Transcriber’s Notes:
Text enclosed by equal signs is in bold (=bold=).
Additional Transcriber’s Notes are at the end.
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Price 25 Cents
SHADOWS OF A GREAT CITY
A ROMANTIC STORY FOUNDED UPON L. R. SHEWELL’S PLAY OF THE SAME NAME
BY GRACE MILLER WHITE
[Illustration: “SAVED”]
* * * * *
[Illustration: “SHE MUST NEVER LEAVE THIS PLACE ALIVE!”]
* * * * *
The Shadows of a Great City.
A ROMANTIC STORY
Founded Upon L. R. Shewell’s Famous Play of
the Same Name.
BY
GRACE MILLER WHITE,
Author of “Driven From Home,” “Joe Welch the Peddler,”
“No Wedding Bells for Her,” “Sky Farm,” “A Midnight
Marriage,” “Souvenir Book of ‘Way Down East’,”
“Why Women Sin,” “Human Hearts,” “A
Ragged Hero,” “From Rags to Riches,”
Etc., Etc.
COPYRIGHT, 1904, BY
J. S. OGILVIE PUBLISHING COMPANY.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED BY C. B. JEFFERSON.
NEW YORK:
J. S. OGILVIE PUBLISHING COMPANY,
57 ROSE STREET.
* * * * *
SHADOWS OF A GREAT CITY
CHAPTER I.
Three children were hopping among the daisies in a beautiful grove near
a stone mansion covered with ivy. Their happy shouts and merry laughter
filled the air until the birds in the branches twittered back from very
happiness.
Two boys and one little girl made up the number, and the girl was
clapping her hands wildly, watching the boys as they wrestled in the
grass.
The larger of them brought the other down upon his face and made him
admit that the match was over.
“I had you foul when I wound my leg about yours,” explained he. “You
cannot expect to down a big fellow like me,” and the boy straightened
himself with a chuckle.
The girl ceased her laughing and came forward.
“Well, I don’t care, George Benson; Tom’s as good as you are any day.
That’s what he is.”
“Nobody said he wasn’t,” contemptuously replied the lad, “but he can’t
fight.”
Tom was watching George out of the corner of his eye, trying to
determine whether it would be well to go at it again, when the girl
spoke:
“Never you mind, Tommy; you come with me, and I’ll ask papa for
twenty-five cents, and then we will go to the candy store.”
The boy addressed as George Benson followed Tom and the girl.
“You needn’t be a tight-wad,” exclaimed he; “stingy, stingy, stingy.”
“She ain’t stingy, George,” snapped Tom, “and if you say she is stingy
again, I’ll knuckle your pate.”
“Stingy cat Annie, stingy cat Annie,” shouted George loudly. “There
now, here’s my head, you knuckle it if you dare!”
With a bound Tom was up on the back of George and was rubbing the curly
head with a vengeance. Back and forth they tottered upon the lawn until
the girl shouted:
“There, that’s enough now, Tom; just you show him that you can lick
him. Now, Mr. George, if you’ll be good, you can go to the candy store
with us.”
“Don’t want none of your old candy,” sulkily replied the other. “I
wouldn’t eat it fer nothing, and I’ll get even with you, Mr. Tom, for
knuckling my pate.”
“Come on now and get even,” exclaimed Tom; “you ain’t the only plug in
the world.”
But George did not seem anxious to get even, and he sent a stone flying
after Annie Benson and Tom Cooper.
“George can be so mean when he wants to be,” sighed the girl.
“So he can. Now, why didn’t he come to the store after the fight? He
had no right to call you stingy.”
“No, for I always give him half of what I have, after he spends his
allowance that father gives him.”
They were silent for a few moments, and then the girl continued:
“I sometimes think that George is jealous of you and me, and he ought
not to be, for father does as much for him as for any one else, and I
am papa’s own child.”
“Of course you are, Annie, while I am only a little boy Mr. Benson was
so good to. Never mind, when I get big I’m going to marry you.”
“Oh, you can’t, Tom,” replied Annie, “for I am four years older than
you are. You would not want to have your wife boss you, would you, Tom,
and I would have to if I was older than you.”
“Oh, not always. I read in a book once,” proceeded Tom earnestly,
“about a man and a woman, and she was ten years older than her husband,
and they were very happy.”
“Were they, really? I never heard of such a thing. I thought the
husbands had to be at least twenty years older than the wife.”
“Pshaw, no, and I’m going to have you for my wife.”
Again there was silence. The girl was about twelve, while the boy,
although large for his age, was but eight.
