Mr. MONTE was partner in a large dry goods house on Broadway, and from
what I knew of his habits I judged that I would most likely find him in
the store about two o’clock. Accordingly, after lunch I took an omnibus
and rode down to the place. It was a massive five story building, with
great iron and glass doors, that turned slowly on their hinges, and,
closing with a loud bang, shut out the noise and rattle of the great
thoroughfare. I stood for a moment confused by the murmur of voices and
the tramp of feet, as the hundreds of salesmen and merchants swarmed
over every floor of the vast building. The next instant the door sentry
approached, and asked whom I wished to see.
”Mr. Monte; is he in?” I replied, feeling for my card.
”Mr. Monte!” he said, looking somewhat surprised. ”What market are you
from?”
”North Carolina,” I replied.
”Oh, then,” said he, walking with me to the head of some stairs that
led to a gas-lighted apartment below, ”you want to see Mr. Bantam.
Ban-_tum!_ Ban-_tum!_” he called in his loudest tone, accenting the
last syllable, and giving it the ”u” sound. ”Mr. Bantam is from your
State; he is down stairs now with Col.—— from Raleigh, in flannels.
Will be up in a moment. How’s trade in your section?”
”I am not a merchant,” I replied, wondering what Mr. Bantam could be
doing with Col.—— in flannel, and if the Col. had forgotten his under
garments when leaving home.
At this moment Mr. Bantam, an elderly man, slightly bald, appeared at
the bottom of the stairway and called out: ”Who is it, Johnson?”
”A gentleman from your State.”
”All right; I’ll be up in five minutes.”
”Wait a few moments, sir,” said Johnson, going back to his post at the
door.
Leaning back against a case of prints, I looked around at this hive of
human bees. From floor to floor, from wall to wall, were heaped and
piled, like immense breastworks, goods and merchandise of almost every
description; case after case of prints, rolls upon rolls of cloths and
cassimeres, long brilliant rows of dress goods, boxes of glittering
silks, long counters of notions, great heaps of shawls, rugs and
blankets; laces, ribbons, and white goods; every department marked by
placards with hands pointing to it, and over each another placard with
terms of sale: ”30 days,” ”Regular,” or ”Net.”
Everywhere, at every case, around every heap of goods were the salesmen
and merchants, bending over fabrics, examining their texture, standing
off to get the full effect of the figure; the one class praising and
overrating, the other undervaluing and quoting prices from other
houses. Just here, at the case next to me, is a fancy young man, with
brilliant studs and a flash cravat, a pencil across his mouth like a
bit, and his shirt sleeves held up by gutta percha bands, diving head
foremost into a box and bringing up a piece of goods, which he exhibits
with a slap, as if it were a horse, and winks at a passing comrade, who
pinches his arm and says: ”How is it, Saunders?” while the merchant, an
old fellow from the country, with a broad felt hat and long coat, who
licks his short stump of a pencil whenever he sets down anything in his
memorandum book, which has his name in gilt letters on the back, and
was sent to him by some advertising house, is bending down to examine
it. Over there is a red-faced man, in a Cardigan jacket, showing ——.
But here is Mr. Bantam, who reads my card and exclaims:
”Smith! I am delighted to see you. When did you leave the old North
State?”
”On Tuesday last,” I replied, rather taken aback by his familiar
cordiality.
”Where are you stopping?” he inquired, bending the corners of my card.
”At the Fifth Avenue Hotel.”
”That is the reason I missed you last night,” he said; ”I did not go
higher than the St. Nicholas. Well, I am very glad you’ve come in.
Hope you’ll make all your dry goods bill with us. It’s much the best
plan to concentrate on a house, and we’ll be sure to do you good. What
department will you look through this evening? I used to sell your
father a great many goods.”
I begged his pardon, but informed him that my father had never been a
merchant, and that I was not merchandising, but had called in to see
Mr. Monte, one of the firm.
”You must excuse me,” he said, familiarly patting me on the back, ”I
thought you wanted to buy. You want to see Mr. Monte? I expect you’ll
have to go to his house, No.—West 34th street. He hardly ever comes
here. Bless your soul, he wouldn’t know what to do if he did come. His
money is all the house wants. Give him a new dog cart and a pair of
ponies and he’s satisfied.”
”Then he is not much of a business man,” I said, for the want of
something else to say, as I took down his address.
