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Alice or The Wages of Sin - Frederic Werden Pangborn · Philosophy and Faith

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  Speaker 1: Chapter one of Alice or The Wages of Sin. This
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  Speaker 1: is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
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  Speaker 1: public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
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  Speaker 1: LibriVox dot org. Recording by Ashley m Alice or The
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  Speaker 1: Wages of Sin by Frederick Worden Pangborn Given up by
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  Speaker 1: the waters, Oh own ye, dying Gales. The saddest of
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  Speaker 1: your tales is not so sad as life, Nor have
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  Speaker 1: you ever began a theme so wild as man, or
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  Speaker 1: with such sorrow rife? Darling Maimie, come home if you
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  Speaker 1: wish to see your mother alive. L. P. M. Thus
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  Speaker 1: read a note among the personals of a metropolitan journal,
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  Speaker 1: which was in everybody's hands on a chilly October morning
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  Speaker 1: not many years ago. Nearly everybody read this journal, and
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  Speaker 1: many read this short item addressed to Darling Amy. The
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  Speaker 1: few even paused in thought to wonder in a passing
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  Speaker 1: way who the writer might be, and to whom the
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  Speaker 1: appeal might be addressed. Such a notice was not like
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  Speaker 1: the majority of those in the same column with it.
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  Speaker 1: It came not from silly and tregaunt, shrewd scoundrel, wily lawyer,
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  Speaker 1: or dashing Swell. Its message was of a different tone
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  Speaker 1: from those above and below it. It had nought to
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  Speaker 1: do with clandestine meetings or estates to be had for
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  Speaker 1: the asking and the fees in England. Its message was
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  Speaker 1: simple and not at all my serious. But it told
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  Speaker 1: a tale of terror, sorrow and suspense, the tale of
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  Speaker 1: breaking hearts and of souls full of misery, A dying
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  Speaker 1: mother's last appeal to a wayward daughter, a last chance
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  Speaker 1: offered a lost girl to come again to the loving
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  Speaker 1: heart which had cared for her from the cradle. It
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  Speaker 1: was sent broadcast over the land in the hope that
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  Speaker 1: the wanderer might see it and come home. Only one
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  Speaker 1: who had been the center of such a message can
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  Speaker 1: know the pain of suspense which must follow its publication,
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  Speaker 1: The restless nights, the listening for the ring of the doorbell,
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  Speaker 1: the hurried reading of the papers in vain searching for
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  Speaker 1: an answering message, the reiterated will it find her? Oh,
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  Speaker 1: will she see it? Of the voice and heart, Each
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  Speaker 1: heart knoweth its own bitterness, and each must suffer for itself.
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  Speaker 1: We can felicitate another in his happiness, sometimes congratulate him.
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  Speaker 1: We can mourn with him in his sorrow, but seldom
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  Speaker 1: intelligently sympathize with him. Only to those who have themselves
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  Speaker 1: passed through the dark valley is the profundity of its
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  Speaker 1: darkness known. To know what it is to suffer, one
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  Speaker 1: must suffer himself. And of all sorrows, the sorrow of
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  Speaker 1: a breaking heart is the sorrow which must ofteness sob
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  Speaker 1: itself to rest in its own tears. Such were the
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  Speaker 1: heart throbs which appeared in that little too line. Notice
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  Speaker 1: did they awaken answering throb in the heart of the
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  Speaker 1: lost wanderer, to whom alone, of all the vast multitude
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  Speaker 1: who might read them, they were addressed? Did this last
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  Speaker 1: pleading turn back the shray lamb to its mother's fold,
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  Speaker 1: even though but to see her die alas like many
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  Speaker 1: another piteous appeal, Did this one go wailing forth only
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  Speaker 1: to be lost in empty air? Did it not find
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  Speaker 1: in its broadcast multification in answering heart? Was this already
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  Speaker 1: sorrow burden to mother heart to be denied that one
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  Speaker 1: last solace before it should cease to beat and be
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  Speaker 1: forever still? Was she to die with the despairing Eli
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  Speaker 1: Eli Lama Sabashlani on her quivering lips. Such things make
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  Speaker 1: it hard to believe in the mercy of God. After
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  Speaker 1: months of agonizing prayer, months of untiring search, here there, everywhere,
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  Speaker 1: with all the help that man can give and money
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  Speaker 1: can buy. Can it be that in the end no
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  Speaker 1: ray of light shall break in upon such darkness? That
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  Speaker 1: the end shall be even as the beginning? Can such
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  Speaker 1: things be? And not wring from the soul that cry,
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  Speaker 1: My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me? The
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  Speaker 1: god man cannot refrain from such a feeling of despair?
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  Speaker 1: And shall a mother be stronger than Christ? Was this
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  Speaker 1: dying woman to pass away with this cry on her lips?
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  Speaker 1: It were hard to think it. But let the story
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  Speaker 1: tell itself, and perhaps the reader may find a lesson
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  Speaker 1: teaching how much evil may follow a bad beginning, and
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  Speaker 1: how the sins of man may come back upon its
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  Speaker 1: own head and even follow the innocence in the deom
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  Speaker 1: of the guilty. Many of the numerous readers of that
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  Speaker 1: newspaper which appeared that she all Loctober morning, read in
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  Speaker 1: another column another article of somewhat more public interest, But
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  Speaker 1: none of the readers, it is safe to say, thought
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  Speaker 1: of connecting it in any way with the two I
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  Speaker 1: notice already quoted. The item of news was wrong, one
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  Speaker 1: which interested the newspaper reporters and police officials for a
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  Speaker 1: short time, and which read as follows. Last night, at
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  Speaker 1: one thirty o'clock, some men employed at the National Steamship
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  Speaker 1: Docks found the body of a young woman floating in
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  Speaker 1: the water. The woman was apparently about seventeen years of age,
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  Speaker 1: bare hair, he is alives like complexion, and her features
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  Speaker 1: were regular and handsome. She was dressed in an old
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  Speaker 1: black alpaca dress, but her underclothing was of equality, too
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  Speaker 1: fine to correspond with the dress, and bespoke good circumstances
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  Speaker 1: on the part of the wearer. Nothing by which the
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  Speaker 1: girl could be identified was found on the body. She
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  Speaker 1: was taken to the morgue, so read the terist newspaper
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  Speaker 1: account of a woman's sad death. The corpse of the
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  Speaker 1: dead girl was exposed in the city morgue for the
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  Speaker 1: customary period. Many came to gaze upon the calm features,
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  Speaker 1: now free from all signs of trouble, and many remarked
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  Speaker 1: the beauty of the faith. But none knew who she was,
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  Speaker 1: and so in due time she is buried in the
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  Speaker 1: public thought of the cemetery there to rest unknown and
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  Speaker 1: forgotten through the rolling years, while other sad jets and
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  Speaker 1: other women's will should entrust the world in their turn
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  Speaker 1: and pass on into oblivion like herself and her sorrow
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  Speaker 1: end of giving up by the waters. Recording by Ashley Amm.
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  Speaker 2: Chapter two of Alice or The Wages of Sin. This
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  Speaker 2: is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
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  Speaker 2: public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit LibriVox
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  Speaker 2: dot org. Recorded by Mary Schneider. Alice or the Wages
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  Speaker 2: of Sin by Frederic Worden Pangborn, Chapter two quote. No
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  Speaker 2: mercy now can clear her for this world's peace to
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  Speaker 2: pray for. As love's wild prayer dissolved in air, her
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  Speaker 2: woman's heart gave way, But the sin forgiven by Christ
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  Speaker 2: in heaven by men is cursed alway. In the crisp
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  Speaker 2: air of an October evening, while the printers in that
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  Speaker 2: great newspaper building were setting the types of that little
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  Speaker 2: two line message which a sad faced, gray haired gentleman
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  Speaker 2: had given to the office clerk for publication, a girlish
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  Speaker 2: figure plodded along with weary steps in the road leading
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  Speaker 2: to the city from a neighboring suburb. At intervals of
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  Speaker 2: perhaps half an hour, this young woman paused, and, leaning
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  Speaker 2: against a fence or tree, rested, for she was very
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  Speaker 2: tired and had come a long distance, having already walked
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  Speaker 2: from the city to the suburban town. She was fair
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  Speaker 2: and sweet to look upon, and noble in appearance, but
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  Speaker 2: trouble and woe were now upon her, and she would
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  Speaker 2: have looked poorly, indeed to those who a short time
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  Speaker 2: before were pleased to behold her. Her errand to that
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  Speaker 2: town had been a sad one, but she had done
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  Speaker 2: it successfully, and now relieved of her burden, she was
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  Speaker 2: trudging back to the city and to death. Her story
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  Speaker 2: is easily told. Mary Morton had met a fate similar
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  Speaker 2: to that which befalls many. A noble girl, daughter of
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  Speaker 2: affluent parents, she had been thrown into the society of
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  Speaker 2: the highest classes of her city, and had become acquainted
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  Speaker 2: with the young collegian with whom she fell in love.
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  Speaker 2: At the age of sixteen years, this young man, not
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  Speaker 2: yet of age himself, she had been persuaded into marrying clandestinely,
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  Speaker 2: he making it an excuse that if his marriage were known,
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  Speaker 2: he would not be allowed to remain in his college,
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  Speaker 2: therefore agreeing to keep the marriage a secret until he
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  Speaker 2: could have graduated. She consented to the union. The time
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  Speaker 2: went by, and the young student's graduation day was near
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  Speaker 2: at hand. Mary was filled with an anxious happiness when
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  Speaker 2: she one day received a letter from him telling her
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  Speaker 2: that he had received a tempting offer from abroad, which
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  Speaker 2: he must accept as soon as he should leave college,
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  Speaker 2: and asking her to wait a little longer before making
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  Speaker 2: their marriage public. Filled with grief and horror, the alarmed
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  Speaker 2: girl wrote him in reply that she could delay no longer,
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  Speaker 2: and that he must come home and acknowledge her. The
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  Speaker 2: reply to this was that he would do as he pleased,
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  Speaker 2: that there was no legal marriage, both being miners at
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  Speaker 2: the time, and that he would go abroad at once.
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  Speaker 2: Mary wrote again, this time in humble, piteous appeal, but
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  Speaker 2: the young man did not reply. Stone to the heart
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  Speaker 2: by such treatment, and terrified by the future, she fled
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  Speaker 2: soon after from home and was never again seen by
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  Speaker 2: her relatives. She found some work in a factory for
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  Speaker 2: a time, but approaching maternity soon drove her from that,
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  Speaker 2: and after leaving the hospital with her baby in her arms,
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  Speaker 2: she had drifted aimlessly about, begging for work and getting none.
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  Speaker 2: The little money which she had is gone, and tonight
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  Speaker 2: heartsore and footsore. She is walking back to the great city,
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  Speaker 2: leaving her baby behind her, and wondering in a dazed
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  Speaker 2: way she should thus suffer. As she plods along the
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  Speaker 2: dark road. She lives over again, in a dreamlike sense,
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  Speaker 2: the happy days of her life. She sees her noble father,
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  Speaker 2: always so proud of her, the older sister, to whom
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  Speaker 2: she was wont to go with every childish trouble, and
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  Speaker 2: to whom she had just gone, although the sister knows
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  Speaker 2: it not, with her last earthly care. And she sees
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  Speaker 2: once more the mother face, gentle and good. And then
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  Speaker 2: she sees no more, but breaks forth into violent sobs,
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  Speaker 2: which attract the notice of passerby, and she hurries on
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  Speaker 2: her way. How long it seems, Why go back to
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  Speaker 2: the city at all? There is but one life there
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  Speaker 2: for her, and that life she will not live. She
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  Speaker 2: may be a ruined and lost girl, but she is
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  Speaker 2: still proud and pure in heart. So on she goes,
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  Speaker 2: But the thought keeps recurring, why go back at all?
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  Speaker 2: Why not end it here? The river is just as
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  Speaker 2: calm and deep over there as in the city, And
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  Speaker 2: why go on? She comes to a cross road. Surely
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  Speaker 2: it must be an invitation for her, for it leads
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  Speaker 2: directly toward the river. She takes the new road. The
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  Speaker 2: lights of the city are in sight, but she is
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  Speaker 2: not now nearing them any longer. Here is the river.
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  Speaker 2: She did not expect to reach it quite so soon,
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  Speaker 2: But then perhaps it is better. So she stands above
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  Speaker 2: the dark water, now upon a little pier to which
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  Speaker 2: a pretty pleasure boat is moored. A thought comes to her,
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  Speaker 2: will some fair maid tomorrow sail forth in this pretty
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  Speaker 2: little boat with her lover. Perhaps love and life may
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  Speaker 2: launch their bark here tomorrow. Despair and death shall be
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  Speaker 2: here tonight.
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  Speaker 3: She takes one last.
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  Speaker 2: Look at the still stars in the soft, dark bed
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  Speaker 2: of sky, one look at the same quiet stars reflected
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  Speaker 2: in the dark water, and with the word mother softly
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  Speaker 2: trembling on her lips, she is gone, and the river
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  Speaker 2: receives her in its ample bosom. Too late, O dying mother,
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  Speaker 2: Too late, O sorrowing father. Your gentle call, sent broadcast
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  Speaker 2: throughout the land, published in a thousand places, spread among
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  Speaker 2: thousands of people, is too late. Not all the newspapers
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  Speaker 2: in the world. World, not all the telegraphs in the
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  Speaker 2: land can call the lost one back. She is gone,
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  Speaker 2: gone to the gentle river which received her when the
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  Speaker 2: world would not, gone to the arms of him who said,
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  Speaker 2: come unto me, all you that labor and are heavy laden,
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  Speaker 2: and meant it. Lost to the world, lost to the father,
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  Speaker 2: lost to the mother.
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  Speaker 3: Gone.
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  Speaker 2: End of chapter two Chapter three of Alice or The
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  Speaker 2: Wages of Sin. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox
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  Speaker 2: recordings are in the public domain. For more information or
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: to volunteer, visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by Mary Schneider.
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  Speaker 2: Alice or the Wages of Sin by Frederick Werden Hangborn,
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  Speaker 2: Chapter three quote. Business associations seldom reveal the inner life
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  Speaker 2: of a man. Mister do Ger was in his office alone.
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  Speaker 2: Mister do Ger was not a man to be easily
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  Speaker 2: put out of temper, that is, when business was good,
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  Speaker 2: as it was at present. But he was not feeling
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  Speaker 2: just right this morning. Despite the fact that business was
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  Speaker 2: good and the firm of Doujer in Company was in
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  Speaker 2: a prosperous condition. The fact was that it was not
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  Speaker 2: business at all, which troubled mister do Ger this morning.
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  Speaker 2: For forty years the firm of Douger in Company had
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  Speaker 2: been in business, and now mister Dogeer was in such
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  Speaker 2: a position that he might have retired altogether had he felt.
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  Speaker 3: Like doing so.
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  Speaker 2: But he did not. Mister do Geer was a man
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  Speaker 2: whom few understood and with whom few could get along.
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  Speaker 2: Abrupt in speech, blunt even to incivility at times. He
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  Speaker 2: was a man who seldom won the cordiality of strangers.
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  Speaker 2: Yet those who knew him well understood that beneath his
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  Speaker 2: wrn exterior there was the heart of an honest, upright man,
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  Speaker 2: and respected him as a good citizen and the next
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  Speaker 2: best thing to a true gentleman, a true man. Mister
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  Speaker 2: do Gier had a wife, a sweet tempered woman who,
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  Speaker 2: by the way, was the only boss that mister Dogier had,
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  Speaker 2: for she knew how to manage him, and a family
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  Speaker 2: of numerous children, among them an adopted daughter who was
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  Speaker 2: very dear to him. This girl was now eighteen years
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  Speaker 2: of age and as lovely a young woman as man
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  Speaker 2: ever gazed upon. And it was about this very person
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  Speaker 2: that mister Dougier was at present worried. The girl was
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  Speaker 2: very dear to her adopted father, and it was with
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  Speaker 2: no small degree of anxiety that he began to fear
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  Speaker 2: lest she might form an attachment which would bring her
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  Speaker 2: unhappiness or lifelong misery. For young Albert Thornberry, his junior partner,
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  Speaker 2: who had been abroad in charge of the foreign business
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  Speaker 2: for several years, was at home now and a guest
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  Speaker 2: at mister Dogier's house, and that where the elderly gentleman
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  Speaker 2: had not failed, being a keen observer, to notice that
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  Speaker 2: Alice had already found favor in Albert's eyes, and that
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  Speaker 2: Albert had been not unkindly received by Alice. Mister do
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  Speaker 2: Gier was not disposed to like this sort of a match,
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  Speaker 2: for the simple reason that he loved his girl too
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  Speaker 2: much to risk her happiness with a man of such
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  Speaker 2: a nature as he thought Thornberry's might be. So, while
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  Speaker 2: satisfied with his younger fellow businessman as a business partner,
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  Speaker 2: he did not relish the prospect of having him for
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  Speaker 2: a son in law. Mister Dogier knew but little of
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  Speaker 2: Albert's life while abroad. He feared that it had not
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  Speaker 2: been of the kind to fit a man to become
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  Speaker 2: a good husband. Hence, it was that mister do not
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  Speaker 2: into good humor on the day of which we write,
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  Speaker 2: and he was going over in his mind the pros
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  Speaker 2: and cons of the matter when Thornberry himself entered the office.
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  Speaker 2: Mister Dogier was right. Albert was a handsome fellow, and
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  Speaker 2: a dangerous one for young girls to know. Thirty seven
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  Speaker 2: years of age, tall and as finely formed as a
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  Speaker 2: first class soldier, beautiful in face as a Greek ideal,
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  Speaker 2: and possessed all the culture of a Finnished gentleman. He
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  Speaker 2: was a man eminently fitted to win the hearts of women,
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  Speaker 2: and if reports were true, they were not a few
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  Speaker 2: who had already been captivated by his graces. He was
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  Speaker 2: credited with having committed all the follies of mankind except marriage,
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  Speaker 2: but really no one had ever charged him with proof
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  Speaker 2: of being guilty of any dishonorable act. It was only gossip, perhaps,
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  Speaker 2: but nevertheless, mister dog would have preferred that Albert should
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  Speaker 2: have remained abroad, or else that he should have waited
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  Speaker 2: until Alice was well married, say to his son Joe,
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  Speaker 2: a matter which may have had something to do with
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  Speaker 2: the emotions of mister Dogier's heart. Before returning to America. However,
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  Speaker 2: Albert was here, and although he might do his best,
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  Speaker 2: there was little hope that mister Dogier would be able
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  Speaker 2: to engineer this matter in his own way, if Albert
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  Speaker 2: should strive to do as his senior feared that he might.
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  Speaker 2: As the junior partner entered the room, mister Dogier could
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  Speaker 2: not help admiring the graceful dignity of the gentleman who
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  Speaker 2: stood before him and gave him a genuine good morning.
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  Speaker 2: It was the instinctive homage which the commoner man always
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  Speaker 2: pays to the gentleman, even in a republic where one
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  Speaker 2: man is as good as another, and as the low
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  Speaker 2: emigrant who comes here imbued with a foreigner's hatred of
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  Speaker 2: the government says, and which being translated, means are refused
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  Speaker 2: to recognize the fact that there are differences between men
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  Speaker 2: other than those laid down by law. Good morning, Sir,
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  Speaker 2: said Albert, cordially, extending his hand and drawing up a chair.
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  Speaker 2: I see that my old friend has lost none of
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  Speaker 2: his methodical habits, always on hand, the time set, and
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  Speaker 2: always interested in his work. I wish that I might
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  Speaker 2: say as much for the junior member, but I fear
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  Speaker 2: that let me tell you, let me tell you, interrupted
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  Speaker 2: the elder, with his customary abruptness. Such talk as that
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  Speaker 2: is all nonsense. Your management abroad has been first class. However,
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  Speaker 2: as I have always said, there is nothing like system,
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  Speaker 2: and everybody should acquire it, true, replied the other. Systematic
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  Speaker 2: habits are good things to form, as the schoolmaster said
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  Speaker 2: when he thrashed the whole school every morning in order
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: to get that part of the work done and out
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  Speaker 2: of the way for the day. To a single man
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  Speaker 2: without home ties or attachments, system in everything is difficult
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  Speaker 2: of attainment. Now if a man is married, Yes, yes,
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  Speaker 2: said mister Dogeer, snapping his fingers and blowing out his cheeks,
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  Speaker 2: a habit of his when in earnest.
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  Speaker 3: That's just it.
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  Speaker 2: You are a right good businessman, Thornberry, and have plenty
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  Speaker 2: of brains, but you don't settle And I tell you
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  Speaker 2: a fellow must settle down if he wants to make
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  Speaker 2: a man of himself. That is an idea which I
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  Speaker 2: have had in my head for a long time, sir,
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  Speaker 2: replied the other. But circumstances have not been favorable in
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  Speaker 2: the first place. Marriage, in my way of thinking, means
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: more than a simple living together. In peace and harmony,
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: love and comfort. Of course, all these must be included
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: in connubial bliss. But these alone would be, to a
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: man of my temperament, simply a stupid bondage, a sort
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: of mutual stagnation in which neither party would become any better,
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: wiser or nobler than each was at the start. I'm
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: afraid your ideal is rather above that of most of us,
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: replied the elder. Perhaps it is, said Albert, but it
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: is an ideal, and as such I must abide by
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: it or remain as I am. Yes, but let me
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: tell you, said mister Dougier, that if half the rumors
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: I have heard concerning you when abroad be correct, your
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: ideal does not seem to worry you much in your
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: practical life. From you, Sir, replied Albert, Knowing you as
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: I do, these words may be taken without umbrage. But
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: remember please that I have never been in the habit
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: of making my private life a subject of conversation, and
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: that what is past is past. If there are any
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: dark passages in my history, they are written, and I
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: hope sealed in secrecy, and it is not my intention
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: to review them at the present day. But to profit
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: by them in the future and use them as guides
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: to a better life. I am now at an age.