“George said he was going to marry me,” said Annie after a while. “He
said that my father was very rich and that he being my cousin ought to
have the right to look after my money.”
“George ain’t good enough for you, Annie,” hesitated Tom. “If you won’t
tell I’ll tell you something.”
“I promise, and cross my heart,” replied Annie.
“I saw Tom take money from your father’s safe.”
“Oh, Tom, you really didn’t?”
“I really did,” answered the boy, hanging his head.
“How could George be so wicked when papa is so good to him. Why, he has
had no father or mother for many years. He and I are the same age. My
father and his are brothers.”
The girl’s mouth drooped at the corners and her little face worked
painfully, for as much as she scolded her big cousin she loved him.
She never had had a brother, and now to find this young lad whom she
had taken into her heart like one should be found wanting was hard to
bear.
“You are sure, Tommy dear?” asked she plaintively.
“More than sure, for he offered me five dollars and I wouldn’t take it.”
“Good for you, Tom,” replied the girl, “and for that I’ll marry you
when you get to be a man. You are a good fellow, Tommy.”
Annie Benson was the only child of her father, her mother having died
long ago.
The millionaire had taken under his control his nephew, who had been
left an orphan, also another boy called Tom Cooper, the son of an
old friend. These three children had grown up together and were like
brothers and sister.
There was much love between them, with the exception of George, who
hated Tom Cooper and wanted his cousin to himself.
“I’ll get even with him for knuckling my nut,” grumbled the lad as he
watched the other two run away. “I suppose he thinks he’s smart because
Annie’s going to buy candy. She ain’t the only one; just look at that
coin,” and he took out a handful of money and pretended to show it to
some one. “’Taint every fellow that can show a hand like that,” and he
ran and jumped over a large gatepost, evidently satisfied with himself.
Annie and Tom in the meantime climbed the mansion steps, and the girl
ran ahead, shaking her golden curls in the wind.
She rapped lightly upon the library door and stood patiently until she
heard a kind voice call out:
“Come in, little one, come in,” and the gentleman put out his arms and
the child sprang into them.
“What does father’s baby want now?” asked he lovingly.
“Some money to go to the store for bon-bons with Tommy. I don’t like
Cousin George as much as I do Tom and father,” and here the child
hesitated. “I have promised to marry Tom.”
This astounding statement caused the man to throw back his head and
give a great laugh.
“You needn’t laugh, father,” said the child, wriggling from his arms
and pouting a little; “if Tommy and I want to get married, can’t we?”
Again the rich man chuckled, drawing the child closely and looking into
her eyes, and then saying solemnly:
“Do you want to leave your father all alone, without any one to love
him?”
How many times in the future did the girl remember these words! How
many tears had she shed over the remembrance of the loving embrace he
had given her when he told her that she could not give away his baby,
that she did not belong to herself and was his own sweet child!
Annie Benson leaned confidently against her father’s breast.
“I’m so glad that you want me, father,” sighed she. “I love you very
much indeed, and I’ll tell Tom that I can’t marry him.”
With two coins in her hand and tender kisses upon her lips, the girl
scampered out to join the waiting youngster upon the porch.
“Can’t marry you, Tom,” she shouted, “for father says I belong to him
and have no right to give myself away.”
“Oh, pshaw, why did you tell him yet? Of course we are too little. Did
he laugh?”
“Not only did he laugh,” replied Annie, “but he shouted.”
“Mean of him,” muttered the lad, tears rising in his eyes. “I suppose
he thinks because I’m but eight years old that I never will be a man,
but, never mind, I’ll show him.”
After that the children got their candy, but neither the boy nor girl
seemed to relish it much, and when they reached home Annie’s father was
talking with George in the library.
“The master wants to see Master Tom for a few moments,” said the
butler.
The little lad tremblingly went to his benefactor.
“You wanted me, sir?” asked he softly.
“Yes. Come here, lad. Would you like to go away to a good school for
boys?”
“And leave Annie?” faltered the boy.
“Of course,” replied Benson; “but you don’t always want to be around
with girls, do you?”
“Is George going?”
“Yes.”
“Then I suppose I’ll have to go,” sobbed Tommy; “but I don’t want to
leave Annie.”
“Annie will go to school herself very soon,” said the millionaire, “and
then you would be left alone.”
Gloom seemed to settle over the childish hearts in the home as both
boys vied with each other for most of Annie’s attention, and Tom won
out, for the little girl could not forget that George had taken money
from her dear father, and the lad pondered long over his cousin’s
changed attitude.
