Comstock Lode (Nev.) -- Fiction; Miners -- Fiction; Virginia City (Nev.) -- Fiction
"That is just the point," remarked the Colonel. "Let me tell you about a
case which transpired right here in this city. There were two men whose
first names were the same, while their surnames were similar. Their
given names were Frank and their surnames were, we will say, Cady and
Carey, respectively. Cady was a young married man. He had a beautiful
wife, a lovely little girl three years of age and a baby boy a year old
at the time I am speaking of. Carey was five or six years younger and
single. They were great friends, notwithstanding that Cady was pretty
fast while Carey was as pure-hearted a young man as ever came here.
More, he was devotedly attached to a young lady who was a close friend
of the wife of Cady. The young couple were expecting to be married in a
few weeks at the time the incident happened which I am going to relate.
"Cady was wealthy, while Carey was poor and a clerk in a mercantile
establishment. One day Cady said to his friend: 'Carey, I bought some
Con. Virginia stock to-day at $55. I have set aside eighty shares for
you. Some people think it is going to advance before long. If it does
and there is anything made on the eighty shares it shall be yours.'
Sixty days later the stock struck $463, when it was sold and the bank
notified Carey that there was a deposit of $32,000 to his credit. When
this stroke of good fortune came the youth hastened to tell the good
news to the girl of his heart, and before they separated their troth was
plighted and the marriage day fixed.
"During this delicious period, one morning Carey stepped into the outer
office of Cady and was horrified to hear from behind the glass screen
which separated the inner office from the main office the wife of Cady
upbrading her husband in a most violent manner. Her back was to the
front of the building. She was holding a letter in her hand, and as
Carey entered the building she began and read the letter through, and
wound up by crying: 'Who is this Marie who is writing to you and
directing the letters simply to Frank, Postoffice box 409? You are
keeping a private box, are you? But you are too careless by half; you
left this letter in your overcoat pocket, and when I went to sew a
button on the coat this morning it fell out, so I could not help but see
it.'
"Just then Cady looked up and saw Carey through the glass petition. The
latter with a swift motion touched a finger to his lips and shook his
head, which in perfect pantomime said: 'Don't give yourself away,' then
in a flash slipped noiselessly from the building.
"Once outside, he hastily, on a leaf of his memorandum book, wrote to
the postmaster that if he called with a lady and asked what his
postoffice box was to answer 409; to at once take out anything that
might be in the box, and if he had time to seal and stamp an envelope,
direct it to him and put it in 409, and he added: 'Don't delay a
moment.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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