gunwagner in prison.
He could look now upon Herbert Randolph and say to himself, truthfully, “I had the ability to succeed as well as you have and to be as much respected as you now are. My advantages, too, were superior to yours, and yet here am I a prisoner in the House of Correction, deprived of my liberty and in disgrace, while you have already entered upon a splendid business career. And all this difference comes from my having made a wrong start.”
Alas! how many human wrecks scattered all along the pathway of life could say the same thing, as they compare their present wretched condition with that of the prosperous and honored citizens—the solid men of the community—who were once their schoolfellows, and whose early career was perhaps less promising than their own. And all this difference, or nearly all, has grown naturally out of the right or wrong start they took in life.
Peter Smartweed alone among the conspirators remains to be accounted for, and this is something that the police could not do. They made a careful search throughout the city for him, but his presence could not be discovered. It was believed that, fearing arrest, he had suddenly left his home and the city in which he had spent his life, when he learned of the fate of Felix Mortimer, his companion in crime.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
A GLIMPSE AT THE FUTURE.
It has not seemed to me desirable to dwell upon Mr. Goldwin’s business affairs—to show the legal squabbles that followed his failure, or to picture in detail the trickery of Breakwell & Co. My aim has been to introduce only what bore directly upon the career of Herbert Randolph. I will say, however, that the banker’s failure did not leave him penniless, as young Randolph feared it might. He was badly crippled at first, but certain securities turned over to him by Breakwell & Co., which at the time of the failure possessed but little market value, began at the end of a few months to advance rapidly. When they had reached a point at which it seemed to him advisable to sell he closed them out at a price that enabled him to pay off all his obligations without drawing upon his personal property for a penny. He was, therefore, still a wealthy man, and was not forced to reduce his style of living in the slightest degree.
With this simple statement I leave the past to record a conversation in which the reader will catch a glimpse of the future, in so far as it relates to some of those who have been most conspicuous in this story.