The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-02-03

room when Dr. Dwight came in. with a
copy Of the Evening Instigator In his
hand. His face was serious. and bore
traces of excitement: and his bearing was
pregnant of news. He walked mp 90 us.
nodded and sat down. holding the paper
across his knee
Smoke said Jordan. lanEuidlv draw
ing a cigar from his waistcoat pocket
"A nip Of brandy if youn touch the
bell" replied Dwight Have YOU heard
about Turkentyne3 It's in the paper. I
see. though it was only eleven when it
happened. I was with him"
HAS he been getting drunk again on
lemonade and seltzer2" intericcted Ma
son. IT'S a funny thing. by thA way.
have you notice it? It's been going on for
the last three OF four weeks. Little Tur-
key always had the best viii in The world
10 get on on 'sprees with the boys. but
fate. in the shape of an impracticable
stomach, made liquor Of any sort an
impossibility for him. He actually can't
touch so much as A glass of claret with
out undergoing disastrous reverses in his
epigastic region. I've seen him following
a knot of the fellows about watching
them toss of their cocktails and straights,
with eyes green wit envy. but never dar-
ing TO chip in himself. The jollier they.
got the more down-in- the mouth he
would grow; and he once conhded TO me
that he would give half his fortune for
the digestion and constitution Of a man
like Greenwood. for example-who. for
his part. can drink all day If he can get
only somebody to pay the shot"
Il guess Greenwood must have found
his paymaster, then remarked I; for
] have noticed the past month or so that
ne has been hilarious every evening; and
I've seen him ordering hzz-and paying
for IT, too-as if 1t was water
What I was going to say resumed
Mason, "Turkentyne has been strangely
festive of late. for no substantial reason
that / could ever discover. I've never
seen him put anything stronger than
lemon juice into his glass, and yet he's
been whooping it up as If he were load
ed with the best stuff in the cellar"
He gets inebriated through sympathy
said Jordan: I've heard of such a thing.
He's probably of a peculiarly sensitive
and sympathetic nature"
Sympathetic as fish," retorted Mason.
scornfully. "a fellow who's made his
money, working wheat corners. as Tur-
kie has. isn't going to suffer from the
pangs of an impressionable magma
ton. NO, sir; there's a mystery there,
and I'd like TO hear an explanation of it.
The man gets roaring drunk on nothing
at all; that's the long and short of it:
and yet I'll wager he hasn't swallowed a
pint Of liquor in three years. I know what
I'm talking about"
Maybe he's a haschisch or choral
lend" suggested.
II am able to answer for him as to that
put in Dwight. who had been silently
slipping his brandy all this while. I'm
his physician: and I'm in a position to
affirm that he has never touched drugs
of any kind He had a peculiar organ
ization, and could stand no sort of slim
ulant-not even tobacco"
There" exclaimed Mason. triumph
antly; and is it not, nevertheless, true.
doctor, that be has been exhibiting all
the symptoms of the practiced rounder?"
IAN but one. ADMIT" replied Dwight.
And what's that?"
why, that every night. at about 2
o'clock a. m. he has suddenly become as
sober as 9. judge. and gone to bed with
a head as clear as crystal. And when
he got up in the morning. there wasn't
the faintest symptom of feverishness or
discontinue of any description. That.
of course, is proof positive of his actual
abstinence"
( BY joveg drawled Jordan; IF the
fellow has discovered a means of enjoy
ing all the delights of the rounder with
out suffering any of the penalties. l
should like to sit at his feet and i'm
bibe his wisdom. What do you make Of
it, doc?"
Il must inform you. gentlemen" said
Dwight, gravely, since you evidently
haven't heard it, that our poor friend
is dead. Yes, he died this morning, in
my presence, at five minutes before II
O'Clock"
We all uttered EXPLANATIONS. After all,
we had liked poor little Turkie. He had
been a vain, shallow, voIuble. absurd
creature; but he had possessed some
warm human qualities. He had been
fond of US; he had fulfilled his conception
of friendship toward US he had been gen.
erous with the only quality of attraction
he had-his money; he had longed to
make US like him. and admit him to the
charmed circle of our good-fellowship. The
charmed circle in question was, verify,
a paltry enough object of ambition; but,
such as it was, Turkie had craved 1T;
and his modification over the constitu-
tional weakness which had disabled him
from partaking of what our civilization
chooses to regard as the emblem of good
fellowship, had been so comically sincere
and acute as to have attracted our amused
attention. The spectacle of the strutting,
Growing little man mourning because he
could not share our excuses, was enough
TO upset the gravity of an Egyptian idol
And then the fantasmal fashion in which,
during the last few weeks, he had con-
trived to accomplish the appearance of
carousal, without employing the con-
crete means to that end-had rioted in
wassail, without absorbing so much as
a d
grotesque kind of miracle as seemed to
suit his character. But that Turkie should,
thus suddenly and without warning.
wrap himself about with the majesty
OF death was a fact quite out of keeping
with the humble measure of his person
atty. There is dignity in death; but who
could associate dignity with the thought
of Turkentyne? The atmosphere of social
dram-drinking had suited him well
enough; but the chill majesty of the last
great change-could that really have
fallen upon Tukentyne?
What did he die OF? How did it hap
pen?'' asked. after a pause.
What the cause of death actually was
am unable even to conjecture" Dwight
replied. But every symptom pointed to
heart failure. superinduced by acute alco-
holism. In fact, it was preceded by as
startling a nit of the horrors as ever 1
Witnessed
why. then. he has been drinking, after
. ALL" said Jordan. He must have done
his loading up in secret. Though ! don't
see what his object could have been in
that, either. But if imagination, or SYM
pathy, can make a man drunk. it's too
much to believe it can give him the d. T.
and kill him.
-&..s-s 4aTT