Argosy All-Story Weekly, February 4, 1922 — page 64: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

RAD “i ( ‘ ‘ on. Pi 15 ach Y Pa " . t " f § n, ap, ws Vad J . 2 soy pes J U Te CN Fe 4 Y gi if* FOee ai d , Kenneth Mac Nichol Author of “ That Kind of a Man," * Eneugh Is Plenty,” etc. A NOVELETTE—COMPLETE IN THIS ISSUE CHAPTER I. THE HEIR TO HOBART. . William Vanderpool Biddle, in the twenty-third year of his life, was a very much spoiled young man. Yet there was in him no natural depravity, even though he had accomplished many evil things. Nor could it be said of him that he had more money than brains, because it was his father’s money that he spent so recklessly, and no son of John Biddle could lack intelligence. But young Biddle’s brains were used, ap- parently, only to invent new and ingenious ways of tumbling into trouble. Idle, care- less, irresponsible, it was only because his father was the great John Biddle that the son was enabled to escape some, at least, of the usual consequences. The father, whom the newspapers men- tioned respectfully as the Copper King, de- cided presently that his worthless son had become too great a drain upon his vast re- sources, both mental and financial. Hav- ing made this decision, John Biddle passed his son along to a very competent contfi- S witian with all possible charity, dential secretary for treatment. The great man could not be bothered by small affairs. Said secretary, also busy, confided his new charge to the care of Scott Hanley, harried superintendent of the Copper Butte Mine at Hobart, Arizona, some thousands of miles from Wall Street, and much farther from that section of Broadway where the white lights burn. There was a general understanding about a meager allowance to be paid, to be in- creased when William Vanderpool demon- strated his fitness to labor in the Biddle vineyards, but which was to cease alto- gether should he acquire a new batch of trouble of any kind, particularly of the wine, woman, and song variety, for which possibilities in Hobart were considered lim- ited. There was also a very definite declara- tion that young Biddle should never have the pleasure of either spending or adding to the Consolidated Copper millions shouid he continue to inhabit New York or any other metropolis except Hobart, in Arizona, for some time to come. This was the real, hard, irreducible fact which finally persuaded, if it did not recon- 374 COMmMiClbooks.Gom