”Not in this line. He knows how to get in the green room at a theatre,
and is a first rate judge of wine; but his connection with us is simply
confined to putting in some money every year, and drawing on it like
Old Harry the balance of the time.”
”I am very much obliged,” I said, putting up my pencil; ”I will hurry
up to his house, if you think I will find him there.”
”He is probably there now, but he will drive out to the Park at four.”
I was about to leave, when a tall, elderly man approached Mr. Bantam,
and said, deferentially,
”Dinkle, of your State, wants Domestics on sixty days. Shall I sell
him?”
”I’ll go see him,” said Bantam, turning off; ”Good bye, Mr. Smith. Call
in again if you have leisure.”
The tall, elderly man was about to follow him, when a sudden
recollection of his face flashed upon me, and I caught his arm.
”Excuse me, but isn’t this Mr. Marshman?”
”It is, sir,” he replied, turning around to me again.
”My name is Smith, sir,” I said, offering him my hand; ”we met at
Saratoga.”
”I remember. How have you been?” he answered coldly, taking my hand
without cordiality, while a flush I could not understand came over his
face.
”You are connected with this house?” I asked; thinking, of course, that
he was a partner.
”Only as a salesman,” he said bitterly, and then added, after a
pause, ”It is not worth while being ashamed of it. Lillian’s infernal
extravagance ruined me, and I was compelled to do something.”
I could make no reply, and there was a pause of some seconds, when he
continued, with increasing volubility, as all men do when speaking of
their misfortunes:
”Lillian’s old uncle, from whom we expected a great deal, died
insolvent. I spent half of what I had in my last political contest,
and was defeated by the——treachery of my friends. Still, after that
we had enough to have lived comfortably, by economizing a little; but
Lillian would have her brown stone and her carriage, her silks and her
laces. and now she has to take the street cars if she rides at all,
and that isn’t often. I could stand it all better if she wouldn’t cut
up so, and mope about her poverty, as she calls it. She turns up her
nose at the neighborhood because we’ve had to come down to Bleecker
street. She spends half her time crying and looking over old finery,
and talking of better days. She puts all sorts of foolish notions into
our little girl’s head, and makes her continually beg me for things
I have not the money to buy. I would ask you to call and see us,
but ‘twould not be pleasant for you, and only make her worse. It is
improper, I know, for me to talk thus to a comparative stranger, but
I am full of bitterness when I think of Lillian’s conduct, and as you
used to know her I have been communicative. Pardon me. Yonder’s Mr.
Bantam. I must go back to my customers. Good day! But take this piece
of advice: don’t marry a belle,” he added, over his shoulder, as he
walked off.
As I stood on the sidewalk to hail an omnibus, my sympathy turned from
him to poor Lillian, reduced to poverty, and her very sighs and tears
ridiculed, to any one who might listen, by her unfeeling husband.
When I knocked at No.—West Thirty-fourth street a servant in livery
appeared and took up my card. I waited a few moments in a very handsome
parlor, when he returned and requested me to walk up stairs. Going
up with him I was ushered into a sitting room furnished with cosy
magnificence, that is, with a splendid Moquette carpet, on which you
were not afraid to tread; velvet divans, on which you did not hesitate
to recline; a rosewood table, on which an inkstand and pens were
scattered; a marble mantel, with a half-smoked cigar tossed on it, an
_etagere_ with a smoking cap, a broken meerschaum, and a Sevres vase of
Latakia, perched among articles of rarest _vertu_. With my first glance
around the apartment Monte came in through a folding door from his
dressing room, wiping his hands on a Russian towel, and giving me one
to shake that was still damp.
”Smith! old fellow, I am devilish glad to see you. When did you arrive?
We had a gay time at Saratoga that season, didn’t we! Where the deuce
have you kept yourself ever since? Sit down.”
”I thought you were aware, Monte,” I said, adopting his free and easy
manner, and lolling carelessly down in an arm chair, ”that we had had a
little unpleasantness down our way. I’ve been in camp four years.”
”Ah, yes,” he said, slipping his arm through the coat his attendant
held ready for him, ”I had overlooked that. So they made a soldier
of you, did they—powder, blood and all? I was captain of a company
our fellows here got up, but when they went down South I resigned. If
the—— States wanted to secede I had no idea of getting my brains
blown out to prevent them.”
”We were defending our country, you know, and, of course, had to
fight,” I remarked, smiling at his idea of patriotism.