* * * * *
The children all went away to school, the millionaire thinking it best
to keep his girl from the two boys, who might captivate her childish
heart, but little he thought that his ambitions for her would be dashed
to the ground by one wave of the tiny white hand.
For four years the children met only in summer, when the girl went
traveling with a chaperone and the boys stayed at home upon the estate.
Scarcely ever did they go to New York city to live in the mansion
excepting at Christmas, when the family were in the city.
One holiday Annie came home in a different mood than ever before, and
her face would color up when spoken to sharply or when surprised.
Her father and the boys noticed the difference, but not one could
understand the cause.
She had very little to say to any one, and one afternoon her father
called her to his study.
“Little maid,” said he tenderly, “is there anything your father can
say to you that will make you any happier than you now are? Even Tommy
noticed that you were not your usual self.”
“Tommy is only a child, father,” said the girl impetuously, “and he
does not know what it means to think.”
“Neither should you, child,” replied Mr. Benson; “you are but sixteen.
What have you in your life to make you so thoughtful, or I might say
unhappy?”
“Not unhappy, father, not that,” cried the girl.
“Then, what?”
“Why--why--nothing. I am worried over my studies.”
Mr. Benson sighed. He would have given much to have had his child give
him her confidence. Her little heart was completely locked and would
not open for his knocking.
“You are positive that you are quite happy?”
“Quite positive.”
“And that you do not want for money?”
“Oh, father dear, all the girls say how generous you are with me.”
“Then there is nothing more I can say, is there?”
He said this pleadingly, because his heart was filled with sorrow for
his darling. Suddenly she burst into tears, and the curly head dropped
upon his arm and the child wept heartily.
After that there was more sympathy between them.
Annie went back to school with a heavy heart. She knew that she was
keeping a weighty secret from her father.
With her hands to her face and tears in her eyes, she stepped from the
train.
A young man, handsome, clever and spirited-looking came to meet her.
“Why, darling, have you been crying, and why? Did you not know that you
were coming to your sweetheart, and that he would care for you?”
“Aye, dear heart, I know,” sobbed the girl, “but I had to lie to my
father, and I love him so dearly, Victor.”
“I know that, dearest, but we are going to tell him just as soon as we
are married. I cannot wait any longer.”
Oh, Annie Benson, beloved of your father, had you only told your
handsome lover that you would rather wait until your parent had
given his consent, how much better your life would have been, but,
woman-like, you could not refuse the man you love.
“I wanted to wait,” murmured she softly.
“Then you do not love me,” said the lad sadly; “you could not stay away
from me for years if you did care for me.”
“But, Victor, I do love you, indeed I do, but I love father, too.”
“Then you will never be my wife, Annie.”
For a moment the girl stood thinking, and even the angels in heaven
wondered if she were going to do what was right.
She simply turned with the love light shining in her eyes, and laid her
hand in his.
“My darling, I am yours when you are ready.”
“Then let it be to-day. Do not go back to school, but come with me, and
you will never regret it.”
Regret it? Is there ever a sin in the world committed that the sinner
does not regret it?
No sooner had the marriage vow been taken, no sooner had Annie Benson
promised to love, honor and obey Victor Standish, than she began to
regret.
“Oh, Victor, I wish father knew,” said she, “and that I was with Martha
at school. The girls will all be expecting me.”
“And you love the girls better than you do me, your own husband?”
“No, no, I love you, Victor, and I will show you what a good wife I can
make.”
“And we will write to your father and tell him all about it,” said the
lad, “and he will forgive, and maybe I can get something to work at in
New York. Would you not like to live with him?”
“Oh, indeed I would. That is all I am worrying about, for my father
loves me devotedly, and I would not wound his feelings for the world.”
So a penitent letter, filled with sobbing appeals to forgive her,
arrived at the Benson mansion, on Fifth avenue, at the appointed time.
The rich man was sitting alone when the butler brought it. He read it
and re-read it, and then sat down to think.
This child, whom he loved better than his life, had without his consent
married some no-account.
“Victor, Victor Standish; and who is he, pray?”
Then his anger arose, and this is the letter he wrote in reply:
“MY DEAR ANNIE:
“To say I was surprised and grieved would not tell my emotion when
I read your letter. I have but this to say: When you feel ready to
leave this vagabond, and come back to your father, he is ready to
receive you. But with him you can never come. I hope I shall hear
from you in a sensible way soon. Do not apply to me for money while
you are this man’s wife. Until that time comes that you are free from
him, I will simply sign myself,
“YOUR FATHER.”