The Cincinnati daily star. [volume] ([Cincinnati, Ohio]) 1875-1880, 1880-01-20
THE MYSTERY In PAL
s ACE GARDENS.
By MRS. J. H. RIDDELL.
CHAPTER I.
THE EMPTY HOUSE.

VhCu tu6 TIduG-NVihoh wal was
quite over, and the French people were
beginning to pay those millards which
once upon time some clever individ-
uals on this side of the Channel, in com
mon, perhaps, with other clever indiyid-
uals in a different country, thought that
wonderful nation would never be able
to scrape together--when the reign of the
Commune was ended and Peace once
again spread her blessings through the
fair land of France-when the English
had become almost accustomed to the
fact of their neighbors across the water
having decided to dispense with the as
sistance of either king or emperor-when
Napoleon III was alive and dreaming
(who can tells) of the earthly greatness
he hoped to compass, or the narrow
grave he was so soon to fill, there stood a
house in Palace Gardens; empty, and to
be sold. a--,. .~ ~
1t had stood empty for long time.
The board in front which informed all
those who passed by that the desirable
residence might be treated for, had grown
in appearance quite weather-beaten with
standing out amongst tho evergreens
during the passage of several springs,
summers, autumns, and winters. The
firm OF auctioneers who might have been
supposed closely interested in it's welfare
seemed to have forgotten its existence,
for the very bills in the windows looked
as If they, too, were weary Of stating a
self-evident proposition.
There were some to whom, passing
that way as they did constantly, the
house grew to be a haunting presence.
When they woke in the night they
thought Of it standing there empty, with
the curtainless and blindless windows
staring out into the darkness; when they
were on Change or visiting their patients,
or porting over brief, or considering the
possibilities of bill of costs, the house
came between them and the sunshine.
Imaginative persons possessed of set
tied incomes, quite easy in their minds
about money matters, with their balances
at their bankers, investments in safe &C.
curities, practically unlimited credit in
the books Of their tradespeople, shook
their heads as they drove past, and de-
cided the house would never be sold;
that it was shauntsd by the ghosts of
ruined men and defrauded women and
beggared children, if by no worse phan-
tom; whilst practical folks-City mag
mates VINO rode to their business in order
to benefit their maltreated livers; clerks,
happy in knowing nothing whatever
OF their livers; gentlemen who were
floating loans and negotiating conces-
sions and advertising new companies and
getting nominated as directors and sup
porting credit upon fictitious papers and
financing banking account-looked at
the house intelligently.
Many man gazing at 1t must have
thought:
"Some day, when I am in Spain, my
house will be standing empty in like
MANNER" or, "When my governor is in
limbo, I wonder if we shall see his crib
vacant. as this is, or if it will turn out
to have been settled upon his wifer''
Gamekeepers nail up kite as pub
Tic warning, and example to all other
kites that they will be similarly dealt
with, and yet 80 terrible a spectacle
seems to exercise no sort of deterrent in |
fuence upon the species; and in like
manner, although the empty house in
Palace Gardens had once been inhabited
by well-known man who, from foreign
parts, could return to England no more,
Its mournfui line Of blank windows, its |
eternal iteration of "To be sold-To be
soid-To be sold;" the green moss on it's |
drive, the litter Of leaves Ga its borders,
its ill-kept grass-plot the paint peeling |
from its doors, its silent bell, its vacant |
rooms-had no more effect in turning
even one commercial sinner into the |
straight and narrow path of rectitude
that the sight Of his fellow rat caught |
in trap prevents his fellow gray-beard |
tearing the flesh of the toothsome chick
en- or sucking the bloed of the pretty
pigeon, who but yesterday noon was
preening her feathers and showing her
many-hued beauties to the admiration of
the sun.
y Those who are not "too deep In the |
swim," to Use an inelegant but expressive
phrase-failed to read the lesson written
on every pane of glass--on every blade
of grass about the empty house-whilst |
for the others who were in the thick of |
the battle, who understood the matter
from A to 2, from the setting out Of the
problem to its solution, they mentally
cried. 1T il too late;" "We may as well |
see it out to the end" 'Tt is dangerous
to 90 forward, but it is certain defeat to
turn back !" "Who can tell how the for
tunes Of any commercial war may turnT
and so held ON to the broad way which
led most of them to pecuniary disgrace
and social destruction. t
No man who reads his Bible could, I |
fancy, have passed that desirable tene-
ment" and fail to think of the house
"bdilt upon the sand" As he remem-
bered t.: tie. iaignts which had once streamed /
from the windows, the carriages which
had been driven through its gates, the
music he had heard floating from its
portals, the wealth and prosperity that
had seemed TO have taken up their abode
within those walls, he could not forget
the parable of that which happened