”I suppose so,” he said, sitting down near me and arranging his cuffs;
then looking up at his servant, who stood waiting, ”James, tell
Thomas to put the bay colt to the wagon; I will drive to Harlem this
afternoon. By the way, Smith,” he continued, when the man had left the
room, ”what ever became of that devil of a beauty that flirted with us
all, and with whom you left the Springs?”
An angry reply rose to my lips at hearing him speak so of Carlotta,
but knowing that it would defeat the object of my visit, I restrained
myself, and replied ”that she had been living down South during the
war, but that I understood she was soon to return to Cuba.”
There was a short silence, and I was wondering how to get at any
information in regard to Lulie, when he put up his eye-glass and looked
at me again.
”You’ve changed a great deal, Smith. I should never have recognized you
without your card.”
It was just the turn I wanted, and I replied:
”I saw you last night at the opera and remembered your face
immediately. But, Monte, _apropos_ of beauty, who was the lady you were
with? She drew my attention entirely from the stage.”
”Ah!” he said, drawing his eye into the least perceptible wink, ”She
was worth a gaze, wasn’t she? I wouldn’t tell every one, but you are a
transient visitor: that was La Belle Louise. Half of New York is crazy
about her—that is, you know, the b’hoys.”
”Not demi-monde?” I asked, looking knowing.
”It was daring in me, wasn’t it?” he went on, without heeding my
remark. ”But she wanted to go and I promised to carry her. Oh! but I
shall have to lie about it to the ladies. I can cheat scandal out of
the morsel if some fellow who knew her don’t blow on me to his mother,
and she let it out to her set. Confound it, though, who cares?”
”Has she many admirers?” I asked.
”Many seek the honor of her acquaintance, but I believe I am the
favored one. I’ll vow it flattens that deucedly though to keep her
in diamonds,” he said, drawing from his pocket a mother of pearl
portemonnaie.
”I’d like to get a peep at her myself; just a peep, Monte. Where does
she reside?” I said, taking out a card.
”Oh, I don’t mind telling you. But it’s no use, she won’t see you.”
”La Belle Louise. Number what?” I asked, pretending to write.
”She is at Madame Dubourg’s, 42d street, if you wish to know,” he said,
somewhat coldly, as if he thought me impertinent.
Quick as thought ‘twas on my card, and then I said, smiling:
”Oh, well, I was only jesting; I will leave day after tomorrow. But
tell me, Monte, something of my old acquaintance, Miss Finnock.”
”Little Saph.!” he said, regaining his good humor. ”She is up the
Hudson living with her brother, who married that horrid Miss Stelway.
You remember them?”
”Very well, but is Miss Finnock not married yet?”
”No, of course not; who would marry such a bundle of sentiment? She
often boasts of you, though, as the young Carolinian she flirted with.”
”I met Mr. Marshman very unexpectedly down at your store to-day,” I
said, not caring to correct little Miss Finnock’s boast.
”Marshman? Yes, he’s selling there for us on a small salary—the best
we could give him though. The old fellow got beaten, took to his cups
and went to the bad very fast. They say his wife has to work hard to
support herself and child, while he drinks up what he gets at our
house. My mother sends them supplies very often, though she has not
visited them, you know, since they left the top.”
”Have you a check book here?” I asked, with a sudden resolution.
”Yes,” he replied, handing me one from his _escritoire_.
”Will you do me the favor to get that to Mrs. Marshman,” I said,
filling up the check for a good round sum and giving it to him. ”Please
draw the money and send it to her so that my name will not be known in
the matter, and do not let Marshman touch any of it.”
”James shall attend to it to-morrow. But stay and dine with me. We’ll
drive out to Harlem, and get back to dinner at six.”
”Thanks, I must return to my hotel, as I have an engagement there. Dine
with me to-morrow. I am at the Fifth Avenue.”
”Would be happy. The Sillery’s very fine there, but I dine our Club
on my yacht to-morrow. Speaking of La Belle Louise,” he continued,
following me down to the door, ”Madame Dubourg told me she gets letters
from North Carolina, and that she is continually sending money to Italy
to complete a monument to go over some poor devil of a deserter from
the rebel army, who was killed down there. Did you ever hear of her
before?”
”La Belle Louise? I never heard the name till you mentioned it,” I said.
”I supposed it was a mistake. Good day.”
”Lulie, I have found you at last,” I murmured, as I sauntered down
Fifth Avenue to the hotel. ”God grant we may save you!”