The county record. [volume] (Kingstree, S.C.) 1885-1975, 1904-06-02
CHAPTER XIV
THE CRYPT.

The human mind. though busiest
when exchanging ideas in conversation
with others, dives DEEPEST in solitude.
Probably no case was ever profoundly
considered unless the student was
alone, and never so profoundly as
.wher involuntarily-when the mental
faculties are so absorbed in contem-
plation of one subject that diversion
from it is as being awakened from
sleep.
I experienced this truth when-hav-
ing retired to my room, set down the
lantern, and exchanged my boots for
slippers-I placed my elbows on the
mantelpiece and my head upon my
hands. and stood so for l know not
how long. That such was my attitude
for not less than two hours am sure
from the interruption which dispelled
my reverie.
, I had emptied my pockets. end all
the money l possessed-six sovereiSns
and some odd shillings-lay before me
on the mantelpiece. Perhaps it was
the sight Of these few coins which led
me to review my experiences OF the
mast twelve days, and to seriously ask
myself for the last time before seek
ing assurance by actual essay. what
were my chances to find the treasure
which had been deposited in the crypt
benest th nv fathers house. That the
treasure Of which had that day read
had been disposed of as described by
INV ancestor, l did not for moment
doubt; that such treasure should be
suffered to rest undisturbed for more
than two hundred years, there we're
many reasons to doubt. Yet was 1t
not distinctly asserted by Roger True
man that the treasure was In the Ao-
bots Cell IN the crypt-that it was to
remain there until he built hospital!
Mighs not the bricked-up arch which
nv aunt Gertrude had noticed when
sbe went over Holdenhurst Hall be
this same Abbot's Cell alluded to by
my ancestor; and might not the reason
for its being bricked up be to secure its
contents? And If that were so. could
ftsa acoptents be other than the quarter
nNhon Venetian sequins which
had 80 straugs fallen into my ances-
tors possession and been as strangely
bestowed by him? 1t must be so. NO
one of my family had ever built or
endowed a hospital-no one of them
had ever possessed so much money
as a quarter of million sequins, un-.
less II were this same Roger Trueman;
and had so large sum of money been
founfa in our house and appropriated
by any member of my family at any
period could not have failed to near
of it. Yes; the money must certainly
be there, and 1 would presently go be-
low and look at it, and my father and
I would fetch it upstairs in the morn
ing. Then would my father and In
sist On returning to uncle Sam the
money which he had so generously
given to us: then would ask Con-
stance Marsh to become my wiie;
then
What a thing is money-the epitome
of all mems desires! Why, those six
small yellow counters lying on the
shelf before me would buy the hard
<,aiIy labor of an East Anglian giant,
who to gain them would sweat ana
Toll In the parched fields from sunrise
TO sunset for twelve weeks-wages
current this last quarter Of the nine
teenth century. For less than two OF
them will moi man labor in darkness
I'm the bowels of the earth with con-
stant peril to life or limb, or stand be-
fore a roaring furnace, or work IN the
noxious air of factory amid the mad
dening whirl of machinery for week,
esteeming himself fortunate II such
slender means Of life so earned be not
denied him? For want Of these same
counters has not loving husband and
father watched his wife pine and his
child die? Answer, you who nave
been up and down this England OF
ours, you who have traversed her
sowns and villages, you vao know how
the poor live and how they die. Is 1t
not so? Why, in the towns OF Chris
tian England, is every man plucked
by the sleeve who passes along the
byeway? What is the cause! Lust!
Nay; dire need of a pitifully few silver
counters, and the inability Of hundreds
of thousands of women to gain them
by means more honorable. Even l,
whose life has not yet run to two dec
ades. and who have always lived re-
mote from the busy haunts OF men,
cannot but knows these truths; and is
1t not wrong in one who has youth.
leisure, and the luXuries of life to so
pass onately desire to grasp this treas
ure, which he has done nothing to ac-
Quire and which certainly is not his?
But a few days ago, and the whole
spirit of greed was foreign to my ma
ture; now is my whole being domi-
mated by it. Alas. can it be that Love,
purest of passions, evOkes Avarice:
No. desire of that which is necessary