TWO FAIR DECEIVERS.
What do young men talk about when they sit at the open windows smoking on summer evenings? Do you suppose it is of love? Indeed, I suspect it is of money; or, if not of money, then, at least, of something that either makes money or spends it.
Cleve Sullivan has been spending his for four years in Europe, and he has just been telling his friend John Selden how he spent it. John has spent his in New York—he is inclined to think just as profitably. Both stories conclude in the same way.
"I have not a thousand dollars left, John."
"Nor I, Cleve."
"I thought your cousin died two years ago; surely you have not spent all the old gentleman's money already?"
"I only got $20,000; I owed half of it."
"Only $20,000! What did he do with it?"
"Gave it to his wife. He married a beauty about a year after you went away, died in a few months afterward, and left her his whole fortune. I had no claim on him. He educated me, gave me a profession, and $20,000. That was very well: he was only my mother's cousin."