Entered at the Post Office at New York, N. Y.,at Second Class Mail Rates. Published Every Week. Vol. VIL For a Woman’s Sake. | BY WATTS PHILLIPS. CHAPTER L “MONEY ADVANCED TO ANY AMOUNT.” “ Excuse me, my dear madam, but what you ey, pose is quite impossible. Business is business. Itis a rule I have laid down in life, never to admit senti- ment into a cash transaction, and I ean’t depart from it.’ BEADLE AND ADAMS, PUBLISHERS, Complete in this Number, No. 98 Wiuuram Street, New York. veiled, descended the narrow and dimly-lighted stairs, with a precipitation that showed her anxiety to escape further interrogation. Mr. Varulam Gritt, however, was quite satisfied as to the present result of his cross-questioning. He watched the dark figure descend one flight of stairs —for Mr. Gritt’s offices were on the second floor— then reclosed his door, muttering and chuckling to himself: “Yes, yes, ma’am, you'll put in # second appear- ance before long; you've smelt the cheese in the Copyrighted 1881, sy Brapie anp ADAMS, April 14, 1881, No. 90 Price, Ten Cents. accomplished more than fialf a dozen words, when, without the usual preliminary of knocking, the office door was burst abruptly open, and a man entered, If any apology were required for this. unceremo- nious entrance, none was offered. The visitor advanced ut once to the fire-place, and, without doffing his hat, elevated his coat tails, through the medium of his left hand, while, with the other, he plucked covawely, ata raged tuft of red hair which sprouted frcm his chin like the beard of a& goat. Verulam Gritt, who seemed to take this visit as a matter of course, ro.e from» his chair, ard addressed Lis visitor “ But, sir, if I could only persuade you to have confidence—’ “In what? Pardon me if I inter- rupt you, but in what? I trade in money; and what. om propose to me has simply relation. to the trans- fer of exceedingly scarce, but at all times useful, article. You roduce acase of peers very hand- some jewels in their way—remark- ably handsume, but not worth by one- half: the sum jyou are desirous of i ing upon en i ; “ Not by one- re “ Wall molt not by one-third. I have told you the amount I am pre- to advance.” “Tt’s not enough! I must have a thousand pounds, I have need of one thousand pounds. “You are not peculiar in that re- spect. - assure you. Now, if your us! ““My husband!" “T perceived when mer BieNys just now, that you wore & wedding-ring—a widow, perhaps?” ” “Yes, you areright. tama wid- ow.” This wag said with a certain hesi- tation, slight in itself, but sufficient to be remarked. ‘Ahem! I see no good in our pro- Jonging this interview. I advertise ‘to advance money to any amount— you will understand, to any amount --to persons of respectability and trustworthiness, upon their own se- eurity, the sex of the applicants of no consequence, and the strictest secrecy to be relied upon. You pro- a security which is not suffi- eient for the sum you require. You have no Sed weS ait come re sponsible for the remainder?’ This was said in a tone of inquiry. “T have no friends.” “And so the whole affair falls through. You refuse to giveme your mame; and have not as yet even shown me your face. deal in money, as before said; and, so far from straining at a gnat, can uvon necessity, swallow, a decent-sized eamel; but, in the present case, where the secrecy is all on one side, the business is fishy—hopinzg I use 80 expressive a word without offense, decidedly fishy.” . ‘Ido not understand you.” “Well, then, queer. Iam a practi- eal] man, and object to being mixed np in any mystery to which I am denied aclue. It’s not busineas. responsible and respectable security, in default of a husband— let us say uncle, brother, or friend—ahem!—who may take pity on a fair lady in distress; and—what! _you are going? No offense intended, and no offense 3 given, TI hope. Think over what I have said, and I 5 see you again, fu removed -morning."