A New Sensation. Albert Ross

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СКАЧАТЬ is to keep you from falling in love with your secretary, when you and she are practically alone, miles and miles from all the people you both know?"

      "I intend to secure a promise from her, before we start, that she will repel, absolutely, the slightest familiarity on my part. I shall fix a salary that will be an object. If she allows me to forget the position toward her that I have chosen, she is to be sent home on the next steamer, with a month's advance wages."

      Harvey bowed again, with the same gravity as before. He pulled at his cigar, but it had gone out and he did not relight it.

      "I have never talked so freely with you before," I went on to say, "and there is no other person on earth with whom I would do so. A year ago, as you are aware, I was stricken suddenly with that damnable thing called neurasthenia. For two months I had insomnia in the worst form that a man can have it and live. Sleepy from noon to noon, I only secured thirty minutes of unconsciousness in each twenty-four hours. Figure the situation to yourself. At nine o'clock every night I fell asleep; at half past nine I awoke, and there was not a wink again until nine the next night. I gave up all expectation of recovery, and the most disheartening things I heard were the predictions of Dr. Chambers, that I would ultimately get well.

      "Finally they sent me to the Sanitarium, where with treanol and bromides I was lulled to unconsciousness for several hours at a time. I would not consent to take opium in any form, even if the refusal killed me. A month passed. The artificial sleep induced brought me little strength, but it helped in a way. Then I went to the Hot Springs of North Carolina, with a valet. My sleeping capacity had returned, and I ceased to use the incentives previously found necessary; but my appetite, poor enough before, deserted me there. For breakfast I actually had to force down the single cup of coffee that formed the repast. At lunch I did not go to the table. For dinner my menu never varied—a few spoonfuls of soup and a small dish of iced cream.

      "The days dragged horribly. Somehow in the absence of real courage I developed a dogged determination that I would live. When I reached New York on my return North, I had too little strength to write a letter or to sit upright for more than a few moments. But the worst was over, and I knew it. It had become only a question of time. Step by step I have advanced until you see me as I am to-day."

      My friend listened intently.

      "And you don't want to fall into the old slough again," he remarked.

      "No, and I never will," I said, with earnestness. "Now, listen: I realize that I was a year ago a slave to certain vices. Yes, let us give them the unconventional name. If I go off alone to some distant part of the world, what is to prevent my beginning again on the old road and ending where I did before? I could take a male companion, but do you imagine he would have any influence with me if I started to go wrong? At best he would be but a servant. If he tried to stand in the way of anything I wanted, the result is certain; he would get his walking papers de suite. I have no mother, no sister. The only woman I ever thought of marrying has coldly declined my offer. Let me go in the company of a woman that is what she should be, and I will return a different man altogether."

      Still Hume did not laugh. I was more grateful for this consideration than I can describe, for I was really very much in earnest. I was like the drowning man, clutching at what seemed to me a life-preserver.

      "How old are you?" asked Hume. "Twenty-five?"

      "Twenty-four."

      "What age would you prefer your secretary to be?"

      "About the same. I could not endure an old maid, and I do not wish to undertake the care of a child."

      "Won't it be hard to find a woman of twenty-four years with the skill and judgment that your situation seems to require?"

      "We shall see. Some of these girls who are obliged to earn their living develop wonderful self-possession."

      He nodded, as if he could not dispute this.

      "Well, Don," he said, after a thoughtful pause, "I am going to be candid with you. The scheme you have outlined would be considered, as you must know, by nine-tenths of our friends, as absolutely senseless. To me it really has some points in its favor, if it can be carried out. You have left the advertisement for insertion? Very well. If you like to trust me so far, bring a batch of your answers here next Tuesday and we will go over them together. There will be a certain per centum that we shall both agree are not worth attention. We will classify the others, and pick out a dozen or so to look up. My time, my services, are at your disposal. The Law is not pressing me particularly just now, and I shall be glad if I can be of use to anybody."

      I accepted the proposition with delight.

      "And now," added Hume, "come over and get a drink."

      But this I was obliged to decline. I had made a solemn promise to Dr. Chambers, nearly a year before, that there were two things from which I would refrain for twelve whole months; and one of them was drinking anything of an alcoholic nature between meals, or stronger than claret even then. This I explained to Harvey, with the additional information that I had not broken my pledge and that the time specified would expire within three weeks.

      "Meet me on the day it is up and let me see you quaff your first Manhattan," he said, laughingly.

      "If I have good luck I shall be far away, on the Briny," I answered. "I shall begin very gingerly, wherever I am. I would rather shoot myself to-night than get into the condition I was when Chambers squeezed that promise out of me. He said the other day that when I entered his office I had eyes like those of a dead fish and so little pulse he could hardly distinguish it."

      "He is quite correct," said Hume. "I saw you about the same time, and I thought, as I live, that you were a goner. You're all right now, though, and—upon my soul!—I hope you'll keep so. The charms of Bacchus are not your worst danger, Venus, my boy, is the lady you want to keep shy of."

      "Don't I know that?" I answered. "Confound her and all her nymphs!"

      "Well, good day," he said, taking my hand in his and putting the other on my shoulder affectionately. "Tuesday I shall look for you, remember, with a dray load of letters from the fair maidens of this metropolis!"

CHAPTER III.

       Table of Contents

      AN EVENING AT KOSTER & BIAL'S.

      Before I actually engaged passage to any foreign port I thought it wise to pay a parting visit to good Dr. Chambers. It was six months since I had last called on him, for finding that I was gaining in every way I did not care to fill myself up with medicines. His advice about abstinence from things hurtful had been religiously followed, and I presented the outward appearance of a man in fairly good health when he came into his office and took my hand. Between us there has grown up a feeling warmer than generally, I am afraid, exists between physician and patient. I am intensely grateful for the skill that changed me from a desponding invalid to one so nearly the opposite in spirits, and the odd five dollar bills I have paid seem no equivalent for the great boon he conferred upon me.

      In plain terms, he saved my life and more. He redeemed me from a sort of hell which I think the old romancers would have substituted for their fire and brimstone had they ever had personal experience of it, as a means of deterring the sinful from their ways. Money cannot pay for such service, and I shall feel an affection for Dr. Chambers as long as memory remains to me.

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