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: What as you say I should settle, and could I
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: find the wife whom my heart craves, I would be
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: only too happy to wed her and cherish her as
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: a wife should be cherished. Your advice, sir, has always
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: been good, and your judgment in business matters sound. But
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: I fear that on the subject of marriage, I should
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: fail to find even in you a satisfactory confessor for
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: my heart and soul. Let us drop that subject and
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: look over the business very well, said mister do Geer,
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: and the two men were very soon absorbed in business.
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: Late that afternoon, as mister do Geer walked slowly home,
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: the conversation of his young partner kept recurring to his mind,
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: and the more he thought over it, the more it
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: puzzled him. He had heard queer rumors concerning this young man, unverified,
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: to be sure, but still ugly enough to make him
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: dislike the present announcement. But there was a frankness, yet reserve,
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: and dignity about Thornbury, which almost convinced mister Dogier that
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: the rumors must be false. Perhaps after all, it would
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: be better to trust the word of a man whom
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: he had always found honorable in business, and disbelieve the
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: rumors Alice was it may be the very young woman
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: who might fill Albert's ideal, and if so, what arrangement
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: could be nicer both socially and financially. He would dismiss
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: the matter altogether, as love affairs were not in his
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: line anyway. Yes, those rumors, and mister Dogeer walked thoughtfully home.
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: End of chapter.
• 23:41
  Speaker 4: Three, Chapter four of Alice or The Wages of Sin.
• 23:48
  Speaker 4: This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
• 23:52
  Speaker 4: the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
• 23:56
  Speaker 4: visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by Simona Alice or The
• 24:01
  Speaker 4: Wages of Sin by Frederic Werden Pangborn, Chapter four, The
• 24:07
  Speaker 4: Unheeded Omen. She loved me for the dangers I had passed,
• 24:12
  Speaker 4: and I loved for that. She did pity them men
• 24:16
  Speaker 4: do their broken weapons rather use than their bare hands.
• 24:22
  Speaker 4: Several weeks had passed since the night when mister Dodger
• 24:25
  Speaker 4: had walked slowly homework pondering the probability of closer relations
• 24:30
  Speaker 4: between his partner and his beloved daughter. And during these
• 24:34
  Speaker 4: weeks Albert had certainly improved in the estimation of his senior.
• 24:39
  Speaker 4: His graceful manners, his culture and good taste, and in
• 24:43
  Speaker 4: particular his excellent methods in business, pleased the older man,
• 24:47
  Speaker 4: and the more he began to know of him, the
• 24:49
  Speaker 4: more he found himself liking him. No partners ever got
• 24:54
  Speaker 4: on better together. The blunt, outspoken man of hard sense
• 24:58
  Speaker 4: and the gentlemen of accomplished and real business ability found
• 25:02
  Speaker 4: in each other the qualities which, while not perhaps alike
• 25:06
  Speaker 4: or congenital, made each respect the other and like him
• 25:10
  Speaker 4: for the worth which was in him. Albert took care
• 25:13
  Speaker 4: of their outside interests, and mister Dodger guarded the business
• 25:18
  Speaker 4: which was managed at the desk, each one knowing that
• 25:21
  Speaker 4: the other was better fitted than himself for his share
• 25:24
  Speaker 4: of the work. The firm of Dodger and Company was,
• 25:27
  Speaker 4: in a word, working harmoniously and prosperously. Thornbury was everywhere
• 25:32
  Speaker 4: in the city and out, and always busy. Mister Dodger
• 25:36
  Speaker 4: was always at his desk in the corner of their
• 25:39
  Speaker 4: building from nine o'clock in the morning until four o'clock
• 25:42
  Speaker 4: in the afternoon. Albert had taken rooms in a good hotel,
• 25:46
  Speaker 4: and his bachelor quarters were such as the most fastidious
• 25:50
  Speaker 4: gentlemen of taste would have been unable to criticize. He
• 25:54
  Speaker 4: had hunted up a few of his old chumps who
• 25:56
  Speaker 4: were living in the city, and was beginning to be
• 25:59
  Speaker 4: well known in ccaciety. At the house of mister Dodger,
• 26:02
  Speaker 4: he was always welcome, Missus Dodger, having taken a great
• 26:06
  Speaker 4: fancy to him, and Alice well, there was no evidence
• 26:09
  Speaker 4: yet to warn the assertion that Alice thought him anything
• 26:12
  Speaker 4: more than a very agreeable person. They went to theaters together,
• 26:17
  Speaker 4: and she was often seen riding with him in his
• 26:19
  Speaker 4: knit bar gay through the park, or is sauntering by
• 26:23
  Speaker 4: his side along the fashionable streets on a pleasant afternoon.
• 26:28
  Speaker 4: No one could say that Alice was in love. But
• 26:31
  Speaker 4: of Albert much might have been said. Had the gossips
• 26:34
  Speaker 4: known all that he could have told them. O gossip,
• 26:38
  Speaker 4: Thou most villainous of all villains. Thou intangible, impersonal, yet
• 26:43
  Speaker 4: ever present, always existing, bane of society. What epithet can
• 26:47
  Speaker 4: I apply to thee which shall contain enough handbane and
• 26:51
  Speaker 4: other noxious poisons metaphorically speaking, to filthy qualify thee thou
• 26:56
  Speaker 4: blackener of the good, Thus murcher of the innocent, Thou
• 27:00
  Speaker 4: coward of cowards, polluter alike of thy victim and thine
• 27:04
  Speaker 4: agent Heaven pitied the man with the past, the woman
• 27:08
  Speaker 4: with a fault, if they ever get within thy foul clutches.
• 27:12
  Speaker 4: Rather a thousand times would I be falsely accused before
• 27:15
  Speaker 4: the harshest tribunal of the land than that my name
• 27:19
  Speaker 4: and honor should fall under thy notice. Thou wretched and
• 27:23
  Speaker 4: seldom punished sinner against the goodness of mankind, Thou sneaking accuser,
• 27:29
  Speaker 4: judge and jury of us, all trying cases without warned,
• 27:33
  Speaker 4: rendering verdicts without evidence, condemning without right or reason. Had
• 27:39
  Speaker 4: the gossips known, but they did not know. Albert Thornbury's
• 27:44
  Speaker 4: past was three thousand miles away in that great burial
• 27:48
  Speaker 4: ground of many pasts, London, and he knew that it
• 27:52
  Speaker 4: could not follow him to America. It was an unpleasant past,
• 27:57
  Speaker 4: but after all, it was not so bad as it
• 28:00
  Speaker 4: might have been, and was not nearly so bad as
• 28:03
  Speaker 4: that other past of which he had almost ceased to
• 28:06
  Speaker 4: think at all, knowing that that, at any rate could
• 28:10
  Speaker 4: never come back. This later past had worried him sometimes,
• 28:15
  Speaker 4: but it could not trouble him now, for it had
• 28:17
  Speaker 4: been left behind. Ah could he have known that, instead
• 28:21
  Speaker 4: of being left behind, it had preceded him to America.
• 28:25
  Speaker 4: What an annoyance it might have become. Not that it
• 28:27
  Speaker 4: would have troubled him much had it not been for Alice,
• 28:31
  Speaker 4: in whom he was rapidly finding that something for which
• 28:34
  Speaker 4: he had always yearned, and which never before had come
• 28:37
  Speaker 4: to him. In Alice, he thought that he saw a
• 28:40
  Speaker 4: prospect of that supremest of all happinesses which can come
• 28:44
  Speaker 4: to such a man as he. A refined, high bred
• 28:47
  Speaker 4: lady wife. Other lovers he had known in his life abroad,
• 28:51
  Speaker 4: but not such love as this might be. The loves
• 28:55
  Speaker 4: of the past were not the kind to satisfy the
• 28:57
  Speaker 4: desires of this refined gentleman, with his esthetic taste and
• 29:02
  Speaker 4: courtly manners. They were but freaks of foolish youth, And
• 29:06
  Speaker 4: now in his manhood he realized what they really were.
• 29:10
  Speaker 4: Could he have left them undone? He would gladly have
• 29:13
  Speaker 4: done so. But he was well out of them now,
• 29:16
  Speaker 4: And why should they trouble him? Be sure, your sin
• 29:19
  Speaker 4: will find you out. He had heard this often, had
• 29:23
  Speaker 4: even applied it to be the case of a poor
• 29:25
  Speaker 4: defaulting clerk, whom he had caught in the act, and
• 29:28
  Speaker 4: afterwards forgiven. Out of tenderness of heart, he had told
• 29:32
  Speaker 4: this young man to remember the injunction, but to apply
• 29:35
  Speaker 4: to himself. Had never seen an appropriate thing to do,
• 29:38
  Speaker 4: And he was right. His sins would never find him out,
• 29:42
  Speaker 4: and why should they. He was truly penitent and intended
• 29:45
  Speaker 4: to sin no more, and surely the little sins of
• 29:48
  Speaker 4: his youth might be allowed to remain as they were,
• 29:52
  Speaker 4: since he meant to sou sin never again, and was
• 29:55
  Speaker 4: in general a noble intentioned fellow who would be of
• 29:58
  Speaker 4: more good than harm in the world. Could he have
• 30:01
  Speaker 4: seen the future, with what terrible force would the words
• 30:04
  Speaker 4: have wrung in his ears? But no one ever foresees
• 30:08
  Speaker 4: the outcome of his deeds. And so we proceed in
• 30:11
  Speaker 4: the belief that our sines, at least are safely housed
• 30:14
  Speaker 4: in oblivion. There is no writing on the wall, even
• 30:18
  Speaker 4: in an unknown tongue, to warn us, and we go
• 30:21
  Speaker 4: fearlessly on until the storm bursts, and then we wonder
• 30:25
  Speaker 4: why we should be thus harshly used by fate. The
• 30:29
  Speaker 4: summer days were come, and the Dodger family were gone,
• 30:33
  Speaker 4: that is, they were comfortably housed in their cottage at
• 30:36
  Speaker 4: Long Branch. Mister Dodger was with them at night, but
• 30:40
  Speaker 4: he spent his days in the office, for to do
• 30:43
  Speaker 4: nothing was not to his liking. Albert was part of
• 30:47
  Speaker 4: the time of the Branch and had become one of
• 30:50
  Speaker 4: the lions of the place, especially in the estimation of
• 30:53
  Speaker 4: certain ladies themselves settled, who would have been pleased to
• 30:57
  Speaker 4: see their daughters settled also, that is, if the catch
• 31:01
  Speaker 4: were a good one. But their angling was unsuccessful so
• 31:05
  Speaker 4: far as Albert was concerned. He would not bite, and Alice,
• 31:10
  Speaker 4: who had by this time discovered that she liked him
• 31:12
  Speaker 4: very well, found herself wondering when he would declare himself,
• 31:17
  Speaker 4: for she knew now by the subtle instinct of womanhood,
• 31:21
  Speaker 4: that Albert loved her once. Indeed, he had almost done so.
• 31:26
  Speaker 4: They had been riding in the dusk along the beach,
• 31:29
  Speaker 4: and had driven back later into the country, away from
• 31:32
  Speaker 4: the lights and display which make the Branch a pleasant
• 31:36
  Speaker 4: place for those who are in love, but not retired
• 31:39
  Speaker 4: enough for those who wished to hear the thrilling words
• 31:41
  Speaker 4: of love's first outspeakings. And he had become very tender.
• 31:46
  Speaker 4: They were, in fact talking of marriage. Do you really
• 31:50
  Speaker 4: think that fidelity in marriage, once established, its sure to
• 31:53
  Speaker 4: remain through all changes of time and circumstances, he said.
• 31:58
  Speaker 4: I think that must depend upon the way in which
• 32:00
  Speaker 4: the fidelity is obtained, said Alice. Of course, I cannot
• 32:04
  Speaker 4: speak for others with certainty. I think that for myself,
• 32:08
  Speaker 4: if I once really loved a husband, I never could
• 32:11
  Speaker 4: become unfaithful to him in any way. And by faithful
• 32:14
  Speaker 4: I mean more than is meant in the words of
• 32:17
  Speaker 4: the ordinary service. I mean faithful to my belief in
• 32:20
  Speaker 4: his goodness, his love for me, his purity of soul,
• 32:24
  Speaker 4: in all that is of him. In short, I know
• 32:27
  Speaker 4: of but one thing which could ever turn me from
• 32:30
  Speaker 4: a man I truly loved. If I should ever find
• 32:33
  Speaker 4: that he had lied to me, that he had deceived
• 32:35
  Speaker 4: me in his wooing, that I think would turn my
• 32:38
  Speaker 4: heart against him. He might commit sins against another. I
• 32:43
  Speaker 4: would go with him even to the gallows. But if
• 32:45
  Speaker 4: I knew that he had lied to me, I could
• 32:47
  Speaker 4: no longer trust him, And I know not what I
• 32:50
  Speaker 4: might do. Anything is preferable to a marriage born of
• 32:54
  Speaker 4: a lie. I agree with you, Alice said, he there
• 32:58
  Speaker 4: is nothing which will kill afection like a lie. I
• 33:01
  Speaker 4: know it from experience, and the silent sorrow of those
• 33:04
  Speaker 4: whom I know to be suffering from the curse of
• 33:06
  Speaker 4: a discovered lie is to me one of the most
• 33:09
  Speaker 4: touching sorrows of earth. To know that the one being
• 33:12
  Speaker 4: who is dearer than all the universe, to whom we
• 33:15
  Speaker 4: have given our whole trust, in whose keeping we have
• 33:18
  Speaker 4: deposited our happiness, has been to us a living lie
• 33:22
  Speaker 4: is to know that which wears out the heart and
• 33:24
  Speaker 4: crushes the soul. Happy is the man who has escaped
• 33:28
  Speaker 4: this torment. His voice trembled, and he spoke with a
• 33:31
  Speaker 4: fervor which touched his hearer like the confession of a
• 33:34
  Speaker 4: soul sick penitent. Alice found herself wondering what his past
• 33:39
  Speaker 4: life might have been, and whether he might not be
• 33:41
  Speaker 4: speaking from his own experience. So bitterly did his words sound,
• 33:46
  Speaker 4: He continued, It is the hardest of sorrows to bear,
• 33:51
  Speaker 4: for one must bear it in silence. The husband who
• 33:54
  Speaker 4: has been deceived by a false wife can hope for
• 33:57
  Speaker 4: no relieving confidence with another. He cannot ask the woman
• 34:00
  Speaker 4: whom he later finds to be the one being necessary
• 34:03
  Speaker 4: to his happiness to be his wife. For if she
• 34:07
  Speaker 4: knows the truth, she will not have him, And if
• 34:09
  Speaker 4: he tells her not, he is a liar, and sooner
• 34:12
  Speaker 4: or later she may find it out, and ruin will
• 34:15
  Speaker 4: come both her confidence he dares not invite. So he
• 34:19
  Speaker 4: suffers in silence and sees the paradise which may never
• 34:22
  Speaker 4: be his, as Moses gazed upon the promised land, wherein
• 34:26
  Speaker 4: he might never dwell. But said Alice, supposing that he
• 34:31
  Speaker 4: should find a woman willing to hear his tale and
• 34:34
  Speaker 4: with heart large enough and faith sufficient to share his
• 34:37
  Speaker 4: past sorrow with him, one who, knowing all, could not
• 34:41
  Speaker 4: be deceived as to the past, would he not then
• 34:44
  Speaker 4: be doing right in wedding her, provided she was in
• 34:47
  Speaker 4: all respects what he really loved, If she would but
• 34:51
  Speaker 4: listen to him. Yes, But Alice, where is such a
• 34:54
  Speaker 4: woman to be found? A woman willing for the sake
• 34:57
  Speaker 4: of love and write to bear the stinging tongue of gossip,
• 35:01
  Speaker 4: the averted eye, the asside remark, and all else that
• 35:05
  Speaker 4: the world inflicts upon the unfortunate. I do not know,
• 35:09
  Speaker 4: said she, But it seems to me that I, loving
• 35:13
  Speaker 4: as I must, love the man to whom I give
• 35:15
  Speaker 4: myself would bear all this and more should he find
• 35:19
  Speaker 4: me worthy of him. Albert was almost at the point
• 35:22
  Speaker 4: of telling her how he loved her. A minute more
• 35:25
  Speaker 4: and the fatal moment would have come fatal to her
• 35:29
  Speaker 4: as well as to him. But a carriage approached just then,
• 35:33
  Speaker 4: and in it were Missus Vanderhoof and her daughter, society
• 35:37
  Speaker 4: people of the branch, who bowed politely to Albert, and
• 35:40
  Speaker 4: his companion, who returned the salutation. As the carriage passed,
• 35:44
  Speaker 4: the spell was broken and Alice was saved. Would that
• 35:47
  Speaker 4: the yeomen had been heeded? Would that Albert had seen,
• 35:50
  Speaker 4: in the interruption of his intention the warning, and remembering
• 35:54
  Speaker 4: the injunction, be sure your sin will find you out,
• 35:57
  Speaker 4: had dismissed marriage forever from him his thoughts, all that
• 36:01
  Speaker 4: he had prayed from the bottom of his heart, deliver
• 36:04
  Speaker 4: us from evil, Lead us not into temptation.
• 36:09
  Speaker 3: End of chapter four, Chapter five of Alice, or the
• 36:17
  Speaker 3: Wages of Sin. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox
• 36:23
  Speaker 3: recordings are in the public domain. For more information or
• 36:29
  Speaker 3: to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by Shasta
• 36:36
  Speaker 3: Oakland California. Alice or The Wages of Sin by Frederic
• 36:43
  Speaker 3: Worden Pangborn, Chapter five. Man's love is of man's life.
• 36:51
  Speaker 3: A thing apart tis women's whole existence. A change came,
• 36:58
  Speaker 3: or the spirit of my dream. The wanderer was alone,
• 37:02
  Speaker 3: as heretofore the beings which surrounded him were gone or
• 37:08
  Speaker 3: were at war with him. He was a mark for
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: blight and desolation, compassed round with hatred and contention. In
• 37:20
  Speaker 3: the midst of life, we are in death, in our
• 37:24
  Speaker 3: moments of supremest joy, when all nature seems to be
• 37:30
  Speaker 3: kind to us, and when care seems to be but
• 37:33
  Speaker 3: a phantom of the past, then it is that grim
• 37:38
  Speaker 3: fate suddenly presents herself, and, holding the cup of hemlock
• 37:44
  Speaker 3: to our lips, bides us drink it to the dregs. Ikarus,
• 37:51
  Speaker 3: joyously parting the cool ether of mourning with his waxen wings,
• 37:57
  Speaker 3: realizes not that at the rising of the sun his
• 38:02
  Speaker 3: wings will melt from his shoulders, and he and his
• 38:06
  Speaker 3: transient pleasure be dashed into the sea. Paris bearing away
• 38:13
  Speaker 3: in triumph, the captive Helen Little thinks that he is
• 38:18
  Speaker 3: soon to see his city in ashes, and the sword
• 38:24
  Speaker 3: of vengeance hanging above his head. Caesar Little expected to
• 38:30
  Speaker 3: receive as the climax of his conquests the merciless thrusts
• 38:35
  Speaker 3: of Brutus Cold Steel and Abraham Lincoln. After spending the
• 38:42
  Speaker 3: best years of his life in working for the welfare
• 38:45
  Speaker 3: of his fellow men, Little thought that the end of
• 38:49
  Speaker 3: it all for him would be the assassin's bullet. Close
• 38:55
  Speaker 3: upon pleasure comes pain. Joy cometh in the morning, but
• 39:00
  Speaker 3: at evening the wind's rise and the storm clouds bursts.
• 39:06
  Speaker 3: Such is the experience of a majority of mankind. Albert
• 39:13
  Speaker 3: Thornbury was intoxicated with love. At last. He had found
• 39:19
  Speaker 3: the peerless woman who would be his wife. A woman
• 39:25
  Speaker 3: highly cultivated, noble in soul, pure in heart, and free
• 39:31
  Speaker 3: from the pruderies which discuss a man of sense and
• 39:36
  Speaker 3: wiser in her eighteen years of life than most women
• 39:41
  Speaker 3: in their matronage. She could be won. He knew it.
• 39:46
  Speaker 3: All that remains was to ask her to be his wife,
• 39:50
  Speaker 3: and his happiness would be secure. The dark shadow which
• 39:56
  Speaker 3: hung over his past should trouble him no more. She
• 40:01
  Speaker 3: would hear his story and love him better for it.
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: He would not marry her with a lie upon his
• 40:09
  Speaker 3: lips that was a thing against which his whole nature revolted.
• 40:16
  Speaker 3: She would know it all, and she would love him.
• 40:20
  Speaker 3: He had found the priceless jewel at last, the one
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: virtuous woman, and the past should be forever sealed. Filled
• 40:32
  Speaker 3: with these delicious dreams. He walked alone upon the sands
• 40:38
  Speaker 3: at midnight, enjoying the calm solitude of the sea. He
• 40:44
  Speaker 3: did not notice a person who had followed him in
• 40:47
  Speaker 3: the darkness, until as he turned in his course he
• 40:52
  Speaker 3: came face to face with her. The figure stepped in
• 40:56
  Speaker 3: front of him to get his attention, and, throwing back
• 41:01
  Speaker 3: its hood, gazed upon him with a pair of magnificent
• 41:07
  Speaker 3: dark eyes. The face was pale and somewhat careworn, but
• 41:12
  Speaker 3: nevertheless beautiful. Albert stopped, transfixed by the sight of this
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: woman risen from the dead. His hair stood erect, and
• 41:25
  Speaker 3: his voice stuck in his throat. The woman did not
• 41:29
  Speaker 3: address him at once, but gazed fixedly into his face.
