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TYPED DRAFT
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of wes Let me be after carrying the big bundle for ye Sir" "O really, thank you, No"
stammered Jack, - "It is important, - law papers --" he added vaguely, not wishing to
hurt the kindly old soul. but mentally saying "I'll linger behind and leave it on
the seat . I believe that's the Dr Judge himself in front this minute"! X
[pinned to page
X And by the Gods! as he turned toward the bon of the boat who should he see but
his neighbor, Well, well early met", said the Judge, cordially. "Do you go up on this
train often? It is a new thing for me, - glad I met you and can have your company".
It was close company too, till the boat bumped on the New York side. Desperate,
at having lost his chance to throw the bundle over board, Jack left it on the seat
right in the face of those stern warnings not to leave any aticles [sic] on the boat!]
"That is to be the end of this?" he groaned inwardly, "I have become the Eugene Aram
of my sex!" Buying some cologne in the first drug-shop, he decided to seek the
shelter of his office without further delay and think out his problem, when the
voice of the drug clerk aroused him -, politely calling as he was just shutting
the door "Is'nt this yours Sir?" In his preoccupied nervousneis [sic] he had almost
forgotten the thing, - the horror! It was a racking day, between his plans and his
failures. Once he determined to boldly hurl Mr Zoroaster from from [sic] the rear window
of his hall way. Nothing easier! Only on opening his door to be sure the coast was clear,
he met the janitor, who seemed to search him with a new gaze, - sort of "Thou-art-the
man"-expression! And as with a feint of business in the next office he passed on,
his heart cried out, "This life of deceit will kill me!" With a tumult of hopes and
fear: the day wore on. Night came. and the four facted? Persian philosopher was not
buried. In the darkness of the ferry he would have no trouble at all. After all
it was only a cat. Jack's spirits rose. He even whistled a bit of the last new
ballet he had seen and liked; sprinkling the cologne freely about. Sure of speedy
[pinned to page:
* Once his avenger slipped from his arms as he stopped? to buy a basket of rare
fruit for poor Kate, but the package was quickly restored to him. However he was
nearing deliverance now. How beautiful life would be without the secret that one
could not lose!]
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kindly mood of companionship and kept close to the suffering man's side | the side
beginning to ache under the inanimate life he was lugging about. He abandoned
hope as thoroughly now as ever did Dante's disciples on entering purgatory, deciding to
wait and make his last throw in the dead of night. If the meaningless warning of the
brakeman, not to leave any articles in the oars, had jarred on his nerves earlier in
the day, imagine with what a screech of irony they sounded to him now!
Not until he reached his own door was the world really left to darkness and to him.
Of course all the reactionary experience of his survival "cum" the cat, can be more? easi
imagined than described. Kate burst into tears, - the palliative of all dear women, -
only to be suddenly roused by her fears to [?] thoughts of escape. The destroyer of their
peace was carefully put in the ash barrel in the darkest cellar, where they agreed
they would bury Zoroaster at the midnight hour," when cats run home and owls to whit
in who" [?] They would bury him they agreed in a grave bigger than the Heidelburger tun wrong[?], to an obliv
beyond any Nirvana known to his philosophical ancestors.
The house was still; servants in bed; when not a sound in the world, beyond the
thumping of their hearts and consciences, as in smoking jacket and pink negligee',
bearing a silver Candle sticks alopt [sic], they crept down the callar [sic] stairs to their
secret burial. Nervous? Of course. The; "what was that?" of the pink Kate as they
made their descent, exciting Jack's strained nervous system to a quiver! It was a real
Hogarthian picture; the black callar for a background, the flickering candle revealing
in soft lights their anxious dear handsome faces, condescending to this repulsive task.
Then with sickening disgust they cut the strings, unrolled the paper, and it was a
Leg of Lamb.!!
SHD
March 1910 -
Brown University Libraries
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