Devils Lake inter-ocean. (Devils Lake, Ramsey Co., Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1905, 1886-08-07
P IL
THE MILLIONAIRE.

H.
THE MILLIONAIRE.
There is hardly a brighter booth In
"vanity Fair" to adopt T~hackeray's met
aphor, than Scarborough; and its gayety
was at the highest point when 1 reached it
on that pleasant August afternoon. The
hotels were full, the promenade was crowded
every morning and evening, the band
played its best, the weather was perfect dur
ing the long warm days, and every night
there was a ball at one or other Of the hotels.
1t should have been impossible for a young
man who had no private cares to worry
him, who was passably well off, and who
was now emerging from the shadow of
bereavement, to feel dull in such a place.
And yet never did l spend q duller or a more
miserable week than that which followed
my arrival at the Grand hotel.
Day after day I went, Immediately after
breakfast, to the famous Spa grounds,
haunting them till 1 became conscious of
the fact that men and women alike specu-
lated as to my identity. Night after night I
was found in the same spot watching the
giddy, laughing throng of pleasure seekers,
the young, the old, tho rich, tho poor, the
wise, the foolish, as they sauntered up and
down listening to the mingled music of the
plllA oilu VI AN oSos = ONCh "C1lU ~ SOlIl6
Ut the balls at the various hotels. and
mingled with the frisky matrons, the dowdy
| country girls, and the men of doubtful antece-
dents and unprepossessing appearance, who
seemed to constitute the stock compan at
these entertainments. l went everywhere
where my fellow creatures were in the habit
of congregating, and gave every hour of my
time that was not spent i'll sleep to the search
on which / was intent. But oil was in vain,
Twas angry with myself because Of the bond
age in which my fancy held mo, and again
and again l thought of flying from the
scene and forgetting everything in distant
travel. But whenever l was on til, point of
/ carrying out this intention my resolution
( failed me. The picture of the ~loveliest face
l had ever seen rose before my eyes. l saw
her once again, as l had seen her when she
stood before me, her hand resting lightly in
my own, and her glance answering mine, as
| she spoke the few commonplace words which
were her only farewell. And whenever that
| vision presented itself to me. the spell was
thrown over mo afresh, and I admitted to
myself that l had met my fate-and sue
cumbed to it.
Yet there was nothing that was pleasur-
able in my mood, even at those moments
when l thought only of the girls beauty and
grace. 1 could not drive from my recollec-
ton the memory of that other face-the face
of the man whom l had struck down at the
railway station at York. Whenever 1
thought of the one, the features of the other
obtruded themselves upon me.
What was the reason Of that stranpe
scene, when she had appealed to me to drive
grew hot with anger and bitter with uu-
/ oroiIipr ioo1CyIcv nc 7 ro4octod kIo% - 1a..A
he must lave known her far better than l
did, and that, deeply as she might hate him
or fear him, he possessed some power over
her of which I knew nothing.
What was the mystery associated with
that beautiful facea In vain I racked nv
brain for some solution of the enigma. 1
only knew that in some fashion, holy or
unholy, this girl, who in a brief hour of time
had made ne more completely her slave
than any other human being had ever done,
was associated with the man, vicious and
vulgar, whose air Of insolent triumph as he
greeted her l could never recall without q
shudder. There We're not wanting other
diversions in Scarborough beside those of
which have spoken, but I cared for none
Of them, and, as the days passed, and my
search met with no success, I would fain
have shrunk even from the accidental &C
quaintances 1 had made in the hotel. 1t was
only ut the dinner table. indeed, or in the
smoking room late at night, that I ever ex
changed a word with a fellow creature.
All round me, however, there was enough
and more than enough, of noisy talk to hide
my sullen and self-absorbed silence. MOI
could l shut my mind to q knowledge of the
fact that all Scarborough was just Their
buzzing with excitement over a new topic Of
interesting gossip.
1t was one of the society journals which
had set the story, about which all were nov
talking, afloat. The gay watering place had
it seemed, received, among its many summe
guests, one who was exceptionally distin
guished. 1t was not that he was Of, high ranl
or of great genius. Rank and genius are novel
ties to be found at times even at Scarbor
ough, but they do not appear to make any
great impression upon the ordinary FIRE
quenters of the place. That which set every
body talking about Mr.. Mauleverer, tn
gentleman whose presence in Scarborough
had been chronicled in the society journal il
question, was his enormous wealth. People
talked OF it, specialized upon it, gloated ovel
it; and men and women alike We're wilt
with anxiety to be brought into close con
tact with ono whose riches were said to b
fabulous in their amount.
Mr.. Mauleverer, I discovered from what
saw in the newspapers and heard from thos'
around me, was a millionaire of the new
style. He was supposed to be some distan
connection of the old Lancashire family o
the same name. But. though English il
blood and name, he was not English eithel
by birth or u%pbringing. He was a ~colonist
and had been born and had spent all his lf
In Australia The scandalloving throng will
whom l mixed in the hotel or on the prone
made made light Of his origin. There wer
some, indeed, some who professed to know
on that "best authority" which the tai
bearer always has at his command, that b
was the son of a convict, a man who hat
disgraced his family in the early part of tn
present century, and who had expiated hi
sins by transportation. There were other
who even limited that he himself was no
: free from reproach. But upon two point
l there was no doubt in the mind Of anybody
The first was, that the man was enormousl,
. rich-rich beyond the dreams of avarice-
and the other, that he was a bachelor o
something more than middle are.
al Continued meet Neek.)
II Money to Loan.
III MOnov IN lOaO on ,rool ohotfal co.,rit