• 41:34
  Speaker 3: At last, his voice came to him, and a groan
• 41:38
  Speaker 3: of anguish escaped his lips. The woman shuddered, and, after
• 41:44
  Speaker 3: a moment's pause, spoke, Are you not even a little
• 41:49
  Speaker 3: bit glad to see me? She said, not even enough
• 41:54
  Speaker 3: to say that you wish me no evil further than
• 41:58
  Speaker 3: that I have brought upon myself. Well, she paused for
• 42:02
  Speaker 3: a reply, but none came. Oh Albert, she added, in
• 42:08
  Speaker 3: a more humble tone. Have you not even a feeling
• 42:12
  Speaker 3: of pity for me? You loved me dearly once. Surely
• 42:17
  Speaker 3: you can at least pity me. Albert spoke, pity you, yes,
• 42:24
  Speaker 3: But what brings you here from the grave in which
• 42:28
  Speaker 3: you were laid ten years ago? Surely you cannot be
• 42:33
  Speaker 3: the person you seem She is dead, dead ten years
• 42:40
  Speaker 3: I know you thought me dead, Albert, said the woman.
• 42:44
  Speaker 3: But I am not. I have been near you all
• 42:49
  Speaker 3: these ten years, but did not dare let you know it,
• 42:53
  Speaker 3: fearing your terrible anger and yearning for your love. My love, korra,
• 43:01
  Speaker 3: my love? Is it? Thus you speak of that which
• 43:05
  Speaker 3: you held light as gossamer, selling it and my honor
• 43:10
  Speaker 3: for a worthless bauble, cheapening it in the sight of men,
• 43:15
  Speaker 3: and damning it in the sight of God. Woman, talk
• 43:20
  Speaker 3: not to me of your yearning for my love. But
• 43:25
  Speaker 3: you did love me, pleaded the woman. Ay I loved you,
• 43:31
  Speaker 3: he replied, bitterly loved you with the mad feverishness of
• 43:36
  Speaker 3: my youth, pictured you as a saint when you were
• 43:40
  Speaker 3: a devil. Worshiped your beauty as priceless when it could
• 43:45
  Speaker 3: have been purchased with a trinket. Loved your presence as
• 43:49
  Speaker 3: that of an angel when it was as baneful as
• 43:54
  Speaker 3: the fatal aconite which the ignorant traveler plucks on the hills.
• 44:01
  Speaker 3: Loved you. Yes, God knows I loved you, and he
• 44:05
  Speaker 3: alone knows how much you valued it. Your words are severe,
• 44:11
  Speaker 3: but not unjust, said the woman. All that you say
• 44:16
  Speaker 3: that I did, I have done, and I have met
• 44:19
  Speaker 3: you tonight in order to tell you more than you
• 44:23
  Speaker 3: already know, and to plead for mercy at your feet.
• 44:28
  Speaker 3: I know that you will hear me, for you are
• 44:31
  Speaker 3: always a just man. Speak on. I won't detain you long, Albert.
• 44:39
  Speaker 3: She said, you thought that I was dead, and I
• 44:43
  Speaker 3: intended to have you think so. From the hour that
• 44:48
  Speaker 3: I fled from your home with that villain. I was
• 44:52
  Speaker 3: sorry for the sin I had committed. Oh, believe me, Albert,
• 44:58
  Speaker 3: when I say that I I am now telling you
• 45:01
  Speaker 3: the truth. You thought I had dishonored you, But that
• 45:06
  Speaker 3: was not so. It might have been so, but God,
• 45:11
  Speaker 3: in his mercy prevented it. In our flight we started
• 45:16
  Speaker 3: for France, and during the ride to Dover, I had
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: time to think over what I was about to do
• 45:24
  Speaker 3: and to repent it in time. Believe me, Albert, I
• 45:28
  Speaker 3: am telling the truth. At Dover, I left the count
• 45:34
  Speaker 3: in the crowd at the station. I slipped away from
• 45:38
  Speaker 3: him and fled. Fled for my very life, and from
• 45:43
  Speaker 3: that date to this I have never seen him. I
• 45:48
  Speaker 3: was saved from dishonor, but not from disgrace. I knew
• 45:53
  Speaker 3: that you would not forgive me, nor even hear me
• 45:57
  Speaker 3: should I return. All these long years, I have waited,
• 46:03
  Speaker 3: hoping that I might find opportunity to tell you all
• 46:08
  Speaker 3: and be forgiven, For I have loved you all these
• 46:12
  Speaker 3: years as only a self ruined woman can love the
• 46:17
  Speaker 3: noble husband whom she has wantonly wronged. But the opportunity
• 46:24
  Speaker 3: never came. To night, I have found courage to face
• 46:29
  Speaker 3: you and to plead my cause. If you would only
• 46:33
  Speaker 3: believe me, Albert, all might be mended in this new country.
• 46:38
  Speaker 3: I loved you so much that I desired you to
• 46:42
  Speaker 3: think me dead. But my heart yearns so to be
• 46:46
  Speaker 3: loved by you again that I cannot, Oh, I cannot
• 46:50
  Speaker 3: let you go. I caused the publication of my death
• 46:55
  Speaker 3: that you might see it and not suffer on my account.
• 47:00
  Speaker 3: May the curse of Almighty God be upon you, for
• 47:03
  Speaker 3: that deed came slowly and wrathfully from the man's lips.
• 47:10
  Speaker 3: Oh Albert, curse me not? Have I not cursed myself enough? Already?
• 47:17
  Speaker 3: Is it not enough that all these years I should
• 47:20
  Speaker 3: suffer alone in anguish of heart? I have known want, poverty, distress, cold,
• 47:29
  Speaker 3: hunger and thirst, the barrenness of the unloved heart, the
• 47:35
  Speaker 3: carking care of loving you in my sin sick soul,
• 47:40
  Speaker 3: with a love I could not kill. I never loved
• 47:45
  Speaker 3: Count Miguel. It was but a momentary fit of insanity,
• 47:51
  Speaker 3: and wrongly as I acted. I checked myself in time
• 47:56
  Speaker 3: to save your honor. God knows not seek to condone
• 48:01
  Speaker 3: my own offense. But Oh Albert, the expiation has been
• 48:07
  Speaker 3: long and terrible, and I can bear it no more.
• 48:12
  Speaker 3: Kill me here on these sands besides the great water.
• 48:17
  Speaker 3: But tell me that your love is not all dead,
• 48:21
  Speaker 3: that I may hope for some ray of light after
• 48:25
  Speaker 3: this terrible penance? Can you not forgive me and let
• 48:28
  Speaker 3: me hope that you will take me back. I can
• 48:33
  Speaker 3: forgive you, but I can never love you again. A
• 48:37
  Speaker 3: piteous moan came from the woman's lips, and she fell
• 48:41
  Speaker 3: before him upon her knees. Albert looked at her. Yes,
• 48:47
  Speaker 3: she was very beautiful, more beautiful perhaps than Alice. Ah,
• 48:53
  Speaker 3: there it was Alice. He could not help telling himself
• 48:58
  Speaker 3: that had this woman and return sooner, she might have
• 49:02
  Speaker 3: been successful in her endeavors to win him back. But
• 49:07
  Speaker 3: Alice now held his heart. Albert, is this all that
• 49:12
  Speaker 3: I can hope for? Is the sin which was only
• 49:16
  Speaker 3: an intention, never to be wiped out? Can you not
• 49:21
  Speaker 3: tell me that you will try to love me again?
• 49:25
  Speaker 3: I care not what you do to me if you will,
• 49:29
  Speaker 3: but take me back to your heart. I'll work for you,
• 49:34
  Speaker 3: live only for you. I'll be your slave anything, for
• 49:39
  Speaker 3: as God is my witness here in the solitude of
• 49:43
  Speaker 3: the night, I love you as women seldom love, Oh husband.
• 49:50
  Speaker 3: Take me back to your heart. I can not. She
• 49:56
  Speaker 3: groveled at his feet. In anguish of remorse despair. She
• 50:01
  Speaker 3: prayed alternately to God and to this man to give
• 50:07
  Speaker 3: her back the heart which he had thrown away, But
• 50:11
  Speaker 3: all in vain love her he did at one time,
• 50:16
  Speaker 3: But now he loved Alice, and there was no room
• 50:20
  Speaker 3: in his heart for this other. He did not doubt
• 50:24
  Speaker 3: her story. He believed her to be telling the truth,
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: and he hated her for it. She was his wife,
• 50:33
  Speaker 3: and no law could rid him of her. A year
• 50:38
  Speaker 3: ago he would no doubt have taken her back, but
• 50:42
  Speaker 3: his heart had no room for her. Now she had
• 50:46
  Speaker 3: come too late. He left her, groveling in her wretchedness
• 50:52
  Speaker 3: on the shore of the sea, and disappeared in the darkness,
• 50:58
  Speaker 3: cursing the feet which had thus turned his nectar into
• 51:03
  Speaker 3: gall his paradise into a hell. He never gave one
• 51:09
  Speaker 3: pitying thought to the creature who lay prostrate upon the sand,
• 51:15
  Speaker 3: writhing in her anguish, and calling upon Heaven to witness
• 51:20
  Speaker 3: that she had told the truth. She had, it is true,
• 51:26
  Speaker 3: done him a wrong. But was it so bad a
• 51:30
  Speaker 3: deed as never to be forgiven or condoned, such as
• 51:35
  Speaker 3: often the lot of women. Caesar said, the wife of
• 51:41
  Speaker 3: Caesar must be above suspicion. And was this to mean that,
• 51:47
  Speaker 3: in the case of this woman, the punishment for not
• 51:51
  Speaker 3: being above suspicion was to be as great as that
• 51:56
  Speaker 3: meeted out to the gross offender who had sinned without repentance.
• 52:03
  Speaker 3: Her sin had been repented of and left uncommitted. It
• 52:09
  Speaker 3: was only a thought of sin. Yet she was to
• 52:13
  Speaker 3: suffer all the penalty of the sin, and never to
• 52:17
  Speaker 3: see hope of forgiveness. Her fate, indeed, was hard. She
• 52:23
  Speaker 3: did not know what it was that her husband could
• 52:27
  Speaker 3: not love her again. She did not know that another
• 52:31
  Speaker 3: had taken the place which had been vacant for ten
• 52:35
  Speaker 3: long years, and which but for that other, might have
• 52:40
  Speaker 3: become her place again. She did not know that she
• 52:45
  Speaker 3: had come too late. Pity her, all, you, hoe, are
• 52:50
  Speaker 3: not so sodden with worldliness or over filled with false saintliness,
• 52:57
  Speaker 3: that you cannot pity, but only judge the fallen. Pity her,
• 53:02
  Speaker 3: for she is worthy of your commiseration. Her sin has
• 53:08
  Speaker 3: been small, her punishment is terrible because she is a woman.
• 53:18
  Speaker 3: End of chapter five Chapter six of Alice or The
• 53:26
  Speaker 3: Wages of Sin. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox
• 53:32
  Speaker 3: recordings are in the public domain. For more information or
• 53:37
  Speaker 3: to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by Shasta Oakland, California.
• 53:47
  Speaker 3: Alice or the Wages of Sin by Frederick Werden Panborn,
• 53:52
  Speaker 3: Chapter six. A wife is like an unknown sea, least
• 53:59
  Speaker 3: known to him who thinks he knows where all the
• 54:03
  Speaker 3: shores of promise be, where lie the islands of repose,
• 54:09
  Speaker 3: and where the rocks that he must flee. The Cardinal
• 54:15
  Speaker 3: rose with a dignified look. He called for his candle,
• 54:20
  Speaker 3: his bell, and his book. Never was heard such a
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: terrible curse. But what gave rise to no little surprise,
• 54:30
  Speaker 3: nobody seemed a penny. The worse the thoughts which were
• 54:36
  Speaker 3: the companions of Albert Thornbury in his room that night
• 54:41
  Speaker 3: must remain unrecorded. The return as from the dead of
• 54:46
  Speaker 3: that woman. His wife had wakened all the memories of
• 54:50
  Speaker 3: the past, and set his thoughts going backward over his life,
• 54:56
  Speaker 3: as he had believed they never could again. His was
• 55:01
  Speaker 3: the case of many, the case of a young man
• 55:05
  Speaker 3: who had made a mistake. Loving with the unquestioning ardor
• 55:10
  Speaker 3: of youth. He had married Cora Tate. Captivated by her
• 55:16
  Speaker 3: hoarylike beauty and the charm of her voice, heard for
• 55:22
  Speaker 3: the first time in the opera and often afterwards in
• 55:26
  Speaker 3: the drawing room, he had made her his wife. Their
• 55:31
  Speaker 3: union had been peaceful until the business cares of the
• 55:36
  Speaker 3: London House of Dougaire and company had taken so much
• 55:41
  Speaker 3: of his time that he could not be her constant companion,
• 55:46
  Speaker 3: and she had unwisely begun to accuse him of neglecting her.
• 55:53
  Speaker 3: Matters went from bad to worse. The presence of the
• 55:57
  Speaker 3: Count Miguel, a gray hair sinner, who had taken a
• 56:02
  Speaker 3: passing fancy for Cora, aiding much to bring about a
• 56:07
  Speaker 3: rupture between husband and wife, until one night, stung by
• 56:12
  Speaker 3: her sharp tongue, Albert had lowered himself from his dignity
• 56:18
  Speaker 3: to say that which should have been left unsaid, And
• 56:23
  Speaker 3: that night Coral left his home, and he had never
• 56:27
  Speaker 3: again heard of her until he saw the announcement of
• 56:32
  Speaker 3: her death in the newspapers. Then he was touched with
• 56:36
  Speaker 3: a feeling of regret that he had been so hasty
• 56:40
  Speaker 3: with his wife, for he felt that a little forbearance
• 56:44
  Speaker 3: might have kept her his own, And now that she
• 56:48
  Speaker 3: was dead, he loved her more than ever. He had
• 56:52
  Speaker 3: always cherished in his memory a tender recollection of her
• 56:57
  Speaker 3: as she was when his bride, and he felt that
• 57:01
  Speaker 3: he might have even forgiven her had she returned to
• 57:05
  Speaker 3: him penitent. He intended never to marry again, but she
• 57:12
  Speaker 3: was dead. Ten years had elapsed since he had seen her,
• 57:17
  Speaker 3: and men forget much in ten years, particularly in matters
• 57:22
  Speaker 3: of love. So in falling in with Alice, it was
• 57:27
  Speaker 3: not strange that he should find that he had changed
• 57:30
  Speaker 3: his mind and might become a husband once more. In
• 57:36
  Speaker 3: Alice he had found something superior to that which had
• 57:41
  Speaker 3: charmed him in Cora, a soul akin with his own
• 57:46
  Speaker 3: in thought, a mind refined and cultured like his own,
• 57:52
  Speaker 3: and his love for her had become the great passion
• 57:55
  Speaker 3: of his life. For it is possible, let poets say
• 58:00
  Speaker 3: what they may, that a man may love with a
• 58:04
  Speaker 3: deeper passion at middle age than in early life. It
• 58:10
  Speaker 3: is not always in youth that one finds the wife
• 58:14
  Speaker 3: who is to be to him the partner whom his
• 58:18
  Speaker 3: manhood will desire. The pretty girl who seems to him
• 58:23
  Speaker 3: at twenty an angel of beauty may fall far short
• 58:28
  Speaker 3: of filling his cravings at forty. What does youth know
• 58:33
  Speaker 3: of the aims, ambitions, tastes and hopes of manhood? Can
• 58:39
  Speaker 3: he be certain that the girl so beautiful in her
• 58:43
  Speaker 3: ball dress, so sweet at the picnic, so lovely in
• 58:48
  Speaker 3: the first months, perhaps years, of married life, when all
• 58:53
  Speaker 3: is bright, when cares are few and ambition is a
• 58:57
  Speaker 3: thing unknown, will be the helpmate of his sterner years,
• 59:02
  Speaker 3: the sharer of his cares and ambitions, the confidant of
• 59:07
  Speaker 3: his purposes and hopes. Does he not often find, as
• 59:13
  Speaker 3: the years go on, that the angel whom he thought
• 59:17
  Speaker 3: so noble, has, after all but the minimum of a soul,
• 59:23
  Speaker 3: the semblance of an intellect, That she is no more
• 59:27
  Speaker 3: capable of understanding his mind than a child. That she
• 59:32
  Speaker 3: can have no sympathy with him in his life work,
• 59:36
  Speaker 3: and no interest in his ambitions beyond that expressed by
• 59:41
  Speaker 3: bread and butter, or perhaps by display and fine clothes.
• 59:48
  Speaker 3: How many men find it worth their while to try
• 59:51
  Speaker 3: to interest their wives in their business, profession, or whatever
• 59:56
  Speaker 3: it may be that is the life of the living,
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 3: the food of their body and mind. Many do at start,
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 3: no doubt. But how many are they who, finding no
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 3: responsive cord, there, give up the hopeless task and go
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 3: their way alone. Their name is legion. The man comes
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 3: home burdened with the cares of his profession or trade.
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 3: He has won his case, his article has been accepted.
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 3: He has at last completed that machine which is to
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 3: revolutionize a branch of industry. He has conquered that stubborn
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 3: case of sickness, in a word, with one thing, which
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 3: mayslfe grander than mere existence, fresh in his mind, and
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 3: tells his wife of his success. It may be that
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 3: heavy cares are upon his aching mind, which she had
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 3: determined to lay aside for the time while he tells
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 3: her only of his good fortune. He tells her all
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 3: about it with the declamatory ardor of an exalted soul. Yes, dear,
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 3: she says, it's very nice, But I do wish that
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 3: Sarah might have a new cloak. The one she's wearing
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 3: is positively shabby. And by the way, the plumber called
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 3: for his money to day or she responds with some
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 3: equally high toned and agreeable thing. And this is all
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 3: he gets and all he ever will get. She has
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 3: lost her charm. She has not grown any during all
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 3: these years of life, while he has gone far ahead.
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 3: She may have been too much burdened with children and
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 3: cares to have had time for improvement. But the fact
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 3: remains she is not his companion. She can never be.
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 3: He has made a mistake. In Alice, Albert had found
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 3: a mind akin to his own. She was much younger
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 3: in years than he, to be sure, but she had
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 3: what the girl at the picnic had not. At eighteen,
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 3: she had become well educated and knew as much as
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 3: he did with his seven and thirty years of those
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 3: things which broaden the understanding and make further development. A
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 3: matter of course, she was a fit companion for his manhood,
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 3: and he loved her. Loved her as men love who
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 3: have made mistakes and have learned to profit by them.
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 3: Knowing the difference between painted and solid substances, the difference
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 3: between eyes that merely sparkle with beauty and eyes behind
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 3: which lie a cultivated mind, knowing the difference between school
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 3: girl tattle and conversation, between society polish and a developed intellect.
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 3: He loved her and had made up his mind to
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 3: marry her, when, like a change of scene in a pantomime,
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 3: appeared the wife of the past and the wife of
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 3: the future, the wife for whom his heart yearned, began
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 3: to vanish out of sight, and the vision of what
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 3: might have been was all that he had, remaining, cursed
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 3: by a mistake. Like thousands of others, he read his
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 3: doom in it both saddened and maddened him. When the
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 3: morning came, Alice received a note from him, telling her
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 3: that he had been compelled to go to the city
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 3: on business, and enclosing his compliments to mister and missus
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 3: Dougere business. Said, mister Dogere, I don't know what business
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 3: could call him off like that. Let me see, let
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 3: me see, puffing out his cheeks and snapping his fingers.
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 3: There is nothing at the office to call him. Hum ho,
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 3: I say, Alice, added the old man, winking at her.
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 3: Couldn't you post us as to the cause of his absence.
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 3: Alice blushed at the blunt remark and made answer in
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 3: the negative, so plainly and with such evident truthfulness that
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 3: mister Dogere was convinced that he had made a mistake.
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 3: So he dropped the matter, and after breakfast, went to
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 3: the city himself. Mister Dogere was right, there was no
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 3: business which should call Albert to town that day. Alice
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 3: wondered that morning what it could be which had taken
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 3: him so suddenly away. The thought that he had told
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 3: an untruth, even a little one such as the letter
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 3: might contain, never entered her head. After hearing his opinion
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 3: of liars last night, she could not think that he
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 3: would lie, even in so small a way as that
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 3: he could not lie. So the girl decided to wait
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 3: for explanations until he should be ready to give them
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 3: a method of disposing of a doubt which it would
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 3: be well for most people to adopt, and to amuse
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 3: herself for the day by a visit to some friends
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 3: farther down the beach. Mister dougeer bothered in his brains
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 3: not a little over Albert's sudden whim, as he called it,
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 3: being always more or less interested in other folks's business
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 3: as well as his own, and not having any of
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 3: his own to trouble him. Just then. This was a
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 3: failing of mister Doge. He was opinionated, stubborn, quick to
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 3: form judgments, and poky, as the New Englanders termed it,
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 3: although good hearted and just at bottom. And if there
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 3: was any one thing which mister Doge did dislike more
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 3: than another, it was mystery. So he bothered his brains.
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 3: He knew that there was no business which would call
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 3: Albert away, but when he arrived at his office he
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 3: found that there was some business which was not part
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 3: of that laid out in his day book of Matters.
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 3: To be tended to, something which made the old man
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 3: thoroughly angry and made him very unpleasant company for the clerks.
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 3: During the night, the place had been robbed and a
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 3: quantity of fine laces just imported and were gone. No
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 3: one knew how it happened, and mister Doget was excited
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 3: and angry. Albert, who was there before mister Douget, had
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 3: been investigating the matter, but without success. The goods were gone,
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 3: and that was all that was known about it. Mister
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 3: Dojay was in a state of mind which would have
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 3: found relief in discharging every man in the place, but
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 3: not being quite fool enough to do that, he went
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 3: for Albert, as the boys say, in his bluntest style,
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 3: with a subject which had nothing whatever to do with
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 3: the robbery, say Thornberry, he said, what did you want
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 3: to go off last night in such a fashion as
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 3: that for? And then send a lying note about it.
