"Well, I suppose we'll have to give in for now; but I'll carry the
matter under protest, up to the United States Supreme Court before I'll
be trampled on."
This boast seemed to relieve him, and we all left the store and went to
my friend's, the detective's, office on Tremont Street, where the
preliminaries of a settlement were entered into. The watch we wanted
back at any rate; the rest of the jewelry was scattered here and there,
only that Mrs. Seymour had preserved a nice string of pearls, worth
some three hundred dollars. There was not much "higgling" over the
estimate of value of the various articles, and the two thousand in
money, of course, went in at its value. In all, the bill footed up
about thirty-six hundred and fifty dollars, besides five
hundred--(which was too little)--for the expenses we had been at.
Suffice it that those building lots in New York changed hands soon
after, "in due legal form," and that a thousand dollars in money
besides left Brady's pocket, and found its way where it could pay
"expenses," etc. The building lots have sold since for far more than
Brady's estimate of "fifty thousand dollars in ten years." The old
gentleman and his wife Mary were delighted with my success: of course
Mr. Hurlbut delivered up the watch for the price he paid for it, which
it was proper he should ask, inasmuch too, as Brady had given us the
money, or its equivalent for it, and more too, and Mrs. Mary said she
should carry it till her dying day, "to ward off mediums and sorcerers,
as the Puritans nailed horse-shoes to door-posts as protection against
witches"; and I venture she's faithfully wearing it now for that
purpose, and as a souvenir of the old gentleman, her good husband, who
is now dead.
I was so much pleased with the cunning and skilful address of Mrs.
Seymour, that I cultivated her acquaintance, and by a "close study"
managed to learn a good deal of her art, and came to a knowledge of the
great extent to which mediums are consulted by people of the first
classes; and was astonished to find how readily they fall, through the
superstitious element in their composition, victims to the sorcerer's
arts. It would require volumes to cite the instances which occur yearly
in New York city alone. Boston is not a whit behind in this,
notwithstanding she boasts herself the Athens of America; but, perhaps,
she so boasts because she worships so many different idols--has as many
gods as the Greek mythology embraced. In proportion to her population
her dupes of superstition are more numerous than those of New York.
------------------------------------------------------------------------