The Quality of Mercy Part 50

Yet it was a real sacrifice, and she was destined to feel it in the narrowed conditions of her life. But she had become used to narrow conditions; she had learned how little people could live with when they had apparently nothing to live for; and now that in Matt she had everything to live for, the surrender of all she had in the world left her incalculably rich.

Matt rejoiced with her in her decision, though he had carefully kept himself from influencing it. He was poor, too, except for the comfortable certainty that his father could not let him want; but so far as he had been able, he had renounced his expectations from his father's estate in order that he might seem to be paying Northwick's indebtedness to the company. Doubtless it was only an appearance; in the end the money his father left would come equally to himself and Louise; but in the meantime the rest.i.tution for Northwick did cramp Eben Hilary more for the moment than he let his son know. So he thought it well to allow Matt to go seriously to work on account of it, and to test his economic theories in the attempt to make his farm yield him a living. It must be said that the prospect dismayed neither Matt nor Suzette; there was that in her life which enabled her to dispense with the world and its pleasures and favors; and he had long ceased to desire them.

The Ponkwa.s.set directors had no hesitation in accepting the a.s.signment of property made them by Northwick's daughter. As a corporate body they had nothing to do with the finer question of right involved. They looked at the plain fact that they had been heavily defrauded by the former owner of the property, who had inferably put it out of his hands in view of some such contingency as he had finally reached; and as it had remained in the possession of his family ever since, they took no account of the length of time that had elapsed since he was actually the owner. They recognized the propriety of his daughter's action in surrendering it, and no member of the Board was quixotic enough to suggest that the company had no more claim upon the property she conveyed to them than upon any other piece of real estate in the commonwealth.

"They considered," said Putney, who had completed the affair on the part of Suzette, and was afterwards talking it over with his crony, Dr.

Morrell, in something of the bitterness of defeat, "that their first duty was to care for the interests of their stockholders, who seemed to turn out all widows and orphans, as nearly as I could understand. It appears as if n.o.body but innocents of that kind live on the Ponkwa.s.set dividends, and it would have been inhuman not to look after their interests. Well," he went on, breaking from this grievance, "there's this satisfactory thing about it; somebody has done something at last that he intended to do; and, of course, the _he_ in question is a _she_.

'She that was' Miss Suzette is the only person connected with the whole affair, that's had her way. Everybody else's way has come to nothing, beginning with my own. _I_ can look back to the time when I meant to have the late J. Milton Northwick's blood; I was lying low for years, waiting for him to do just what he did do at last, and I expected somehow, by the blessing of G.o.d, to help run him down, or bring him to justice, as we say. The first thing I knew, I turned up his daughter's counsel, and was devoting myself to the interests of a pair of gra.s.s-orphans with the high and holy zeal of a Board of Directors. All I wanted was to have J. Milton brought to trial, not so I could help send him to State's prison with a band of music, but so I could get him off on the plea of insanity. But I wasn't allowed to have my way, even in a little thing like that; and of all the things that were planned for and against, and round about Northwick, just one has been accomplished. The directors failed to be in at the death; and old Hilary has had to resign from the Board, and pay the defaulter's debts. Pinney, I understand, considers himself a ruined man; he's left off detecting for a living, and gone back to interviewing. Poor old Adeline lived in the pious hope of making Northwick's old age comfortable in their beautiful home on the money he had stolen; and now that she's dead it goes to his creditors.

Why, even Billy Gerrish, a high-minded, public-spirited man like William B. Gerrish,--couldn't have his way about Northwick. No, sir; Northwick himself couldn't! Look how he fooled away his time there in Canada, after he got off with money enough to start him on the high road to fortune again. He couldn't budge of his own motion; and the only thing he really tried to do he failed in disgracefully. Adeline wouldn't let him stay when he come back to buy himself off; and that killed _her_.

Then, when he started home again, to take his punishment, the first thing he did was to drop dead. Justice herself couldn't have her way with Northwick. But I'm not sorry he slipped through her fingers. There wasn't the stuff for an example in Northwick; I don't know that he's much of a warning. He just seems to be a kind of--incident; and a pretty common kind. He was a mere creature of circ.u.mstances--like the rest of us! His environment made him rich, and his environment made him a rogue.

