The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-12-01
MAN WITH A LURID PAST
GRAPHIC SKETCH OF STOKES, THE
MAN WHO KILLED JIM FISKE.
Kept an Impassive Face and n Bold
Front to the Last, but Was Haunt
ed by Thoughts of His Deed.
New York Telegraph.

New York Telegraph.
An old New Yorker, sitting at ease in the
barroom of the Hoffman House, the first of
it's kind, the precursor of the modern idea
in drinking places, summed it up in a nut
shell:
$50 Ed Stokes has gone at last to meet
the spirit of Jim Fiske, the only thing in
the world or out of it he feared. What a
meeting it must lave been! L would give
$4,000 to have seen it. But do you realize
that in the death Of Stokes Broadway loses
it's most picturesque and interesting figure,
the central figure of the most enthralling
drama ever enacted Upon the stage of life
in this great center of strange and lurid
dramas? 1 have wondered often that no
dramatist or novelist has seized the salient
points of this mans story and turned it to
use. What a melodrama it would make!
What a book
Yes, the story of this strange and silent
man, with the lurid past and the secretive
present, would have made good reading or
good stage material. But it is safe to say
that while Edward S. Stokes was alive no
author, playwright, manager, or publisher
would have the nerve to make use of the
drama of his life, so that it would be recog-
niZed and recognizable.
Stokes was without question the greatest
gambler that New York ever possessed.
Greater than the late Marcus Cicero Stan
ley, in his prime the king of lottery and
policy men, he possessed many Of the
traits OF the essential oil of venom. Cold,
heartless, impassive, secretive, relentless,
with heart of stone and nerves of steel, he
possessed those elements which make the
perfect gambler. But Stokes had that
which Stanley never possessed-fascina-
ton. The cousin with whom he quarreled.
as he quarreled with all men sooner or
later, and with whom he was reconciled on
his ~deathbed. declares him to nave been
the handsomest, most physically perfect
man he ever knew. and out of the long line
of beautiful women who bowed beneath
the magic OF his sway, from Helen Joseph
inc Mansfield to Rosamond Langdon Bar
clay, there is not one that will not echo
this p~anegyric. He drew the women of a
certain kind-but only women of that
kind-to him as the magnet draws the
fecks or steel. They loved him and We're
true to him who were true TO no other man.
But how he gambled. this man! Not with
the cards alone, but with stocks and bonds
and gold mines and cable and telegraph
companies and hotels and restaurants. and
will mems friendships and women's hearts.
and once with the life of a patron and a
friend. whom Stokes himself had alienated
by stealing the friendship and loyalty of a
woman. All such things were to him a fas-
chatting game. He watched millions come
and millions go, and friendship come and
friendship go, and never changed a muscle
Of his white, handsome face, or lost the
cold glitter of his eye. ~
THE WAY OF NATURE.
Did he enjoy the game? God knows. Ask
the man who sits beside the green cloth
for four n twenty hours at a stretch if
he enjoys it. Ask the opium smoker or
hashish eater if he enjoys it. If you ask
me for my opinion. 1 will tell
you that I think Edward s.
Stokes, behind that immobile face
with it's snow white hair. White while he
yet was a young man. enjoyed the same
delights that such as these enjoy-greater
than YOU or i, thank God. are capable OF
experiencing-and suffer excruciating agony
in penalty. II is the way that nature hath
TO make US pay our debts.
His earlier adventures, and possible his
later ones. also We're a vindication OF the
proverbs IL a French one?-'Lucky at
love. unlucky at cards" He failed as a