The Argosy — page 13: what you’re looking at

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

Lhe Master of Greylands. 3 ‘“‘T know it, sir,” he said, his manner betraying the deepest respect and sympathy. “I have seen it coming a long while. So have you sir. Why have you not confided in me before ? ” “T could not,” breathed Mr. Peter Castlemaine. ‘I wanted to put it from me, as a thing that could never really be. It has never come | sO near as it has come now, Hill; it has never been so real as at this | moment of outspoken words.” ‘It was not my place to take the initiative, sir. I could but place facts and figures before you, compare past balances with present ones, other years’ speculations with last year’s, and—and give you the opportunity of opening the subject with me. But you never would.” “JT have told you why, Hill,” said Mr. Pe.ct Castlemaine. ‘I strove to throw the whole trouble from me. It was a weak, mistaken feeling : but nine men of ten, would have been actuated by it under similar circumstances. And yet,” he added, half in soliloquy, “I never was much like other men, and I never knew myself to be weak ” “ Never weak; never weak,” responded the faithful clerk, affec- tionately. “J don’t know, Hill: I feel so now. It.has been to me longas a far-off monster, creeping onwards by degrees, advancing each day by stealthy steps: and now it is close at hand, ready to crush me.” ‘IT seem not to understand it,” said poor Hill. ‘‘ And there are times when I cannot,” returned Mr. Peter Castle- maine. “In the old days, sir, everything you handled turned to gold. You had but to take up a speculation, and it was sure to turn out a grand success. Why, sir, your name has become quite a proverb for luck. But for some time past things have changed, and instead of success, it has been failure. Sir, it is just as though your right hand had lost its cunning.” “ Right, Hill,” sighed his master, “‘my hand seems to have lost its cunning. It is—I have said it over and over again to myself—just as though some curse pursued me. If a scheme has Jooked fair and pro- mising to day, a blight has fallen on it to-morrow. And I, like a fool as I see now, plunged into fresh ventures, hoping to redeem the last one. Were all disclosed, the public would say that the mania of gambling must have taken hold of me—” ‘¢ No, no,” murmured the clerk. ‘‘____When it was but the recklessness of a drowning man. Why, Hill—if I could get in the money, at present due to me, money that I think will come in, perhaps shortly, though it is locked up now, we should weather the storm.” ““T trust it will be weathered, sir; somehow. At the worst, it will not be a bad failure ; there'll be twenty shillings in the pom they