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 3: Albert never became angry when mister d'urge was mad. He
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 3: merely looked at his partner, and although his face flushed
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 3: with anger at the insult, he made no reply whatever,
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 3: but took up his hat and left the room. Hum
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 3: said the old man fine set of follows. I've got
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 3: round here. Let me tell you there's got to be
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 3: an improvement in this place before long, or I'll know why.
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 3: And he settled himself down for the day of first
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 3: class gudgeon and a day of sorry hard times for
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 3: the clerks who could not afford, like Albert, to take
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 3: their hats leave until the storm should have passed. Albert
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 3: went about during the day thinking much over his strange
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 3: predicament and cruel fate. He loved her, and he knew
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 3: that she loved him. In fact, he had already shown her.
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 3: He feared that he loved her, and she would expect
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 3: a fuller declaration from him soon. Should he tell her
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 3: the truth, the whole truth, and trust her nobility of
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 3: mind to judge him fairly. It would be a hard
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 3: thing to do, to tell the woman to whom he
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 3: had only half proposed that the reason he could not
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 3: marry her was that he was already married. Had he
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 3: any warrant for telling her this? Perhaps not. But on
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 3: the other hand, he knew that she would expect something
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 3: from him. He could not bear the thought of having
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 3: her believe him a male flirt that most contemptible of
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 3: all two leggid creatures. What to do he did not know.
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 3: He could not flee altogether. Society would gossip. He was
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 3: in sore distress, but he made up his mind to
• 1:10:24
  Speaker 3: do one thing anyhow, He would return to the branch
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 3: and let things take their own course. Better would it
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 3: have been for him had he decided to face the
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 3: gossip's fire, better a thousand times had he fled forever
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 3: from the land. But who knows what is best for
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 3: him in this world of doubts and dilemmas. And Albert
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 3: was but one of us, a mortal, with all a
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 3: mortal's liability to err in judgment. He returned to the
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 3: branch and took up his quarters, explaining his letter to
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 3: Alice by stating that his business was finished and she
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 3: had too much sense to care to ask what might
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 3: have been the nature of his sudden call. It was
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 3: a lie which he had told her, a lie indefinite,
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 3: but nonetheless a lie. Oh man, how well thou canst preach?
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 3: How pearly dost thou practice? End of chapter six.
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 5: Chapter seven of Alice or The Wages of Sin. This
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 5: is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 5: public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 5: LibriVox dot org Alice or The Wages of Sin by
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 5: Frederick Warden Pangborn, Chapter seven. Gold gold, gold, gold, bright
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 5: and yellow, hard and cold, Spurned by the young, but
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 5: hugged by the old, to the very verge of the churchyard.
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 5: Mold price of many a crime, untold gold gold, gold, gold,
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 5: go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 5: henceforward in thy shadow, never more alone, upon the threshold
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 5: of my door of individual life. I shall command the
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 5: uses of my soul. Isaac Rosenbaum was in his shop.
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 5: Not that Isaac was ever to be found anywhere else
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 5: but in his shop, or that he was ever known
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 5: to go out of it. But Isaac was in his shop.
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 5: And what is more to our interest, he had in
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 5: his shop with him two things which are to figure
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 5: in our story. Isaac had many other things in his shop.
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 5: He had one of the finest collections of real bric
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 5: a brac in the city. He had everything in the
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 5: decorative art line of goods from a broken teapot of
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 5: it might be preadamite times. At least he would have
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 5: so dated it if by doing so he could have
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 5: made it sell to a modern twenty five cents by
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 5: the yard oil painting. He had stores of clothes, ancient
• 1:13:04
  Speaker 5: and modern. He had weapons enough and of styles sufficient
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 5: to have equipped anything from a night templar to a
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 5: Saint Patrick's parade dey martial. He had a wealth of
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 5: old iron, brass, copper and lead. He had bottles and bibles,
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 5: linen and leather, pewter and porcelain, silk and shoddy pipes
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 5: and pistols, muslins and machinery. And he also had diamonds
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 5: and rubies, silver and gold. In short, Isaac Rosenbaum was
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 5: one of that most shrewd yet ignorant, untasteful yet discriminating,
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 5: dirty low down, much sought and everywhere abused class of men.
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 5: A Chatham Street pawnbroker, Isaac was very old. Nobody knew
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 5: how old, for he had been in that shop as
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 5: long as anybody thereabout could remember. His form was bent
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 5: and shrunk by age. His beard was long and as
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 5: white as snow, and the eyes which shone from beneath
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 5: his shaggy gray brows were piercing and black and cunning.
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 5: With the alertness of wary old age, Isaac was not
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 5: attending to be busyness. On this night when we first
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 5: make his acquaintance, he was doing something which he had
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 5: done time and time again during eighteen years. He was
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 5: reading a letter, the same letter which he had read
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 5: over and over for eighteen years, wondering if the time
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 5: would ever come when this letter could be converted into
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 5: the only value which it, or anything else had in
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 5: his eyes. Money. He had kept this letter a long time,
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 5: hoping to find its owner, not with any intention of
• 1:14:26
  Speaker 5: delivering it, because it was the proper thing to do so,
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 5: but in the hope that the unknown owner might be
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 5: glad to get possession of it by paying a good price.
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 5: Isaac knew little, almost nothing concerning the letter, but he
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 5: knew enough to see money in it. For Isaac, the
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 5: contents of the letter awakened in his heart no feeling
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 5: of sentiment for the writer or the other parties mentioned
• 1:14:47
  Speaker 5: in it. But he often read it over, probably at
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 5: first in a vain search for a clue to its
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 5: mission of usefulness for him, and now more from habit
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 5: than anything else. It was the first piece of business
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 5: which had never proved to be lucrative, and he was
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 5: not satisfied to have it remained so long unproductive, he
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 5: felt as if he were being swindled. A shadow darkened
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 5: the doorway of the dirty shop, and a woman entered
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 5: noiselessly but quickly. Isaac, seeing a customer, laid the letter
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 5: upon the counter, and for the first time in his life,
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 5: forgot that he had not returned it to its hiding place.
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 5: The errand of the woman was a common enough one,
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 5: yet Isaac, venerable flint heart though he was, could not
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 5: help but notice that this customer was very beautiful. He
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 5: had had many beautiful customers before, but not one who
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 5: seemed so beautiful as this creature. She laid a ring
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 5: upon the counter and simply said, how much the old
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 5: man took the trinket, He could have shown her many
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 5: more like it in his safe, all pledges of that
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 5: love which is said to endure until death, and turning about,
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 5: threw it into a scale, weighing it with care. As
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 5: the woman stood there waiting, her eye fell upon the
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 5: letter which lay upon the counter, and she caught a
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 5: name written there. The thought was quick as the glance,
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 5: and not knowing really why she did it, she softly
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 5: took the letter and hid it in her dress. Isaac
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 5: made her an offer for the ring, a villainously meager price,
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 5: she knew, but she took the money and hurriedly left
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 5: the shop. The rage of ten thousand demons robbed of
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 5: a sinner's soul could scarcely equal that of Isaac, when
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 5: a moment later he perceived that his letter had been stolen.
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 5: What is there more indignant than a plundered thief. Isaac
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 5: had been robbed. He knew it at once, knew that
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 5: the woman had stolen his letter, the letter which he
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 5: had carefully guarded for eighteen years, the letter which was
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 5: to fill his coffers at small cost, the one investment
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 5: which had never yet proved productive. She had taken it, And,
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 5: going beyond the truth, he at once inferred that she
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 5: had come for the purpose of taking it. His wrath
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 5: and terror were pitiable, although worthy of contempt. The jew
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 5: had been out, Jude the usurer had been taken in
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 5: and done for. Isaac felt so wroth that he close
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 5: the place an hour before time. That night, while Isaac
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 5: was venting his impotent wrath upon the senseless old garments
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 5: which draped the walls of the den behind his shop,
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 5: the woman whose wedding ring he had just taken in
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 5: pawn was reading with eager eyes and blanched face the
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 5: letter which she had stolen. She had taken it in
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 5: a sudden impulse, born of the sight of two words
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 5: which had drawn her attention to it, and now that
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 5: she had made out its contents, she was filled with
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 5: many conflicting emotions. The letter would be of value to him,
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 5: perhaps that it was intended by the writer to be
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 5: sent to him. There could be no doubt in her mind.
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 5: It told him that which he did not know and
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 5: which he ought to know. And it also told her
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 5: that which made her heart sick and her brain reel
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 5: of a naturally jealous temperament. She hated arrival, even in imagination,
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 5: and this letter told of one who might be a
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 5: rival in reality, a rival widening the gap between herself
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 5: and that almost hopeless goal which she had suffered penance
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 5: ten years to reach. This was one act respect of
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 5: the case, as presented by the inferences which she drew
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 5: from the letter. But there was also another suggested to
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 5: her by this stolen letter. It might be that this,
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 5: instead of weakening her cause with her husband, could be
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 5: made to strengthen it, if she could only trace out
• 1:18:15
  Speaker 5: the mystery which the letter showed as yet to be solved.
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 5: Might it not be that Albert, in his gratitude to
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 5: her for her unselfish love and willingness to condone his
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 5: past offenses, would love her once more and take her
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 5: again to his heart. A wild throb of hope leaped
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 5: in this woman's breast at the thought. She was not
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 5: a bad woman, as women go, merely a shallow one,
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 5: but unlike most shallow women, capable of powerful passion and
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 5: great love. Perhaps she thought this letter might be made
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 5: to work for her own welfare and win back her
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 5: lost husband. She resolved not to deliver the letter at once,
• 1:18:51
  Speaker 5: but to solve its mystery herself, and then go to
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 5: him with it and plead at his feet. Little did
• 1:18:57
  Speaker 5: she think what the result of her search would reveal,
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 5: And little did she dream of the terrible denouement in
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 5: which this hidden tragedy would end. Whom the gods would
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 5: destroy they first make mad better would it have been
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 5: that they destroyed Corrotate in the madness of her love
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 5: before she could have obtained that letter. The more old
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 5: Isaac thought over the theft of the letter, the more
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 5: uneasy he became. So long as he kept the letter
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 5: in his possession, he had nothing to fear. But now
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 5: that it had fallen into the hands of an unknown person,
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 5: and one whom he believed knew more about it than he,
• 1:19:32
  Speaker 5: his fear of punishment an apology for conscience in him,
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 5: as in many other folk, began to be very disagreeable.
• 1:19:39
  Speaker 5: Knowing so much yet so little concerning this letter, he
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 5: could form no conception of what the result of its
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 5: loss might be to himself. He had intended to make
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 5: capital of the letter if opportunity should ever come, but
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 5: he never had had any intention of letting it go
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 5: out of his hands until he had made himself secure.
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 5: The shrewd old rascal had been outwitted and this letter
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 5: stolen in the dead of the night from a corpse.
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 5: Years before. This letter, which he had been detaining in
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 5: the hope that it might be the means of bringing
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 5: him gain through the misery of others, was perhaps to
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 5: bring danger to him and gain to another. Old Isaac
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 5: was in a quandary. He enjoyed a mystery, provided it
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 5: was no mystery to him, and he held the solution
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 5: in his hands. But he had serious objections to being
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 5: a part of an unsolved problem. Isaac, for the first
• 1:20:27
  Speaker 5: time in many years, was afraid. Thus conscience or an
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 5: apology for it, doth make cowards of us. All end
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 5: of chapter seven.
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 3: Chapter eight of Alice or Their Wages of sim This
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 3: is a LibriVox recording. All librivoxed recordings are in the
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 3: public domain. Former information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 3: dot org. Recording by Shasta, Oakland, California. Alice or the
• 1:21:07
  Speaker 3: Wages of Sin by Frederic Burdon Pangborn, Chapter eight. Had
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 3: it pleased Heaven to try me with affliction? Had he
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 3: reigned all kinds of sores and shames upon my bare head,
• 1:21:28
  Speaker 3: steeped me in poverty, to the very lips given to
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 3: captivity me and my utmost hopes, I should have found
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 3: in some part of my soul a drop of patience,
• 1:21:42
  Speaker 3: but alas to make me a fixed figure for the
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 3: time of scorn. To point his slow, unmoving finger at
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 3: I have given suck and know how tender tiss to
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 3: love the babe that milks me, I would, while it
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 3: was smiling in my face, have plucked my nipple from
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 3: its boneless gums and dashed the brains out. Had I
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 3: so sworn as you have done to this, mister Georgeare
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 3: was up to his eyes in business. Thornbury had been
• 1:22:22
  Speaker 3: much at the branch and was supposed to be enjoying
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 3: Alice's company. He certainly was in her company much of
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 3: the time that a reader of his inner life, if
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 3: such reader could have been found, would have found it
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 3: difficult to assert that he was enjoying himself. His was
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 3: an infatuation which boded no good for himself or to Alice.
• 1:22:52
  Speaker 3: Loving her madly, yet knowing that he must never let
• 1:22:57
  Speaker 3: it be known. Yearning for the boom which could never
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 3: become his, he hovered about her like the moth about
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 3: the candle flame, differing from the moth, and that he
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 3: knew his danger, yet liked the moth. Unable to break
• 1:23:14
  Speaker 3: away from the fatal brightness, he lingered about her, loving
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 3: her in silence, yet thinking to avoid doing harm. And
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 3: Alice loved him, loved him as only women of the
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 3: highest type can love. The time wore on, and mister
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 3: Dogere was busy with a business new to him, thief hunting.
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 3: He had employed detectives and was filled with a buld
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 3: dog determination to find out how the robbery had been committed.
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 3: And by whom I tell you what? Thornberry, he said,
• 1:23:58
  Speaker 3: Let me tell you I I will get to the
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 3: bottom of this thing. Or my name isn't John Dougare.
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 3: If there's any one thing I hate more than anything else,
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 3: by thunder, it's a mystery. I've had one mystery in
• 1:24:13
  Speaker 3: my life, and one is enough. There was my wife's sister,
• 1:24:18
  Speaker 3: daughter of Luke Morton, now dead, disappeared one night years
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 3: ago and never was heard of since, killed her mother
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 3: and the old man too, and made Sarah as miserable
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 3: as if she had lost me, perhaps more so. And
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 3: by jove, I don't like a mystery. Here's this robbery
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 3: committed right under our noses, doors and windows, all right,
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 3: yet the place robed. And let me tell you, my son,
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 3: I will know how it happened. And he did know,
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 3: sooner than he expected, and not with the result for
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 3: which he had hope. As the old man sat in
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 3: his office late in the day, one of the thief
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 3: hunters entered and closed the door. What do you want, said,
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 3: mister dogare more money to go on with your make
• 1:25:18
  Speaker 3: believe detective work. I'll give you one more installment, but
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 3: after that let me tell you, my friend, no more
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 3: money until the goods are delivered. The man took his seat.
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 3: I have found some of the lost race, he said.
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 3: Mister Dogere was interested thoroughly. Now where, he said, in
• 1:25:43
  Speaker 3: a fence's place in Chatham Street. The old cheney who
• 1:25:48
  Speaker 3: has got the stuff was scared when I charged him
• 1:25:52
  Speaker 3: with receiving it at night through his back alley door.
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 3: And when I told him a few more things, he
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 3: owned up, but he would not give me a cue
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 3: to get the fellow who stole the goods. Said he
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 3: would give up the lease, but not the man unless
• 1:26:11
  Speaker 3: you came personally and asked him to what's the act
• 1:26:16
  Speaker 3: like that for, said mister Dogair. I'll soon make him
• 1:26:19
  Speaker 3: give up his thief. I'll go there with you tonight.
• 1:26:24
  Speaker 3: That night, mister Dogair and the officer went to Old
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 3: Isaac's shop, and mister Dojare identified his stolen property. He
• 1:26:35
  Speaker 3: then demanded that Isaac should surrender the thief. Isaac seemed
• 1:26:41
  Speaker 3: loath to do so, but mister Dojaar threatened him with
• 1:26:45
  Speaker 3: immediate arrest if he did not comply with this request.
• 1:26:49
  Speaker 3: The old Jew's eye glowed with a strange light when
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 3: he made an arrangement that mister Dojair and the officer
• 1:26:59
  Speaker 3: should conceal themselves in his shop at one o'clock that night.
• 1:27:04
  Speaker 3: That was the hour, he said, when the thief would
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 3: come with the rest of the stolen lace, for part
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 3: of it was still missing. At the appointed time, mister
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 3: Dogare and his man were ready concealed in the shop,
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 3: awaiting the coming of their prisoner, that was to be
• 1:27:24
  Speaker 3: mister Dogere was beginning to enjoy the affair. They had
• 1:27:29
  Speaker 3: not long to wait. In a moment, a slight sound
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 3: was heard without Old Isaac unbolted the back door, and
• 1:27:38
  Speaker 3: a man entered bearing a bundle. It was the remainder
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 3: of the stolen lace. Isaac stepped back, and the man
• 1:27:50
  Speaker 3: laid the bundle upon the counter and opened it. Then,
• 1:27:55
  Speaker 3: turning about, revealed to mister Dogare, who had come forth
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 3: from his hiding place, the well known features of his
• 1:28:05
  Speaker 3: own son, Joe Clerk, in the office of his father
• 1:28:11
  Speaker 3: and future member of the firm of Dojare and Company,
• 1:28:16
  Speaker 3: the house of many years standing an untarnished reputation. Mister
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 3: Dogare gazed at the young man, who was too much
• 1:28:26
  Speaker 3: terrified to move, with a look of horror and disgust
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 3: depicted on his sturdy countenance. Great God, he muttered, can
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 3: this be my son? Long and fixedly he gazed upon
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 3: the youth, the officer standing in readiness to seize the
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 3: prisoner at a signal. Old Isaac himself affected to silence
• 1:28:54
  Speaker 3: by the work he had done, and a shadow, like
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 3: the grayness of death pallor fell upon his face. His son,
• 1:29:06
  Speaker 3: the beloved son in whom he had been well pleased,
• 1:29:10
  Speaker 3: the son of his old age, the babe of his
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 3: early manhood, the son to whom he looked for support
• 1:29:19
  Speaker 3: in coming years, the son upon whom he had intended
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 3: to shower blessings such as only the rich can give
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 3: their children. His son, his heir, his successor in that
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 3: honorable house, his boy a thief. The terrible truth came
• 1:29:40
  Speaker 3: flowing in upon his mind, like the rush of waters
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 3: from a bursted lake sweeping through a fair valley, and
• 1:29:50
  Speaker 3: he felt a strange sense of dread stealing upon him.
• 1:29:55
  Speaker 3: Dread for the future, dread for the past and the present.
• 1:30:00
  Speaker 3: He felt a fear of the truth now, as great
• 1:30:05
  Speaker 3: as had been his desire to know the truth an
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 3: hour ago. His son was a thief, a mean, low, souled,
• 1:30:14
  Speaker 3: sneaking thief. He thought of his honor among men, of
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 3: his pride in this boy, of his wife, that thief's mother,
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 3: And he thought of justice. A terrible conflict was now
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 3: raging in his soul, a silent conflict, such as takes
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 3: place only in the souls of men of sterner stuff.
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 3: So long he stood there that the officer opened his
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 3: mouth to speak, but mister Dogere silenced him with a sign.
• 1:30:52
  Speaker 3: His thoughts were shaping themselves now and becoming coherent. This
• 1:30:58
  Speaker 3: was his son. This was a thief. This was the
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 3: boy his wife loved. This was a thief. This was
• 1:31:09
  Speaker 3: the son in whom had centered his best hopes and
• 1:31:14
  Speaker 3: tenderest affections, in whom he had placed all confidence, and
• 1:31:19
  Speaker 3: who was to be some day entrusted with the care
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 3: of that house of great business and honorable reputation. This
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 3: was a thief. He thought of all these things, and more.
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 3: He thought of his wife, the mother of Alice, the
• 1:31:39
  Speaker 3: sister of Albert, the friend of himself, the father, an employer.
• 1:31:46
  Speaker 3: He thought of the law and of justice. And there
• 1:31:50
  Speaker 3: came from his lips, as from the lips of an
• 1:31:53
  Speaker 3: Abraham at the funeral, pyre, gazing lovingly upon the face
• 1:31:58
  Speaker 3: of his isaac, the words it must be, so take him, officer,
• 1:32:06
  Speaker 3: I will appear against him tomorrow. And the old gentleman
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 3: passed out into the night, the blackest night which he
• 1:32:16
  Speaker 3: had ever seen, and with a blacker night in his heart,
• 1:32:21
  Speaker 3: walked sturdily and sadly to his lonely home, where God
• 1:32:26
  Speaker 3: alone knows how he spent the hours until daylight. True
• 1:32:32
  Speaker 3: to his promise, the father appeared next morning against his son,
• 1:32:38
  Speaker 3: and the magistrate bound the youth over for trial. The
• 1:32:43
  Speaker 3: firmness of mister Dorgere under this trial was something woeful
• 1:32:49
  Speaker 3: to contemplate. Many men thought him harsh and unfeeling, bigoted,
• 1:32:55
  Speaker 3: and even cruel. They knew not of the fire of
• 1:32:59
  Speaker 3: any wish which burned deep down in his soul as
• 1:33:04
  Speaker 3: he gazed at that beloved son, whom he was delivering
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 3: up to the stern hands of justice and law. But
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 3: mister de Jair was a peculiar man, one of the
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 3: sort who could bear the gnawing of the fox at
• 1:33:22
  Speaker 3: his bibles and still be calm. And so he bore
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 3: the comments of his fellow men without retort, and suffered
• 1:33:32
  Speaker 3: in silence. Wrongheaded, it may be, but true to his principles.
• 1:33:40
  Speaker 3: Had Job been any other clerk in the house, his
• 1:33:43
  Speaker 3: treatment would have been the same, no worse, no better.