Sometimes I think there _was_ nothing to Northwick, except what happened to him. He's a puzzle. But what do you say, Doc, to a world where we fellows keep fuming and fizzing away, with our little aims and purposes, and the great ball of life seems to roll calmly along, and get where it's going without the slightest reference to what we do or don't do? I suppose it's wicked to be a fatalist, but I'll go a few aeons of eternal punishment more, and keep my private opinion that it's all Fate."

"Why not call it Law?" the doctor suggested.

"Well, I don't like to be too bold. But taking it by and large, and seeing that most things seem to turn out pretty well in the end, I'll split the difference with you and call it Mercy."

WILLIAM DEAN HOWELLS'S NOVELS.

THE QUALITY OF MERCY.

AN IMPERATIVE DUTY.

A HAZARD OF NEW FORTUNES.

THE SHADOW OF A DREAM.

ANNIE KILBURN.

APRIL HOPES.

BY CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER.

AS WE WERE SAYING.

With Portrait, and Ill.u.s.trated by H.W. MCVICKAR and Others.

So dainty and delightsome a little book may it be everybody's good hap to possess.--_Evangelist_, N. Y.

OUR ITALY.

In this book are a little history, a little property, a few fascinating statistics, many interesting facts, much practical suggestion, and abundant humor and charm--_Evangelist_, N. Y.

A LITTLE JOURNEY IN THE WORLD.

A Novel.

The vigor and vividness of the tale and its sustained interest are not its only or its chief merits. It is a study of American life of to-day, possessed with shrewd insight and fidelity.--GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS.

A powerful picture of that phase of modern life in which unscrupulously acquired capital is the chief agent.--_Boston Post._

STUDIES IN THE SOUTH AND WEST, with Comments on Canada.

Perhaps the most accurate and graphic account of these portions of the country that has appeared, taken all in all.... A book most charming--a book that no American can fail to enjoy, appreciate, and highly prize.--_Boston Traveller._

THEIR PILGRIMAGE.

Mr. Warner's pen-pictures of the characters typical of each resort, of the manner of life followed at each, of the humor and absurdities peculiar to Saratoga, or Newport, or Bar Harbor, as the case may be, are as good-natured as they are clever. The satire, when there is any, is of the mildest, and the general tone is that of one glad to look on the brightest side of the cheerful, pleasure-seeking world with which he mingles.--_Christian Union_, N. Y.

BY CONSTANCE F. WOOLSON.

JUPITER LIGHTS.

EAST ANGELS.

ANNE.

FOR THE MAJOR.

CASTLE NOWHERE.

RODMAN THE KEEPER.

There is a certain bright cheerfulness in Miss Woolson's writing which invests all her characters with lovable qualities.--_Jewish Advocate_, N. Y.

Miss Woolson is among our few successful writers of interesting magazine stories, and her skill and power are perceptible in the delineation of her heroines no less than in the suggestive pictures of local life.--_Jewish Messenger_, N. Y.

Constance Fentmore Woolson may easily become the novelist laureate.--_Boston Globe._

Miss Woolson has a graceful fancy, a ready wit, a polished style, and conspicuous dramatic power; while her skill in the development of a story is very remarkable.--_London Life._

Miss Woolson never once follows the beaten track of the orthodox novelist, but strikes a new and richly-loaded vein, which so far is all her own; and thus we feel, on reading one of her works, a fresh sensation, and we put down the book with a sigh to think our pleasant task of reading it is finished. The author's lines must have fallen to her in very pleasant places; or she has, perhaps, within herself the wealth of womanly love and tenderness she pours so freely into all she writes. Such books as hers do much to elevate the moral tone of the day--a quality sadly wanting in novels of the time.--_Whitehall Review_, London.

BY MARY E. WILKINS.

A NEW ENGLAND NUN, and Other Stories.

A HUMBLE ROMANCE, and Other Stories.