The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-03-28
A sHREWD WIDOW.
Her Income of $50 "a Month from Two
Sets of Cheap Furniture.

new 1OEk sun.
THE curious and adroit ways in which
some persons manage 10 make money in
this city on a capital small In substance
but large In assurance were brought 10
my mind the other night when 1 went 10
take dinner with a friend" said a man
about town the other day. My friend. by
the way, Is a very prosperous and mighty
paid executive officer of one or the big com
rercial concerns in this city. He occupies
for the winter season a set OF apartments
In a fashionable apartment house on the
west side. As he had announced his inten-
ton of remaining in the city until June J..
of course | did not imagine any connection
between his household arrangements and
a big moving van which l saw standing
fl front OF the door of the apartment house
as L approached. Men carrying furniture
jostled me as L entered, and L said to my
when | stepped out of the elevator at my
friends landing 4 met more men, coming
out of his apartments carrying more furni-
ture, under the supervision of an auction
eer. who stood at the landing shouting IN
structions.
Just within the door 1 found my friend
and his wife and servants and children in
company with a man whom / afterward
found was a city marshal
AT sight of me my friend burst into
laughter. Come in he cried. we can re-
ceive. you IN a novel manner The city
and my friend led me through his apart
ments. His parlor was untouched, but
every bed but one and every bureau and
chair had disappeared from his bedrooms
and dining room and Kitchen. and the car
pets were gone from bedrooms and hall. L
guess L won't stay to dinner, L remarked
when / saw the bare condition of the din
Ing room. oh, yes, you Will, said the
wife. Il Will borrow a kitchen table and
some chairs from a neighbor, and we Will
get along. Thank heaven, we still have the
kitchen utensils and the dinner left. put L
don't know that We should have had these
If my husband had not got home before the
men got through taking out the furniture
we had dinner and passed the evening
very pleasantly in the parlor and 1 finally
left the family of five persons to go to sleep
as best they could upon the one bed and
parlor sofa that were left. While we ate
dinner they told me how they came TO be
in such a fix.
1T seems that when they were house
hunting last fall they saw this fiat, and,
liking It's location. .dickered for it's posses
but her business projects were not prosper
Ing and she was about to give up posses
SOD She owned the turnlturs that had
lease of the place up to June / and to sub
iet IT 10 my friend Wtth Turhit1re for an
furniture. Ny friend hired II on these
terms As my friend preferred to have his
own parlOr furniture and some other things,
he discarded that much of the widows
goods Then a brilliant idea struck her.
The fiat across the hall was just being va
Gated. She saw the leaving tenant, bought
for a trifie some of his furniture and moved
I'm that which my friend had discarded and
advertised that flat TO rent furnished. In
three days she got a tenant and made a
DdrBdlh Win nlm Dy WHICH Sle Tedpeu an
other income of SO a month for the use of
Ter furniture in that fiat.
Everything went along all right until the
day i went there to dine, when the city
marshal had suddenly appeared. 1t seems
that the widow had borrowed money on
her furniture, and still owed something less
than 800. She had fallen behind in her pay
ments and the marshal had come to fore
close the chattel mortgage. The widow
settled the debt the next day and had the
furniture moved back. 1t was during the
moving of the furniture, my friend tells me.
that he first noted the paucity and cheap
ness, and he declares that the widow could
a replaced 1t with modern fiat furniture
for about the amount of the debt. and yet
on this small Investment and the little extra
she had spent for the balance of the furni-
ture in the other fiat the astute widow was
drawing an income of $50 a month"