Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1874-08-20
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gone down and put her in the carriage,
and returned to his lonely house and the
endless figures with which he was always
cipherIng, on his endless papers, and
which he now began to look over again
with q groan.
Mr.. Rothely heard the wheels on the
pavement when his wife came back, and
he was just putting up his papers as she
entered.
II saw your light" she said. "What!
always those papers, those hateinl pa
pers Do you want to kill yourself ?
And she came and laid one arm lightly
over his shoulder.
why should it kill me to sit here and
study my calculations till this hour he
said, ..any more than it will kill you to 60
out in the cruel weather and dance till
the same hour?'
"Oh, that's different !" she said, with a
laugh. "That's pleasure. And this"
isn't pleasure" said he, rising. NO.
"Weil, what Is it then ?" she asked
coaxingly, twining her arm in his
ssIt's pain ~ he exclaimed, vexed by
her light way when his trouble was so
great-"it's pain and perpexity, and a
sword hanging over my head ~ And he
turned about and left the room hurriedly
sure that, the next moment, she would be
SAYING, II do believe Mr.. Rothely is los
ing his mind !" and the next moment after
be singing the last tune to which she had
waltzed, yawning and going off gayy to
bed.
But what Mrs. Rothely was really say
ing was Il wonder what il means. Did
do anything to tease himP | wonder il
he is displeased that | 60 out without him.
I'm sure had world rather he went,
too don't know. He hardly ever
comes to talk with me now !; he never tells
me anything he couldn't tell anybody
else's wife. wonder-Oh it couldn't be
it couldn't possibly be, that he is tired of
me Pshaw! what fool / am, to be
moaning this way over busy man -
But when Mr.. Rothely went to bed,
just before daybreak, after taking another
turn with his papers, his wife was Sleep
ing the rosy sleep OF the just, rosy
deWy, lovely sleep, which he hung mo-
ment idolatrously before he turned away.
half Indignantly for all. to think she could
take so eaily what was torment to him;
and then, laughing little grimly to him
self, he compared himself to the present
who one moment, prays to his little wood
en- image. and, the next moment, cuffs 1t
roundly for not answering the prayer.
He had gone over his papers again, as
was said, and had thought that he might
worry through, as he called, without the
open shame of failure and disgrace of
bankruptcy-for shame and disgrace it
seemed to him-if he could only lay his
hands on certain sum of ready money,
a sum that was not large one tor man |
accustomed TO the figures that Mr.. Rothe- I
ly was, but something over a hundred
thousand dollars. The open shame of
failure was great deal to Mr.. Rothely,
for his pride was trait that everything,
so far, had fostered; and the apprehep-
sion of loss his failure would entail on
others was still more to him, for he always
felt himself an honest man, and had be-
lieved that, in respect to a record of un-
blemished integrity, his pride had some
reason for its being. write on my
gravestone," he was fond of saying,
"Here lies an honest man." Whether he
was abstractly and intrinsically an honest
man, from whom deceit and untruth shrank
as from the daylight, it never occurred to
him to question he had never been test
ed. ''Show me the man whom | have
ever wronged of anything !" would have
replied. if the doubt had been suggested
and would have considered it fully an
swered. "A hundred thousand dollars
ready money ?' he was saying now to
himself; and as he said it his eye rested
Inadvertently on the door of the little iron |
safe let into the wall, where his wife's
jewels were kept, and which, in her IA
tigue and in that carelessness which was
half charm, she had. that night, left
ajar. And little devil began whispering
in his ear. There is more }han hundred
thousand dollars ready money there?"
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