Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1911-07-11
BY THOMAS DIXON
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BOOK 1.-THE ROOT.
CHAPTER XVII.
Soma Inside Facts.

ure. She had begun to tease with gen.
tie raillery about his tragic eXaggera-
ton of the treachery of her betrayal
and laughingly promised to make 1t
all I'D by introducing him to group
of the richest and most beautiful girls
in New York. He could take his choice
under her wise guidance. She prom
ised to begin his course of instruction
tonight.
Never had Bivenss offer seemed
more generous and wonderful. His
pulse beat with quickened stroke as ne
felt the new sense of power with
which he would look out on the world
as a possible millionaire.
He gazed over the old Square with
a feeling of regret at the thought OF
leaving it. He had grown TO love the
place in the past years Of loneliness.
He had become personally acquainted
with every tree and shrub and every
limb of the nearby trees. He had
watched them grow from his window,
seen them sway in the storm, bow
beneath the ice, and grow into new
beauty and life each spring. He was
deciding too soon, perhaps. There
were some features of Bivens's busi-
ness he must understand more clearly
before he could give up his freedom
and devote himself body and soul to-
the task of money making as his asso-
ciate.
70 q q
with deliberation. But If he should go
in for money, he wouldn't forget his
old friends, nor would he leave WASH
ington Square. He would buy that
corner plot on Fifth Avenue across the
way for his house There should be
two beautiful suites in it for the doc
tor and Harriet, and from their Win
dows they could always see the. old
home on the other side. He would buy
the two adjoining houses, turn them
into a sanitarium, endow it and place
the doctor in charge. And he would
give him a fund of ten thousand a
year for his outside work among the
poor.
He woke from his reverie with a
start and looked at his watch to find he
had been standing there dreaming for
half an hour. He hurried across the
Square to take a cab at the Brevoort.
His mood was buoyant. He was
looking out on life once more through
rose tinted glasses. At Eight street he
met at right angles the swarming thou
In from their
work-heavy looking men who tramp
ed with tired step, striking the pave
ments DULY with their nailed shoes,
tired anxious women, frouzle- headed
little girls, sad-eyed boys half-awake
all hurrying, the fear of want and the
horror of charity in their silent faces.
And yet the sight touched no respon-
sive chord of sympathy in Stuarts
heart as it often had. Tonight he saw
only the thing that is and felt that It
was good.
He pushed his way through the
shabby throng, found a cab, sprang in
and gave his order 10 the driver. A
row of taxicabs stood by the curb. He
took an old fashioned hanson from
choice. 1t seemed to link the present
moment of his life to the memory OF
some wonderful hours he had spent,
with Nan by his side, years ago.
AS the cab whirled up Fifth Avenue
he leaned back in his seat with a feel
ing of glowing satisfaction with him.
self and the world. The shadows OF
beautiful spring night slowly deepened
as the city drew her shining mantle OF
light about her proud form. The
Avenue flashed with swift silent auto
mobiles and blooded horses. These
uptown crowds through whose rushing
streams he passed were all we'll dress
ed and carried bundles of candy, flow
ers and toys. The newsboys were al
ready crying extras with glowing ad-
vance accounts of the banquet and
ball.
Stuart felt the contagious enthusi-
asm of thousands of prosperous men
and women whose lives at the moment
flowed about and enveloped his own.
This was a pretty fine old world after
III. and New York the only town worth
living in.
And what was il that made the diff
ference between the squalid atmos-
phere below Fourth street and the
glowing, flashing, radiant, jeweled
world uptown? Money! 1t meant
purple and fine linen. delicacies of food
and drink, pulsing machines that
could make a mile minute. high-step
ping horses and high-bred dogs, music
and dancing, joy and laughter, sport
and adventure, the mountain and the
sea, freedom from care, fear, drudgery
and slavery!
After all in this modern passion Tor
money might there not be something
deeper than mere greed; perhaps ne
regenerating power of the spirit press
ing man upward? Certainly he could
only see the bright side of it tonight
and the wonder grew on him that he
had lived for twenty five years in
fog of sentiment and ignored deliber-
ately the biggest fact of the century,
while the simpler mind of the poor
white boy i'm Bivens had grasped the
truth at once and built his life square
ly on it from the beginning. Well,
he had set his mind to it at last IN
time to reach the highest goal of sue
cess. if he so willed. For that he was
thankful.
AS his cab swung into Riverside
Drive from Seventy second street the
sight which greeted him was one OF
startling splendOr.
Bivens's yacht lay at anchor in the
river just in front of his house. She
was festoOned with electric lights from
the water line to the top of her tower
ing steel masts. From every shroud
and halyard hung garlands of light,
and the flags which flew from her
peaks were illumined with waving red,