* , Mr. Varulam Gritt opened wide his office So sa) door, and bowed out a lady, who—her hroud- SOE ANG ola or a lange cldale nd her "tens chou MISS FANCOURT CONSOLES MAUD, trap, and are frightened at first, but your need must more than pressing to bring you here at all; and you'll come back again, forced, in spite of yourself, to make a clean breast of it.” He sat down at his desk, and, with a countenance which, in its best aspect, was suggestive of an una- miable door-knocker, dipped his pen—a_ steel pen th a needle point—into the ink, and commenced to write upon what appeared to be, from the sound it. made, a sheet of blue-lined sand-paper. He had not in a voice of great deference: “YT didn't expect a visit from you to-day, Mr. £cratton, but your pres- ence is always welcome—always welcome here, sir. As I often say to‘my clerk, Nobbs—Percival Nobbs. a young man of good family, but unfortunate—your visits are like early violets, cheering and fragrant —cheering and fragrant,” The new-comer gave another an- gry pluck at his beard, and said, in a voice that was something between snarl and a wl, “* What was the matter with the woman I met on the stairs just now?” ‘You met her?” “Don’t 1 tell youso?_ What was the matter with her? I heard her sob beneath her veil as she passed “T can’t say. She’s a mystery. She came here in answer to one of our advertisements. Wanted tu raise money on some jewels which weren't worth what she demanded. She 1efused to answer questions and went away in a huff." “Young oF old?” , 1 should think, by the d hands.”’ “‘ And what about, the face?” “She never raised her veil, though Tasked her to doso again and again.) wore a double veil, evidently for the R se of concealment.” “Well, you've had her followed, of - @ourse;, 50 We shall learn from Nebbs where she lives.” Mr. Varulam Gritt’s usually sharp, nut-cracker Visage assumed a some- what sheepish expression. “Why ae8 see, Mr. Scratton, I war awkwardly situated. ‘ Terae, is away upon impcrtan usiness, the lad Tet hastily, and—and——”” “And you were such a confound- ed foolas to let this chance escape you! What do you think I placed you here for, sir, and made you my agent, with large capital at your back, but to ferret out such profita- ble mysteries as this ove would = been to us had you only have u common sharpness?” “TI don’t see how this particular case promised to be as. profitable as you make out, Mr. Scratton, The woman offered an inadequate secur- ity, and wouldn’t take a shilling less than the sum she demanded.” “How much was that?” - “*One thousand pounds.” “What?” The gentleman addressed as Mr. Scratton left off lucking at his tuft of beard, and ee to the Seee, near which Verulam Gritt was sea , struck bis hand down upon it so fiercely that the scattered papers performed a dance of their own, and the eat leaden inkstand was, for the nonce converted to a fountain which descended in a sable shower upon everything around. f J : “You're an ass, Mr, Verulam Gritt—you’re an ass! When I found you a miserable, pettifogging attorney, starving in a garret, having been struck .off the rolls for malpractices, I thought I had found one whose nose, having bee ese down to such an exceedingly sharp point, would know how to apply the grindstone to others. I took you for a fox, a wolf, a lynx, a hunting. leopard—anything but an ass, Mr. Verulam Gritt, or you might have rotted and died for me.” - “You're too hasty, sir,”’ pleaded Gritt, humbly. “I ‘hope you’ve never found me scrupulous. I’m not be a constience, but I'd perjure myself for you, wir.” “Bah! you'd perjure yourself for eighteenpence for any man, if there was no prospect of your being found out, And,” continued Scratton, resuming his position before the fire, “it you use the word conscience to me again, we part company. You've let a chance slip through your fingers, and there's an end of it.’”’ “She'll turn up again,” said Gritt, positively. “Tfshe does, let Nobbs stick to her like her shadow. If Nobbs should be absent, follow her yourself. Do you hear?” “Yes, sir.” “Then, now for the business that’s brought me to town. Have you all the papers connected with Richard Goodeve s affairs ?’’ “ They're in the inner office. Everything prepared. ‘We can act upon the bill of sale at once.” “TV’'ll go in Bnd look over them. The man himself will be herein an hour, so*do you stay in the outer office; he mustn’t see mo, at any price. Richard Good- eve is one of your independent, outspoken fellows, ever ready to imagine and to revenge & wro: Such men, in skillful hands, are invaluable; and, if-you only act your part well, Richard Goodeve—Richard the Proud—Richard the Radical—Richard the Stiff-necked, shall be at my beck and call, as much my bond-servant to command as though his skin was black, and I had purchased him in an African slave-market.” With these words, Mr. Scratton, no longe? plucking at his tult of beard, but fondly caressing that :adorn- ment, passed into the inner offices, where we will leave him; white, for the better information of the reader, we enterinto some details, historical and otherwise, respecting Mr. Daniel Scratton, and his friend, Mr. Verulam Gritt. CHAPTER II. SPINNING THE WEB. Wes will, therefore, begin with Mr. Daniel Scratton. By profession, he wus a land-agent; an elastic term, often including, as it did in his case, many other agen- _ cies, tosay notuing of the brisk and protitable trade of an auctioneer. ; ‘ His residence was in Gatford, a picturesque, old- fashioned town in Surrey; a town with a castle, which did its duty asa jail; a work-house also—a sort of jail without the romantic adjuncts; a market-day once a week; @ ghastly Assembly Room, which witnessed elephantine revels, say once a month, and whose stale, mouldy atmosphere, and shrouded furniture, when in @ quiescent state, was only suzgestive of weak-minded ‘hosts,;who had once, wuen living, a passion for bil- fiards, chronic melancholy, and sore throats. © . When Daniel Scratton first opened his eyes—and beri § small, gray, cunning eyes they were—upon the world, his family position in the social scale was low down in- deed, he having been born of a pauper parent in the Gatford work-house. He also owed what- scholastic | ‘uirements: he possessed, principally of the urith- metical order, to another charitable institution belong- ing to the same town. 5 ' ¥rom infancy. to manhood, the surroundings of the. Gattord charity boy-were hard and surdid. A child of poverty, aud a pauper by birta, Daniel soon learned the value of money ; and troui the time his brain was first able to compass an idea, that one idea was how to ob- tain it. A cuild’s mind has been described as a sheet of blank paper; but the mind of Danicl Seratton was blue-lined from the very first, and lettered £s.d. _ Obtain money he did, and much money. As an island. is but the product of accumulated atoms, so the for- _ tune of Scratton had begun with the smallest savings at first. “Get money, my child,” is the reported advice of aman of business to his son. “Get money—honest- ly, if you can; but get it.” Had Daniel been the cff- spring of that worthy may, he could: not have adopted his principle, or want of principle, more readily, nor have acted upon it more rigidly. a With such a man, it is almost unnecessary to add, that, as he grew more plethoric in pocket, Lis habits became more penurious, and his conduct in. business, if possible, still more hard and graspiny, till thie Gat- ford folk, in recognition of tliis combination ot meun- ness and cruelty, bestowed upon him the sobriquets of ‘ Miser Yiton and Daddy Flintskin. All of which, however, not prevent his receiving every outward show of respect and consideration; and hats were doffed, and faces dressed in sycophantic smiles, when- ever his tall, lean figure was seen in the Town Hall, or at church (he was a regular attendant at morning and evening service), or at the markets, or shambling up the High + in pursuit of what he was pretty certain to overtake—some profitable business. As time “pro- grossed, Miser Scratton’s ambition grew in proportion to his gains, and he determined to widen the scene of his operations. - It was not long before he did so, While on a business visit to London—and Scratton made no visits to any person or place but be had some sort of business in vietw— chance had thrown in his way a miserable, poverty-atricken knave, yet a cunning one withal, whom, Nature, in her wickedest mocd, seemed to have fashioned, as she fashions other reptiles, to do secret and noxious work ina dark and, crawling wie seb ths very inctrainent Unt Baalal Wieation OR A WOMAN'S SAKE, wanted—a poor rogue, on his last legs, wanting some richer rogue asa putron. — : be A bond was entered into—a plan of action laid down; and, as master and man, they worked Tom Tidler’s ground together. To catch flies, the spider requires a web; and the web that Miser~Scratton. fabricated. was of the simplest character; but once within its meshes, the victim found himself, or herself, held as with bonds of iron, ‘ An office consisting of three rooms, in the borough of Southwark, was first