United States or Taiwan ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Morgan Ruyler IV had overlooked his father-in-law's divagation from the orthodox standards of his own family because he had been a spectacular financial success; bringing home ropes of enormous pearls from India in addition to the fantastic sums paid him by enraptured native princes.
Ruyler saw Spaulding give her a sharp "sizing-up" look, as he murmured, "Well, so long, Guv. See you to-morrow. Hope the man'll turn out all right after all." "I hope so. He's a good chap otherwise." "Good night, ma'am. Tell your husband to put that ruby in a safe deposit box." "Oh, nobody knows the safe is there except Mr. Ruyler and myself "
He had met Spaulding at the station in San Francisco, and private conversation on the crowded train had been impossible. When they had walked a few yards along the wide avenue, as brilliant as day with its thousands of colored lights concealed in the astonished pines, Ruyler sat deliberately down upon a bench and motioned the detective to take the seat beside him.
Morgan Ruyler married again as soon as convention would permit, this time carefully selecting a wife of the soundest New York predispositions and with a personal admiration of Queen Victoria; and he had watched young Price like an affectionate but inexorable parent hawk until the young man followed his brother a quintessential Ruyler into the now historic firm.
Marian Ruyler had yielded the point and departed hopefully for a broader sphere when her second and favorite son was eight.
He had broached the subject with some trepidation, for they had never had a quarrel; but she had shown no resentment whatever, merely an eager desire to please him. She even went directly down to the Palace Hotel and reproached her august parent for failing to warn her that a dollar was not capable of infinite expansion. But no wonder she had been extravagant, she told Ruyler plaintively.
I shall feel like an empress but more, more, I shall wear this lovely thing I, I, Hélène Ruyler, born Perrin, who never had a franc in her pocket in Rouen! Price! Have you changed your mind but no! I cannot believe it." That was it then! He watched her mobile face sharply. It expressed nothing but the excited rapture of a very young woman over a magnificent toy.
He closed the door of the safe, swung the bookcase into place, slipped the ruby with its curious gold chain that looked massive but hardly weighed an ounce, into his pocket, rang for a servant and told him to ask Mrs. Ruyler to come down to the library as soon as she was dressed. Ruyler sighed as he heard his wife walk down the hall.
"Everybody should have his daily job, prescribed either by the state or by necessity; but something he must do if both he and society would continue to exist." Ruyler elevated his eyebrows and looked at her curiously. "Socialism. I didn't know you had ever heard of it." "Aileen and I are not such fools as we look as you were good enough to intimate just now.
Well, that and time, and white hair, would change pretty near any woman, particularly one with small features. You look a real old lady, and you can't be mor'n forty-five. How did you manage the white hair? Bleach?" Ruyler felt his heart turn over. The frozen blood pounded in his brain and distended his own muscles, his mouth unclosed to let his breath escape.
Word Of The Day