Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1881-01-22
UNIoNl
The Ventures and Adventures Of Charlie Gould;
a ROMANCE OF THE STOCK MARKET.
Z BY EDWARD F. oAHILL.

| talk business now. l trust everything &c
you, and believe you won't play me
false.
81 merely wanted to tell you that we
| are going to divide the stock. Each share
viii be divided into five, and that will still
further help to boost them along" and sc
his attempt to put matters on a reasonable
commercial footing ended, almost before il
had begun. And so, talking banalities OF
everyday life and Indifferent matters, the
breakfast dragged its slow length along to
It's close.
Let US go for stroll on the beach, y
he said, " and smoke cigarette. May
offer you-oae p rendering her package.
Perhaps-by and by, when we get
down on the beach"
So they took their way downwards to
the yellow sands and shingly beach, and
stroIled along until they found a sheltered
nook where they might sun themselves and
be seen by none. She seated herself upon
fragment of rock, and he placed himself
on the dry sand at her feet.
Very beautiful she looked, raising from
time to time her speaking hand and round
ed wrist to remove the cigarette, showing
liberal glimpses of sandled foot and blue
silk stocking, looking imperious love as
queenly, softleyed Juno may have done.
She felt that he was at her mercy as he sat
below her on the sand, drawing uneasy
lines with the point of a stick, and think
that he felt it, too.
" George" she began, &c I want to talk
to YOU. Look at me, please, and don't
make me nervous by scraping."
90 What is it, Eliza" he asked, laying
aside his drawing materials and looking
upward into her eyes.
g fear you came here with the inten-
ton of treating me badly" She was de.
termined to have an explanation with him
now, when she felt that the trumps were
all in her hand.
g Treating treating you badly, Eliza.
What do you mean ? Have l ever treated
you badly ?"
No, George" and she dwelt fondly on
his name, ''you have not, so far; but men
are so chaBgeable and false, and, indeed, /
am most afraid of your daughter.
swell, to tell the truth, she did say
that l had better break off with YOU" 1t
must be confessed that it was cowardly of
him to try to shift the blame on to his
daughters shoulders, but even great Sam
son was cowardly when shorn of bis strength
By Delilah
"Oh, it was she was it? thought co.
But after all, George, who is she to come
bet 8een you and me Are we not nearer
to one another than any daughter can be to
her father p
He was wavering sorely. Had he been
candid and told her the real reasons which
his daughter had put forth, it might have
been better for the success of his project.
His daughter had told him that he would
be disgraced forever in society if he mar
ried Z" that woman )" that she was disrep-
utable, and had one or two or half dozen
husbands, for all one knew, scattered about
the country, and she had vowed that she
never would enter her fathers house again
if "that vile woman" was to be mistress
there-all delivered with magnificent
ascending scale and climax of feminine
indignation. But unfortunately, or fortu.
nately, one does not say such things of a
woman to her face, however much one may
be compelled to give them mental
assent but if he had had the
courage or the cowardice - call it
which you will-to have done so, he might
have found short road to his object. She
would, in that case, naturally enough have
lost her temper and recklessly have put
herself in the wrong by abusing him in her
Just anger. When she had "taken it out
in this manner he would have gotten out
of the scrape, if not in the quiet, business
like way he had planned, still in some un-
dignifed fashion, and at the cost of some
personal modification. But rejecting that
these strong measures were not open to
him as a man, he thought that he would
again try the business aspect of the case
as a forlorn hope.
But couldn't some arrangement be
made, Eliza l am willing to do anything,
IN reason"
For shame, George!" she blazed out.
"t0 think of offering me money after
the happy times in store for US, and now
you offer me money! For shame " and
her bosom began to heave and the great
sobs to rise. Was she acting? Indeed l
scarcely know, but do know that if she
was not averse to highten the effect a lit
tie, nevertheless there must have been a
strong undercurrent OF feeling which car
RED her along. She was woman who
had fought hard fight with a cruel world,
but she was woman still, and we viii not,
if we can help it, be as cruel in our con-
struction of her weakness as that same
world. He was conquered when he saw
the rising sobs. He Strengthened himself
up slowly, and clasping her tiercely, said +:
My darling, you are worth the balance of
them put together.
Even whilst he was doing so, he knew
that he was mad he knew that he would
be compelled to succumb to the pressure
of his daughter authority, backed by that
pubic opinion of society which he was
cewardly enough to dread, but be was
simply powerless in her hands at that
moment. You, gentle reader, will know
that. in endeavoring to mount the social
Olympus, he was striving after an empty
bubble, for it is perfectly possible for a
man to see a great deal Of tine company
and yet not be in society at all. People will
come to him if he feeds them daintily and
receives them luxuriously, but they will no
more admit him to the penetralia of the
sacred fame than the ragged gamin who
watches the parade from the pavement,
unless he happens to be OF the initiated.
The barriers of true society are invisible
and cannot be broken down by violence or
taken By storm, while they are passed at
once and without effort by those who know
the magic secret. No matter how often
they may induce prophet, priest or king
of the subtle craft to come at their cali,
those who have not this knowledge will
never enter the sacred circle; no matter
how much they may forgather with the
initiated, they will forever belong to the
profane vulgar. He, of course, did not
know these things. He did not know that
he was fighting against an intangible bar
rier, ever shifting but ever present, aud he
deemed that society was at his beck and
call in right of his great wealth, if only he
did not pass such bounds as responsibility
recognized and his daughter laid down. |
even suspect that the substance, doubtful
as it was, which he was resolved to put
away from him, was better than the vain
shadow he was pursuing She was reck-
less enough. The bloom of womanhood
had been rubbed off by contact with the
world, and she was ready to do almost
anything to compass the end she had in
view; but she was true to him, and she
was ready to take him for better or for
worse, If he had not a five cent piece be.
tween him and starvation. But even while
yielding for the moment to the influence OF
her beauty, he knew that he would have
to put her away from him, and so was
doubly false; whilst she, poor woman,
thought without much misgiving, that she
had carried her point, and went on her
homeward way rejoicing.
CHAPTER XII.