The Argosy — page 137: what you’re looking at

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

120 On and Off. you to see to. Dear aunt left directions in her will, I know, as to what she wished done; for she often told me that it should be opened before anything was decided.” ‘‘Did she tell you how she left her property?” The words slipped out before he knew that they were coming. “Oh, she had scarcely anything to leave, you know. She may have put by a little for legacies to the servants, and so on; and there is the silver and the pictures ; but all her money goes to my cousin, John Lifford, at her death.” “* What!” ‘You seem surprised. Were you calculating on its coming to me? You made a mistake then ; she had only a life-interest in her property.” ‘‘T always understood you were to be her heir?” ‘You did not understand it from me; I am sure I never said a word about it. Did you marry me for money ?” ‘Certainly I did not marry you for money; but I could not have married you if you had not had money.” ‘Why, haven’t you enough for us both?” ‘*No, indeed. I shall have plenty by-and-bye, when my shares begin to pay ; but the plain truth is that at present, if I have as much cash as will pay our bill here, it is all that I can muster.” ‘¢ And what are we to do?” ‘Tam afraid we must manage upon your income for a year, and then we shall be all right.” * But my pension was only £50 a year, and it stopped when I was married.” | “The deuce!” Ada burst into tears. Wilfrid walked up and down the room furiously, biting his moustache in savage disappointment, and holding his tongue with difficulty. At last, he flung out of the room, and walked out into the chilly March dusk. He walked for miles and miles, tiring down his rage, and partly succeeded. His mind was all in a turbid whirl at first, in which he knew only that all the world had been in a conspiracy to delude him. Gradually it cleared a little, and he began to recognise how far he had been self-deceived. Ada had told him no untruths, that was clear; it was all the doing of those meddling, chattering fools who had told him that she had a fortune, and he had been double-dyed idiot enough to believe them, and hurry to secure it without knowing what he was about. In this fashion, with endless reiteration and far more emphatic mental expressions, he abused himself and his ac- quaintances, until he found himself in the outskirts of Newport, having walked nearly across the island. Here he suddenly dis- covered that he was dead tired, with the excitement and the furious pace at which he had walked; and that it was long past dinner- time. So he looked fora respectable hotel, ordered dinner, and found that his misfortunes did not prevent him from eating it when it came. Eomichbooks.co