• 1:33:49
  Speaker 3: This sad disclosure put an end to the stay of
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 3: the family at the branch, and the mother and sister
• 1:33:57
  Speaker 3: returned to a saddenedcomb. The hardest part of mister Georgere's
• 1:34:03
  Speaker 3: trial was yet to come, and hard as it was,
• 1:34:07
  Speaker 3: he bore it calmly and firmly. The pleading of the
• 1:34:12
  Speaker 3: mother for her son, the supplications of the girl whom
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 3: he so dearly loved, praying with tearful eyes for her brother,
• 1:34:22
  Speaker 3: were hard to endure, but he bore them. Almighty God
• 1:34:28
  Speaker 3: administering the sentence of doom to the rebellious angels, could
• 1:34:34
  Speaker 3: not have been more firm in the sad solemnity of
• 1:34:38
  Speaker 3: his stern final judgment. Thornbury entered his plea for the
• 1:34:45
  Speaker 3: unfortunate Jove, but it was a vain appeal. Joe was
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 3: a criminal, and no less a criminal because he was
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 3: the son of the man against whom he had sinned.
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 3: Should the judge upon the bench refused to pass sentence
• 1:35:03
  Speaker 3: on his guilty and convicted son mister Goujaire would not
• 1:35:08
  Speaker 3: have admitted that any judge had the right so to do,
• 1:35:13
  Speaker 3: and it was not right that he should shield the guilty,
• 1:35:17
  Speaker 3: And because it was not right, he would not do it.
• 1:35:20
  Speaker 3: It sundered his very heartstrings to thus decide, but it
• 1:35:25
  Speaker 3: was just and justice must be done. And so the
• 1:35:31
  Speaker 3: luckless Joe, gay and foolish, once light hearted and free,
• 1:35:37
  Speaker 3: was confined in jail to await the dreaded trial which
• 1:35:42
  Speaker 3: should make him a branded felon and forever blessed his
• 1:35:47
  Speaker 3: life prospects, while his mother and sister sat silent in
• 1:35:52
  Speaker 3: dumb terror, and his father went about his business with
• 1:35:58
  Speaker 3: the vulture at his heart and his silent sorrow eating
• 1:36:03
  Speaker 3: the life from his soul. End of chapter eight. Chapter
• 1:36:14
  Speaker 3: nine of Alice or The Wages of Sin. This is
• 1:36:18
  Speaker 3: a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
• 1:36:25
  Speaker 3: For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
• 1:36:31
  Speaker 3: Recording by Shasta Oakland, California. Alice or the Wages of
• 1:36:37
  Speaker 3: Sin by Frederic Worden Pangborn. Chapter nine. Should a serpent
• 1:36:44
  Speaker 3: tell me with a look like that there was no
• 1:36:48
  Speaker 3: venom in his sting? I would believe him. While the
• 1:36:53
  Speaker 3: senior member of the House of Dorgerre was busy making
• 1:36:57
  Speaker 3: money and hunting thieves, the younger member was playing a
• 1:37:02
  Speaker 3: dangerous game. Albert, despite his resolve to avoid all danger,
• 1:37:08
  Speaker 3: found himself unable to keep Alice from his thoughts or
• 1:37:13
  Speaker 3: to remain absent from her side. An irresistible fate seemed
• 1:37:19
  Speaker 3: to draw him to her, which battle against it as
• 1:37:23
  Speaker 3: he might, was not to be conquered. The flame was bright,
• 1:37:28
  Speaker 3: and the moth could not resist the temptation to singe
• 1:37:32
  Speaker 3: his wings. Would that the metaphor were perfect, and that
• 1:37:37
  Speaker 3: in this case it had been only the moth which
• 1:37:41
  Speaker 3: could be injured. Alice was now deeply in love with Albert,
• 1:37:46
  Speaker 3: a pure womanly love which only waited to be asked,
• 1:37:51
  Speaker 3: and it would give its all to the well being
• 1:37:54
  Speaker 3: of the one whom it thought it had found worthy.
• 1:37:58
  Speaker 3: Albert knew this, and thought of that other love, dead
• 1:38:03
  Speaker 3: now yet binding him with a galling, never to be
• 1:38:07
  Speaker 3: severed chain maddened him. At times he thought he would
• 1:38:13
  Speaker 3: tell Alice all his history, and throw himself from mercy
• 1:38:17
  Speaker 3: at her feet, and beg her to cast him off.
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 3: But it was a difficult thing to do more than once.
• 1:38:27
  Speaker 3: He had almost done this, but at the crucial moment
• 1:38:31
  Speaker 3: his courage would fail without meaning to. He had made
• 1:38:36
  Speaker 3: love to her. How could it be otherwise with two
• 1:38:40
  Speaker 3: persons whose whole souls and tastes were akin And Alice
• 1:38:47
  Speaker 3: knew it, knew it by instinct, and waited with loving
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 3: heart for more. She knew that he loved her. Yet
• 1:38:56
  Speaker 3: sometimes there would come over him fits of abstraction which
• 1:39:01
  Speaker 3: seemed unexplainable, and she would find herself distressed that she
• 1:39:06
  Speaker 3: could not ask him to let her share his cares
• 1:39:10
  Speaker 3: and show him how much she would bear for him.
• 1:39:14
  Speaker 3: On one occasion, as they were riding along through a
• 1:39:18
  Speaker 3: lonely region of silence, one of these fits came upon him,
• 1:39:24
  Speaker 3: which distressed her so that she could no longer restrain
• 1:39:28
  Speaker 3: herself from offering him her sympathy. The silence had been
• 1:39:34
  Speaker 3: of long duration, and she said, Albert, my friend, what
• 1:39:41
  Speaker 3: a tenderness was in her voice, although she strove to
• 1:39:44
  Speaker 3: make it merely friendly. Is there not some trouble brewing
• 1:39:49
  Speaker 3: in your heart, some wrong which a friend might share
• 1:39:54
  Speaker 3: and bear with you, making the burden less burdensome to
• 1:39:58
  Speaker 3: the heart which now bears it alone. I do not
• 1:40:02
  Speaker 3: desire to intrude on your thoughts, but I have noticed
• 1:40:07
  Speaker 3: that often when with me, you become troubled. And I
• 1:40:11
  Speaker 3: know that I am not the cause of this trouble,
• 1:40:15
  Speaker 3: whatever it may be. If I were less your friend,
• 1:40:19
  Speaker 3: I might think it is I who have displeased you.
• 1:40:22
  Speaker 3: But true friends should not so judge the moods of
• 1:40:27
  Speaker 3: their dear ones. It is only silly school girls who
• 1:40:32
  Speaker 3: thus take crude offense at imagined wrongs. If your trouble
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 3: is one that a friend might share, let me be
• 1:40:42
  Speaker 3: that friend. Did ever manhood receive a truer tribute of
• 1:40:48
  Speaker 3: love than this? Albert thought not, and the words and
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 3: the tone of the speaker's voice fell with telling power
• 1:40:58
  Speaker 3: upon his heart. He tried to make some commonplace answer,
• 1:41:04
  Speaker 3: but the answer would not come. Such words as those
• 1:41:08
  Speaker 3: just spoken do not admit of flippant reply. He was
• 1:41:13
  Speaker 3: on the point of telling her all the truth, but
• 1:41:16
  Speaker 3: the thought came that perhaps she might resent the insult
• 1:41:21
  Speaker 3: which he had been offering her womanhood by his silent courtship.
• 1:41:27
  Speaker 3: Should he tell her how he had loved her while
• 1:41:30
  Speaker 3: belonging to another woman. And his courage failed him. Still,
• 1:41:37
  Speaker 3: he was moved to secure her sympathy. So much did
• 1:41:40
  Speaker 3: he yearn for it? Yes, Alice, he replied, there is
• 1:41:46
  Speaker 3: a trouble weighing on my heart, A trouble so sore
• 1:41:50
  Speaker 3: that try as I will not to bear it about
• 1:41:54
  Speaker 3: with me, it will not down. It comes to me
• 1:41:58
  Speaker 3: in the lone hours of the night, it often follows
• 1:42:02
  Speaker 3: me by day, and even in your entertaining, he nearly said,
• 1:42:07
  Speaker 3: precious company, it sometimes finds me out and will not
• 1:42:12
  Speaker 3: be dispelled. Like many other men, I bear with me
• 1:42:17
  Speaker 3: a burden which I can alone scarcely carry, and which
• 1:42:22
  Speaker 3: another cannot share. But are you sure that no friend could,
• 1:42:28
  Speaker 3: by his sympathy make your burden less heavy? Could not
• 1:42:33
  Speaker 3: the sacred fellowship of a true friend's confidence become a
• 1:42:38
  Speaker 3: solace in this sorrow or care, even though it might
• 1:42:43
  Speaker 3: not till the sorrow or remove the care. I fear not,
• 1:42:48
  Speaker 3: my friend. There are often burdens in the soul of man,
• 1:42:54
  Speaker 3: the sharing of which with another might make them doubly weighty.
• 1:42:59
  Speaker 3: Mine is such a burden, begotten of no fault of mine,
• 1:43:05
  Speaker 3: but only a mistake. It is mine to bear forever,
• 1:43:09
  Speaker 3: blighting my dearest hopes, and making my life at times
• 1:43:14
  Speaker 3: a thing which I would sell like esau for a
• 1:43:19
  Speaker 3: mess of perishable cottage. Could I but enjoy the price
• 1:43:24
  Speaker 3: and then die. You should not talk like that, she said.
• 1:43:30
  Speaker 3: It is not manly and does not please me. If
• 1:43:34
  Speaker 3: your trouble is of such a kind as you say,
• 1:43:37
  Speaker 3: bear it bravely and hope for a brighter day when
• 1:43:41
  Speaker 3: it shall begin to be less of a burden. Live
• 1:43:46
  Speaker 3: in your usefulness as a man, and fine comfort in
• 1:43:51
  Speaker 3: your friends. I do not ask you to tell me
• 1:43:54
  Speaker 3: that which must be hid in secret, whatever it be.
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 3: I believe you when you say that it is no
• 1:44:03
  Speaker 3: fault of yours which blights your life. And I offer
• 1:44:07
  Speaker 3: you my truest friendship now, if you will take it
• 1:44:11
  Speaker 3: for what it is worth, A friendship which asks nothing
• 1:44:15
  Speaker 3: which it is not yours to give, and which believes
• 1:44:19
  Speaker 3: in your honesty and trusts you. Surely men have had
• 1:44:24
  Speaker 3: women friends who were above the grade of those who
• 1:44:28
  Speaker 3: seek their opposites in sex merely that they may gain
• 1:44:32
  Speaker 3: their affections later. Such a friendship I offer you, Albert.
• 1:44:37
  Speaker 3: Will you accept it? How she loved this man to
• 1:44:42
  Speaker 3: whom she was proffering only friendship. She felt that he
• 1:44:46
  Speaker 3: loved her, and that for some reason she knew not what.
• 1:44:51
  Speaker 3: He could not tell her so, but she meant what
• 1:44:54
  Speaker 3: she had said, and was willing to have it so
• 1:44:58
  Speaker 3: decreed if it could never be otherwise. When he told
• 1:45:03
  Speaker 3: her that he was blameless, she believed him and would
• 1:45:07
  Speaker 3: have scorned to question him. And he blameless. Yes, he
• 1:45:13
  Speaker 3: knew that it was not his fault that the dead
• 1:45:16
  Speaker 3: had come to life. But was he wholly blameless for
• 1:45:20
  Speaker 3: his life? Subsequent to that revelation, which had shown him
• 1:45:25
  Speaker 3: that he could no longer think of Alice but with sin,
• 1:45:30
  Speaker 3: he feared that he was not, But he felt that
• 1:45:34
  Speaker 3: he could not leave her. Alice, He said, his voice
• 1:45:38
  Speaker 3: low and tender, I accept your noble offer. I take
• 1:45:43
  Speaker 3: your friendship. Let it be ever as the friendship of
• 1:45:47
  Speaker 3: those who parting in death hope to again clasp hands
• 1:45:53
  Speaker 3: in a happier and fairer land than the one in
• 1:45:57
  Speaker 3: which they part. Let it be friendship, true, unquestioning, and eternal.
• 1:46:05
  Speaker 3: I accept it, and may God bless you for it.
• 1:46:10
  Speaker 3: They spoke no more that night, but rode home in silence.
• 1:46:15
  Speaker 3: Albert felt a sense of relief that bond of friendship
• 1:46:21
  Speaker 3: seemed to have placed a guard about Alice, which made
• 1:46:25
  Speaker 3: it seem that he was a little nearer to the
• 1:46:28
  Speaker 3: path of right than before. But she she loved him,
• 1:46:33
  Speaker 3: and she had not the consolation of knowledge to soothe
• 1:46:37
  Speaker 3: her disturbed mind. So the compact was made, and they
• 1:46:42
  Speaker 3: continued to make love, calling it friendship. What's in a
• 1:46:47
  Speaker 3: name O fatal deceit that lies in ambiguity, whether it
• 1:46:53
  Speaker 3: be of word or sense, these knew not even what
• 1:46:58
  Speaker 3: friendship is. Meanwhile, came the dreadful news of the crime
• 1:47:04
  Speaker 3: committed by Joe, and the family returned to the city,
• 1:47:09
  Speaker 3: saddened by the disgrace which had come upon them. Alice
• 1:47:15
  Speaker 3: felt for her brother most keenly, and her pleadings with
• 1:47:19
  Speaker 3: the stern old man his father were many and piteous,
• 1:47:24
  Speaker 3: but they availed nothing. Driven by despair and sorrow, she
• 1:47:30
  Speaker 3: took her trouble to Albert, who had also done all
• 1:47:34
  Speaker 3: in his power to save Joe from his father's just severity.
• 1:47:40
  Speaker 3: To Albert, the grief stricken girl opened her heart and
• 1:47:44
  Speaker 3: pleaded as Portia pleaded for Antonio in vain hope that
• 1:47:50
  Speaker 3: he might win from his partner's rigorous heart some touch
• 1:47:54
  Speaker 3: of mercy. And Albert was moved by this woman's tears
• 1:48:00
  Speaker 3: as never woman had moved him before. He promised her
• 1:48:04
  Speaker 3: that if it were a possible thing to do, he
• 1:48:08
  Speaker 3: would save Joe from the disgrace of state prison. The
• 1:48:12
  Speaker 3: trial was near at hand, and mister dougere kept mostly
• 1:48:18
  Speaker 3: by himself, staying late at his office and leaving the
• 1:48:22
  Speaker 3: house early in the morning. His stout old heart was breaking,
• 1:48:27
  Speaker 3: but no one knew it. Such natures as his must
• 1:48:32
  Speaker 3: always suffer in silence. Meanwhile, the trial was approaching, and
• 1:48:38
  Speaker 3: Joe had become certain that his doom was sealed. Thornbury
• 1:48:44
  Speaker 3: kept his own counsel, and only when he had solved
• 1:48:47
  Speaker 3: the problem, made known his plans to Alice, and she,
• 1:48:53
  Speaker 3: moved by her woman's heart, accepted them and forgave her friend,
• 1:48:58
  Speaker 3: as he asked her to, for the wrong which he
• 1:49:02
  Speaker 3: had done to please her. So one dark, rainy night,
• 1:49:08
  Speaker 3: a boat landed on the lonely shore of Rareton Bay,
• 1:49:13
  Speaker 3: and Joe, well disguised and accompanied by Albert and Alice,
• 1:49:19
  Speaker 3: stood upon the sands and clasped hands for the last time,
• 1:49:24
  Speaker 3: perhaps upon earth. Joe had full directions and money from Albert,
• 1:49:31
  Speaker 3: and this was to be their last meeting. The morrow
• 1:49:35
  Speaker 3: would see Joe fleeing for lands unknown, while the other
• 1:49:40
  Speaker 3: two would return home to pray for the erring one
• 1:49:45
  Speaker 3: and keep the secret. Joe was free. In a short time,
• 1:49:51
  Speaker 3: he would be beyond capture, and the state prison would
• 1:49:55
  Speaker 3: never confine him within its walls. A woman's pity had
• 1:50:00
  Speaker 3: saved him, A friend's frailty had delivered him from punishment.
• 1:50:07
  Speaker 3: Albert's money had bought him freedom. It could never buy
• 1:50:11
  Speaker 3: back his reputation, It could never restore him to honor,
• 1:50:17
  Speaker 3: but it had given him his liberty. He was free,
• 1:50:21
  Speaker 3: and Albert, the man of business honor, whom no man
• 1:50:26
  Speaker 3: could have moved to do a dishonest deed, had bribed
• 1:50:31
  Speaker 3: the jailer and set the prisoner free because a woman
• 1:50:36
  Speaker 3: had pleaded with weeping eyes. That which he had done
• 1:50:41
  Speaker 3: had been done for this woman, whom he called his friend,
• 1:50:46
  Speaker 3: O friendship, what would you not induce men to do
• 1:50:50
  Speaker 3: when your alias is love? End of chapter nine.
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 4: Chapter ten of Alice or The Wages of Sin. This
• 1:51:05
  Speaker 4: is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
• 1:51:08
  Speaker 4: public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
• 1:51:13
  Speaker 4: LibriVox dot org. Recording by Simon Arussu Alice or The
• 1:51:17
  Speaker 4: Wages of Sin by Frederic Worden Pangborn, Chapter ten, Gathering
• 1:51:23
  Speaker 4: of the storm clouds. Woe, woe, weell fated one my
• 1:51:27
  Speaker 4: last word, this, this only, and no more, for evermore.
• 1:51:32
  Speaker 4: Hell hath no fury, like a woman scorned. The foll
• 1:51:36
  Speaker 4: days were come, and things had relapsed into their former routine.
• 1:51:41
  Speaker 4: The saddened household went about its customary rounds, and none
• 1:51:45
  Speaker 4: of its members ever mentioned the name of the one
• 1:51:47
  Speaker 4: who had brought disgrace upon its honorable name. The heart
• 1:51:51
  Speaker 4: of the mother was sore, but she bore her trouble
• 1:51:54
  Speaker 4: in silent patience, hoping for a day of forgiveness and
• 1:51:58
  Speaker 4: the return of the prodigal Mister Dodger was in his
• 1:52:01
  Speaker 4: daily doings the same as before, but he was never
• 1:52:05
  Speaker 4: jolly now as he had been at times in the past,
• 1:52:08
  Speaker 4: and he had become stern in his manner and unsocial.
• 1:52:12
  Speaker 4: Some natures are thus affected by grief or wrong. They
• 1:52:15
  Speaker 4: never mellow under the hand of chastisement or the pain
• 1:52:19
  Speaker 4: of sorrow, but harden into silent austerity. Alice was not
• 1:52:24
  Speaker 4: altogether unhappy, for she felt that brighter days would come,
• 1:52:28
  Speaker 4: and was hopeful. She knew that she was beloved, and
• 1:52:31
  Speaker 4: she trusted in the honor of this lover, who, for
• 1:52:34
  Speaker 4: some reason could not tell his love. Albert behaved much
• 1:52:38
  Speaker 4: as formerly, but his fits of abstraction were often upon him.
• 1:52:42
  Speaker 4: He felt himself accursed, and began to look upon his
• 1:52:45
  Speaker 4: wife as upon one who had no right to stand
• 1:52:48
  Speaker 4: between him and his desires. He had pitied her at first,
• 1:52:52
  Speaker 4: now he hated her. She had become his enemy, and
• 1:52:55
  Speaker 4: he sometimes found himself wishing that she would die and
• 1:52:59
  Speaker 4: set him free. The wish was wicked, but it was
• 1:53:02
  Speaker 4: a desire of nature and uncontrollable. One evening he received
• 1:53:07
  Speaker 4: a note. It was from Cora. With mingled thoughts, he
• 1:53:10
  Speaker 4: opened it. It was a request that he would call
• 1:53:13
  Speaker 4: on her just once, and she assured him that after
• 1:53:16
  Speaker 4: that she would never trouble him again. You surely will
• 1:53:19
  Speaker 4: not refuse a dying woman's request, the note said. It
• 1:53:23
  Speaker 4: contained an address in a miserable locality, and thither he
• 1:53:27
  Speaker 4: went that night, feeling a sort of pity for the woman,
• 1:53:30
  Speaker 4: now that she was nearing her end and could not
• 1:53:32
  Speaker 4: be a clog upon his freedom much longer. Thus do
• 1:53:35
  Speaker 4: we often forgive those who can no longer injure us.
• 1:53:39
  Speaker 4: He found her in a wretched room, in her bed,
• 1:53:41
  Speaker 4: with a paler of final sickness upon her face. He
• 1:53:45
  Speaker 4: entered and stood beside her couch, waiting for her to speak.
• 1:53:49
  Speaker 4: She gazed at him long and earnestly. You do not
• 1:53:52
  Speaker 4: hate me, now, Albert, do you? She said? Hate you? No, Cora,
• 1:53:57
  Speaker 4: I hope that I have never done that. You wronged
• 1:53:59
  Speaker 4: me once, but that is past. Now. You asked me
• 1:54:02
  Speaker 4: to love you again, but I could not. It was
• 1:54:05
  Speaker 4: not my fault. I could not. But you will forgive me, Albert.
• 1:54:09
  Speaker 4: I know you will. If you knew how I have
• 1:54:12
  Speaker 4: yearned for you all these long years, repenting the rash
• 1:54:15
  Speaker 4: deed which I did not do, yet having thought to
• 1:54:19
  Speaker 4: do it must bear its penalty in fool. You would
• 1:54:22
  Speaker 4: be full of pity for me. You would love me
• 1:54:25
  Speaker 4: a little, only just a little, perhaps, but you could
• 1:54:28
  Speaker 4: not help loving me. I have suffered all that I
• 1:54:31
  Speaker 4: can suffer for my sin. I have lost your love.
