His Heart's Queen

by Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

"It's all gone!—hic—every—dollar we had in the world, and, Belle, we're—hic—beggars!"

"What do you mean, Will?" his wife demanded, with a sinking heart and white face.

"Are you deaf?" he bawled, with another oath. "We're—hic—beggars, I tell—hic—you. I've just—hic—rattled away the hic—last dollar."

There was a scene then, as might be expected, for Mrs. Mencke was not a woman to tamely submit to such wrong and abuse, and the thought that the whole of her own, as well as Violet's fortune, had been squandered at the gaming-table and the race-track was more than she could bear. She could talk as few women can talk, and when she had ceased her denunciations, Wilhelm Mencke was completely sobered, and sat pale and sullen and cowed before her.

She did not realize how exceedingly bitter and stinging her denunciations were until the next morning, when, upon rising, she found the jewel-box, in which she kept the jewelry which she commonly wore (her diamonds and more valuable gems being locked in a trunk, fortunately) together with all that Violet had possessed, was rifled of its contents and her husband gone, together with his traveling-bag and a change of clothes.

The desertion of her husband was the most humiliating of all her troubles; but her proud spirit would not yield to even this blow. She calmly stated that her husband had been suddenly called home and that she was to follow him by the next steamer.

Fortunately she had considerable money with her, and she settled every bill with a grave front, and finally took her departure from the hotel with as much pomp and state as she had maintained throughout her sojourn there.

A week from the day of her husband's flight she was crossing the Atlantic alone, and immediately upon reaching New York proceeded to Cincinnati in the hope of saving something by the sale of her house and furniture. The house had already been disposed of, though she learned that not much had been realized on it, for it had been heavily mortgaged and the sale was a forced one.

This fact told her that her husband was in America, although no one had seen him, for the sale had been made through an agent, and she tried to feel thankful that he had had the grace to leave her the furniture. This she turned into money, but it did not bring her a third of its real value, for she was forced to sacrifice it at auction.

Where now was the proud woman's boasted wealth and position? Where now her vaunted superiority over the "low-born carpenter" because of his poverty?