Custer weekly chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, S.D.) 1890-1931, 1900-07-14
Tie Fittest Survives
BY ]. II. coNNELLY.

in Wall street, he had sensibly taken
John Latham's advice in retrenching
his unnecessary expenditures, and one
of the main steps to that end was his
removal from the costly hotel where
he had been living to the combined
lodging and boarding house in which
John resided. There he had a bed
room, small, but large enough to sleep
in, for the same sum per week as
he had been paying per diem for his
apartment at the hotel. 1t adjoined
Johns room, which was a large one,
and when the communicating door
had been opened the young men prac-
tically enjoyed the two in common.
The larger one, in which a good fire
was kept, served as their parlor. Some
of the persons occupying rooms in h
house took their meals at the land
lady's table, but Latham and Sewall
found 10 better suited to their conyen-
fence to patronize restaurants at
such times as appetite and opportuni-
ty conJointly served. When Chester
Sewall returned home at the usual
hour for finding his friend there on
the day of John Latham's hurried de-
parture for the southwest, the busy
young lawyer was in Harlem. The
loneliness and quiet of the Dol were
uncomfortable to a main whose distress
and anxiety had wrought his nerves
to the highest tension, and Chester
went out again TO walk, not with the
object of going anywhere, but just to
walk until he should have tired him.
self out and might hope to sleep. BY
the time he revisited the room his
friend was half way across the state
of New Jersey and going rapidly.
From the central gas fixture in the
main % depended by a string a
card upon which was written:
Dear Chet-IIave TO go away. Don't
expect me until YOU see me. Good
luck to you. Yours, John.
The finder stared at the writing in
dismay.
He could hardly have imagined any
thing else that would have seemed so
disastrous at this particular iu~ncture
as Johns departure. Weary in body,
sore in spirit, on the very verge of de-
spair, he had come home counting on
receiving from his friend consolation,
encouragement, advice, perhaps even
financial aid. He felt as he fancied a
man might feel who stood alone upon
a mere foothold of sand in
midocean and knew that the last ship
by which he might have been saved
had sailed away from him in the
night.
That stock, in defiance of all posi-
biliey, had gone on falling. 1t was u
monstrous and, as il seemed to him
an unheard of thing that it should 50
pcrsistently go down when everybody
said IL ought to go up, but it had
done so until the wiseacres gravely
shook their heads and said there was
no knowing where it would stop low,
The business re- ions between him
and his broker were upon the same
footing again as when he had Dor
rowed $1,000 to protect his margin a
couple of days before. Once more he
was about to be sold out. Whether he
wanted TO enlarge his debt to John in
order to risk more or not he had not
determined. 1t was q question he had
proposed to leave to John, who had
unconsciously settled it by going
away.
While waiting and watching The
ticker that afternoon, with the
gambling fever hot upon him, he had
in obedience to a momentary impulse
entered a bucket shop and riskct
the last bank bill he possessed upon
the fluctuations of a peculiarly lively
wildcat mining stock, concerning
which he knew absolutely nothing, II
was not so much the prospect of the
possible petty gain that tempted hin
as the idea he suddenly conceived
that his luck in hat small venture
would forecast the fate awaiting his
larger interests, which was still in thu
balance. 1t was only a $40 note any
way, too small a sum to be Of any
practical use. He lost, and accepting
the augury was not surprised wher
he saw recorded ION the tape q fur
Their fall of the stock to which he haC
clung with such fatal persistence, on,
that wiped out" his margin. He wa
utterly ruined.
AS he sat alone before Johns fire
turning these things over in his mind
it wSs a singular fact that he felt
peculiarly keen regret for the $1I
thrown away in the bucket shop
The thousands he had risked and los
were simply capital" an abstrac
element i'm business transactions, tina
had never materialized to his sight il
the form of bank notes, having al
ways appeared in the unimrressiv,
guise of certified checks. But the 81
note was a familiar and comprehensi
BILE thing of accurately MEASURABLE
value. 1t would have bought 20 fruga
meals. BY the way, how much did h
actually have left for the purchase o
food? A very serious question.
He set himself at once to ransack
ing his pockets. Dimes were thing
for Thanksgiving; nickels, objects o
interest; pennies, not To be despised
How he lamented now the loss of hi
good so note! But while he wa
prosecuting this search something
was brought to light that gave a ney
direction to his thoughts and cause
n new trouble to loom up before him
1t was an envelope that he recognize
at nee as containing tickets of ad
mission to the opera the next evening
He had procured them a week before
Trina having expressed a desire TO wit
ness the representation of "Loher
grim announced for that date, bu
his business troubles had driven tn
fact from his memory for three o
four days past.
What "A CHASTITY satire upon his mis-
cry that engagement now seemed t
him, Anxious about food for the i'm
mediate future and under contract I
take a millionaire's daughter to tn
opera! The recalling of apposit
Greek and Latin quotations to sui
pretty much all chances and cond
tions was his happiest talent, but
failed him now. He was too niue
troubled to think OF anything tina
seemd adequate to the occasion.
Irma~ would expect to be taken I
the opera house and home again in
carriage, of course. That was wha
she was accustomed to. But eve
street a fares would narrow hi
dietary plan seriously.
1t occurred to him that there woul
be wisdom i'm feigning sudden indi'
position and sending her the tickets