• 1:54:34
  Speaker 4: Sometimes I have thought my punishment too severe, unjust even,
• 1:54:38
  Speaker 4: but God knows best about that. It is enough for
• 1:54:41
  Speaker 4: me to know that I have lost your love, and
• 1:54:44
  Speaker 4: that I have no hope in life. I did think, Albert,
• 1:54:47
  Speaker 4: that I might, by true penitence, wean you back. I
• 1:54:50
  Speaker 4: thought that these weary years of silence and honest remorse
• 1:54:53
  Speaker 4: might awaken your love again and give you back to me.
• 1:54:57
  Speaker 4: When I met you that night by the water, I
• 1:54:59
  Speaker 4: had and I saw that you believed my story. But
• 1:55:02
  Speaker 4: I did not know then. I know it now. You
• 1:55:05
  Speaker 4: could not love me because you had learned to love another,
• 1:55:08
  Speaker 4: and my coming was like a death blow to your hopes.
• 1:55:11
  Speaker 4: Do not look at me, so I will not upbraid you. Dear.
• 1:55:15
  Speaker 4: She is perhaps better than I, But, oh, Albert, she
• 1:55:18
  Speaker 4: can never love you more dearly than I do now, sinful, weak,
• 1:55:21
  Speaker 4: penitent and dying. But Albert, she that woman, Please talk
• 1:55:26
  Speaker 4: of something else. The words were cold and cutting, and
• 1:55:29
  Speaker 4: the woman shuddered. Albert, dear, she continued, after a pause,
• 1:55:33
  Speaker 4: You must hear me this time, because it will be
• 1:55:36
  Speaker 4: the last, and because it is for your good that
• 1:55:38
  Speaker 4: I wish to speak to you. Oh, do not refuse
• 1:55:41
  Speaker 4: to hear me now, or you may regret it all
• 1:55:44
  Speaker 4: your life. Albert, tell me, truly, have I guessed right?
• 1:55:47
  Speaker 4: Do you love this Alice better than my own immortal soul?
• 1:55:52
  Speaker 4: He murmured, scarcely knowing what he answered. I knew it, Albert.
• 1:55:56
  Speaker 4: My instinct guided me. All right, you love Alice. She
• 1:56:00
  Speaker 4: is good and noble. But O, my husband, when I
• 1:56:03
  Speaker 4: am dead and gone, you must not wed that woman.
• 1:56:06
  Speaker 4: Peace woman, The words came sternly and coldly. Peace, I say,
• 1:56:10
  Speaker 4: I cannot obey you, she cried, rising in her couch,
• 1:56:13
  Speaker 4: her face flushing with a fever redness. I cannot hold
• 1:56:16
  Speaker 4: my peace, Albert, by the love you once bore me,
• 1:56:19
  Speaker 4: by the love I bear you. Now I implore you.
• 1:56:21
  Speaker 4: A dying woman implores you, Albert, not to love that woman.
• 1:56:25
  Speaker 4: She must never be your wife. She cannot, she shall not.
• 1:56:29
  Speaker 4: I tell you to hold your peace, he cried, Such
• 1:56:32
  Speaker 4: as you shall not name her to me, O husband,
• 1:56:35
  Speaker 4: she cried, springing from the couch and throwing herself at
• 1:56:38
  Speaker 4: his feet, her rich, dark hair flowing about her. Oh,
• 1:56:41
  Speaker 4: my husband, hear me, hear me. This must not be, Albert.
• 1:56:45
  Speaker 4: Never could I rest in my grave if such a
• 1:56:47
  Speaker 4: thing were to come on you. I love you, Albert,
• 1:56:50
  Speaker 4: love you better than you know. And you must not
• 1:56:52
  Speaker 4: love her. She sees a cursed woman. I will not
• 1:56:56
  Speaker 4: listen to you, O husband, curse me not. I love you,
• 1:57:00
  Speaker 4: so I have much to tell yet, and if you
• 1:57:02
  Speaker 4: will but hear me, you will cover my poor head
• 1:57:05
  Speaker 4: with blessings, not curses, for the love I give you,
• 1:57:08
  Speaker 4: when I might have been revenge for curse. Unjust. This Alice,
• 1:57:12
  Speaker 4: whom you love, is not. Will you obey me? Or
• 1:57:15
  Speaker 4: shall I leave you here fleeing from the sound of
• 1:57:17
  Speaker 4: your polluting voice? Hear me, Albert, I will be brief.
• 1:57:21
  Speaker 4: You cannot wed this woman whom you love. I will
• 1:57:24
  Speaker 4: not allow it. I your wife, forbid it. She with
• 1:57:28
  Speaker 4: an oath. He flung her from him and fled. She
• 1:57:31
  Speaker 4: lay unconscious on the floor a long time, and then,
• 1:57:34
  Speaker 4: crawling feebly to her bed, lay down in thought. And
• 1:57:37
  Speaker 4: as she thought her love cherished so long, began to
• 1:57:40
  Speaker 4: grow cold and turn to hate. This man, whom she
• 1:57:43
  Speaker 4: had loved all the long years, for whom she had
• 1:57:46
  Speaker 4: suffered so much, whom she was willing to renounce forever,
• 1:57:50
  Speaker 4: and to whom she had been ready to do a
• 1:57:52
  Speaker 4: great service. This man had spurned her, had rejected the
• 1:57:55
  Speaker 4: sacrifice which she was about to make. This man has
• 1:57:58
  Speaker 4: scorned her, cursed her, and she now began to hate him.
• 1:58:03
  Speaker 4: And as the hatred grew, its force came ever in
• 1:58:06
  Speaker 4: increasing volumes of anathemas until she hated him with a
• 1:58:10
  Speaker 4: dangerous and vengeful hatred, which, had she been able to act,
• 1:58:14
  Speaker 4: would have boded him no good. But she was sick
• 1:58:17
  Speaker 4: and dying, while he was well and prosperous. She hated
• 1:58:20
  Speaker 4: him now for that, she hated him for everything that
• 1:58:23
  Speaker 4: was of him or near to him. And thus she
• 1:58:26
  Speaker 4: lay in her lonely bed, hating the husband whom she
• 1:58:29
  Speaker 4: had loved so much during those ten long years. When Albert,
• 1:58:33
  Speaker 4: ashamed of his brutality and sorry for his rashness, returned
• 1:58:37
  Speaker 4: next morning to ask a more amicable farewell from the
• 1:58:40
  Speaker 4: woman who was after all his dying wife, he found
• 1:58:43
  Speaker 4: that Coral was gone. No one about the place had
• 1:58:46
  Speaker 4: seen her go out, and he could get no information
• 1:58:49
  Speaker 4: of her whereabouts. He had come too late, Like many
• 1:58:52
  Speaker 4: another penitent of this earth, he had come too late
• 1:58:55
  Speaker 4: to save himself. He did not know it, but he
• 1:58:58
  Speaker 4: felt unhappy that he had arted thus in anger from
• 1:59:01
  Speaker 4: the woman who had been true to him so many years,
• 1:59:04
  Speaker 4: and whom he did pity, although he could not love
• 1:59:07
  Speaker 4: her after this event. It is not strange that the
• 1:59:10
  Speaker 4: announcement of the finding of a woman's body in the
• 1:59:13
  Speaker 4: river that night attracted his attention, and that he went
• 1:59:16
  Speaker 4: to the house of the unknown dead as soon as
• 1:59:19
  Speaker 4: possible to see this round woman whom no one knew.
• 1:59:23
  Speaker 4: There she lay on the cold marble slab, what remained
• 1:59:26
  Speaker 4: of a self destroyed woman, driven to her doom by
• 1:59:29
  Speaker 4: that most remorseless of all those circumstances, a foe against
• 1:59:34
  Speaker 4: whom woman is less able to do bettle than a man.
• 1:59:37
  Speaker 4: Her garments were shabby, but the form which they covered
• 1:59:41
  Speaker 4: was shapely and would well have displayed the best of Raymond.
• 1:59:44
  Speaker 4: And the face Albert felt a chill as he raised
• 1:59:47
  Speaker 4: the cloth which hid it. A fair, sweet face, a calm,
• 1:59:51
  Speaker 4: peaceful face now, whatever it may have been in life, expression,
• 1:59:55
  Speaker 4: oval and clear of skin, and enshrouded in a wealth
• 1:59:59
  Speaker 4: of rich, dark hair. It was a beautiful face, and
• 2:00:02
  Speaker 4: Albert almost loved it again now that it was his
• 2:00:05
  Speaker 4: no more, Yes, it was Cora. Beyond a doubt, He
• 2:00:09
  Speaker 4: told the attendant that he could give him no information
• 2:00:12
  Speaker 4: about the dead. How could he bear his life to
• 2:00:14
  Speaker 4: the cold public gaze, and what good would it do
• 2:00:18
  Speaker 4: if he should do so. He had met her, he said,
• 2:00:21
  Speaker 4: but could tell nothing of her history, excepting that she
• 2:00:24
  Speaker 4: had seemed friendless, but he would bear the expense of
• 2:00:27
  Speaker 4: her burial, of her death. He knew nothing. This much,
• 2:00:31
  Speaker 4: he told, and no more. As he walked homework, all
• 2:00:35
  Speaker 4: the past came back to him, from the day when,
• 2:00:37
  Speaker 4: in his mad infatuation, he had taken that fair woman
• 2:00:41
  Speaker 4: to his heart, to this day when he had found
• 2:00:43
  Speaker 4: her dead in the morgue. He felt sorry that their
• 2:00:47
  Speaker 4: final meeting had been such as it was, that they
• 2:00:50
  Speaker 4: had parted in anger. A kindly parting would have been better,
• 2:00:54
  Speaker 4: But it was over, and he was free. Free. He
• 2:00:57
  Speaker 4: felt that he must scream that word aloud in the street. Free,
• 2:01:01
  Speaker 4: free to walk abroad with no secret in his heart,
• 2:01:04
  Speaker 4: free to do as he pleased with his affections, free
• 2:01:07
  Speaker 4: to woo Alice in honor, free to marry her. He
• 2:01:11
  Speaker 4: hurried along, and, ringing the bell of mister Dodger's house,
• 2:01:14
  Speaker 4: called for Alice. Soon she came to him, and there
• 2:01:17
  Speaker 4: in the quiet of the old house, he told her
• 2:01:20
  Speaker 4: of his past, of Cora, of her return to life,
• 2:01:23
  Speaker 4: of his love for herself, of his unhappy parting with
• 2:01:26
  Speaker 4: a wife who was a clock to his life, of
• 2:01:28
  Speaker 4: her death. All hold, he did not tell her of
• 2:01:31
  Speaker 4: Cora's mention of herself. Perhaps he could not. He attributed
• 2:01:35
  Speaker 4: it to mere jealousy at the most, all all but that,
• 2:01:39
  Speaker 4: and Alice heard him. She said no word to interrupt
• 2:01:42
  Speaker 4: the tale, But at its close she placed her hand
• 2:01:45
  Speaker 4: in his and raised her trusting face up to be kissed.
• 2:01:49
  Speaker 4: No proposal of marriage had been made, but they knew
• 2:01:52
  Speaker 4: and were happy. Ah race of mortal men, how as
• 2:01:56
  Speaker 4: a thing of naught, I count yea thou yea leave,
• 2:02:00
  Speaker 4: for who is there of men that more of blessing
• 2:02:03
  Speaker 4: knows than just a little while to seem to prosper well,
• 2:02:07
  Speaker 4: and having seemed to fall. End of chapter ten. Chapter
• 2:02:18
  Speaker 4: eleven of Alice or The Wages of Sin. This is
• 2:02:21
  Speaker 4: a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
• 2:02:26
  Speaker 4: For my information ough to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
• 2:02:30
  Speaker 4: Recording by Simon Arussu Alice or The Wages of Sin
• 2:02:35
  Speaker 4: by Frederic Warden Pengworn. Chapter eleven, The Calm before the Storm,
• 2:02:41
  Speaker 4: mayne manne take hell ufar sin. It was winter and
• 2:02:45
  Speaker 4: the Christmas season was not far off. The sorrows of
• 2:02:48
  Speaker 4: the family had become as a wound, which kindly time
• 2:02:51
  Speaker 4: has scarred over and quiet serenity reigned in mister Dodger's home.
• 2:02:56
  Speaker 4: To night, however, the usual calm of the family is ruffle,
• 2:03:00
  Speaker 4: for it is the night of a wedding, and Alice
• 2:03:03
  Speaker 4: has but now become the wife of her foster father's
• 2:03:05
  Speaker 4: young partner. The wedding has been a quiet one, witness
• 2:03:09
  Speaker 4: only by a few intimates, and the happy pair are
• 2:03:12
  Speaker 4: sum to be for a short tour, returning in time
• 2:03:15
  Speaker 4: for the Christmas Eve reunion of the old home. Alice
• 2:03:19
  Speaker 4: is very happy in this climax of her long silent
• 2:03:22
  Speaker 4: loving and Albert is happier than he remembers ever to
• 2:03:25
  Speaker 4: have been before. For this union is he feels, in reality,
• 2:03:30
  Speaker 4: joining of two souls with but a single thought, two
• 2:03:34
  Speaker 4: hearts that beat as one. Friendship may be the joining
• 2:03:38
  Speaker 4: of two souls with but a single thought love, the
• 2:03:42
  Speaker 4: union of two hearts that beat as one. But marriage
• 2:03:46
  Speaker 4: to be marriage in its highest sense must be the
• 2:03:49
  Speaker 4: union of soul with soul, and heart with heart. And
• 2:03:52
  Speaker 4: few there are who find this boon. If such a
• 2:03:56
  Speaker 4: union be possible on earth, surely that of two such
• 2:03:59
  Speaker 4: beings as these is just married, gives promise of it.
• 2:04:03
  Speaker 4: The ceremony, and all that follows a wedding ceremony being over,
• 2:04:07
  Speaker 4: the time for the goodbyes had arrived, and Alice, in
• 2:04:10
  Speaker 4: her traveling robes, having bid farewell to the good souls
• 2:04:13
  Speaker 4: who had given her parents care and love, went out
• 2:04:16
  Speaker 4: into the cold, snowy night, leaning upon her husband's arm.
• 2:04:20
  Speaker 4: Albert placed her in the carriage and was about to
• 2:04:23
  Speaker 4: follow himself when a person touched his arm, and turning about,
• 2:04:28
  Speaker 4: he beheld that which seemed to freeze the blood in
• 2:04:30
  Speaker 4: his heart, the face of Cora Tait, pale when and passionless,
• 2:04:36
  Speaker 4: but with a baleful glitter in its eyes. He tried
• 2:04:39
  Speaker 4: to speak, but could not command his voice, and only stared.
• 2:04:43
  Speaker 4: The time seemed to him long, but it was only
• 2:04:46
  Speaker 4: a few seconds since she had touched him. When she
• 2:04:49
  Speaker 4: spoke Albert, she said, you were too willing to think
• 2:04:53
  Speaker 4: me dead. You did not look well at that other's face.
• 2:04:57
  Speaker 4: You would not listen to me when you thought me dying.
• 2:05:01
  Speaker 4: You would not come near me when you thought me dead.
• 2:05:04
  Speaker 4: You have punished me more than was your right. You
• 2:05:07
  Speaker 4: scorned me when I gave you loving penitence. You spurned
• 2:05:11
  Speaker 4: my dying counsel, and would not hear my warning voice,
• 2:05:14
  Speaker 4: I hate you now, I leave you to your fate.
• 2:05:18
  Speaker 3: Go.
• 2:05:19
  Speaker 4: Then the voice, which had been subdued and mellow, ceased,
• 2:05:22
  Speaker 4: and she was gone. He never had any clear recollection
• 2:05:26
  Speaker 4: of what followed, except that he found himself in the
• 2:05:29
  Speaker 4: carriage beside his wife, and that he was telling her
• 2:05:32
  Speaker 4: some lie or other about unimportunate beggar. Alice, with woman's
• 2:05:37
  Speaker 4: quick perception, saw that he was troubled, but with a
• 2:05:41
  Speaker 4: wisdom not often possessed by woman, dropped the matter then
• 2:05:45
  Speaker 4: and there and never spoke of it again. She made
• 2:05:48
  Speaker 4: up her mind that she would never look into the
• 2:05:50
  Speaker 4: past again, but would devote herself to the happy now.
• 2:05:54
  Speaker 4: There was wisdom in this, and many a married pair
• 2:05:56
  Speaker 4: would be happier were the wife to adopt this plan
• 2:05:59
  Speaker 4: of leaving. Men are not prone to inquire into the
• 2:06:02
  Speaker 4: past of their wives. They believed them pure, and as
• 2:06:06
  Speaker 4: a rule battle against the very idea of thinking otherwise.
• 2:06:09
  Speaker 4: But women often allow themselves to pry back into the
• 2:06:12
  Speaker 4: past of their husbands, and in so doing sometimes render
• 2:06:16
  Speaker 4: a once assured happiness void and make for themselves a
• 2:06:20
  Speaker 4: future of senseless jealousies and miserable discomfitures. This was an
• 2:06:25
  Speaker 4: error into which Alice did not allow herself to drift.
• 2:06:28
  Speaker 4: So the wedding tour was, after all a pleasant one
• 2:06:32
  Speaker 4: and unmarred by any disagreeable events. Albert, to be sure,
• 2:06:36
  Speaker 4: was occasionally moody and seemed absorbed in somber thoughts, but
• 2:06:40
  Speaker 4: he managed to keep them out of notice most of
• 2:06:43
  Speaker 4: the time, and Alice did not often allow him to
• 2:06:46
  Speaker 4: brood alone. As to Albert, his condition of mind was
• 2:06:49
  Speaker 4: one which he himself could not have described. He sometimes
• 2:06:53
  Speaker 4: found himself almost believing that Cora was really dead, and
• 2:06:57
  Speaker 4: that the face in the street was only a vision.
• 2:07:00
  Speaker 4: Yet he knew better. He knew that she was alive,
• 2:07:03
  Speaker 4: and that he had made a hasty mistake. When in
• 2:07:05
  Speaker 4: the morgue, Albert, you were too willing to think me dead.
• 2:07:09
  Speaker 4: You did not look well at that other's face. The
• 2:07:13
  Speaker 4: words came back to him with terrible force. He had
• 2:07:16
  Speaker 4: been too willing to believe her dead. It was true.
• 2:07:19
  Speaker 4: Had the dead woman in the more been Alice, would
• 2:07:23
  Speaker 4: he have given her but a passing glance.
• 2:07:25
  Speaker 1: Ah.
• 2:07:26
  Speaker 4: No, he knew it well.
• 2:07:27
  Speaker 1: Now.
• 2:07:28
  Speaker 4: He had made a mistake, a terrible mistake, and one
• 2:07:31
  Speaker 4: not to be remedied. The more he pondered on these things,
• 2:07:34
  Speaker 4: the more he determined not to alter his course. He
• 2:07:38
  Speaker 4: could not give up that which he had gained, and
• 2:07:40
  Speaker 4: which he might still retain if he could only find
• 2:07:43
  Speaker 4: the means to silence this terrible witness. And he had money.
• 2:07:47
  Speaker 4: With money, he had saved Joe, and why not himself.
• 2:07:51
  Speaker 4: Cora was alone, without friends and an outcast. While he
• 2:07:55
  Speaker 4: was powerful, she could be silenced, or, at any rate,
• 2:07:59
  Speaker 4: if the worse came suppressed beyond belief. He knew that
• 2:08:02
  Speaker 4: he was becoming a villain at heart already, But the
• 2:08:05
  Speaker 4: words of Cora had put him on his smettle, and
• 2:08:08
  Speaker 4: now that the dove was cost he meant to fight
• 2:08:11
  Speaker 4: for Alice if need be. He never would have married her,
• 2:08:14
  Speaker 4: knowing Cora to be alive. But he had married her honorably,
• 2:08:18
  Speaker 4: and the fault was not his. Thus he reasoned with
• 2:08:21
  Speaker 4: himself and with his warped conscience. It was the best
• 2:08:25
  Speaker 4: that he could do, he thought, and he mapped his
• 2:08:27
  Speaker 4: course accordingly. So they went away on their bridal tour,
• 2:08:31
  Speaker 4: happy in each other, but with a little shadow of
• 2:08:34
  Speaker 4: the cloud, no bigger than a hand over them. Happy
• 2:08:38
  Speaker 4: as they were, Alice felt the shadow of the cloud
• 2:08:41
  Speaker 4: Albert felt the shadow of the cloud, but unlike Alice,
• 2:08:44
  Speaker 4: knew that it was not the shadow of a cloud
• 2:08:46
  Speaker 4: passing away, but of one rising and spreading over the horizon.
• 2:08:50
  Speaker 4: How great or how little the storm behind it might be,
• 2:08:53
  Speaker 4: he knew not, but he felt its coming with ominous dread,
• 2:08:58
  Speaker 4: Like the Monarch of old. He saw the writing on
• 2:09:00
  Speaker 4: the wall and knew it was of evil important, yet
• 2:09:03
  Speaker 4: could not read its meaning, but it troubled him. End
• 2:09:07
  Speaker 4: of chapter eleven, Chapter twelve of Elis or The Wages
• 2:09:16
  Speaker 4: of Sin. This is a LibriVox recording. All librivos recordings
• 2:09:21
  Speaker 4: are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer,
• 2:09:24
  Speaker 4: please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by Simon Arrussu Alice
• 2:09:29
  Speaker 4: or The Wages of Sin by Friedrich Warden Pangborn, Chapter twelve,
• 2:09:34
  Speaker 4: The storm cloud bursts. Could we but know the working
• 2:09:38
  Speaker 4: of our deeds? But tear the veil apart and see
• 2:09:42
  Speaker 4: the end? The horrid climax of some petted scheme might
• 2:09:46
  Speaker 4: turn us from a film and to a friend. Woe, woe, woe, woe,
• 2:09:53
  Speaker 4: All cometh clear at last, all light. May this my
• 2:09:57
  Speaker 4: last glance be on thee who now am sin owing
• 2:10:00
  Speaker 4: my birth to those to whom I ought not and
• 2:10:03
  Speaker 4: with whom I ought not in wedlock. Living Christmas Eve,
• 2:10:08
  Speaker 4: Albert and Alice had arrived home the day before, and
• 2:10:12
  Speaker 4: to night were to be present at a social gathering
• 2:10:14
  Speaker 4: in mister Dodger's house. It was early as yet, and
• 2:10:18
  Speaker 4: Albert had gone out for an hour to attend to
• 2:10:21
  Speaker 4: some matters in which Santa Claus and the children are
• 2:10:23
  Speaker 4: supposed to be jointly interested, leaving Alice in her pretty
• 2:10:27
  Speaker 4: little room. Alice was very happy to night, happy in
• 2:10:30
  Speaker 4: her love, happy in the love of her husband, and
• 2:10:33
  Speaker 4: happy in her peace of mind and purity of soul.
