"'Why not give her a ticker in her bedroom while you are about it, Ethel?' I suggested."
"But Ethel could not smile. 'I think that is perfectly probable,' she answered. And then,
'Oh, Richard, isn't it mean!' At this I took her hand, and she--but again I abstain from dwelling upon those circumstances of the engaged which are familiar to you all."
"The change of May into June, and the change of June into July, did not mellow Ethel's bitter feelings. I remember the day after Petunias defaulted on their interest that she exclaimed, 'I hope I shall never meet her!' We always called Mr. Beverly's mother 'she'
now. 'For if I were to meet her,' continued Ethel, 'I feel I should say something that I should regret. Oh, Richard, I suppose we shall have to give up that house on Park Avenue!'"
"I put a cheerful and even insular face on the matter, for I could not bear to see Ethel so depressed. But it was hard work for me. Some few of my investments were evidently good; but it always seemed as if it was into these that I had happened to put not much money, while the bulk of my fortune was entangled in the others. Besides the usual Midsummer faintness that overtakes the stock market, my own specialties were a good deal more than faint. On the 20th of August I took the afternoon train to spend my two weeks' holiday at Lenox; and during much of the journey I gazed at the Wall Street edition of the afternoon paper that I had purchased as I came through the Grand Central Station. Ethel and I read it in the evening."
"'I wonder what she's buying now?' said Ethel, vindictively."
"'Well, I can't help feeling sorry for her,' I answered, with as much of a smile as I could produce."
"'That is so unnecessary, Richard! She can easily afford to gratify her gambling instinct.'"
"'There you go, Ethel, inventing millions for her just as you invented grandchildren.'"
"'Not at all. Unless she constantly had money lying idle, she could not take these continual plunges. She is an old woman with few expenses, and she lives well within her income. You would hear of her entertaining if it was otherwise. So instead of conservatively investing her surplus, she makes ducks and drakes of it in her son's office.
Is he at Hyde Park now?' Hyde Park was where the old Beverly country seat had always been."
"'No,' I answered. 'He went to Europe early last month.'"
"'Very likely he took her with him. She is probably at Monte Carlo.'"
"'Scarcely in August, I fancy. And I'll tell you what, Ethel. I have been counting it up.
She has lost twenty-four thousand dollars in the Standard Egg alone. It takes a good deal of surplus to stand that.'"
"'Serve her right,' said Ethel 'And I would say so to her face.'"
"September brought freshness to the stock market but not to me. Mr. Beverly, like the well-to-do man that he was, remained away in Europe until October should require his presence as a guiding hand in the office. Thus was I left without his buoyant consolation in the face of my investments."
"Petunias were being adjusted on a four per cent basis; Dutchess and Columbia Traction was holding its own; I could not complain of Amalgamated Electric, though it was now lower than when I had bought it, while had I sold it on that Wednesday in May when Ethel begged me, before the increased dividend turned out a mistake, I should have made money. But Philippi Sewers were threatened; Pasteurised Feeders had been numb since June; Pollyopolis Heat, Light, Power, Paving, Pressing, and Packing was going to pass its quarterly dividend; and Standard Egg had gone down from 63 to 7 1/8. My million dollars on paper now was worth in reality less than a quarter of that sum, and although we could still make both ends meet fairly well in some place where you wouldn't want to live, like Philadelphia, in New York we should drop into a pinched and dwarfed obscurity."
"I must say now, and I shall never forget, that Ethel during these gloomy weeks behaved much better than I did. The grayer the outlook became, the more words of hope and sense she seemed to find She reminded me that, after all my Uncle Godfrey's legacy had been a thing unlooked for, something out of my scheme of life that I had my youth, my salary and my writing; and that she would wait till she was as old at Mr. Beverly's mother."
"It was the thought of that lady which brought from Ethel the only note of complaint she uttered in my presence during that whole dreary month."
"We were spending Sunday with a house party at Hyde Park; and driving to church, we passed an avenue gate with a lodge. 'Rockhurst, sir,' said the coachman. 'Whose place?' I inquired. 'The old Beverly place, sir.' Ethel heard him tell me this; and as we went on, we saw a carriage and pair coming down the avenue toward the gate with that look which horses always seem to have when they are taking the family to church on Sunday morning."
"'If I see her,' said Ethel to me as we entered the door, 'I shall be unable to say my prayers.'"
"But only young people came into the Beverly pew, and Ethel said her prayers and also sang the hymn and chants very sweetly."
"After the service, we strolled together in the old and lovely grave yard before starting homeward. We had told them that we should prefer to walk back. The day was beautiful, and one could see a little blue piece of the river, sparkling."
"'Here is where they are all buried,' said Ethel, and we paused before brown old headstones with Beverly upon them. 'Died 1750; died 1767,' continued Ethel, reading the names and inscriptions. 'I think one doesn't mind the idea of lying in such a place as this.'"
"Some of the young people in the pew now came along the path. 'The grandchildren,' said Ethel. 'She is probably too old to come to church. Or she is in Europe.'"
"The young people had brought a basket with flowers from their place, and now laid them over several of the grassy mounds. 'Give me some of yours,' said one to the other, presently; 'I've not enough for grandmother's.'"
"Ethel took me rather sharply by the arm. 'Did you hear that?' she asked."
"'It can't be she, you know,' said I. 'He would have come back from Europe.'"
"But we found it out at lunch. It was she, and she had been dead for fifteen years."
"Ethel and I talked it over in the train going up to town on Monday morning. We had by that time grown calmer. 'If it is not false pretences,' said she, 'and you cannot sue him for damages, and if it is not stealing or something, and you cannot put him in prison, what are you going to do to him, Richard?'"
"As this was a question which I had frequently asked myself during the night, having found no satisfactory answer to it, I said: 'What would you do in my place, Ethel?' But Ethel knew."
"'I should find out when he sails, and meet his steamer with a cowhide.'"
"'Then he would sue me for damages.'"
"'That would be nothing, if you got a few good cuts in on him.'"
"'Ethel,' I said, 'please follow me carefully. I should like dearly to cowhide him. and for the sake of argument we will consider it done Then comes the lawsuit. Then I get up and say that I beat him because he made me buy Standard Egg at 63 by telling me that his mother had some, when really the old lady had been dead for fifteen years. When I think of it in this way, I do not feel--'"
"I know,' interrupted Ethel, 'you are afraid of ridicule. All men are.'"
"Had Ethel insisted, I believe that I should have cowhided Mr. Beverly for her sake. But before his return our destinies were brightened. Copper had been found near Ethel's waste lands in Michigan, and the family business man was able to sell the property for seven hundred thousand dollars. He did this so promptly that I ventured to ask him if delay might not have brought a greater price. 'Well', he said, 'I don't know. You must seize these things. Blake and Beverly might have got tired waiting."
"'Blake and Beverly!' I exclaimed 'So they made the purchase. It Mr. Beverly back?'"
"'Just back. To tell the truth I don't believe they're finding so much copper as they hoped.'"