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come out and get her pay and the freedom of the Loops, to boot."
"One thing, more," he interrupted her thanks at the door, as on her previous
visit. "Now that you've shown the stuff you're made of, I should esteem it,
ahem, a privilege to give you a line myself to the INTELLIGENCER people."
The Minions Of Midas
WADE ATSHELER is dead dead by his own hand. To say that this was entirely
unexpected by the small coterie which knew him, would be to say an untruth;
and yet never once had we, his intimates, ever canvassed the idea. Rather had
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we been prepared for it in some incomprehensible subconscious way. Before the
perpetration of the deed, its possibility is remotest from our thoughts; but
when we did know that he was dead, it seemed, somehow, that we had understood
and looked forward to it all the time. This, by retrospective analysis, we
could easily explain by the fact of his great trouble. I use "great trouble"
advisedly. Young, handsome, with an assured position as the right-hand man of
Eben Hale, the great street-railway magnate, there could be no reason for him
to complain of fortune's favors. Yet we had watched his smooth brow furrow and
corrugate as under some carking care or devouring sorrow. We had watched his
thick, black hair thin and silver as green grain under brazen skies and
parching drought. Who can forget, in the midst of the hilarious scenes he
toward the last sought with greater and greater avidity who can forget, I say,
the deep abstractions and black moods into which he fell? At such times, when
the fun rippled and soared from height to height, suddenly, without rhyme or
reason, his eyes would turn lacklustre, his brows knit, as with clenched hands
and face overshot with spasms of mental pain he wrestled on the edge of the
abyss with some unknown danger.
He never spoke of his trouble, nor were we indiscreet enough to ask. But it
was just as well; for had we, and had he spoken, our help and strength could
have availed nothing. When Eben Hale died, whose confidential secretary he
was nay, well-nigh adopted son and full business partner he no longer came
among us. Not, as I now know, that our company was distasteful to him, but
because his trouble had so grown that he could not respond to our happiness
nor find surcease with us. Why this should be so we could not at the time
understand, for when Eben Hale's will was probated, the world learned that he
was sole heir to his employer's many millions, and it was expressly stipulated
that this great inheritance was given to him without qualification, hitch, or
hindrance in the exercise thereof. Not a share of stock, not a penny of cash,
was bequeathed to the dead man's relatives. As for his direct family, one
astounding clause expressly stated that Wade Atsheler was to dispense to Eben
Hale's wife and sons and daughters whatever moneys his judgement dictated, at
whatever times he deemed advisable. Had there been any scandal in the dead
man's family, or had his sons been wild or undutiful, then there might have
been a glimmering of reason in this most unusual action; but Eben Hale's
domestic happiness had been proverbial in the community, and one would have to
travel far and wide to discover a cleaner, saner, wholesomer progeny of sons
and daughters. While his wife well, by those who knew her best she was
endearingly termed "The Mother of the Gracchi." Needless to state, this
inexplicable will was a nine day's wonder; but the expectant public was
disappointed in that no contest was made.
It was only the other day that Eben Hale was laid away in his stately marble
mausoleum. And now Wade Atsheler is dead. The news was printed in this
morning's paper. I have just received through the mail a Ietter from him,
posted, evidently, but a short hour before he hurled himself into eternity.
This letter, which lies before me, is a narrative in his own handwriting,
linking together numerous newspaper clippings and facsimiles of letters. The
original correspondence, he has told me, is in the hands of the police. He has
begged me, also, as a warning to society against a most frightful and
diabolical danger which threatens its very existence, to make public the
terrible series of tragedies in which he has been innocently concerned. I
herewith append the text in full:
It was in August, 1899, just after my return from my summer vacation, that
the blow fell. We did not know it at the time; we had not yet learned to
school our minds to such awful possibilities. Mr. Hale opened the letter, read
it, and tossed it upon my desk with a laugh. When I had looked it over, I also
laughed, saying, "Some ghastly joke, Mr. Hale, and one in very poor taste."
Find here, my dear John, an exact duplicate of the letter in question.
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OFFICE OF THE M. OF M. August 17, 1899.
MR. EBEN HALE, Money Baron:
Dear Sir, We desire you to realize upon whatever portion of your vast
holdings is necessary to obtain, IN CASH, twenty millions of dollars. This sum
we require you to pay over to us, or to our agents. You will note we do not
specify any given time, for it is not our wish to hurry you in this matter.
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