• 2:10:36
  Speaker 4: The little cloud which had deemed the glory of her
• 2:10:39
  Speaker 4: sunshine for a brief time, had vanished entirely during her
• 2:10:43
  Speaker 4: wedding tour, and Albert had been himself again. She sat
• 2:10:47
  Speaker 4: in the pretty little easy chair which he had given her,
• 2:10:50
  Speaker 4: and glancing about the room with its every color, and
• 2:10:53
  Speaker 4: fittingly speaking, not only the good taste of its furniture,
• 2:10:56
  Speaker 4: but his love for her was filled with this happiness
• 2:10:59
  Speaker 4: on speakable. Here in the sanctum sanctotum of their little
• 2:11:04
  Speaker 4: home would they passed the happiest hours of their lives.
• 2:11:07
  Speaker 4: Here they would read together, here, talk in soft tones
• 2:11:11
  Speaker 4: of their mutual joys. And here, it might be they
• 2:11:15
  Speaker 4: would retire together in sorrow. Here she would be loved
• 2:11:18
  Speaker 4: by the husband whom she worshiped, as the women of
• 2:11:22
  Speaker 4: the mythologists worshiped their god lovers. Here her children would
• 2:11:26
  Speaker 4: be born. Here, their proud father with the first gaze
• 2:11:29
  Speaker 4: upon them and upon her, with that tenderness which comes
• 2:11:33
  Speaker 4: to manhood at the birth of its offspring, and the
• 2:11:36
  Speaker 4: safety of its best beloved. Here should be her home.
• 2:11:39
  Speaker 4: Her rests are wholly of hollies. Thus she sat dreaming
• 2:11:43
  Speaker 4: in the innocence and purity of her woman's soul. Did
• 2:11:47
  Speaker 4: you ever see a gentle dog in company with its master,
• 2:11:50
  Speaker 4: gazing at him with that trustful fondness so common in
• 2:11:53
  Speaker 4: the dog when it has a kind ruler. How happy
• 2:11:56
  Speaker 4: the creature seems in this perfect faith. Someone unseen now
• 2:12:00
  Speaker 4: discharges his murderous gun at the unsuspecting creature, and the
• 2:12:04
  Speaker 4: death dealing bullet pierces its side. Note the change from
• 2:12:08
  Speaker 4: joy to misery, the sudden turning with rage at the
• 2:12:11
  Speaker 4: person who has intended the wrong, as it thinks to
• 2:12:14
  Speaker 4: its beloved muster. Then let it slowly dawn upon the
• 2:12:18
  Speaker 4: creature's mind that it is the master himself who has
• 2:12:21
  Speaker 4: done this wrong, And it may flee from him in terror,
• 2:12:24
  Speaker 4: but it loves him still. It is a thing worthy
• 2:12:27
  Speaker 4: of a poet's pen. Such is the love of woman
• 2:12:31
  Speaker 4: for the man, who, having won her affections, wrongs her.
• 2:12:35
  Speaker 4: As Alice sat thus musing in her room, a servant
• 2:12:39
  Speaker 4: announced that the poor woman was without who wished to
• 2:12:42
  Speaker 4: speak to her? She said, she must see you herself, ma'am,
• 2:12:46
  Speaker 4: said the maid. Let her come into the reception room,
• 2:12:49
  Speaker 4: said Alice, I will see her there. She went below
• 2:12:52
  Speaker 4: in a minute, and in the room met a tall,
• 2:12:54
  Speaker 4: finely built young woman, very shabbily dressed. Her face bore
• 2:12:59
  Speaker 4: traces of beauty, but it also bore the marks of
• 2:13:02
  Speaker 4: incurable disease. What she might have been, it was difficult
• 2:13:05
  Speaker 4: to imagine, but handsome she certainly had been. Alice metioned
• 2:13:10
  Speaker 4: her to a seat, but she refused with a nod,
• 2:13:12
  Speaker 4: and remained, standing, Are you the wife of Albert Thornbury?
• 2:13:17
  Speaker 4: Inquired the visitor. Yes, do you love him very dearly?
• 2:13:22
  Speaker 4: What do you mean by such questions as these? Said Alice, calmly,
• 2:13:26
  Speaker 4: but flushing at the manner of the stranger, no matter
• 2:13:29
  Speaker 4: what I mean, replied the woman. I have something to
• 2:13:32
  Speaker 4: tell you. If there is anything I can do for you,
• 2:13:35
  Speaker 4: said Alice. There is nothing you can do for me,
• 2:13:38
  Speaker 4: said the woman. I have a letter for your husband,
• 2:13:41
  Speaker 4: that is all. I believe you are a woman who
• 2:13:44
  Speaker 4: would not tell a lie. You look like one, I
• 2:13:47
  Speaker 4: should hope. So then if I give this letter to you,
• 2:13:50
  Speaker 4: you will deliver it to your husband, certainly? Will you
• 2:13:55
  Speaker 4: also read it first yourself? I do not generally read
• 2:13:58
  Speaker 4: my husband's letters. Then you cannot have this one. But
• 2:14:02
  Speaker 4: why should I read it? Pray because it concerns you
• 2:14:05
  Speaker 4: more than it does him. Very well, I will read
• 2:14:08
  Speaker 4: it then, and I wish you to read it now.
• 2:14:11
  Speaker 4: It is not sealed, as you see. Read it now,
• 2:14:14
  Speaker 4: and the woman handed her a stained yellow piece of
• 2:14:17
  Speaker 4: paper in an equally much stained envelope, and stepping back
• 2:14:20
  Speaker 4: a pace waited for Alice to read. As Alice read
• 2:14:24
  Speaker 4: the blurred and faded writing, the woman watched with evident
• 2:14:28
  Speaker 4: intense interest. The letter was dated October the eighteenth, over
• 2:14:33
  Speaker 4: eighteen years before, and read as follows, Dear Albert, the
• 2:14:38
  Speaker 4: end is at hand deserted by you and left to
• 2:14:41
  Speaker 4: perish alone. I have borne all that I can bear.
• 2:14:44
  Speaker 4: I do not ask you to think tenderly of me.
• 2:14:46
  Speaker 4: You have used me too cruelly for that. But I
• 2:14:49
  Speaker 4: want you to know what has become of our baby,
• 2:14:52
  Speaker 4: for she is our baby, born in true wedlock, whether
• 2:14:55
  Speaker 4: you own her or not. I have left her at
• 2:14:58
  Speaker 4: the house of my father's old friend, in the hope
• 2:15:00
  Speaker 4: that my sister will take her and be good to her.
• 2:15:03
  Speaker 4: She will never know whose child she is caring for.
• 2:15:06
  Speaker 4: But I have placed my lockett, the one which you
• 2:15:09
  Speaker 4: gave me when you loved me, upon her neck, with
• 2:15:12
  Speaker 4: a note requesting that she be told when she grows up,
• 2:15:14
  Speaker 4: that she must always keep it for her mother's sake.
• 2:15:17
  Speaker 4: You will know the lockett, and should you ever find her,
• 2:15:21
  Speaker 4: be good to her, for she is your daughter, and
• 2:15:23
  Speaker 4: injure her not for the sake of her mother, whom
• 2:15:26
  Speaker 4: you destroyed. I shall never trouble you again. I go
• 2:15:30
  Speaker 4: to meet my God to night. May he forgive you
• 2:15:33
  Speaker 4: for the wrong you have done your wife, Mary Morton Thornbury.
• 2:15:37
  Speaker 4: The letter was addressed mister Albert Thornbury, cared Dodger and Company, London.
• 2:15:43
  Speaker 4: Alice read a letter in a bewildered way, not half
• 2:15:46
  Speaker 4: comprehending its import, but she knew that it was brought
• 2:15:50
  Speaker 4: for the purpose of doing her husband harm, and it
• 2:15:53
  Speaker 4: angered her. Have you read it, said the woman. I
• 2:15:56
  Speaker 4: have said, Alice, and I desire that you, villain lie
• 2:16:00
  Speaker 4: forger as I am sure you are leave my house
• 2:16:04
  Speaker 4: at once, you promised me, and I will keep my promise,
• 2:16:07
  Speaker 4: cried Alice, flushing with anger. My husband shall have the
• 2:16:11
  Speaker 4: letter and will probably know how to deal with the
• 2:16:14
  Speaker 4: blackmailer who originated it. Leave me at once, certainly, madam,
• 2:16:20
  Speaker 4: with pleasure. If you should want any witnesses as to
• 2:16:23
  Speaker 4: the genuineness of the letter, there is an address. Throwing
• 2:16:27
  Speaker 4: a card upon the table, Good evening, and the woman
• 2:16:30
  Speaker 4: went quietly from the room. Somehow the sight of that
• 2:16:33
  Speaker 4: pure Gaulish face unnerved her and deprived her of all
• 2:16:36
  Speaker 4: desire to see her suffering. It will be enough to
• 2:16:39
  Speaker 4: know that he is punished, she said to herself, as
• 2:16:42
  Speaker 4: she went forth into the snowy night. She loves him.
• 2:16:45
  Speaker 4: She loves him, she muttered, And my God, so do I,
• 2:16:49
  Speaker 4: and she hurried away. Alice, now that the woman had departed,
• 2:16:53
  Speaker 4: began to think. She read the letter carefully, to the end.
• 2:16:56
  Speaker 4: It did not as yet enter her mind that this
• 2:16:59
  Speaker 4: could be anything more than a scheme to levy blackmail
• 2:17:02
  Speaker 4: upon her husband. But nevertheless, there was one passage in
• 2:17:05
  Speaker 4: the letter which puzzled her. Perhaps it was only coincidence,
• 2:17:10
  Speaker 4: but it was strange. Of her own birth and parentage.
• 2:17:13
  Speaker 4: She knew nothing excepting that she was an adopted daughter,
• 2:17:17
  Speaker 4: and more than that she never had asked to know.
• 2:17:20
  Speaker 4: The impression on her mind was that her parents were
• 2:17:23
  Speaker 4: both dead long ago. Mister and Missus Daughters had been
• 2:17:26
  Speaker 4: father and mother to her, and it had never occurred
• 2:17:29
  Speaker 4: to her to think of any others as being such.
• 2:17:32
  Speaker 4: But one thing in that letter troubled her, not that
• 2:17:35
  Speaker 4: it occurred to her to connect her husband with it
• 2:17:38
  Speaker 4: in any way, but because it was a queer coincidence.
• 2:17:41
  Speaker 4: She did have a locket which had come into her
• 2:17:44
  Speaker 4: possession in a manner similar to that described in the letter.
• 2:17:47
  Speaker 4: Missus Dodger had given it her on her tenth birthday
• 2:17:51
  Speaker 4: and told her that it had been left for her
• 2:17:53
  Speaker 4: by her mother, with a request that she would always
• 2:17:56
  Speaker 4: keep it for her mother's sake. More than this, Missus
• 2:17:59
  Speaker 4: dods Roger had never told her, and Alice had supposed
• 2:18:03
  Speaker 4: that this was all that she knew. The locket was
• 2:18:06
  Speaker 4: a peculiar trinket, quite large, heart shaped, curiously engraved and
• 2:18:11
  Speaker 4: studied with a row of small diamonds, and bearing the
• 2:18:14
  Speaker 4: inscription till death does uspart in French. How could the
• 2:18:18
  Speaker 4: writer of this vile letter have hit upon such an
• 2:18:21
  Speaker 4: odd coincidence. She went to her jewel case and got
• 2:18:25
  Speaker 4: the locket, and almost for the first time in her life,
• 2:18:29
  Speaker 4: began to wonder who her mother was, and to speculate
• 2:18:32
  Speaker 4: upon the mystery of her parentage, and had almost forgotten
• 2:18:36
  Speaker 4: the disagreeable letter in her meditation upon the other topic.
• 2:18:40
  Speaker 4: When Albert entered, how handsome he was, fresh from the
• 2:18:44
  Speaker 4: winter air, with a bright sparkle in his eyes. As
• 2:18:48
  Speaker 4: he laid the mysterious Christmas bundles upon the table, slyly
• 2:18:51
  Speaker 4: hiding one in his pocket, and came to her. He
• 2:18:55
  Speaker 4: leaned over her and gently kissed her beautiful hair. He
• 2:18:58
  Speaker 4: did not see the letter on the locket, for they
• 2:19:01
  Speaker 4: lay in the shadow, and he was too intent in
• 2:19:04
  Speaker 4: gazing upon the dear face that he loved to notice surroundings.
• 2:19:08
  Speaker 4: Why this look of worriment on my pretty face, said he,
• 2:19:12
  Speaker 4: noticing the expression of her countenance. Oh, Albert, such a
• 2:19:16
  Speaker 4: visit as I have had since you went out. A
• 2:19:19
  Speaker 4: strange woman came to me and brought a letter, which
• 2:19:22
  Speaker 4: she said was for me to read and give to you,
• 2:19:25
  Speaker 4: A horrible blackmailing letter. And I have been so angry
• 2:19:28
  Speaker 4: over it to think that any one could expect to
• 2:19:31
  Speaker 4: make me think ill of you. Darling. Here you can
• 2:19:34
  Speaker 4: read it and then throw it into the fire, or
• 2:19:37
  Speaker 4: keep it as evidence to catch the villains if they
• 2:19:40
  Speaker 4: ever come again. And with love, trust, faith and confidence
• 2:19:44
  Speaker 4: depicted in her bright eyes, she handed him the letter.
• 2:19:48
  Speaker 4: He took it with an expression of curiosity, and began
• 2:19:51
  Speaker 4: to read it carelessly at first, then slowly and attentively.
• 2:19:55
  Speaker 4: An expression of pain and regret came over his face,
• 2:19:59
  Speaker 4: so that Alice sai, oh, don't let that thing worry you.
• 2:20:03
  Speaker 4: Nobody is going to turn me against you, dear true darling,
• 2:20:07
  Speaker 4: he replied, it is foolish to mind such sneaking things
• 2:20:10
  Speaker 4: as this. He had composed himself by this time, remembering
• 2:20:14
  Speaker 4: the presence of his wife, But he was thinking with
• 2:20:17
  Speaker 4: painful intensity. For him, there was no doubting the genuineness
• 2:20:21
  Speaker 4: of the letter. The handwriting of Mary Morton he knew
• 2:20:25
  Speaker 4: at once, and this, this letter, brought on a Christmas
• 2:20:28
  Speaker 4: Eve in the honeymoon of his only happy marriage, was
• 2:20:32
  Speaker 4: like a visitor from the grave. It explained nothing clearly,
• 2:20:36
  Speaker 4: but it told him that Mary was, without doubt dead,
• 2:20:40
  Speaker 4: And he told him also that there was some one
• 2:20:42
  Speaker 4: in the world, either a living child of his own
• 2:20:46
  Speaker 4: or a grave containing her remains. Which were this child alive,
• 2:20:50
  Speaker 4: how much might she know or not know? Mary's letter
• 2:20:54
  Speaker 4: told him that the child, his babe, had been left
• 2:20:56
  Speaker 4: to the house of mister Dodger. Neither Dodger nor his
• 2:21:00
  Speaker 4: wife had ever mentioned the fact. It would not be
• 2:21:03
  Speaker 4: like Dodger if he knew that such was the case,
• 2:21:06
  Speaker 4: to hesitate to tell him Albert about it, and to
• 2:21:09
  Speaker 4: censure him soundly for the whole affair. Probably it was
• 2:21:12
  Speaker 4: Mary's intention to leave her babe there, but something had prevented.
• 2:21:16
  Speaker 4: And again, how came it happened that the letter should
• 2:21:19
  Speaker 4: be so long delayed, and then delivered in such a
• 2:21:22
  Speaker 4: manner that certainly did look like blackmail, But the writing
• 2:21:27
  Speaker 4: it was surely that of his first girl love. Could
• 2:21:30
  Speaker 4: Mary have known Cora? No, that was impossible. Yet somehow
• 2:21:35
  Speaker 4: he began to think that Cora might have been the
• 2:21:37
  Speaker 4: bearer of the letter, and he was pondering over this
• 2:21:41
  Speaker 4: when Alice speaking aroused him from his thoughts. Anyhow, he thought,
• 2:21:46
  Speaker 4: she shall never know that it is anything but a
• 2:21:48
  Speaker 4: spurious document. Never mind the letter, dear, said she. But
• 2:21:53
  Speaker 4: let me tell you something singular. You see, the letter
• 2:21:56
  Speaker 4: mentions a locket left by a mother for her babe.
• 2:21:59
  Speaker 4: You know I am only an adopted child of mister Dodger,
• 2:22:03
  Speaker 4: and is it not strange that, as a coincidence, I
• 2:22:06
  Speaker 4: should have a lockett which my mother left for me
• 2:22:09
  Speaker 4: with an injunction similar to that describing this foolish letter.
• 2:22:13
  Speaker 4: See here it is, dear, you have probably never noticed it,
• 2:22:17
  Speaker 4: as I seldom. Weart fearing that it might be lost,
• 2:22:20
  Speaker 4: and she placed a lockett in his hand. Albert took
• 2:22:23
  Speaker 4: it mechanically. His thoughts had begun to become strangely confused
• 2:22:28
  Speaker 4: while his wife was speaking, and looked at it at
• 2:22:31
  Speaker 4: first quickly, then with a steady gaze, full of amazement, terror,
• 2:22:35
  Speaker 4: and conflicting emotions. Alice was frightened at his appearance. She
• 2:22:40
  Speaker 4: started to speak, but he moved his hand in a
• 2:22:43
  Speaker 4: manner which stilled her at once and filled her with
• 2:22:46
  Speaker 4: a nameless fear. For a long time. Albert gazed upon
• 2:22:49
  Speaker 4: that locket. He knew it well. It was one made
• 2:22:53
  Speaker 4: to his own order for Mary Morton, nearly twenty years before,
• 2:22:57
  Speaker 4: and he knew it his gift to Mary Mary, his
• 2:23:00
  Speaker 4: gift to her child, to his child, and the gift
• 2:23:03
  Speaker 4: to his wife from her mother. There could be no
• 2:23:06
  Speaker 4: doubt the beautiful woman before him was his daughter. He
• 2:23:10
  Speaker 4: looked at her, a searching, piercing look that chilled her heart.
• 2:23:15
  Speaker 4: And as he looked, he began to see a resemblance,
• 2:23:18
  Speaker 4: faint but true, to the sweet girl whom he had
• 2:23:21
  Speaker 4: basely ruined and deserted. Thought after thought came poring over
• 2:23:26
  Speaker 4: his mind, and as the truth, the terrible truth of
• 2:23:29
  Speaker 4: bold facts, became clear, a sound of anguish, such as
• 2:23:33
  Speaker 4: few ever utter, burst from his lips, and with a
• 2:23:36
  Speaker 4: cry like that of the fate stricken Odipus, a cry
• 2:23:40
  Speaker 4: of horror and anguish, he rushed from the room, and
• 2:23:44
  Speaker 4: Alice heard him, hurrying through the holes and into his library,
• 2:23:48
  Speaker 4: closing the door behind him. Then all was still. How
• 2:23:52
  Speaker 4: long she remained there in terror, she never knew, but
• 2:23:56
  Speaker 4: she was aroused by the entrance of a servant who
• 2:23:59
  Speaker 4: said that mister Dodge was below and had come to
• 2:24:02
  Speaker 4: ask what they laid her and mister Thornbury. So long,
• 2:24:05
  Speaker 4: Alice had always loved this strangely bluff old gentleman as
• 2:24:08
  Speaker 4: a daughter should, and she went to him at once.
• 2:24:11
  Speaker 4: We had begun to think that you were sick, daughter,
• 2:24:14
  Speaker 4: he said, as he kissed her. Why have you not
• 2:24:17
  Speaker 4: been at the house? And where is Albert? Filled with
• 2:24:20
  Speaker 4: a nameless terror, she handed him the letter and the locket, and,
• 2:24:24
  Speaker 4: flinging from his presence before he could restrain her, she
• 2:24:27
  Speaker 4: hurried along the hallway to the library. She opened the
• 2:24:30
  Speaker 4: door gently and entered the room. She was not there.
• 2:24:34
  Speaker 4: On a table was a note which he knew at
• 2:24:36
  Speaker 4: once to before her from her husband. It merely told
• 2:24:39
  Speaker 4: her to read some letters which were laid on the
• 2:24:41
  Speaker 4: table and she would know all. There were two of them,
• 2:24:45
  Speaker 4: and they were in the same handwriting as the first
• 2:24:47
  Speaker 4: received that evening, and bore the signature your loving wife,
• 2:24:51
  Speaker 4: Mary M. Thornbury. Slowly and surely the light began to
• 2:24:55
  Speaker 4: dawn upon her clouded thoughts. Mary Morton, her baby, He
• 2:25:00
  Speaker 4: baby left with missus Dodger, the locket, herself, herself and
• 2:25:05
  Speaker 4: the Locket, the locket and Mary Morton, Mary Morton and
• 2:25:08
  Speaker 4: Albert Thornbury. Her husband as to a man walking in
• 2:25:13
  Speaker 4: a dark along a road, the flash of the lightning
• 2:25:16
  Speaker 4: reveals the sudden presence of a deadly serpent in the
• 2:25:19
  Speaker 4: act of springing at him. So at the silent mention
• 2:25:22
  Speaker 4: of her husband, the whole truth flashed upon Alice. It
• 2:25:26
  Speaker 4: was all true, The letter was genuine, and he knew it.