selected, judiciously situated next door to one of those antiquated old inns, where farmers frequenting the markets still love to congregate; the rest of the scheme was accomplished by the following advertisement, inserted in the leading papers of the London and provincial press : ‘*MONEY ADVANCED to any amount, in town or coun- try, upon all kinds of securities, mortgages, leases, re- versions, portable property of every description, and furniture without removal. The strictest secrecy guaranteed. None but principals treated with. Apply to X. ¥.Z., one door from the ‘Jolly Waggoner,’ High Street, Borough.” What a bait for the needy! A philanthropist, possessed of money which he is ready to advance to any amount, upon any security (so the necessitous read it), and the strictest secrecy guar- anteed. No wonder the flies rushed into the snare— from those whose gaudy wings required a new gilding, to those who only sought the respite of a day, an hour, from the winter, death. Any interest they were ready to pay, any sacrifice they were prepared to make, as long as the world—their world consisted at the most some thirty or forty per- sons—knew flothing of their distress. It was the drowning man or woman frantically fight- ing for a straw, which broke as soon as it was grasped. In the foreground of the picture we have painted was Verulam Gritt, with his ready, cunning, smooth manners, and sharp knowledge of all the crooked paths of the law; but behind him,in the shadow was Miser Seratton, watching everything, directing everything, and briskly pulling the strings. Let us now glance into that innér room, in which the latter personage is busily engaged examining a queer of papers spread out betore him on the able. The small eyes gleam beneath shaggy eyebrows, knit- ted above the long, thin, straight nose, which, together with the sharp projection of the chin, give to the whole visage an unpleasant animal look, cruel and cunning as that of a beast of prey. The man is not old —not very old; but there are crow’s-feet.at the corners | of the eyes, and the stubbly hair, of a sandy red, has al- ready retreated from the temples, The last paper examined, he pushes the heap from him with a laugh, by uo means a ‘pleasant laugh to hear, and rubs his long, bony hands together so vigorously that they seem to crackle like dry ehips. ‘ “What oor thing lifé is! . It’s now twenty-five years since I first knew this Richard Goodeve. He was then a red-cheeked, happy young: fellow, whose only idea of the world was that it was a place made expressly to go birds’-nesting in; and now he has grown up into a moody, vindictive man, nursing all sorts of wrongs, real and imaginary, and brooding over schemes of re- taliation and vengeance. It’s not always well to begin life too happily. Look at me! I began mine in a work- house, and I’ve risen pretty well, considering.” He stretched out his hand, and took up'a paper that lay near him. - % ee -“ The day after to-morrow Sir Hugh Willoughby pays the remainder of the Oakwoods’, purchase money.” Here he ground out an oath between his teeth, and struck the paper with his other hand, as though he was smiting the face of a foe. _ . _-“IfLeould see him buried beneath the land he has purchased, and his wiie s pride humbled to the dust, I would savrifice every farthing of the money, Miser Seratton as I’m cdlied. It’s now fiiteen years since Sir th Hugh, speaking from the hustings, threatened to horse- whip me for some observations I had made. He did horsewhip me, too, and lost his election by it, that’s some comfort. We've shaken . long ago, and transacted business; but if Sir Hugh Willoughby knew my feelings towards him and his,he would sooner have grasped tlie most venomous of snakes than have touch- ed mine in friendship. For years and years I have cast about me how to pay my debt to him, and at last chance offers me. the means.” ea ees are Cag ‘Ser'tton’s face darkened more and more, and the long, lithe fingers, stealing up to the face, tore at tho re turf of beard savayely, as though it Were no longer a part of himself, but belonged to an enemy, » \ «« Work-house born, and charity bred—vagabon 1 by birth, and‘ rogue by inclination !’—tiose were the words he used fifteen years ago; and, when I resented ‘them by some truths about himself, he lashed me with his riding-whip, in the Gatford mar