawls in the sand; and the word that she always writes is “Isabel.” A man sits a few yards away. You can see that they are companions, even if no longer comrades. His face is dark and smooth, and almost inscrutable—but not quite. The two speak little together. The man also scratches on the sand with his cane. And the word that he writes is “Anchuria.” And then he looks out where the Mediterranean and the sky intermingle, with death in his gaze.</p>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
<section id="the-vitagraphoscope-1-3" epub:type="subchapter">
|
||||
<header>
|
||||
<p>The Wilderness and Thou</p>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<p><b>Scene</b>—<i>The Borders of a Gentleman’s Estate in a Tropical Land.</i> An old Indian, with a mahogany-coloured face, is trimming the grass on a grave by a mangrove swamp. Presently he rises to his feet and walks slowly toward a grove that is shaded by the gathering, brief twilight. In the edge of the grove stand a man who is stalwart, with a kind and courteous air, and a woman of a serene and clear-cut loveliness. When the old Indian comes up to them the man drops money in his hand. The grave-tender, with the stolid pride of his race, takes it as his due, and goes his way. The two in the edge of the grove turn back along the dim pathway, and walk close, close—for, after all, what is the world at its best but a little round field of the moving pictures with two walking together in it?</p>
|
||||
<p>Curtain</p>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</body>
|
||||
</html>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -97,9 +97,9 @@
|
||||
<p>The planter held at arm’s length the unceremonious visitor—a long dangling black stocking. “It’s loaded,” he announced.</p>
|
||||
<p>As he spoke, he reversed the stocking, holding it by the toe, and down from it dropped a roundish stone, wrapped about by a piece of yellowish paper. “Now for the first interstellar message of the century!” he cried; and nodding to the company, who had crowded about him, he adjusted his glasses with provoking deliberation, and examined it closely. When he finished, he had changed from the jolly host to the practical, decisive man of business. He immediately struck a bell, and said to the silent-footed mulatto man who responded: “Go and tell <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Wesley to get Reeves and Maurice and about ten stout hands they can rely upon, and come to the hall door at once. Tell him to have the men arm themselves, and bring plenty of ropes and plough lines. Tell him to hurry.” And then he read aloud from the paper these words:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
|
||||
<p epub:type="salutation">To the Gent of de Hous:</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:salutation">To the Gent of de Hous:</p>
|
||||
<p>Dere is five tuff hoboes xcept meself in the vaken lot near de road war de old brick piles is. Dey got me stuck up wid a gun see and I taken dis means of communication. 2 of der lads is gone down to set fire to de cain field below de hous and when yous fellers goes to turn de hoes on it de hole gang is goin to rob de hous of de money yoo gotto pay off wit say git a move on ye say de kid dropt dis sock in der rode tel her mery crismus de same as she told me. Ketch de bums down de rode first and den sen a relefe core to get me out of soke youres truly,</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:signature">Whistlen Dick</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Whistlen Dick</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>There was some quiet, but rapid, mavœuvring at Bellemeade during the ensuring half hour, which ended in five disgusted and sullen tramps being captured, and locked securely in an outhouse pending the coming of the morning and retribution. For another result, the visiting young gentlemen had secured the unqualified worship of the visiting young ladies by their distinguished and heroic conduct. For still another, behold Whistling Dick, the hero, seated at the planter’s table, feasting upon viands his experience had never before included, and waited upon by admiring femininity in shapes of such beauty and “swellness” that even his ever-full mouth could scarcely prevent him from whistling. He was made to disclose in detail his adventure with the evil gang of Boston Harry, and how he cunningly wrote the note and wrapped it around the stone and placed it at the toe of the stocking, and, watching his chance, sent it silently, with a wonderful centrifugal momentum, like a comet, at one of the big lighted windows of the dining-room.</p>
|
||||
<p>The planter vowed that the wanderer should wander no more; that his was a goodness and an honesty that should be rewarded, and that a debt of gratitude had been made that must be paid; for had he not saved them from a doubtless imminent loss, and maybe a greater calamity? He assured Whistling Dick that he might consider himself a charge upon the honour of Bellemeade; that a position suited to his powers would be found for him at once, and hinted that the way would be heartily smoothed for him to rise to as high places of emolument and trust as the plantation afforded.</p>
|
||||
|
||||
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