• 2:25:30
  Speaker 4: Her husband was her father. She was his daughter, basely
• 2:25:35
  Speaker 4: deserted in her infancy, to be more basely debased in
• 2:25:39
  Speaker 4: her womanhood. As sickening horror filled her high bred soul,
• 2:25:43
  Speaker 4: her head was all afire. Within her brain seemed filled
• 2:25:47
  Speaker 4: with horrid fumes. A sense of loathing for herself came
• 2:25:51
  Speaker 4: over her, and with a moan of woeful timber, she
• 2:25:54
  Speaker 4: staggered across the room, and parting the drapery between the
• 2:25:57
  Speaker 4: library and reception room, stopped on the threshold, transfixed by
• 2:26:02
  Speaker 4: a sight which met her gaze, a side to touch
• 2:26:05
  Speaker 4: Anne Hatred's self with pity. Albert Thornbury lay upon the floor,
• 2:26:10
  Speaker 4: dead with a cry of love, for love will leave
• 2:26:14
  Speaker 4: when other senses are dead. She fell upon the corpse
• 2:26:17
  Speaker 4: and covered it with kisses. Surely she might love him
• 2:26:20
  Speaker 4: now that he was dead. But a second thought came.
• 2:26:24
  Speaker 4: Mary Morton was dead, and Mary Morton was his wife.
• 2:26:27
  Speaker 4: While she what was she worse than anything of which
• 2:26:31
  Speaker 4: society can conceive, worse than the commonest of the common,
• 2:26:35
  Speaker 4: lower than the lowest. Hastily rising, she hurried to her room,
• 2:26:39
  Speaker 4: just as mister Dodger, who had been trying to make
• 2:26:42
  Speaker 4: something out of the letter which she had given him
• 2:26:44
  Speaker 4: to read, enter the parlor and found the dead body
• 2:26:48
  Speaker 4: of his partner lying upon the floor. With the help
• 2:26:52
  Speaker 4: of a man servant, whom he summoned quickly, he carried
• 2:26:55
  Speaker 4: Albert to his room, summoned a doctor, and took possession
• 2:26:58
  Speaker 4: of the house. He sent for his wife, and, then
• 2:27:01
  Speaker 4: telling her briefly what had happened, sent her in search
• 2:27:04
  Speaker 4: of Alice. Then he read the letter again and also
• 2:27:07
  Speaker 4: those found in library, thought awhile and perceived the truth.
• 2:27:12
  Speaker 4: As he rushed from a chair with a heart heavier
• 2:27:15
  Speaker 4: than he had ever known before. His wife met him
• 2:27:18
  Speaker 4: at the door, her face full of terror and her
• 2:27:20
  Speaker 4: eyes running with tears. Alice was nowhere to be found.
• 2:27:25
  Speaker 4: She had fled. End of Chapter twelve.
• 2:27:32
  Speaker 3: Chapter thirteen of Alice or The Wages of Sin. This
• 2:27:38
  Speaker 3: is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
• 2:27:43
  Speaker 3: public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
• 2:27:49
  Speaker 3: LibriVox dot org. Recording by Shasta, Oakland, California. Alice or
• 2:27:57
  Speaker 3: the Wages of Sin by Frederick Worden pang Born, Chapter thirteen.
• 2:28:05
  Speaker 3: Be sure your sin will find you out to eyes
• 2:28:10
  Speaker 3: which spoke and said, sleep, dreams, and death. We are
• 2:28:16
  Speaker 3: only gods that answer prayer. With the faint gleam of
• 2:28:20
  Speaker 3: the tender evening light, there came a human form, barefooted, bareheaded,
• 2:28:27
  Speaker 3: with broken limbs of golden chains gleaming here and there
• 2:28:31
  Speaker 3: upon her limbs with white robes hanging heavily soaked with
• 2:28:38
  Speaker 3: dews and rains, and fell at the feet of Thanatos.
• 2:28:45
  Speaker 3: She had fled, even as her mother, nearly twenty years before,
• 2:28:51
  Speaker 3: had fled from her home with her burden of shame
• 2:28:55
  Speaker 3: and her breaking heart, to bury her crushed soul and
• 2:28:59
  Speaker 3: outraged womanhood in oblivion. So Alice now fled from all
• 2:29:06
  Speaker 3: that was dear to her. In the short hour which
• 2:29:09
  Speaker 3: had turned her happiness to agony, she had lost all
• 2:29:14
  Speaker 3: care for life, all yearning for friendships, all desire for love.
• 2:29:20
  Speaker 3: One idea alone now filled her mind, an idea which
• 2:29:26
  Speaker 3: had never before come to her. Now she cared not
• 2:29:30
  Speaker 3: to see ever again the faces of those to whom
• 2:29:34
  Speaker 3: she had been so dear. The kind friends, the tender
• 2:29:39
  Speaker 3: foster parents, the once beloved husband were all alike to
• 2:29:45
  Speaker 3: her objects of terror. But one idea filled her soul,
• 2:29:52
  Speaker 3: and one creature, alone in all the universe, had a
• 2:29:56
  Speaker 3: place in her heart. She yearned for her mother. To
• 2:30:00
  Speaker 3: this one person of all the universe, she yearned to go,
• 2:30:06
  Speaker 3: and she was dead with the sense that God had
• 2:30:10
  Speaker 3: entirely deserted her. She felt that mother and mother alone
• 2:30:15
  Speaker 3: would have taken her in loathsome as she had become
• 2:30:20
  Speaker 3: in her own sight, and given her comfort. She had
• 2:30:25
  Speaker 3: now out of all the mass of confused thoughts which
• 2:30:29
  Speaker 3: filled her brain, but one idea. Hurrying along in the
• 2:30:35
  Speaker 3: chilly winter night, she bore in her hand the card
• 2:30:40
  Speaker 3: which the horror bringing messenger had left. As she hurried
• 2:30:44
  Speaker 3: along the streets, she was conscious that it was a
• 2:30:48
  Speaker 3: gala night, that the store windows were ablaze with lights,
• 2:30:53
  Speaker 3: that happy people were jostling past her as they bore
• 2:30:58
  Speaker 3: their Christmas burdens to happy homes, and that the world
• 2:31:02
  Speaker 3: was gay. The world was happy, but it was no
• 2:31:07
  Speaker 3: longer her world. For her, there was now no world, past, present,
• 2:31:14
  Speaker 3: or future. She was the one of all the world
• 2:31:19
  Speaker 3: who was unlike all the rest, and a terrible sense
• 2:31:23
  Speaker 3: of loneliness came upon her. She met a party of
• 2:31:27
  Speaker 3: bad women in company with worse men. She was lower
• 2:31:33
  Speaker 3: than they. How they would laugh in scorn? Could they
• 2:31:37
  Speaker 3: know her story? As she passed them, One of the
• 2:31:41
  Speaker 3: men spoke to her, but she was not offended. Why
• 2:31:45
  Speaker 3: should she be she had fallen lower than he or
• 2:31:49
  Speaker 3: his companions. You smile at her illogical ideas, But would
• 2:31:56
  Speaker 3: the world tomorrow be more just to her than she
• 2:32:00
  Speaker 3: was to herself? On she goes through the streets, turning
• 2:32:05
  Speaker 3: here and there, she notes by the lettering on the
• 2:32:08
  Speaker 3: lamp posts the course she wishes to take. At last,
• 2:32:13
  Speaker 3: she has reached her destination. She enters the wretched den
• 2:32:18
  Speaker 3: of Isaac and inquires for Cora. The old man informs
• 2:32:24
  Speaker 3: her that he does not know who she is. He
• 2:32:28
  Speaker 3: is frightened, for he is not certain that this visit
• 2:32:31
  Speaker 3: may not forebode some trouble for himself. And when she
• 2:32:35
  Speaker 3: abruptly tells him her name and her errand he is
• 2:32:40
  Speaker 3: only too glad to do that which she asks, and
• 2:32:44
  Speaker 3: which he alone can do. Donning his old hat and coat,
• 2:32:50
  Speaker 3: the aged man goes forth with her into the night,
• 2:32:54
  Speaker 3: and something of pity, if not regret, touches him as
• 2:32:59
  Speaker 3: he looks at the woe begone face of the girl
• 2:33:03
  Speaker 3: whom he has helped to ruin her the streets. Together
• 2:33:08
  Speaker 3: they go, the once proud and happy lady of refinement
• 2:33:11
  Speaker 3: and culture and the sordid Jew. On they go, Alice,
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  Speaker 3: walking in silence while Isaac leads the way. He does
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  Speaker 3: not understand what this journey means, but he is afraid
• 2:33:26
  Speaker 3: not to obey, so on they go, until at last
• 2:33:31
  Speaker 3: they come to a graveyard. Tracing the way carefully among
• 2:33:37
  Speaker 3: the stones and mounds, Old Isaac leads her to a
• 2:33:42
  Speaker 3: remote corner of the platte, and by a sign indicates
• 2:33:47
  Speaker 3: a certain grave. Are you sure, she asks, I am,
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  Speaker 3: my lady, for I followed her here myself nigh twenty
• 2:33:57
  Speaker 3: years ago, and mark the spot. He replies, very well,
• 2:34:03
  Speaker 3: you may go, she says, and hands him her purse. Mechanically,
• 2:34:09
  Speaker 3: his sordid hands grasp his God and he moves away,
• 2:34:14
  Speaker 3: wondering whether he has done a wise thing or not.
• 2:34:20
  Speaker 3: He is gone, and she is alone, at last with
• 2:34:24
  Speaker 3: the only thing in the universe for which she cares,
• 2:34:28
  Speaker 3: her mother's ashes. She feels a sense of peace stealing
• 2:34:33
  Speaker 3: over her shocked and anguished soul, and fancies she feels
• 2:34:38
  Speaker 3: a presence near her. She knows it is her mother,
• 2:34:42
  Speaker 3: for it allays the terrible yearning which has been her
• 2:34:46
  Speaker 3: agony this dreadful night. She is not certain just how
• 2:34:51
  Speaker 3: long it may have been since she fled from that horror,
• 2:34:55
  Speaker 3: but it has been a long time anyhow. This is
• 2:35:00
  Speaker 3: her mother's grave Mother. Mother. She keeps repeating the soft
• 2:35:06
  Speaker 3: word over to herself, and it seems to do her good.
• 2:35:11
  Speaker 3: And she never knew her, never knew this sweet woman
• 2:35:15
  Speaker 3: who loved her, this long suffering woman who died for
• 2:35:19
  Speaker 3: her in the hope that she might be saved to
• 2:35:23
  Speaker 3: an honorable life. Perhaps, after all, it is better as
• 2:35:29
  Speaker 3: it is. Had she learned her mother's story in a
• 2:35:33
  Speaker 3: different way, she might have wronged her in her heart.
• 2:35:37
  Speaker 3: Now she adores her as a saint. It is not
• 2:35:41
  Speaker 3: so dark as it was. Morning must be nearer. The
• 2:35:46
  Speaker 3: thought of daylight brings a dread to her heart. She
• 2:35:50
  Speaker 3: must not wait so long. Her mother must come soon
• 2:35:55
  Speaker 3: and take her. She feels that this will be so,
• 2:35:59
  Speaker 3: and that all all she has to do is to wait.
• 2:36:03
  Speaker 3: It is chilly, but she hardly notes it, and a
• 2:36:06
  Speaker 3: drowsy feeling is stealing over her. She seems to be
• 2:36:11
  Speaker 3: half alive and half in a trance like state. And
• 2:36:16
  Speaker 3: again she feels that gentle presence. How soothing it is,
• 2:36:21
  Speaker 3: how full of restfulness. She must have had some feeling
• 2:36:26
  Speaker 3: as this when a little babe she fell asleep in
• 2:36:31
  Speaker 3: her mother's arms. She is asleep and dreaming, But no,
• 2:36:37
  Speaker 3: that vision was too vivid to be a dream. Fair,
• 2:36:41
  Speaker 3: sweet face, tender eyes, This is no dream. It is mother.
• 2:36:48
  Speaker 3: A soft sigh, and Alice is asleep, peaceful, quiet sleep,
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  Speaker 3: such as comes only to the innocent of heart and
• 2:36:58
  Speaker 3: pure of soul. They found her next morning, dead in
• 2:37:04
  Speaker 3: the neglected corner of the burial ground, upon one of
• 2:37:09
  Speaker 3: the pauper graves. Neither mister Georgere nor his wife ever
• 2:37:15
  Speaker 3: knew why she had gone there to die. Only God
• 2:37:19
  Speaker 3: and her mother held that secret. They buried her beside
• 2:37:25
  Speaker 3: her false husband, for it was best that it should
• 2:37:29
  Speaker 3: so be done. And the horrid secret of their lives
• 2:37:33
  Speaker 3: was buried with them. The grave keeps its own counsel
• 2:37:38
  Speaker 3: so long as men disturb it not, And there were
• 2:37:42
  Speaker 3: none who cared to invoke secrets from these graves. So
• 2:37:48
  Speaker 3: let them rest. She the fair, unsullied soul, so fit
• 2:37:54
  Speaker 3: to live, so fit to die, prepared for either state.
• 2:38:00
  Speaker 3: He the noble and ignoble, who thought that repentance alone,
• 2:38:07
  Speaker 3: without reparation, could atone for wilful sin, and of whom
• 2:38:13
  Speaker 3: it is best to say no further, seek his merits,
• 2:38:17
  Speaker 3: to disclose or draw his frailties from the dread abode.
• 2:38:22
  Speaker 3: There they alike, in trembling hope, repose the bosom of
• 2:38:28
  Speaker 3: his father and his God. The tale is told in
• 2:38:34
  Speaker 3: the quiet of the grave, among the silent multitudes of
• 2:38:38
  Speaker 3: bygone years crumble the remains of Albert Thornbury in the
• 2:38:44
  Speaker 3: narrow bed. Next him lies the woman whom he loved
• 2:38:48
  Speaker 3: with tenderness of manhood's strong passion, and whom he knew
• 2:38:53
  Speaker 3: too late could never be his wife, whom he blasted
• 2:38:58
  Speaker 3: in her womanhood, and against whom he sinned unconsciously but
• 2:39:04
  Speaker 3: beyond redress. She lies in the wife's place, but she
• 2:39:09
  Speaker 3: is not his wife. In the far corner of the
• 2:39:13
  Speaker 3: same plat, unknown, unmourned, forgotten, is another grave, and in
• 2:39:20
  Speaker 3: it lies the woman who is his wife, and against
• 2:39:24
  Speaker 3: whom he sinned guiltily. Three graves containing the wrecks of
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  Speaker 3: three lives destroyed by a boy's sinful mistake. Be sure
• 2:39:38
  Speaker 3: your sin will find you out. Men repeat the words often,
• 2:39:43
  Speaker 3: but they do not believe them to be true. Could
• 2:39:47
  Speaker 3: we raise the impreditable curtain of time and see the
• 2:39:52
  Speaker 3: scene behind? Could we foresee the end of our bad beginnings?
• 2:39:57
  Speaker 3: This might become an almost most sinless world. Could the
• 2:40:03
  Speaker 3: thoughtless girl coquetting in her innocent sense of safety, toying
• 2:40:09
  Speaker 3: with the double edged tools which sooner or later cut
• 2:40:13
  Speaker 3: back and rend the heart with merciless stabs, blighting the
• 2:40:18
  Speaker 3: life and making a double terror of death, foresee the end?
• 2:40:24
  Speaker 3: She would be more careful of herself and value less
• 2:40:28
  Speaker 3: than she does the empty gratifications of vanity. Could the
• 2:40:34
  Speaker 3: venerated pastor, seeking the companionship of the women of his
• 2:40:39
  Speaker 3: congregation ever too readily to fall in love with their
• 2:40:44
  Speaker 3: father confessor, meaning perhaps no harm. Foresee the intricate meshes
• 2:40:51
  Speaker 3: of the toils into which he is weaving himself, he
• 2:40:54
  Speaker 3: would be more circumspect in his conduct. Could the young
• 2:40:58
  Speaker 3: man lightly trifling with the loves of women, knowing little
• 2:41:03
  Speaker 3: of the power of that delicious poison which destroys body,
• 2:41:08
  Speaker 3: soul and mind, know the danger which lurks behind the
• 2:41:13
  Speaker 3: golden glories of such delights, and see the work which
• 2:41:17
  Speaker 3: time will develop. He would seek his mother oftener, and
• 2:41:22
  Speaker 3: the soft skin beauties of his choice would lose for
• 2:41:26
  Speaker 3: him many of their charms. Could the man of business,
• 2:41:31
  Speaker 3: misapplying the trusts in his charge, a little here, a
• 2:41:36
  Speaker 3: little there, falsifying his accounts, robbing this one to deceive
• 2:41:42
  Speaker 3: that one, covering his tracks skillfully, and as he thinks
• 2:41:47
  Speaker 3: forever foresee the end, the disgrace, the ruin, the never
• 2:41:53
  Speaker 3: to be rectified wrong which he is doing himself. His
• 2:41:58
  Speaker 3: dealings would be honest, and his conduct above reproach and honorable.
• 2:42:05
  Speaker 3: We see it not. We have no faith in the
• 2:42:08
  Speaker 3: words they apply to others, but not to ourselves. Our
• 2:42:14
  Speaker 3: sin will not find us out. Albert Thornbury little thought
• 2:42:19
  Speaker 3: that the sin of twenty years oblivion would never come
• 2:42:24
  Speaker 3: back to him. Little did he suspect that, in the
• 2:42:28
  Speaker 3: very moment of his greatest happiness, when all the troubles
• 2:42:33
  Speaker 3: of his life were at rest, when he had at
• 2:42:35
  Speaker 3: last found the one thing needful to fill the vacant
• 2:42:40
  Speaker 3: place in his man's heart. Little did he think that
• 2:42:44
  Speaker 3: at this moment of self satisfaction, the horrible truth would
• 2:42:49
  Speaker 3: be forced upon him, that his sin had found him out.
• 2:42:55
  Speaker 3: And more terrible even than this comes the dreadful truth
• 2:42:59
  Speaker 3: of that other awful warning, the truth of which is
• 2:43:03
  Speaker 3: proven in moral and physical life at all times, that
• 2:43:08
  Speaker 3: the sins of the fathers shall be visited upon the children,
• 2:43:14
  Speaker 3: innocent and guilty alike, to bear the yoke of sorrow,
• 2:43:19
  Speaker 3: and to feel the stern grip of the hand of punishment. Cruel, unjust, diabolical,
• 2:43:26
  Speaker 3: no doubt, but a fact. We see it in the
• 2:43:31
  Speaker 3: everyday meeting of our fellows. The morally warped, the socially degraded,
• 2:43:37
  Speaker 3: the sinfully diseased, the hopelessly insane, all bear witness of
• 2:43:44
  Speaker 3: this dreadful truth. Whether there is justice or sense in
• 2:43:49
  Speaker 3: such a law, whether it be divine or devil bred,
• 2:43:53
  Speaker 3: we cannot say. But it is a law, an inexorable, terrible,
• 2:43:59
  Speaker 3: all awful fact. Be sure your sin will find you
• 2:44:05
  Speaker 3: out if not during your life, perhaps in the lives
• 2:44:10
  Speaker 3: of those whom you leave behind you to struggle through
• 2:44:14
  Speaker 3: their lives handicap by your folly, cursed by your sins.
• 2:44:20
  Speaker 3: Could the millions to day, laboring under the blight placed
• 2:44:24
  Speaker 3: upon them by their fathers, behold as in a panorama,
• 2:44:29
  Speaker 3: the deeds for which they now are doing penance, Being
• 2:44:33
  Speaker 3: innocent themselves, there might be an uprising of indignation, a
• 2:44:40
  Speaker 3: pouring out of the vials of wrath, a panic of
• 2:44:44
  Speaker 3: cursings and reproach, such as the God of the Jews
• 2:44:49
  Speaker 3: himself could scarcely hope to hurl from his high throne above.
• 2:44:55
  Speaker 3: Be sure your sin will find you out. This has
• 2:45:00
  Speaker 3: a significance more than personal wider in its application than
• 2:45:06
  Speaker 3: the laws of nations or the religions of the world.
• 2:45:10
  Speaker 3: The man who loves his honor, the man who loves
• 2:45:14
  Speaker 3: his posterity, the man who loves mankind. And if one
• 2:45:19
  Speaker 3: be not such a man as this, he is but
• 2:45:23
  Speaker 3: little higher than the breeding bull or the protozoun, which
• 2:45:28
  Speaker 3: parts from its budded offspring never to meet it again.
• 2:45:33
  Speaker 3: Must ever bear this truth in mind if he is
• 2:45:36
  Speaker 3: sure that his sin will find him out. Reading the
• 2:45:40
  Speaker 3: injunction in its broadest meeting, he will be careful lest
• 2:45:45
  Speaker 3: he sin. These words carry with them no promise of pardon,
• 2:45:51
  Speaker 3: no hint of forgiveness, no hope of absolution. They are plain, terse,
• 2:45:58
  Speaker 3: and not to be misunderstood. They are the embodiment of
• 2:46:02
  Speaker 3: all warnings against wrongdoing, and the succinct codification of unalterable, inexorable,
• 2:46:12
  Speaker 3: passionless law. Be sure your sin will find you out.
• 2:46:22
  Speaker 3: End of Chapter thirteen. And of Alice, or the Wages
• 2:46:28
  Speaker 3: of Sin by Frederic Werden bangborn